Charles de Gaulle
Charles de Gaulle
| Charles de Gaulle | |
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| 18th President of France Co-Prince of Andorra |
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| In office 8 January 1959 – 28 April 1969 |
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| Prime Minister | Michel Debré (1959–1961) Georges Pompidou (1962–1968) Maurice Couve de Murville (1968–1969) |
| Preceded by | René Coty |
| Succeeded by | Alain Poher (interim) Georges Pompidou |
| Leader of the Free French Forces | |
| In office 18 June 1940 – 3 July 1944 |
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| Preceded by | French Third Republic |
| Succeeded by | Provisional Government of the French Republic |
| President of the Provisional Government of the French Republic | |
| In office 20 August 1944 – 20 January 1946 |
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| Preceded by | Philippe Pétain (as chief of state of Vichy France) Pierre Laval (as chief of government) |
| Succeeded by | Félix Gouxin |
| Prime Minister of France | |
| In office 1 June 1958 – 8 January 1959 |
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| President | René Coty |
| Preceded by | Pierre Pflimlin |
| Succeeded by | Michel Debré |
| Minister of Defence | |
| In office 1 June 1958 – 8 January 1959 |
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| President | René Coty |
| Prime Minister | Charles de Gaulle |
| Preceded by | Pierre de Chevigné |
| Succeeded by | Pierre Guillaumat |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 22 November 1890 Lille, France |
| Died | 9 November 1970 (aged 79) Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, France |
| Political party | Rally of the French People (1947–1955) Union for the New Republic (1958–1968) Union of Democrats for the Republic (1968–1970) |
| Spouse(s) | Yvonne de Gaulle |
| Occupation | Military |
| Religion | Roman Catholic |
| Signature |  |
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle (English: /ˈtʃɑrlz/ or /ˈʃɑrl dəˈɡɔːl/; French: [ʃaʁl də ɡol] (
listen); 1890–1970) was a French general and statesman who led the Free French Forces during World War II. He later founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and served as its first President from 1959 to 1969.
A veteran of World War I, in the 1920s and 1930s de Gaulle came to the fore as a proponent of mobile armoured divisions, which he considered would become central in modern warfare. During World War II, he reached the temporary rank of Brigadier General, leading one of the few successful armoured counter-attacks during the 1940 Battle of France, and then briefly served in the French government as France was falling.
He escaped to Britain and gave a famous radio address, broadcast by the BBC on 18 June 1940, exhorting the French people to resist Nazi Germany and organised the Free French Forces with exiled French officers in Britain. As the war progressed de Gaulle gradually gained control of all French colonies except Indochina most of which had at first been controlled by the pro-German Vichy regime. Despite earning a reputation for being a difficult man to do business with, by the time of the Allied invasion of France in 1944 he was heading what amounted to a French government in exile, but although he insisted that France be treated as a great independent power by the other Allies, the Americans in particular remained deeply suspicious of his motives. De Gaulle became prime minister in the French Provisional Government, resigning in 1946 due to political conflicts.
After the war he founded his own political party, the RPF. Although he retired from politics in the early 1950s after the RPF's failure to win power, he was voted back to power as prime minister by the French Assembly during the May 1958 crisis. De Gaulle led the writing of a new constitution founding the Fifth Republic, and was elected President of France, an office which now held much greater power than in the Third and Fourth Republics.
As President, Charles de Gaulle ended the political chaos that preceded his return to power. A new French currency was issued in January 1960 to control inflation and industrial growth was promoted. Although he initially supported French rule over Algeria, he controversially decided to grant independence to that country, ending an expensive and unpopular war but leaving France divided and having to face down opposition from the white settlers and French military who had originally supported his return to power.
Immensely patriotic, de Gaulle and his supporters held the view, known as Gaullism, that France should continue to see itself as a major power and should not rely on other nations - like the US - for its national security and prosperity. Often critisised for his Politics of Grandeur, de Gaulle oversaw the development of French atomic weapons and promoted a foreign policy independent of U.S. and British influence. He withdrew France from NATO military command—although remaining a member of the western alliance—and twice vetoed Britain's entry into the European Community. He travelled widely in Eastern Europe and other parts of the world and recognised Communist China. On a visit to Canada he gave encouragement to Quebec Separatism.
During his term, de Gaulle also faced controversy and political opposition from Communists and Socialists. Despite having been re-elected as President, this time by direct popular ballot, in 1965, in May 1968 he appeared likely to lose power amidst widespread protests by students and workers, but survived the crisis with an increased majority in the Assembly. However, de Gaulle resigned after losing a referendum in 1969. He is considered by many to be the most influential leader in modern French history.
Early life and military career
De Gaulle was born in the industrial region of Lille in French Flanders, the third of five children of Henri de Gaulle, a professor of philosophy and literature at a Jesuit college, who eventually founded his own school. He was raised in a family of devout Roman Catholics who were nationalist and traditionalist, but also quite progressive.
De Gaulle's father came from a long line of aristocrats from Normandy and Burgundy, while his mother, Jeanne Maillot, descended from a family of rich entrepreneurs from Lille According to Henri, the family's true origin was never determined, but could have been Celtic. He thought that the name could be derived from the word gaule—a long pole which was used in the Middle Ages to beat olives from the trees. Another source has the name deriving from Galle, meaning "oak" in the Gaulish language, and the sacred tree of the druids.
De Gaulle was educated in Paris at the College Stanislas and also briefly in Belgium. Since childhood, he had displayed a keen interest in reading and studying history. Choosing a military career, de Gaulle spent four years studying and training at the elite military academy, Saint-Cyr. While there, and because of his height, high forehead, and nose, he acquired the nicknames of "the great asparagus". and "Cyrano".
He acquired yet another nickname, Le Connétable, when he was a prisoner of war in Germany during World War I. This had come about because of the talks which he gave to fellow prisoners on the progress of the conflict. These were delivered with such patriotic ardour and confidence in victory that they called him by the title which had been given to the commander-in-chief of the French army during the monarchy. Graduating from St Cyr in 1912, he joined the 33rd infantry regiment of the French Army, based at Arras and commanded by Colonel (and future Marshal) Philippe Pétain. De Gaulle's career would follow Pétain's for the next 20 years.
While serving during World War I, he reached the rank of captain, commanding a company, and was wounded several times. One wound in the left hand obliged him later to wear his wedding ring on his right hand. He was wounded again and captured at Douaumont in the Battle of Verdun in March 1916, one of the few survivors of his battalion.
While being held as a prisoner of war by the German Army, de Gaulle made five unsuccessful escape attempts and wrote his first book, co-written by Matthieu Butler, "L'Ennemi et le vrai ennemi" (The Enemy and the True Enemy), analysing the issues and divisions within the German Empire and its forces; the book was published in 1924. After the armistice, de Gaulle continued to serve in the army, and was with the staff of General Maxime Weygand's military mission to Poland as an instructor of Polish Infantry during its war with Communist Russia (1919–1921). He distinguished himself in operations near the River Zbrucz and won the highest Polish military decoration, the Virtuti Militari.
He was promoted to Commandant in the Polish Army and offered a further career in Poland, but chose instead to return to France, where he taught at the École Militaire. Although he was a protégé of his old commander, Marshal Philippe Pétain, De Gaulle believed in the use of tanks and rapid manoeuvres rather than trench warfare.
De Gaulle served with the Army of Occupation in the Rhineland in the mid 1920s. As a Commandant (Major) by the late 1920s, he briefly commanded a light infantry battalion at Treves and then served a tour of duty in Syria, then a French protectorate under a mandate from the League of Nations. During the 1930s, now a lieutenant-colonel, he served as a staff officer in France. In 1934 he wrote "Vers l’Armée de Métier" (Toward a Professional Army), which advocated a professional army based on mobile armoured divisions. Such an army would both compensate for the poor French demography, and be an efficient tool to enforce international law, particularly the Treaty of Versailles which forbade Germany from rearming. The book sold only 700 copies in France, where Pétain advocated an infantry-based, defensive army, but 7,000 copies in Germany, where it was read aloud to Adolf Hitler.
Second World War
The Battle of France
At the outbreak of World War II, de Gaulle was only a colonel, having antagonised the leaders of the military through the 1920s and 1930s with his bold views. Initially commanding a tank regiment in the French Fifth Army, de Gaulle implemented many of his theories and tactics for armoured warfare against an enemy whose strategies resembled his own. After the German breakthrough at Sedan on 15 May 1940 he was given command of the improvised 4th Armored Division.
On 17 May, de Gaulle attacked German tank forces at Montcornet with 200 tanks but no air support. Although de Gaulle's tanks forced the German infantry to retreat to Caumont the action brought only temporary relief and did little to slow the spearhead of the German advance. Nethertheless, it was one of the few successes the French enjoyed while suffering defeats elsewhere across the country, and as recognition for his efforts, De Gaulle was promoted to brigadier general, a rank he would hold for the rest of his life.
On 5 June, Prime Minister Paul Reynaud appointed him Under Secretary of State for National Defence and War and put him in charge of coordination with the United Kingdom.
As a junior member of the French government, he unsuccessfully opposed surrender, advocating instead that the government remove itself to North Africa and carry on the war as best it could from France's African colonies. While serving as a liaison with the British government, de Gaulle telephoned Paul Reynaud, the French prime minister, from London on 16 June informing him of the offer by Britain of a Declaration of Union. The declaration, inspired by Jean Monnet, would have merged France and the United Kingdom into one country, with a single government and army. The offer was a desperate, last-minute effort to strengthen the resolve of Reynaud's government; his cabinet's hostile reaction to the offer contributed to Reynaud's resignation.
In rejecting the proposal, Marshal Petain, believing that Germany would soon defeat Britain as well and who later went on to lead the collaborationist Vichy regime, told British Prime Minister Churchill that "in three weeks, England will have its neck wrung like a chicken" and that such a plan would be like "fusion with a corpse".
Returning the same day to Bordeaux, the temporary wartime capital, de Gaulle learned that Marshal Pétain had become prime minister and was planning to seek an armistice with Nazi Germany. De Gaulle and other allied officers rebelled against the new French government; on the morning of 17 June, de Gaulle and a few senior French officers flew to Britain with 100,000 gold francs in secret funds provided to him by the ex-prime minister Paul Reynaud. Narrowly escaping the Luftwaffe, he landed safely in London that afternoon.
Leader of the Free French
De Gaulle strongly denounced the French government's decision to seek armistice with the Nazis and set about building the Free French Forces from the soldiers and officers deployed outside France or who had fled France with him. On 18 June, de Gaulle delivered a famous radio address via the BBC Radio service. Although the British cabinet initially attempted to block the speech, they were overruled by Churchill.
De Gaulle's Appeal of 18 June exhorted the French people not to be demoralised and to continue to resist the occupation of France and work against the collaborationist Vichy regime, which had signed an armistice with Nazi Germany. Although the original speech could only be heard in a few parts of occupied France, de Gaulle's subsequent ones reached many parts of the territories under the Vichy regime, helping to rally the French resistance movement and earning him much popularity amongst the French people and soldiers. On 4 July 1940, a court-martial in Toulouse sentenced de Gaulle in absentia to four years in prison. At a second court-martial on 2 August 1940 de Gaulle was condemned to death for treason against the Vichy regime.
With British support, the de Gaulle family settled in Berkhamsted (36 miles northwest of London) from October 1941 to September 1942. He organised the Free French forces and gradually the Allies gave increasing support and recognition to de Gaulle's efforts. In dealings with his British allies and the United States, de Gaulle insisted at all times on retaining full freedom of action on behalf of France and he was constantly on the verge of being cut off by the Allies. Many denials of the deep and mutual antipathy between de Gaulle and political leaders of Anglo-American allies of the French are on historical record.
