La Resistenza francese e la questione europea, in L’unità europea obiettivo comune della Resistanza al nazifascismo Antonella Braga, Fulvio Cambotto, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2024. Book chapter by R. Belot p. 55-78.

The unity of the French Resistance was largely a myth. Gaullists and Communists did not believe in the Resistance as a political force. De Gaulle “also saw it as a rival and wanted to quash any argument over legitimacy in the bud”. The Resistance fighters were not all Europeanists and federalists, far from it. But those who were did not succeed, at least until 1947-1948, in making French politics evolve in their direction. There was an impotence to go against the general tendency of French diplomacy from 1943 to 1947 to want to create “an anti-German Europe organized around France” (G. Bossuat). Moreover, French opinion was not ready to support this revolution and to escape from “Gallican solipsism” (J.-M. Soutou). Germany, even if it had come to terms, was less a hope than a danger. The Resistance was not united on this fundamental point. However, Europe will be made, but step by step, by “little piece”. Henri Frenay's entire attitude is based on a particularly lucid historical and geopolitical observation, which he developed during the Montrouge Congress in 1947. As early as 1945, he noted that “Germany and Europe were defeated” and that, contrary to common opinion and political myths, “the victors were outside Europe”. It is an idea dear to Frenay that Europe is “defeated” and that the victors, contrary to the myths that Gaullists and Communists try to put forward, are not in Europe. This Europe must be reborn as Europe or die. For the great Resistance fighter, who paid with his person for the fatherland, who was even one of the “inventors” of the Resistance, the victory of France is largely a fiction. Its freedom and autonomy were hampered by its economic fragility and geopolitical weakness. This is why nationalism and sovereignty are paths that can lead nowhere. The future of European countries can only be European.

The contribution is available here: «La Resistenza francese e la questione europea_Robert Belot.pdf»