THE FRENCH GENERALS OF VICTORY 1942–1945

The French Army was severely defeated in 1940. Reduced by the armistice conventions to a strength of 100,000 men in metropolitan France and a few tens of thousands in the colonies, General Weygand, Delegate-General of the government in Algiers, nonetheless managed to bring the Army of Africa up to 227,000 men.

Having been reinforced by General de Gaulle's Forces Françaises Libres and equipped with new materiel by the United States, the reconstituted French Army resumed its victorious struggle against the Axis alongside the Allies — first in Tunisia in 1942, then in Italy in 1943, and finally in France in 1944 and Germany in 1945.

This volume presents the biographies of thirty-seven French generals who played a major role during the Liberation campaigns. Among them are leading figures such as Juin and de Lattre, iconic personalities of Free France such as Leclerc, Koenig and Larminat, as well as a number of lesser-known generals whose contribution to the final victory was nonetheless significant.

Illustrated with more than 300 photographs — often previously unpublished — drawn from private collections and public archives (American ones in particular), this book sheds new light on the battles fought by the French Army from 1942 onwards.

A Doctor of History and historian, François de Lannoy is the author of numerous works and articles on the Second World War. He has already published with ETAI, in this same series, Les maréchaux du Reich, Les généraux américains 1943–1945 and, in collaboration with Max Schiavon, Les généraux français de 1940.

Max Schiavon, Doctor of History, headed research at the Service historique de la Défense. A specialist in contemporary military history and the author of numerous works and articles, he has recently published Le front d'Orient 1915–1918 (Tallandier), Le général Salan, défenseur de l'Empire (ETAI), Les combats héroïques du capitaine Manhès et La guerre du Rif 1925–1926 (Pierre de Taillac) and Mussolini, un dictateur en guerre (Perrin).