Vichy France (9 page)
39
Paul Valéry,
Cahiers
, vol. 23 (Paris, 1960), 386, 505;
The Journals of André Gide
, translated and edited by Justin O’Brien, vol. IV (New York, 1957), 26, 31, 39, 47.
40
Le Figaro
, 19 June and 15 July 1940; Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,
Letters
, 147.
41
René Gillouin, “Responsabilités des écrivains,” in
Journal de Genève
, no. 33, 7–8 February 1942, attacks these three. See Emmanuel Mounier’s attack on the “Intelligentzia folâtre et décadente” in
Esprit
, no. 97 (February 1941).
42
The Journals of André Gide
, translated and edited by Justin O’Brien, vol. IV (New York, 1957), 39 (28 July 1940).
43
Paul Valéry,
Cahiers
, vol. 23 (Paris, 1960), 384, 421.
44
Charles Maurras,
La Seule France
(Paris, 1941); Henri Massis,
Les Idées restent
(Paris, 1941); Jacques Benoist-Méchin,
La Moisson de quarante
(Paris, 1941), 50, 175, seeks “counterpoisons” to Descartes and Rousseau. The last phrase is from Jacques Chardonne,
Chronique privée de l’an 1940
(Paris, 1940), 90. René Gillouin and Maurras, drawing on Le Play, both insisted that the values of the French Revolution were “Anglo-Saxon.”
45
Emmanuel Mounier, “D’Une France à l’autre,”
Esprit
, 8e année (November 1940), 1–40.
Esprit’s
first editorial in 1932, some of which is quoted here, was called “Refaire la renaissance.”
46
Cahiers
, vol. 23 (Paris, 1960), 429 ff.
47
Journal des années noires
(Paris, 1947), 25 July 1942.
48
The essential study of Laval in any language is now Geoffrey Warner,
Pierre Laval and the Eclipse of France
(London, 1968).
49
Warner, 21.
50
T-120/2624/D525934–37; Paul Baudouin,
Neuf mois au gouvernement
(Paris, 1948), 219.
51
For Weygand’s wish to exclude all parliamentarians from the government in 1940, see his 28 June note to Pétain published in Paul Baudouin,
Neuf mois au gouvernement
(Paris, 1948). Weygand’s postwar version may be found in
Mémoires
, III,
Rappelé au service
(Paris, 1950), 298.
52
The period between the armistice of June 25 and the National Assembly of July 9–10 is even more obscure, if possible, than the prearmistice days and the Vichy days, which get the lion’s share of attention in the postwar memoirs and most accounts. Two famous examples of projects for the reconstruction of France are Weygand’s note of 28 June (see previous footnote) and Gaston Bergery’s Declaration of 7 July, signed by some seventy parliamentarians and published by one of them, Jean Montigny,
Toute la vérité sur un mois dramatique de notre histoire
(Clermont-Ferrand, 1940), 139 ff. This work helps magnify Laval’s role in the July days.
53
The Taurines and Badie proposals had only about fifty supporters between them. They are printed in full, among other places, in Louis Noguères,
Le Véritable procès du maréchal Pétain
(Paris, 1955), 157, 160–61. One Socialist deputy (Biondi), two Radical deputies (Roche, Margaine), and one senator (the Marquis de Chambrun, not to be confused with Laval’s son-in-law, the Comte René de Chambrun) voted “no” on 9 July.
54
See footnote 13, above.
55
The Bergery Declaration is published in Jean Montigny,
Toute la vérité sur un mois dramatique de notre histoire
(Clermont-Ferrand, 1940), 139 ff. The full Herriot speech may be consulted in the
Journal officiel, débats, Chambre
, 11 July 1940.
56
The names of the 80 are printed conveniently in Robert Aron,
Histoire de Vichy
(Paris, 1954), 153 n., for those without access to the
Journal officiel
for 11 July 1940. They included 36 SFIO, 13 Radicals, and a scattering from other groups. A majority of both Socialists and Radicals voted “yes.” Five Socialists and two Radicals (including Herriot) abstained.
57
The morning session of July 10 does not appear in the
Journal officiel.
See Commission parlementaire d’enquête,
Evénements survenus en France de 1934 jusqu’en 1945
, vol. II, 479–97.
58
Noguères, 158; Anatole de Monzie,
La saison des juges
(Paris, 1943), 8.
59
Marcel Marion, of the PPF, as quoted in Robert J. Soucy, “The Nature of Fascism in France,”
Journal of Contemporary History
I:1 (1966), 55.
60
Jacques Benoist-Méchin,
La Moisson de quarante
(Paris, 1941), 51. See also Henry de Montherlant,
Le Solstice de juin
(Paris, 1941).
