207: Epilogue: Riom

Description

In early 1942 the new Vichy French government would bring charges against 6 men in the effort to determine the reasons for France’s defeat in 1942. The resulting trial would not go as planned.

Come check out my keynote speech on the topic of Deception in February 2025: https://intelligentspeechonline.com/ Coupon Code: SECOND

Listen

Transcript

Hello everyone and welcome to History of the Second World War Episode 207 - The Fall of France: Epilogue - Riom. This week a big thank you goes out to Nicholas and Sasha for their donations through buymeacoffee, and trust me this podcast runs on coffee and to 1jnoftz, Russell, Mark, Fyrequeene, and Henry for choosing to support the podcast by becoming a member. You can find out more about becoming a member over at historyofthesecondworldwar.com/members. After the signing of the armistice with Germany, Petain and his French government would form what would come to be known as the Vichy government due to the fact that it was based in the town of Vichy France. The full scope of the actions of the Vichy government is beyond the scope of this episode and this series because it is deeply intertwined with many other events beyond the Invasion of France. However, there is one event from the Vichy government that is deeply tied to the fall of France in 1940 and that is what is known as the Riom Trial. The goal of the trials at Riom in 1942 were to find a person to blame for the defeat of France in 1940, to determine who should be made the scapegoat, and then to sentence them appropriately. But the goals of the trial were more expansive than simply determining the root cause of the failure of the French Army, but instead were driven by politics. Petain and the other Vichy leaders were very concerned about appearing to be the legitimate leaders of France, especially given the rising popularity of the Free France movement. The hope was that by pinning the blame for the defeat on some of the pre-war politicians of the Third Republic Petain could solidify himself as the new leader of France. The continued conflict between the Right and the Left of French politics also came into play at Riom, with the Vichy government representing the rightist authoritarian strand of French politics. They would seek to place the blame not just on the pre-war politicians but also to make the case that the entirety of the Third Republic was fatally weakened by Socialism, and that Socialism was embodied in the leader of the Popular Front Leon Blum. If they wanted to pursue these goals with the trial there was one huge, major, unavoidable problem that they had to work around: many of the Vichy leaders hard participated in French politics before the war. There were two main ways that the Vichy leaders sought to get around this problem. The first was by strictly limiting the scope of their inquiry, questioning, and investigation to be between March 1936 and September 3, 1939. This time period was a period where Petain and Weygand not directly involved in national French politics, and many of the other Vichy leaders were less involved due to the formulation of the Popular Front government in 1936 followed by a series of leftist and center leftist government afterwards. The second method used to shift blame was through the focusing of the trial on 6 specific men, their decisions, and their impact. Riom was not an indictment on the French governments before the war, or the French military, but instead on just 6 men. The six men were former Prime Ministers Daladier and Blum, former head of the French Army General Gamelin, Former Inspector General of the Army Pierre Jacomet, and then former ministers of aviation Pierre Cot and Guy La Chambre. The Trial itself would end up taking place over 24 sessions, the first of which would take place on February 19, 1942 and then the last on April 2nd. Because of the goals of the trial, the press not just from France but from around the world were invited to the proceedings. It was supposed to be a triumphant display of Vichy legitimacy, power, and importance, it was instead a complete and total disaster. The trial would go down as an incredible example of a self-own in which the Vichy government brought together a group of people that would spend the majority of the trial sessions attacking not just the Vichy leaders, but the very premise of the trial, and they would do so convincingly. The root of the problem is that the Vichy leaders totally misunderstanding how the defendants would use the stage that they were being put on. Instead of meekly go down without a fight, particularly Daladier and Blum went on the attack, well the verbal attack. It did help that many of the facts were the on side of the defendants, and that they were both skilled at using those facts to demonstrate that the pre-war governments had done many of the correct things to prepare for a war. They instead shifted the blame on to the military and the French High Command, which is exactly where Petain, Weygand, and others did not want it to be. Petain was one of the most influential figures in the shaping and structuring of the interwar French military, and so if the defendants could place the blame on the military they were coming close to putting it onto Petain, which was unacceptable. And so, on April 11th, the trial was stopped, an excuse was given to delay any further trial activities, and it would never start again.

