One after the other, all the ministers arrive at the “isba.”
At 10:30 P.M., the General appears at the foot of the stairs of his Caravelle. He returns from Bucharest in as good shape as Pompidou did from Kabul last Saturday. But his conclusions are completely different.
We line up in protocol order.
The General’s ears are still ringing with the enthusiasm he has raised. And here we are, all anxious, a thousand miles from his dream. After reviewing the honor guard, he addresses each of us in turn. Even Pompidou, so trained in displaying serenity, looks a bit sheepish when the General addresses him: “So, you let them take the Odéon? Is it chaos everywhere?”
He makes him lose, as only he can, his permanent smile. Pompidou responds in a low voice with a phrase that I do not hear; but he keeps the look of a scolded child for several long minutes.
To Malraux, the General says: “They took the Odéon from you?”
Malraux: “It won't bring them good luck.”
When it is my turn, the General says to me: “So, your students, they are still running around?”
AP: “I hope they will eventually tire themselves out.”
He moves on to the next person.
With his familiar gesture, he invites us to gather in a circle around him.
CDG: “I decided to return a few hours earlier. This cannot continue. We must make a stand immediately. The Sorbonne, the Odéon, it's too much. We are going to take all of this back in hand. We are going to address the problems as we have always addressed them in difficult times. We are going to appeal to the people.”
The General then speaks to us about his trip: “It was very important. It is extraordinary how much they love France over there. France is freedom, it is the independence of the people. And then,” he says, turning to me, “the Romanians make the selection! They have no trouble with their students.”
As the General leaves, we wonder what he meant by talking about his plans. Some think that the General has Article 16 in mind, but Couve puts us on the right track by mentioning a referendum. In any case, everyone is struck by his determination, which seems like a reproach towards what happened in his absence and, frankly, towards Pompidou.
For six years, this is the first time I have seen him reprimand — indirectly, and without saying it — his Prime Minister in front of his ministers. Pompidou dives into the General's car, looking sheepish.
Grimaud has taken measures for the procession to follow an unusual route. What a derisory contrast! De Gaulle has just left the Romanian crowds cheering the man who managed to position himself between the two superpowers to proclaim the right of peoples to self-determination. And he must return to the Élysée by a stealthy route.
At the “isba” in Orly, Flohic whispered to me: “The General has been nervous about what is happening in Paris. We called several times a day to get the latest news. Each time, we learned that a new factory, a new faculty, or the Odéon had been occupied. On the return flight, he wrote a paper that he showed me: ‘We must first retake the Odéon, then the Sorbonne.’ These are the strict orders he is going to give to the government. He blames Pompidou for letting everything go.”
AP: “What is happening is in the logic of last Saturday's decision. Once you make the bet to trust the revolutionaries as if they were good little students, you are forced to let the experiment unfold, which means you cannot react.”
Flohic: “That is exactly what the General sees. We are on a slippery slope. That is why he has decided to hold a referendum, which in his eyes is the only way to stop the slide, by proving that the people are behind him.”
Sunday morning, May 19, 1968.
The General held a meeting on maintaining order; at the very hour when, last Sunday, he had instructed Tricot to organize one to adopt my “balanced plan.”
This Sunday, the nature of the debate has changed. It is no longer about the university or the students, who have been completely overtaken. It is now only about the struggle against the subversion that is sweeping through. Only Pompidou, Fouchet, Joxe, Messmer, Grimaud, and Gorse — since everything is suspended at Information — were invited. At the end of the meeting, Gorse humorously, and then Pompidou eagerly, repeat the oracle's verdict: “Reform, yes; chienlit1, no.”
I try to find out more. Fouchet is not in his office, but I question Dannaud, who has just received a succinct summary of the meeting from him.
Each person received their share. The General attacked straight away: “This chaos has gone on long enough. I have taken my decisions. We evacuate the Odéon today and the Sorbonne tomorrow. At the ORTF, Gorse, you throw the troublemakers out the door.”
Fouchet objected that the police are traumatized. The General asked him to explain the trauma. Fouchet replied that they feel they have been disavowed. Pompidou agrees to evacuate the Odéon but asks to postpone the Sorbonne. The General consents and, despite Grimaud's objections, maintains his instructions for the Odéon, while leaving Grimaud in charge of the maneuver.
Monday, May 20, 1968.
How was the instruction given yesterday morning by the General to Pompidou, Fouchet, and Grimaud to evacuate the Odéon during the night divulged? How could it have spread throughout Paris, if not through the efforts of those who did not want to execute it? Obviously, it was no longer possible to carry out an operation that required surprise once the radios had announced it.
Of course, it was not a matter of storming the theater with machine guns when it was filled with three thousand onlookers caught up in their psychodrama; but rather of slipping in during the early hours of the morning, when only a few dozen sleepy occupants would remain on the premises.
Every evening, I call my correspondents in Seine-et-Marne. Not only does the disapproval not diminish, but the surprise at the passivity of the authorities increases. What the press reports about the deluge of verbiage flooding the amphitheaters of the Sorbonne and the stage of the Odéon shocks the good people. The violence of the leftists seems more and more gratuitous, insurrectional. And on the government's side, there is no sign of the vigorous reaction that is expected. People are astonished that a brutal halt is not being put to these violences.
The government fights censure in the Assembly, Pompidou holds court at Matignon
Palais-Bourbon, Tuesday, May 21, 1968, 10 a.m.
This morning, I am presenting to the Commission of Cultural Affairs of the National Assembly. Marie-Madeleine Dienesch tells me, upon welcoming me, that she has never seen so many people since she has been chairing the commission.
