Solidarity at Algiers
The last difficulty to be surmounted by the French Committee Of National Liberation was the decision regarding the control of the armed forces at the disposal of the committee. None of the expedients suggested or temporarily adopted was satisfactory, and none of them embodied an arrangement fundamentally acceptable to both General de Gaulle and General Giraud. The new arrange- ment seems to meet that need. Under it General Giraud becomes Commander-in-Chief of all the French armies (the distinction b,nween de Gaullist forces and Giraud forces being thus obliterated), the navy and the air force, and the chairmanship of the Committee of National Liberation is to be shared on a new basis, General Giraud presiding when military affairs are under discussion, and General de Gaulle on other occasions,—an arrangement which must obviously be suspended when General Giraud is actually in the field. General Giraud thus secures command of all French forces everywhere (a not inconsiderable concession on General de Gaulle's part) and the army as whole is brought ultimately under civl control—that of the Committee of National Liberation—a principle to which as much importance has habitually been attached in France as in this country. General Giraud will work " in conjunction with " a Committee of National Defence over which General de Gaulle will preside. This is only one, though the most important, sign of the growing stability and authority of the Committee of National Liberation, and there seems no good reason why the United Powers should delay any longer to recognise it as having the status of a provisional French Government. In view of the speed at which military events are moving the arguments for such action are strong. Mr. Eden has stated that it is under discussion.
