Gustave Hervé

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Gustave Hervé

Gustave Hervé (born January 2, 1871 in Brest , † October 25, 1944 in Paris ) was a French publicist and politician . He was initially a socialist anti-militarist and anti-nationalist . At the beginning of the First World War, he turned into a nationalist close to fascism . As early as the 1930s he propagated Philippe Pétain as the savior of France , but after 1940 turned away from the Vichy regime , disappointed .

Life

Antimilitarist

Hervé was initially a lecturer in history before becoming a journalist. Between 1901 and 1905 he became known through anti-militarist publications. He urged workers to "hoist the national flag on the dung heap". He was of the opinion that the workers had no fatherland , so he rejected the demand for a fatherland defense. In 1901 he founded an anti-militarist movement ( Hervéism ). When a united French socialist party was founded in 1905 with the Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière , the group around Hervé formed its most radical wing. In 1906 he founded the newspaper La Guerre sociale . With this paper he wanted to unite socialists, syndicalists and anarchists under a common anti-militarist program. Among the French socialists, but also at the international socialist congresses, for example in Stuttgart in 1907, he campaigned for a general strike , desertion of soldiers and revolution in response to the threat of war . Lenin criticized this as "semi-anarchist absurdities".

National socialist

Around 1911/12, after serving a prison sentence, Hervé moderated his radical position and approached the moderate stance of Jean Jaurès . After the beginning of the First World War he was an advocate of the Union sacrée , the French equivalent of the German truce . He became increasingly a war propagandist with nationalistic undertones. In 1916 he renamed his newspaper La Victoire . It appeared as such until 1940. The socialist party SFIO excluded him during the war, as he advocated national socialism . This should be on the cooperation of classes and not on the class struggle based. It is not the class but the nation that is the moving force in history . In 1919 he founded the Parti socialiste nationale . Their number of followers remained low. In 1925 it was reorganized as Parti de la République autoritaire before the old name was used again in 1927. After all, from 1932 onwards the party called itself La Milice socialiste .

After the war he advocated a France within its natural and historical borders and an authoritarian government. Later he advocated a Franco-German compromise, a revision of the Versailles Peace Treaty and even the creation of the United States of Europe . Recourse to nationalism and religious traditions should overcome social divisions and decadence in society. He observed the authoritarian and fascist currents in Europe with sympathy. Benito Mussolini , who had traveled a similar path from socialist to fascist, he regarded as his Italian comrade. In 1930 he drew attention with an exchange of letters with Adolf Hitler . He welcomed Hitler's appointment as Reich Chancellor in 1933 as a rescue from the red tide. As early as 1935, he saw the only possibility of saving France in a dictatorship by Marshal Petain.

After the collapse of France in 1940, his paper initially campaigned for a collaboration with the Germans . Soon he was disappointed with the Vichy regime. The state hindered his activity, various papers attacked him, his newspaper was banned and at times the Gestapo was after him. In 1941 he wrote to the government that his supporters could no longer support the regime. In 1944 he turned to Charles de Gaulle , who he believed could make his dream of a Christian, authoritarian republic come true. Shortly before his death he described himself as the first Bolshevik , the first Fascist, the first Petainist, the first member of the Resistance and the first Gaullist .

literature

  • Daniel Mollenhauer: Gustave Hervé. In: Encyclopedia First World War. Paderborn 2009, p. 553.
  • Michael B. Loughlin: Gustave Hervé's Transition from Socialism to National Socialism: Another Example of French Fascism? In: Journal of Contemporary History January 2001, pp. 5-39.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Stefan Grüner: Paul Reynaud (1878-1966): Biographical studies on liberalism in France. Munich 2001, p. 164.
  2. ^ William Fortescue: Third Republic in France 1870-1940: Conflicts and Continuities. London 2000, p. 227.
  3. ↑ Othmar Plöckinger: History of a book: Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf" 1922-1945. Munich 2006, p. 549.
  4. ^ Philip Michael Hett Bell: The Origins of the Second World War in Europe. Edinburgh 1986, p. 107.
  5. ^ Matthias Waechter: The Myth of Gaullism: Hero Cult, History Politics and Ideology 1940-1958. Göttingen 2006, p. 38.
  6. ^ Stefan Grüner: Paul Reynaud (1878-1966): Biographical studies on liberalism in France. Munich 2001, p. 164.
  7. ↑ Michael B. Loughlin: Gustave Hervé's Transition from Socialism to National Socialism: Another Example of French Fascism? In: Journal of Contemporary History January 2001, p. 27.
personal data
SURNAME Hervé, Gustave
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French publicist and politician
DATE OF BIRTH January 2, 1871
PLACE OF BIRTH Brest (Finistère)
DATE OF DEATH October 25, 1944
Place of death Paris