History of Madagascar
By the 15th century, Europeans had wrested control of the spice trade from the Muslims. They did this by bypassing the Middle East and sending their cargo-ships around the Cape of Good Hope to India. The Portuguese mariner Diogo Dias became the first European to set foot on Madagascar when his ship, bound for India, blew off course in 1500. In the ensuing two-hundred years, the English and French tried (and failed) to establish settlements on the island.
History of Madagascar
Malagasy troops fought in France, Morocco, and Syria during World War II. Prior to the implementation of the Final Solution, Nazi Germany had considered the Madagascar Plan, which would have relocated European Jews to Madagascar. After France fell to the Germans in 1940, the Vichy government administered Madagascar until 1942, when British Empire troops occupied the strategic island in the Battle of Madagascar in order to preclude its seizure by the Japanese. The United Kingdom handed over control of the island to Free French Forces in 1943.