Editing Renault (section)

===World War II and aftermath (1939–1944)===
After the [[Second Armistice at Compiègne|French capitulation in 1940]], [[Louis Renault (industrialist)|Louis Renault]] refused to produce tanks for [[Nazi Germany]], which took control of his factories. As Renault was manufacturing the [[Renault UE]] tank for the Allies, he produced [[Mercedes-Benz L3000|trucks]] instead. On 3 March 1942, the British [[Royal Air Force]] (RAF) launched 235 low-level bombers at the [[Île Seguin|Île Seguin, Billancourt, Paris]] plant, the largest number aimed at a single target during the war.<ref>Ben Macintyre, ''Agent Zigzag'', p37, Bloomsbury, 2010 ({{ISBN|978-1-4088-1149-8}})</ref> {{Convert|460|MT|}} of bombs were dropped on the plant and the surrounding area, causing extensive damage along with heavy civilian casualties.<ref name=Automobilia1940-46/> Renault resolved to rebuild the factory as quickly as possible, but bombardments continued a year later, on 4 April, this time delivered by the Americans, and on 3 and 15 September 1943.<ref name=Automobilia1940-46/>

A few weeks after the [[Liberation of Paris]], at the start of September 1944, the factory gates at Renault's Billancourt plant reopened.<ref name=Automobilia1940-46/> Operations restarted slowly, in an atmosphere poisoned by plotting and political conspiracy.<ref name=Automobilia1940-46/> In 1936, the Billancourt factory had been the scene of violent political and industrial unrest that had surfaced under [[Leon Blum|Léon Blum]]'s [[Popular Front (France)|Popular Front]] government. The political jostling and violence that followed liberation ostensibly reflected the rivalries between [[capitalist]] collaboration and [[communist]] resistance; many of the scores settled predated the invasion.<ref name=Automobilia1940-46/>

Responding to the chaotic situation at Renault, a 27 September 1944 meeting of the [[Council of Ministers of France|Council of Ministers]] <small>([[:fr: Conseil des ministres (France)|fr]])</small> took place under [[Charles de Gaulle|de Gaulle's]] presidency. Postwar European politics had quickly become polarised between communists and anti-communists, and in France de Gaulle was keen to resist [[French Communist Party|Communist Party]] attempts to monopolise the political dividends available to [[French resistance|resistance]] heroes: politically Billancourt was a communist stronghold. The government decided to "requisition" the Renault factories.<ref name="Automobilia1940-46" /> A week later, on 4 October, [[Pierre Lefaucheux]], a resistance leader with a background in engineering and top-level management, was appointed provisional administrator of the firm, assuming his responsibilities at once.<ref name="Automobilia1940-46" />

Meanwhile, [[Provisional Government of the French Republic|provisional government]] accused Louis Renault of collaborating with the Germans. In the frenzied atmosphere of those early post-liberation days, with many wild accusations, Renault was advised by his lawyers to present himself to a judge. He appeared before Judge Marcel Martin, on 22 September 1944<ref name="Automobilia1940-46" /> and was arrested on 23 September 1944, as were several other French automobile-industry leaders.<ref name="Automobilia1940-46" /> Renault's harsh handling of the 1936–1938 strikes had left him without political allies and no one came to his aid.<ref name="Saltmarsh1" /> He was incarcerated at [[Fresnes prison]] where he died on 24 October 1944 under unclear circumstances,<ref name="shame">{{cite news| title = Louis Renault and the shame of a nation| work=The Daily Telegraph | first = Ian | last = Morton| date = 14 May 2005| url = https://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/2735296/Louis-Renault-and-the-shame-of-a-nation.html| location=London}}</ref> while awaiting trial.<ref name="ogre">{{cite news| title = Foreign News: Was He Murdered?|magazine=Time | date = 6 February 1956| url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,893292,00.html| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081214123926/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,893292,00.html| url-status=dead| archive-date=14 December 2008}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1499&dat=19700107&id=dT0aAAAAIBAJ&pg=5789,2899107|title=The Rise and Fall of Louis Renault|last=Scriba|first=Jay|date=7 January 1970|work=The Milwaukee Journal|page=16|access-date=11 February 2014}}{{Dead link|date=February 2022 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

On 1 January 1945, by de Gaulle's decree, the company was posthumously expropriated from Louis Renault. On 16 January 1945, it was formally nationalised as ''Régie Nationale des Usines Renault''.<ref name="Automobilia1940-46">{{cite journal| first = René | last = Bellu | title =Automobilia| journal = Toutes les Voitures Françaises 1940–46 (Les Années Sans Salon)| volume = 26| page = 5|year = 2003|publisher=Histoire & collections|location=Paris }}</ref> Renault's were the only factories permanently expropriated by the French government.<ref name="Berliet Renault">{{cite book| title = Language, politics, and society, p. 46-47| year = 1974| quote = <!-- The activities of Louis Renault led to the spectacular expropriation of his company by the State; what is less well known is that he died in prison awaiting trial, and therefore was never convicted. The car manufacturer Marius Berliet suffered the same fate of expropriation. At his trial in September 1945, Berliet claimed in his defence that his company had produced few cars for the German occupants than any other car producer: 2239 cars for the Germans vs. 6548 for French customers. This compared to Renault which had delivered 32,887 vehicles to the Germans and only 1697 to French clients, a pattern followed by Citroën (32,248 produced for Germans and only 2052 for French clients)(Aron, 1974). Managers at Renault claimed for their part, that they had deliberately slowed down production, producing 7677 fewer vehicles than the target of 41,909 vehicles imposed by the German occupants. The argument, however, cut no ice with the Confederation Generale du Travail (CVT), who maintained that the go-slow had been organised by the workers, not the management. Louis Renault may have been punished more for his attitudes than his actions, which were mirrored by those of many other employers. Robert Aron reports that when a Gaullist seeking his support for the Free French, Renault is alleged to have replied "De Gaulle connais pas!" (Aron, 1974, 234).-->| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=TlN0QLK4LhUC&q=louis+renault&pg=PA47| isbn = 978-1-85359-487-8| author1 = Ager, D. E| author2 = Wright, Sue| author3 = Hantrais, Linda| author4 = Howorth, Jolyon| publisher = Multilingual Matters}}</ref> In subsequent years, the Renault family tried to have the nationalisation rescinded by French courts and receive compensation. In 1945, and again in 1961, the Courts responded that they had no authority to review the government's actions.<ref name="Saltmarsh1">{{cite news|url= https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/20/business/global/20renault.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 |title=To Restore Reputation of a Renault Founder, Family Goes to Court |last1=Jolly |first1=David |last2=Saltmarsh |first2=Matthew |date=19 May 2011 |access-date=18 February 2014 |newspaper= The New York Times}}</ref>