COLONEL COLLET

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 May 1941, Page 6

COLONEL COLLET

FAMOUS LEADER LEAVES SYRIA DENUNCIATION OF VICHY TREACHERY. REFUSAL TO BECOME ACCOMPLICE. LONDON. May 24. A famous French military leader, Colonel Collet, has left Syria to join the Free French forces. In a manifesto addressed to officers and soldiers of the army of the Levant, Colonel Collet recalls the “solemn promise” of the French High Commissioner, M. Dentz, to defend Syria, and he states that the French army was convinced that the leader would keep his word.’ Colonel Collet declares that French supplies were being given to the Bagdad rebels for the war against Britain. Citing Marshal Petain’s statement of April 17 that ‘’honour forbids us to take any' action against our former allies.” the colonel asks: “Can it bo that you have forgotten so easily or attach so little importance to honour?" Entirely rejecting the Vichy excuses that the German planes had made “forced landing's” in Syria, he says that the policy of Vichy is incompatible with honour, and he adds that he crossed the frontier into Palestine with 11 is troops, as he could no longer remain at his post without becoming an accomplice in this policy. The official Vichy news agency admits that Colonel Collet has crossed into Transjordania from Syria, and says that under the pretext of exercising, the colonel, who was commander of the tribal levies, made the troops under his command carry out a manoeuvre designed to draw them across the frontier to join with the British forces from Transjordania.