Dupuy, on behalf of the communist group, begins by explaining that he refuses to attend this session in solidarity with the students. The other opposition deputies (FGDS and centrists) shrug their shoulders. No doubt they find that the PC is pushing cynicism a bit too far, so soon after having stigmatized the leftists. Once the communists have left, I am given the microphone.
“The crisis of the University that has erupted has today become a crisis of society. It should not be inferred from this that the crisis of the University has disappeared. It persists. It is deep. It is possible that it could be beneficial. (...)”
“The explosion we are witnessing has the effect not only of tearing away the veils that concealed the truth but probably also of shattering the obstacles that stood in the way of reforms. No one any longer dares to say that construction and recruitment will suffice to solve all the problems. This error, which we denounced, is now eliminated. The imperial University is moribund, as is the imperial barracks-like lycée.”
I develop three points: the lack of participation, irresponsibility, and distance from life. Then I conclude: “We are open to all ideas. We are determined to bring to fruition those that are reasonable. It is still possible to draw good from evil.”
Council of Tuesday, May 21, 1968, noon.
Joxe has included on the agenda a bill granting amnesty, which will be submitted for a vote by both assemblies the following day; and Messmer two decrees: the call-up of reservists and the requisition of goods and persons under a 1938 law.
CDG: “This Council has only one limited and precise objective. The session that will count is the one on Thursday. I will have to tell you some essentially important things before addressing the nation on Friday. Very well. The amnesty. I consider it a completely secondary matter. But still, it had been said, so let's do it!”
Joxe is as concise as possible, and the General does not add a word of commentary. Messmer is no more verbose about his decrees, which provide the means to resist. The General translates their use for us: “Do not forget that attempts to occupy ministerial premises constitute unacceptable attacks on the security of the State. Any director, any head of service who allows this will be immediately dismissed.”
Palais-Bourbon, Tuesday, May 21, 1968, afternoon.
While the debate on the motion of censure continues in the hemicycle, the deputies pace the corridors. Old-guard Gaullists — Baumel, Fanton, Rey — wonder, dismayed: “How could the General, after thundering like Jupiter on Sunday morning at the Élysée and demanding the evacuation of the Odéon that evening and the Sorbonne the next day, be so quickly convinced that it had to be abandoned?”
Meanwhile, de Gaulle receives Harriman, the head of the American delegation to the Paris talks, and then Xuan Thuy, the head of the North Vietnamese delegation. How he must be troubled by the contrast between the pride that the French, if they were patriots, should feel in welcoming the two enemies in our capital… and the shame they inflict on themselves through their disorder.
Tuesday, May 21, 1968, evening.
I made a statement about the exams, to indicate that they will take place regardless.
In the evening, Jobert calls me: “The Prime Minister does not wish for you to make statements. This wish also applies to your colleagues. He considers that, during this period of crisis, all communications to the public should be concentrated in his hands.”
Pompidou had already adopted the same attitude in March 1963, during the miners’ strike. The Minister of Industry no longer existed, nor did the Minister of Finance — regardless of its stature. He wanted to be the only one to speak, except to delegate to his Minister of Information the task of making a statement in his name that he had previously dictated.
Pompidou does not deviate from this line. In today's debate on the motion of censure, he abruptly took the microphone away from his Minister of Information, live in front of the entire nation.
Although he refused my resignation, everything is happening as if he had accepted it. He is the Minister of Education. But he is also the Minister of Justice; the Minister of the Interior, the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Information. However, the system has its limits; others would need to act as spokespersons for him; but since he has replaced everyone, no one can replace him.
Matignon, Wednesday, May 22, 1968.
Pompidou, at the center of a table covered in gray felt, in the large white salon where he holds his meetings, with his back to the park — as if to avoid distraction, or to better observe who is entering — presides like a benevolent prince. He occasionally calls upon parliamentary “companions,” whom he cheerfully mixes with high-ranking officials, supposedly “companions” as well for the occasion.
Pompidou: “Ah, Kaspereit! I was waiting for you! I like Kaspereit, he always has a smile.”
I have the impression that this smile is not shared by some of the high-ranking officials present. They find it natural to be mixed with ministers, but not with rank-and-file deputies of the majority party. In this fluid period, they do not like being confused with activists.
Pompidou also always has a smile. He appreciates in his interlocutors the control of their anxieties, detachment, and distance. He sometimes lights a cigarette with the previous one; but often, he keeps the extinguished butt in the corner of his mouth, as if to forbid himself from starting again. His smile is accentuated by this.
“You see,” he tells us, “when a child or a teenager has a fit of anger, it's like a bout of madness: first, you have to make the fever go down and the madness recede, before it has time to contaminate others. You have to pat his cheek if he is ten, appeal to his common sense if he is eighteen; you must not risk making the fever rise again.”
Fouchet says wryly: “On May 8th, when the workers and farmers were demonstrating together in the nine departments of the West, we had completely stripped Paris bare, we were at the mercy of the enraged. We must never repeat this imprudence.”
Pompidou decisively states: “Paris is Paris. If the rioters take control of the Hôtel de Ville, or the Palais-Bourbon, or Matignon, or even more so the Élysée, the State and France are done for. If it's the prefecture of Nantes, no one cares. Tell Vie to manage on his own. If the leftists bother him, he just needs to call on the CGT's security service, who will deal with them.”
