ranoncles said:
This would have major butterfly effects IMO. I don’t know how much military effect it would have had.
Adding the French could well have been the tipping point. The relationship between France and Germany would also change. Most likely, the Germans would not cripple French military power and perhaps even allow them some kind of junior ally status.
I've thought about Vichy becoming a full-fledged ally, on a par with Romania. If it happens, the effect on Britain is life-threatening: it frees Dakar for U-boats.




It opens the South Atlantic & Caribbean in ways Dönitz could scarcely dream of OTL.
What does this do to Coastal Command? Does it mean squadrons of Stirlings in Newfoundland & Bermuda? (I know, this is an old dream of mine.

) Does it mean the U.S. is drawn into the European war, thanks to more U-boat sinkings of U.S. merchants, sooner?
Does it mean Yamamoto accelerates planning for Pearl Harbor? Or gambles, instead, on the Southern Option without it?
Does this mean invasion of Egypt from Vichy Syria?

Closing the Med from Vichy Morocco? The fall of Malta?
ranoncles said:
would America still be welcomed as liberators if they were allied to the English?
Seeing they're freeing France from the
Nazis, I don't see why not.
Grimm Reaper said:
France ends WWII treated as a conquered member of the Axis, no occupation zone in Germany for France
Vichy might be, but that doesn't mean there's not still a Free French government, which
would deserve one. It does mean the U.S. is going to want another figurehead for its Free French leader, presuming FDR & Winston still can't stand
Le Grand Charles.

It does appear Free France would have to be a more equal parnter, tho. That being so, an equal French occupation zone in Germany postwar is likely IMO.
Grimm Reaper said:
possibly French colonies are never returned
With France an active Axis partner, I'd agree. Which means U.S. refuses to turn back Vietnam.

This avoids the 10,000 Day War.


(And butterflies Oliver Stone's career.


It also butterflies
Bolan.

{Which might lead to Joe Copp a lot earlier, tho.

})