He harboured a suspicion of the British in particular, believing that they were surreptitiously seeking to steal France's colonial possessions in the Levant. A self-confessed lover of all things French, Winston Churchill was often frustrated at de Gaulle's patriotic egocentricity, but also wrote of his "immense admiration" for him during the early days of his British exile. Though their relationship later became strained, Churchill tried to explain the reasons for de Gaulle's behaviour in the 2nd volume of his history of WW2;
"He felt it was essential to his position before the French people that he should maintain a proud and haughty demeanour towards "perfidious Albion", although in exile, dependent upon our protection and dwelling in our midst. He had to be rude to the British to prove to French eyes that he was not a British puppet. He certainly carried out this policy with perseverance"
Clementine Churchill, who admired de Gaulle, once cautioned him, "General, you must not hate your friends more than you hate your enemies." De Gaulle himself stated famously, "France has no friends, only interests." The situation was nonetheless complex, and de Gaulle's mistrust of both British and U.S. intentions with regards to France was mirrored by a mistrust of the Free French among the U.S. political leadership, who for a long time refused to recognise de Gaulle as the representative of France, preferring to deal with representatives of the Vichy government. Roosevelt in particular hoped that it would be possible to wean Pétain away from Germany.
Working with the French resistance and other supporters in France's colonial African possessions after the Anglo-U.S. invasion of North Africa in November 1942, de Gaulle moved his headquarters to Algiers in May 1943. He became first joint head (with the less resolutely independent General Henri Giraud, the candidate preferred by the U.S. who wrongly suspected de Gaulle of being a British puppet) and then – after squeezing out Giraud by force of personality – sole chairman of the French Committee of National Liberation.
Preparations for D-Day
As preparations for the liberation of Europe gathered pace, the Americans in particular found de Gaulle's tendency to view everything from the French perspective to be extremely tiring. Roosevelt, who refused to recognise any provisional authority in France until elections had been held, considered de Gaulle to be a potential dictator, a view backed by a number of leading Frenchmen in Washington, including Jean Monnet, who later became an instrumental figure in the setting up of the European Coal and Steel Community that led to the modern EU. He also refused to allow Churchill to provide de Gaulle with strategic details of the imminent invasion because he did not trust him to keep the information to himself (this fear was later proved groundless). French codes were known to be weak, but because Gallic pride prevented the Free French from using British or American codes, this posed a major security risk.
Nevertheless, a few days before D-Day Churchill, whose relationship with the General had deteriorated since the days he first came to Britain, decided he needed to keep him more or less informed of developments, and on 2 June he sent two passenger aircraft and his representative, Duff Cooper to Algiers to bring de Gaulle back to Britain. De Gaulle refused because of Roosevelt's intention to install a provisional Allied military government in the former occupied territories pending elections, but he eventually relented and flew to Britain the next day.
Upon his arrival at RAF Northolt on 4 June 1944 he received an official welcome, and a letter reading "My dear general! welcome to these shores, very great military events are about to take place!" Later, on his personal train, Churchill informed him he wanted him to make a radio address, but during the general conversation which followed with others present he raised his (justified) concerns about the validity of the new currency to be circulated by the Allies after the liberation, and when informed that the Americans continued to refuse to recognise his legitimate right to form a provisional government, de Gaulle erupted in anger. De Gaulle was concerned at a general break down of civil order and of a potential communist takeover in the vacuum which might follow a German withdrawal of France.
Churchill then also lost his temper, saying that Britain could not act separately from America, and that under the circumstances, if they had to choose between France and the US, Britain would always choose the latter. De Gaulle replied that he realised that this would always be the case. The next day, de Gaulle refused to address the French nation because the script again made no mention of his being the legitimate interim ruler of France. It instructed the French people to obey Allied military authorities until elections could be held, and so the row continued, with de Gaulle calling Churchill a "gangster". Churchill in turn accused the general of treason in the height of battle, and demanded he be flown back to Algers "in chains if necessary".
In the years to come, the hostile dependent wartime relationship of de Gaulle and his future political peers re-enacted the historical national and colonial rivalry and lasting enmity between the French and English, and foreshadowed the deep distrust of France for post-war Anglo-American partnerships.
Return to France
Perhaps inevitably, de Gaulle ignored les Anglo-Saxons, and proclaimed the authority of the Free French Forces in France the next day. Under the leadership of General de Lattre de Tassigny, France fielded an entire army –a joint force of Free French together with French colonial troops from North Africa – on the western front. Initially landing as part of Operation Dragoon, in the south of France, the French First Army helped to liberate almost one third of the country and actively rejoined the Allies in the struggle against Germany. As the invasion slowly progressed and the Germans were pushed back, de Gaulle made preparations to return to France.
On 14 June he left Britain for France for what was supposed to be a one day trip. Despite an agreement that he would bring only two staff, he was accompanied by a large entourage with extensive luggage, and upon arrival made his way to the city of Bayeux, which he now proclaimed as the capital of Free France. Though a number of rural Normans remained mistrustful of him, he was warmly greeted by the local inhabitants, and although the official position of the supreme military command remained unchanged, local Allied officers found it more practical to deal with the fledgling administration in Bayeux in everyday matters
Of little strategic value, Paris was initially not high on the list of Allied objectives, but both de Gaulle and the commander of the 2nd Armoured Division, General Leclerc were concerned that a possible communist attempt to take over of the capital would plunge France into civil war. De Gaulle successfully lobbied for Paris to be made a priority for liberation on humanitarian grounds and obtained from Allied Supreme Commander General Eisenhower an agreement that French troops would be allowed to enter the capital first. A few days later, General Leclerc's French Armoured Division entered the city, and after a six days of fighting in which the resistance played a major part, the German garrison surrendered on 25 August.
It was fortunate for de Gaulle that the Germans had forcibly removed members of the Vichy government and taken them to Germany a few days earlier on 20 August; it allowed him to enter Paris as a liberator in the midst of the general euphoria, but there were serious concerns that communist elements of the resistance, which had done so much to clear the way for the military would try to seize the opportunity to proclaim their own 'Peoples' Government' in the capital. De Gaulle made contact with Leclerc and demanded the presence of the 2nd Armoured Division to accompany him on a massed parade down the Champs Elysees, 'as much for prestige as for security'
As his procession came along the Place de Concorde it came under machine gun fire by Vichy militia and fifth columnists who were unable to give themselves up. Later, on entering the cathedral at Notre Dame to be received as head of the provisional government by the Committee of Liberation, loud shots broke out again, and General Leclerc and Koenig tried to hustle De Gaulle through the door, but De Gaulle shook off their hands and never faltered. While the battle began outside, he walked slowly down the aisle. Before he had gone far a machine pistol fired down from above, at least two more joined in, and from below the F.F.I, and police fired back. A BBC correspondent who was present reported;
“…the General is being presented to the people. He is being received…they have opened fire!… firing started all over the place. . . . that was one of the most dramatic scenes I have ever seen. . . . General de Gaulle walked straight ahead into what appeared to me to be a hail of fire. . . . but he went straight ahead without hesitation, his shoulders flung back, and walked right down the centre aisle, even while the bullets were pouring about him. It was the most extraordinary example of courage I have ever seen. . . . there were bangs, flashes all about him, yet he seemed to have an absolutely charmed life."
Later, in the great hall of the Hotel de Ville, de Gaulle was greeted by a jubilant crowd and delivered a characteristically Franco-centric proclamation;
"Paris outraged, Paris broken, Paris martyred, but Paris liberated! By herself, liberated by her people, with the help of the whole of France! We will not rest until we march, as we must, into enemy territory as conquerors. France has a right to be in the first line among the great nations who are going to organize the peace and the life of the world. She has a right to be heard in all four corners of the world. France is a great world power. She knows it and will act so that others may know it"
A few days later de Gaulle, still unsure of the trend of events in Paris, asked General Eisenhower to send some American troops into Paris as a show of strength. This he did 'not without some satisfaction', and the 28th Infantry Division paraded down the Champs Elysees on 29 August.
"Speech made by General de Gaulle at the Hotel de Ville in Paris on August 25th 1944". Fondation Charles de Gaulle. 2008. http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=514. Retrieved 2 November 2008.</ref>
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Speech by Charles de Gaulle.
Speech by Charles de Gaulle after the liberation of Paris, August 1944.
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The same day, Washington and London bowed to the inevitable and finally came to an agreement to accept the position of the Free French. The following day General Eisenhower gave his de facto blessing with a visit to the General in Paris.
President of France 1944–1946
Proclaiming the continuity of the Third Republic, De Gaulle took up residence in his old office at the War Ministry and served as President of the Provisional Government of the French Republic from September 1944.
He sent the French Far East Expeditionary Corps to re-establish French sovereignty in French Indochina in 1945, making Admiral d'Argenlieu High commissioner of French Indochina and General Leclerc commander-in-chief in French Indochina and commander of the expeditionary corps. On a visit to Russia for talks with Stalin at the end of 1944, he demonstrated that despite all that had happened, he retained great respect for the Germans. While visiting the battlefield at Stalingrad with Molotov, he stood for a long time before the incredible destruction before saying sombrely "Un grand peuple, les Allemands".
The French First Army captured a large section of territory in southern Germany after the Rhine crossings, thus enabling France—despite Russian objections—to be an active participant in the signing of the German surrender. At the Yalta conference in February 1945, Churchill and Roosevelt insisted that Stalin allow a French post-war zone of occupation be created in Germany, but because he was not invited to the conference, de Gaulle perceived this as a slight on his personal esteem. One commentator said that Yalta was "the lump that stuck in the back of de Gaulle’s throat".[page needed]
As the war neared its end, the nation was forced to confront the reality of what had happened under German rule. In France, collaborators were more severely punished than in most other occupied countries; in addition to the estimated 4500 summarily killed by partisans, almost 2000 people received the death sentence from the courts, including Pierre Laval, a key member of the hated Vichy administration.
With the pre-war leaders discredited, the communists became a major political force with over a million members, but de Gaulle refused to grant them any key positions in his cabinet because of their connections with Russia, although he did pardon their leader, Maurice Thorez, who had been sentenced to death in absentia by the Vichy government. De Gaulle found dealing with the "regime of parties" frustrating; one of his ministers described him as "A man equally incapable of monopolizing power and of sharing it". In October 1945, elections were held for a new Constituent Assembly whose main task was to write a constitution for the Fourth Republic. Three parties, the Communists, Socialists and Republican MRP won 75% of the vote and all wanted to deprive the President of most of his powers.
De Gaulle resigned from the provisional government on 20 January 1946; he favoured a strong executive for the nation and disapproved of the draft constitution for the Fourth Republic, which he believed placed too much power in the hands of a parliament with its shifting party alliances. He was succeeded by Félix Gouin (French Section of the Workers' International, SFIO), then Georges Bidault (Popular Republican Movement, MRP) and finally Léon Blum (SFIO). The move was called "a bold and ultimately foolish political ploy", with de Gaulle hoping that as a war hero, he would be soon brought back as a more powerful executive by the French people. However, that did not turn out to be the case.
1946–58: Out of power
De Gaulle's opposition to the proposed constitution failed as the parties of the left supported a parliamentary regime. The second draft constitution narrowly approved at the referendum of October 1946 was even less to de Gaulle's liking than the first. He then returned to his home at Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises to write his war memoirs.
In April 1947 de Gaulle made a renewed attempt to transform the political scene by creating a Rassemblement du Peuple Français (Rally of the French People, or RPF), which he hoped would be able to move above the familiar party squabbles of the parliamentary system. Despite taking 40% of vote in local elections and 121 seats in 1951, lacking its own press and access to television, support for the new party ebbed away. In May 1953, he withdrew again from active politics, though the RPF lingered until September 1955.
He once more retired to his country home to continue his war memoirs, Mémoires de guerre. The famous opening paragraph of this work begins by declaring, "All my life, I have had a certain idea of France (une certaine idée de la France)", comparing his country to an old painting of a Madonna, and ends by declaring that, given the divisive nature of French politics, France cannot truly live up to this ideal without a policy of "grandeur" (roughly "greatness"). During this period of formal retirement, however, de Gaulle maintained regular contact with past political lieutenants from wartime and RPF days, including sympathisers involved in political developments in French Algeria, becoming "perhaps the best-informed man in France".
