Histoire militaire de la France : De 1871 à 1940

After the defeat of 1870, the Third Republic first succeeded to overcome it, in creating a significant colonial empire and carrying out a diplomatic and military recovery which, after forty years, made it possible to win the war of 1914-1918 with the assistance of allies whose role was more and more important. In 1917, the high command understood that the military 20th century was beginning. But when peace returned, it could not overcome the double handicap of the stagnation of the population of an exhausted country and the lack of continuity in the action of transitional governments facing overwhelming difficulties. The Third Republic was unable to take advantage of the victory, hampered by the constraints on foreign policy and by its own contradictions. The slow rise of renunciation and decadence led to disaster in 1940. The French army, which twenty years earlier had lasted four years, collapsed in ten days. Fighting had to stop, and, as in 1870, the regime collapsed under the shock of defeat. The history of the land, sea and air armies thus took root in all political, economic, social and psychological fields and was more than ever blended with the country's successes and misfortunes.