Louis Maurin
Louis Félix Thomas Maurin (; 5 January 1869 – 6 June 1956) was a French army general who was twice Minister of the Armed Forces (France), Minister of War in the 1930s. Before and during World War I (1914–18) he was a strong advocate of motorization. In the inter-war period from 1919 to 1939 he advocated a policy of passive defense against the growing German threat. He thought that with all the money that had been spent on the Maginot Line fortifications it would be madness to go on the offensive. He saw little value in tanks as a weapon. He advised against a limited military reaction when Germany reoccupied the Rhineland in March 1936, calling for general mobilization or nothing. He did not consider that the 1936 pact with Russia would help France militarily. Early years Louis Félix Thomas Maurin was born in Cherbourg on 5 January 1869. He graduated from the École Polytechnique and joined the army, where he made his career in the artillery. In 1899 Maurin and Maurice Gamel ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Minister Of Defence (France)
The Minister of the Armed Forces (, ) is the leader and most senior official of the French Ministry of the Armed Forces (France), Ministry of the Armed Forces, tasked with running the French Armed Forces. The minister is the third-highest civilian having authority over France's military, behind the President of France, President of the Republic and the Prime Minister of France, Prime Minister. Based on the governments, they may be assisted by a minister or state secretary for veterans' affairs. The office is considered to be one of the core positions of the Government of France. Since 20 May 2022, the Minister of the Armed Forces has been Sébastien Lecornu, the 45th person to hold the office. History The minister in charge of the Armed Forces has evolved within the epoque and regimes. The Secretary of State for War (France), Secretary of State of War was one of the four specialised secretaries of state established in France in 1589. This Secretary of State (Ancien Régime), S ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Maxime Weygand
Maxime Weygand (; 21 January 1867 – 28 January 1965) was a French military commander in World War I and World War II, as well as a high ranking member of the Vichy France, Vichy regime. Born in Belgium, Weygand was raised in France and educated at the École spéciale militaire de Saint-Cyr, Saint-Cyr military academy in Paris. After graduating in 1887, he went on to become an instructor at the Saumur Cavalry School. During World War I, Weygand served as a staff officer to General (later Marshal) Ferdinand Foch. He then served as an advisor to Poland in the Polish–Soviet War and later High Commissioner of the Levant. In 1931, Weygand was appointed Chief of Staff of the French Army, a position he served until his retirement in 1935 at the age of 68. In May 1940, Weygand was recalled for active duty and assumed command of the French Army during the Battle of France, German invasion. Following a series of military setbacks, Weygand advised armistice and France subsequently capit ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pierre Flandin
Pierre is a masculine given name. It is a French form of the name Peter. Pierre originally meant "rock" or "stone" in French (derived from the Greek word πέτρος (''petros'') meaning "stone, rock", via Latin "petra"). It is a translation of Aramaic כיפא (''Kefa),'' the nickname Jesus gave to apostle Simon Bar-Jona, referred in English as Saint Peter. Pierre is also found as a surname. People with the given name * Monsieur Pierre, Pierre Jean Philippe Zurcher-Margolle (c. 1890–1963), French ballroom dancer and dance teacher * Pierre (footballer), Lucas Pierre Santos Oliveira (born 1982), Brazilian footballer * Pierre, Baron of Beauvau (c. 1380–1453) * Pierre, Duke of Penthièvre (1845–1919) * Pierre, marquis de Fayet (died 1737), French naval commander and Governor General of Saint-Domingue * Prince Pierre, Duke of Valentinois (1895–1964), father of Rainier III of Monaco * Pierre Affre (1590–1669), French sculptor * Pierre Agostini, French physicist * ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland became part of Nazi Germany, while the country lost further territories to First Vienna Award, Hungary and Trans-Olza, Poland (the territories of southern Slovakia with a predominantly Hungarian population to Hungary and Zaolzie with a predominantly Polish population to Poland). Between 1939 and 1945, the state ceased to exist, as Slovak state, Slovakia proclaimed its independence and Carpathian Ruthenia became part of Kingdom of Hungary (1920–1946), Hungary, while the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was proclaimed in the remainder of the Czech Lands. In 1939, after the outbreak of World War II, former Czechoslovak President Edvard Beneš formed Czechoslovak government-in-exile, a government-in-exile and sought recognition from the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming Chancellor of Germany#Nazi Germany (1933–1945), the chancellor in 1933 and then taking the title of in 1934. His invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 marked the start of the Second World War. He was closely involved in military operations throughout the war and was central to the perpetration of the Holocaust: the genocide of Holocaust victims, about six million Jews and millions of other victims. Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn in Austria-Hungary and moved to German Empire, Germany in 1913. He was decorated during his service in the German Army in the First World War, receiving the Iron Cross. In 1919 he joined the German Workers' Party (DAP), the precursor of the Nazi Party, and in 1921 was app ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charles De Gaulle
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle (22 November 18909 November 1970) was a French general and statesman who led the Free France, Free French Forces against Nazi Germany in World War II and chaired the Provisional Government of the French Republic from 1944 to 1946 to restore democracy in France. In 1958, amid the May 1958 crisis in France, Algiers putsch, he came out of retirement when appointed Prime Minister of France, Prime Minister by President René Coty. He rewrote the Constitution of France and founded the French Fifth Republic, Fifth Republic after approval by 1958 French constitutional referendum, referendum. He was elected President of France later that year, a position he held until his resignation in 1969. Born in Lille, he was a decorated officer of World War I, wounded several times and taken prisoner of war (POW) by the Germans. During the interwar period, he advocated mobile armoured divisions. During the German invasion of May 1940, he led an armoured divisi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Deuxième Bureau
