Petain's Submission
Step by step Marshal Petain has yielded to Hitler's ever-increasing demands till his own humiliation has become complete, and not a shadow of the advantages he professed to have gained for France by his submission remains. What has he gained by the Armistice and repeated acts of humiliation? Unoccupied France is now occupied. Those elements of the Army which he had been allowed to retain have been demobilised by order of Hitler. The Toulon fleet has been scuttled. North Africa hat gone. Even the last refuge of silence has been denied him. When the Marshal did not answer Hitler's long, insulting letter he was once again threatened, and once again—though nothing remains to be saved—he submits, and writes obediently, not to say slavishly, "I can only bow to these decisions, which have had painful repercussions throughout the whole country." Having talked " honour " ad nauseam, at the last he refuses the anzende honorable—that of resignation or defiance. Nor has he left himself in any position of power. It is President Laval who is "head of the Government," and in best quisling vein has seized the opportunity to explain that he hopes for a German victory, that he wants his country to strike at the menace of Bolshevism, that he seeks the road of collaboration with Germany, "loyally accepted and loyally practised," in a "war of religion." The first example of his loyal collaboration is a decision to name 15,000 French workers from the former unoccupied zone to be sent to Germany. Petain has submitted in order that Laval may sell his countrymen as slaves.
