The Middle East and WW2: France divided and Britain in a tricky position

So far, the history of the Middle East has been a complicated story of Britain and France trying to out-manoeuvre each other whilst at the same time out-manoeuvring the Arabs and, in Britain’s case, the Jews too. Couldn’t get more complicated? Of course it could. In WW2, the same complications are there to be seen but now Britain is dealing with two Frances: Vichy France, the third of France that had some autonomy from the Germans so long as they collaborated with them; and Free France led by General Charles de Gaulle, from London mostly. And Free France, desperate though its position was, was as much at odds with the British as pre-war France had been. And the war, the need for oil, what Germany might or might not do and what a post-war world would look like needs to be added to the mix. A complicated story is going to get much more complicated.