0:19

German and Italian forces in North

0:22

Africa knew that an offensive

0:24

from Montgomery's Eighth Army in Egypt

0:26

was coming, but

0:29

a whole other offensive force was

0:31

gathering at Gibraltar. The

0:33

Axis side did not yet realize it, but

0:36

the situation in North Africa was

0:38

about to change dramatically. Welcome

0:43

to the history of the 20th century. Episode

1:12

378, The End of the

1:15

Beginning. Two

1:27

episodes ago, I ended the narrative on October

1:29

23, 1942, just as the Second Battle of

1:34

El Alamein was about to begin. That

1:38

was ten weeks after Bernard Montgomery was

1:40

put in command of the Eighth Army,

1:43

a long wait to be sure, especially

1:45

considering how impatient the Prime Minister

1:47

was to see the British Army

1:50

go on the offensive. Fortunately

1:53

for Montgomery, he had an ally in

1:55

his superior, General Harold Alexander, head of

1:57

the Middle East Command, who defended

2:00

him when the Prime Minister

2:02

expressed doubt. Montgomery

2:05

put the time to good use. He

2:08

spent some of it meeting with his

2:10

soldiers, which helped boost morale in the

2:12

battered 8th Army. New

2:14

tanks, trucks, ammunition, and supplies

2:16

were arriving every week, so

2:19

time was most assuredly on

2:21

the British side. The

2:25

Axis forces were in trouble, and they knew

2:27

it. Axis aircraft

2:29

flew regular reconnaissance over the

2:31

British lines, and they

2:33

saw for themselves how the British

2:35

were getting more of everything. More

2:38

soldiers, more tanks, more lorries, more

2:40

fuel, more ammunition. Supply

2:42

to the Axis side had to

2:44

be trucked over that long, long

2:46

road from Tripoli, and the

2:49

trucks ate up most of the fuel

2:51

they carried before they arrived. You

2:53

can understand why Rommel was

2:55

constantly complaining. By

2:57

late October, after six weeks

2:59

of shipments, the Axis

3:02

front line still had only two

3:04

days worth of fuel and sixteen

3:06

days worth of ammunition. The

3:10

German and Italian forces at El Alamein

3:12

were not going to be able to

3:15

outfight the enemy. With so

3:17

little fuel, they certainly weren't going to

3:19

outmaneuver them. Their only

3:21

hope was Rommel's plan, to

3:24

trap the British in what he

3:26

called the Devil's Gardens, the spaces

3:28

between the minefields, and

3:30

destroy them with artillery and

3:32

anti-tank guns. On

3:36

the other side of the line, Bernard

3:38

Montgomery was not about to do anything

3:40

as plodding and predictable as that. The

3:44

Axis commanders knew a British attack

3:46

was coming, and Montgomery knew that

3:48

they knew. The front

3:50

line was so narrow, there weren't many options

3:52

for the focus of the offensive. The

3:55

only terrain that had any real military

3:57

value was the strip along the coast.

4:00

where ran a road and a railroad

4:02

track. So that was the

4:04

obvious place for the Germans and Italians to

4:06

keep their eyes on. So,

4:11

in the weeks leading up to

4:13

the battle, Montgomery put a strong

4:15

emphasis on misdirection. The

4:18

British parked their supply trucks near the

4:20

front line and their tanks

4:22

to the rear. Obviously, they

4:24

would want their tanks up front when

4:26

they began their offensive, so Axis commanders

4:28

assumed they were safe for the time

4:31

being. What they didn't

4:33

know was that at night, when the

4:35

reconnaissance planes were on the ground, the

4:38

British were gradually swapping the trucks

4:40

and the tanks. Tanks

4:42

parked near the front line were camouflaged

4:44

to look like trucks from the air.

4:47

Trucks parked in the rear were camouflaged to

4:49

look like tanks from the air. Supply

4:53

dumps were also stacked and camouflaged

4:55

to look like trucks. The

4:57

British covered their rubbish dumps with

5:00

camouflage netting. The Axis side

5:02

figured that was a trick and ignored them, but

5:05

then the British would gradually remove the

5:07

empty crates and the rubbish dump by

5:09

night and replace them with

5:11

full crates of ammunition. Perhaps

5:15

the cleverest bit of misdirection

5:18

was the construction of a water

5:20

pipeline from Alexandria to the front.

