Timeline of the Battle of France

• 2 September: Tensions began to flare with Germany as Britain and France put Germany on notice for the invasion of Poland.
• 3 September: France declared war on Nazi Germany.
• 7 September: French forces engage in light skirmishes with German forces near Saarbrücken.
• 10 September: British forces arrived to reinforce the French.

May 1940

• 3 May: Abwehr Colonel Hans Oster, a secret anti-Nazi, sends a warning to the Dutch Government about the German invasion of France.
• 10 May: At 2:30 Germany's land forces move into Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. Winston Churchill becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
• 11 May: British and French forces move into Belgium and begin a long line of strategic defenses in the center of the country to defend Belgium in an effort to force the Germans to halt their advance.
• 12 May: German General Guderian with his three divisions successfully reach the
  Montherme and Sedan
  in just 24 hours.
• 13 May: The first German forces emerge from the Ardennes on the river Meuse, facing stiff resistance.
• 14 May: German Panzer Corps 15, 44, and 19 face only a small amount of Allied forces and were able to set up bridgeheads. Panzer Corps 15 and 19 break through Allied defenses at Sedan, which allows German forces to bypass the Maginot line.
• 15 May: Germany plans the final push into France, moving all troops and tanks toward Paris and the English Channel coast. The Germans had air superiority and the Maginot line proved to be worthless. The Dutch surrender to the Germans after heavy bombing across Rotterdam.
• 17-18 May: Antwerp and Brussels would fall to Germany; the Allies were forced to retreat to the coastline of France.
• 20 May: General Maxime Weygand replaces General Maurice-Gustave Gamelin as supreme Allied commander due to major losses across France. Winston Churchill ordered preparations of ships and vessels to evacuate British forces from the coast of France. German forces reached the English Channel.
• 21 May: The allied forces tried to counterattack the German forces but were repelled by another advancing German land force near Arras.
• 24 May: The
  Hitler ordered all his forces to halt and not cross the Lens-Bethune-St-Omer-Gravelines line, which allowed Allied forces more time to reach the coast of France
  .
• 25 May: German forces took
  Boulogne as more retreating Allied forces reach Dunkirk
  .
• 26 May: Around 850 British civilian ships and vessels help assisted Allied forces of
  Operation Dynamo code name for the evacuation of British forces from Dunkirk took place. Hitler also ordered his army forces towards Dunkirk to finally destroy the Allies. HMS Curlew was sunk from the air by the Luftwaffe
  .
• 27 May: Allies enter Narvik.
• 28 May: King Leopold of Belgium had ordered his army to surrender to the German forces, which gave the Allies the needed time to evacuate from Dunkirk. With Belgium under complete German control, Germany planned to move toward the French coast to completely eliminate the Allied forces. By nightfall about 25,000 British forces had evacuated from Dunkirk.
• 29 May: About 47,000 British forces were evacuated from Dunkirk.
• 30 May: About 6,000 French forces evacuate with around 120,000 Allied forces evacuating from Dunkirk.
• 31 May: Around 150,000 Allied soldiers arrive in Britain.

June 1940

• 1 June: The French sixteenth Corps took the defense of the region around
  evacuation of Dunkirk
  .
• 3 June: The German Luftwaffe bombed Paris.
• 4 June: Allied forces began to evacuate the area at
  Operation Dynamo the evacuation from Dunkirk officially ended as around 338,326 British forces and 113,000 French forces were evacuated from Dunkirk to Britain. The German Luftwaffe ceased bombardment of Dunkirk
  .
• 5 June: The second part of the
  River Somme
  .
• 9 June: German forces launched an offensive on Paris.
• 10 June: Norway surrendered to German forces and Italy joined the war by declaring war on France and Great Britain.
• 12 June: The 51st Highland Division surrendered to German forces due to being surrounded.
• 13 June: Paris was declared an open city by the
  French government as the government fled to Bordeaux
  .
• 14 June: German troops entered the French capital of Paris.
• 16 June: French Marshal
  St. Nazaire, La Pallice, Nantes, and Le Havre
  .
• 17 June: Petain asked Germany for armistice terms. Finishing off some Allied resistance, the Germans crossed the
  river Loire and reached the Swiss
  frontier.
• 18 June:
  de Gaulle told the people of France on a broadcast from London on the BBC
  to resist the Germans.
• 22 June: France signed an armistice with Germany.
• 23 June: Adolf Hitler toured captured Paris.
• 24 June: The French officially surrendered at Compiegne, the site of the German World War I surrender.

Notes and references

• Sheffield, Gary. "BBC - History - World Wars: The Fall of France." BBC News. BBC, 30 Mar. 2011. Web. 28 Mar. 2017.
• Horne, Alistair. To Lose a Battle: France 1940. Penguin UK, 2007.
• Bond, Brian. The Battle for France & Flanders: Sixty Years On. Pen and Sword, 2001.
• "BBC - History - Churchill Becomes Prime Minister (pictures, Video, Facts & News)." BBC News. BBC, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2017.
• The Battle of France 1940." Theriflesww1.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2017.
• Evans, Elinor. "The Fall of France: Hitler's Greatest Gamble." History Extra. BBC History Magazine, Jan.-Feb. 2017. Web. 30 Mar. 2017. <http://www.historyextra.com/article/bbc-history-magazine/fall-france-hitler%E2%80%99s-greatest-gamble>.
• "The Battle of France." RAF Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2017. <http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/research/online-exhibitions/history-of-the-battle-of-britain/the-battle-of-france.aspx>.