GERMAN FORCES INVADE WESTERN EUROPE
The campaign against the Low Countries and France lasts less than six weeks. The Germans concentrate their attack through Luxembourg and the Ardennes Forest near the French city of Sedan. German tanks and infantry burst through the French defensive lines and advance to the coast, trapping the British and French armies in the north. The Allies successfully evacuate over 300,000 troops from Dunkerque (Dunkirk) to Britain, but France is decisively defeated. Paris, the French capital, will fall to the Germans on June 14, 1940. As part of the armistice agreement France signs with Germany on June 22, Germany occupies northern France while southern France remains unoccupied. A new French government (situated in Vichy) declares neutrality in the war, but promises cooperation with Germany.
Hitler visits Paris, 1940
Frenchman weeping as Nazis enter Paris