5:23

The reasons why the British might want to

5:25

build a water pipeline to their desert position

5:28

were obvious, but it was

5:30

a ruse. The pipeline

5:32

was fake, meant to lull

5:34

the enemy into complacency, and

5:36

the project was timed so that

5:38

the quote-unquote pipeline would

5:40

not quite be finished when the

5:43

offensive began. The

5:45

British used similar tricks to make it look

5:47

as if the offensive, when it came, would

5:49

be at the southern end of the line,

5:52

while actually preparing the attack for the

5:54

northern end of the line. 23rd,

6:00

as soon as the sun set, British,

6:03

Australian, South African, and

6:05

New Zealander infantry began

6:08

quietly advancing into the German

6:10

minefield. Understand

6:13

that these were anti-tank mines. The

6:16

footfall of a single soldier would not

6:18

be enough to detonate them, hence

6:20

the codename Operation Lightfoot. Soldiers

6:24

probed the ground with their bayonets, identifying

6:27

and removing the mines, then marking

6:29

a pathway for the tanks. Two

6:33

hours later, under a full moon,

6:36

the British attack began. The

6:39

first thing Axis soldiers noticed was

6:41

the horizon to the east flickering,

6:43

like a distant thunderstorm. 1000

6:47

artillery guns opened fire on the

6:49

German positions, timed so that

6:51

the shells would land up and down

6:53

the 60-kilometer axis front line at the

6:56

same time. When

6:58

bombers struck the Axis rear, the

7:01

German commander Georg Stuma, mindful of

7:03

how little ammunition he had, ordered

7:07

Axis artillery not to respond.

7:12

Just before midnight, the infantry began

7:14

to advance down the cleared corridors.

7:17

The Scottish Highland Division marched

7:19

with bagpipes scurrying, a

7:22

long-standing custom of the Highlanders. There's

7:25

nothing more terrifying than a squad of

7:27

bagpipers headed straight for you. But

7:31

Rommel had planted an exceptionally

7:33

deep minefield. The Allies

7:35

did not realize this, and unfortunately for

7:38

them, dawn came before they had worked

7:40

all the way through. Allied

7:43

artillery and air units pounded the Axis

7:45

positions, keeping them pinned down while the

7:48

infantry worked in haste to clear the

7:50

last of the mines. Rommel

7:53

Stuma took a car to the front line

7:56

to assess the situation for himself, as

7:58

they made a stop along the way. Along the way,

8:01

the car came under fire while

8:03

Stoma was outside. He

8:05

jumped onto the running board, and the car

8:07

raced for safety. But

8:09

a few minutes later, the driver realized

8:11

Stoma was no longer there. They

8:14

found his body later, lying by the side

8:16

of the road. Dead,

8:18

but unwounded. Apparently,

8:21

the excitement had been too much for him,

8:23

and he'd had a heart attack. When

8:27

news of the British offensive and Stoma's

8:30

death made it to the Wolfslayer, Hitler

8:32

ordered Rommel to cut short his

8:35

R&R in Germany. Rommel

8:37

rushed back to North Africa, stopping

8:39

in Rome only long enough to

8:41

complain once again to the Italian

8:43

Supreme Command that their supply deliveries

8:46

were inadequate. He

8:48

arrived at the front on the evening of

8:51

the 25th, two days into the battle. Rommel

8:54

correctly guessed the British were trying to

8:56

break through at the northern end of

8:58

the line and ordered it reinforced. The

9:02

British had by this time opened lanes

9:04

through the minefield, but were stymied

9:06

by the Axis defense. The

9:08

heavy Allied air and artillery bombardments

9:10

had taken it serious toll on

9:13

Axis soldiers and machines, especially at

9:15

that northern end of the front.

