Battle of Dakar

The Battle of Dakar, known in Britain as Operation Menace, was the first large joint operation of the British and the Free French, and also the first engagement in which Frenchmen fired on Frenchmen on a large scale. On the morning of 23 September 1940 a British squadron with an aircraft carrier and two battleships appeared off Dakar, the capital of French West Africa, accompanied by ships carrying the troops of General Charles de Gaulle. It was expected that a show of force would be enough and that the garrison and the colonial authorities would go over to Free France, as Chad, Cameroon and the Congo had done in August. The Governor-General, Pierre Boisson, refused, and for three days the coastal batteries, the battleship Richelieu, submarines and Vichy fighters put up a resistance the British had not anticipated. On 25 September, after the battleship Resolution had been torpedoed, the expedition was called off. For de Gaulle it was the most painful defeat of the first year of the war; for the Vichy government, proof that it could defend its empire.

Name and dates

English-language literature speaks of the Battle of Dakar or of Operation Menace; French literature of the battle, the expedition or the “affair” of Dakar (bataille, expédition, affaire de Dakar). Some accounts describe it under the heading Operation Menace. The battle is taken to begin at dawn on 23 September 1940, when the squadron appeared off the port and de Gaulle called on Dakar by radio to join Free France, and to end on 25 September, when in the afternoon the British and French ships sailed south to Freetown. The fighting thus lasted three full days, with pauses forced by fog, and was very intense, especially on 24 and 25 September. The clashes at sea with French cruisers a few days earlier are not counted as part of the battle, nor are the Vichy air force’s retaliatory raids on Gibraltar on 24 and 25 September, which were its direct consequence.

Background

Dakar and the Vichy empire

Under the armistice of 22 June 1940 France kept its fleet and its colonies. The government of Marshal Philippe Pétain, who on 10 July was granted full powers at Vichy, regarded the intact empire as its main asset in dealing with Germany. In London General de Gaulle, the leader since his appeal of 18 June of those who wanted to fight on, needed territory, men and money. On 2 August a military court at Clermont-Ferrand sentenced him to death in absentia. At the end of August Cameroon, Chad, Middle Congo and Ubangi-Shari rallied to him without a shot being fired. North Africa and West Africa remained with Pétain.

Dakar was the most valuable place in French Africa on the Atlantic. It had a well-equipped naval base with a large dry dock, an airfield and powerful coastal batteries, and it lay on the shortest route between Europe and South America. The British, whose only base in West Africa was the poorly equipped Freetown in Sierra Leone, feared that the Germans might one day set up a U-boat base at Dakar. Further inland in West Africa, at Thiès and Kayes, there was also gold: the reserves of the Banque de France shipped out of Brest and Lorient in June, and the gold of Belgium and Poland that had earlier been entrusted to France.

At Dakar lay the Richelieu, the most modern French battleship, which on 18 June, still unfinished, had escaped from Brest ahead of the Germans. During Operation Catapult the British tried to put her out of action. On 8 July aircraft from the carrier Hermes hit her in the stern with a torpedo, and the ship could no longer put to sea, but her guns could still fire from the harbour. After Mers-el-Kébir the French sailors at Dakar hated the British more than ever, and the Vichy government removed from West Africa officers and officials considered Anglophile. At the end of June Pierre Boisson, until then Governor-General of French Equatorial Africa and a veteran of the First World War in which he had lost a leg, became High Commissioner for French Africa, based at Dakar. He was Pétain’s man and declared that he would defend the territory entrusted to him against anyone who attacked it: the Germans, the British or the Gaullists. The naval commander at Dakar was Rear Admiral Marcel Landriau, and the commander of the ground forces in West Africa was General Jean Barrau.

The Menace plan

The idea came from de Gaulle. Originally he wanted to land a small column at Conakry in French Guinea and march on Dakar overland, gathering up the garrisons along the way. Winston Churchill, who accepted the plan at the beginning of August, considered such a march too slow and too risky: the Royal Navy could not keep powerful ships off the coast of Africa for long while invasion threatened at home. He pushed through a direct strike at Dakar. The political premise, however, remained de Gaulle’s: the French at Dakar, on seeing their compatriots and a mighty fleet, would go over to Free France without a fight. The British were to come into action only if persuasion failed, and even then the main role on land was to be played by the French.

