Video: 'Franco-German Armistice: Hitler (1940)' (Note: film of Hitler himself was taken June 21, 1940)

(Saturday, June 22, 1940, 6:50 p.m. Central European Summer Time; during the Battle of France, part of Western Front of the World War II) — The Armistice of 22 June 1940 between Germany and France was signed tonight near Compiègne, France, by officials of Nazi Germany and the French Third Republic.

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The armistice established a German occupation zone in Northern and Western France that encompassed all English Channel and Atlantic Ocean ports and left the remainder “free” to be governed by the French.

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Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler deliberately chose Compiègne Forest as the site to sign the armistice due to its symbolic role as the site of the 1918 Armistice with Germany that signaled the end of World War I with Germany’s surrender.

Video: 'World War II - Blitzkrieg to the Bomb Documentary' (Armistice of 22 June 1940 at 16:58)

The cease-fire went into effect at 00:35 on June 25, 1940, more than two days later, only after another armistice was signed between France and Italy, the main German ally in Europe.