Editing Philippe Pétain (section)

==Interwar period==

===Respected hero of France===
[[File:Мундиры маршалов Франции - Петэна, Фоша, Жоффра.JPG|thumb|Uniforms of [[Marshal of France]] (Pétain, Foch, Joffre) at [[Les Invalides]].]]

Pétain ended the war regarded "without a doubt, the most accomplished defensive tactician of any army" and "one of France's greatest military heroes" and was presented with his [[Marshal's baton|baton]] of [[Marshal of France]] at a public ceremony at [[Metz]] by President Poincaré on 8 December 1918.<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 204.</ref>{{failed verification|date=October 2023}} He was summoned to be present at the signing of the [[Treaty of Versailles]] on 28 June 1919. His job as Commander-in-Chief came to an end with peace and demobilisation, and with Foch out of favour after his quarrel with the French government over the peace terms, it was Pétain who, in January 1920, was appointed Vice-Chairman of the revived ''[[Conseil supérieur de la Guerre]]'' (Supreme War Council). This was France's highest military position, whose holder was Commander-in-Chief designate in the event of war and who had the right to overrule the Chief of the General Staff (a position held in the 1920s by Pétain's protégés [[Edmond Buat|Buat]] and [[Marie-Eugène Debeney|Debeney]]), with Pétain holding the vice chairmanship until 1931.<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 212.</ref><ref>Atkin, 1997, p. 41.</ref> Pétain was encouraged by friends to go into politics, although he protested that he had little interest in running for an elected position. He nevertheless tried and failed to get himself elected President following the [[1919 French legislative election|November 1919 elections]].<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 217.</ref>

Shortly after the war, Pétain had placed before the government plans for a large tank and air force, but "at the meeting of the ''Conseil supérieur de la Défense Nationale'' of 12 March 1920, the Finance Minister, [[Frédéric François-Marsal|François-Marsal]], announced that although Pétain's proposals were excellent they were unaffordable". In addition, François-Marsal announced reductions – in the army from fifty-five divisions to thirty, in the air force, and did not mention tanks. It was left to the Marshals, Pétain, Joffre, and Foch, to pick up the pieces of their strategies. The General Staff, now under General Edmond Buat, began to think seriously about a line of forts along the frontier with Germany, and their report was put forward on 22 May 1922.  The three Marshals supported this. The cuts in military expenditure meant that taking the offensive was now impossible and a defensive strategy was all they could have.<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 217–219.</ref>

===Rif War===
{{main|Rif War}}
Pétain was appointed Inspector-General of the Army in February 1922, and produced, in concert with the new Chief of the General Staff, General [[Marie-Eugène Debeney]], the new army manual entitled ''Provisional Instruction on the Tactical Employment of Large Units'', which soon became known as 'the Bible'.<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 219.</ref> On 3 September 1925, Pétain was appointed sole Commander-in-Chief of French Forces in [[Morocco]]<ref>Williams, 2005. p. 232.</ref> to launch a major campaign against the [[Rif Republic|Rif]] tribes, in concert with the Spanish Army, which was successfully concluded by the end of October. He was subsequently decorated in [[Toledo, Spain|Toledo]] by King [[Alfonso XIII]] with the Spanish ''[[Medalla Militar]]''.<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 233–235.</ref>

===Vocal critic of defence policy===
In 1924 the National Assembly was elected on a platform of reducing the length of national service to one year, to which Pétain was almost violently opposed. In January 1926, the Chief of Staff, General Debeney, proposed to the ''Conseil'' a "totally new kind of army. Only 20 infantry divisions would be maintained on a standing basis". Reserves could be called up when needed. The ''Conseil'' had no option in the straitened circumstances but to agree. Pétain disapproved of the whole thing, pointing out that North Africa still had to be defended and in itself required a substantial standing army. But he recognised, after the new Army Organisation Law of 1927, that the tide was flowing against him. He would not forget that the Radical leader, [[Édouard Daladier]], even voted against the whole package, on the grounds that the Army was still too large.<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 244.</ref>

On 5 December 1925, after the [[Locarno Treaty]], the ''Conseil'' demanded immediate action on a line of fortifications along the eastern frontier to counter the already proposed decline in manpower. A new commission for this purpose was established, under [[Joseph Joffre]], and called for reports. In July 1927 Pétain himself went to reconnoitre the whole area. He returned with a revised plan and the commission then proposed two fortified regions. The [[Maginot Line]], as it came to be called, (named after [[André Maginot]] the former Minister of War) thereafter occupied a good deal of Pétain's attention during 1928, when he also travelled extensively, visiting military installations up and down the country.<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 247.</ref> Pétain had based his strong support for the Maginot Line on his own experience of the role played by the forts during the Battle of Verdun in 1916.

