ANXIETY AT VICHY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 242, 10 September 1940, Page 6

ANXIETY AT VICHY.

The Government at Vichy is far from happy. It has found that Frenchmen overseas are not to be dragooned into submission to Nazi .dictates, and are determined to give their support' to General de Gaulle in resisting the common enemy of Britain and France. French Equatorial Africa gave a brilliant lead to France’s colonial possessions which has been followed elsewhere, notably by Tahiti in the • Pacific Ocean, and a few days ago Marshal Petain found it necessary to send an appeal to all the colonies to cease their defection. . The commanders at Indo-Cliina have shown determination to follow an independent course of action in relation to Japan, to the annoyance of both Berlin and Tokio. Following Marshal Petain’s request for a reaffirmation of Morocco’s complete loyalty is the announcement that General Weygand is being sent to French Africa to take charge of its political and military affairs. Quite obviously Vichy is most anxious lest this great territory should also renounce its allegiance to the men who failed when France’s crucial hour struck. French aeroplanes have been arriving in Gibraltar from Morocco and many pilots there are said to be keen to join General de Gaulle. General Weygand’s special mission is to arrest this movement ag'ainst Vichy, but the pendulum is commencing to swing with such force that he ma3 r well find the task beyond his influence. The desire of many Frenchmen overseas to keep faith with Britain is well understood. They have witnessed the remarkable manner in which this Empire is withstanding Nazism and all its frig'htfulness. At first they were crushed by France’s capitulation; now, fortified by Britain’s power of resistance, they are recovering* their balance and" rallying to the cause which brought them into war against Germany. They know that the men of Vichy are not the true rulers of France but the puppets of a creed that would destroy France. The arrest of promi,nent French war leaders and the changes in the Government are the bidding, of Hitler, and they show- the anxiety felt by both Berlin and Vichy at the developments in France’s colonial Empire.