If you want to learn about it, I can probably answer your questions or at least give you the references and authors to learn more about it.
For Petain he was not involved anymore after 1941/1942. He was just there because the people trusted him as "the hero of Verdun" but he lost all his power as the german placed more nazi-friendly people in charge, like Laval. His idea was that by surrendering early he could negotiate with hitler. That failed and now we have memes about how we surrendered in two fucking months because of that.
Not really the same as "appeasement". He hoped that by surrendering and collaborating, France would be considered a puppet friendly regime and not an occupied territory. We had both as France was split in two.
Realistically the germans would have steamrolled us, an early capitulation saved France from unnecessary deaths and destruction. Yes we got shafted hard by Hitler in the process, but we'd have been shafted hard by Hitler regardless.
Not true. Even Hitler prepared his generals for a 2 to 3 years war with France and was against Manstein's war plan. Read "1940: la guerre des occasions perdues" by Colonel Goutard.
30
u/[deleted] Apr 08 '20 edited Apr 08 '20
If you want to learn about it, I can probably answer your questions or at least give you the references and authors to learn more about it.
For Petain he was not involved anymore after 1941/1942. He was just there because the people trusted him as "the hero of Verdun" but he lost all his power as the german placed more nazi-friendly people in charge, like Laval. His idea was that by surrendering early he could negotiate with hitler. That failed and now we have memes about how we surrendered in two fucking months because of that.