lieutenant-colonel and military air-weaponry engineer. He was the creator of the Nord SS.10/
SS.11
The SS.11, or AS.11, known as AGM-22 in American service, is a French manual command to line of sight wire-guided anti-tank missile manufactured by Nord Aviation. The missile entered service with the French Army in 1956. Production of the SS.1 ...
Charles de Gaulle on 22 August 1962, following de Gaulle's decision to accept Algerian independence. The attack made international headlines. Bastien-Thiry was the last person to be executed by firing squad in France.
Though the assassination attempt almost claimed de Gaulle's life, the President and his entire entourage escaped injury. The event is depicted in Frederick Forsyth's novel, '' The Day of the Jackal'' (1971), and also in the film adaptation of the same name (1973), in which Bastien-Thiry was portrayed by actor
Jean Sorel
Jean Sorel (; born 25 September 1934) is a French actor.
Born Jean Bernard de Chieusses de Combaud de Roquebrune, he worked extensively in European cinema during the 1960s and 1970s with directors such as Luis Buñuel and Luchino Visconti. How ...
.
Life
Bastien-Thiry was born to a family of
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...
Meurthe-et-Moselle
Meurthe-et-Moselle () is a department in the Grand Est region of France, named after the rivers Meurthe and Moselle. It had a population of 733,760 in 2019.RPF. He attended the ''
where he specialized in the design of air-to-air missiles. In 1957, he was promoted to principal military air engineer. He was married to Geneviève Lamirand whose father, Georges Lamirand (1899–1994), had been General Secretary of Youth from September 1940 to March 1943 in the government of
Free French
Free France (french: France Libre) was a political entity that claimed to be the legitimate government of France following the dissolution of the Third Republic. Led by French general , Free France was established as a government-in-exil ...
.Jean Lacouture, ''Charles de Gaulle – Le souverain 1959-1970'', p. 276-279. Together they had three daughters.
French Évian Accords
French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to France
** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents
** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Fran ...
referendum).
Bastien-Thiry, who was involved with the still-mysterious organization, "''Vieil État-Major''", tried to make contact with the ''
Citroën DS
The Citroën DS () is a front mid-engined, front-wheel drive executive car manufactured and marketed by Citroën from 1955 to 1975, in fastback/sedan, wagon/estate, and convertible body configurations, across three series of one generation.
M ...
Thanks to intelligence gained by the authorities from the interrogation of Antoine Argoud, Bastien-Thiry was arrested when he came back from a mission in the United Kingdom. He was brought to trial before a military tribunal presided over by General Roger Gardet, which ran from 28 January to 4 March 1963. He was defended by a legal team consisting of attorneys Jacques Isorni, Richard Dupuy, Bernard Le Coroller, and
Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour
Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour (12 October 1907 – 29 September 1989) was a French lawyer and far-right politician. Elected to the National Assembly in 1936, he initially collaborated with the Vichy regime before leaving for Tunisia in 1941. After ...
who was later a candidate for the presidency in 1965. While claiming that the death of de Gaulle would have been justified by the "genocide" of the European population of newly independent Algeria (a reference mainly to the Oran massacre of 1962) and the killing of several tens or hundreds of thousands of mostly pro-French Muslims (''
s'') by the FLN, he claimed that while the other conspirators might admittedly have been trying to kill the head of state, he had only been attempting to capture de Gaulle so as to deliver him to a panel of sympathetic judges. Bastien-Thiry, who had been certified as "normal" by psychiatrists in spite of a history of clinical depression (caused by a period of overwork), was convicted and sentenced to death, as were two of his accomplices: Lt. de la Tocnaye and Prevost (a former volunteer in Korea and in Vietnam). The only would-be assassin to escape was OAS member Georges Watin (also known as "The Lame Woman" or "The Limp" due to an old war wound), who died in February 1994 at age 71.
Possibility of clemency
As president, de Gaulle had the power of clemency. He pardoned those who fired the shots, but refused to pardon Bastien-Thiry, despite an appeal from Bastien-Thiry's father. Before the trial, the President expressed his intention to grant clemency to Bastien-Thiry, saying the "idiot" would "get off with twenty years and in five years I'll free him". However, according to his son-in-law Alain de Boissieu, after the conspirators' conviction, de Gaulle stated his reasons for refusing to alter the sentence:
# Bastien-Thiry had directed his subordinates to fire on a car in which there was an innocent woman present (Madame Yvonne de Gaulle).
# He had endangered civilians, namely the Fillon family, who had been travelling in a car near that carrying de Gaulle.
# He had brought foreigners, specifically three
Hungarians
Hungarians, also known as Magyars ( ; hu, magyarok ), are a nation and ethnic group native to Hungary () and historical Hungarian lands who share a common culture, history, ancestry, and language. The Hungarian language belongs to the Ural ...
, into the plot.
# During his trial, he claimed he intended not to kill de Gaulle, but rather to ''kidnap'' him. Asked how he intended to confine the President, Bastien-Thiry replied, "We would just have taken away his spectacles and braces." His defense lawyer was heard to mutter, "he has just signed his own death warrant," as it was much anticipated that while de Gaulle might have pardoned an assassin, he would not pardon an assassin who publicly mocked him.
# Finally, and most serious in de Gaulle's eyes, while the other conspirators did the actual firing and had thus placed themselves in some danger, Bastien-Thiry had only directed events from afar, acting as a lookout for the gunmen.
Execution
Fearing a plot to free Bastien-Thiry, the authorities devised what was probably the biggest security operation in French judicial history in order to take him from his cell to the place of execution. 2000 policemen were posted along the route and 35 vehicles were used. There was indeed such a plot, headed by Jean Cantelaube, one of de Gaulle's former security officers, but it had been abandoned. Cantelaube was later identified as the intelligence agent who provided information to Bastien-Thiry's organization.
The execution took place only one week after the trial, which was unusually swift. Moreover, an appeal was about to be heard by the
Conseil d'État
In France, the (; Council of State) is a governmental body that acts both as legal adviser to the executive branch and as the supreme court for administrative justice, which is one of the two branches of the French judiciary system. Establi ...
(French supreme public court) which might have overturned the sentence. Nonetheless, Bastien-Thiry, having refused a blindfold and clutching a
rosary
The Rosary (; la, , in the sense of "crown of roses" or "garland of roses"), also known as the Dominican Rosary, or simply the Rosary, refers to a set of prayers used primarily in the Catholic Church, and to the physical string of knots or ...
, was executed by firing squad at Fort d'Ivry on 11 March 1963. He was 35 years old. That very evening, President de Gaulle offered a dinner party to the presidents of the special courts, including the one who sent Bastien-Thiry to his death.
About Bastien-Thiry, de Gaulle said "The French need martyrs ... They must choose them carefully. I could have given them one of those idiotic generals playing ball in
Tulle
Tulle (; ) is a commune in central France. It is the third-largest town in the former region of Limousin and is the capital of the department of Corrèze, in the region of Nouvelle-Aquitaine. Tulle is also the episcopal see of the Roman Cat ...
prison. I gave them Bastien-Thiry. They'll be able to make a martyr of him. He deserves it."Lacouture, 329