Armée d’Afrique ARMED MERCHANT CRUISER (AMC) The designation of several dozen British passenger liners hastily converted for convoy escort duties during the early stages of the Battle of the Atlantic (1939–1945) This repeated an exercise by the Royal Navy during World War I AMCs were hybrids of inferior speed, armament, and firepower, with overlarge crews and high maintenance costs Some naval officers thought they were barely better than no escorts at all Worse, conversions removed these large ships from more effective duty as troop transports That said, they fi lled a desperate need for escorts during the most dangerous period of U-boat threat to British shipping They presented a small threat to surface attack, helped hunt German resupply ships, and enforced the difficult northern blockade Over 50 were placed in service, including some in the Royal Australian Navy and others with Canadian or other non-British crews Fifteen were sunk; several fell victim to powerful German surface raiders; the rest were torpedoed by U-boats The low military value of AMCs conduced to reconversion as the escort ship crisis passed The last AMCs were decommissioned or converted to troop ships by the end of 1943 Surplus crew were diverted to escort carriers by then coming into service in greater numbers See also Athenia, sinking of ARMEEABTEILUNG “Army detachment.” An improvised Wehrmacht formation larger on paper than a corps, but smaller than an army They were usually named for their commander of the moment, as in “Armeeabteilung Kempf.” Late in the war, Adolf Hitler and the OKH increasingly resorted to this type of formation The rough Red Army equivalent was an “operational group.” ARMÉE D’AFRIQUE The large French colonial army based in Algeria Before the war it policed the French Empire in Africa It included units of Turcos, or Algerian infantry; Zouaves, or European “colons” in all-white units who dressed Berber-style in brightly colored uniforms; Spahis, or Arab-style light cavalry; and polyglot soldiers of the Foreign Legion The Armée d’Afrique formed 12 divisions in the French order of battle in 1939 By June 1940, 80,000 of its troops were deployed in metropolitan France The rest guarded overseas colonies Most of the latter remained loyal to Vichy, spurning the Free French and the Western Allies alike As the French Army was confined to just 100,000 men inside France by the armistice imposed by Germany, Vichy authorized an expansion of overseas garrisons to 225,000 Most were deployed to fight the Free French and oppose Western Allied landings in outposts of colonial empire, not to take on the German conqueror and occupier of the home country Some troops shifted to support for General Charles de Gaulle as the tide turned in the Mediterranean from the end of 1942 They were merged with Free French forces to fight on the southern flank in the Tunisian campaign Some fought in the Italian campaign (1943–1945), made the DRAGOON landings in France on August 15, 1944, and fought into Germany in 1945 See also Tirailleurs Senegalese 71