De Gaulle understood that only nations are real
31 May 2008
Few may celebrate the half-century since Charles de Gaulle’s triumphs of 1958, says Robin Harris, but this realist genius understood that, in geopolitics, the nation-state was all
It was never de Gaulle’s intention to pursue a policy of neutrality between East and West, but rather a policy of independence. At the same time he recognised that France was part of the Free World and would live or die with it. He also believed that Moscow’s threats must be swiftly and strongly resisted. He was tougher than anyone else when the Soviets threatened Berlin. And he gave stronger backing to Kennedy in the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 than did the wavering, super-diplomatic British.
The principal difference between de Gaulle’s foreign policy and that of any other Western leader was his conviction that, as he put it, ‘the only international realities are nations’. It was the basis on which he conducted policy in Europe, resisting supranational pressures, insisting on national — above all, French national — interest. It was also the assumption on which he directed wider diplomacy, not least in Cold War politics. He did not believe that communism would last. ‘Russia will absorb communism as a blotter absorbs ink,’ he once observed — meaning that the underlying national traits of the Russians would overcome any ideology. And he has been proved right.
He was also right about Britain, though the British then and since have been small-mindedly reluctant to admit it. He grasped that France was a rival but lesser power, and that British closeness to America made it still more difficult for him to restore the balance. His response was to keep us out of French-led Europe — at least for as long as Britain remained in hock to the United States. He disliked the Americans, and with some reason, given the enthusiasm with which Roosevelt had tried to oust him from leadership of the Free French. His attitude, though, was less hostile to the British than is depicted. He knew what he owed us, even if he did not like to remember it. The question, anyway, was a matter not of sentiment but of strategy — ‘to know’, as he put it, ‘whether the English want to give preference to Europe, or [consciously echoing Churchill] to the open seas’. Man of destiny though he was, de Gaulle was fully aware that he could not decide ours.
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Ed Hummer
May 29th, 2008 8:52am Report this commentHe betrayed the french in French Algeria and sowed the seeds for the current islamist disaster we are currently facing worldwide.
John Hislop
May 29th, 2008 12:03pm Report this comment...and so a French-dominated Europe, built by the French for the French, paid for by German money as rebranded good Europeans after the war, helped by American money as buffer states against the Soviets, while the British paid off lend-lease for American entry into the war.
Britain (not England) has never broken into this Franco-German relationship and should leave the EU at the first opportunity.
Only if we see the French abandoning the monthly trip to Strasbourg in favour of supranational Brussels will we know that things have changed.
I suspect Mr. Harris is right and that French nationalism, then as now, is the real driver behind "Le Project Europeene". They seem to get a very good deal out of it - paying as much in as they get out, consistently over decades. How were we so stupid?
Time to turn back and face the Atlantic and the free world and leave this EU, destined to collapse, behind.
We're looking for that tough leader who, like De Gaulle, will push for British interest above all else.
The nation state is not dead despite Common Purpose and inflated public sector salaries on the back of an EU model.
We can, and will, escape this strait jacket.
Penfold
May 29th, 2008 2:55pm Report this commentDe Gaulle's sole aim was to put "la gloire" back into France whilst conveniently forgetting that the country had been defeated in 1940, become Quislings and collaborators by '41 and needed America and Britain with the Commonwealth to achieve freedom in '44 from the Germans.
He also promoted the myth of the Maquis.
But say what you will, De Gaulle solely thought of France and acted in the best interests of France. A lesson we should take on board.
Ray
May 29th, 2008 3:11pm Report this commentJohn - We had a very tough leader in Margaret Thatcher, though sadly it was only towards the end of her premiership that she woke up to the precise nature of the EU project - by which time her political capital was spent and she was too weakened to stop it, other than at the margins. John Major was to be similarly disabused of any touching faith in the benign intentions of the European establishment.
What the Conservative Party desperately needs is for its present leadership to be under no illusions about the EU at the outset, and to careful plan and execute Britain's extraction from this nefarious superstate (indeed, the kind of long-term calculation that the Lady herself demonstrated when defeating Arthur Scargill and the NUM).
John Morrison
May 29th, 2008 4:28pm Report this commentJe compri.Vive DeGaulle.Je mais souviens.The US needs a Grande Charles.
John Morrison
May 29th, 2008 4:28pm Report this commentJe compri.Vive DeGaulle.Je mais souviens.The US needs a Grande Charles.
Ganpat Ram
May 30th, 2008 12:47pm Report this commentDe Gaulle was a great front-man for the French middle class at a time when they desperately needed one.
This hugely tall, endlessly eloquent soldier with his record of great bravery seemed impressive and so people did not notice the shabby nature of most of his supporters after the War.
The French middle class had been utterly discredited by the 1940 crushing defeat by Hitler and the general collaboration of the French with the Nazis that followed.
Such collaboration is not surprising: in civilized countries, depending on urban utilities, it is not easy to wage an insurgency against a ruthless power like the Nazis.
It is no accident that ferocious guerrilla resistance was faced by the Nazis only in backward peasant countries like Yugoslavia and Russia.
Britishers sneer at the French for having mostly collaborated with the Nazs duing the War - the windily "radical" Sartre, for instance, put out plays under Gestapo censorship ! - but what if Britain had been overrun by Hitler?
I am sure most Britons would have coolly collaborated with the Nazis too, and in fact, fought less bravely than the French resistance (largely communist inspired) did.
De gaulle was a smart guy. He saw it was crazy to hang on to Algeria. "Assimilate the Muslims?", he asked sarcastically. "With their exploding birth-rate THEY will assimilate US ! My village of Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises will become Colombey-les-Deux-Mosques!"
Not a bad perception atl all for 1960 !!!
That level of understanding of important facts marks De Gaulle as a truly great leader.
How many, even TODAY, understand the extent of the Islamic threat to freedom?
Stephen Green
May 30th, 2008 5:12pm Report this commentAgreed. But is the UK a "nation" rather than two Nations,a pricipality and a province?
Cornwall has pretentions to nationhood as does Cumberland. Which is "real"?
David Lindsay
May 30th, 2008 5:37pm Report this commentFrance needs a new de Gaulle, a good conservative 'dirigiste' in opposition to the capitalist corrosion of everything that conservatives exist in order to conserve, who, inseparably therefrom, treats both halfs of the neocon-Islamic alliance just as the General treated all four of German occupation, Soviet infiltration, American domination, and the unbalancing of the nasecent EU by British accession. After all, de Gaulle was right on all those counts.
Yes, that is what France needs.
And so does Britain.
As Harris writes of the Fourth Republic:
"the system was incestuous and unstable, a small group of small men swapping posts in nominally different governments — all incapable of decisive action. Inflation corroded the franc, while collapse abroad, first in Vietnam but imminently in Algeria, corroded French self-respect far more."
Imagine!
François Portier
June 4th, 2008 9:02pm Report this commentA very cogent, well-written and well-informed article. Congratulations from a Frenchman. A note in passing to the people who contributed their comments. Judging from what I know (I wasn't born then)few French people were active collaborators during the period of occupation, or Resistance fighters for that matter, though it has become fashionable to play down the latter's not-so-insignificant role these days (my great-uncle was a Resistance fighter, was betrayed by another Frenchman, and got shot by the Germans in 1944). Most of them were patient onlookers, enduring restrictions and (I'm sorry to say) inaccurate Anglo-American bombing raids - Not unlike the Channel islanders at the same time, I suppose.
As a Eurosceptic (yes, we have them in France too) I heartily approve of the tone of the article. Keep up the good work!
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