Pompidou began by having illusions about the nature of the events. But he has admirably withstood the shock. If he is anxious, he keeps his anxiety to himself. If some members of his entourage entertain the idea of seeing the General fade away, he does not expose himself to the accusation of disloyalty. He has been too closely tied to all the vicissitudes of the Gaullist adventure for the past twenty-four years not to “stick” to it; and the General is necessary to give him his legitimacy.
He has received several groups of Gaullist parliamentarians in his office. He gives them neither assurance nor promises. But they leave reassured, having seen him so composed, so smiling.
Every day, he makes a round in the press room of Matignon. Television shows serene images of him. The General “is no longer himself”; but Pompidou is there.
The General holds council on the referendum
Élysée, Thursday, May 23, 1968.
Flohic, with whom I chat for a moment before joining my colleagues who are arriving one after the other in the Council room, speaks of “the complicit indulgence of some towards the demonstrators.” Is he thinking of Grimaud, or someone higher up? In any case, with his absolute loyalty to the General, there is no doubt that he has heard the latter make similar remarks.
Before the arrival of the General and Pompidou, the ministers exchange their concerns. It seems to me that a clear majority of them find that the policy of unconditional appeasement has failed: it has set the whole society ablaze.
Missoffe: “Pompidou's system is impressive, but it doesn't work. Everyone is clamoring: ‘What about me, what about me.’”
Guéna: “The students have shown that all you need to do is smash everything to get everything. Why should the young workers hold back?”
Marcellin: “How is it that the government is showing such weakness? Who already, within the state apparatus, has a thoughtful conception of maintaining order? Never any initiatives to take things back in hand, to put the adversary out of action! We reply blow by blow, and always while retreating!”
I respond that I think like him, but that I also understand the hesitation of Pompidou, Fouchet, and Grimaud: they fear that firmness will lead to bloodshed.
Marcellin: “But that's absurd! It's not a matter of using firearms, since the rioters aren't using them! Obviously, we must stay within the same register as them. But above all, what we need to do is abandon the defensive; strike at the head, imprison the leaders, disorganize the attack system of the revolutionary groups. When there is agitation, it's because there are agitators. From the beginning, we should have thrown the leaders in jail and dissolved their movements. And if the agitators reconstitute them, we must prosecute them for reconstituting dissolved leagues. I know the drill. I learned it with Jules Moch.”
“In ‘52, the communists, armed with iron bars, staged a violent demonstration against the arrival of General Ridgway in Paris, you remember. I was in the government. We didn't back down. Eight hundred arrests, including Jacques Duclos and André Stil. One hundred fifty indictments for threatening the internal security of the state, raids on the PC headquarters. The communists then understood that violence was turning against them.”
However, Grimaud can boast, since the night of the barricades, of a dozen calm days, during which his tactic of non-action was followed. And he can even triumph by pointing out that it was the ban on Cohn-Bendit's residence, issued against his advice, that reignited the disorder. For him, we are not going far enough in the direction of patience; for the General, we have gone much too far. Pompidou, sometimes follows his inclination, which is that of Grimaud, and sometimes makes a concession to the General, which goes in the opposite direction. The result is a bit rough.
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Council of Thursday, May 23, 1968.
Silence falls as the General arrives. As if insensitive to the pressure of events, the Council proceeds with its agenda. We discuss the fiscal regime of New Caledonia, the development of the North. The General briefly mentions his trip to Romania. His accelerated return serves as a transition: Fouchet and then Jeanneney provide an update on the disorder in the streets and in the economy. After their lengthy interventions, the General concentrates for a moment, then says:
“I am going to ask each of you to express yourselves. I will first tell you what I think of the situation.”
“We find ourselves in a certain country, in a certain society, which are being swept away by a transformation of an extent and at a pace never seen before. It is a country that fears neither war nor misery. It knows neither internal nor external anxiety. It is witnessing a movement, a progress that surpasses it, because they are due to causes that surpass it and that can be summed up in one word: the technical and mechanical civilization. So, it is troubled in all its elements, especially in its youth.”
“It should not be surprising that at one moment or another, there was a national —and international — protest, but as always, we show the way.”
“The trouble is felt from top to bottom, and especially in what is most agitated, the University.”
“The University is poorly organized, not at all adapted to its purpose. It has been in disarray for a long time. We could have done a number of things a long time ago that we did not do. I will not dwell on it, but everyone understands what I mean. The same goes for public order. It is possible that we could have acted more quickly and more firmly from the beginning of the disorders in the streets.”
The General addresses the Prime Minister directly, who faces him: “Your psychology has been to let things happen, to let things come. This can be understood, provided that the limits beyond which the State would be affected are not crossed.”
“But what is the point of elaborating? The fact is that, under the effect of the detonator that was the student world, the demonstrations of all those who are not content for one reason or another have followed one after the other. We have witnessed an attempt to occupy the factories and the country.”
“This situation cannot continue. It must be brought to an end by placing the French people in front of the realities. Unless this leads to a revolution, to the will of a part of the country to seize the Republic and overthrow the institutions. This intention certainly exists in certain teams, in certain organizations. But it is not the generalized intention of the country to make a revolution. And the State is sufficiently established on its foundations, it has sufficient resilience to prevent it from being overthrown. It is enough to want, it is enough to hold firm. I do not believe that the State can be swept away.”
“There are causes. There is everywhere a desire to benefit from progress, to take one's share of the profit. There is a general desire, especially among those who are used to making demands — the workers, the farmers — to improve their condition. It is an impulse of the mechanical society: to gain. Why shouldn't they gain something? They see that it works, that it responds. Why not take advantage of it? One hardly calculates what imbalances this can cause.”