9:18

One particularly useful Allied weapon

9:20

was the American P-39 fighter,

9:23

a little plane that didn't have much altitude

9:26

and didn't have much range, and the British

9:28

didn't think much of it. But

9:30

what it did have was a 37mm

9:33

cannon that fired straight through the

9:35

propeller hub, making it easy for

9:37

the pilot to aim, and

9:39

the cannon was devastating to Axis

9:42

vehicles. The

9:45

British went into this battle with a

9:47

nearly 2 to 1 advantage in numbers

9:49

of tanks, and that ratio was growing

9:52

by the hour. Still,

9:54

they were struggling to break through that

9:56

Axis front line. Axis

9:59

planes found the British truck convoy bringing

10:01

in ammunition and fuel and destroyed

10:03

it, the fires burned for a

10:06

night and a day. With

10:09

the offensive seeming to go nowhere,

10:11

one of Montgomery's subordinates advised calling

10:13

it off, but Montgomery

10:15

refused. In London,

10:18

in the Cabinet war rooms

10:20

underneath Whitehall, Winston Churchill

10:22

wondered aloud why it was so hard

10:25

to find a general who could, you

10:27

know, win a battle. The

10:32

fighting continued for days under

10:34

miserable conditions. To

10:36

the desert heat and the ever-present

10:38

flies was added the heat

10:40

from burning wrecks that dotted the front

10:43

lines and the stench

10:45

of decomposing bodies. Four

10:48

Italian tankers and one freighter

10:50

attempting to bring fuel and

10:52

ammunition to Tobruk were identified

10:54

and sunk by the RAF

10:57

thanks to information provided by

10:59

Enigma decrypts, which also told

11:01

Montgomery that the Germans were down to 80

11:04

operational tanks and the Italians 200 while

11:06

he had more than 800. As the

11:14

fighting at El Alamein raged

11:16

on inconclusively, the

11:18

opposite end of the Mediterranean was

11:20

thick with intrigue. On

11:23

October 27th, the British submarine

11:26

HMS Serif left Gibraltar

11:28

for the French coast to pluck

11:30

Henri Giraud from the custody of

11:32

the Vichy government and bring him

11:34

to the rock. Giraud

11:37

didn't want to have anything to do with

11:39

the British. He insisted an

11:41

American submarine should pick him up. The

11:44

trouble with that idea was the US

11:47

Navy had no submarines in the Mediterranean.

11:50

So HMS Serif, commanded by

11:52

Royal Navy Lieutenant Norman Jewell,

11:55

temporarily became USS Serif,

11:57

commanded by US Navy

12:00

Captain Gerald Wright, and

12:02

flew a U.S. flag so

12:05

as not to offend the general's

12:07

delicate sensibilities. The

12:09

submarine's British sailors got into the spirit of

12:11

the thing, affecting American

12:13

accents with varying degrees

12:15

of success. I

12:18

wonder how many other times in naval

12:21

history a warship was under

12:23

the command of two different officers from

12:25

two different navies. The

12:28

serif was ordered to patrol the French

12:30

coast until it received instructions on where

12:33

and when to pick up the French

12:35

general and escape artist. The

12:37

submarine waited six days. On

12:42

November 2nd, Rommel reported to Hitler that

12:44

his army was on the verge of

12:46

destruction. Hitler cabled

12:49

back, ordering him, quote, to

12:51

stand fast, yield not

12:53

a meter of ground, and

12:56

throw every gun and every man into

12:58

the battle. By

13:02

the time Rommel received Hitler's reply,

13:04

he had already begun a retreat.

13:08

Rommel ordered the foot soldiers, mostly

13:10

Italian units, to hold

13:12

the line while what remained of

13:15

the panzer units and motorized units,

13:17

which were mostly German, withdrew. Some

13:20

German soldiers commandeered Italian trucks at

13:23

gunpoint to use in their own

13:25

escape, leaving the Italians

13:28

stranded. News

13:31

of Rommel's retreat order reached the Wolf's

13:33

Lair just after midnight on November 3rd.

13:37

But the duty officer did not immediately

13:39

take this news to Hitler. Instead,

13:41

he put it into the stack of

13:43

reports for the 9am review. Hitler

13:47

was beside himself. He

13:49

concluded that the OKW had deliberately

13:51

withheld the news to give Rommel

13:53

more time to execute his retreat.

13:56

Hitler called in the duty officer,

13:58

a major, and threatened to

14:00

execute him, although the Fuhrer

14:03

settled for busting him down to private.

14:08

In Gibraltar, General Giraud met

14:10

with General Eisenhower and General

14:12

Clark. Eisenhower

14:14

asked Giraud to assume command of

14:16

French forces in North Africa after

14:18

the Americans landed, and then

14:21

order the French troops to stand down. Afterward,

14:24

Giraud would effectively be military

14:26

governor of French North Africa,

14:29

at least until the liberation of France.

14:33

Giraud was offended by the offer.

14:36

He'd expected to be put in

14:38

command of the entire operation torch.

