Pétain, Laval and the armistice of Compiègne, June 1940

Philippe Pétain looks down with lowered eyes, and a dark-haired man with a moustache, apparently Pierre Laval, sits at a table covered with papers. In a clearing Adolf Hitler stands in uniform on a gravel path and walks with raised arm past a relief of a falling eagle between the dates 1914 and 1918; a railway carriage stands in the clearing. German officers escort a French general and civilians into the panelled carriage; the monument is hung with the German war flag, a statue of Foch stands among the trees, and a man in uniform signs a document. The Compiègne scenes are German newsreel footage.

On 17 June 1940 Pétain, head of government since the previous day, asked for an armistice. Hitler had it signed near Compiègne in the carriage in which Germany had accepted the armistice of November 1918. General Keitel and General Huntziger signed on 22 June.