“And then there is another element, correlated with the first. It is a generalized desire to participate, as they say. Not to be carried along by the mechanics, the industrial organizations, the administrations, all these instruments that make the mechanics work. This can lead to a desire to contest without restraint.”
“The general desire to participate is particularly manifested in the youth. And the desire to improve material conditions is not particularly manifested among the most disadvantaged, but rather among the executives, who naturally lead the others.”
“Thus, everyone wants more than they have. And everyone ‘wants to get involved,’ ‘to be consulted,’ ‘to participate.’”
“On the other hand, there is a necessity for the nation and an obligation for the State. First, to maintain public order. To ensure the population the elementary things: life, health, communications, freedom of work wherever possible.”
“Correlatively and immediately, it is necessary to keep in touch, to talk, to negotiate, to negotiate in any case with those who have the means to negotiate. We will have to give things, and it will be better to give them willingly, but the balance must not be upset.”
“But, beyond that, the State, and starting with myself, must carry out an overall operation, a national operation.”
“What is elementary, and even natural, is this desire for elevation and participation. The State must take it into account, embrace it, and make it its business; and the country must mandate it to do so. The country must tell us: ‘We trust you, as you are, to reform the University in order to adapt it to the modern needs of the Nation; to establish and specify the role of the youth; to influence the economy in order to improve the lot of all and especially the least favored; to extend participation so that it touches responsibilities, through the association of personnel in the running of companies; to develop training and ensure employment; to define regional organization.’”
“The operation to be done, the operation that I must do, is a referendum on these subjects; it is to ask the people for a mandate to do these things.”
“If it is no, my task is finished.”
“If it is yes, we will do it, with this support formulated by the country, if it so wishes.”
The announced “round table” begins. It is Edgar Faure who speaks first.
Edgar Faure: “Society does not have the resilience and shock absorbers that would allow it to absorb the jolts. The intermediate bodies are weakened, and we must not give the impression of too much direct democracy.”
CDG (quick to understand the underlying criticism): “The mandate will be given to the public authorities, and not to the President of the Republic alone. We are not excluding Parliament or the unions, and you are right, we must not give that impression.”
Edgar Faure: “Three causes have combined to create the crisis: the university malaise, the sluggishness of the economic situation due to the lack of stimulus, and the insufficiency of the political base for the majority.”
(Like the press and the Parisian political circles, he overlooks another factor or does not see it: the revolutionary groups.)
Marcellin (taking up the problem of intermediate bodies in his own way): “We must fight against the tendency of the central administration to absorb everything. We must not only decentralize, as the referendum text provides, but also devolve power by giving regional assemblies decision-making power.”
(Marcellin says nothing about the firm and sensible ideas he develops before and after the Council.)
As if to discourage the other ministers from going into details, de Gaulle specifies: “It is not a question of submitting anything other than a general text to the referendum. The operation to be carried out is an operation of confidence, of intention. We must not spell things out.”
Michel Debré emphasizes politics: “The crisis began with the presidential election; a difficult situation was created, which was aggravated by mediocre legislative elections and by the indiscipline of a weak majority. The foundation of power is no longer solid enough. As soon as difficulties appear, everything collapses.”
“National interest demands rigor and effort. Political reasons push us to back down from this effort. As for decentralization, we can do it, but on the condition that the State relies on universal suffrage.”
De Gaulle approves: “Yes, to oppose federalism.”
Billotte: “The young have the impression that our society remains frozen, while the scientific revolution is sweeping us along at full speed. Your speech tomorrow must emphasize the new man of the 20th century, and make it understood that we will demolish all the bastions of conservatism that we have been running up against for so many years. We must establish participation at all levels.”
Schumann: “This is a new beginning. That is what the country expects from you. Only this is worthy of you. The 1967 elections had begun a certain disaggregation. We had interrupted the paths of Gaullism, that is to say, the direct appeal to the country. Today, you are seizing the opportunity by the hair. You are turning the event around. Bravo!”
When it is my turn, I raise objections: “As for the form, is the referendum suitable for a period of serious crisis? It is not familiar to the French. The left will not fail to speak of a Bonapartist plebiscite. The fundamental reflex of the French remains legislative elections. This seems to me to be the most appropriate procedure for a new beginning.”
“Regarding the University, in the deluge of chatter that is overwhelming it, two words stand out: participation and autonomy, which can be the best or the worst of things. One could even argue that the crisis emerged at Nanterre from an excess of participation and autonomy. Dean Grappin wanted to make the university an experimental ground for participation. Parity commissions of teachers and students were created for programs, exams, and pedagogy… Political discussion was allowed for students. The result was not long in coming. The faculty was rendered unable to function. Dean Grappin is the first to recognize that this experiment failed.”
“As for autonomy, things need to be clarified. Each of the universities should be more autonomous in recruiting its students and teachers and in managing itself. But the autonomy of the University as a whole is in some respects too great: the sacrosanct university franchises have favored the spread of disorder. These autonomist traditions prevent the government from restoring order itself and from intervening in the functioning of a body that isolates itself from the rest of the nation.”
“It is not just any participation and any autonomy that would allow us to resolve the crisis. But a breach has opened. We must take advantage of the crisis to implement profound reforms in the coming weeks.”
Throughout this intervention, Pompidou kept nodding, accentuating his smile when I spoke of the perverse effects of participation, encouraging me to develop my remarks. The General, on the other hand, looked somber and closed off.
