Allied Leaders of World War II/de Gaulle

Charles de Gaulle was born near the French border with Belgium in northern France. He served in the army before World War One, and indeed was already an officer when the war started. Given high marks by his superiors, de Gaulle was wounded and then captured by the Germans in 1916. He spent the rest of the war as a prisoner. After the war, de Gaulle served with French military personnel in Poland, there to help train the Poles, who were then in a war with Soviet Russia. A writer and military thinker, de Gaulle favored mobile warfare, rather than the infantry-based static and trench warfare of the then recently concluded war.

When the German offensive in western Europe commenced in May 1940, de Gaulle's armored division launched a somewhat successful attack against the Germans and he was promoted to Brigadier General. He opposed the French surrender to Germany and wanted the war continued from French colonies in North Africa.* As France prepared to surrender, de Gaulle fled to Britain where he began forming what came to be known as the "Free French Forces" from other Frenchmen who had left France. He became noted for his radio broadcasts to the French people, urging them to resist the German occupation and the collaborationist French government at Vichy.** This brought a death sentence to de Gaulle from the French Vichy government, but it made him the leader of Frenchmen everywhere who wanted France free from Axis forces. As such, de Gaulle became noted for his conflict and "difficult behavior" with the British, and later the Americans, and the relationship between these "allies" was often "frosty," to put it mildly, as the British and the Americans didn't trust de Gaulle, and de Gaulle didn't trust the British and the Americans. After the Axis defeat in North Africa, De Gaulle moved his operations to (French) Algeria, where he saw himself as the legitimate leader of a French government in exile, to be continued as a temporary government in France, once parts of the country were liberated. This was something the Americans, especially, would not support. Things were so bad, de Gaulle even refused to broadcast by radio to France as the Allies prepared to launch the invasion to liberate France in June 1944.

The Allied invasion eventually succeeded, and a second invasion, in southern France, was launched in August 1944. It consisted of substantial French forces. With the Germans in retreat, fearful of a French communist takeover in Paris, and of German retaliation against the French capitol, de Gaulle wanted Paris freed by French troops, and the Allies acceded to his wishes. Paris was liberated on August 25. Since many French leaders had been associated with the Vichy government, de Gaulle was essentially seen by most French people as the obvious leader of a new government until the country could regain its footing. As the war approached its end, de Gaulle demanded that France be given a prominent role in shaping post-war Europe. The fact that the Soviet Union, Britain, and America had shouldered much of the war effort didn't seem to bother him in the least, and the relationship between the various Allies continued to be contentious.

During the time of German occupation, the French resistance forces had many communist elements,*** but once the war on French soil essentially ended, the resistance forces continued in existence, not only as a military presence, but as something of a political movement of the left. De Gaulle ordered the separate military aspect of the Resistance disbanded, with those wishing to maintain a military life having to join the actual French army. De Gaulle gave some positions in his new government to men from the Resistance, including a couple of communists, but he and men from the "Free French" basically dominated the top positions, leaving bitter feelings.

While not invited to the "Yalta Conference" in February 1945 by the "Big Three" Allied leaders (Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin), De Gaulle did win a French role, supported by Britain and the U.S., in the occupation of Germany during the conference, although Stalin insisted the new zone come from the British and American portions of Germany, and indeed the relatively small French zone was the region just over the border from France. Further, France was given a seat on the United Nations Security Council, an international organization that was just forming. Even these victories didn't soothe the angry feelings of the contentious Frenchman for having been left out of the conference in the first place.

When the war ended, de Gaulle faced a new problem, an elected Assembly. The power of the communists could no longer be denied, as they won more than a quarter of the vote, making them the largest party in multi-party France. Combined with the vote of other left of center parties, the left had garnered about 75% of the total vote, although de Gaulle was still the choice to head the government. His unwillingness to appoint communists to many positions within the government brought serious arguments, and the desire of the communists and others to cut military spending brought de Gaulle's resignation in early 1946, just two months after the election. De Gaulle remained out of office until 1958, but with France embroiled in many problems with her colonies, including a problem in Indochina, which brought American involvement and the subsequent Vietnam War, he was again chosen to lead the government. A few months later he was elected President of France. He remained as president until 1969, when he resigned, after years of contentiousness with Britain, the U.S. and others, which is beyond the scope of this article. He died in November 1970.

De Gaulle was certainly a "difficult" person, but he was a solid advocate for France, and he is fondly remembered as such by many of his countrymen. He ranks up there with the greatest French leaders.

* France controlled Tunisia, Algeria, and French Morocco, all in the western part of North Africa.

** Hitler took control of northern France, including Paris, and the French Atlantic coastline area, but permitted a collaborationist government to rule the remainder of France and her colonies. This collaborationist government ended in November 1942 when Hitler and Mussolini sent troops into the area after the Allies invaded the French North African colonies, which lay to the rear of Rommel's forces in Libya. The Germans occupied most of the collaborationist area, with Italy taking the area of the Riviera along the Mediterranean, an area of historical dispute between Italy and France. When Italy surrendered in September 1943, the Germans took control of the Riviera, too.

*** This isn't terribly surprising, as many resistance movements in Europe had large communist elements, or were even actually communist groups, like Tito's Partisans in Yugoslavia. As the war neared its end, these groups became political forces, or even provided the basis of communist governments in eastern Europe, where Stalin's Soviet Union dominated.

WORD HISTORY:
Chief/Chef-These are really the same word, but in English they have varied meanings, as well as the different spelling. "Chief' goes back to Indo European "kaput/khauput," which meant "head." This gave its Latin offspring "caput," with the same meaning, and then the word later "capum." Old French, a Latin-based language, inherited a form of the word as "chief" (the "ch" pronounced as "sh") which meant "leader of some entity, main person or position." This was borrowed into English during the 1200s. In French, the word later became "chef," still with the same meaning, and it later came to be used in the expression, "chef de cuisine," for "head of the cooking or of the kitchen." The shortened version, "chef," was borrowed into English in the 1820s for "head cook." German too borrowed the word "chef," and it generally carries the meaning of English "chief;" that is, "main, head, chief, boss."