Where Does Freedom Lie?

The loyalties of Frenchmen who want to see their country freed were last week sadly tied in knots. Admiral Jean Franc,ois Darlan, ex-Vichyite, was in the saddle in North Africa, with full, if only temporary, U.S. approval. General Henri Honore Giraud, known hater of the Germans, was his subordinate commander. General Charles de Gaulle, the man who refused to admit the French surrender at Compiegne and founded the only recognized organization of free Frenchmen, was somewhere out in the cold, with no voice whatever in the proceedings hailed as the first step toward France's liberation.

True, military expediency had dictated the U.S. arrangement with Darlan in Africa. But if the Admiral and his Vichy clique were to be thrown overboard when the American position was secure--as President Roosevelt indicated--what would follow? For Frenchmen there were principles involved--principles which were symbolized in the resistance which the Fighting French had put up since the Armistice and which now, like De Gaulle and his followers, had been ignored.

General Giraud, the soldier, had recognized the military situation dictating Darlan's appointment and, with a soldier's judgment of the tactical problem, had accepted the Darlan solution. In the minds of many non-Vichy Frenchmen, this had done his reputation much harm; certainly it had made cooperation between him and De Gaulle impossible until the obstacle of Darlan was removed. The Fighting French had hoped to join forces with the popular escapist Giraud, a hope that had been frustrated before they had been able even to establish contact with him.

In this confusion, with their homeland fully occupied and under Hitler's creature Pierre Laval, no one could say which way French minds would turn. But there were trends: it was reported by one labor leader who fled from France to London, with Air General d'Astier de la Vigerie, that President Roosevelt's stock had dropped 75% in France when Darlan was appointed, that General Giraud had "disappointed us all." The hopes of Frenchmen, in his view, were still pinned on De Gaulle; while Admiral Darlan held his present post, he said, the French people would never willingly answer any call to arms.

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