В целом, стоит признать, что четкого плана европейского строительства в годы войны у де Голля не было. Он принял на вооружение некоторые основополагающие принципы концепции европеизма: добровольность, межгосударственное взаимодействие, безусловное признание западных буржуазных ценностей, начало сближения государств региона первоначально в экономической, а потом и в политической областях. Но такие вопросы, как членство отдельных европейских государств, формирование интеграционных органов управления, их функции и взаимодополняемость, отношения западноевропейского сообщества со сверхдержавами, место и роль в нем Германии, были слабо разработаны и аргументированы в середине 40-х гг.

Уйдя в отставку с поста председателя Временного правительства 20 января 1946 г., де Голль на долгих двенадцать лет лишился возможности оказывать непосредственное влияние на принятие внешнеполитических решений, в том числе и в европейском вопросе. Процесс интеграционного строительства начался без него. В 1952 г., после тяжелейшего послевоенного экономического кризиса, в условиях политических пертурбаций, разрыва союзнических отношений Великих держав и начавшейся «холодной войны», в западной части разделённой надвое Европы возникла первая интеграционная группировка из шести государств: Франции, ФРГ, Италии, Бельгии, Голландии и Люксембурга. Ею стало «Европейское объединение угля и стали» – реальное воплощение европейской мысли.

Naoumova natalia

Moscow, the parti communiste Français, and france’s political recovery[326]

Moscow’s view of France at the Liberation differed from those of Washington or London in four significant ways. First, France’s importance, though not negligible, was secondary. No Soviet leader or diplomat thought of France as a major power. Stalin opposed both French participation at the Yalta conference of February 1945 and a French zone of occupation in Germany. On 9 May 1945, only Eisenhower’s pressing request allowed the French to be included at the Soviet-organised surrender ceremony outside Berlin[327]. Moreover, whatever Europe’s medium-term future, securing a defensive glacis through the installation of pro-Soviet regimes in the East took priority, for Soviet leaders, over designs for Communist revolution in the West. If good behaviour there – holding back any revolutionary aspirations – ensured Anglo-American acceptance of Soviet hegemony in the East, the price was well worth paying.

Secondly, however, the Soviet Union, unlike the other two major allies, possessed a powerful client party in France, in the Parti Communiste Français. On one level, the PCF pursued the conventional aims of a party in a democratic system – policy achievements, office, and votes. At the same time the Soviet archives of the period testify to Moscow’s enormous influence on the PCF’s strategy and tactics, even during the period between the dissolution of the first Communist international organisation, the Comintern, in May 1943, and the foundation of its successor, the Cominform, in September 1947. Inevitably this influence was used in accordance with Soviet foreign policy goals.

Thirdly, France’s post-war economic predicament, of increasing concern to the British and Americans, was of marginal importance to Franco-Soviet relations. True, shipments of Soviet wheat reached France, and were made much of by the PCF, in the approach to the elections of June 1946. But the French traded relatively little with the Soviet Union, and looked to Washington not Moscow for economic aid.

The fourth difference lies in the Soviet attitude to de Gaulle, which was almost a mirror image of the British and American views. In Anglo-American eyes, the General’s major quality was his ability to contain the Communists; for the Soviets, whatever the accommodations of the moment, he belonged to the ‘reactionary’ camp. On the other hand, his prickly independence from the western allies was a clear recommendation for Moscow. Stalin had been a better ‘Gaullist’, at least since 1943, than either Roosevelt or Churchill: readier to recognise the Comité Français de Libération Nationale, set up in Algiers in June 1943, as a governmentin-waiting, and willing to accommodate the CFLN in Moscow in case of further difficulties with the ‘Anglo-Saxons’.[328]His signature of the Franco-Soviet pact in December 1944 should be viewed in this light.

The making of that alliance is the first focus of this chapter. Its significance, however, proved largely symbolic, especially after the end of hostilities in Europe. A more important aspect of Franco-Soviet relations, at least over the ‘long’ Liberation period, was the relationship between Moscow, the PCF, and the French political system. The vicissitudes of this relationship, from co-operation to Cold War, are covered in the remainder of this study, which approaches both questions from a Moscow perspective, using both official archives and the Soviet press.

The Franco-Soviet alliance

On 30 August 1944, Pravda published a message from Stalin to de Gaulle, president of the Gouvernement Provisoire de la République Française (GPRF): ‘On the occasion of the liberation of Paris, capital of France, we address to you… in the name of the peoples of the Soviet Union and of myself, friendly congratulations to the French people and our wishes for the most speedy liberation of France from the German yoke.’[329]The warmth of Stalin’s greeting was returned on 2 December, as de Gaulle’s arrived in Moscow in the company of his Foreign Minister Georges Bidault: ‘I am happy and flattered’, said the General, ‘to be in the capital of the Soviet Union and to offer the homage of France, ally of the Soviet Union, with a view to victory and a beneficial peace for the whole of humanity.’[330]De Gaulle’s stay, which lasted over a week, saw an impressive round of cultural events and diplomatic receptions, but above all substantive talks with Stalin, Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov, and other Soviet leaders.

That de Gaulle wanted a treaty of alliance was clear from his first contacts with Stalin and Molotov. ‘France’, he told the Russians, ‘understands that for the problem of the German danger to be settled it is not enough to resolve frontier issues. To prevent a new attack from Hitler an alliance of anti-German powers will be needed.’ When the Soviet leaders observed that a Franco-Soviet mutual assistance pact had been signed with the Laval government in 1935, de Gaulle remarked with some bitterness that he was not Laval, and expressed a strong wish to conclude