Timeline of World War II (1940) - June 1940

June 1940

3: Last day of Operation Dynamo. 224,686 British and 121,445 French and Belgian troops have been evacuated.
Germans bomb Paris.

7: German battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst sink the aircraft carrier HMS Glorious and two destroyers off Norway; the British ships have had no air cover.

9: Red Army provokes conflicts in the Latvian border.

10: Italy declares war on France and the United Kingdom.
: Norway surrenders. King Haakon and his government had been evacuated to Britain three days previously.

11: French government decamps to Tours.

13: Paris occupied by German troops; French government moves again, this time to Bordeaux.

14: Elements of the French Navy (Marine Nationale) based in Toulon carried out offensive operations against Italian targets along the Ligurian coast.
A total military blockade on the Baltic States by the Soviet Baltic Fleet. Soviet troops along the Baltic borders are ready to organise communist coups in the Baltic States. Soviet bombers shoot down a Finnish passenger airplane Kaleva flying from Tallinn to Helsinki and carrying three diplomatic pouches from the U.S. legations in Tallinn, Riga and Helsinki.

15: Eight hour ultimatum to surrender is given to Lithuania by the Soviets. President Smetona escapes from the country so the takeover is not possible to do in a formally legal way. Soviet troops enter Lithuania and attack Latvian border guards.

16: Philippe Pétain becomes premier of France upon the resignation of Reynaud's government.
The French sloop La Curieuse forced the Italian submarine Provano to surface and then sank it by ramming.
Soviet Union gives eight hour ultimatum to Latvia and Estonia to surrender.

17: Sinking of liner RMS Lancastria off St Nazaire while being used as a British troopship—Britain's worst maritime disaster since the Anglo-Dutch wars.
Soviet troops enter Latvia and Estonia.

18: General De Gaulle forms the Comité français de la Libération nationale, a French government in exile; Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are occupied by the Soviet Union.

20: The French seek an armistice with the Italians

21: Franco-German armistice negotiations begin at Compiègne.
Elements of two Italian armies cross into France during Italian invasion of France.

21: The French battleship Lorraine opened fire on the Italian port of Bardia in Italian North Africa. During some of the last actions of the French against the Italians, French naval aircraft attacked Taranto and Livorno in mainland Italy.

21: Soviet-led coups in the Baltic States. In the only military resistance in Tallinn, 2 die on Estonian side and about 10 on the Soviet side.

22: Franco-German armistice signed.

24: Franco-Italian armistice signed.

25: France officially surrenders to Germany at 01:35.

26: The Soviet Union send an ultimatum demanding Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from Romania.

27: Romanians propose negotiations. Molotov replies that the demands are land concessions or war. New ultimatum from the Soviets to the Romanians.

28: General De Gaulle recognised by British as leader of Free French.
Marshal Italo Balbo, Commander-in-Chief of Italian North Africa, is accidentally killed in a "friendly fire incident" by Italian anti-aircraft fire at Tobruk, Libya.

28: The Red Army occupies Romanian Bessarabia and the northern part of Bukovina.

28: The Luftwaffe bombs the demilitarised British Channel Islands, they had not been informed of the demilitarization. In Guernsey, 33 are killed and 67 injured, in Jersey, 9 are killed and many are injured.

28: Axis and Allied convoys clash south-west of Crete.

30: Germany invades the Channel Islands.