Between 1946 and 1958 there were no less than 24 separate ministries. The president retained relatively little real executive power, and manoeverings among various radical and socialist groups in the Assembly led to the government being repeatedly overthrown. Governments were so short lived that they achieved little, and the politics of the 4th Republic began to show the same characteristics of the 3rd Republic. Endlessly frustrated by the devisiveness of the Fourth Republic, de Gaulle famously asked; how can you govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?
The public showed their frustration with a marked shift of suppport towards the extreme right, particularly the Poujadists, a far right party who championed the cause of shopkeepers, farmers and other small businesses who were concerned at increased taxes and price controls brought in to try to kerb inflation. Led by Pierre Poujade, the party were anti semitic, anti American and imperialist, but won 2.6 million votes in 1956, giving them 52 seats.
1958: Collapse of the Fourth Republic
The Fourth Republic was tainted by political instability, failures in Indochina and inability to resolve the Algerian question. It did, however, pass the 1956 loi-cadre Deferre which granted independence to Tunisia and Morocco, while the Premier Pierre Mendès-France put an end to the Indochina War through the Geneva Conference of 1954. Under Guy Mollet, while he survived the 1956 Suez Crisis, French prestige suffered a humiliating defeat with the forced withdrawal from Egypt under international pressure.
On 13 May 1958, settlers seized the government buildings in Algiers, attacking what they saw as French government weakness in the face of demands among the Arab majority for Algerian independence. A "Committee of Civil and Army Public Security" was created under the presidency of General Jacques Massu, a Gaullist sympathiser. General Raoul Salan, Commander-in-Chief in Algeria, announced on radio that he was assuming provisional power, and appealed for "confidence in the Army and its leaders".
Under the pressure of Massu, Salan declared Vive de Gaulle! from the balcony of the Algiers Government-General building on 15 May. De Gaulle answered two days later that he was ready to "assume the powers of the Republic". Many worried as they saw this answer as support for the army.
At a 19 May press conference, de Gaulle asserted again that he was at the disposal of the country. As a journalist expressed the concerns of some who feared that he would violate civil liberties, de Gaulle retorted vehemently:
Have I ever done that? On the contrary, I have re-established them when they had disappeared. Who honestly believes that, at age 67, I would start a career as a dictator?
A constitutionalist by conviction, he maintained throughout the crisis that he would accept power only from the lawfully constituted authorities. De Gaulle did not wish to repeat the difficulty the Free French movement experienced in establishing legitimacy as the rightful government. He told an aide that the rebel generals "will not find De Gaulle in their baggage".
The crisis deepened as French paratroops from Algeria seized Corsica and a landing near Paris was discussed (Operation Resurrection). Political leaders on many sides agreed to support the General's return to power, except François Mitterrand, Pierre Mendès-France, Alain Savary, the Communist Party, and certain other leftists. On 29 May the French President, René Coty, appealed to the "most illustrious of Frenchmen" to confer with him and to examine what was immediately necessary for the creation of a government of national safety, and what could be done to bring about a profound reform of the country's institutions.
De Gaulle remained intent on replacing the constitution of the Fourth Republic, which he blamed for France's political weakness. He set as conditions for his return that he be given wide emergency powers for six months and that a new constitution be proposed to the French people. On 1 June 1958, de Gaulle became Premier and was given emergency powers for six months by the National Assembly, fulfilling his desire for parliamentary legitimacy.
On 28 September 1958, a referendum took place and 79.2 percent of those who voted supported the new constitution and the creation of the Fifth Republic. The colonies (Algeria was officially a part of France, not a colony) were given the choice between immediate independence and the new constitution. All African colonies voted for the new constitution and the replacement of the French Union by the French Community, except Guinea, which thus became the first French African colony to gain independence, at the cost of the immediate ending of all French assistance.
According to de Gaulle, the head of state should represent "the spirit of the nation" to the nation itself and to the world: "une certaine idée de la France" (a certain idea of France).
1958–62: Founding of the Fifth Republic
In the November 1958 elections, de Gaulle and his supporters (initially organised in the Union pour la Nouvelle République-Union Démocratique du Travail, then the Union des Démocrates pour la Vème République, and later still the Union des Démocrates pour la République, UDR) won a comfortable majority. In December, de Gaulle was elected President by the electoral college with 78% of the vote, and inaugurated in January 1959.
He oversaw tough economic measures to revitalise the country, including the issuing of a new franc (worth 100 old francs). Internationally, he rebuffed both the United States and the Soviet Union, pushing for an independent France with its own nuclear weapons, and strongly encouraged a "Free Europe", believing that a confederation of all European nations would restore the past glories of the great European empires.
He set about building Franco-German cooperation as the cornerstone of the European Economic Community (EEC), paying the first state visit to Germany by a French head of state since Napoleon. In January 1963, Germany and France signed a treaty of friendship, the Élysée Treaty. France also reduced its dollar reserves, trading them for gold from the U.S. government, thereby reducing the US' economic influence abroad.
On 23 November 1959, in a speech in Strasbourg, de Gaulle announced his vision for Europe:
Oui, c’est l’Europe, depuis l’Atlantique jusqu’à l’Oural, c’est toute l’Europe, qui décidera du destin du monde.("Yes, it is Europe, from the Atlantic to the Urals, it is the whole of Europe, that will decide the destiny of the world.")
His expression, "Europe, from the Atlantic to the Urals", has often been cited throughout the history of European integration. It became, for the next ten years, a favourite political rallying cry of de Gaulle's. His vision stood in contrast to the Atlanticism of the United States and Britain, preferring instead a Europe that would act as a third pole between the United States and the Soviet Union. By including in his ideal of Europe all the territory up to the Urals, de Gaulle was implicitly offering détente to the Soviets, while his phrase was also interpreted as excluding the United Kingdom from a future Europe.
Algeria
Upon becoming president, de Gaulle was faced with the urgent task of finding a way to bring to an end the bloody and divisive war in Algeria. French left-wingers were in favour of granting independence to Algeria and urged him to seek a way to achieve peace while, at the same time, avoiding a French loss of face. Although the military's near-coup had contributed to his return to power, de Gaulle soon ordered all officers to quit the rebellious Committees of Public Safety. Such actions greatly angered the French settlers and their military supporters, whom de Gaulle had manipulated to believe that he supported them.
He was forced to suppress two uprisings in Algeria by French settlers and troops, in the second of which (the Generals' Putsch in April 1961) France herself was again threatened with invasion by rebel paratroops. De Gaulle's government also covered up the Paris massacre of 1961, issued under the orders of the police prefect Maurice Papon. He was also targeted by the settlers' resistance group Organisation de l'armée secrète (OAS) and several assassination attempts were made on him; the most famous is that of 22 August 1962, when he and his wife narrowly escaped an assassination attempt when their Citroën DS was targeted by machine gun fire arranged by Colonel Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry at Petit-Clamart.
After a referendum on Algerian self-determination carried out in 1961, de Gaulle arranged a cease-fire in Algeria with the March 1962 Evian Accords, legitimated by another referendum a month later. Although the Algerian issue was settled, Prime Minister Michel Debré resigned over the final settlement and was replaced with Georges Pompidou on 14 April 1962. France recognised Algerian independence on 3 July 1962, while an amnesty was belatedly issued covering all crimes committed during the war, including the genocide against the Harkis. In just a few months in 1962, 900,000 French settlers left the country. After 5 July, the exodus accelerated in the wake of the French deaths during the Oran massacre of 1962. It had now become clear that the Evian Accords would not be enforced and that the French government had no intention of protecting the settlers.
Direct presidential elections
In September 1962, de Gaulle sought a constitutional amendment to allow the president to be directly elected by the people and issued another referendum to this end. After a motion of censure voted by the Parliament on 4 October 1962, de Gaulle dissolved the National Assembly and held new elections. Although the left progressed, the Gaullists won an increased majority—this despite opposition from the Christian democratic Popular Republican Movement (MRP) and the National Centre of Independents and Peasants (CNIP) who criticised de Gaulle's euroscepticism and presidentialism.
De Gaulle's proposal to change the election procedure for the French presidency was approved at the referendum on 28 October 1962 by more than three-fifths of voters despite a broad "coalition of no" formed by most of the parties, opposed to a presidential regime. Thereafter the President was to be elected by direct universal suffrage for the first time since Louis Napoleon in 1848.
1962–68: Politics of grandeur
With the Algerian conflict behind him, de Gaulle was able to achieve his two main objectives: to reform and develop the French economy, and to promote an independent foreign policy and a strong stance on the international stage. This was named by foreign observers the "politics of grandeur" (politique de grandeur). See Gaullism.
"Thirty glorious years"
In the immediate post war years France was in a bad way; wages remained at around half prewar levels, the winter of 1946-1947 did extensive damage to crops - leading to a reduction in the bread ration, hunger and disease remained rife and the black market continued to flourish. Germany was in an even worse position but after 1948 things began to improve dramatically with the introduction of Marshall Aid - large scale American financial assistance given to help rebuild European economies and infrastructure. This laid the foundations of a meticulously planned programme of investment in energy, transport and heavy industry, overseen by the government of prime minister Georges Pompidou.
In the context of a population boom unseen in France since the 18th century, the government intervened heavily in the economy, using dirigisme— a unique combination of capitalism and state-directed economy — with indicative five-year plans as its main tool. This brought about a rapid transformation and expansion of the French economy.
High-profile projects, mostly but not always financially successful, were launched: the extension of Marseille harbour (soon ranking third in Europe and first in the Mediterranean); the promotion of the Caravelle passenger jetliner (a predecessor of Airbus); the decision to start building the supersonic Franco-British Concorde airliner in Toulouse; the expansion of the French auto industry with state-owned Renault at its centre; and the building of the first motorways between Paris and the provinces.
With these projects, the French economy recorded growth rates unrivalled since the 19th century. In 1964, for the first time in nearly 100 years France's GDP overtook that of the United Kingdom, a position it held until the 1990s. This period is still remembered in France with some nostalgia as the peak of the Trente Glorieuses ("Thirty Glorious Years" of economic growth between 1945 and 1974).
Fourth nuclear power
During his first tenure as President, de Gaulle became enthusiastic about the possibilities of nuclear power. France had carried out important work in the early development of atomic energy and in October 1945 he established the French Atomic Energy Commission (Commissariat a l'Energie Atomique, (CEA) responsible for all scientific, commercial, and military uses of nuclear energy. However, partly due to communist influences in government who opposed proliferation, research stalled, and France was excluded from American, British, and Canadian nuclear efforts.
By October 1952 Britain became the third country - after America and the Soviet Union - to independently test and develop nuclear weapons. This gave Britain the capability to launch a nuclear strike via its Vulcan bomber force and it began developing its own ballistic missile programme known as Blue Streak.
As early as April 1954 while out of power, de Gaulle had proposed that France should also have its own nuclear weapons; at the time nuclear weapons were seen as a national status symbol and a way of maintaining international prestige with a place at the ‘Top Table’ of the United Nations. Full-scale research began again in late 1954 when Prime Minister Pierre Mendes-France authorized a plan to develop the atomic bomb; large deposits of uranium had been discovered near Limoges, in central France, providing the researchers with an unrestricted supply of nuclear fuel. France's independent force de frappe (strike force) came into being soon after de Gaulle’s election with his authorisation for the first nuclear test.
With the cancellation of Blue Streak, the US agreed to supply Britain with its Skybolt and later Polaris weapons systems, and in 1958 the two nations signed the Mutual Defence Agreement forging close links which have seen the US and UK cooperate on nuclear security matters ever since. Although at the time it was still a full member of NATO, France proceeded to develop its own independent nuclear technologies - this would enable it to become a partner in any reprisals and would give it a voice in matters of atomic control.
