Abstract
De Gaulle’s policy towards the USSR during World War II has been the subject of various explanations and appraisals. The most commonly encountered is what might be called ‘realism’. According to this version, the General considered that Eternal Russia was more important than the Soviet regime, which was either a mere historical avatar or, at most, an instrument serving Russia’s permanent imperial ambitions. As a result, he is supposed to have thought that Moscow’s support was indispensable to France during the war and also looking forward to the post-war period, both against Germany and against the Anglo-Saxons. In this interpretation, de Gaulle had a very classical idea of the balance of power in Europe which took no account of the specific revolutionary element embodied by the USSR, or else he regarded this as nothing more than a means to achieve Russia’s traditional aims.1
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Notes
This view of things is well summarized by P. Lefranc in J. Lacouture, R. Mehl, de Gaulle ou l’éternel déft (Paris: Seuil, 1988) p. 159.
J.-B. Duroselle, L’Abîme 1939–1945 (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1982) p. 313.
N. Moltchanov, Le General de Gaulle (Moscow: Editions du Progres, 1988) p. 143.
H. Rollet, ‘Ambiguïtés diplomatiques. La France Libre et l’URSS en 1942’, Commentaire, 64 (Winter 1933).
H. Feis, Churchill Roosevelt, Stalin (Princeton: 1957) pp. 213–14.
R. Massigli, Une comédie des erreurs 1943–1956 (Paris: Plon, 1978) p. 37 ff.
Henri-Christian Giraud, de Gaulle et les communistes, 2 Vols (Paris: Albin Michel, 1989) Vol. 1, p. 336.
J. Laloy, Yalta (Paris: Laffont, 1988) p. 88 ff.
C. de Gaulle, Lettres, Notes et Carnets, Juin 1943–Mai 1945 (Paris: Plon, 1983) pp. 359–60.
G.-H. Soutou, ‘Georges Bidault et la construction européenne 1944–1945’, in S. Berstein, J.-M. Mayeur, P. Milza (eds), Le MRP et la construction européenne (Bruxelles: Complexe, 1993).
J. Lacouture, de Gaulle, Vol. 2 (Paris: Seuil 1990) pp. 184–202, and
Ph. Buton, Les lendemains qui déchantent. Le Parti communiste français à la Libération (Paris: Presses de la FNSP, 1993) p. 200 ff.
P. Billotte, Le Temps des armes (Paris: Plon, 1972) p. 395 ff., and note by Billotte, s.d., mentioning de Gaulle’s reservations on points of detail but implying his overall agreement, MAE, series being rearranged (the note of 15 September has not been found).
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© 1996 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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Soutou, GH. (1996). General de Gaulle and the Soviet Union, 1943–5: Ideology or European Equilibrium. In: Gori, F., Pons, S. (eds) The Soviet Union and Europe in the Cold War, 1943–53. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25106-3_20
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