Vichy France (57 page)

⁴
Von Papen’s report on conversation with Bergery, (T-120/6726H/E510434);
Ministère public c/Bléhaut
, fascicule 2.

⁵
Deutscher General Vichy “Akte 7a: Stimmung; Akte 7b: Lage” (T-501/120/383–87, 397–402); Pierre Pucheu,
Ma Vie
(Paris, 1948); Paul Buttin,
Le procès Pucheu
(Paris, 1947); Gen. Schmitt,
Toute la vérité sur le procès Pucheu
(Paris, 1963).

⁶
Sources, éléments de travail pour les chefs des Chantiers de la jeunesse
, no. 16, November 1942; Chantiers de la jeunesse,
Bulletin périodique officiel
, no. 112 (15 Nov. 1942), no. 113 (25 Nov. 1942), and no. 115 (15 Dec. 1942). I owe access to these publications to MM. Pierre Martin and Dominique Morin in Paris. General de la Porte du Theil’s deportation by the Germans in May 1944, which won him acquittal after the war, followed a German decision to arrest all leaders capable of any role whatever in France. It was typical of German inability to distinguish between Vichy nationalists and the Resistance.

⁷
Pétain-Prince Rohan conversation, 20 October 1942, in German Foreign Office file, “Abwehr-Frankreich” (T-120/894/291479–83). The Pétain-von Neubronn conversation of 15 July 1943 and the Pétain-Krug von Nidda conversation of 23 August 1943 are found in Pariser Botschaft, Bdl. 1120, “Politische Beziehungen Frankreich-Deutschland, vol. 2” (T-120/3546H/E022140–41, 022155–56).

⁸
Achenbach (Paris) 910 to Berlin of 9 February 1943 (T-120/1832/418619–20) reports Pétain’s mediation suggestion to Krug von Nidda. Laval’s mediation efforts in 1943–44 are given particular attention in Geoffrey Warner,
Laval
, 360, 365–67, 392–96. Also see
this page
. General Lannurien’s testimony appears in
Procès Pétain
, 317 (
Journal officiel
edition). General de la Porte du Theil also recalled Pétain’s arbitration hopes in
Tronçais
, the “alumni” bulletin of the Chantiers de la Jeunesse, special issue on Pétain’s death, 1951. By then, 1943 ideas of an anti-British, pro-American, anti-Communist Europe had acquired a Cold War currency in which Pétain and Laval could appear as forerunners.

⁹
M. R. D. Foot,
SOE in France
(London, 1966);
DFCAA
, I, 108.

¹⁰
Les Procès de la collaboration
(Paris, 1948), 263, 314. See also the charges of “brigandage” by Prince Xavier de Bourbon, who had sheltered units of the military Resistance and who survived deportation to Dachau,
Ministère publique c/Chevalier
, 154. He admitted his group killed some “faux maquis.”

¹¹
General Laure, “Journal,” 26 August 1941. It should be noted that this manuscript was edited in 1947 for publication. For Weygand, see
FRUS
, 1941, II; 449. Jacques Chevalier’s letters are found in
Ministère public c/Chevalier
, 39–63. The
francs-tireurs
seem to have raided a chateau in 1944 where Chevalier had stored the “cartridges of our chosen sharpshooters.” It is not impossible that some so-called Resistance units of conservative social composition were in fact more active against the
maquis
than against the Germans. See also trials of General Delmotte, 71; Jean Ybarnégaray, 91; Admiral Bléhaut, fascicule 2, 18–22.

¹²
Gordon Wright, “Reflections on the French Resistance,”
Political Science Quarterly
LXXVII: 3 (September 1962), 336–49, summarizes this information usefully in English. Other estimates put the total active Resistance at 45,000.

¹³
Tribunal militaire de Paris, “Procès Oberg-Knochen,” 13 September–9 October 1954 (Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaine, dossier LXIV-1) fascicule 1, 49 ff., fascicule 9, 23 ff.;
Ministère public c/Bousquet
, 107–34.

