FRANCE SHAMED

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 224, 11 October 1940, Page 7

FRANCE SHAMED

ATTITUDE OF THE PETAIN GOVERNMENT TRAITOR TO THE CAUSE The Petain Government will tryto turn French anger and French shame against us, writes D. W. Brogan in the Spectator. It will', at first, have some success. But its success is bound to be limited. Even if all France, or the majority of Frenchmen, had no higher ideals' than those of M. Laval or M. Deat (it is unfair x to lump the two together, but for the moment they are allies.or accomplices), the necessities of the war, if we hold out, will force the Germans to strip France of that wealth, that internal security, that rest, that its present governors have foolishly thought to buy at such a price. The vision that may haunt some French minds of France as a willing partner in a Fascist Europe is baseless. F'ascism needs sorap spiritual food, it needs the psycholo gical support of patriotism. What can the Petain Goveriment do to sup ply that need? Against it speaks the most varied patriotic tradition in Europe: Joan of Arc and Richelieu, Danton and Gambetta, F'och and Clemenceau. Even the Bourdon Restoration of 1814 and 1815 had more to offer French sentiment than that. Louis XVIII bore only the shadow of the great name, but there had been the great name.