Show of Doubt

Like a camel driver urging his beast to get up off its knees. French Premier Pierre Mendes-France cajoled and prodded the French National Assembly towards the decision it had balked at for years. Now both France's allies and France's enemies demanded that the issue of German rearmament be met, and Mendes promised that France would declare itself.

The agile young Premier's tenacity at the London Conference had won substantial concessions from the Germans and a history-making commitment from Britain. Paris headlines called the achievement a "decisive step" and "unmitigated success." But the politicians awaited their Premier's return with jeers and indifference. The prospect of making a decision, even en principe, threw the Assembly into a tizzy. Party lines unraveled like old hawsers. In the corridors of the Palais Bourbon, said one who was present, "there was so much grappling with souls that you could weigh them." But the tocsin summoned the Deputies, and, in a mood that one French newspaper called "obvious resignation and embarrassment," they assembled for the showdown.

A Glass of Milk. As the Premier strode to the rostrum, looking wan and harassed, barely two thirds of the Deputies were present. All Europe waited on their decision, yet there was little to be felt or seen of the profound sense of history that had reigned at the London Conference and shone in its decisions. A bored-looking, frock-coated usher placed the inevitable glass of milk at Mendes' right hand, and in a flat, disappointed voice, the Premier began to speak. Mendes was off form. His theme was essentially negative. Bidding for the support of EDC champions, he argued that enough of EDC's supranationality had been put into the Brussels Treaty Organization (BRUTO) to limit German arms without really limiting French arms. BRUTO, explained Mendes, would give France "the right of veto . . . on any increase in the armed forces of another participant, for example, Germany." Instead of using German rearmament as an "excuse for withdrawing their troops," the U.S., Britain and Canada as well had agreed to maintain their commitments on the Continent.

But Mendes parliamentary strategy also required that he pick up votes from the Socialists (104 seats), whose left wing opposed EDC. To curry favor with them, he came ominously close to beggaring the very policy he was advocating. Mendes assured the Socialists that he would never have accepted the London agreement if there were any danger of its "straining our relations" with the Soviet Union. Besides, he said, "you know, and the Soviet Union knows well, that time is needed, two or three years without doubt, for the London decisions to result in arms for Germany. It is not to be too optimistic to hope that during this period negotiations [with Russia] will have [ended] in disarmament." It was almost as if the Premier were inviting Frenchmen to use the London agreement as they had for four years used EDC, to delay Germany's sovereignty and rearmament while pretending to inch towards it. In effect, he was asking the Assembly to approve German rearmament in theory, while suggestting sotto voce that the new German army might never become a reality.

Soul of a Soldier. But even this devious approach failed to swing the Assembly. From two directions at once, the opposition hit at Mendes and the London plan. On one side were Communists and Pacifists--mostly among the Socialists--who oppose all German rearmament, on the other, the "Europeans"--mainly of the Catholic M.R.P. As champions of EDC, the Europeans could not forgive the Premier who had presided. Pilate-like, over the death of EDC and who now pleaded for their support for a new European alliance, shorn of most of the safeguards that had distinguished EDC.

The Europeans, in perhaps understandable antagonism, let a crafty old nationalist carry their side into the fight. Ex-Premier Paul Reynaud scoffed at "the Eden miracle," warned of the "rebirth of the Wehrmacht" and sarcastically asked: "Will there be a German general staff which will train men a la prussienne and force in them the soul of a German soldier?" Even old Robert Schuman, who probably sacrificed his political future by his long fight for EDC, assumed a slight tinge of nationalism. "There is the risk," said he of the London plan, "that Germany will one day withdraw from this fragile syndicate."

Assembly on the Spot. All day and all night the grappling went on. Mendes took a nap on the cot in his office, then, tugging at his rumpled suit, returned to the floor to fight his way out of an old beartrap of French politics--the "war of resolutions." By attaching crippling resolutions to a government motion, the Assembly often evades a decision or makes futile a government proposition. Mendes found himself fighting more than a dozen of them. As a favor to the Europeans, he agreed to one that expressed a "desire to continue with the construction of Europe." But he flatly turned down all others because they sought guarantees that he could not obtain or proposed reopening negotiations with the eight other London powers. Said Mendes: "I refuse to have my hands tied." Of the EDC crowd a Mendes supporter said: "These ghouls. They want to sneak into the graveyard and dig up EDC."

Mendes had hoped to win tentative Assembly approval without staking his premiership on the outcome, but the Assembly did not let him. Shortly before 1 a.m. on the second day of debate, the Premier, his voice thick with disgust, announced: "I must pose the question of confidence." That meant that the vote would be delayed until this week and if the Mendes government is beaten, the Cabinet would have to resign.

Mendes-France was one Frenchman, at least, who seemed to realize that France's time for putting off things was near an end. "German rearmament has already been decided upon," he warned. "The only question is whether it will be with us or in spite of us."

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