The definitive study of the army that liberated the south of France.

On 15 August 1944, the First French Army landed in Provence. With some 300,000 soldiers in its ranks, it liberated the major cities of southern France in the summer. It was then sent to Germany, the Alps and northern Italy. This first French army was led by General de Lattre de Tassigny, the man who represented France at the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany on 8 May 1945.

France's first army was given a triple role: diplomatic, political and military. As an instrument for regaining national greatness four years after defeat, it not only had to demonstrate, on the battlefield, the country's ability to liberate itself, but also to place it among the victorious powers. It must also, by integrating thousands of fighters from the internal resistance, act as a symbol of the rediscovered unity of the Nation. Finally, as the heir to the discredited army of defeat and Vichy army, it had to face up to the aspirations for renewal demanded by the French society of the Liberation.

Drawing on a vast corpus of sources collected in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, some of which have never been published before, Claire Miot examines this pivotal period in the re-establishment of republican legality and the entrenchment of Gaullist power, as well as the bumpy transition from the Occupation to the Liberation, and the discontinuous transition from war to peace.