Six years later, on 13 February 1960, France became the world's fourth nuclear power when an extremely high powered nuclear device was exploded in the Sahara some 700 miles south-south-west of Algiers. In August 1963 France decided against signing the Partial Test Ban Treaty designed to slow the arms race because it would have prohibited her from testing nuclear weapons above ground. France continued to carry out tests at the Algerian site until 1966, despite the independence of Algeria in 1962. France's testing program then moved to the Mururoa and Fangataufa Atolls in the South Pacific.
In November 1967, an article by the French Chief of the General Staff (but inspired by de Gaulle) in the Revue de la Défense Nationale caused international consternation. It was stated that French nuclear force should be capable of firing "in all directions" – thus including even America as a target. This surprising statement was intended as a declaration of French national independence, and was in retaliation to a warning issued long ago by Dean Rusk that US missiles would be aimed at France if it attempted to employ atomic weapons outside an agreed plan. However, criticism of de Gaulle was growing over his tendency to act alone with little regard for the views of others. In August, concern over de Gaulle's policies had been voiced by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing when he queried ‘the solitary exercise of power’.
NATO
With the onset of the Cold War and the perceived threat of invasion from the Soviet Union and the countries of the eastern bloc, America, Canada and the other western European countries set up the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) to co-ordinate a military response to any possible attack. France played a key role during the early days of the organisation, providing a large military contingent and agreeing - after much soul-searching - to the participation of West German forces. But after his election in 1958 Charles de Gaulle took the view that the organisation was too dominated by the US and UK, and that with its problems in Vietnam, America would not fulfil its promise to defend Europe in the event of a Russian invasion.
De Gaulle demanded political parity with Britain and America in NATO, and for its geographic coverage to be extended to include French territories abroad, including Algeria, then experiencing civil war. This was not forthcoming, and so in March 1959 France, citing the need for it to maintain its own independent military strategy, withdrew its Mediterranean fleet from NATO, and a few months later de Gaulle demanded the removal of all US nuclear weapons from French territory.
In 1964 de Gaulle visited Russia, where he hoped to establish France as an alternative influence in the Cold War. Later, he proclaimed a new alliance between the nations, but although the Soviet statesman Alexei Kosygin made a return visit to France, the Russians did not accept France as a super power, knowing that in any future conflict they would have to rely on the overall protection of the Western Alliance.In 1965, de Gaulle pulled France out of SEATO, the Southeast Asian equivelent of NATO and refused to participate in any future NATO manoeuvres.
In February 1966, France withdrew from NATO military command, but remained within the organisation. However, secret protocols were agreed whereby French forces could quickly be re-integrated into NATO command, demonstrating that the move was little more that a symbolic show of defiance to America and Britain. De Gaulle, haunted by the memories of 1940, wanted France to remain the master of the decisions affecting it, unlike in the 1930s, when it had to follow in step with its British ally. He also declared that all foreign military forces had to leave French territory and gave them one year to redeploy. This latter action was particularly badly received in the US, prompting Dean Rusk, the US Secretary of State to ask de Gaulle if the cemeteries containing the 50,000 American war dead from the two world wars were also to be removed.
EEC
Despite its success in the war, Britain experienced a difficult time in the post war world. While France and other European countries were enjoying booming economies, Britain experienced high inflation, stagnant growth and poor labour relations. A number of her important colonial possessions - not least India and Palestine - quickly gained independence, and following the Suez Crisis, where Britain and France unsuccessfully sought to prevent the Egyptians from nationalalising the Suez Canal, Britain struggled to adjust to its reduced world position. The US Secretary of State Dean Acheson commented that Britain had "lost an empire and had not yet found a role"
France meanwhile, experiencing the disintegration of her own empire and severe problems in Algeria, turned towards Europe after Suez, and to Germany in particular. In the years after, the economies of both nations came together and they became leading partners in the drive towards European unity.
One of the conditions of Marshall Aid was that the nation’s leaders must get together to co-ordinate economic efforts and to pool the supply of raw materials. By far the most critical commodities in driving growth were coal and steel. France assumed it would receive large amounts of high quality German coal from the Ruhr as reparations for the war, but America refused to allow this, fearing it could lead to a repeat of the renewed bitterness after the Treaty of Versailles which partly caused World War 2.
Under the inspiration of the French statesmen Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman, together with the German leader Konrad Adenauer, the rift between the two nations had begun to heal and along with Italy and the Benelux countries, they formed the European Coal and Steel Community, which following the Treaty of Rome of 1957 became the European Economic Community, also known as the Common Market, beginning around the same time as de Gaulle's presidency. Though he had not been instrumental in setting up the new organisation, de Gaulle spoke enthusiastically of his vision of "an imposing confederation" of European states and of formulating a common European foreign policy.
De Gaulle, who in spite of recent history admired Germany and spoke excellent German in contrast to his poor, mumbling English,[page needed] established a good relationship with the ageing West Germany Chancellor Konrad Adenauer - culminating in the Elysee Treaty in 1963 - and in the first few years of the Common Market, France's industrial exports to the other five members tripled and its farm export almost quadrupled. The franc became a solid, stable currency for the first time in half a century, and the economy mostly boomed. Adenauer however, all too aware of the importance of American support in Europe, gently distanced himself from the general’s more extreme ideas, wanting no suggestion that any new European community would in any sense challenge or set itself at odds with the U.S. In Adenauer's eyes, the support of the U.S. was more important than any question of European prestige. Adenauer was also anxious to reassure Britain that nothing was being done behind her back and was quick to inform the Prime Minister Harold McMillan of any new developments.
Great Britain initially declined to join the Common Market, preferring to remain with another organisation known as the European Free Trade Area, mostly consisting of the northern European countries and Portugal. By the late nineteen fifties German and French living standards began to exceed those in Britain, and the government of Harold Macmillan, realising that the EEC was a stronger trading bloc than EFTA, began negotiations to join.
De Gaulle vetoed the British application to join the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1963, famously uttering the single word 'non' into the television cameras at the critical moment, a statement used to sum up French opposition and belligerence towards Britain for many years afterwards. MacMillan said afterwards that he always believed that de Gaulle would prevent Britain joining, but thought he would do it quietly, behind the scenes. He later complained privately that "all our plans are in tatters"
One reason given for de Gaulle's refusal was the recent American agreement to supply Britain with the Skybolt nuclear missile. He did it, he said, because he thought the United Kingdom lacked the necessary political will to be part of a strong Europe. He further saw Britain as a "Trojan Horse" for the USA. He maintained there were incompatibilities between continental European and British economic interests. In addition, he demanded that the United Kingdom accept all the conditions laid down by the six existing members of the EEC (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands) and revoke its commitments to countries within its own free trade area (which France had not done with its own). He supported a deepening and an acceleration of common market integration rather than an expansion.
However, in this latter respect, a detailed study of the formative years of the EEC argues that the defence of French economic interests, especially in agriculture, in fact played a more dominant role in determining de Gaulle's stance towards British entry than the various political and foreign policy considerations that have often been cited. The General's attitude was also influenced by resentments which had come about during his exile in Britain during the Second World War.
Dean Acheson believed that Britain made a grave error in not signing up to the European idea right from the start, and that they continued to suffer the political consequences for at least two decades afterwards. However he also stated his belief that de Gaulle used the 'Common Market' (as it was then termed) as an "exclusionary device to direct European trade towards the interest of France and against that of the United states, Britain and other countries."
Claiming continental European solidarity, de Gaulle again rejected British entry when they next applied to join the community in December 1967 under the Labour leadership of Harold Wilson. During negotiations, de Gaulle chided Britain for relying too much on the Americans, saying that sooner or later they would always do what was in their best interests. Wilson said he then gently raised the spectre of the threat of a newly powerful Germany as a result of the EEC, which de Gaulle agreed was a risk. The veto on British entry made de Gaulle unpopular in Ireland since it was clear that for economic reasons Ireland would be excluded from the EEC as long as Britain remained outside.
After de Gaulle left office the United Kingdom applied again and finally became a member of the EEC in January 1973. Britain had to give up its exclusive rights to the fishing grounds around its island however, the catch being pooled with other nations as part of the Common Fisheries Policy. It also caused great anger in Australia and New Zealand, who lost important trading markets, among them exports of lamb. Britain continued to feel it received a poor deal from Europe for many years, however. In 1984 then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, went to Brussels and through hard bargaining managed to obtain for Britain a £6 billion per year rebate on the basis that Britain paid a disproportionately high financial contribution in relation to what it received back from the EEC e.g. development grants, farming subsidies through the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
Recognition of the People's Republic of China
De Gaulle was convinced that a strong and independent France could act as a balancing force between the United States and the Soviet Union, a policy seen as little more than posturing and opportunism by his critics, particularly in Britain and the United States, to which France was formally allied. In January 1964, France established diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC)—the first step towards formal recognition. This was done without first severing links with the Republic of China (Taiwan), led by Chiang Kai-shek. Hitherto the PRC had insisted that all nations abide by a "one China" condition, and at first it was unclear how the matter would be settled. However, the agreement to exchange ambassadors was subject to a delay of three months and in February, Chiang Kai-shek resolved the problem by cutting off diplomatic relations with France. Eight years later U.S. President Richard Nixon visited the PRC and began normalising relations – a policy which was confirmed in the Shanghai Communiqué of 28 February 1972.
As part of a European tour, Nixon visited France in 1969. He and de Gaulle both shared the same non-Wilsonian approach to world affairs, believing in nations and their relative strengths, rather than in ideologies, international organisations, or multilateral agreements. De Gaulle is famously known for calling the UN the pejorative "le Machin" ("the thingamajig.")
Visit to Latin America
In September and October 1964, despite a recent operation for prostate cancer and fears for his security, he set out on a punishing 20,000-mile tour of all ten republics in Latin America. He had visited Mexico the previous year and spoke, in Spanish, to the Mexican people on the eve of their celebrations of their independence at the Palacio Nacional in Mexico City. During his visit, he was again keen to show the French flag and gain both cultural and economic influence in this new 26-day tour. He spoke constantly of his resentment of US influence (hegemony) in Latin America – "that some states should establish a power of political or economic direction outside their own borders". Yet France could provide no investment or aid to match that from Washington.
Second term
In December 1965, de Gaulle returned as president for a second seven-year term, but this time he had to go through a second round of voting in which he defeated François Mitterrand, who did far better than anyone dreamed possible, gaining 45% of the vote. In September 1966, in a famous speech in Phnom Penh (Cambodia), he expressed France's disapproval of the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, calling for a U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam as the only way to ensure peace. As the Vietnam War had its roots in the previous Indochina War, in which the United States had provided France with aid, this speech did little to endear de Gaulle to the Americans[who?], even if their leaders later came to the same conclusion. He later visited Guadeloupe, in the aftermath of Hurricane Inez for 2 days, bringing aid which totalled billions of francs.
Empty Chair Crisis
During the establishment of the European Community, de Gaulle helped precipitate one of the greatest crises in the history of the EC, the Empty Chair Crisis. It involved the financing of the Common Agricultural Policy, but almost more importantly the use of qualified majority voting in the EC (as opposed to unanimity). In June 1965, after France and the other five members could not agree, de Gaulle withdrew France's representatives from the EC. Their absence left the organisation essentially unable to run its affairs until the Luxembourg compromise was reached in January 1966. De Gaulle succeeded in influencing the decision-making mechanism written into the Treaty of Rome by insisting on solidarity founded on mutual understanding. He vetoed Britain's entry into the EEC a second time, in June 1967.
Six-Day War
With tension rising in the Middle East in 1967, de Gaulle on 2 June declared an arms embargo against Israel, just three days before the outbreak of the Six-Day War. This, however, did not affect spare parts for the French military hardware with which the Israeli armed forces were equipped.
This was an abrupt change in policy. In 1956 France, Britain, and Israel had cooperated in an elaborate effort to retake the Suez Canal from Egypt. Israel's air force operated French Mirage and Mystère jets in the Six-Day War, and its navy was building its new missile boats in Cherbourg. Though paid for, their transfer to Israel was now blocked by de Gaulle's government. But they were smuggled out in an operation that drew further denunciations from the French government. The last boats took to the sea in December 1969, directly after a major deal between France and now-independent Algeria exchanging French armaments for Algerian oil.