¹⁴
General Bridoux, “Journal,” 23 October 1942; Tribunal Militaire de Paris, Procès Oberg-Knochen, 59. The “Desloges” radio detection mission into the unoccupied zone is discussed in Procès Oberg-Knochen, 53 ff.,
Ministère public c/General Delmotte
, and
Ministère public c/Bousquet
, fascicule 2, 28.

¹⁵
René Bousquet note of 24 November 1942, quoted in
Ministère public c/Bousquet
, 6–15; Procès Oberg-Knochen, fascicule 2, 69; Abetz report to Ribbentrop, 7 January 1944, quoted in Procès Oberg-Knochen, fascicule 3, 99.

¹⁶
See
this page
.

¹⁷
Ministère public c/Darnand
; Pierre Cluzel,
Le Drame héroïque des Glières
(Paris, 1945); Procès Oberg-Knochen, fascicule 2, 79 ff., for Darnand and for details of other French auxiliary groups such as the “Bande Bonny-Lafont” or the Gestapo de la rue Lauriston, which aided the German police. The fullest account of the Milice is Delperrie de Bayac,
La Milice, 1918–45
(Paris, 1969). Pétain sent Laval a long report on 6 August 1944 on excesses committed by the Milice. See
Procès Pétain
, 290–91.

¹⁸
FRUS
, 1940, II, 430.

¹⁹
“Second Front,”
La Revue universelle
, 25 August 1942.

²⁰
Jules Guesde is supposed to have remarked to his fellow French Socialists in July 1914, “I don’t understand your fear of war. War is the mother of revolution.” Harvey Goldberg,
Life of Jaurès
(Madison, Wisconsin, 1962), 480. For the young Mussolini, see Stuart J. Woolf, “Mussolini as Revolutionary,” Journal of Contemporary History, II, 190. For the establishment, see Arno Mayer, “Domestic Causes of the First World War,” in Leonard Krieger and Fritz Stern (eds.),
The Responsibility of Power
(New York, 1968).

²¹
Robert C. Tucker,
The Marxian Revolutionary Idea
(New York, 1969), 140; for the French left’s fear of another “sacred union,” see Gaston Bergery, “Le Pacte Franco-Russe” [Paris, n.d. (1935)], 9. For French officers’ reactions to the 1917 mutinies, see Guy Pedroncini,
Les mutineries de 1917
(Paris, 1967).

²²
Admiral Platon’s speech at the funeral for the victims of the air raid on Boulogne-Billancourt accused the British of renouncing victory in favor of “murders without any military significance.” He wished the British had shown similar zeal at Dunkirk in May–June 1940 “when we asked for RAF help in vain” (Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaine, document no. CLXXXIII-50). Examples from 1941 of Vichy efforts to persuade the United States to mediate a compromise peace are found in
FRUS
, 1941, II, 396, 457, 461. For August 1942, see U.S. Dept. of State Serial File 851.00/2933.

²³
Abetz (Paris) to Berlin No. 2145 of 23 May 1942 (T-120/422/217099 ff, also printed in
Mémorandum d’Abetz
, 159, 177); Geoffrey Warner,
Pierre Laval and the Eclipse of France
(London, 1968) 311–12. For press analysis of the coming second front, see
La Revue universelle
, 25 August 1942. André Gide-Roger Martin du Gard,
Correspondance
(Paris, 1968), II, 262.

²⁴
FRUS
, 1942, II, 254, 256, 308, 319, for Noguès’ fears in 1942 that an Allied landing would trigger a native rising and draw the Germans into North Africa. For similar views expressed by Governor-General Pierre Boisson of French West Africa,
ibid.
, 341.

²⁵
For Laval and Rochat, see
FRUS
, 1942, II, 181–83, 187–89. For views attributed to Pétain, 190.

²⁶
FRUS
, 1942, II. For Col. Van Hecke, 299. For unnamed “friendly officers,” 319, 362. Giraudist officers were alarmed at the possibility of a landing before their target date of spring 1943 and offended at the British seizure of Madagascar in May 1942.

²⁷
Abetz to Ribbentrop, Paris 3331 of 4 August 1942, in Botschafter Ritter, op. cit. (T-120/926/297252). This is in fact what Pétain did in June 1944.