Michelet began by lightening the mood by saying: “General, we must understand the students. With them, we must go easy.” Laughter around the table. The General does not seem to appreciate it. But Michelet develops his idea and broadens the debate: “The crisis of youth is a global crisis. It has been brutally suppressed in Moscow, Warsaw, Madrid, and South America. In Paris, where the enraged students of Nanterre were not locked up, there were no shootings. The revolution was able to take off without difficulty and feed off the precedents of which our history is rich. Because it is a revolution.”
“Gaullism is the rejuvenation of the country. France is rejuvenated. We were probably wrong not to give the right to vote at 18. It would be a mistake if young people under 21 opposed a reform that is being made for them but without them.”
Pierre Dumas does not reject the idea of a referendum but wishes for elections as soon as possible. “The fact that our majority was too narrow aggravated the feeling that power was not firmly established and encouraged the opposition forces to try to bring it down. Couldn't we allow voting from the age of 18? It would be an act of confidence in the youth; despite appearances, I believe there would be many more young people in favor than against.”
The General remains silent; Fouchet dismisses this suggestion: “We do not have the time to modify the legal provisions.”
Chirac: “The referendum is the only possible response. But simultaneously, negotiations with the unions must advance very quickly. We must not count on rot.”
Gorse (returning to the idea of elections): “The referendum will not be enough. Elections are more in line with the habits of the French.”
The General, who had not responded to my remark, cuts in sharply: “No, because the opposition is seeking to undermine the authority of the State and only the referendum can confirm it.”
(The General gives full credit to the referendum as a means of affirming national confidence. It is yes or no. It is categorical. Elections, on the other hand, are biased because they involve voting for individuals who may not be good conductors of the popular will.)
Malraux: “Yes, it is the referendum and nothing else that is necessary. The choice must be made by the country: it is either reform, which only you with your government can lead, or revolution. It is simple and the people will understand.”
“The reform must in no way be dictated by the opposition. The government must not dance to the tune of the strikers. What will follow the referendum will be the implementation of something fundamental, a systematic new deal.”
CDG: “That is to say, it must be done spontaneously” (he emphasizes the word with his voice)
Missoffe: “You want to consult the people by making them participate. Participation must come through general elections. Yesterday, I do not hide it, I wished that the Assembly would overthrow the government.”
CDG: “The referendum does not exclude elections.”
Faced with this unexpected opening from the General, Pompidou intervenes vigorously: “I beg that we do not speak of upcoming elections. We would no longer be able to hold the Assembly in the days when we would particularly need it.”
Missoffe continues: “We laughed at the hippy phenomenon, the beatniks, the provocateurs. We were wrong not to attach enough importance to this phenomenon. This need of the young to mark their difference, to escape, to regroup in violent action, these are tendencies that were highlighted in the White Paper published by my ministry.”
“The young of the baby boom know that they are a force. They can no longer bear that adults consider themselves the owners of all the levers of power.”
“And then, the transistor and television have brought about direct information, without intermediaries. Traditional structures are fading or collapsing. Hence the general abdication of authority.”
Guéna: “The response to the referendum will be the third round of the presidential election. Victory will give us increased strength.”
CDG: “Victory is not assured.”
Ortoli: “We must not ask for full powers, but for confidence. We must engage in this referendum with a spirit of dialogue.”
Couve: “The crisis we are going through is revolutionary. France does not change through evolution, but through jolts. The authority of the State is seriously undermined. What is needed first is to restore it. Then, we must take in hand the necessary transformations, now that the shock has made them possible.”
Guichard suggests organizing the referendum and elections on the same day: “We cannot keep this Assembly.”
Pompidou: “If we talk about elections, we will alienate the parliamentarians.”
Guichard: “Recourse to elections is the only safety valve in French political life. Elections coupled with a referendum are effective. Experience has shown this.”
Fouchet approves.
Pompidou concludes the debate: “The movement we are witnessing, you have analyzed it, General: it reflects a material need and a more moral than political need to feel responsible, associated with decisions. Faced with a technocratic and centralizing administration, people feel like a herd and revolt against the shepherd.”
“Youth: their explosion will have allowed us to shatter an outdated University. But it does not come without drawbacks.”
“France no longer has fundamental concerns. Germany is struggling with its national problem; Belgium, with its linguistic problem; England, against decadence; the United States, with racial conflict. Paris was bored. Hence the taste for destruction, so that things change.”
“We have returned to the Paris of the Revolution. In 1830, in 1848, in 1870, Parisian movements were enough to bring down regimes. The Third and Fourth Republics got by with ministerial crises. But today, the authority of the State has been maintained, which proves that the Fifth Republic is holding firm” (this is a response to Couve)
“Everything will eventually settle down. But this crisis has brought to light new forces: youth; and also the CGT and the PC, which have jumped on the bandwagon and shown that they are the only forces capable of paralyzing the State. There is only one support: public opinion. We must appeal to it. The President of the Republic, because he is also General de Gaulle, must find support in public opinion”.
“I am not in favor of elections coupled with the referendum. I would rather tend to prefer dissolution. But there is a chance that the referendum will be positive on the name of General de Gaulle, and a risk that the elections will be negative, as a reaction against the government, against the ministers, against myself. We risk losing the elections, while we must win the referendum.”
(Surprising declaration, since he has confided to me several times since the presidential election that the General's popularity has been worn out by the accumulation of categories that do not forgive him for having won one of the past battles against them; while he, Pompidou, escapes these grievances. Sincere discouragement, or modest and clever way of combating those who whisper to the General that his Prime Minister only thinks of replacing him?)
“General, we have been faithful to you, and we will remain so.”
CDG: “Thank you. I am touched.”