Before getting into more detail about the Riom trials, it is best to take a step back and discuss the creation of the Vichy government, particularly as it related to the powers of the government and its leader, Petain, when compared to what had come before. It is also worth stating here that many of the actions of the Vichy leaders, especially during these early years of the war, were not dictated by Germany, the German government mostly just left the French alone in southern France as long as they continued to abide by the terms of the armistice. The reason that this is important is that many of the Vichy leaders would later claim that their actions were impacted by German opinions or orders, which was not the case. One of the first decisions that was made was where to base the new government, and for this the inland city of Vichy was chosen at least partially because it did not have any dominant political movement like the larger cities in the unoccupied zone of southern France had, cities like Marseilles or Lyons. Then in early July 1940 the Chamber of Deputies and the French Senate would hold a session in which they voted to give Petain the ability to rewrite the French constitution as he felt was necessary in a vote that would heavily favor Petain. While the outcome of this vote was far from favorable, and the legitimacy of the vote would be questioned, it was essentially just giving emergency powers to Petain to rule by decree. Those decrees would begin to flow quite quickly, and would completely change how the French government was structured. The first act with the powers given to him would see Petain put in a position of leadership as the Head of the new government without the previous demarcation between Prime Minister and President, which in the previous system had always been two different individuals. Instead all of the powers of related to the leadership of the country were placed on a single person, Petain. He was then, in the second act, given the ability to form a government, dismiss or appoint ministers, and to put in place new laws as he so chose. The third act of the new government was to adjourn both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, with no date set on their return. Then at the end of July another act was put forth which created the Supreme Court of Justice, which would be the court where the Riom trials would take place. The investigation and the preparation of the trial would then take until mid February 1942.

For a trial that was theoretically started to find the root cause for France’s failure to properly prepare for war it is interesting that the person who led the French military for most of the 1930s, General Gamelin, was only barely involved. He was one of the 6 men named as defendants in the case, and he would have the same opportunities as the other men to give an opening statement, be questioned, and then cross examine witnesses, but then he just didn’t. Instead he would submit a memorandum that gave a detailed accounting of French interwar military policy. However, unlike the other men involved Gamelin’s memorandum was far more in line with the viewpoints of the Vichy officials, criticizing the Popular Front government and pointing to its period in power as the origin point for France’s failure. Most of his criticism rested on the typical criticisms leveled against the French socialists from those on the political right, pointing to things like pacifism and a level of decadence that robbed France of its martial spirit. While Gamelin would give this statement in writing that was his only real contribution to the trial, because he refused to participate in discussions or in questioning. Here were his reasons: “Today, I cannot present my defense without risking identifying some names, French or foreign, that the greater good of the nation must protect from these proceedings. . . . Likewise, I would be forced to mention the responsibilities of men who found themselves under my authority that I consider it my duty or my honor to protect and whom I would thus risk offending.” Gamelin’s refusal to participate in the trial in any meaningful way was an interesting course of action. On one side it had the intended effect of protecting the French Army, because Gamelin was the person who could speak to the actions and decisions that led the French Army to where it was in May 1940. But at the same time his silence also made it more difficult for the problems of the French Army to be pinned upon the political leaders like Daladier and Blum. It was also just a clear act of defiance against the new regime, one that so prominently featured Gamelin’s successor Weygand.

One man who absolutely would use the speaking opportunities presented to him was Leon Blum. Blum had been the leading figure of the Popular Front movement which had rode a wave of public support to form the Socialist led government of 1936, right at the beginning of the period that the Riom trials were set up to investigate. Along with Daladier he was the leading figure on which blame was being placed by the structure of the Riom trials, and instead of shying away from those charges he leaned into them and attacked them. During his opening statements he would question the entire concept of the trial and the court saying: “Sirs, your mission is to establish and punish those responsible. For what? A military defeat. Yet, by your indictment, you have already removed from the proceedings all that concerns the conduct of military operations.” Blum was alluding to the fact that the court set as an end date September 3, 1939, which meant that it specifically did not include the period during which France was actually invaded by Germany, which Blum claimed made it a bit difficult to discuss the causes of a military failure when they could not discuss the military event itself. To close out his opening statement Blum would deliver one of the best quotes of the entire trial, and with it also made it clear that he was not going to just roll over for the Vichy government: “If the Republic must remain accused, we will stay at our battle station as its witnesses and its defenders.” After Blum’s statement was complete, another problem for the government was introduced when one of his attorney’s announced before the court that the French press within the Vichy zone had been given a specific list of instructions on how the trial should be discussed and covered within their newspapers. Now obviously, this did not impact the press within the Vichy zone, they just did not report on what was said, but the press that were from the wider world or from the occupied zone of Northern France were not under any restrictions. The attempts at censorship, which were amateurish and ill-thought out did nothing to help the credibility of the Vichy government outside of the territory that they controlled, and what was one of the purposes for the trial in the first place.

