The Free French Forces (Forces Francaises Libres) was the name applied to French citizens who fought overtly, as a military formation, against Germany and the Vichy Government after France fell as a result of the Battle of France. The Free French Forces had its origin in a BBC broadcast of June 18, 1940, by Charles de Gaulle from London to the French people. Commemorated in French history as the "Appeal of June 18," it was a call to French men and women to continue to resist the Nazi occupation. Subsequent broadcasts repeated this call, and De Gaulle, keenly aware of the power of symbols, even fashioned a Free French flag featuring the red Cross of Lorraine superimposed on the white band of the nation's tricolor. As compelling a figure as de Gaulle was, his broadcasts initially drew only some 7,000 volunteers to the Free French Forces. In addition, about 3,600 sailors joined the Free French Navy, which consisted of 50 ships that had been in British-controlled ports or had sailed to such ports at the time of the fall of France. This force operated as an auxiliary to the British Royal Navy.

The Free French Forces received a significant influx of men in fall 1940, when the French colonies of Chad, Cameroon, Moyen-Congo, French Equatorial Africa, and Oubangi-Chari broke with the Vichy Government and joined the Free French. Somewhat later, colonies in New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, and the New Hebrides also joined. French Indochina and the French colonies of Guadeloupe and Martinique in the West Indies remained under Vichy control.

A blow to recruitment came as a result of the Battle of Mers-el-Kebir, a British attack on the French fleet harbored in this Algerian port, in which some 1,297 French sailors were killed. This turned many against the idea of joining the Free French Forces, which collaborated with the British. Nevertheless, de Gaulle carried on, and, in September 1941, he formally created the Comite National Francais (French National Committee), the Free French government in exile. On November 24, 1941, U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt conferred considerable legitimacy on the Comite National Francais by extending Lend-Lease Act policy to it. Free French troops fought in the North African Campaigns and also against Italians in Ethiopia and Eritrea. They also fought Vichy French troops in Syria and Lebanon. . .

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