Quote Originally Posted by xsnaggle View Post
They weren't in the south of fFance and they weren't bombed. They were in the french Algerian port of Oran and Admiral Cunningham sent a destroyer into the harbour to ask them to join him. They refused not realising the whole British Med fleet was sitting outside with all its guns (Including 3 battle ships) trained on them. Or perhaps they did know but thought that the British wouldn't fire. Wrong!!!
Yes youre right that it was in Algeria, I was confused with another scuttling. But I was replying to someone saying that we could have destroyed them after the Germans took them. I know they weren't bombed at that time, but if we were going to wait for the Germans then I assume that's the only way to do it, which seems a very difficult mission to me.