The naval force under Vice-Admiral John Cunningham (not to be confused with Admiral Andrew Cunningham, commander of the Mediterranean Fleet) consisted of the aircraft carrier Ark Royal; two old battleships, Barham, torpedoed by U-30 in December 1939, and Resolution; three heavy cruisers, Cumberland, Devonshire and the Australian Australia; two light cruisers and a dozen or so destroyers. The Free French had three sloops (Savorgnan de Brazza, Commandant Duboc and Commandant Dominé) and several smaller vessels. The ground forces under Major-General Noel Irwin comprised Royal Marines brigades, some 4,000 men in four battalions, and about 2,500 Free French, including a battalion of the 13th Demi-Brigade of the Foreign Legion. They were carried by the Dutch liners Westernland (with de Gaulle and his staff) and Pennland, British transports and the Polish Sobieski, which carried one of the Royal Marines battalions. With de Gaulle was a British liaison officer, General Edward Spears. The convoys left Britain at the end of August and assembled at Freetown on 17 September.

The preparations were full of indiscretions. In Liverpool and London French officers were said to have talked openly about Dakar, and de Gaulle to have ordered tropical uniforms. How far Vichy actually learned of the plan from these leaks is unclear. Later accusations of betraying the secret, levelled among others at Admiral Émile Muselier, proved groundless.

Force Y

The real blow came from another quarter. After the loss of Equatorial Africa the Vichy government, with the consent of the German armistice commission, sent Rear Admiral Célestin Bourragué’s Force Y out of Toulon on 9 September: three modern light cruisers of the La Galissonnière class, Georges Leygues, Montcalm and Gloire, and three large destroyers of the Le Fantasque class. Their task was to recover the equatorial colonies for Vichy. On 11 September the force passed unhindered through the Strait of Gibraltar. The French had notified the British naval attaché in Madrid of the voyage in advance, but the message, passed on without urgency, prompted no timely reaction. By the time London sent ships in pursuit, the French had put in at Casablanca, and on 14 September they reached Dakar. The Admiralty blamed the commander at Gibraltar, Admiral Dudley North, and soon relieved him, which became the source of a dispute lasting many years.

The arrival of Force Y at Dakar changed the balance of forces. In London on 16 September the War Cabinet was inclined to cancel the operation and divert the expedition to Douala, but de Gaulle and the commanders on the spot argued that the plan was still feasible, and Churchill agreed. When on 18 September the cruisers sailed south from Dakar towards Libreville, they were intercepted on 19 September by Australia and Cumberland, while a second group with the cruiser Primauguet and a tanker was intercepted by other British ships. Under threat of action the French agreed to turn back. Gloire, with engine trouble, sailed under escort to Casablanca, but Georges Leygues and Montcalm slipped away from their shadowing ships during the night and returned to Dakar. When the battle began four days later, the port was defended by two more modern cruisers than had been assumed. Vichy recalled Bourragué for failing to carry out his task.

Dakar also had powerful coastal batteries: 240 mm guns on the island of Gorée, at Cap Manuel and at Bel Air, several 155 mm and 138 mm guns and anti-aircraft artillery, as well as two squadrons of Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters at Ouakam airfield and a few bombers. In the harbour lay the Richelieu, four destroyers, sloops, auxiliary cruisers and three Redoutable-class submarines.

Course of the battle

23 September

The squadron arrived off Dakar at dawn on 23 September in thick fog, which clung to the coast for most of the day and meant that the whole intended show of force simply could not be seen from the shore. At around 6 a.m. de Gaulle addressed the soldiers, sailors and inhabitants by radio, calling on them to join Free France. Aircraft from Ark Royal dropped leaflets on the city. Two French Caudron Luciole light aircraft took off from the carrier carrying officers who were to win over the airmen at Ouakam to de Gaulle’s side. They landed, but after a moment’s hesitation they were arrested. According to several accounts one of them was carrying a list of de Gaulle’s supporters in the city, whom Vichy immediately detained. Captain Claude Hettier de Boislambert, sent to West Africa to prepare a coup, was already in prison.