14:41

In other words, he wanted Eisenhower's job.

14:44

Eisenhower wouldn't agree to that. He

14:47

had no authority to agree to that.

14:50

The irritated Giraud announced that in

14:52

that case, he would

14:54

remain a spectator on the sidelines,

14:56

as he put it. Happily,

15:00

the following day he relented

15:02

and agreed to cooperate with

15:04

Eisenhower. In

15:08

Egypt, the Axis forces were in

15:10

full retreat, the Allied forces

15:12

in full pursuit. On

15:15

November 7, the Eighth Army

15:17

reached Mersa-Mertru. On

15:19

the 9th, Sidi Barrani. On

15:21

the 11th, it crossed the border into

15:23

Libya. Much of

15:25

Rommel's army escaped, though the British did take

15:28

some 40,000 prisoners, most of

15:31

whom were Italian. Both

15:33

sides lost hundreds of tanks and

15:35

artillery guns and dozens of aircraft.

15:38

Those losses amounted to less than half

15:40

what the British had started with, but

15:43

represented almost all of the Axis

15:45

side's equipment. The

15:50

victory at El Alamein was

15:52

due less to Bernard Montgomery's

15:54

generalship, though his careful planning

15:56

and patient preparation certainly helped,

15:59

than it was was a clear sign that the

16:01

war had reached a tipping point. El

16:05

Alamein can be thought of as the

16:07

first World War's Western Front in miniature.

16:10

Like the Western Front, both sides had

16:13

sufficient units to cover the entire front,

16:15

making maneuver impossible and forcing a

16:18

war of attrition. What

16:20

made this battle different was that although

16:22

the British side had a steady stream

16:25

of equipment and ammunition flowing to it,

16:27

the Germans did not. In

16:30

the last war, the Germans had had

16:32

railroads that could bring their ammunition virtually

16:34

from the factory floor straight to the

16:37

trenches. No such luck this

16:39

time. The

16:42

Royal Artillery and the RAF

16:44

pummeled the Italians and Germans,

16:46

while the Axis side lacked the ammunition

16:49

to answer in kind. The

16:51

RAF also blocked the meager flow

16:54

of Axis supplies by ship from

16:56

Italy with a crucial assist

16:58

from the Wizards at Bletchley Park,

17:01

who were now reading Enigma

17:03

messages routinely. After

17:06

the war, when Churchill wrote its

17:08

history, he remarked of this battle,

17:12

It may almost be said, before

17:14

Alamein we never had a victory,

17:18

after Alamein we never had

17:20

a defeat. But

17:23

I prefer the assessment of the battle he

17:25

made on November 10th, as the

17:27

Eighth Army was approaching the Libyan border. In

17:30

a speech at the Lord Mayor's Banquet in

17:32

the City of London, he described the

17:34

victory and summarized it this way. This

17:38

is not the end. This

17:40

is not even the beginning of the

17:42

end. But it is, perhaps,

17:46

the end of the beginning. I

18:34

want to take a brief diversion here and

18:36

open up a new topic, the

18:39

Jewish population of France and

18:41

of the French colonial possessions around

18:43

the Mediterranean, because this is about

18:46

to become important to our narrative.

18:49

First, metropolitan France. When

18:53

France fell in 1940, they were just shy of 350,000

18:55

Jewish people living in France, the

18:59

majority of them in Paris. A

19:02

substantial portion of this total

19:04

were from Germany or Austria

19:06

or Czechoslovakia originally. They

19:08

had fled Nazi persecution and turned

19:11

to France for refuge. Longtime

19:13

listeners know that France is a country

19:16

with its own sorry history of anti-Semitism,

19:18

and if you don't believe me, check

19:20

out episode 8. Nevertheless,

19:23

Nazi Germany's record was far

19:25

worse. I doubt

19:27

that any of these Jewish refugees

19:29

ever imagined that France would soon

19:31

be defeated, and they would

19:34

be under German jurisdiction once again. The

19:37

armistice of 1940 divided France

19:39

into a zone of German

19:41

occupation and unoccupied

19:44

France, which called itself the

19:46

French state, ruled by

19:48

Marshal Pétain from the city of

19:50

Vichy. When

19:53

occupied France, the Germans set to

19:55

work at once, identifying which members

19:58

of the population under their jurisdiction

20:00

were Jewish, with an

20:02

assist from French police, who, under

20:04

the terms of the armistice,

20:07

were obligated to take orders from

20:09

the German occupation authorities. The

20:12

Germans began to expropriate Jewish

20:14

property, and arrest and

20:16

in turn individual Jewish people just

20:18

weeks after the occupation was established.

