Page 111 - Was Hitler a Riddle?

98 The French Diplomats

Germany and Poland; russian policies in Ukraine; the conflicts between
the Nazis and the evangelical Church; and the persecution of the Jews, to
mention only the most important ones. Often his dispatches ran to seven
printed pages, and in one day during the Czech crisis of september 1938
he produced six long reports. He was an acute observer of events, he read
the German press omnivorously, and he knew how to turn an interesting
phrase. supremely confident in his own judgments, he was not shy about
expressing his opinions or giving advice to his superiors in Paris.
François-Poncet first took interest in German affairs as a young man.
Born in 1887 in Paris into an educated middle-class family—his father held
the position of counselor of the Court of appeals—he attended the highly
regarded lycée Henri iV and upon graduation in 1906 began to study Ger-
manistics at the École supérieure, also a prestigious institution. in 1907 he
continued his studies at the Universities of Berlin and Munich, from which
he graduated in 1909 after having written a thesis on Goethe’s Wahlverwand­
schaften (elective affinities). For two years, he occupied various academic
positions and in 1911 received a fellowship that enabled him to resume his
literary and historical research in Paris. He published several articles on
German cultural themes and in 1911 a short book in support of the French
government’s proposal to extend the period of military service. He argued
that such an extension was necessary to reinforce the “esprit public” of
young Frenchmen as well as to strengthen France against Germany, which,
he believed, had embarked on a program to establish “German hegemony
in europe,” an endeavor widely supported by the people. François-Pon-
cet admired Germany’s cultural achievements, but he was troubled by the
enthusiasm of the German nation for the creation of a “militaristic state.”
during World War i, François-Poncet served as a lieutenant in the French
army; in view of his expertise in German affairs he was assigned in 1916 to
the Ministry of Foreign affairs, which sent him to switzerland, where he
was engaged in secret work consisting mainly of following internal devel-
opments in Germany and sending reports on his findings to Paris. 8
When the war ended, robert Pinot, the influential general secretary of
the Comité des Forges (Committee of Heavy industry), took an interest
in François-Poncet’s career and appointed him to an important position;
he was to study developments in industry, technology, and the economy
in general, both within France and in foreign countries, and produce daily
reports to be published in the Bulletin quotidien, a journal widely read by
businessmen in Paris. a moderate republican during his years as a student,
François-Poncet now became a confirmed conservative, although he was