Hello, and thank you for listening to the history of World War II podcast, episode 378,

West Africa, and Charles DeGau.

Before we get into Operation Pedestal, which will leave Malta barely hanging on, we have

to catch up with events in Africa.

The North African campaign has been told through Operation Crusader, which was in December

of 1941.

But West Africa has been neglected.

Thus we will cover DeGau's work in West Africa, and then cover North Africa for the first

half of 1942, and then on to Pedestal, why to clear the way for the return to the Eastern

Front.

On with the story.

When War came, as Poland was invaded, the British and French worked out pretty quickly amongst

themselves that while the British vessels would handle the German warships in the Atlantic

in North Sea, the French fleet would counter the Italian fleet in the Mediterranean.

But six weeks after Germany invaded the West, France was out of the war.

But what about her powerful fleet?

That was a question that had to be addressed, but another important question was, how

would the various parts of the French Empire fall to Vichy or the Free French, represented

by General Charles DeGau?

For example, some colonies like Cameroon and French Equatorial Africa went to DeGau

while the North African colonies, I.e. Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, went to Vichy.

But what would dictate DeGau's next move was that the French West African countries,

...