Paris before the Offensive
IN April, 1940, the atmosphere was stormy and
troubled. Paul Reynaud had taken office. I had
a high opinion of his intelligence but was folly
aware of the hatred he had aroused in the majority
of the parliamentarians. There was a story, too, that
he had upset the Belgian Government. He was said
to have asked them point-blank, 'Are you with us or
against us? If you are with us, then we must
look into our military arrangements together
immediately. It's high time/ The Belgian Govern-
ment, we were told, had refused indignantly.
Between Reynaud, the President of the Council,
and Daladier, the Minister for War, the antagonism
was no less bitter. Reynaud wanted to replace
General Gamelin by General Georges. To this
Daladier was absolutely opposed. When the
Reynaud Government went before the Chamber,
it obtained a majority of one. On the 2Oth April, it
obtained unanimity. That seemed to me reassuring,
but a senator I met that evening told me, with
fiendish joy, that it was nothing of the sort.
*You don't understand the parliamentary game/
he said. It was Reynaud's opponents who
canvassed for unanimity, because unanimity is
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