armistice shifted the power balance post-armistice of France's reduced military resources away from France and towards the colonies, especially North Africa. By 1943, all French colonies, except for Japanese-controlled Indochina, had joined the Free French cause. The colonies in North Africa and French Equatorial Africa in particular played a key role Vichy French colonial forces were reduced under the terms of the armistice. Nevertheless, in the Mediterranean area alone, Vichy had nearly 150,000 men under arms. There were about 55,000 in French Morocco, 50,000 in Algeria, and almost 40,000 in the Army of the Levant. Diplomacy, politics, and administration Diplomacy and politics Appeal of 18 June Refusing to accept his government's armistice with Germany, Charles fled to England on 17 June and exhorted the French to resist occupation and to continue the fight. Reynaud resigned after his proposal for a Franco-British Union was rejected by his cabinet and De Gaulle facing imminent arrest, fled France on 17 June. Other leading politicians, including Georges Mandel, Léon Blum, Pierre Mendès France, Jean Zay and Édouard Daladier (and separately Reynaud), were arrested while travelling to continue the war from North Africa. De Gaulle obtained special permission from Winston Churchill to broadcast a speech on 18 June via Radio Londres (a French language radio station operated by the BBC) to France, despite the Cabinet's objections that such a broadcast could provoke the Pétain government into a closer allegiance with Germany. In his speech, de Gaulle reminded the French people that the British Empire and the United States of America would support them militarily and economically in an effort to retake France from the Germans. Few actually heard the speech but another speech, heard by more people, was given by de Gaulle four days later. After the war, de Gaulle's radio appeal was often identified as the beginning of the French Resistance, and the process of liberating France from the yoke of German occupation. Northern Africa De Gaulle's support grew out of a base in colonial Africa. In the summer of 1940, the colonial empire largely supported the Vichy regime. Félix Éboué, governor of Chad, switched his support to General de Gaulle in September. Encouraged, de Gaulle traveled to Brazzaville in October, where he announced the formation of an Empire Defense Council in his "Brazzaville Manifesto", and invited all colonies still supporting Vichy to join him and the Free French forces in the fight against