Under de Gaulle, following the independence of Algeria, France embarked on foreign policy more favourable to the Arab side. General de Gaulle's position in 1967 at the time of the Six Day War played a part in France's newfound popularity in the Arab world. Israel turned towards the United States for arms, and toward its own industry.
In a televised news conference on 27 November 1967, de Gaulle described the Jewish people as "this elite people, sure of themselves and domineering". In his letter to David Ben-Gurion dated 9 January 1968, he explained that he was convinced that Israel had ignored his warnings and overstepped the bounds of moderation by taking possession of Jerusalem, and so much Jordanian, Egyptian, and Syrian territory by force of arms. He felt Israel had exercised repression and expulsions during the occupation and that it amounted to annexation. He said that provided Israel withdrew her forces, it appeared that it might be possible to reach a solution through the UN framework which could include assurances of a dignified and fair future for refugees and minorities in the Middle East, recognition from Israel's neighbors, and freedom of navigation through the Gulf of Aqaba and the Suez Canal.
Nigerian Civil War
The Eastern Region of Nigeria declared itself independent under the name of The Independent Republic of Biafra on 30 May 1967. On 6 July the first shots in the Nigerian civil war were fired, marking the start of a conflict would last until January 1970. Britain provided military aid to the Federal Republic of Nigeria—yet more was made available by the Soviet Union. Under de Gaulle's leadership, France embarked on a period of interference outside the traditional French zone of influence. A policy geared toward the break-up of Nigeria put Britain and France into opposing camps. Relations between France and Nigeria had been under strain since the third French nuclear explosion in the Sahara in December 1960. From August 1968, when its embargo was lifted, France provided limited and covert support to the breakaway province. Although French arms helped to keep Biafra in action for the final 15 months of the civil war, its involvement was seen as insufficient and counterproductive. The Biafran Chief of Staff stated that the French "did more harm than good by raising false hopes and by providing the British with an excuse to reinforce Nigeria."
Vive le Québec libre!
In July 1967, de Gaulle visited Canada, which was celebrating its centennial with a world fair in Montreal, Expo 67. On 24 July, speaking to a large crowd from a balcony at Montreal's city hall, de Gaulle shouted Vive le Québec! (Long live Quebec!) then added, Vive le Québec libre! (Long live Free Quebec!). The Canadian media harshly criticised the statement, and the Prime Minister of Canada, Lester B. Pearson stated that "Canadians do not need to be liberated." De Gaulle left Canada abruptly two days later, without proceeding to Ottawa as scheduled. He never returned to Canada. The speech caused offence in most of Canada; it led to a significant diplomatic rift between the two countries. However, the event was seen as a watershed moment by the Quebec sovereignty movement.
In the following year, de Gaulle visited Brittany, where he declaimed a poem written by his uncle (also called Charles de Gaulle) in the Breton language. The speech followed a series of crackdowns on Breton nationalism. De Gaulle was accused of hypocrisy, on the one hand supporting a "free" Quebec because of linguistic and ethnic differences from other Canadians, while on the other supposedly "oppressing" a regional and ethnic nationalist movement in Brittany.
May 1968
De Gaulle's government was criticised within France, particularly for its heavy-handed style. While the written press and elections were free, and private stations such as Europe 1 were able to broadcast in French from abroad, the state's ORTF had a monopoly on television and radio. This monopoly meant that the executive was in a position to bias the news. In many respects, society was traditionalistic and repressive, including the position of women. Many factors contributed to a general weariness of sections of the public, particularly the student youth, which led to the events of May 1968.
The huge demonstrations and strikes in France in May 1968 severely challenged de Gaulle's legitimacy. He and other government leaders feared that the country was on the brink of revolution or civil war. On 29 May de Gaulle disappeared without notifying Prime Minister Pompidou or anyone else in the government, stunning the country. He fled to Baden-Baden, Germany to meet with General Massu, now head of the French military there, to discuss possible army intervention against the protesters. De Gaulle returned to France after being assured of the military's support.
In a private meeting discussing the students' and workers' demands for direct participation in business and government he coined the phrase "La réforme oui, la chienlit non", which can be politely translated as 'reform yes, masquerade/chaos no.' It was a vernacular scatological pun meaning 'chie-en-lit, no' (crap-in-bed, no). The term is now common parlance in French political commentary, used both critically and ironically referring back to de Gaulle.
But de Gaulle offered to accept some of the reforms the demonstrators sought. He again considered a referendum to support his moves, but on 30 May Pompidou persuaded him to dissolve parliament (in which the government had all but lost its majority in the March 1967 elections) and hold new elections instead. The June 1968 elections were a major success for the Gaullists and their allies; when shown the spectre of revolution or civil war, the majority of the country rallied to him. His party won 352 of 487 seats, but de Gaulle remained personally unpopular; a survey conducted immediately after the crisis showed that a majority of the country saw him as too old, too self-centred, too authoritarian, too conservative, and too anti-American.
Retirement
Charles de Gaulle resigned the presidency at noon, 28 April 1969, following the rejection of his proposed reform of the Senate and local governments in a nationwide referendum. De Gaulle vowed that if the referendum failed, he would resign his office. Despite an eight-minute-long speech by de Gaulle, the referendum failed and he duly resigned, whereupon he was replaced by Georges Pompidou.
De Gaulle retired once again to his beloved nine-acre country estate, La Boisserie (the woodland glade), in Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, 120 miles southeast of Paris. There the General, who often described old age as a "shipwreck," continued his memoirs, dictated to his secretary from notes. To visitors, de Gaulle said: "I will finish three books, if God grants me life" 'The Renewal', the first of 3 planned volumes to be called Memoirs of Hope was quickly finished and immediately became the fastest seller in French publishing history. During the day he also usually also took two strolls, one alone and the other with his wife Yvonne around the village.
He did not accept the sizable pensions to which he was entitled as a retired president and as a retired general, instead, he accepted only a much smaller colonel's pension. He was punctilious with regard to money, taking care to separate his private expenses from those of his official function. He paid for his own haircuts, the stamps for personal correspondence and had an electricity meter installed in the private accommodation at his official residence.
Private life
Charles de Gaulle married Yvonne Vendroux on 7 April 1921. They had three children: Philippe (born 1921), Élisabeth (1924), who married General Alain de Boissieu, and Anne (1928–1948). Anne had Down's syndrome and died at the age of 20.
De Gaulle always had a particular love for his handicapped daughter; one Colombey resident recalled how he used to walk with her hand-in-hand with her around the property, caressing her and talking quietly about the things she understood.
One of Charles de Gaulle's grandsons, also named Charles De Gaulle, was a member of the European Parliament from 1994 to 2004, his last tenure being for the National Front. Another grandson, Jean de Gaulle, was a member of the French Parliament until his retirement in 2007.
Death
On 9 November 1970, two weeks short of what would have been his 80th birthday, Charles de Gaulle died suddenly, despite enjoying very robust health his entire life (except for a prostate operation a few years earlier). He had been watching the evening news on television and playing Solitaire around 7.40 pm when he suddenly pointed to his neck and said "I feel a pain right here." before collapsing. His wife called the doctor and the local priest, but by the time they arrived he had died from a ruptured blood vessel.
His wife asked that she be allowed to inform her family before the news was released. She was able to contact her daughter in Paris quickly, but their son, who was in the navy was difficult to track down and so the President, Georges Pompidou was not informed until 4am the next morning and went on television some 18 hours after the event to inform the nation of the general's death. He said simply; "France is a widow"
De Gaulle had made arrangements that insisted that his funeral would be held at Colombey, and that no presidents or ministers attend his funeral – only his Compagnons de la Libération
Despite his wishes, such were the number of foreign dignitaries who wanted to honour De Gaulle that Pompidou was forced to arrange a separate memorial service at the Notre-Dame Cathedral, to be held at the same time as his actual funeral. Among those at the memorial service were 63 present or former heads of state, including US President Nixon, Soviet President Nikolai Podgorny, British Prime Minister Edward Heath, the Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, the President of Italy, representatives of 17 of France’s former African colonies and the reigning monarchs of Ethiopia, Iran, The Netherlands, Belgium, Monaco and Luxembourg. Also in the congregation were David Ben-Gurion, Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan, Harold Wilson, former West German Chancellors Ludwig Erhard and Kurt-Georg Kiesinger, Marlene Dietrich and US Senator Edward Kennedy, who remembered De Gaulle's immediate decision to attend the presidential funeral of his brother John in 1963. The Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung was unable to attend but sent a wreath. The only notable absentee was Canadian PM Pierre Trudeau, possibly because he was still angry over de Gaulle's cry of "Vive le Quebec libre" during his 1967 visit.
It was the biggest such event in French history, with hundreds of thousands of French people - many carrying blankets and picnic baskets - and thousands of cars parked in the roads and fields along the routes to the two venues. Special trains were laid on to bring extra mourners to the region and the crowd was packed so tightly that those who fainted had to be passed overhead toward first-aid stations at the rear.
The General was carried to his grave next to his daughter Anne on an armoured reconnaissance vehicle and as he was lowered into the ground the bells of all the churches in France tolled starting from Notre Dame and spreading out from there. He was buried on 12 November.
Madame de Gaulle asked the undertaker to provide the same type of oak casket he used for everyone else, but because of the General's extreme height, the coffin cost $9 more than usual. He specified that his tombstone bear the simple inscription of his name and his years of birth and death. Therefore, it simply says: "Charles de Gaulle, 1890–1970".
The French newspaper Le Monde referred to the days after his death as "a planetary mourning." At the service, President Pompidou said "de Gaulle gave France her governing institutions, her independence and her place in the world." André Malraux, the writer and intellectual who served as his Minister of Culture, called him "a man of the day before yesterday and the day after tomorrow."
His family has turned the La Boisserie residence into a foundation. It is currently the Charles de Gaulle Museum.
Views of Charles de Gaulle's legacy
General Charles de Gaulle remains an important, if controversial historical figure, and an enormous number of books have been written about him.
Of the memoirs written by the prominent British and American figures who dealt with him during and after the war, such as Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Montgomery, Acheson and Rusk, a large proportion refer to their irritation and mistrust of him.
Despite his earlier admiration, Churchill reflected later that "Of all the crosses I have had to bear, the Cross of Lorraine (the symbol of the Free French) was the heaviest". In a letter to Anthony Eden just before D-Day, he wrote of de Gaulle, “There is not a scrap of generosity about this man, who only wishes to pose as the saviour of France in this operation…he is a wrong-headed, ambitious and detestable Anglo-phobe”.
De Gaulle's attitude annoyed President Roosevelt, who viewed him as “an utterly sincere megalomaniac”. The Americans were resentful at his lack of expressed gratitude at the major role their forces played in liberating Europe; the White House continually urged its army war correspondents to press the point that young Americans were dying to set France free from the Nazis, and it was noted that in exaggerating the severity of the supposed Parisian famine to the US military, de Gaulle manipulated the situation to his own advantage.
The French writer Jacques Mondal, who was present said “Knowing General de Gaulles character, it is not surprising that during those days he openly demonstrated his determined intention to be master in Paris without worrying any more about whom he owed the position to”. Mondal believed that the determination the General displayed was part of what made him so successful, and that the Americans showed themselves to be very understanding under the circumstances.
On de Gaulle’s demeanor and return to Paris, the historian Anthony Beevor writes of his “almost perverse pleasure at biting the American and British hands that fed him", and of his "...supreme disdain for inconvienient facts, especially anything which might undermine the glory of France; only de Gaulle could write a history of the French army without mentioning the Battle of Waterloo”.
