VICHY'S DISPERSAL SALE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 118, 21 May 1941, Page 6

VICHY'S DISPERSAL SALE

Anticipating that Marshal Petain will try to purchase continued peace from Germany by sale of portions of the Empire of France, General de Gaulle has intervened to give notice —or, rather, to repeat notice, already given—that such sales will not be recognised; that the Petain Government possesses no constitutional authority; that, even if it did possess such authority, it is acting as a suborned agent, not as a free Government; that the real France is the Free France, who fights on. The following sentences from General de Gaulle's statement deserve to live in history:

The Vichy "Government" is not in a position to exercise the prerogatives of French sovereignty, and it has no right to do so. In particular, the measures it is taking in collaboration with the invader are neither free nor legal, and consequently they cannot be considered as being those of the French people.

General de Gaulle's expectation that Hitler has at last "put over" his deal with Marshal Petain .is now widespread. Hitler lias "doled out" some more prisoner-releases (affecting 100,000 of the older French soldiers held prisoner in Germany) and this is taken as the outward and visible sign that a partial liquidation of the French Empire is proceeding. It is rumoured—and for the present the statement rests on no higher basis — that Hitler gave Croatia to Mussolini as a solatium for Mussolini's pledge that he will abandon his claim on France for Nice and Savoy; though why Mussolini should have any solatium passes understanding if, as is further rumoured, the French island of Corsica, also Tunis, are to pass to him from the failing hand of the Hero of Verdun. "They shall not pass," the 'famous watchword, seems to be now the property of General de Gaulle rather than of its author.

Putting aside rumour, the known facts include the use by the enemy of aerodromes in French-mandated Syria for aerial operations in Irak; and this fact in itself is sufficient to thin the ice almost to breaking-point. The French Empire includes a landing place in South America; a jump-ing-off place in West Africa; islands off the American coast; a landing place in North Africa; a strategic possession in the Red Sea region of Africa; Syria, gateway to Irak oil; Indian Ocean islands; an East Asiatic region which, with Thailand, could be used to outflank Singapore; and Pacific Ocean Islands. In every one of these French territories where the Vichy writ runs at all, the British Empire must feel that its interests are precarious, because those interests have been damaged beyond all doubt in Syria, have been threatened by the three-cornered Vichy-Japan-Thailand deal, and have been at least disserved in French North Africa. Nowhere yet has the Vichy Government bought peace by its illegal sales, apart from the apparent peace with Thailand in Indo-China. Of what avail is French hospitality in Tunis, territorial waters to the Axis invaders of Africa if Tunis is to go to Mussolini? As to the French possessions within the sphere of the Monroe Doctrine, a member of the United States House of Representatives has introduced a Bill authorising the President to buy them. This member assumes the willingness of the President to buy—which is at least doubtful, in present circumstances — and a right-to-sell vesting in what General de Gaulle calls a usurping Government. Meanwhile, the diplomatic relations of Vichy and Washington assume a sharper tone, and a clarification of the President's attitude to Admiral Darlan's dispersal sale of an ancient empire may not be long delayed.