Speculative History: France in 1934

[Covenant]

I would love to put this in History but I don't know if it merits it. If someone like Thanas wants to help me tailor it to suit the qualifications of a History Board post, I'd happily edit it to qualify, but until then I'll leave it here where it won't offend.

The year is 1934, and tensions are high. Rocked by repeated scandals and the crumbling economics of a world-wide depression, a knockout blow is delivered in the form of the Stavisky Affair, a massive embezzling scandal that brought down government officials, enraged the populace, and ended with the mysterious death of Alexandre Stavisky himself. While this scandal was far from the worst on record, the Right swung it like a cudgel against the entrenched Left of the Third Republic government, forcing Prime Minister Chautemps to resign in disgrace as the press claimed Chautemps had Stavisky killed to cover up further involvement of his government. In the wake of this, the new Minister dismisses the Right Wing favoring prefect of Paris Police, Jean Chiappe, in a move that seems calculated to gain support from the left but is claimed to be due to involvement with the Stavisky Affair. This act seems to be the exploding point for the Far Right in Paris, and what follows is a turning point in history.

Riots erupt in Paris as the Far Right Leagues take to the streets. Among them are the violent Monarchists like Action Française, the Jeunesses Patriotes ("Patriot Youth") with historic legacies and ties to the Right Wing politicians, a number of French Fascist groups like Francisme, and the Veteran's Association called the Croix-de-feu. There may have been as many as 100,000 rioters in the streets of Paris that night, with their sights on storming the Palais Bourbon and lynching the Left-Wing Parliament. Within the Parliament itself were Right Wing politicians eager to strike at their colleagues on the left, and the session that day ended with the two sides coming to blows.

The forces were arrayed in a disorganized fashion, as the Leagues had no unified organization or ideology, except in their opposition to the Left. There is evidence they were in communication in the days preceding the Riots, but on the day itself there is no unity of purpose in the crowds. The riot tactics used are violent but amateurish, and the extreme brutality of the police in defense of the seat of the French parliament ensures that no forces reach it from the heavily-defended northern approach.

From the more difficult-to-defend south, however, are the massive numbers of the Croix de Feu, the WW1 Veteran's Group that surround the Palais Bourbon. Organized fighters and activists with experience taking to the streets, this group was unhesitatingly struck at by the police despite their relatively placid demeanor. The violence that they experienced seemed to shock their leader, Colonel François de la Rocque, and instead of spurring them onwards he dispersed their numbers. Elsewhere the police employed the same tactics, firing into crowds and surging out to strike at rioters. Daladier did not order a State of Emergency, and the rioters did not cut communications, and the police seemed to be able to keep the crowds at bay despite the fire and violence they wreaked elsewhere.

When the night was over and the Riots finally dispersed around 2:30 in the morning, there were 16 dead and over 2,000 wounded, with a majority of that number coming from Action Française. As a result of this mass uprising of the Right, Daladier stepped down and a Right Wing Prime Minster took the helm, though without an entire renovation of the Parliament. Tensions would remain high, even as the Leagues were outlawed, until their memberships eventually came into their own in 1940 when they were handed a étrange défaite, or "divine surprise" and the hated Third Republic was toppled and the Right finally had a chance to enact some real reforms. We all know how that worked out for them.

Also, none of this is the speculative part.

The speculation comes when we consider how close the Third Republic came to an early death when the Rioters failed to seize Parliament. With members of that house actively beating their fellow parliamentarians and lynch mobs swirling around outside like piranhas, it is somewhat of a miracle that things did not go any worse than they did. Historians have a degree of agreement on the fact that if Colonel François de la Rocque had ordered the Croix de Feu into attack mode there would have been nothing able to stop them. This is not to say they were the only ones capable of seizing the reigns of government, as any organizing force could have managed that given the numbers involved, but this is a situation where one man's gut decided the fate of an Empire.

So I ask, with the least alternate history revising required, what else could have happened that night? If the Far Right Leagues had managed to surge across police lines, or the police had not been eager to fire into crowds, what then? If the Far Right Leagues had managed to act with some degree of order, possibly under a charismatic leader like de la Rocque, would they have been able to seize control of the government?

Those two are open questions, but the larger question is mostly "What would have happened?" Clearly, the actors involved were not organized or prepared enough to commit to a coup that night, but if they had they may have been able to give an attempt. Do we have any way of guessing if the result would have been an overthrow like other states had endured during the Interwar period (Italy, Spain, Germany) or was there no chance that this mob could have ever done anything other than upset the chain of command?