Writing in 1970, the German writer Walter Laquer said that de Gaulle displayed “an essentially eighteenth century concept of international politics” and referred to his “colossal egocentricity and dictatorial and capricious style, even when at his best”. Likewise, in his 1994 book ‘Futurist of the Nation’, the French professor and academic Régis Debray, who served as Foreign Affairs adviser to President François Mitterrand, suggested that he was “an anarchic, ungrateful xenophobe, authoritarian and vaguely fascist” but pointed out that virtually all of his predictions, such as the fall of communism, the reunification of Germany and the resurrection of ‘old’ Russia had come true since his death. Debray compared him with Napoleon ('the great political myth of the nineteenth century'), calling de Gaulle his twentieth century equivalent, "but whereas Bonaparte left two generations of Frenchmen dead on the battlefield, de Gaulle merely left us stranded, alive but dazed".
Debray went on to say that ironically, as a result of reading his account of his time in exile in his autobiography, “Probably no Frenchman since Hastings has done more to create a familiar, attractive and romantic image of the hereditary enemy Britain in the minds of Frenchmen of a certain age that this champion of the French self-interest”.
Despite the almost universal criticism of his manner, virtually all writers agree about his two major achievements; his founding of the Fifth Republic, which despite setbacks has proved much more robust and durable than the Fourth Republic, and of his strength and resolve - despite the human cost - in dealing with the Algerian crisis. By insisting on strong executive powers for the president, and through his use of popular referendums to push through important legislation, he was able to prevent party politics watering down or frustrating his policies and managed to provide France with its first effective leadership since the war.
On Algeria, the Australian historian Brian Crozier has written “that he was able to part with Algeria without civil war was a great though negative achievement which in all probability would have been beyond the capacity of any other leader France possessed” In April 1961, when two rebel generals seized power in Algeria, he “did not flinch in the face of this daunting challenge”, but appeared on television in his general’s uniform to forbid Frenchmen to obey their orders in an “inflexible display of personal authority”.
After independence however, at least 10,000 Moslems who had served in the French army were massacred by the new Algerian government, and a number of writers[who?] believe that de Gaulle must share some of the blame because, having decided to give Algeria its independence, he showed undue haste in pulling French forces out too soon, and failed to ensure that proper controls were in place to protect those left behind in the political vaccum.
The historian K. Perry, while referring to his handling of the Algerian settlement as “a masterly performance”, also went on to say that “his impatient shedding of the problem increased the price in human terms that had to be paid. He was so possessed by a burning ambition to restore French greatness and break American leadership in western international affairs that he wished for a speedy end to the Algerian problem, which had become a tiresome distraction for him”. A number of commentators, such as the Russian writer Alexander Werth are heavily critical of his role in covering up the actions of the police in the 1961 Paris Massacre and the 1962 Oran Massacre. After the decision was made to give Algeria its independence, French-Algerian settlers and members of the army who were largely instrumental in de Gaulle’s return to power felt betrayed, and in the bloody aftermath of murder, kidnapping and torture which followed, the Organisation de l’Armee Secrete (OAS) made at least four separate attempts on his life between September 1961 – August 1962 to try to get the decision reversed.
Many were impressed by de Gaulle’s defiant refusal to be cowed however, reporting that in at least one instance he did not duck down out of the line of fire when his motorcade came under a hail of bullets. This mirrored the remarkable courage he displayed on his triumphant return to Paris in 1944 while under intermittent machine gun fire as he was being proclaimed leader of France. He refused to pardon the ringleader of the ambush, Jean Bastien-Thiry, whose defence centred on de Gaulles supposed culpability for the Oran massacre, and he became the last man executed by firing squad in France.
De Gaulle was also a brilliant orator and excellent manipulator of the media, as seen in his shrewd use of television to pursuade around 80% of Metropolitan France to approve the new constitution for the Fifth Republic. In so doing, he refused to yield to the reasoning of his opponents who said that if he succeeded in Algeria, he would no longer be necessary, and afterwards enjoyed massive approval ratings; de Gaulle himself once said that “every Frenchman is, has been or will be Gaulist”.
De Gaulle remains hugely popular in France. In 1990, his old enemy, the left wing President Francois Mitterrand presided over the celebrations to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth. Mitterrand, having once written a vitriolic critique of him called the ‘Permanent Coup d’ Etat’, quoted a then recent opinion poll, saying; “As General de Gaulle, he has entered the pantheon of great national heroes, where he ranks ahead of Napoleon and behind only Charlemagne”
In its obituary, TIME Magazine said;
"He rescued his nation not once but twice, the first time from the shame of its capitulation to the Nazis in World War II, the second from its own quarrelling factions. With the Fifth Republic, he gave France its first strong governmental framework since the days of Louis Napoleon. He was indeed ‘I'homme du destin,’ (a man of destiny) as Winston Churchill once called him, and even his name, suggestive of both Charlemagne and ancient Gaul, was perfectly suited to the role he took upon himself. But the fact was that France offered De Gaulle too limited a scope and power base. Try as he might, he could not change the basic reality that France simply lacked the specific gravity to offset the force of a superpower.
"Like most crusaders, De Gaulle was extraordinarily farsighted but sometimes, maddeningly, his imperious manner and fragile sensibilities infuriated his nation's closest allies. In a vain effort to force French leadership on Europe, he twice vetoed Britain's entry into the continent's first economic cooperative, the Common Market. At home, he stinted on public welfare in the form of new roads, telephones and a thousand other needed improvements, to pay for symbolically important but ultimately hollow shows of prestige, like the nuclear Force de Frappe"
In Britain, his apparent betrayal at twice preventing the British attempt at joining the EEC was keenly felt for many years. That de Gaulle did not reflect mainstream French public opinion with his veto was illustrated by the decisive majority of French people who voted in favour of British membership when the much more concilitory Pompidou called a referendum on the matter in 1972. His early influence in setting the parameters of the EEC can still be seen today, most notably with the controversial Common Agriculural Policy.
Some writers take the view that Pompidou was a more progressive and influential leader than de Gaulle because, though also a right wing Gaulist he was less autocratic and more interested in social reforms. He was not at all inclined towards unnessary shows of petulance, and although he followed the main tenets of de Gaulle’s foreign policy, he was keen to work towards warmer relations with the US. A banker by profession, Pompidou is also widely credited, as de Gaulle's Prime Minister from 1962 - 1968 with putting in place the reforms which provided the impetus for the economic growth which followed.
In 1968, shortly before leaving office, de Gaulle refused to devalue the Franc on grounds of national prestige, but upon taking over Pompidou reversed the decision almost straight away. It was ironic that during the financial crisis of 1968, France had to rely on American (and West German) financial aid to help shore up the economy. Perry has written “The events of 1968 illustrated the brittleness of de Gaulle’s rule. That he was taken by surprise is an indictment of his rule; he was too remote from real life and had no interest in the conditions under which ordinary French people lived. Problems like inadequate housing and social services had been ignored. The French greeted the news of his departure with some relief as the feeling had grown that he had outlived his usefulness. Perhaps he clung onto power too long, perhaps he should have retired in 1965 when he was still popular. ”
Brian Crozier has said "the fame of de Gaulle outstrips his achievements, he chose to make repeated gestures of petulance and defiance that weakened the west without compensating advantages to France”
However, Daniel Mahoney writes that “such is the level to which de Gaulle has now passed into mythology in France that he is now claimed by all the political parties, though some more than others. No account of de Gaulle that wishes to capture the man and his works can simply be a profile of his time in power, for Charles de Gaulle was undoubtably one of the great human beings of the twentieth century, a member of that distinguished elite who deserve the appellation ‘statesman’”
Writing in 1995, another commentator, Pierre Manent attempted to explain why he remains so popular in France, yet perhaps not so in the wider world;
“It is true that de Gaulle wanted France to take its destiny into its own hands and wished it would cease to depend on American protection. As such, this ambition was legitimate, even if one disagrees with the manner in which it was formulated and put into practice. As for the wartime difficulties with Roosevelt, the great American president was simply mistaken about de Gaulle, whom he took to be an aspiring despot, and this error of judgement was the principle cause of grave political differences that could have been avoided”
List of ministers of his 2nd government, 21 December1945 – 26 January 1946
- Charles de Gaulle: Chairman of the Provisional Government France
- Georges Bidault: Minister of Foreign Affairs
- Edmond Michelet: Armed Forces Minister
- Charles Tillon: Minister of Armaments
- Adrien Tixier: Minister of the Interior
- René Pleven: Minister of Finance
- François Billoux: Minister of National Economy
- Marcel Paul: Minister of Industrial Production
- Ambroise Croizat: Minister of Labour
- Pierre-Henri Teitgen: Minister of Justice
- Paul Giacobbi: Minister of National Education
- Laurent Casanova: Minister of Veterans and War Victims
- François Tanguy-Prigent: Minister of Agriculture and Supply
- Jacques Soustelle: Minister of Colonies
- Jules Moch: Minister of Public Works and Transport
- Robert Prigent: Minister of Population
- Raoul Dautry: Minister of Reconstruction and Town Planning
- Eugène Thomas: Minister of Posts
- André Malraux: Minister of Information
- Vincent Auriol: Minister of State
- Francisque Gay: Minister of State
- Louis Jacquinot: Minister of State
- Maurice Thorez: Minister of State
List of ministers of his 3rd government, 9 June 1958 – 8 January 1959
- Charles de Gaulle: President of the Council and Minister of National Defence
- Maurice Couve de Murville: Minister of Foreign Affairs
- Émile Pelletier: Minister of the Interior
- Antoine Pinay: Minister of Finance and interim Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism
- Édouard Ramonet: Minister of Industry
- Paul Bacon: Minister of Labour
- Edmond Michelet: Minister of Veterans and War Victims
- Michel Debré: Minister of Justice
- Jean Berthoin: Minister of National Education
- Roger Houdet: Minister of Agriculture
- Bernard Cornut-Gentille: Minister of Overseas France
- Robert Buron: Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism
- Eugène Thomas: Minister of Posts
- Édouard Ramonet: Minister of Commerce
- Pierre Sudreau: Minister of Construction
- Max Lejeune: Minister of Sahara
- Guy Mollet: Minister of State
- Pierre Pflimlin: Minister of State
- Félix Houphouët-Boigny: Minister of State
- Louis Jacquinot: Minister of State
Changes
- 12 June 1958: André Malraux enters the cabinet as Minister of Radio, Television, and Press.
- 14 June 1958: Guy Mollet becomes Minister of General Civil Servants Status.
- 7 July 1958: Bernard Chenot enters the cabinet as Minister of Public Health and Population. Jacques Soustelle succeeds Malraux as Minister of Information.
- 23 July 1958: Antoine Pinay becomes Minister of Economic Affairs, remaining also Minister of Finance.
In popular culture
In France, he is commonly referred to as Général de Gaulle or simply Le Général. His detractors sometimes call him la Grande Zohra.
De Gaulle is a presence in the Frederick Forsyth novel The Day of the Jackal, in which the OAS – after the failure of the actual August 1962 Petit Clamart assassination attempt – hire an English professional assassin to kill him on Liberation Day 1963. The novel was made into a film, starring Edward Fox and Michel Lonsdale, in 1973.
The Flanders and Swann song "All Gall" contains highlights from de Gaulle's career set to the tune of This Old Man.
Charles de Gaulle's head was in the Futurama movie Bender's Big Score as a reference to the Scott Walker song 30 Century Man also featured in the movie.
De Gaulle was seen in Ike: Countdown to D-Day played by actor George Shevtsov. In the film he opposes the plans to invade Normandy and Dwight D. Eisenhower's request that the French people accept Eisenhower as the united voice of the Allies.
Honours and awards
French
- Grand Master of the Légion d'honneur
- Grand Master of the Ordre de la Libération
- Grand Master of the Ordre national du Mérite
- Croix de guerre (1939–1945)
Foreign
- Knight Grand Cross decorated with Grand Cordon of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (16 June 1959)
- Knight of the Order of the Royal House of Chakri
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Elephant
- Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order
- Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav
- Knight Grand Cross of Virtuti Militari
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the White Rose
- Grand Cordon of the Order of the Dragon of Annam
- Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Order of Cambodia
Memorials
A number of monuments have been built to commemorate the life of Charles de Gaulle.
France's largest airport, Roissy outside Paris, is named Charles de Gaulle Airport in his honour. France's nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is also named after him.
