The military history of France during World War II covers the period from 1939 until 1940, which witnessed French military participation under the French Third Republic, and the period from 1940 until 1944, which was marked by mainland and overseas military administration and influence struggles for the French colonies (under the command of Admiral François Darlan) between Vichy France, the Free French Forces under General Charles de Gaulle (London) and the Army of Africa under General Henri Giraud (French Algeria). In August 1943, the de Gaulle and Giraud forces merged in a single chain of command subordinated to Anglo-American leadership, meanwhile opposing French forces on the Eastern Front were subordinated to Soviet or German leaderships. This in-exile French force together with the French Forces of the Interior (FFI) played a variable-scale role in the eventual liberation of France by the Western Allies and the defeat of Vichy France, Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, and the Japanese empire. Vichy France fought for control over the French overseas empire with the Free French forces, which were aided by Britain and the U.S. By 1943, all of the colonies, except for Indochina, had joined the Free French cause.France and Britain declared war on Germany when it invaded Poland in September 1939. After the Phoney War from 1939 to 1940, with very little fighting, the Germans invaded and defeated France and forced the British off the continent. France formally surrendered to Germany and Italy—who invaded late in the campaign—on 25 June 1940, and a collaborationist government, the French State, was established. De Gaulle did not recognise the Vichy government and on 18 June 1940, as an answer to Pétain's own June 17 appeal to "cease the fight" and to obey him on the French national radio, Charles de Gaulle gave a memorable speech to the French people on BBC Radio from London, telling the French people they had lost the battle but not the war.The number of Free French troops grew with Allied success in North Africa and subsequent rallying of the Army of Africa which pursued the fight against the Axis fighting in many campaigns and eventually invading Italy, occupied France and Germany from 1944 to 1945. On 23 October 1944, Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union officially recognized de Gaulle's regime as the Provisional Government of the French Republic (GPRF) which replaced the in-exile Vichy French State (its governement having fled to Sigmarigen in western Germany) and preceded the Fourth Republic (1946).Recruitment in liberated France led to enlargements of the French armies. By the end of the war in Europe in May 1945, France had 1,250,000 troops, 10 divisions of which were fighting in Germany. An expeditionary corps was created to liberate French Indochina then occupied by the Japanese. During the course of the war, French military losses totaled 212,000 dead, of which 92,000 were killed through the end of the campaign of 1940, 58,000 from 1940 to 1945 in other campaigns, 24,000 lost while serving in the French resistance, and a further 38,000 lost while serving with the German Army (including 32,000 "malgré-nous").Among aspects of French military history in the war were limited French participation in the invasion of Normandy of June 1944 (the French commandos of 1er Bataillon de Fusiliers Marins Commandos under Major Philippe Kieffer) and the presence of French SS among the defenders of Berlin in May 1945 (33rd SS Division commanded by Hauptsturmführer Henri Fenet).
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