[1] Two cruisers of this class, Georges Leygues and Montcalm, took part in the defence of Dakar in late September 1940 during World War II.

[3] In 1920 the French Navy made plans to construct 5,200-ton light cruisers, with a main armament of 139.7 mm (5.5 in) guns, capable of speeds over 36 knots (67 km/h).

[10] Germany was not subject to the restrictions in warship building resulting from the treaty, and the German Reichsmarine laid down, between 1926 and 1928, three cruisers of the Königsberg class with a displacement of 6,650 tons, armed with three triple turrets of 150 mm (5.9 in) guns, and a speed of 30–32 knots.

[11] In 1929, an improved unit, Leipzig, with a more powerful cruising diesel engine installation, and a more extended armoured belt, with nearly the same displacement (6,710 tons).

The four units of the Da Giussano class (first sub-class of the Condottieri cruisers group) were laid down in 1928, and completed in 1931–32, respecting the newly signed London Naval Treaty.

On a displacement of about 5,200 tons, they were armed with eight 152 mm guns in four double turrets, and could attain the remarkably high speed of 37 knots (69 km/h), but with negligible armour and short radius of action.

[26] This was on the basis of Émile Bertin's armament, and on Algérie's protection and propulsion that was designed the lead ship of the La Galissonnière class, launched in November 1933.

The U.S. Navy answered with the Brooklyn class,[29] with fifteen 152 mm (6.0 in) guns, a speed of 32.5 knots (60.2 km/h), but a more exact displacement of 9,700 tons.

They were fitted with twelve 152 mm guns, in four triple turrets, and aircraft installations at the center of the ship, had a speed of 32 knots (59 km/h), and were nearly respecting the 10,000-ton displacement.

Aircraft installations, two catapults, crane and hangar, accommodating three/four seaplanes, would have been fitted in the ship's center, aft of a single large funnel.

But only the name ship was actually laid down in the Lorient Navy Yard, and as work was suspended during the war, she was launched in 1946, and completed only in 1956, as an integral anti-aircraft cruiser design.

Their aircraft installations, with hangar and derrick on stern, and a catapult fitted on the top of the aft 152 mm turret, could accommodate four Loire 130 seaplanes.

[39] Upon completion, La Galissonnière, Jean de Vienne, and Marseillaise were attached to the Mediterranean Squadron, forming the 3rd Cruiser Division stationed at Bizerte.

Georges Leygues, Montcalm, and Gloire were assigned to the Atlantic Fleet, stationed at Brest and forming the 4th Cruiser Division.

The 4th Cruiser Division carried out an endurance cruise to Indochina, from December 1937 to April 1938, and represented France at the July 1939 New York World's Fair.

In response to the increasingly threatening attitude of Italy, in April 1940, the Force de Raid was sent to the Mediterranean Sea, and the 3rd and 4th Cruiser Divisions were then based in Algiers.

After Italy entered the war in June, they carried out two sorties, unsuccessfully attempting to intercept Italian fleet units.

Slowed by machinery problems, Gloire was intercepted by British cruisers, and was only allowed to proceed on to Casablanca, as Georges Leygues and Montcalm reached Dakar at full speed, and so took part in its defence against Operation Menace.

Until 1943, they remained there, where Gloire joined them in March 1941: from 15 to 25 September 1942, she was sent to rescue the victims of the sinking of the British troopship Laconia, torpedoed by the German submarine U-156.

[47] In Toulon, two of the three cruisers from the 3rd Cruisers Division, Marseillaise and La Galissonnière, the latter being replaced on 15 March 1941 by Jean de Vienne, were incorporated in a so-called High Seas Force, which nearly never went to sea, due to the lack of fuel, but in November 1940, to cover the return to Toulon of the battleship Provence, which had been severely damaged by British gunfire in July 1940.

In January 1942, Jean de Vienne was sent to rescue the liner Lamoriciere, whose sinking in a winter tempest, off the Balearic Islands, caused more than 300 deaths.

After the successful Allied landings in Morocco and Algeria, in November 1942, the Germans occupied the Zone libre, and tried to seize the French warships in Toulon, (Operation Lila).

[48] In 1944, after the Italian surrender, the Germans rendered the wrecks to the Vichy authorities, but they were sunk, following Allied bombing attacks on Jean de Vienne on 24 November 1943 and La Galissonnière, on 18 April 1944.

Sent to the Mediterranean Sea, the Montcalm supported the Liberation of Corsica in September 1943, and Gloire carried out bombardment missions against land-based targets in the Gulf of Gaeta in early 1944.

Until April 1945, the three cruisers were part of the so-called Flank Force, operating off the Mediterranean coast of the western Italian Riviera.