While Blum cast himself as the defender of the Republic during his opening statements, when it was Daladier’s turn to speak he went straight for Petain. After stating that he had made the decision to give more money to French rearmament than any Prime Minister in the history of France he began to bring out documents from Petain’s time as minister of war in 1934. The most important of these was a document that Petain had written that called for a reduction in armament spending in 1934, a reduction, not an increase. Daladier’s purpose with this document was not just to cast a shadow on Petain and the Vichy leaders, but also to make clear to the court that by restricting the time under question in the ways that the court was doing, just between March 1936 and September 1939 there were critical pieces of information that were difficult to bring forward. And he was right, the decisions and actions of governments and nations during the interwar years were irrevocably linked between years and decades. What was happening in 1936 or 1939 had its roots a decade or more earlier, and it was only by digging into events that the reason causes of decisions in 1940 could be determined. Obviously I would agree with this line of thinking, it is basically the entire driving force behind this podcast. Daladier would end his opening comments by another direct attack at Petain: “[Pétain] seeks to dishonor the Republic after having fought for it [in World War I]. Was it the Republic that, in 1934, reduced armament credits? Was it the Republic that prevented Marshal Pétain, minister of war in 1934, from presenting a French plan [for rearmament] in response to German actions? Was it the Republic that is responsible for the misconduct or the breakdown in morale that we will cover during the course of these proceedings? Neither the Republic nor the institutions of liberty led France to defeat.” After a recess the session after Daladier made his statement was again filled with discussion of the timeframe under review. One of Daladier’s lawyers just came out and accused the court of protecting Petain and Weygand by choosing a time period during which they were not in office. Blum would add some emphasis to this with a specific example related to Germany. He pointed out that Germany had left the League of Nations at the end of 1933, and then had openly declared the return of constriction and mandatory military service for all males in March 1935. However during this period the French Minister of War did not push for an increase in readiness for the French Army or for an increase in the overall military budget. Instead France continued as it had before, with the Minister of war of course being Petain. During the next session Daladier came under more direct attack because he had spent some time as Minister of War before 1939, but he was able to at least deflect the blame by stating that he simply continued the policies put forward by Petain, the person who had preceded him. And regardless, Daladier would point out that the Minister of War, while responsible for the political side of the military was not responsible for choosing exactly which things that the military budget should be spent on, or how it should be used, or what the war plans were. Daladier made it clear that any questions about the efficacy of military spending had to be concerned with those topics, and for those topics they woul dneed to talk to somebody else. This entire line of questioning of Daladier was deeply problematic for the Vichy leaders because at all times Daladier could fall back on what Petain’s views were, or what Weygand’s views and actions were. For example, due to the success that the Germans had with their armored divisions in France the obvious question that was asked was why the French did not such effective armored units. When they attempted to blame Daladier he simply stated that Petain had always emphasized their value in supporting the infantry, and even those he supported and had been part of the creation of the first armored division, it was too late to make a difference. Daladier was also able to pull in information that many within the court did not at the time know about as part of his case, for example in December 1939 Weygand had authorized the dispatch of anti-tank weapons to Turkey, and if Weygand believed that there were extra anti-tank weapons in France in December 1939, why was he being blamed for there not being enough in September 1939? Along with overall military spending, Daladier would also be questioned at length about his views and decisions on the Maginot Line. While later generations would question why the French spent so much money on the Maginot Line at this point, on February 28, 1940 the questioning of Daladier were far more concerned with why he did not spend more on the fortifications along the French frontier. Once again Daladier was prepared for this line of questioning and prepared with his defense. On the topic of spending money he was able to point to the fact that while he was in the government he had authorized 2.5 billion francs for construction of fortifications. When the topic of why the Maginot Line was not extended further north Daladier would point to the fact that in 1927 the French Supreme War Council had advised against fortifying the areas in the north. The reasons for this were that it would be difficult due to the shape of the border, and the fact that the locations of the major industrialized cities and the geography that surrounded them would make fortifications difficult to build. This allowed Daladier to simply claim that whatever role he played in not extending the Maginot line further north he was simply following the advice of the military experts, was he supposed to do something different? Oh, and the Vice President of the Supreme War Council when that recommendation was made? Why it was Marshal Petain of course. With the Riom trial being covered by the international press answers like this would make headlines, as an example on March 1, 1942 the New York Times would have a story with the headline: “DALADIER ACCUSES PETAIN OF NEGLECT; Ex-Premier at Riom Trial Lays Responsibility for Defense Weaknesses to Marshal HE CITES SEDAN War Council Headed by Petain Vetoed His Plan for Forts in Region, He Testifies.” Not a great look for the Vichy government which was still trying to gain some level of international recoginition. The final day that Daladier would be questioned on would be during the 6th session on March 3rd, the focus during the session was once again on the funds available for rearmament during the 1930s. But again Daladier was able to deflect blame from himself by pointing out that Petain had actually reduced the spending on industrial mobilization efforts in the years before Daladier had become the Minister of Defense in 1936. This session would mark the end of the direct questioning of Daladier, in what had been a completely disastrous set of sessions for the Vichy government. Daladier had been able, in almost every case, not just to deflect any blame from his actions but more importantly to tie any of the accusations back to Petain.