20:22

Other people identified as Jewish

20:24

in occupied France were forced

20:26

to wear yellow stars for

20:28

easy identification, as was

20:30

the case throughout German occupied

20:32

Western Europe. In

20:36

1941, the Germans in occupied

20:38

France began to round up

20:41

Jewish people en masse, beginning

20:43

with the refugees. In

20:46

1942, the Germans began shipping

20:48

Jewish people to Eastern Europe

20:50

as part of Operation Reinhard.

20:53

The official story was that all Jewish

20:55

people were being relocated to begin their

20:58

lives in a new homeland. Nazi

21:01

propaganda emphasized how happy they

21:03

would be in this Eastern

21:05

European wonderland. Most

21:07

sensible people discounted these claims and

21:09

assumed relocation wasn't going to be

21:11

all that pleasant for the people

21:14

being relocated. Still

21:16

few guessed the awful truth that

21:19

these people were being sent off to

21:21

be murdered wholesale. What

21:25

about unoccupied France? Jewish

21:29

people were better off there, but

21:31

only relatively speaking. In

21:33

addition to those native to the

21:36

region, large numbers of Jewish people

21:38

from occupied France fled into the

21:40

unoccupied zone. Also,

21:42

German authorities ruling the territories

21:44

of Alsace and Lorraine, which

21:46

the Germans now administered in

21:48

what amounted to de facto

21:50

annexation, expelled their

21:53

Jewish population into unoccupied

21:55

France. They gave

21:57

no notice or advance warning, either to

21:59

the the deportees themselves or to the

22:02

government in Vichy, which put

22:04

them into internment camps on their

22:06

arrival. The

22:10

armistice terms did not permit Germany

22:12

to dictate domestic policy to the

22:14

French government in Vichy. Nevertheless,

22:17

the Vichy government of its own

22:19

accord began replicating Germany's

22:22

anti-Semitic laws in France.

22:25

In October 1940, the Vichy

22:27

government enacted new laws regarding

22:29

its Jewish population. The

22:32

first defined who was Jewish,

22:34

mirroring the definition in Germany's

22:36

Nuremberg Laws, and

22:38

barred Jewish people from certain professions,

22:40

including law, teaching,

22:42

filmmaking, and journalism.

22:46

The second required all Jewish foreigners

22:48

to be confined to internment camps.

22:52

Later, Jewish refugees from occupied

22:54

France and the people expelled

22:56

from Alsace-Lorraine were also

22:59

put into internment camps. A

23:02

third law devised in 1941

23:04

required a census of all

23:06

Jewish people in unoccupied France,

23:09

as the Germans had already done

23:11

in occupied France. Bear

23:14

in mind that the chief of the

23:16

French state, Philippe Pétain, ruled

23:19

France by decree, so

23:21

these laws were essentially his

23:23

personal declarations. France

23:26

had been divided into its

23:28

secular Republican left and its

23:30

Catholic extremist monarchist right since

23:33

the revolution, and Jewish

23:35

people in France had always been stuck in the

23:37

middle. Revolutionary

23:39

France had been the first country in

23:42

Europe to recognize equal rights for its

23:44

Jewish citizens, while the right

23:46

tended to think of the French Jewish

23:48

population as aliens, and

23:51

the Vichy government was the apotheosis

23:53

of the French right. Defenders

23:57

of the Vichy government point out

24:00

it did not force Jewish people to

24:02

wear yellow stars, as the Germans did

24:04

in occupied France, nor

24:06

did it bar Jewish people

24:08

from public venues, such as

24:10

theaters, libraries, schools, or sports

24:12

facilities, as they did in

24:14

Germany, nor did they

24:16

require Jewish people to adopt distinctively

24:19

Jewish names. But

24:21

then, Pétain had less than three years

24:23

in power. What would he have

24:25

done if he'd had more time? As

24:30

for the French colonial possessions, well,

24:33

there had been Jewish communities

24:35

in Syria, Lebanon, and North

24:37

Africa since ancient times. In

24:41

Syria and Lebanon, the tensions in

24:43

Palestine led to violence against Jews

24:45

in those two countries, with the

24:47

notable exception of the city of

24:50

Beirut, which remained relatively safe. This

24:53

violence, in turn, led to large

24:55

numbers of people migrating to Palestine.

