Encircling Gloom
By DARSIE GILLIE
Paris
The Paris policeman after his demonstrative buting last week has become more human and therefore no doubt sympathetic as an individual. He is no longer just authority personified. But this sudden humanisation of authority is also a grimly frightening business for any citizen who thinks at all—above all for anyone with the re- sponsibility of government. A subversive police- man is a pleasant thought; but not a rebellious police force. It is no wonder that riot police were flown in from Strasbourg and Algiers to make sure that nothing would go wrong in Paris while the Government is shaken in its seat, and the coalition parties sternly declare they want no crisis but all pull in opposite directions.
Older Parisians can all remember an occasion twenty-four years and Six weeks ago—the 6th of February, 1934—when buses flamed on the Place de la Concorde, thirty people were killed and in the course of three days the police were nearly run off their legs through sheer fatigue. Last week it was the police who disguised themselves as rioters, with, it is true, comparatively little vio- lence except against some officials who tried to address them at the prefecture. No one was hurt, no buses were set alight. But here was the frame- work of society breaking loose at a moment when society itself was at sixes and sevens. And in con- sequence a new prefect and riot police were brought back from Algeria to make order certain in the capital. From Algeria!
The capital would feel much more sure of order if the Government seemed to be on its toes to meet surprises or united as to how to deal with them. The Sakiet bombing was on a Saturday, the first governmental declaration about it on the next Tuesday. The police demonstration was on a Thursday, the first government statement still only next Tuesday. M. Gaillard got an icy recep- tion; and the Minister of the Interior, who had not resigned (though the Prefect of Police had), got if possible a colder one. But the three principal parties making up the majority had already re- solved that this was no time for a government crisis, thdugh each of them had expressed the view that the situation had deteriorated. They were right in the sense that it would bb very difficult to fit together yet another jigsaw puzzle. It might take weeks and be no more united, resolute or capable of controlling the various services than the present one.
The Paris police have led the way in rebellion against authority. The police services dependent on the SfIrete which are responsible for order in the rest of France did not take part in Thursday's demonstration. They point out that unlike the Paris police they obligatorily serve for periods in Algeria and have had 112 killed, whereas the Paris police, not subject to this obligation, have had ten killed. Any concessions made to the Paris police must therefore also be made to the force, almost twice the size, controlled by the SfIret6. Conces- sions made to the police will reopen the way to demands for wage increases from other branches of the civil service.
The Minister of National Defence, M. Chaban Delmas, and the Vice-Minister for Air, M. Christ- iaens, have used the occasion for presenting their budgets to make speeches more suitable to opposi- tion leaders, making it clear that in their view their credits are quite insufficient—as indeed they are, since the cost of the Algerian war is making French defence on any other line than the Atlas Mountains a verbal formula. But the conclusion to which they point is not that there is something wrong with Algerian policy but rather that they are not being given enough money. The news- papers carry stories of threatened resignations on the highest military level because France will only be able to make a token contribution to NATO. Official denials limp rather lamely after. The dis- content on the highest, military level is certainly widespread and certainly politically more danger- ous amongst junior officers. On a still lower level the parachutists, or rather the ex-parachutists in their military formations, may or may not be a danger to the republic, but increasingly they are thought of as such and sometimes used as an indefinite threat. The vague emotions behind this growing unease are the frustration and incompre- hension of men who have made sacrifices and cannot understand why they do not bear fruit.
Confusion grows darker as former resisters allow themselves to be drawn into the company of the ex-Vichyssois Right. It was extraordinary, for instance, to see a Soustelle, associated with Free France from the day General de Gaulle raised his standard, supporting in the name of national unity in a Paris by-election a candidate whose attitude was the 'very opposite of his own during the war, this one-time anti-Fascist shoulder-to-shoulder with the Poujadists. But it was at least refreshing to see another early Gaul- list, General Billotte, standing as a non-party candidate to protest against such 'surrender of principle and gathering a substantial number of votes.
What France needs is fairly obvious, but it is not at all clear how she is to get it.. The critics of orthodox policy are permanently denounced as defeatists and traitors. Without a change of heart and a great awakening of civic courage, the only alternative to a government very similar to the present one and its two predecessors would be a Popular Front government with the Communists as the senior partners. This is still fortunately unthinkable. In the airless and anxious atmo- sphere the French public needs a great deal more of the truth, above all about Algiers, and a sharp reaffirmation of republican liberty. She needs enough courage amongst public men and editors to make a real discussion of policy in North Africa possible before further disasters befall her. This courage burns all the brighter in certain quarters for its absence elsewhere, but not brightly enough to disperse the encircling gloom.
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