MARSHAL GAMELIN—A SOLDIER BORN

Manawatu Times, Volume 65, Issue 3, 4 January 1940, Page 4

MARSHAL GAMELIN—A SOLDIER BORN

MARSHAL GAMELIN, the Com-mander-in-Chief of the Allied Military Forces, who is 66 years of age, comes from a military family. He is a world authority on Napoleon’s movements, and it is reported that- he can recite every army order Napoleon issued, and the name to whom it was issued. Both ancestry and environment made Maurice Gamelin a soldier, states an article in the New York Times. He was bom in 1872 (the year after the Franco-Prussian War), in Paris, at No. 262 Boulevard St. Germain, just across from the War Ministry, in whose shadow he played war games as a child. On his fathers side he was descended from at least five generals, one of whom served under Louis XVI. His father, Zephirin Auguste Joseph Gamelin, became Controller-General of the French Army after he had been gravely wounded at Solferino, during Napoleon lll.’s fight against the Austrians. Maurice first went to the College Stanislas, a strict and scholarly Catholic school with considerable social standing and a military flavour. After Stanislas he entered the military college, St. Cyr, where, in 1893, he finished first in a class of 449. There followed three years of service with the 3rd Regiment of the "Tirailleurs Algeriens,” because he wanted to see some rough service, and three years with the arrn 3 r s geographical service, because

Pen Picture of the Man

he liked to paint landscapes in water colour, survey, and map. In 1899 he was admitted to the War College, where he studied tactics under Lieut.Colonel, later Marshal, Foch, who particularly noticed his qualities. He graduated in 1902 with the commendation of "tres bien.” During the next four years he had various field commands, and in 1906 he became orderly officer to General Joffre, then commander of the 6th Infantry Division in Paris. In 1912, when Joffre was promoted to the Supreme War Council, Gamelin was chosen as Joffre’s "chef de cabinet,” or military secretary. During this time the French general staff was discussing (but only discussing) the possibility of a German violation of Belgian neutrality to attack France. Gamelin made a study of it, and wrote out a defence of such an attack. That was the germ of Joffre’s instruction No. 2. During those critical days General Joffre, who had called Gamelin "one of my red blood corpuscles,” came to admire his little aide’s unfailing composure as well as his swift and incisive tactical foresight. Paraphrasing Abraham Lincoln, he observed: "If this is philosophy, it is time all generals were philosophers.” Not only was Gamelin a gifted staff officer; the number and quality of his citations in the field make him stand 1 ou t in the war-time company of blun-

derers and butchers like Sir Galahad at a gang shooting. In 1919 General Gamelin headed the French military mission to Brazil. In 1925 he was sent to Syria to help put down the Druse revolt He was made commander of France’s army of the Levant, then brought home in 1928. Three years later he became chief of staff, and in 1935 achieved what was then the biggest French military job, that of Vice-president of the Supreme War Council (the President is the War Minister). As France’s No. 1 soldier, Gamelin has continued the Maglnot Line to the sea, mechanised the array to a point below Germany’s but at which he thinks it can be most effective, extended the conscript period from a year to 18 months, to two years—this over the bitter opposition of most French politicians. He has confidence in the army he has built. During the Munich crisis he believed the French army was ready to fight, and General Gamelin quietly went to London to tell the statesmen so. He got about the same attention that he got in 1936 from short-lived Premier Sarraut, when he told the Government he could chase the Germans out of the Rhineland if they wanted him to. The thoroughgoing general would not agree to shove off, however, without ordering a general mobilisation, and Mr. Sarraut feared it was too close to the General Election to risk it. The history of Adolf Hitler’s aggressions dates from there. Maurice Gamelin is generally characterised as colourless. That, however, is the way the French have learned to like their general best. Napoleons L and 111. had plenty of colour, but they did not pay off at the finish. Particularly in these times, France wants her soldiers mute and professional, and the mutest and most professional is Maurice Gamelin. General Gamelin Is very easily approached, his voice is quiet, and he is always calm. . ("It’s no use getting angry at things; it’s a matter of indifference to them.”) His well-trained memory is stUl prodigious. He is said not only to know every road near any French frontier, but also to know by name and sight every French officer down through the rank of colonel. He is not chummy with his staff, but treat? them with what they call “benevolent formality.” The general usually wears, except on ceremonial occasions, a dark civilian suit. He does not mind the numerous luncheons and dinners he has to attend, likes to go out in the evenings, to hear opera and ancient music. If he stays home he reads. His library is stocked principally with philosophy, folklore, political and military history, and treatises on his other old favourite, mapmaking. He has few friends, but one of his best, oddly enough, is that other able professional, Marshal Pietro Badoglio, of Italy. On his fifty-fifth birthday General Gamelin married. He and his wife, who is as neutraltoned as her husband, have no children. Madame la Generale enjoys going to manoeuvres.