25:00

French North Africa had a Jewish population

25:02

of about 100,000 at this time, most

25:05

of whom lived in the city of

25:07

Algiers. France

25:09

seized control of Algeria in

25:11

1830, but it

25:13

did not extend French citizenship

25:15

to the indigenous population. In

25:19

1870, during the Franco-Prussian War,

25:22

the Provisional Government of National

25:24

Defense issued a decree extending

25:27

French citizenship to Jewish Algerians,

25:30

who were described as indigenous Israelites

25:32

in the text of the decree.

25:35

Muslim Algerians remained second-class

25:37

citizens in their own

25:39

country. As

25:42

you could imagine, this led to

25:45

tension between the Jewish and Muslim

25:47

communities in Algeria. It

25:49

also led to Jewish Algerians tending

25:52

to identify with the French and

25:54

embracing French language and culture. Then

25:58

came 1940, rule

26:00

from Vichy. Along

26:02

with its other anti-Semitic legislation, the

26:04

Vichy government rescinded that 1870 decree

26:06

stripping the Jewish community in Algeria

26:11

of their French citizenship, returning

26:14

them to the status of second-class citizens

26:16

in their own country. Vichy

26:21

anti-Semitism prompted the formation

26:23

of a largely Jewish underground

26:25

resistance movement in Algiers and

26:28

armed force who trained and

26:30

stockpiled weapons. Representatives

26:33

of the resistance were among those

26:35

who met with US Consul Robert

26:38

Murphy in October. The

27:28

French government in Vichy and

27:30

the UK's relationship with it, and

27:33

they would have been likely to cite

27:35

two disturbing truths. That

27:37

the Vichy government allowed the Germans and

27:40

Italians to base aircraft in Syria to

27:42

aid the Iraqi coup. And

27:45

that the Japanese planes that sank

27:47

HMS Prince of Wales and Repulse

27:50

had been based on airfields in

27:52

French Indochina. The

27:56

Italian Navy and the German Luftwaffe made sure that the German army was

27:58

not shipping through the

28:01

Mediterranean risky. So as

28:03

you know, the British were supplying

28:05

Montgomery's 8th Army from ships that

28:07

took the long way around Africa.

28:10

Ships traveling to India also went

28:12

around Africa. And

28:15

once those ships cleared the Cape of

28:17

Good Hope and circled into the Indian

28:19

Ocean, they passed by

28:22

the large island of Madagascar, also

28:24

controlled by the French government at

28:27

Vichy. It

28:29

doesn't take much imagination to

28:31

picture German or Japanese aircraft

28:33

flying from that island to

28:36

threaten this delicate but vital

28:38

British supply route, nor

28:40

to envision Japanese warships or

28:43

submarines using Madagascar as a

28:45

base. As

28:47

early as December 1941, some in the British Admiralty were

28:52

urging a preemptive occupation of

28:54

Madagascar. Charles

28:57

de Gaulle brought up the possibility of

28:59

a free French operation to take control

29:01

of the island. But

29:05

this was during that awful period

29:07

when the Japanese were advancing everywhere

29:09

and seemed unstoppable. Winston

29:11

Churchill vetoed any action against

29:14

Madagascar. Britain had bigger

29:16

fish to fry. General

29:19

Wavell, head of ABDACOM in the

29:21

Southwest Pacific, agreed with him, at

29:24

least until March 1942. At

29:28

the same time, representatives of the

29:30

Kriegsmarine had been meeting with the

29:32

Japanese to discuss ways in

29:35

which the German and Japanese navies could

29:37

work together against the British. In

29:40

March 1942, the German side

29:42

proposed the Japanese move forces

29:44

into the Western Indian Ocean.

29:47

The Japanese side floated the

29:49

possibility of stationing submarines and

29:52

perhaps a few surface raiders

29:54

at Madagascar in order

29:56

to attack British shipping between South

29:58

Africa and Aden. or India. The

30:03

Americans were reading Japanese naval codes by

30:05

this time, so when the

30:08

naval attaché updated Tokyo on these

30:10

discussions, Washington learned all

30:12

about them and shared that intelligence

30:14

with London. The British

30:17

decided it was time to go

30:19

ahead with the invasion of Madagascar,

30:22

codenamed Operation Ironclad.