De Gaulle then sent two motor launches into the harbour with officers who were to hand Boisson a letter. They were led by Lieutenant Commander Georges Thierry d’Argenlieu, in civilian life a Carmelite friar. The port authorities refused to parley and threatened arrest. As the boats pulled away they were raked with machine-gun fire, and d’Argenlieu and another officer were wounded. From that moment it was clear that Dakar would not go over to Free France peacefully.

At around 10 a.m. the batteries opened fire, first on the Free French sloops, which had come close to the port in the fog, and then on the British ships. When Vichy warships tried to leave harbour, Australia fired warning shots. Before noon the British returned fire, and an artillery duel began, interrupted by the fog. A heavy shell from a 240 mm battery hit Cumberland’s engine room, killing seven men. The cruiser withdrew from the action and went for repairs to Bathurst in the Gambia. The submarine Persée, which had left harbour to attack the British ships, was detected and fired on by the cruiser Dragon and the destroyers Inglefield and Foresight. The crew, all but one sailor, abandoned the sinking boat. Both destroyers were later hit by fire from the shore, and four men were killed on Foresight.

In the afternoon de Gaulle made a second attempt: a Free French landing at Rufisque, a small port a dozen or so kilometres east of Dakar, from where the troops were to advance on the city overland. First the sloops entered the harbour with troops on board. The large destroyer L’Audacieux came out of Dakar to meet them. Fired on by Australia and the destroyers, she burst into flames and was beached. About 80 of her crew were killed, more than a quarter of all the Vichy French dead in the battle. At Rufisque the Commandant Duboc came under fire from batteries and machine guns, and a shell that struck her bridge killed three sailors. Vichy aircraft appeared over the bay, both cruisers of Force Y came out of Dakar into the roads, and the fog and a breakdown in communications between de Gaulle and Cunningham disrupted the operation. In the evening de Gaulle called off the landing. He later explained that he had not wanted to shed “French blood by French hands”.

24 September

During the night Cunningham, on behalf of the British government, delivered an ultimatum to Boisson: if he did not hand Dakar over to de Gaulle by 6 a.m., the fleet would attack. The text accused the colonial authorities of intending to surrender the port to the Germans, which was taken at Dakar as an insult. Boisson replied that France had entrusted Dakar to him and that he would defend it to the end. From that moment the initiative passed to the British, and de Gaulle was left in the role of an onlooker.

On the morning of 24 September, with visibility still poor and under a smokescreen laid by French destroyers, Ark Royal sent Blackburn Skua dive-bombers and Swordfish torpedo bombers against the Richelieu. The battleship suffered near misses at most, while the aircraft ran into anti-aircraft fire and the Curtiss fighters from Ouakam. In the morning and afternoon raids the British lost several aircraft together with their crews. Meanwhile the destroyer Fortune detected the submerged submarine Ajax as she was closing on Barham. After a depth-charge attack Ajax surfaced and was scuttled by her own crew, whom the British took prisoner.

The battleships twice bombarded the port and the batteries, in the morning and again in the afternoon. The Richelieu returned fire, but a barrel burst in one of her main guns, putting a turret out of action and limiting her part in the duel. The British probably managed to hit the battleship with one or two 15-inch (381 mm) shells, which did her no serious damage. British gunnery was inaccurate, because the ships were firing at long range, in fog and smoke, often at targets they could not see. Many shells fell on the port and the town. Civilians were killed, houses were destroyed, and in the harbour the Danish freighter Tacoma, interned by the French, burned out. Barham also took several hits from the batteries, which did her little harm. In the afternoon Cunningham drew the squadron off beyond the range of the coastal guns.

That evening, at de Gaulle’s and Cunningham’s headquarters, abandoning the operation was considered. From London, however, came Churchill’s instruction to see the matter through. The Prime Minister hoped that another day of bombardment would break the defenders’ will.

25 September

On the morning of 25 September the squadron returned to the previous day’s positions, in markedly better visibility. Waiting for it there was a third submarine, Bévéziers under Lieutenant Commander Pierre Lancelot, which had left harbour on 23 September and had been cruising at sea for two days, anticipating that the British would come back to the same spot. Shortly after 9 a.m. she fired a spread of four torpedoes at Resolution. One struck her side. The battleship took on a heavy list, part of her boiler rooms flooded, and her speed fell to a few knots. At almost the same time the Richelieu, which had brought her second turret into action during the night, resumed firing, and Barham suffered further damage. Two shells hit Australia, whose Walrus seaplane was shot down over the port together with its three-man crew.