²⁸
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, Abteilung für Wehrmacht Propaganda, “Geheim-Akten über Fremde Staaten: Frankreich” (T-77/OKW-1605/2,488,982; 6,500,019 ff; 6,500,0411 ff; and 6,500,052 ff); General Bridoux, “Journal”; Abetz (Paris) to Ribbentrop 3478 of 12 August 1942 (T-120/434/220263). See also Robert O. Paxton,
Parades and Politics at Vichy
(Princeton, N.J., 1966), chap. 10.

²⁹
The defense at Marshal Pétain’s trial succeeded in casting doubt on the very existence of Pétain’s 21 August letter to Hitler. German archives show, however, that the letter did reach Berlin, where the various officers of the Foreign Ministry who commented upon it took it to be genuine. Abetz (Paris) 3627 to Ribbentrop of 22 August 1942 transmitted the letter (T-120/434/220294 and T-120/929/297221), and the Political Branch (Pol. 11) commented upon it (T-120/4634H/E208594–602). Since the Vichy communique using the offensive word
cleanse
was published only in the Occupied Zone, it cannot be definitely traced to Pétain or Laval, but Pétain poured out his bitterness against the “enemy” and his relief at their failure to German Consul-General Roland Krug von Nidda on August 20 (T-120/434/220287–91). U.S. Chargé d’Affaires S. Pinckney Tuck had already reported in early August that Pétain was determined to resist Allied “aggression” (
FRUS
, 1942, II, 190). Fernand de Brinon in
Procès Pétain
, 287–89, and in
Mémoires
(Paris, n.d.), 125–26.

³⁰
Hitler’s 5 May 1942 remark is found in T-73/192/405497, quoted in Edward L. Homze,
Foreign Labor in Nazi Germany
(Princeton, N.J., 1967), 135. Abetz (Paris) 3869 to Ribbentrop of 4 September 1942 (T-120/926/297200–2). The negotiations over neutral shipping and the persistent French requests for armor in West Africa may be followed in T-120/434/
passim
, in T-120/926/297207–11, and in the unpublished diary of General Bridoux.

³¹
T-120/894/291479–83.

³²
Information about French troop movements to the Atlantic coast of Morocco in the spring of 1942 and their retirement in the fall may be found in T-77/OKW-2285/5, 596,253, and
passim.
Some French troops were also sent to the Rif mountains at the same time.

³³
The November 10 message was first described at Pétain’s trial from shorthand notes taken by Dr. Ménétrel, Pétain’s physician and confidant. See Louis Noguères,
Le Véritable procès du maréchal Pétain
(Paris, 1955), 448. The message concerned is probably the same expression of “entire confidence” in Darlan published in
Le Figaro
on 10 November 1942, although neither prosecution nor defense was aware of that. Darlan at that point was declaring himself Clark’s prisoner and refusing to take responsibility for a general cease-fire. The Nov. 13 alleged message was added to the story in Admiral Auphan’s trial in July 1955, fascicule 2, 58, 110. See also Auphan and Mordal,
La Marine française pendant la seconde guerre mondiale
(Paris, 1958), 294, 304, and Marshal Alphonse Juin,
Mémoires 1: Alger, Tunis, Rome
(Paris, 1959), 96, 108. The problem with that story is that on November 13 Laval was trying to get the Germans to acquiesce in a neutrality arrangement between Noguès, Darlan, and the Allies that would exclude Giraud and preserve “the present organization … intact.” See below, footnote 50. Darlan did in fact write to Admiral Leahy on 27 November 1942 that “confidential messages passed to me by someone at the French Admiralty” informed him that “the Marshal was, in the bottom of his heart, of the same opinion” as Darlan. See William D. Leahy,
I Was There
(New York, 1950), 485. That claim was, of course, the basis for the new legitimacy in North Africa and very much in Darlan’s interest to assert. For the view that the marshal’s “accord” covered only Noguès’ and Darlan’s efforts to get rid of Giraud, see the occasionally inaccurate article of General Schmitt, “Le général Juin et le débarquement en AFN,”
Revue d’histoire de la deuxième guerre mondiale
, no. 44 (December 1961).