30:27

After the South African Air Force

30:29

flew reconnaissance over the island, a

30:32

Royal Navy task force led

30:34

by the battleship HMS Ramelies,

30:36

and including the carriers HMS

30:39

Illustrious and Indomitable, escorted

30:41

three brigades of soldiers who executed

30:43

an amphibious landing at the port

30:45

city of Diego Suarez on the

30:47

northern tip of the island on

30:50

May 5th. The

30:52

landing force was able to seize the

30:54

port and the town without much difficulty.

30:57

You should note, this was the

30:59

first British amphibious invasion since Gallipoli

31:01

in 1915. That

31:06

got the British control of Madagascar's

31:08

most important port, but of course

31:10

it's a big island, and it

31:12

has a lot of other ports,

31:15

and the French forces on the island, mostly

31:18

Malagasy colonial soldiers, were

31:20

not about to give up. In

31:23

Vichy, Admiral Darlan issued orders to

31:26

the French governor to fight the

31:28

British to the bitter end. The

31:31

French government sent a plea

31:33

for assistance to Japan. The

31:36

Japanese responded by deploying three

31:38

submarines. One of the

31:40

submarines launched a midget submarine that

31:42

penetrated the harbor at Diego Suarez

31:45

and torpedoed Ramelies and a British

31:47

oil tanker, seriously damaging

31:50

both ships. It

31:53

took six months of on

31:56

and off fighting and multiple

31:58

assaults on Madagascar's ports, The

32:00

British took the capital to Nana Reeve,

32:03

but the French governor, Armand

32:05

Arnay, escaped and

32:07

continued to fight a guerrilla campaign

32:09

from the island's lush tropical forests.

32:13

Arnay eventually agreed to an armistice

32:15

on November 6th. It

32:18

has been noted that French forces

32:20

on Madagascar resisted the British, longer

32:23

than French forces in France had

32:26

resisted the Germans. The

32:31

French were forced to take the capital

32:33

to Nana Reeve, but

32:36

the French were forced to take

32:39

the capital to Nana Reeve. Adolf

33:00

Hitler loved his anniversaries. He

33:07

gave a speech every New Year's Day,

33:09

for example, and on every

33:11

January 30th, the anniversary of the day he

33:14

was first appointed chancellor, but

33:19

the most important date on the Nazi holiday

33:21

calendar was November 8th, the anniversary of the

33:23

1923 putsch. Every

33:29

year he traveled to Munich to give a speech

33:31

to the Old Fighters, as he called them, the

33:35

party members who had marched with him

33:37

in his failed quest to seize control

33:39

of the government of Bavaria. On

33:44

the afternoon of the 7th, Hitler

33:46

boarded his train for Munich. He

33:49

and his military leaders had seen reports

33:51

that large numbers of British and American

33:53

ships had massed at Gibraltar and then

33:55

sailed into the Mediterranean. The smart bet

33:58

was that the German troops had been

34:00

was that they were escorting a convoy

34:02

headed for Malta. Hitler

34:04

himself was too focused on the

34:07

crucial offensive to take Stalingrad and

34:10

on his upcoming speech to

34:12

give the matter much thought. That

34:15

night along the way Hitler's

34:18

train was stopped in Turingia so a

34:20

message could be delivered to the Fuhrer

34:22

from the foreign office. A

34:25

naval force of British and American ships

34:28

numbering over 300, making it

34:31

one of the largest forces ever assembled

34:33

in naval history, had entered

34:35

the Mediterranean and was headed for

34:37

the coast of French North Africa.

34:41

Hitler understood the significance of this

34:43

at once. The Western

34:45

Allies had chosen to invade North

34:47

Africa rather than Europe and

34:50

the Wehrmacht was completely unprepared for

34:52

the move. Everything

34:55

they had was either in Western

34:57

Europe or in Egypt or

34:59

in Russia. So he

35:01

began to rant about Göring and the

35:03

Luftwaffe. Why had they not

35:05

developed the long-range bombers which Germany could

35:07

now be using to destroy the invaders

35:10

at sea? Foreign

35:12

Minister Ribbentrop proposed to put out

35:15

diplomatic feelers to the Soviet Union

35:17

to see if a diplomatic settlement of

35:19

the war in the east was feasible.