The reason for this question is that I'm working on a story (for a game, in fact, in my capacity as Lunar Giant Studio's lead designer) that uses the events of the early 1930's of France as a backdrop. The riots are an excellent expression of anger, confusion, and fear on the part of some fairly lousy people. I'm doing research so I can use these events as a backdrop without merely appropriating them, but none of the massive volumes really give me an idea of what was really at risk in this situation, and wildly speculative alt-history scenarios are similarly useless. Since what I need to know is inherently speculative (and yes, open to narrative interpretation which I intend to commit anyway, for the sake of a good story) I feel like there's nothing I can do but see what other history-minded folks might think. That way I can figure out the 'least offensive' speculative option, one that won't get a kneejerk "that'd never happen!" from someone, which will engender less resistance if players (readers, etc) are told about what is at stake on that night. It just doesn't feel... important without stakes, you know? Knowing some foul plot is doomed to failure from the outset is less exciting than discovering it in retrospect.

In any case, I open the floor. The night is rife with revolution, anger, and a bit of Q magic. What would have happened, had just one or two things been different? What would have happened if you had been a charismatic leader of the whole riot, or del la Roque had? What happens to France if the Far Right Leagues, organized by Q or disorganized like in reality, had managed to sack and seize the center of the Third Republic's Leadership six years before Germany was going to do the same thing?

[Esquire]

Depends on who ends up in charge. De la Roque, if I recall, was an anticommunist and very much in favor of militarization against Germany, but basically Socialist in his domestic politics; if he or somebody similar ends up in charge France would probably be in a much better position come World War Two. The Maginot Line might be extended, or mobile forces created and trained to defend the northern borders - I think that was the plan, anyway.

In any case the Croix de Feu is very well placed to unite French popular opinion, and is conveniently already on the side of rearmament. A France dominated by them will be much more proactive against German aggression, and we might very well see an earlier WW2, one for which the Allies are better prepared.

Also, étrange défaite does not translate to "divine surprise."

EDIT: Just so we're clear, I'm not an expert and am not claiming to be; if/when Thanas shows up to point out some really obvious impossibility I'll readily concede.

[Steve]

I'm not Thanas (I'm not nearly pedantic enough ) but if I recall correctly extending the Maginot Line isn't as feasible; it would cut through a more built up portion of France if you did so, and the country was already nearly bankrupt. The same to creating "more mobile forces"; France couldn't afford it, and I'm not sure even changing to a right-wing government would fix that. Especially if Left counter-demonstrations paralyze the country further, which is entirely possible.

As it was, France did have some motorized units in 1940 IIRC, but they were tthe units sent to aid the Netherlands and thus were in the pocket created when Rommel reached the coast. And I'm not sure how tthis scenario fixes France's enormous morale issues, since the Right and the Left, as you noted, were at the point of violence at several points and that reached into the Army.

[Elheru Aran]

The Maginot Line was somewhat of a bad, outdated idea anyway. Eliminate it and you save France millions of dollars. I'm not sure if it had actually been started before 1934 or not, though... but even if it had been, you could stop it.

[Steve]

Actually, the Maginot worked. It's just that the Allies couldn't exploit its success, so everyone presumes it failed.

[Covenant]

Another failing of the Maginot Line was that it did not extend up to cover the border with Belgium, for fear (rightly so) that it would offend them. Furthermore, there were repeated discussion as what to do if Germany was to move through Belgium... including some plans that if the Germans began moving, France would simply move through the Belgian nation and occupy portions of it without permission, just so it can be sensibly defended by the massively more powerful army of the French. This would have dramatically changed the way the war went, but it was downvoted because it was deemed unacceptable at a political level. Same thing with a massive buildup on the French side of their border.

So really, one needn't replace the government for an Alt History scenario where the Germans get stopped early on. Even the Germans thought they'd get the hammer dropped on them as soon as they moved into the Czech nations, though I forget off-hand what the military plan was called. In any case, what became known as the "Phony War" or the "Sitzkrieg" on the part of the French was due to terrible morale, terrible leadership, and terrible political situations that had turned the French people against their English-speaking allies as well as any hope of retaining a strong alliance with the Communist forces in Russia.

