On July 3, 1940, the Royal Navy killed 1,297 French sailors in under 20 minutes, and the victims were Britain's allies of just weeks earlier. This episode reconstructs the desperate strategic math behind Operation Catapult: France had fallen, the French Navy was the second-largest capital-ship force in Europe, and the British War Cabinet judged Hitler's Article 8 promise and Admiral Darlan's word to scuttle insufficient against the risk that the fleet might fall to the Axis.

We cover the bloodless seizures in Plymouth and Portsmouth, the fatal scuffle aboard the submarine Surcouf, the peaceful negotiation at Alexandria, and the catastrophe at Mers-el-Kebir. Admiral Gensoul refused to receive Captain Holland because of his rank, then sent a truncated summary of the British ultimatum to his government that omitted the option of sailing to the ...