Neutral ship flying French flag(?)

[Jay]

Date: July, 1941
Location: Naval square CG21
Events: Sighted a "convoy" consisting of a small tanker, an armed trawler, and a tug boat on a NE heading. The ships were flying flags with vertical blue/white/red bars. According to the flag chart, these were French ships. Given the date, I assumed that these would be enemy ships, and torpedoed the tanker.

To my surprise, the icon on my navigation chart representing the sunken ship was green, indicating that the tanker was a neutral vessel. When I saved and exited, the summary statistics also showed the tonnage as neutral

Can someone with a better grasp of history than mine please explain the status of French ships in July of '41? Thanks.

[kenijaru]

I think you just torpedoed a Vichy France tanker.

[GoldenRivet]

There are "Free French" and "Vichy French"

Free french escaped france during her fall and surrender to the Nazis. These are still enemies (basically merchants and warships which fled france and refused to stop fighting despite their government's orders to do so.

Their flag is seen here... http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/06/Flag_of_Free_France_1940-1944.svg/450px-Flag_of_Free_France_1940-1944.svg.png

Vichy French are the french who have surrendered to the Germans, and have laid down their arms and were more or less in cahoots with the Germans.

Their flag is seen here... http://www.appliedlanguage.com/flags_of_the_world/large_flag_of_french_guiana.gif

note the subtle difference?

this can be nearly impossible to notice from 1,000+ meters through a periscope.

Attack the french vessels with great caution :up:

[Sailor Steve]

If you're using GWX there's a pull-down chart in the Periscope views which shows all the flags, and which ones are friendly, neutral and enemy and at what dates.

[A Very Super Market]

Remember, you conquered France way back in 1940, they are defeated.

Free French ships are pretty rare (I haven't seen any), but they have a cross in the middle.

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[andym]

Remember, you conquered France way back in 1940, they are defeated.

Free French ships are pretty rare (I haven't seen any), but they have a cross in the middle.

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I sank a small convoy of 3 free french ships off casablance a few nights ago.

[Jay]

If you're using GWX there's a pull-down chart in the Periscope views which shows all the flags, and which ones are friendly, neutral and enemy and at what dates.
That is the chart I used to identify the ships. That chart shows France as an Allied nation from 09/39 - 06/40 and from 10/44 - 08/45. The problem is that the chart doesn't indicate the status of (Vichy) France between those periods. As I now know, Vichy France officially was a neutral country.

BTW, the GWX manual does report that Vichy France was neutral.

[Brag]

Jay, the Gestapo will arrest you when you return to port. :cool:

[A Very Super Market]

Why? For sinking French ships? They will probably throw him a party instead, Germany does not answer to the frogs....

[Jay]

Jay, the Gestapo will arrest you when you return to port. :cool:

Yikes! I'll beat the post-war rush by heading for Argentina right now.:D

[Brag]

Better to dance the tango than sit in a concentration camp-- future ancient saying. :smug:

[Task Force]

Better to dance the tango than sit in a concentration camp-- future ancient saying. :smug:

:rotfl:What if Argentina is overflown with Germans and Vichy French.:lol: (still cant believe that U boat kapitan a attempted to go to Argentina after he got the surrender message.):lol:

[A Very Super Market]

Haha, wouldn't he know how good the allies are at catching subs by then? That would discourage me from trying to run across the ocean

[Task Force]

Id hate to have been on that sub. They did a large portion of that trip below the surface with there snorkel up. The crew got very ill from lack of sunlight, and the different diseases and mold growing inside there sub.:yep: Id hate to be part of there crew.

[Jimbuna]

Desperate times often call for desperate measures http://www.psionguild.org/forums/images/smilies/wolfsmilies/pirate.gif

[RawJoh1]

Hi guys, this is my first post. Sorry for bumping this old thread but it's relevant to what I want to ask.

I'm playing GWX 3.0 and was following a merchant ship. I submerged, got close (around 1000m) and inspected the flag. Now, I'm 99% sure it was French. But when I torpedoed it, it showed up in green and was thus neutral.

So far my story's pretty similar to that expressed in the OP. However, in my game it's 20th September 1939, so the ship could NOT have belonged to Vichy France, since Vichy France does not exist yet.

Here are 3 screenshots of the neutral ship. The first two show the flag, the last one has the date on it.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/flag1.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/flag2.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/date.jpg

Any ideas? My initial thought was that it could be a Belgian ship, and due to it being night its flag looks like a French flag. But I think that's pretty unlikely. You can clearly see that the flag is the colour of the French flag.

Any ideas?

[bigboywooly]

Cant see clearly from your pics
Could be from Belgian looks very similar
What gives away its neutral status is the way its lit up like a christmas tree :yeah:

[Lt. Sven Thomsen]

Yay.

Never attack shiny boats, your renown WILL get electrocuted.

[PBV]

It is Belgian, the center is clearly (well, "clearly") yellow (or at least too yellowish to be white) :know: The outer colours can fool though...

[Kongo Otto]

Hi guys, this is my first post. Sorry for bumping this old thread but it's relevant to what I want to ask.

I'm playing GWX 3.0 and was following a merchant ship. I submerged, got close (around 1000m) and inspected the flag. Now, I'm 99% sure it was French. But when I torpedoed it, it showed up in green and was thus neutral.

So far my story's pretty similar to that expressed in the OP. However, in my game it's 20th September 1939, so the ship could NOT have belonged to Vichy France, since Vichy France does not exist yet.

Here are 3 screenshots of the neutral ship. The first two show the flag, the last one has the date on it.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/flag1.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/flag2.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y247/phawkins1988/date.jpg

Any ideas? My initial thought was that it could be a Belgian ship, and due to it being night its flag looks like a French flag. But I think that's pretty unlikely. You can clearly see that the flag is the colour of the French flag.

Any ideas?

I whould say it was Belgian or an Irish Ship you sunk.

[GoldenRivet]

Could even be Romanian if one saw any hint of blue in the first vertical bar of the flag instead of black.

you hit either a Belgian or a Romanian

but its definitely not french as the center bar is yellow

EDIT

It IS romanian... i just isolated the first color in the flag and it is a near navy blue... not black.

I commend you for going to so much trouble to verify the nationality before attacking.

but i believe any board of inquiry would clear you of any wrong doing. The ship was darkened in a combat zone, and you did your due diligence in identifying the nationality of the craft.

such is war

[bigboywooly]

but i believe any board of inquiry would clear you of any wrong doing. The ship was darkened in a combat zone, and you did your due diligence in identifying the nationality of the craft.

such is war

Its lit up like New York

:rotfl:

[A Very Super Market]

What the bugger is a Romanian ship doing off the coast of France?

[GoldenRivet]

but i believe any board of inquiry would clear you of any wrong doing. The ship was darkened in a combat zone, and you did your due diligence in identifying the nationality of the craft.

such is war

Its lit up like New York

:rotfl:

Oh hey look... It IS lit up. I guess I'm just used to the flags being hit with flood lights

Haha

Don't mention the lights to the board bro

And in the future it's a fair bet that anything with lights on is neutral.

As to why it's off France... I have seen almost every nationality in the game off the French coast... Including Japanese