The ''Deuxième Bureau de l'État-major général'' ("Second Bureau of the General Staff") was France's external military intelligence agency from 1871 to 1940. It was dissolved together with the Third Republic upon the armistice with Germany. However the term "''Deuxième Bureau''" (), like "MI6" and "KGB", outlived the original organization as a general label for the country's intelligence service. French military intelligence was composed of two separate bureaux prior to World War II. The ''Premier Bureau'' was charged with informing the high command about the state of French, allied and friendly troops, while the ''Deuxième Bureau'' developed intelligence concerning enemy troops. The ''Deuxième Bureau'' was celebrated for its cryptanalytical work, but it was criticized for its involvement in the Dreyfus affair and its consistent overestimation of German military formations prior to World War II. Its final director was Colonel Louis Rivet. History 19th century On June ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Remilitarization Of The Rhineland
The remilitarisation of the Rhineland (, ) began on 7 March 1936, when military forces of Nazi Germany entered the Rhineland, which directly contravened the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Treaties. Neither France nor Britain was prepared for a military response, so they did not act. After 1939, commentators often said that a strong military move in 1936 might have ruined the expansionist plans of Adolf Hitler, the dictator of Germany. However, recent historiography agrees that both public and elite opinion in Britain and France strongly opposed a military intervention, and neither had an army prepared to move in. After the end of World War I, the Rhineland came under Allied occupation. Under the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, the German military was forbidden from all territories west of the Rhine or within 50 km east of it. The 1925 Locarno Treaties reaffirmed the then-permanently-demilitarised status of the Rhineland. In 1929, German Foreign Minister Gustav Stresemann ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Franco-Soviet Treaty Of Mutual Assistance
The Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance was a bilateral treaty between France and the Soviet Union with the aim of enveloping Nazi Germany in 1935 to reduce the threat from Central Europe. It was pursued by Maxim Litvinov, the Soviet foreign minister, and Louis Barthou, the French foreign minister, who was assassinated in October 1934, before negotiations had been finished. His successor, Pierre Laval, was sceptical of the desirability and of the value of an alliance with the Soviet Union. However, after the declaration of German rearmament in March 1935, the French government forced the reluctant foreign minister to complete the arrangements with Moscow that Barthou had begun. Ratification The pact was concluded in Paris on 2 May 1935 and ratified by the French government in February 1936. Ratifications were exchanged in Moscow on 27 March 1936, and the pact went into effect the same day. It was registered in ''League of Nations Treaty Series'' on 18 April 1936. Lava ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Anthony Eden
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon (12 June 1897 – 14 January 1977) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1955 until his resignation in 1957. Achieving rapid promotion as a young Conservative member of Parliament, he became foreign secretary aged 38, before resigning in protest at Neville Chamberlain's appeasement policy towards Mussolini's Fascist regime in Italy. He again held that position for most of the Second World War, and a third time in the early 1950s. Having been deputy to Winston Churchill for almost 15 years, Eden succeeded him as the leader of the Conservative Party and prime minister in 1955, and a month later won a general election. Eden's reputation as a skilled diplomat was overshadowed in 1956 when the United States refused to support the Anglo-French military response to the Suez Crisis, which critics across party lines regarded as a historic setback for B ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pierre-Étienne Flandin
Pierre-Étienne Flandin (; 12 April 1889 – 13 June 1958) was a French conservative politician of the Third Republic, leader of the Democratic Republican Alliance (ARD), and Prime Minister of France from 1934 to 1935. A military pilot during World War I, Flandin held a number of cabinet posts during the interwar period. He was Minister of Commerce, under the premiership of Frédéric François-Marsal, for just five days in 1924. He was Minister of Commerce and Industry in the premierships of André Tardieu in 1931 and 1932. Between those posts, he served under Pierre Laval as Finance Minister. In 1934 (6 February to 8 November), he was Minister of Public Works in the second cabinet of Gaston Doumergue. He became Prime Minister in November 1934, but his premiership lasted only until June 1935. However, a number of important pacts were negotiated during his term: the Franco-Italian Agreement of 1935, the Stresa Front and the Franco-Soviet Pact. Flandin was, at 45, the younges ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Albert Sarraut
Albert-Pierre Sarraut (; 28 July 1872 – 26 November 1962) was a French Radical politician, twice Prime Minister during the Third Republic. Biography Sarraut was born on 28 July 1872 in Bordeaux, Gironde, France. On 14 March 1907 Sarraut, Senator of Aude and Under-Secretary of State for the Interior, was ridiculed by Clemenceau for trying to plead the case of his electorate during the revolt of the Languedoc winegrowers. Clemenceau told Sarraut, "I know the South, it will all end with a banquet". After massive demonstrations in the winegrowing region in June 1907 Clemenceau asked Sarraut to bring the leader Ernest Ferroul to the negotiating table. Ferroul told him: "When we have three million men behind us, we do not negotiate". From 17 June 1907 the Midi was occupied by 22 regiments of infantry and 12 regiments of cavalry. The gendarmerie was ordered to imprison the leaders of the demonstrations. Sarraut refused to endorse this policy and resigned from the governmen ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |