Talk:Syria-Lebanon Campaign

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Contents

[edit] Arabs

Was there much support among the Arab population for the Axis? For the Allies? Jztinfinity 03:02, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

There is a book that may help answer part of your question (The Third Reich and the Arab East). Mkpumphrey 17:55, 13 August 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Format

There appears to be a formatting error, with use of firefox, default font, resolution 1024x768, such one of the sections is approximately 1 inch wide.Istand1337 22:23, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Force numbers

I've been giving some thought to the troop numbers in the infobox and I see a problem. It says there were 2,000 Indian troops involved. I reckon that 5th Indian Infantry Brigade fighting with the Free French would have alone accounted for this and more. In addition there was 10th Indian Division on the Euphrates (say another 12,000) plus most of 17 Indian Inf. Brigade in the Duck's Bill area of Syria - say another 4,000. Even allowing for the fact that splitting these units between Britain and India (each brigade had 2 Indian battalions and 1 British one) would account for say 11,000 indians and 5,000 Brits. I can't find any sources on this. Can anybody help? Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 23:07, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and also Habforce which was effectively an enlarged brigade, say 4,000 split 3:1 British:Palestinians. The numbers I'm giving are guesses but the orders of magnitude are in the right ballpark and don't fit with the infobox. Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 23:14, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] only 5,668 men chose to join ... De Gaulle -- is disingenuous

"This left 37,736 Vichy French prisoners of war. But, when given the choice of being repatriated to France or joining the Free French, only 5,668 men chose to join the forces of General Charles De Gaulle. [13]"

Does anyone know the breakdown of the French vs Lebanese/Syrians who choose to join De Gaulle?

The above sentence is disingenuous, possibly unfairly impunes the reputation of the French Vichy forces. If one remembers that the absolute majority of Vichy forces were locals to the area, the fact that most of them chose not to go fight in Europe for France makes a lot more sense. Remember, after the 1000 French dead, there were 6000 left (minus wounded), it's possible that a huge majority of the French chose to fight with De Gaulle, while the Palestinian/Syrian Colonial Troops chose not to.

CraigWyllie (talk) 13:03, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

It is incorrect to state that most of the Vichy forces were local. In fact the Armée du Levant was composed of French troops, colonial troops (Moroccan, Tunisian, Algerian and Senegalese) and Foreign Legion units(who were presumably of mixed nationalities). Besides the Armée du Levant, there were 11 battalions of what were called "Troupes Spéciales": locally recruited troops. However, these were considered to be of dubious loyalty and military value, and, except for some Circassian cavalry units and a few Bedouin companies, they didn't take much part in the fighting. Most of them were deployed to Northern Syria, to defend against an unlikely Turkish invasion.
Only the men of the Armée du Levant were given the choice of repatriating to France or fighting with the Free French. Those who chose to fight with De Gaulle break down into:
French:1046
Foreign legion:692
North-Africans:963
Senegalese:1584, total: 4285
There were also 1048 prisoners captured before the armistice, who were given a choice between spending the rest of the war in a POW camp, and joining the Free French, which somewhat limited their options... Total: 6,333 acording to Buffetaut, Y. ; De l'Irak à la Syrie 1941. In fact, of those who willingly joined the FFL, most were not French. --Raoulduke47 (talk) 23:10, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I see, thank-you. So the word "only" in the sentence I quoted is justified. So how do we prevent someone else from thinking that it's unjustified and possibly POV (like I did). Perhaps we should provide a breakdown? I'll suggest this:
"But, when given the choice of being repatriated to France or joining the Free French, only 1046 French, 692 Foregn legion, and 2547 North-Africans and Senegalese (plus 1048 various others captured earlier) chose to join."
Also I think that the infobox for this whole article is a tad incorrect and/or could show the further breakdown. It currently states that the breakdown of Vichy forces was 8000 French (seems accurate) and "Syrian/Lebanese: 25,000". Counting battalion from the Army_of_the_Levant page and scaling appropriately to get an equal rough final total (which means 1300 per battalion), I think it should be something like this:
French 8000
(hmmm, should we break this out into French and Foreign Legion? Wild guess, 4000 foreign legion, 3000 French)
Colonial (African) 17,000
Syrian/Lebanese: 13,000
So, by showing the breakdown in the infobox, and by giving the breakdown in the actual numbers of each subgroup that chose to join the Free French, and of course referencing where appropriate, we totally avoid appearing POV when using the overall figure and the phrase "only .... chose to join".
I'm not going to make the change just yet myself, as it must be obvious I don't have references for any of this, and as I said I'm making estimates based on the Army_of_the_Levant description, which itself notes that the colonial infantry (French regulars enlisted for overseas service) were brought to full strength by mixing in some colonial troops.
Please let me know what you think and/or if you have any better numbers. Cheers! CraigWyllie (talk) 04:29, 21 May 2008 (UTC)