A new book revisits the trial of Philippe Pétain in 1945
Julian Jackson uses the case of the collaborationist leader to examine France’s collective guilt
Few home-grown 20th-century leaders prompt as much discomfort for the French as Philippe Pétain. The head of the Vichy regime, who signed the armistice with Germany on June 22nd 1940 and was photographed shaking the hand of Adolf Hitler in the French town of Montoire, embodied his country’s collaboration with Nazi Germany and the sacrifice of its national honour. In this painstakingly researched work, Julian Jackson, a British historian and biographer of Charles de Gaulle, examines Pétain’s trial as a way to put both a leader and a country in the dock.
This article appeared in the Culture section of the print edition under the headline “Man of dishonour”
From the July 8th 2023 edition
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