“We must go to the essential. The essential is that the people, in their mass, regain control and impose a halt to a violent minority that does not represent them. The essential, therefore, is to win the referendum and, in the process, to carry out great reforms.”
Joxe, upon leaving, declares to us: “And he rose again on the third day.”
110 rue de Grenelle, Friday, May 24, 1968.
I feel that the central administration is as if in weightlessness. Everything seems suspended. For my part, at the moment Pompidou chooses, I will leave this house. I want to take advantage of the fact that it still believes me to be the minister to leave it a message.
This morning, I convened, for a reflection meeting, everyone who counts at “110.” We crowd into the library of the cabinet, and each person no doubt has their own way of perceiving the event. As the head of the largest administration of the State, I extensively develop my critique of administrative centralization. If the slightest tremor spreads through all the structures of the machine; if every decision must either be referred back to the ministry and even to the minister, or be confined within the narrow limits set by the norm dictated from above; if this traditional centralization has been further reinforced in recent years by the new organ of the general secretariat; if this reinforcement seemed necessary to repair the disorders that usage introduces into such a complex and vast arrangement; in short, if the National Education remains under the sign of Colbert, it should not be surprising that one day this administrative absolutism collapses. I therefore invite all the officials of the administration to draw the lesson from this crisis. The necessary reforms, already sketched out in the functioning of the University and in that of the schools, imply an equally profound reform of the central administration.
As I speak, I feel Pierre Laurent, seated next to me, tensing up. When I finish, he briefly takes the floor to quickly get to the formula he must have been meditating on: “You have accused Colbert, but Colbert was not guillotined, Louis XVI was.”
However, he too will follow me to the scaffold. But has the central administration changed? Has it not continued, under the sign of Colbert, and from reform to reform, to prevent change?
Pompidou continues negotiations with the unions
Matignon, Friday, May 24, 1968, afternoon.
Pompidou receives me on Friday afternoon, on the eve of Grenelle: “We are at the point where the CGT and the Communist Party are the last guarantors of a peaceful solution. We are going to reach an agreement with them to satisfy the salary and category demands. This will allow us to stifle the demands that seek to paralyze the country.”
(He seems to attach more importance to tomorrow's negotiation between “responsible” powers at the summit, already initiated behind the scenes, than to the announcement that the General will make tonight of a referendum on participation.)
“The most important thing,” he adds, “was not to convince Debré to abstain from coming to the negotiating table tomorrow, but to convince the General. It was much easier than I thought. He understood that with Debré, we would inevitably come to a rupture, and that we could only succeed without him.”
I propose to Pompidou to cut off the sources, or rather the resources, of the student movement. We have opened the floodgates by allowing the occupation of the Sorbonne, and then, step by step, countless faculties, restaurants, and university residences. “The minds are ripe for us to cut off their supplies: no electricity, no provisions, treatment suspended for teachers who participate in the movement.” Pompidou replies: “No, we just have to wait.”
Rue de Grenelle, May 24, 1968, 8 P.M.
The General speaks. The protesters protest. The protesters attack the police, the stock exchange, public order, without much concern for De Gaulle. De Gaulle attacks the deep causes of social disorder, without seeming to be concerned about public disorder:
“Crisis of the University, caused by the inability of this great body to adapt to the modern necessities of the nation, at the same time as to the role and employment of the youth. Crisis of society, which requires us to adapt our economy not to this or that category of particular interests, but to the national and international necessities of the present, by organizing the participation of personnel in professional responsibilities, by developing the training of the young, by ensuring their employment, by implementing industrial and agricultural activities within the framework of our regions.”
He has plunged into the heart of our difficulties. And yet, his speech did not resonate. It only confirmed the organization of a referendum whose announcement had been leaked for several days. In the following hour, it is noted that the disappointment is general. The press will echo the sole chant of the protesters: “Farewell, De Gaulle, farewell!” The General has made the same error of judgment that he rightly reproached me for in my televised intervention on May 6. This cold sermon is not in phase with the violence that is overflowing at the same moment in the streets, this violence that delights some and scandalizes others. Dannaud tells me in the evening that the prefects are overwhelmed.
When I return home in the evening, my neighbor, a business owner, tells me on the landing: “What Pompidou is doing with the unions is what needed to be done. That here is a man! What De Gaulle just said is zero. In my circles, we all think the same thing. He must go.”
Phone calls with Foccart and Tricot show me that his immediate entourage is dismayed: “It is an uncontrollable torrent,” the General told them. He himself has drawn the lesson from this failure: “I missed the mark!”
110, rue de Grenelle, Sunday, May 26, 1968.
At the moment when, at the Ministry of Labor, 127 rue de Grenelle, negotiations are being conducted at full speed with the social partners, I am enraged, at 110, at not being able to engage in dialogue with those who, in the turmoil or collapse of the university and school system, hold a share of responsibility.
I draft a letter to this effect intended for Pompidou, and I submit to him projects of telexes to the rectors.
A first telex aims to set the position of the State regarding the institutional derailments observed in the faculties: yes to new bodies that are added to or associated with the institutions of law; no to bodies that claim to replace them, even with the agreement of the institutions of law.
A second telex aims to quickly organize the “participation of students in the life of secondary schools”: election of one or two class delegates, periodic meeting of these delegates, creation of a consultative body comprising, in equal numbers, members of the administration and the teaching staff, and parents of students and students. This representative body could address all the problems of school life (cultural activities, student centers, cooperatives, clubs, sports associations, documentation centers, etc.).
“Edgar Faure, upon his arrival at the ministry, will put in place these institutions, which still function today.”
