Operation Catapult

Attack on Mers El Kébir

Part of the Battle of the Mediterranean of World War II

Battleship Strasbourg under fire.

Date

3 July 1940

Location

Off Mers El Kébir, French Algeria, North Africa
35°43′10″N 0°41′20″W / 35.71944°N 0.68889°WCoordinates: 35°43′10″N 0°41′20″W / 35.71944°N 0.68889°W

Result

British victory

Disabling of the French flotilla of Mers-el-Kébir

Belligerents

United Kingdom

Vichy France

Commanders and leaders

Strength

1 aircraft carrier
2 battleships
1 battlecruiser
2 light cruisers
11 destroyers

4 battleships
5 destroyers
1 seaplane tender

Casualties and losses

6 aircraft destroyed
2 dead

1 battleship sunk
2 battleships damaged
3 destroyers damaged
1 destroyer grounded
1 tugboat destroyed
1,297 dead
350 wounded

British victory

The Attack on Mers-el-Kébir, part of Operation Catapult and also known as the Battle of Mers-el-Kébir, was a British naval bombardment of the French Navy (Marine nationale) at its base at Mers El Kébir on the coast of French Algeria on 3 July 1940. The raid resulted in the deaths of 1,297 French servicemen, the sinking of a battleship and the damaging of five other ships.

The combined air-and-sea attack was conducted by the Royal Navy in response to the Second Armistice at Compiègne between Germany and France on 22 June, which had seen Britain's sole continental ally replaced by a collaborationist government administrated from Vichy. The new Vichy government had also inherited the considerable French naval force of the Marine Nationale; of particular significance were the seven battleships of the Bretagne, Dunkerque and Richelieu classes, which was the second largest force of capital ships in Europe after the Royal Navy. Since Vichy, which was created on July 10th 1940, one week after the attack, was seen by the British as a mere puppet state of the Nazi regime, there was serious fear that they would surrender or loan the ships to the Kriegsmarine, which could undo British naval superiority by giving the Axis an advantage in the Battle of the Atlantic. Admiral François Darlan, Commander of the French Navy promised that the fleet would remain under French control and out of the hands of the Germans.Winston Churchill, still reeling from Dunkirk and stung by the Vichy French collaboration, determined that the fleet was too dangerous to remain intact, French sovereignty notwithstanding.

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Wikipedia