But any shakeup in leadership might have changed the quickness to which the military responded to those threats, as just changing a few officers here and there may have made the difference between military intelligence being ignored and being used to inform actions.

[Elheru Aran]

Actually, the Maginot worked. It's just that the Allies couldn't exploit its success, so everyone presumes it failed.

How's that? First I've heard of that...

EDIT: Honest question. I've always seen stuff along the lines of "psh, the Maginot line was useless, Germany rolled France anyway".

Though now that I think about it, I'm guess you're talking about it being one reason why Germany did an end-run through Belgium rather than strike into France directly? Because I do agree that emplaced fortifications like the Line would have made a direct assault quite expensive for the Germans...

[Covenant]

Well, the Maginot Line was a very effective set of fortifications for what it was specifically designed for... but strategically it was a mistake because it did not cover the Belgian border. However, when the Wehrmacht did engage the Maginot Line defenses in June before the Armistace and found the defenses extremely difficult to penetrate. Remember, this was after the Fall of Paris, so France was mostly toast and morale was in the toilet, and yet the defenses were holding. Some of the small bunkers were taken and break-throughs were consistently achieved after days of fighting, but in the Line's defense none of the major fortresses could be taken out or captured. As a defensive bulwark the line preformed exactly to specifications, even exceeding some of the advanced and creative weapons tech of the German offensive. But because they did not provide a 360 degree defensive bubble, nor were they backed up, nor did they cover the incredibly obvious path through the Low Countries, we now remember them as an exercise in failure.

If the Line designs had been placed in strategically valuable positions and then used, as intended, as a "safe zone" to attack from and fall back to, then it may have worked splendidly. Unfortunately, it was deployed in a pretty laughable fashion (covering a river advance that was already difficult, leaving open the same route that anyone invading France wanted to use anyway) and the Germans were also able to attack through the Northern Ardennes, which was a bit of a shock. Really though, this was a strategic failure more than anything, not a failure of the line itself. France had sufficient men at arms to make an excellent fight of it, had they chosen to violate neutrality and occupy areas of the Low Country before Germany could blow through them.

[CaptHawkeye]

How's that? First I've heard of that...

The purpose of a fortification is not to defeat an enemy. It's to close a given route of approach to that enemy. Case in point, Germany never once entertained the idea of attacking through Alsace-Lorraine because of the Maginot Line. Their attack route was always obviously going to be through Belgium. France just made the mistake of assuming Belgium would side with them in another war.

An illegitimate fascist government proclaims itself from Paris, right-wing parties like Croix and Action side with it and galvanize their highly vocal (yet minority) supporters to make the movement appear as a general revolution. I feel a situation very similar to the Spanish Civil War breaks out. Much will depend on how quickly the Third Republic will react to a coup, how loyal the Army will be, and whether or not Britain will intervene.

[Thanas]

Britain is in no shape to intervene though, given that it is 1934. Outside their navy they got nothing of real value.

And then you get Italy and Germany in the mix as well....

[Covenant]

Several of the factions are actually Anti-German as well as Anglophobic, so it would be a very odd state of affairs if a state of civil war did exist in France. If the forces involved were not so belligerent you could almost see them trying to become neutral, rather than have to shake hands with anyone.

The counter-demonstrations that occurred days later, organized by the French Left, helped to unify the Socialist and Communists on the Left. If that never occurred then it might leave the Right without enough of an opposition, or if the Right had seized Parliament then maybe those bonds would seal even further. It's hard to imagine the Soviets as being interested in aiding a French Communist counter-revolution (nor the British being excited about aiding communists over the channel) or organized enough to do it effectively if they wanted to, but that would certainly be a moment of interest to a lot of factions with a later stake in the upcoming war.

War is inevitable at this point anyway, and since the French ended up being a non-combatant during the Sitzkreig and invasion of 1940 (not entirely true, they did put up good fights where they fought, which was a problem more caused by leadership than by fighting men individually) there might not be a major difference in the way a lot of things play out. Germany might end up occupying a portion of the country to aid the new Right Wing government as a stabilization force, humanitarian reasons of course, which would look very much like Vichy.

[Thanas]

Though at this point the German Army is in no shape to wage war either and would not be until 1938+. Fact is, nobody is really prepared for war. Which is why I think it would most likely end up like spain, with Germany grabbing Elsaß-Lothringen and England some of the colonies.