The session following the last of Daldier’s questioning would be focused on one of the former French ministers of Aviation, Guy La Chambre. One French chronicler of the events at Riom would write of La Chambre “in a good political trial, it is necessary to have at least one acquitted.” And it is easy to see why this was the case, because it would be very difficult to focus any real blame on La Chambre who had been put in a very bad situation when he became the Minister of Aviation in January 1938. To quote La Chambre himself “we were five years behind; that is a tough disadvantage to overcome" which was absolutely correct because the Luftwaffe had begun its rearmament process, particularly with large investments in the aviation industry in 1933, and the French only got truly serious about in 1938.

After the La Chambre’s questioning was complete the trial moved onto Leon Blum. Blum, much like with his opening statement was ready, just like Daladier had been, for his questioning to begin with one witness claiming that Blum appeared to be looking forward to the questioning and that felt like he had prepared a long and detailed history of the Popular Front and its role in France’s preparations for war. This would begin from the very start of Blum’s questioning session, and the government had given him some really easy angles of attack. And they were dumb things, just sloppy mistakes that clearly displayed the inability of the Vichy government to prepare for any real resistance from the defendants. For example, one of these was the fact that there were several different decisions and actions that Leon Blum and the Popular Front government were accused of doing that did not actually happen when they were in power. Some happened before the Popular Front government came to power in June 1936 and after he left office in June 1937. This of course tied into Blum’s earlier critiques, which he would reiterate, that it was disingenuous for the trial to be based on the very specific set of dates that the Vichy leaders had suggested. Blum would also go further in his critique of specifically the Vichy leader Pierre Laval, who had been a major decision maker for the Vichy government in 1940 before being removed by Petain in December, he would then be brought back into the government after the trial ended based on German demands. Laval had been a major advocate for reducing the spending of the French government, with government spending being the biggest dividing line between those on the Left and the Right in France during the 1930s. If you remember back to the Third Republic series of episodes one of the major challenges for the French governments during the mid 1930s is that their resistance to government spending increases, and their slavish adherence to the Gold Standard had served them well during the early years of the Great Depression. But then by the mid 1930s as the economies of other nations began to recover, the French recovery was far more sluggish due to the same policies that had helped them in earlier years. Laval was one of the leading voices for a reduction of government spending and the balancing of the budget. Which also almost always put him in opposition to increased military spending, which was exactly what the primary charges were against Blum and Daladier, that they had not allowed appropriate levels of government spending. Just another example of the non-existent differences the Vichy leaders were trying to create between themselves and the defendants. During the two sessions in which he was questioned Blum, much like Daladier before him went on long monologues on many of the topics that were discussed. One of the reasons that this was allowed was because of the decisions made by the President of the Court, or Chief Justice, Pierre Caous, who did not cut off either Daladier or Blum except for reminders from time to time to return to the topic under discussion. This freedom of narrative was used like a weapon by Daladier and Blum.

After the two sessions during which Blum was questioned the trial moved on to discuss the actions of Robert Jacomet, the former inspector general, and also the least well known of any of the defendants. Once this was complete there was a period where witness testimony was presented before the court. In many cases the goal of the government with these witnesses was to prove that the French army was neglected, they spot of inadequate equipment, demoralized troops, a lack of proper training, and other related topics. But few of the witnesses stood up well against the cross examination from Blum and Daladier, who were both active with their questioning. On April 2nd the court would take a scheduled break for Easter, with the plan being to come back after the holiday to continue the witness testimonies. But then, it didn’t. Instead it was announced on April 11 that the Riom trial was being suspended through the creation of a new law. Obviously the trial was not going as planned for the Vichy government, and instead of a trial focused on assigning blame to the defendants it had instead turned into an indictment of the Vichy government itself. Due to this change there was also pressure from the Germans for the trial to end, the last thing that they wanted in the spring of 1942, when they were deep into the campaign in Russia, was for some kind of revolt or political uncertainty in unoccupied France, and so they would request that the trial be ended. The three primary defendants would remain imprisoned, and then in March 1943 Blum, Daladier, and Gamelin would all be turned over to German authorities where they would remain until the spring of 1945, with Blum being sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp. What had started as a trial with tremendous fanfare, designed to determine who to blame for the failures of the French had instead turned into an airing of grievances against many of the Vichy leaders. It goes down in history of a great example of, if you are going to have something approaching a show trial it is best if you know that you can control the show. Daladier and Blum were given too much freedom, too much ammunition, and simply had too many facts that they could pull from in their defense. The moment that they decided they would not go quietly the trial was doomed to failure. It would represent the second time that the French government had been defeated by an opposition due specifically to that opposition choosing a bold offensive. Sure, the first time it had been the German armored divisions crashing through the Ardennes that had caused the defeat of France on the battlefield, but the second time the French government had been defeated in the courtroom by its own former members who chose a similarly bold strategy that the conservative French leaders were ill prepared for.