Tikvah
Editors’ Pick

January 18, 2024

Setting the Record Straight about Vichy France and the Jews

Philippe Pétain’s apologetics, and his defenders.

In 1918, Philippe Pétain was the most admired man in France—having beaten the Germans at Verdun and played a critical role in leading French forces to victory. In the next world war, when France was collapsing before the German onslaught, Pétain was made prime minister and promptly negotiated a surrender, presiding over the Vichy regime until the Allies liberated the country. He was then tried and convicted of treason, although many decades would go by before serious attention was paid to the part he played in the extermination of his country’s Jews.

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