Operation Grasp

Attack on Mers El Kébir
Part of the Battle of the Mediterranean during the Second World War
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°W / 35.71944; -0.68889Coordinates: 35°43′10″N 0°41′20″W / 35.71944°N 0.68889°W / 35.71944; -0.68889 Result British victory
Belligerents
United Kingdom	France
Commanders and leaders
James Somerville Dudley Pound	Marcel-Bruno Gensoul François Darlan
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

The Attack on Mers-el-Kébir (3 July 1940) also known as the Battle of Mers-el-Kébir, was part of Operation Catapult. The operation was a British naval attack on French Navy ships at the base at Mers El Kébir on the coast of French Algeria. The bombardment killed 1,297 French servicemen, sank a battleship and damaged five ships, for a British loss of five aircraft shot down and two crewmen killed.

The combined air-and-sea attack was conducted by the Royal Navy after the Second Armistice at Compiègne between Germany and France on 22 June. The only continental ally of Britain had been replaced by a government administered from Vichy, which inherited the French navy (Marine nationale). Of particular significance to the British were the seven battleships of the Bretagne, Dunkerque and Richelieu classes, the second largest force of capital ships in Europe after the Royal Navy. The British War Cabinet feared already that France would hand the ships to the Kriegsmarine, giving the Axis an advantage in the Battle of the Atlantic. Admiral François Darlan, commander of the French Navy, promised the British that the fleet would remain under French control but Winston Churchill and the War Cabinet judged that the fleet was too powerful to risk an Axis take-over.

After the attack at Mers-el-Kébir and the Battle of Dakar, French aircraft raided Gibraltar and the Vichy government severed diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom. The attack created much rancour between France and Britain but also demonstrated to the world that Britain intended to fight on. The attack is controversial and the motives of the British are debated. In 1979, P. M. H. Bell wrote that "The times were desperate; invasion seemed imminent; and the British government simply could not afford to risk the Germans seizing control of the French fleet... The predominant British motive was thus dire necessity and self-preservation".

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Wikipedia