Teach me about Philippe Pétain, /his/
>>1282048
The Last Frenchman.
He did nothing (morally) wrong.
>>1282048
He was a hero and was killed by cowards
>>1282048
faggot who sold out his country
Work, Family, Homeland was his motto. As de Gaulle said, Petain never worked a day in his life, didn't have a family, and as for its homeland, he sold it to the krauts.
>>1284216
>
>
>
- Charles de Gaulle
Only communists dislike him.
>>1284216
Yeah I'm sure that de Gaulle wasn't exaggerating out of his loose French anus there.
>>1284216
Damn there's some rekage going on over here.
>>1284707
>sworn enemies invade your country and destroy your army
>lick their boot
I am sure more than just communists hate him
>>1284778
Amen. I'm a communist but even if I wasn't I'd still hate him.
>>1284820
So what? I can hate them both then.
>>1284820
And never has it been discovered exactly how widespread their sabotage of the french industry was. Somehow, french communists genuinely were deluded that the German-URSS pact of non-aggression meant that their support should be owed to Germany.
Fucking communists. Scum of the earth and traitors to their own.
>>1282048
Old fashioned conservative who used his fame to try salvage France from what appeared to be an unstoppable Germany. Turns out he rapidly became a non-entity in the Vichy government. Tragic and well meaning, but misguided in thinking he could actually work with Germany and pro-Nazi French politicians like Laval. He wasn't good at dealing with politician crap.
Petain had more in common with Miguel Primo de Rivera, dictator of Spain than French fascists like Marcel Deat or Pierre Laval.
I actually read a decent biography about him I got at a library book sale.
>>1282048
"hurr sold his country"
"hurr traitor"
He did everything he could to insure that france wasn't wiped out off completely from the face of europe
>>1282048
>pre WW1
Took part in some colonial wars then became a profesor in a military university. He was an über hipster since he was the only guy to contest the French academia's completely retarded and idiotic obsession of "permanent offensive" which would kill off enormous amount of Frenchmen in WW1.
>WW1
Called back from retirement into military service. Since he wasn't an obnoxious retard who didn't just throw his men at machine guns he was highly respected by the frontline men and despised by fellow officers. Won the battle of Verdun with clever tactics and persistence. He was made one of the chief leaders of the French army after the mutinies of 1917. His promise of guaranteeing French soldiers hot meals every day and stopping useless offensives "until the tanks and Americans arrive" made him even more popular wit the troop. During the 1918 spring offensive, when the Germans were almost at the gates of Paris, he was actually proposing to surrender but got slapped by Ferdinand Foch, the other top French general who was a firm believer of the permanent (now mechanized) offensive doctrine and notoriously anti-german. Made marechal along with Foch when the war ended-
>interbellum
He was part of the superior military council and was ardently opposed to all of the successive French governments which decreased the army's budget, size, organization, etc... Basically by 1936 he already knew that the gutted French Army couldn't compete against Germany (he wasn't entirely wrong). That's the period when he came to hate leftists since they kept shutting him down.
>WW2
Everyone knew he was a very pessimistic personwho wouldn't try to save France, but was still voted in as head of state. By that point he was already old, sick and senility was starting to settle in. He "ruled" over an extremly slimy bunch of collaborators who disliked each other, so they kept him as head of state, to mantain an appearance of outwards stability.
cont.
>>1284703
What is with the french?
>>1287246
I think we need to point out that like >>1285216 said, Petain wasn't a fascist. He was an old "get off my lawn lefties REE" style dictator.
Meanwhile his government was a rag tag team of deluded communists (!), slimy opportunists and crazy fascists who all opposed each other, but were forced to live together because they were the only ones willing to collaborate. In the end he drew the short end of the stick. He was imprisoned and tried after the liberation of France.
>post WW2
Even though the gommies campaigned to get him killed, de Gaulle commuted his sentence to life imprisonment. Died a few years later because none of the unstable governments of the IV Republic wanted to get a popularity hit by commuting his sentence to allow him to get treated in a hospital.
>>1282048
He did nothing wrong.
