Edouard Daladier
from Wikipedia:
Édouard Daladier (French pronunciation: [18 June 1884 – 10 October 1970) was a French Radical politician and the Prime Minister of France at the start of the Second World War.
Daladier's last government was in power at the time of the negotiations preceding the Munich Agreement, when France backed out of its obligations to defend Czechoslovakia against Nazi Germany. He was pushed into negotiating by Britain's Neville Chamberlain, without which war would have been inevitable at that time. Unlike Chamberlain, Daladier had no illusions about Hitler's ultimate goals. In fact, he told the British in a late April 1938 meeting that Hitler's real aim was to eventually secure "a domination of the Continent in comparison with which the ambitions of Napoleon were feeble." He went on to say "Today, it is the turn of Czechoslovakia. Tomorrow, it will be the turn of Poland and Romania. When Germany has obtained the oil and wheat it needs, she will turn on the West. Certainly we must multiply our efforts to avoid war. But that will not be obtained unless Great Britain and France stick together, intervening in Prague for new concessions but declaring at the same time that they will safeguard the independence of Czechoslovakia. If, on the contrary, the Western Powers capitulate again, they will only precipitate the war they wish to avoid."
Nevertheless, perhaps discouraged by the pessimistic and defeatist attitudes of both military and civilian members of the French government, as well as traumatized by France's blood-bath in World War I that he personally witnessed, Daladier ultimately let Chamberlain have his way. On his return to Paris, Daladier, who was expecting a hostile crowd, was acclaimed. He then commented to his aide, Alexis Léger: "Ah, les cons (the fools)!".
Rearmament
In October 1938, Daladier opened secret talks with the Americans on how to bypass American neutrality laws and allow the French to buy American aircraft to make up for productivity deficiencies in the French aircraft industry. Daladier commented in October 1938, "If I had three or four thousand aircraft, Munich would never have happened", and he was most anxious to buy American war planes as the only way to strengthen the French Air Force.
A major problem in the Franco-American talks was how the French were to pay for the American planes, as well as how to bypass the American neutrality acts. In addition, France had defaulted on its World War I debts in 1932 and hence fell foul of the American Johnson Act of 1934, which forbade loans to nations that had defaulted on their World War I debts. In February 1939, the French offered to cede their possessions in the Caribbean and the Pacific together with a lump sum payment of 10 billion francs, in exchange for the unlimited right to buy, on credit, American aircraft. After torturous negotiations, an arrangement was worked out in the spring of 1939 to allow the French to place huge orders with the American aircraft industry; though most of the aircraft ordered had not arrived in France by 1940, the Americans arranged for French orders to be diverted to the British.
World War II
When the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed, Daladier responded to the public outcry by outlawing the French Communist Party, which had refused to condemn Joseph Stalin's actions. In 1939, after the German invasion of Poland, he was reluctant to go to war, but he did so on 4 September 1939, inaugurating the Phony War. On 6 October of that year, Hitler offered France and Great Britain a peace proposal.
There were more than a few in the French government prepared to take Hitler up on his offer; but, in a nationwide broadcast the next day, Daladier declared, "We took up arms against aggression. We shall not put them down until we have guarantees for a real peace and security, a security which is not threatened every six months.". On 29 January 1940, in a radio address delivered to the people of France entitled The Nazi's Aim is Slavery, Daladier left little doubt about his opinion of the Germans. In his radio address, he said: "For us, there is more to do than merely win the war. We shall win it, but we must also win a victory far greater than that of arms. In this world of masters and slaves, which those madmen who rule at Berlin are seeking to forge, we must also save liberty and human dignity."
In March 1940, Daladier resigned as Prime Minister in France because of his failure to aid Finland's defence during the Winter War, and he was replaced with Paul Reynaud. Daladier remained, however, Minister of Defence, and his antipathy to Paul Reynaud prevented Reynaud from replacing Maurice Gamelin as Supreme Commander of all French armed forces.
Paul Reynaud
Paul Reynaud (15 October 1878 - 21 September 1966) was a French politician and lawyer prominent in the interwar period, noted for his stances on economic liberalism and militant opposition to Germany. He was the penultimate Prime Minister of the Third Republic and vice-president of the Democratic Republican Alliance center-right party.
Although Reynaud was increasingly popular, the Chamber of Deputies elected Reynaud premier by only a single vote with most of his own party abstaining; over half of the votes for Reynaud came from the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) party. With so much support from the left - and the opposition from many parties on the right - Reynaud's government was especially unstable; many on the Right demanded that Reynaud attack not Germany, but the Soviet Union.[7] The Chamber also forced Daladier, whom Reynaud held personally responsible for France's weakness, to be Reynaud's Minister of National Defense and War. One of Reynaud's first acts was to sign a declaration with British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain that neither of the two countries would sign a separate peace.
Reynaud abandoned any notion of a "long war strategy" based on attrition. Reynaud entertained suggestions to expand the war to the Balkans or northern Europe; he was instrumental in launching the allied campaign in Norway, though it ended in failure. Britain's decision to withdraw on 26 April prompted Reynaud to travel to London to personally lobby the British to stand and fight in Norway.[8]
The Battle of France began less than two months after Reynaud came to office. France was badly mauled by the initial attack in early May 1940, and Paris was threatened. On 15 May, five days after the invasion began, Reynaud contacted his British counterpart and famously remarked, "We have been defeated... we are beaten; we have lost the battle.... The front is broken near Sedan." Charles de Gaulle, whom Reynaud had long supported and one of the few French commanders to have fought the Germans successfully in 1940, was promoted to brigadier general and named undersecretary of war.
Bibliography
World War II Magazine's WWII Day-By-Day Desk Diary
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