Works
French editions
- La Discorde Chez l’Ennemi (1924)
- Histoire des Troupes du Levant (1931) Written by Major de Gaulle and Major Yvon, with Staff Colonel de Mierry collaborating in the preparation of the final text.
- Le Fil de l’Épée (1932)
- Vers l’Armée de Métier (1934)
- La France et son Armée (1938)
- Trois Études (1945) (Rôle Historique des Places Fortes; Mobilisation Economique à l’Étranger; Comment Faire une Armée de Métier) followed by the Memorandum of 26 January 1940.
- Mémoires de Guerre
- Volume I – L’Appel 1940–1942 (1954)
- Volume II – L’Unité, 1942–1944 (1956)
- Volume III – Le Salut, 1944–1946 (1959)
- Mémoires d’Espoir
- Volume I – Le Renouveau 1958–1962 (1970)
- Discours et Messages
- Volume I – Pendant la Guerre 1940–1946 (1970)
- Volume II – Dans l’attente 1946–1958 (1970)
- Volume III – Avec le Renouveau 1958–1962 (1970)
- Volume IV – Pour l’Effort 1962–1965 (1970)
- Volume V — Vers le Terme 1966–1969
English translations
- The Enemy's House Divided (La Discorde chez l’ennemi). Tr. by Robert Eden. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2002.
- The Edge of the Sword (Le Fil de l’Épée). Tr. by Gerard Hopkins. Faber, London, 1960 Criterion Books, New York, 1960
- The Army of the Future (Vers l’Armée de Métier). Hutchinson, London-Melbourne, 1940. Lippincott, New York, 1940
- France and Her Army (La France et son Armée). Tr. by F.L. Dash. Hutchinson London, 1945. Ryerson Press, Toronto, 1945
- War Memoirs: Call to Honour, 1940–1942 (L’Appel). Tr. by Jonathan Griffin. Collins, London, 1955 (2 volumes). Viking Press, New York, 1955.
- War Memoirs: Unity, 1942–1944 (L’Unité). Tr. by Richard Howard (narrative) and Joyce Murchie and Hamish Erskine (documents). Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1959 (2 volumes). Simon and Schuster, New York, 1959 (2 volumes).
- War Memoirs: Salvation, 1944–1946' (Le Salut). Tr. by Richard Howard (narrative) and Joyce Murchie and Hamish Erskine (documents). Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1960 (2 volumes). Simon and Schuster, New York, 1960 (2 volumes).
See also
- Gaullism
- Gaullist Party
- List of names and terms of address used for Charles de Gaulle
Notes
- ^ "Cinquième République". Assemblée Nationale Française. 2008. http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/histoire/legislatures.asp. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ a b Berthon, Simon (2001). Allies at War. London: Collins. p. 21. ISBN 0007116225.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/pages/l-homme/accueil/biographie/1940-1944-la-france-libre-et-la-france-combattante.php?searchresult=1&sstring=FFL. Retrieved 10 September 2009.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/pages/l-homme/accueil/biographie/1940-1944-la-france-libre-et-la-france-combattante.php. Retrieved 10 September 2009.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/pages/l-homme/dossiers-thematiques/1958-1970-la-ve-republique/politique-et-institutions.php. Retrieved 10 September 2009.[dead link]
- ^ "Gen. De Gaulle At Élysée To-Day New President Faces Growing Threat Of Labour Unrest". The Times. 8 January 1959.
- ^ "Chronologie 1890–1913" (in French). La fondation Charles de Gaulle. http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/pages/l-homme/dossiers-thematiques/1890-1940-la-genese/jeunesse-et-formation/reperes/chronologie-1890-1913.php. Retrieved 8 November 2010.
- ^ a b c d e f g h "Charles de Gaulle". Grolier Online. http://www.grolier.com/wwii/wwii_degaulle.html. Retrieved 27 December 2008.[dead link]
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle – La Genèse 1890–1940 : une famille du Nord". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/pages/l-homme/dossiers-thematiques/1890-1940-la-genese/jeunesse-et-formation/analyses/une-famille-du-nord.php. Retrieved 10 September 2009.
- ^ Crawley, Aidan (1969). De Gaulle. London: The Literary Guild. pp. 13–16. ASIN B000KXPUCK.
- ^ His mother's ancestry was part Irish, Scots and German. (Ledwidge, Bernard (1982), De Gaulle. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. p. 6. ISBN 0-297-77952-4)
- ^ Crawley p. 13–14
- ^ Crawley comments further: 'Henri's theory may have been known in scholastic circles, for in November 1940, a group of Paris students marched around the Arc de Triomphe each carrying two poles ('deux gaules') as a gesture of defiance to the uncomprehending Germans'.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=1077. Retrieved 11 January 2009.
- ^ Dallas, Gregor (2005). 1945: The War That Never Ended. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press. p. 90. ISBN 0-300-10980-6.
- ^ Gorman, Robert F. (ed.) (2008) "Charles de Gaulle" Great Lives from History: The 20th Century Salem Press, Pasadena, Calif., ISBN 978-1-58765-345-2
- ^ Debray, Régis (1994) Charles de Gaulle: Futurist of the Nation translated by John Howe, Verso, New York, ISBN 0-86091-622-7; a translation of Debray, Régis (1990) A demain de Gaulle Gallimard, Paris, ISBN 2-07-072021-7
- ^ Ledwidge, Bernard (1982). De Gaulle. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. p. 24. ISBN 0297779524.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j "Charles de Gaulle". Time. 5 January 1959. http://www.time.com/time/subscriber/personoftheyear/archive/stories/1958.html. Retrieved 9 October 2010.
- ^ "Index of Surnames: Polish Order of the Virtuti Militari Recipients (1792–1992)". Z Wesolowski and FEEFHS. 1997. http://feefhs.org/pl/vm/vm-d.html. Retrieved 28 December 2008.
- ^ a b c d Brad DeLong (29 May 2000). "Charles de Gaulle". University of California at Berkeley. http://econ161.berkeley.edu/TCEH/charlesdegaulle.html. Retrieved 11 February 2008.
- ^ Ledwidge p. 50-52
- ^ "Cabinet Paul Reynaud". Assemblée Nationale Française. 2008. http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/histoire/gvt3rep.asp#paulreynaud. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ Roussel, Eric (2002). Charles de Gaulle. Paris: Editions Gallimard. p. 113. ISBN 2070752410.
- ^ Monnet, Jean (1 January 1976). Memoires. Paris: Arthème Fayard. pp. 20–21. ISBN 2-213-00402-1.
- ^ Shlaim, Avi (July 1974). "Prelude to Downfall: The British Offer of Union to France, June 1940". Journal of Contemporary History. 3 9: 27–63. doi:10.1177/002200947400900302. http://www.jstor.org/stable/260024. Retrieved 3 September 2010.
- ^ The Fall of France - Winston Churchill 1948
- ^ a b Mahrane, Said (June 2010). "de Gaulle 1958–1970". Le Point (Grand Angle) (8).
- ^ http://www.cavortingwithstrangers.com/bookVIII-Gaulle.php
- ^ Bremner, Charles (18 October 2003). "Did De Gaulle really hate the British Mais non". The Times (London). http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article995545.ece.
- ^ Peter Yapp, ed (April 1983). The Travellers' Dictionary of Quotation: Who Said What, About Where?. London: Routledge Kegan & Paul. p. 143. ISBN 0710009925, 9780710009920.
- ^ Allies at War, part 3, BBC TV
- ^ D. Day, The Battle for Normandy. Anthony Beevor 2009
- ^ D. Day: Battle for Normany. Anthony Beevor 2009
- ^ a b c d e D. Day; Liberation of Normany. Anthony Beevor 2009
- ^ The European Institute
- ^ a b c d Purnell’s History of the Second World War: No. 72 1966. By Jacques Mondal
- ^ TIME Magazine - 4 September 1944
- ^ Anthony Clayton, Three Marshals of France. p. 124
- ^ Berthon, p. 325
- ^ a b c De Gaulle; the statesman: Brian crozier (Methuen). 1974
- ^ a b c d e Modern European History: K. Perry. WH Allen 1976
- ^ Despite his attempts to prevent it, in October 1946 the French people voted for a very similar political system as before the war. "1944–1946: Liberation". Fondation et Institut Charles de Gaulle. 2008. http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=370. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ "Gouvernement Provisoire de la République Française". Assemblée Nationale Française. 2008. http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/histoire/legislatures-CFLN-Gouvernementprovisoire-et-constituantes.asp. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ Hitchcock, William I. (2004). The Struggle for Europe: The Turbulent History of a Divided Continent 1945 to the Present. Random House. p. 112. ISBN 0385497997. http://books.google.com/books?id=fFfhnC4mYccC&pg=PT112&lpg=PT112&dq=%22a+bold+and+ultimately+foolish+political+ploy%22&source=bl&ots=QZfKSl2Nn7&sig=OwpF2hFMMOejZ3IgH-OIPw5PK_Y&hl=en&ei=CVA1TfS7GJDUtQOtiZHpBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22a%20bold%20and%20ultimately%20foolish%20political%20ploy%22&f=false.
- ^ TIME Magazine- 16 March 1962
- ^ "La France face à la décolonisation de 1945 à 1962". CPRD Champagne-Ardenne. 2008. http://www.crdp-reims.fr/cinquieme/decolonisation.htm. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ "Generals in Algiers revolt against Paris – Demand for "Government of Public Safety"". The Times. 14 May 1958.
- ^ "Vive De Gaulle – General Salan's Public Utterance". The Times. 16 May 1958.
- ^ "General de Gaulle's Bid for Authority – Ready to Assume Powers of Rebublic". The Times. 16 May 1958.
- ^ "Party System has Failed State and People – General de Gaulle Explains his Views". The Times. 20 May 1958.
- ^ "General Massu – Obituary". The Times (London). 29 October 2002. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article818845.ece. Retrieved 28 April 2010.
- ^ "President Coty speaks of Crumbling Republic". The Times. 30 May 1958.
- ^ As he commissioned the new constitution and was responsible for its overall framework, de Gaulle is sometimes described as the author of the constitution. De Gaulle's political ideas were written into a constitution by Michel Debré who then guided the text through the enactment process. Thus while the constitution reflects de Gaulle's ideas, Michel Debré was the actual author of the text.
- ^ "Gen de Gaulle given a majority of 105 – Full powers demanded for six months". The Times. 2 June 1958.
- ^ "Sweeping Vote for General de Gaulle – 4:1 Majority says "Yes" to new Constitution". The Times. 29 September 1958.
- ^ The citation in French is taken from Charles de Gaulle, Mémoires de guerre, tome 1, Plon, 1954
- ^ "Landslide Vote Repeated for de Gaulle – President of Fifth Republic – Sweeping Powers". The Times. 22 December 1958.
- ^ "New Year Brings in New Franc". The Times. 2 January 1960.
- ^ Crawley p.411, p.428
- ^ "Germans Give General de Gaulle a Hero's Welcome". The Times. 6 September 1962.
- ^ Crawley p.422
- ^ Crawley p.439
- ^ Gaulle, Charles de. (2009) In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 8 July 2009, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online Library Edition:
- ^ "Rebels Plot to Seize Power in Paris – Sirens to Warn Citizens of Algeria Parachutists – General De Gaulle Assumes Dictatorial Powers". The Times. 24 April 1961.
- ^ Crawley p.381
- ^ "Vote Of Confidence In General De Gaulle – Conclusive Referendum Verdict On Algeria Peace". The Times. 9 April 1962.
- ^ "M. Pompidou Takes Over from M. Debre – Few Changes in New Cabinet". The Times. 16 April 1962.
- ^ "De Gaulle Challenge to Parliament – To Retire if Referendum not Approved – Call to Nation before Debate on Censure Motion". The Times. 5 October 1962.
- ^ "De Gaulle against the Politicians – Clear Issue for October Referendum – Assembly Election Likely after Solid Censure Vote". The Times. 6 October 1962.
