Abstract
French soldiers were citizens of a Republic. Len Smith made this point well in his work on the mutinies of 1917, and I fully agree with him.1 However, it seems to me that soldiers’ citizenship is still much more evident when considering their behaviour after combat than during it. The French system of pensions, benefits and assistance has been framed by the idea that wounded soldiers were citizens. This idea was obvious to them, and it became obvious to politicians too.
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Notes
Leonard Smith, Between Mutiny and Obedience: The Case of the French Fifth Infantry Division During World War I (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994).
On this Office, see Olivier Faron, Les enfants du deuil, orphelins et pupilles de la nation de la première guerre mondiale (1914–1941) (Paris: Ed. de la Découverte & Syros, 2001).
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© 2013 Antoine Prost
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Prost, A. (2013). René Cassin and the Victory of French Citizen-Soldiers. In: Eichenberg, J., Newman, J.P. (eds) The Great War and Veterans’ Internationalism. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137281623_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137281623_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-44823-4
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