With one battleship badly damaged, the other and two cruisers hit, and the enemy batteries intact, Cunningham decided, in agreement with de Gaulle, to break off the operation. London approved the same day. The squadron sailed away to Freetown. Barham towed Resolution for part of the way; repairs to the latter lasted, with interruptions, until 1942, largely at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. The ground forces, which had never gone ashore, returned to Freetown, and some of the Royal Marines went back to Britain in October.

Losses

The figures vary from source to source. On the Vichy side, according to tallies cited by naval historians, about a hundred soldiers and sailors were killed and more than 180 wounded (other calculations give 92 military dead). The largest number, about 80, died on the destroyer L’Audacieux, which ran aground and, although later refloated, never returned to service. The submarines Persée and Ajax were sunk and the Richelieu damaged. In the town, according to Jürgen Rohwer’s figures, 84 civilians were killed and 197 wounded. Tallies based on the French colonial archives (ANOM), covering both military personnel and civilians, give a total of nearly 200 dead and more than 500 wounded.

British losses in men were markedly lower. The Royal Navy’s casualty lists record seven dead on Cumberland in those days (one wounded man died later) and four on Foresight, to which must be added the airmen of the aircraft shot down and the sailors of the damaged ships. Tallies of aircraft lost range from six to nine, mostly Swordfish. Resolution was badly damaged, and Barham, Cumberland and Australia more lightly. The Free French lost several killed, mainly on the Commandant Duboc, and several airmen taken prisoner.

Significance

Militarily the battle was a defeat for the Royal Navy: two battleships, an aircraft carrier and three heavy cruisers failed over three days to silence the batteries or to put out of action an unfinished battleship lying in harbour. It turned out that ships firing at long range, in fog and without observation, were unable to destroy strongly defended coastal fortifications, and that an amphibious operation against a determined enemy required entirely different preparation and equipment from what was available in 1940. Some of these lessons were applied two years later in the landings in North Africa.

The political consequences were greater. The assumption on which the whole plan rested – that the French in the colonies would go over to de Gaulle as soon as they saw his troops – proved false wherever the authorities and the military remained loyal to Pétain and the memory of Mers-el-Kébir was fresh. The press in Britain and the United States sharply criticised the expedition, and the blame was laid chiefly on de Gaulle, even though it was Churchill who had pushed through the direct attack on Dakar. The French general went through days of deep despondency. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt developed a lasting mistrust of him and his entourage. Churchill, however, defended de Gaulle publicly and did not withdraw his support. Free France recovered a month later: in October de Gaulle arrived in Douala; on 27 October, in Brazzaville, he challenged the legitimacy of the Vichy regime; and in the Battle of Gabon his forces took the last colony of Equatorial Africa still loyal to Vichy.

For Vichy the defence of Dakar was a great propaganda success – after Mers-el-Kébir, further proof of “English perfidy” – and at the same time an argument to show the Germans that France could defend its empire by itself and effectively. On 24 and 25 September the Vichy air force retaliated with raids on Gibraltar, heavier than the one of 18 July. Some historians believe that Dakar also influenced Hitler’s policy towards Spain, convincing him that Vichy was a more reliable partner than Francisco Franco, whose demands concerned precisely the French possessions in Africa. In October 1940 Hitler met Franco at Hendaye and Pétain at Montoire, and Spain did not enter the war.

French West Africa remained with Vichy for more than two years. The gold that the British and de Gaulle had hoped to recover stayed in Vichy’s hands. The Belgian gold was carried across the Sahara in 1941 and 1942 and handed over to the Germans; the Polish gold survived in Africa and was returned to the Polish government-in-exile only in 1944. Only after the Allied landings in North Africa in November 1942 did Boisson bring Dakar over to the Allied side, and the Richelieu, after a refit in the United States, fought against the Germans and the Japanese. Boisson, removed by de Gaulle in 1943, was imprisoned and died in 1948 before he could be tried. Dakar remained in French memory as a symbol of fratricidal war, which in the following years was repeated in Gabon, Syria and Lebanon, Madagascar and North Africa.