Captain Charles de Gaulle continued to be a protégé of Pétain throughout these years. He even allegedly named his [[Philippe de Gaulle|eldest son]] after the Marshal, although it is more likely that he named his son after his family ancestor Jean Baptiste Philippe de Gaulle,<ref>A Certain idea of France The life of Charles de Gaulle, Julian Jackson, p. 58.</ref> before finally falling out over the authorship of a book he had said he had ghost-written for Pétain.

===Election to the ''Académie française''===
[[File:Pétain-Baschet-mai 1940-A.jpg|thumb|1926 painting of Maréchal Pétain]]

In 1928, Pétain had supported the creation of an independent air force removed from the control of the army, and on 9 February 1931, following his retirement as Vice-Chairman of the Supreme War Council, he was appointed Inspector-General of Air Defence.<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 250–252.</ref> His first report on air defence, submitted in July that year, advocated increased expenditure.<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 253–254.</ref> In 1931 Pétain was elected a Fellow of the ''[[Académie française]]''. By 1932 the economic situation had worsened and Édouard Herriot's government had made "severe cuts in the defence budget... orders for new weapons systems all but dried up". Summer manoeuvres in 1932 and 1933 were cancelled due to lack of funds, and recruitment to the armed forces fell off. In the latter year General [[Maxime Weygand]] claimed that "the French Army was no longer a serious fighting force". [[Édouard Daladier]]'s new government retaliated against Weygand by reducing the number of officers and cutting military pensions and pay, arguing that such measures, apart from financial stringency, were in the spirit of the [[Geneva Disarmament Conference]].<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 257.</ref>

In 1938, Pétain encouraged and assisted the writer [[André Maurois]] in gaining election to the ''Académie française'' – an election which was highly contested, in part due to Maurois' Jewish origin. Maurois made a point of acknowledging with thanks his debt to Pétain in his 1941 autobiography, ''Call no man happy''&nbsp;– though by the time of writing their paths had sharply diverged, Pétain having become Head of State of [[Vichy France]] while Maurois went into exile and sided with the [[Free French]].

===Minister of War===
Political unease was sweeping the country and, [[6 February 1934 crisis|on 6 February 1934]], the Paris police fired on a group of [[Far-right leagues|far-right rioters]] outside the Chamber of Deputies, killing 14 and wounding a further 236. President Lebrun invited 71-year-old Doumergue to come out of retirement and form a new "government of national unity". On 8 February, Pétain was invited to join the new French cabinet as Minister of War, which he only reluctantly accepted after many representations.

His important success that year was in getting Daladier's previous proposal to reduce the number of officers repealed. He improved the recruitment programme for specialists and lengthened the training period by reducing leave entitlements. However, Weygand reported to the Senate Army Commission that year that the French Army still could not resist a German attack. Marshals [[Louis Franchet d'Espèrey]] and [[Hubert Lyautey]] (the latter died suddenly in July) added their names to the report. After the autumn manoeuvres, which Pétain had reinstated, a report was presented to Pétain that officers had been poorly instructed, had little basic knowledge and no confidence. He was also told by [[Maurice Gamelin]] that, if the plebiscite in the [[Territory of the Saar Basin]] went for Germany, "it would be a serious military error" for the French Army to intervene. Pétain responded by again petitioning the government for further funds for the army.<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 260–261, 265.</ref>

During this period, he repeatedly called for a lengthening of the term of compulsory military service for conscripts from two to three years, to no avail. Pétain accompanied President Lebrun to [[Belgrade]] for the funeral of [[Alexander I of Yugoslavia|King Alexander]], who had been assassinated on 6 October 1934 in [[Marseille]] by [[Vlado Chernozemski]], a Bulgarian nationalist from [[IMRO]]. Here he met [[Hermann Göring]] and the two men reminisced about their experiences in the Great War. "When Göring returned to Germany he spoke admiringly of Pétain, describing him as a 'man of honour'".<ref>Williams, 2005, p. 266.</ref>

