"The Unknown Massacres: Black French Prisoners in 1940" Topic

"Historically speaking, the Holocaust, and the Nazi mass exterminations and atrocities committed in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union between 1939 and 1945 have always received more attention than other crimes that took place during the Second World War. For instance, a long-forgotten fact was the various massacres of African French war prisoners during the German invasion of France in May and June 1940, when German soldiers randomly executed black Tirailleurs Sénégalais. Raffael Scheck, professor of modern history at Colby College, recently wrote on this in Hitler's African Victims: The German Army Massacres of Black French Soldiers in 1940. This book presents an interesting account of these events, and provides a fair analysis of the causes and motivations of the perpetrators.In four detailed chapters, Scheck presents an overview of the massacres of black French Colonial Troops, the number of victims(1,500 to 3,000), as well as the military events that led to them. In order to illuminate the motivations that led the German invaders randomly to murder so many black war prisoners, chapters 2 and 3 give an overall analysis of a problematic that seemed unanswerable in this particular case: why did this happen? Chapter 4 takes a look at the implications of such events, and it integrates those atrocities into the gradual barbarization process of the German Wehrmacht that took place between 1939 and 1945.

In 1940, the French army included more than 100,000 black French soldiers from France's African colonies, mainly Senegal, Mauritania,and Niger. More than 75,000 of them served in France before and during the German invasion; the rest of them served guard duty in the various colonies. As the Wehrmacht panzer divisions swept across France in May-June 1940, some of those black French soldiers (about 40,000 of them), mainly organized in black regiments or mixed units, were engaged in fierce combat against German soldiers. About 10,000 black soldiers were killed, some wounded, and others taken prisoner during the French debacle. Scheck states that between 1,500 to 3,000 black French prisoners of war were massacred throughout the campaign, either during or after combat. Generally speaking, Tirailleurs Sénégalais were treated differently from other war prisoners by the victorious army. The existence of a well-implanted anti-black racism and stereotypes among the German soldiers frequently resulted in the black French troops being separated from other prisoners of war. Fear of coupes-coupes (a hand-to-hand weapon used by the Tirailleurs Sénégalais that German soldiers considered a treacherous weapon), latent desire for revenge because of German losses, or simple racism, resulted in random massacres of black French war prisoners by members of the Wehrmacht…."
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Amicalement
Armand

Hardly 100000, that would be 12 divisions as they' d only be infantry. Pc exageration. I am too lazy to look now at the actual numbers, But the few 1000s unfortunate to be captured, and their white officers, were murdered by nazi fanatics. Some of the north Africans too.
Not undercover news. Long time known.

Hardly 100000, that would be 12 divisions as they' d only be infantry. Pc exageration. I am too lazy to look now at the actual numbers

Well I did look it up, and around 100,000 men in 8 divisions is stated by Paul Gaujac in ‘Les Troupes Coloniales dans la campagne de France'.

From ministry of def.source:
In metro France 1939-40, troupes coloniales
95000 north Africans ( might include Zouaves and chasseurs d.'Afrique, europeans )
50000 others, mostly blacks, " tirailleurs sénégalais"
Up to 17000 casualties. They fought well, lots of professionals and of course few prisoners.
Senegalese mostly 1ere. And 6e DIC.

Their treatment by the Germans goes far, from half overgrown fears of say south of Med treatment by those chaps supposedly started in 1859 in Italy. They sure behaved badly in Germany in 1945. But fought admirably everywhere.

Thanks!.

Amicalement
Armand