61
The Journals of André Gide
, 23, 31. Gide accepted authority only as a choice among evils. “If tomorrow, as is to be feared, freedom of thought or at least of the expression of that thought is refused us, I shall try to convince myself that art, that thought itself will lose less thereby than in excessive freedom.” See pp. 38, 49.
62
General Léon Huntziger, quoted in
Le Temps
, 17 August 1941; Albert Camus,
The Plague
(New York, 1954), 87 ff.
63
The Journals of André Gide
, translated and edited by Justin O’Brien, vol. IV (New York, 1957), 34, 186 (17 July 1940, 7 March 1943).
64
Emanuel d’Astier de la Vigerie, in
Sept fois sept jours
, refers throughout to Pétain simply as “le drapeau.” For the interview in
Le Flambeau
, see issue of 9 May 1936. Léon Blum’s remarks on Pétain appeared in
Le Populaire
, 3 March 1939. Céline ridiculed Pétain as “le maréchal Prétartarin” in
L’École des cadavres
(Paris, 1938), 84–96.
65
Janet Flanner [Genêt],
Pétain: Old Man of France
(New York, 1944), 47, is the only biographer to mention drugs. For transcripts of Pétain’s conversations in 1943, see the references in chap. 4, note 63. When interviewed by the parliamentary investigating commission in 1947 in his prison on the Ile d’Yeu, however, Pétain was clearly senile.
66
Poincaré,
Mémoires
, X, 63–64, 85–86, 88. Paul Valéry,
Oeuvres
(Pléiade edition, 1957), I, 1098 ff. The last words of this paragraph are from de Gaulle’s radio speech of 26 June 1940.
67
Guy Pedroncini,
Les Mutineries de 1917
(Paris, 1967), has significant contemporary material on officers’ evaluation of the mutinies.
68
Admiral Fernet,
Aux côtés du maréchal Pétain
(Paris, 1953), 150, reports that Pétain wanted to be minister of education in 1934. For his remark to Bullitt,
FRUS
, 1940, II, 384.
69
See the ex-Communist A. Rossi [Angelo Tasca],
La Guerre des papillons
(Paris, 1954), Appendix X, for clandestine Communist posters from 1940 and early 1941. Jacques Fauvet,
Histoire du parti communiste français
, vol. 2 (Paris, 1965), quotes extensively from the party press in this period. Even the official party histories now play down the spurious “appeal of 10 July.”
70
Christian Pineau,
La Simple vérité
(Paris, 1960), 593, publishes this curious text.
71
Henri Noguères,
Histoire de la résistance en France
(Paris, 1967), I, 208, shows the absence of German “grand operations” against the Resistance at first. See
DFCAA
, IV, 454, for the beginning of German executions for resistance in the Occupied Zone in May 1941.
72
I have followed this process much more fully in
Parades and Politics at Vichy
(Princeton, N.J., 1966), chap. 3.
73
Jean Renoir to Robert Flaherty, 8 August 1940, in Robert Flaherty MS, Columbia University.
74
Mitteilungen über die Arbeiten der WaKo
, no. 46, 19 August 1940 (T-120/353/206537–40).
75
Jacques Soustelle,
Envers et contre tout
(Paris, 1947), I, 29.
76
Charles de Gaulle,
Mémoires de Guerre
, vol. I,
L’Appel
(Paris, 1954), 100; Marcel Vigneras,
Rearming the French
(Washington, D.C., 1957), 10.
77
Orion [Jean Maze],
Nouveau dictionnaire des girouettes
(Paris, 1948).
78
Georges Blond,
Pétain
(Paris, 1966), attributes the August 1944 message to Henri Massis. See also
Le Procès du maréchal Pétain
(Paris, 1945), 9.
79
Le Procès du maréchal Pétain
(Paris, 1945), 191.
80
Spaak and other leading Belgian ministers wanted an armistice, but the Germans refused. Thomas J. Knight, “Belgium Leaves the War, 1940,”
Journal of Modern History
41:1 (March 1969), 62–63.
81
See Délégation française auprès de la commission allemande d’armistice,
Recueil de documents publié par le gouvernement français
, 5 vols. (Paris, 1947–59). With the exception of a few major documents omitted, this provides the best day-to-day account of technical negotiations between the German military and the French government at Vichy. It is cited hereafter as
DFCAA.
82
Some information on Abetz’ subsidies to the press may be found, in Pariser Botschaft, Ordner 1134, “S 8 Geheim, 1940–44” (T-120/3112).
I / The French Quest for Collaboration, 1940–1942
Why have you
[
Germans
]
never supported us?
—
Laval to General von Neubronn, June 1943
We know the immense difficulties which await us to assure the vital needs of the country and, moreover, we know nothing of the intentions of the Reich, which up to now hasn’t shown the slightest sign of a desire for collaboration.
—
Yves Bouthillier to Gen. Doyen, 23 October 1940
1