===Critic of government policy===
In November, the Doumergue government fell. Pétain had previously expressed interest in being named Minister of Education (as well as of War), a role in which he hoped to combat what he saw as the decay in French moral values.<ref name=paxton>Paxton, Robert O. (1982). ''Vichy France: Old Guard and New Order, 1940–1944'', pp. 36–37. Columbia University Press. {{ISBN|0-231-12469-4}}.</ref> Now, however, he refused to continue in Flandin's short-lived government as Minister of War and stood down – in spite of a direct appeal from Lebrun himself. At this moment an article appeared in the newspaper ''[[Le Petit Journal (newspaper)|Le Petit Journal]]'', calling for Pétain as a candidate for a dictatorship. 200,000 readers responded to the paper's poll. Pétain came first, with 47,000, ahead of [[Pierre Laval]]'s 31,000 votes. These two men travelled to [[Warsaw]] for the funeral of the Polish Marshal [[Piłsudski]] in May 1935 (and another cordial meeting with Göring).<ref>Williams, 2005, pp. 268–269.</ref> Although ''Le Petit Journal'' was conservative, Pétain's high reputation was bipartisan; socialist [[Léon Blum]] called him "the most human of our military commanders". Pétain did not get involved in non-military issues when in the Cabinet, and unlike other military leaders he did not have a reputation as an extreme Catholic or a [[Monarchism in France|monarchist]].<ref name="jackson2001">{{cite book|title=France: The Dark Years, 1940–1944|publisher=Oxford University Press|author=Jackson, Julian|year=2001|pages=[https://archive.org/details/france00juli/page/124 124–125, 133]|isbn=0-19-820706-9|url=https://archive.org/details/france00juli/page/124}}</ref>

He remained on the ''Conseil superieur''. Weygand had been at the British Army 1934 manoeuvres at [[Tidworth Camp]] in June and was appalled by what he had seen. Addressing the ''Conseil'' on the 23rd, Pétain claimed that it would be fruitless to look for assistance to the United Kingdom in the event of a German attack. On 1 March 1935, Pétain's famous article<ref>Philippe Pétain, "La securité de la France aux cours des années creuses", ''Revue des deux mondes'', 26, 1935.</ref> appeared in the ''[[Revue des deux mondes]]'', where he reviewed the history of the army since 1927–28. He criticised the reservist system in France, and her lack of adequate air power and armour. This article appeared just five days before [[Adolf Hitler]]'s announcement of Germany's new [[Luftwaffe|air force]] and a week before the announcement that Germany was increasing its army to 36 divisions. On 26 April 1936, the [[1936 French legislative election|general election results]] showed 5.5&nbsp;million votes for the [[Popular Front (France)|Popular Front]] parties against 4.5&nbsp;million for the Right on an 84% turnout. On 3 May Pétain, was interviewed in ''Le Journal'' where he launched an attack on the Franco-Soviet Pact, on Communism in general (France had the [[French Communist Party|largest communist party]] in Western Europe), and on those who allowed Communists intellectual responsibility. He said that France had lost faith in her destiny.<ref>Anthony Adamthwaite, ''Grandeur and Misery: France's Bid for Power in Europe 1914–1940'' (London: Arnold, 1995), p. 182.</ref> Pétain was now in his 80th year.

Some argue{{who|date=July 2020}} that Pétain, as France's most senior soldier after Foch's death, should bear some responsibility for the poor state of French weaponry preparation before World War II. Others say that Pétain was one of many on a large committee responsible for national defence, and interwar governments frequently cut military budgets. In addition, with the restrictions imposed on Germany by the Versailles Treaty there seemed no urgency for vast expenditure until the advent of Hitler. It is argued{{who|date=July 2020}} that while Pétain supported the massive use of tanks he saw them mostly as infantry support, leading to the fragmentation of the French tank force into many types of unequal value spread out between mechanised cavalry (such as the [[SOMUA S35]]) and infantry support (mostly the [[Renault R35]] tanks and the [[Char B1 bis]]). Modern infantry rifles and machine guns were not manufactured, with the sole exception of a light machine-rifle, the [[Mle 1924]]. The French heavy machine gun was still the [[Hotchkiss M1914]], obsolete when compared to the new automatic weapons of German infantry. A modern infantry rifle was adopted in 1936 but very few of these MAS-36 rifles had been issued to the troops by 1940. A well-tested French semiautomatic rifle, the MAS 1938–39, was ready for adoption but it never reached the production stage until after World War II as the [[MAS 49]]. French artillery had not been modernised since 1918. The result of all these failings is that the French Army had to face the invading enemy in 1940 with the dated weaponry of 1918. Pétain had been made Minister of War in 1934, but could not reverse 15 years of inactivity and constant cutbacks.  French aviation entered the War in 1939 without even the prototype of a bomber aeroplane capable of reaching Berlin and coming back. French industrial efforts in fighter aircraft were dispersed among several firms ([[Dewoitine]], [[Morane-Saulnier]] and [[Marcel Dassault|Marcel Bloch]]), each with its own models.