To the Prime Minister, I write:
“I am receiving overtures from various quarters to convene a round table meeting as soon as possible, which could include, in addition to the delegates of the major teaching unions, certain representatives of the UNEF and the SNESup. In my opinion, to defuse a resumption of violence, we should urgently apply a positive tactic, the main lines of which I would like to present to you as soon as possible. Otherwise, we risk adding to the agitators the ‘desperados.’”
I have these texts delivered to Matignon in the evening.
They will not emerge from there. To the war of movement that I still believe possible, both on the side of order and on the side of reform, Pompidou prefers a war of attrition.
Pompidou is backstabbed by the Left
Monday morning, May 27, 1968.
Pompidou believed that everything had been settled. Thanks to twenty-six hours of discussion, face to face with the labor and employer organizations, the category demands of the workers were satisfied. He goes to sleep for two hours after a press conference where he expressed his relief. At 10 A.M., when he wakes up, he learns with astonishment that the workers at Renault in Billancourt have decided unanimously to continue the struggle.
A sense of dejection grips the government and the cabinets. Pompidou’s entire strategy was hanging on this agreement. He considered it a great success and did not imagine that Georges Séguy and Benoît Frachon would not honor their signatures.
Double game of the communist apparatus? Sincerity of Séguy, caught off guard by a crowd movement? Or, has the PC and the CGT, on whom Pompidou was relying to defend the State, the regime, the economy, come to believe that the moment has come to make the revolution triumph?
The failure, in any case, revives the political opposition, which success would have deprived of fuel. The non-communist left, led by Mitterrand and Mendès France, agree with L’Humanité in proclaiming that the only service de Gaulle can now render to France is to leave.
But is there a reverse double game or dissensions in what Waldeck-Rochet said, in the tone of a prayer, to Jacques Vendroux, who hastened to relay this signal of hope to us in the corridors of the Palais-Bourbon: “Tell the General that he does not have the right to leave.”
Before the Council on Monday, May 27, 1968, 2:45 P.M.
Most of the ministers are here a good quarter of an hour early, as if they wanted to gather, amidst the general disarray, to create an exchange of information and analyses. The faces are grave; some are even dismayed or anxious. Missoffe tells me: “De Gaulle must remember what he said in May 58, at the end of the Fourth Republic: ‘Power is no longer to be taken, it is to be picked up.’ We are back to that point.”
Most of my colleagues think that the Communist Party is preparing to be the one to pick it up.
And yet, Pompidou's strategy is based on the opposite bet: namely, that the PC is the only pillar on which the government and the State can rely, since it is the only force that does not want revolution at any price. Missoffe concludes with the formula: “France is governed by the two Georges.”
Debré shares Pompidou's sentiment: “The Communist Party is a stabilizer, in the face of the madness of the enraged: when it got involved in organizing a procession, like on May 13, the non-students, mainly organized by the CGT, were ten to one against the students incited by the leftists. It kept them very calm.” But he is starting to have doubts: “What will happen tomorrow or the day after, when the PC realizes that it is disavowed by its own base? No one can predict that at the moment, not even the communists.”
Couve recalls that the same process occurred in all the popular democracies in the East: first, a government of national unity; then, when things are ripe, the government falls like a rotten pear and is replaced by a communist government with a few figureheads.
For once, Malraux nuances Couve: “In the East, Soviet troops were present or very close. Even if they did not intervene, there was a fear that they might. Here, we know they will not.”
But what happened this morning at Billancourt changes everything. The rebellion of the base against its leaders creates a revolutionary situation. Actions that were denounced as the adventurism of the leftists can now become realism.
Council on the Grenelle agreements
Council of Monday, May 27, 1968, 3 P.M.
Pompidou reports on the Grenelle agreements. Despite the refusal of the Renault workers, he continues to display his optimism: “We have just gone through a very serious crisis.”
(We look at each other, and our eyes say: “But we haven't gone through it at all!”)
Pompidou continues: “The Renault workers want to obtain an extension. We will have to start again, it will cost a little more, but they cannot always refuse.”
When he finishes, the General, visibly in a very bad mood, is expeditious: “No need to discuss what has been done or what will result from it. Are there any objections? There are none. So, we consider these agreements as accepted by the Council of Ministers.”
Pompidou remains exemplarily calm, contenting himself with lighting a cigarette. In self-control, the student has surpassed the master.
Michel Debré asks for the floor. De Gaulle blocks him in advance: “I give you the floor, but I ask you not to say a word outside of what I have just said.”
Debré: “There is talk of devaluation as a way to cover the cost of Grenelle. That is absurd! France possesses considerable foreign exchange reserves. That is a word to banish.”
CDG: “You are absolutely right. Let no one speak of devaluation!”
De Gaulle then turns to the Prime Minister. He must take a lot upon himself to continue: “Mr. Prime Minister, you have conducted these negotiations as best as possible and we authorize you to go to the end of the agreement.” He also congratulates Jeanneney and Chirac for participating in this negotiation. Jeanneney says modestly: “I did not open my mouth, it was the Prime Minister who conducted everything.”
The floor is given to Fouchet, who discusses the maintenance of order.
After his presentation, the General speaks with vivacity: “These demonstrations are an eternal recurrence, an endless chain. There is no reason for them to stop if we do not stop them. Why the hell do we not forbid them? There have been enough gatherings and parades in the streets for the past three weeks to vent people's feelings! Now, if they absolutely want to have processions, they can do so in Chartres, but not in Paris.”
