He smiled.
Yes, he thought. Things are about to get very interesting here. Now the war in the West has truly been reborn.
On the Allied side of these deliberations, Eisenhower had attempted to arrange a secret meeting between Admiral Darlan and General Mark Clark in northern Spain to discuss the possibility of signing an armistice with France and ending hostilities between French and Allied forces. He was rebuffed in the beginning, but when Hitler ordered “Case Anton,” the German plan to send the 7th Army into Vichy controlled France, Darlan began to see things differently. Marshall Petain protested the buildup of German forces, but to no avail. It was clear that the Germans were planning to move substantial forces south, possibly all the way into French North Africa, and they wanted to take hold of any French military assets by the earlobes there before they slipped away.
So the meeting was finally set up, with Clark taking to an American submarine and slipping ashore with a team of US Army Rangers near the rocky headlands of the small Spanish port of Henday. A three mile hike through the mountains would take them to a small farm overlooking the port. Darlan made discrete arrangements to inspect the frontier defenses on the Spanish border, and submitted a false travel itinerary that would have him begin his tour at Lourds in Southern France. Instead he continued on the train to Henday, and so the town where Hitler once negotiated to gain Franco’s cooperation for Operation Felix would now become the site where Clark would attempt to wrest both Spain and France from the Führer’s hands.
Darlan was High Commissioner of the colonies, and nominal commander in chief of all French North African forces. The ground for this meeting had been tilled for many months, so Darlan had been considering his options for a good long while. The two men met, shook hands cordially, and seated themselves at a small kitchen table in the quiet farmhouse. The edgy US Rangers stood watch, along with a small detachment of five security men that accompanied Darlan.
“Admiral,” said Clark, “This meeting has been a long time coming, and let us hope we can reach an accord here. I will restate the offer communicated to you earlier, and begin by saying that it has the approval of both the President of the United States, and Prime Minister Churchill. We are prepared to accept you as head of a new provisional government overseeing all French held territories in North Africa.”
“That is big of you, Mon General, because you see I presently hold that position.” Darlan smiled.
“Well Admiral… That could soon change. If, however, you would like to keep your present job, we would demand that you issue an immediate order for all French Forces in North Africa to join the Allies, or, at the very least, they must cease resistance and stand neutral while we go after the Germans.”
Darlan took a long breath. “You realize the Germans are moving troops to Tunisia even as we speak? They have withdrawn forces from southern Morocco and occupied Fez.”
“We’re well aware of that.”
“Well General, those troops are presently operating with our own troops. Do you realize the difficulty such an order would create?”
“Of course I do. In fact, we’re counting on it.”
“And if I found such an order too preposterous to contemplate?”
“Then your forces will continue to be treated as a hostile, and dealt with accordingly. We would prefer to avoid that, and as you undoubtedly know, Admiral Michelier and General’s Lascroux and Martin have already agreed with similar proposals put to them on the field of battle, and at Casablanca ,our General Patton faced down the entire German 327th Infantry Division.”
“A pity that division was withdrawn to Fez and Melkenes before the issue could be decided,” said Darlan. “I have no doubt that the untimely withdrawal of the Germans in that sector contributed greatly to the decision to yield Casablanca, and General Martin was too fond of his villa at Marrakech to see that city torn apart by fighting. But you must understand that the Germans intend to stay in Morocco, and they are obviously very intent on securing Algeria and Tunisia as well. The outcome of all these events is very much in doubt. If I were to act prematurely…”
“If you were to act too late,” Clark cut in, “then it might be difficult for us to guarantee that your position in North Africa could be upheld. I don’t have to tell you that your General De Gaulle would be more than happy to take over there.”
“He is not my General, and as far as I am concerned he will never command so much as a single platoon here.”
“Then you need to act. There is no time for equivocation. I need to go back with a firm answer in hand.”
Darlan thought a moment, knowing he had the authority to do what this man was asking him, even though Petain would most likely attempt to rescind any order he gave. Beyond that, there were mixed loyalties within his remaining divisions. Some regiments were nationalists, and would fight on, others cared little for the war that had finally come to their shores, and would willingly see any armistice as a means of extricating themselves from it.
“If I give this order,” he explained, “you must realize that I cannot entirely guarantee that the troops in the field will obey.”
“Well they certainly won’t have any chance to make that choice if you don’t give the order.”
Darlan had been firmly in the camp of the collaborators, and was uncertain of the consequences for his past actions. “You would also guarantee that I would be granted personal immunity?”
“That was in the offer you received, and yes, we can guarantee that no charges would be brought against you personally, or any member of your staff. All we want is the speedy resolution of French participation as active combatants here. You are the one man who can do this, Admiral. Do not miss this opportunity.”
Darlan nodded heavily. “Very well, General Clark, you may tell your superiors that I will issue such an order, for good or for ill, and expect the troops under my command to follow it. Whether they do so, with the Germans holding a bayonet to their backs, remains in doubt, but you will at least have my cooperation.”
Clark got what he came for, and now he could make that 3 mile hike again and take to the rubber rafts for another ride on a submarine out to Madeira. Darlan had acted as the opportunist he was, fearful that the outcome of the battle then underway would leave him in a fatally compromised position if he continued to lead his forces here in open arms against the Allies. He gave General Clark his word that his order would be transmitted no later than the 1st of October, three days hence.
But he would not live that long.
Unbeknownst to either of the two men that day, another player had entered the scene, with an agenda that neither man saw coming. It might have been Himmler, who was privy to the secret conversations Darlan had exchanged with Churchill—but it wasn’t his doing that day. It might have been a young dissident student named Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle, the man who would assassinate Darlan on Christmas eve of that very year in Fedorov’s history, but it wasn’t his to decide either.
No, the man in charge of these events would be the same who had first oiled the hinge of fate at Henday when Hitler last visited this sleepy coastal fishing port—a simple railway engineer named Juan Alfonso. He had stopped a leak in the roof of a train car, and that had been the balm that led to the unexpected accord when Hitler concluded his negations with Franco’s Spain. This time he was at work, as usual, greasing a squeaky wheel on the train that would soon take Darlan back to his next appointment on the inspection tour.