The Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries during the Second World War. Beginning on 10 May 1940, the battle defeated primarily French forces. The German plan for the battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb (Case Yellow), German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes and then along the Somme valley to cut off and surround the Allied units that had advanced into Belgium to meet the German threat. When British, Belgian and adjacent French forces were pushed back to the sea by the highly mobile and well-organized German operation, the British government decided to evacuate the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) as well as several French divisions at Dunkirk through Operation Dynamo.