Shortie wrote:
IIRC the MM had two nice modern battlecruisers (Dunkerque class)
Modern, but outmatched by everything in the Royal Navy one on one, they'd basically be twins to the twins. However they don't have nearly as good armor, though its not so horribly flawed, and there range and endurance is really too low for major commerce raiding.
one nice modern battleship (Richelieu) and her unfinshed sister
Neither was finished, though Richelieu was close, and neither would be for some time given the working conditions are near certainty of sabotage, if not by the French then by RN landing partiers which historically helped wreck a number of ships and installations during the Battle of France. That's ignoring any issues of any later RAF bombing or naval attacks.
But it'll take a fair while to get new crews trained and worked up, and all the while the RAF and RN will be trying to make it a terminal experience for them. Getting from North Africa past Gibralter and the UK back to safety would not be easy. And that's ignoring the problem of logistical support for them all.
If the ships are positioned as historical then the Germans wouldn't get them. So the main body of the French fleet ought to be assumed to be a Toulon.
Mers el Kabir.
Linky-poo
A battleship, cruiser and several other vessels also agreed to demobilize themselves in Alexandria, though the situation came close to resulting in a battle inside the harbor when word of Mers el Kabir arrived.
Now to cover everything else...
Another battleship and several other minor warships fled from Northern France to Southampton and also agreed to demobilization. The battleship, Lorraine, was later scuttled as a breakwater at Normandy. But her deck remained above water and she looked operational, so German bombers and midget subs frequently attacked and hit the hulk.
The French also had a cruiser and small task force in Indochina, which after fighting the Thai's ended up laid up for the duration of the war, though the USN sank the cruiser during an air raid in 1944. The incomplete battleships Richelieu and Jean Bart both had part of there armament and could move, they steamed from Brest to Dakar and Casablanca respectively. Richelieu was pretty much alone except for the some subs, while Jean Bart had a cruiser and destroyers with her. That force was largely destroyed and Jean Bart heavily damaged in action (if she'd had 6 inch ammo onboard the ship would have blown up) against US forces during the Torch Landings. She saw no more service of any form in the war.
Richelieu saw some action first in mid 1940 during Operation Menace. In this the British and newly formed Free French attempted to seize Dakar. They through the local French commander would welcome them, in fact Mers el Kabir ha left them extremely bitter and they fought. The British proved unable to even hit Richelieu, which was tired up to a pier, with bombs or shellfire, and the whole operation was called off after a French sub torpedoed one of the British battleships. Later though in 1942 when the French forces in North Africa joined the Allies she was refitted in the US and then operated in the Indian Ocean. While the IJN never came out to fight she did bombard oil refineries on Sumatra and escort British carriers on similar raids.
The last major French naval force was a Toulon, it had three battleships and battlecruisers by 1942, the battlecruisers having escaped Mers el Kabir without being destroyed. Along with them where 70 odd cruisers, destroyers and auxiliaries. In 1942 French forces in North Africa joined the allies after a brief but intense resistance, this triggered the German occupation of what remained of France. When German forces reached Toulon every ship was scuttled. German efforts to stop this led to one hilarious example in which a tank began firing at the battlecruiser Strasbourg, only to flee when the ship's main battery began turning to engage.