- ^ ""Yes" Reply for Gen. De Gaulle – Over 60 p.c. of Valid Votes – President Likely to Keep Office". The Times. 29 October 1962.
- ^ Kolodziej, Edward A (1974). French International Policy under de Gaulle and Pompidou: The Politics of Grandeur. New Haven, Conn: Cornell University Press. p. 618. ISBN 0-300-10980-6.
- ^ Purnell’s History of the Second World War: No. 123 1966. By Kenneth Macksey
- ^ France's GDP was slightly higher than the UK's at the beginning of the 19th century, with the UK surpassing France around 1870. See e.g. Maddison, Angus (1995). L'économie mondiale 1820–1992: analyse et statistiques. OECD Publishing. p. 248. ISBN 9264245499, 9789264245495., Google Books link Maddison, Angus (1995). ibid. ISBN 9789264245495. http://books.google.com/?id=A5BFpqBqQ_gC&lpg=PA248&dq=pib%20france%201820&pg=PA248#v=onepage&q=pib%20france%201820. Retrieved 13 May 2010.
- ^ Haine, W. Scott (1974). Culture and Customs of France. Westport CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006. p. 315. ISBN 0313328927, 9780313328923.
- ^ "Marshal Juin Defended – General de Gaulle on Moral Issue". The Times. 8 April 1954.
- ^ "Weekend of Rejoicing in France". The Times. 15 February 1960.
- ^ Ledwidge p. 341
- ^ "Independents Fear for France’s Future – Gaullist Policy Queried". The Times. 18 August 1967.
- ^ Crawley p.431
- ^ Fontana History of England - Britain & the World role; Robert Holland 1991
- ^ Present at the Creation - My Years in the State Department - Dean Acheson 1969
- ^ Fontana History of England - Britain & the World role; Robert Holland 1991
- ^ Purnell's history of the Second World War - number 123 - 1974
- ^ a b TIME Magazine - 8 August 1960
- ^ Futurist of the Nation: Regis Debray. 1994
- ^ Twentieth Century Britain. Denis Richards & Antony Quick, 1974
- ^ Fontana History of England - Britain & the World role; Robert Holland 1991
- ^ "How the EU was built". BBC News. 5 December 2000. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1055729.stm. Retrieved 18 August 2007.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=375. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
- ^ "European NAvigator (ENA) – General de Gaulle's first veto". http://www.ena.lu/general_gaulle_veto-020100862.html. Retrieved 17 January 2009.
- ^ Moravscik, Andrew (December 2008). The Choice for Europe: Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to Maastricht. Cornell University Press. ISBN 0801435099.
- ^ Present at the Creation - My Years in the State Department - Dean Acheson 1969
- ^ Harold Wilson Autobiography
- ^ "Just a Normal Winter's Day in Dover". The Times. 2 January 1973.
- ^ "Recognition of Peking by France – Relations with two regimes – Chiang protest but no break". The Times. 28 January 1964.
- ^ "Chiang Breaks with France". The Times. 11 February 1964.
- ^ "Nixon's China's Visit and "Sino-U.S. Joint Communiqué". http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/ziliao/3602/3604/t18006.htm. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
- ^ "De Gaulle's Warm Welcome to Nixon". The Times. 1 March 1969.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=497. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
- ^ "Gen. De Gaulle Takes His Legend To S. America – 40 Speeches To Be Made During 20,000-Mile Tour". The Times. 18 September 1964.
- ^ Crawley p.427
- ^ "France Again Elects Gen. De Gaulle – M. Mitterrand Concedes Within 80 Minutes – Centre Votes Evenly Divided". The Times. 20 December 1965.
- ^ "Address by the President of the French Republic (General de Gaulle), Phnom Penh, Cambodia, September 1, 1966". Fondation Charles de Gaulle. 2008. http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=530. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ "France Ends Boycott of Common Market – No Winners or Losers after Midnight Agreement". The Times. 31 January 1966.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle – De Gaulle and Europe". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=178. Retrieved 18 January 2009.[dead link]
- ^ "European NAvigator (ENA) – General de Gaulle's second veto". http://www.ena.lu/general_gaulles_second_veto-020102622.html. Retrieved 17 January 2009.
- ^ "French Emphasis on Long-Term Issues". The Times. 7 June 1967.
- ^ The Cherbourg Boats by Doron Geller
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle – De Gaulle and the Third World". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=180. Retrieved 17 January 2009.[dead link]
- ^ "France-Israel: from De Gaulle’s arms embargo to Sarkozy’s election". Ejpress.org. http://www.ejpress.org/article/28101. Retrieved 9 March 2010.
- ^ "Text of de Gaulle's Answer to Letter From Ben-Gurion". Select.nytimes.com. 10 January 1968. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10C11F73C541B7B93C2A8178AD85F4C8685F9&scp=1&sq=de+Gaulle+dignified+minorities&st=p. Retrieved 9 March 2010.
- ^ "920 Days of Fighting, Death and Hunger". The Times. 12 January 1970.
- ^ Saha, Santosh C. (2006). Perspectives on Contemporary Ethnic Conflict: Primal Violence Or the Politics of Conviction?. Lanham MD: Lexington Books. pp. 344, p.184–184. ISBN 0739110853, 9780739110850.
- ^ 24 July 1132/ "CBC archives". Archives.cbc.ca. 24 July 1988. http://archives.cbc.ca/on_this_day/ 24 July 1132/. Retrieved 9 March 2010.
- ^ "Gen De Gaulle Rebuked by Mr Pearson – Canada Rejects Efforts to Destroy Unity – Quebec Statements Unacceptable". The Times. 26 July 1967.
- ^ Peter Berresford Ellis, The Celtic Dawn, Constable, London, 1993, pp. 62.
- ^ "Les femmes et le pouvoir". http://www.histoire-politique.fr/index.php?numero=01&rub=dossier&item=7. Retrieved 13 January 2009. "of the first eleven governments of the Fifth Republic, four contained no women whatsoever. Furthermore, in May 1968, the executive was 100 per cent male."
- ^ a b Dogan, Mattei (1984). "How Civil War Was Avoided in France". International Political Science Review / Revue internationale de science politique 5 (3): 245–277. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1600894.
- ^ "Autocrat of the Grand Manner". The Times. 28 April 1969.
- ^ Crawley p.454
- ^ Crawley (p.454) also writes that de Gaulle was undoubtedly using the term in his barrack-room style to mean 'shit in the bed'. De Gaulle had said it first in Bucharest while on an official visit from which he returned on 19 May 1968. Pompidou told the press that de Gaulle used the phrase after the Cabinet Meeting on 19 May.
- ^ "Dropping the Pilot". The Times. 11 July 1968.
- ^ "Déclaration du Conseil constitutionnel suite à la démission du Général de Gaulle, Président de la République". Constitutional Council of France. 1969. http://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/conseil-constitutionnel/francais/les-decisions/depuis-1958/decisions-par-date/1969/declaration-de-vacance-1969/decision-declaration-de-vacance-1969-du-28-avril-1969.7153.html.
- ^ "Press Release re Resignation". Fondation Charles de Gaulle. 2008. http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=532. Retrieved 2 November 2008.
- ^ "Charles de Gaulle Defeated". UPI.com. 1969. http://www.upi.com/Audio/Year_in_Review/Events-of-1969/Charles-DeGaulle-Defeated/12303189849225-8/. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
- ^ a b c d e f g TIME Magazine - 23 November 1970
- ^ "Find a Grave – Georges Pompidou". http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=8093. Retrieved 17 January 2009.
- ^ "Site non officiel du Parti socialiste français". http://www.psinfo.net/elections/municipales/2001/pariscopie/listes/fn.php3. Retrieved 17 January 2009.[dead link]
- ^ "Assemblée Nationale". http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/12/tribun/fiches_id/1437.asp. Retrieved 15 January 2009.
- ^ "World Leaders to Gather in Paris to Honour General de Gaulle". The Times. 11 November 1970.
- ^ "Testament de Charles de Gaulle, 16 janvier 1952". Histoire de France et d'ailleurs. http://www.histoire-de-france-et-d-ailleurs.com/articles/Testaments/TestamentdeGaulle.htm. Retrieved 3 February 2009.
- ^ "1970 – Year in Review. De Gaulle and Nasser die". UPI.com. http://www.upi.com/Audio/Year_in_Review/Events-of-1970/DeGaulle-and-Nasser-Die/12303235577467-8. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
- ^ "Fondation Charles de Gaulle – Retirement". http://www.charles-de-gaulle.org/article.php3?id_article=377. Retrieved 17 January 2009.
- ^ Consise history of WWII; Vincent Esposito, 1964
- ^ Europe Since Hitler: Walter Laquer London (Weidenfeld & Nicolson). 1970
- ^ Futurist of the Nation: Régis Debray. 1994
- ^ Modern European History: K. Perry. WH Allen 1976
- ^ The DeGaulle Revolution. London. Alexander Werth, 1960
- ^ Futurist of the Nation: Régis Debray. 1994
- ^ De Gaulle: Statesmanship, Grandeur and Modern Democracy: Daniel Mahoney 2000
- ^ 20th Century Britain. Denis richards & Anthony Quick. 1974
- ^ 20th Century Britain. Denis Richards & Anthony Quick. 1974
- ^ De Gaulle: Statesmanship, Grandeur and Modern Democracy: Daniel Mahoney 2000
- ^ De Gaulle: Statesmanship, Grandeur and Modern Democracy: Daniel Mahoney 2000
- ^ Nickname originally used by French settlers in Algeria. Roger Peyrefitte (9 February 1976). "Des Livres – Tableaux de chasse". Albin Michel. pp. 448 p., 45 F.. http://referentiel.nouvelobs.com/archives_pdf/OBS0587_19760209/OBS0587_19760209_011.pdf. Le Nouvel Observateur; In 1948 he made a speech in Edinburgh regarding France's historical alliance with Scotland; Charles de Gaulle described the alliance between Scotland and France as "the oldest alliance in the world". He also declared that:[8] In every combat where for five centuries the destiny of France was at stake, there were always men of Scotland to fight side by side with men of France, and what Frenchmen feel is that no people has ever been more generous than yours with its friendship. Vialatte Alexandre, Sigoda Pascal "Alexandre Vialatte L'Age d'Homme". (31 July 1997). Collection : Les dossiers h. p.150. ISBN 2-8251-2453-2 ISBN 978-2-8251-2453-6 google books
- Aussaresses, General Paul (2010). The Battle of the Casbah: Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Algeria, 1955–1957. New York: Enigma Books, ISBN 978-1-929631-30-8.
- Crawley, Aidan (1969). De Gaulle. London: The Literary Guild. ASIN B000KXPUCK.
- Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles de Gaulle and The France He Saved. Simon and Schuster, 2010. ISBN 9781847373922
- Haine, W. Scott (2006). Culture and Customs of France. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0313328927.
- Saha, Santosh C. (2006). Perspectives on Contemporary Ethnic Conflict: Primal Violence or the Politics of Conviction?. Lexington Books. ISBN 0739110853.
- Speer, Albert (1997). Inside the Third Reich. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0684829495.
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Pierre Laval (as Prime Minister) |
Chairman of the Provisional Government of France 1944–1946 |
Succeeded by Félix Gouin |
| Preceded by Philippe Pétain (as Head of State) |
||
| Co-Prince of Andorra 1944–1946 with Ramon Iglesias i Navarri |
||
| Preceded by Pierre Pflimlin |
Prime Minister of France 1958–1959 |
Succeeded by Michel Debré |
| Preceded by Pierre de Chevigné |
Minister of National Defence 1958–1959 |
Succeeded by Pierre Guillaumat |
| Preceded by René Coty |
Presidents of the French Republic 1959–1969 |
Succeeded by Alain Poher |
| Co-Prince of Andorra 1959–1969 with Ramon Iglesias i Navarri |
Succeeded by Georges Pompidou |
|
| Party political offices | ||
| New title | Gaullist Party Presidential Candidate 1958 (won); 1965 (won) |
Succeeded by Georges Pompidou |
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