Macron U-turns on honouring Petain

The French government has backed down over plans to pay tribute to Marshal Philippe Petain (pictured).
French President Emmanuel Macron provoked controversy when he defended his decision to include the Second World War Vichy puppet leader in a ceremony for First World War leaders.
The 41-year-old, who is touring northern France to mark the centenary of the end of the war, called Petain a “great soldier” when asked why he was included among a list of great marshals.
But then the presidential spokesman Benjamin Griveaux posted on Facebook that no tribute would be paid to Petain tomorrow (Saturday).
“We had announced that we would honour the marshals of the Great War. Some have deduced that Petain was one of them; this is not the case. If there was confusion, it was because we were not clear enough on that point,” Griveaux posted.
Petain led troops to victory at Verdun in 1916 and is regarded as saving the French army from collapse amid several mutinies a few months later.
He won the rarefied rank of marshal for his role in First World War victories but was sentenced to death by a French court in 1945 for leading the collaborationist puppet administration that handed Jews over to Nazi occupiers. He died in 1951 at 95 with successive French governments reluctant to execute the senile former war hero.
Respect for Petain as the Great War commander-in-chief led Charles de Gaulle, who had served under him, to commute his death sentence to life imprisonment in 1945. Petain, then in his 80s, was initially popular during the Nazi occupation for ending the bloodshed and humiliation of conflict.
“It’s legitimate that we render homage to the marshals that led the army to victory” despite later “disastrous choices”, Macron said in Charleville-Mezieres near the Belgian border. “I don’t hide from history. Political life and human nature are more complex than we would like to think.”
Jewish association CRIF condemned the comments, saying: “The only thing we will remember from Petain is that he was, in the name of the French people, stripped of his national honours in his July 1945 trial.”
Macron attempted to clarify his remarks.
“Petain has been an accomplice in terrible crimes,” the centrist president said. “But Petain was a marshal in the Great War. I forgive nothing but I won’t erase bits of our history. I will always fight anti-Semitism.”
Macron’s approval levels have sunk to around 30 per cent, partly because of loose-tongued remarks.

Marshal Philippe Petain with his 1940 cabinet. Picture credit: Wikimedia