The transmutation of the rioters into pilgrims to Chartres is so audacious that it brings a smile. We had forgotten that we were in the month of Mary! But the General does not smile:
“These gatherings, that's enough! They must no longer be tolerated! It is easier to forbid them than to deal with their excesses afterward. If the police are not enough, we will call on the army. Until now, we have refrained from doing so, but we must not hesitate to resort to it. Maintaining public order has always been one of the essential missions of the army.”
“There is still a gathering at Charléty this evening, it must be the last! This is no longer acceptable! No more parades! They can meet at the Mutualité if they want, or in any enclosed place, but they must not come out! The streets belong to traffic, they have belonged to the demonstrators long enough!”
“We were very wrong to let these demonstrations continue and escalate. We were very wrong to release the four detained students. We were very wrong to open the Sorbonne to the rioters. If there are still troublemakers, they must be put out of action. I have told you and I repeat: we should have rounded up 500 of them every evening.”
“And then, if the police did their job, we would know exactly what we are dealing with. We would be informed in advance of the plans of all these leaders. But the police are always surprised. They should have informants among all these enraged people, who would keep us informed hour by hour. All this is not difficult to set up! It's child's play!”
“And then, I am not sure that the assistance of the army is as extensive as it could be. In the provinces, the DOT must play its full part in maintaining public order. This should have prevented what happened in Toulouse. We must use military forces to protect public buildings. We must not wait to intervene.”
Frey (speaking as a former official responsible for public order): “Such an insurrection was only possible through an international conspiracy. Several hundred leftist students went to Berlin in February, where they took courses in urban guerrilla warfare.”
Fouchet (annoyed that his predecessor at the Place Beauvau is encroaching on his domain): “It's all very well to say it's an international conspiracy, but we would need to prove it; we have no evidence.”
Frey: “Precisely, we should open a judicial investigation for undermining the internal and external security of the State. It may not yield immediate results. But the opening of the investigation itself would have a decisive psychological effect. And it would allow for custody.”
(Joxe and Gorse speak in the same vein.)
CDG: “It must be done, gather the elements and discuss it with the Prime Minister.”
Edgar Faure: “I am not in favor of it. We must be careful about escalation, about the reflexes of solidarity among the young. We are in the realm of the irrational. What is most concerning is the explosive mix of conspirators, the enraged, and the sheep who follow blindly.”
Pompidou: “I also believe that, at present, opening an investigation would not be opportune.”
CDG: “Order is not maintained solely with law enforcement.”
But he does not insist.
The discussion turns to examining the referendum bill, on which the Council of State has issued an unfavorable opinion, which is being disregarded.
CDG: "We are experiencing a shock. Our society is in mutation. It is normal that there are shocks. What was not normal is that there had not already been comparable ones. There will be others, many others.
“The real question is whether society will reform or collapse. If it collapses, it would be a great misfortune for everyone.”
“If it frankly and squarely engages in the path of reform, it will gradually adapt to its own transformations. The bill is the affirmation of this fact.”
The General continues after a silence: “Once again, French society is decomposing, the elites are collapsing, those who should help to stand firm are lying down. We have seen this before, in another month of May, twenty-eight years ago. In one form or another, it reappears from time to time. A proposition is made to the nation. The nation will say whether it wants to make this renovation, and whether it is the current regime and its leader who should do it.”
The General puts his glasses on, reads the text phrase by phrase, accepts an amendment here and there. The text is short, simple, and clear. It is adopted.
Messmer asks the question that is on many lips: “And if, on June 16, due to a lack of printing facilities or transportation, the referendum does not take place?”
Pompidou smiles at the audacity. No one responds.
Rumors are circulating that the police, whose unions are predominantly left-wing, are preparing to side with the protestors. But this is likely just self-intoxication.
Has the General heard this rumor? In any case, he is consistent in his ideas. What he said the other day in a small committee, in a French of barracks — “We must give them some hooch” — he repeats at the end of the Council of Ministers in chosen terms: “I insist that immediate material benefits be given to the police: in these times when so much is demanded of them, it is the least we can do.” If he had not pounded his fist on the table upon his return from Bucharest, the concerned ministries, Finance and Civil Service, would surely have continued to drag their feet as usual, that is, to wait until the useful moment had passed. And despite the fist-pounding, the matter is still not settled. The General knows this. He gives another punch to the hornet's nest.
Joxe pulls me aside with a smile: “If the General wants to keep the Prime Minister, he must change the Assembly. But if he wants to change the Prime Minister, he must keep the Assembly. You can very well see he wants to keep the Assembly. That means he wants to change the Prime Minister. He summoned Couve to the Élysée yesterday, through a hidden door. It wasn't to string pearls.”
This chain of reasoning is seductive. If the General gave himself five or six weeks to change the Prime Minister, he could indeed proceed with the dissolution, organize general elections, and then appoint a new government. But if he wants to change the Prime Minister immediately, he has to choose another procedure to consult the people: there is only the referendum.
Marcellin and I descend the stairs together, almost stopping at each step. We share the same questions.
Why does the General, always so imaginative and so determined, give the appearance of this passivity that he rightly reproaches his government for? Why does he not resort to the exceptional powers that, in all democracies, a exceptional situation calls for: state of emergency, martial law… Why does he not initiate prosecutions for undermining the internal security of the State? Why does he not invoke Article 16, which, in our Constitution, seems to have been written precisely for circumstances of this nature? He who has reflected more than anyone on the duties and prerogatives of power towards the nation and the Republic, why does he remain helpless in the face of this unleashing? How does he focus solely on the objective of participation, which many of his ministers, starting with the Prime Minister, consider a chimera out of time?