35:24

Hitler rejected Ribbentrop's proposal.

35:26

He ordered OKW

35:28

chief Alfred Yodel to pull together

35:30

everything the Wehrmacht could spare and

35:33

ready them to be sent to Tunisia. His

35:36

biggest concern was the French and

35:39

whether they could be trusted to stay

35:41

the course as he put it. He

35:43

wondered aloud whether he should have made

35:45

more concessions to the French so that

35:47

they would have a greater incentive to

35:49

remain loyal to Germany. In

35:53

North Africa, Robert Murphy was

35:56

sitting by the radio listening to

35:58

the French language broadcast of

36:00

the BBC Overseas Service. At

36:03

midnight, he heard the

36:05

announcer read out this brief, cryptic

36:08

message. Hello,

36:10

Robert. Franklin is coming.

36:14

Robert referred to him, Robert

36:17

Murphy. Franklin was

36:19

FDR. The message

36:21

meant that American soldiers would

36:23

hit the beaches the following

36:25

morning. We'll

36:30

have to stop there for today. I thank

36:34

you for listening, and I'd

36:36

especially like to thank Gaston, Sergio,

36:38

and Moritz for their kind donations.

36:41

Quite the international effort there, guys.

36:43

I appreciate it. And

36:45

thank you to Nathan for becoming a

36:47

patron of the podcast. Donors

36:50

and patrons like Gaston and Sergio

36:52

and Moritz and Nathan help cover

36:54

the costs of making this show,

36:57

which in turn keeps the podcast

36:59

available free for everyone always. So

37:01

my thanks to them and

37:03

to all of you who have pitched in and helped

37:05

out. If you'd like to become

37:08

a patron or make a donation, you are most

37:10

welcome. Just visit the

37:12

website, historyofthe20thcentury.com, and

37:14

click on the PayPal or Patreon buttons.

37:18

And as always, the podcast website

37:20

also contains notes about the music

37:23

used on the podcast, which is

37:25

sometimes my own work, sometimes licensed,

37:27

but usually the music you

37:30

hear here is free and downloadable.

37:32

So if you hear a piece of music

37:34

on the podcast, then you would like to

37:37

know more about it, including the composer, the

37:39

performers, and a link to where you

37:41

could download it. That would be the place

37:43

to go. While you're there, you

37:45

can also leave a comment and let me know

37:48

what you thought about today's show. Mrs.

37:51

History of the 20th Century and I are back from our

37:53

trip to Scotland. We had a very nice time. A

37:56

kind listener in Scotland took us both out

37:58

to dinner. in Glasgow, so

38:00

that was very nice. Thank you for that. Now

38:03

I'm back home and back to work on the podcast,

38:05

and I'm a

38:07

couple weeks further behind, but well, that's

38:09

how it goes. We'll get caught

38:11

up, don't worry. And

38:14

I hope you'll join me next week here on

38:16

the history of the 20th century, as

38:19

U.S. forces join in offensive action

38:21

for the first time in the

38:23

European theater, if not

38:25

quite in Europe. How

38:27

green is my ally! Next

38:30

week, here on

38:33

the history of the 20th century. Oh,

38:37

and one more thing. After

38:39

French forces in Madagascar surrendered

38:41

on November 6th, Winston

38:44

Churchill invited Charles de Gaulle to

38:47

appoint the new free French governor

38:49

of the island. This

38:51

was meant in part to make

38:54

up for Churchill's earlier refusal to

38:56

allow de Gaulle and his free

38:58

French forces to participate in the

39:00

invasion. More

39:02

important though, Operation Torch

39:05

was going to begin two days

39:07

later, and de Gaulle had

39:09

been kept entirely in the dark about

39:11

it. President Roosevelt

39:14

didn't trust him. Also,

39:16

de Gaulle was not a popular

39:18

figure among the French army officers

39:20

in North Africa, not even the

39:22

ones willing to cooperate with the

39:24

Americans. They didn't like

39:27

de Gaulle, who to them was

39:29

a British puppet and a traitor. He

39:32

had already been tried and sentenced

39:34

to death in absentia. No

39:37

doubt Churchill knew exactly how de Gaulle

39:39

was going to react once he knew

39:41

allied soldiers had landed on French soil

39:44

in North Africa without so much as

39:46

a heads up, and

39:48

he was trying to placate the general

39:50

in advance. Thank

40:30

you.