Giraud: What happened in Paris

Eye-witness Report

[Socialist Appeal, Vol. 6, No. 7, Mid-October 1944, Supplement, p. 1+4]

Although the capitalist groups, and especially the Stalinists, succeeded in canalising the Paris uprising of August 19th to the 24th into nationalist lines, the class lines exerted their influence

Although the bourgeois groups, and especially the Stalinists, succeeded in canalising the Paris uprising of August 19th to 24th into nationalist lines, making it a “national” insurrection, the class lines, although superficially hidden, exerted their influence.

The general slogan was the purely nationalist one “Out with the Boche”, and the general idea in the minds of the insurrectionists who fought and died on the barricades, was that the sole purpose of the uprising was the ejection of the Germans from the city. In fact, the Communist Party of France, which no doubt exerted the greatest influence in the resistance movement (in Paris the F.T.P. Frances Tireurs et Partisans, formed the major part of the F.F.T.) deliberately fostered this mood. “L’Humanité’’ appeared one day with the headline: “A chaque Parisien son Boche” (To each Parisian his Boche”). However, if the class issues were momentarily confused in the minds of the masses, the character of the movement revealed the underlying class issues.

The actual street fighting was done largely by the F.F.I. (F.T.P., .etc.) in the City itself, aided on the barricades by elements of the petit bourgeoisie (the local shop keepers, functionaries, housewives, etc.) and workers in the popular districts (14th 11th, etc.)

The workers of the banlieu (suburbs) of the big factories, Renault, Citroen, S.N.A.C., Gnome et Rhone, etc., did not, in general, descend into Paris. They intervened in quite another way. They occupied the factories, arrested or forced the arrest of the collaborating directing personnel, and in the most advanced cases, prepared the factories to start production again under their control.

In most factories, the initiative was taken by Communist Party factory militants, and Trotskyists. Example: At a factory employing over 1,000 workers, about 15 workers assembled at the factory. These included about 10 C.P. members and supporters, and about 2 or 3 Trotskyists. These 15 occupied the deserted factory, sent messages to call the workers to a factory meeting and to elect a workers’ committee. A “Commission d'Épuration ” (Purging Committee) was set up to “try” all the collaborating managing personnel, directors, managers, etc. Supply Committees were elected to take over the factory canteen.

The food situation being acute, the factory canteens had begun to play an important role. Not only the workers, but their families fed at them. A large proportion of the disputes and strikes that took place in the weeks prior to the capture of Paris, were related to feeding and canteen arrangements — over the quality and quantity of the food, its price, etc. Thus, during the insurrection, the canteen and the control of it became a vital matter. To obtain food the workers had recourse to direct requisitioning. Black market stocks were raided by organised detachments, sent out by the factories to supply the canteens. In the districts, Housewives’ Committees sprang up to fight the Black Market and ensure the distribution of captured German food stocks.

Factory Militias

In many factories the nuclei of workers’ militias had already been built up secretly under the German occupation. The Communist Party had called for the formation of “Milices Ouvrier Patriotiques”, but in two ways their growth was obstructed. Firstly, whatever arms were available to the Resistance movement, were distributed mainly to the reactionary elements, the O.C.M., the Armeé Sécrete, etc. The F.T.P. and workers had to arm themselves mostly from arms captured or stolen from the Germans. Secondly, the Stalinists urged the workers to leave the factories and join the Maquis, where invariably the workers were integrated under the leadership and control of ex-officer cadres. The Trotskyists urged the workers to stick to the factories, which was their stronghold, and not allow themselves to be dispersed and thus lose their class coherence.

In some cases, when the workers came to Occupy the factories, they found these already guarded by F.F.I. formations including the reactionary bosses’ Organisation Civile et Militaire (O.C.M.).

Production under Workers’ Control

In many factories in the Paris region similar conditions as in Italy in 1919, and in Spain in 1936 existed, where the whole of the managing and technical personnel of the works had either fled or were arrested. The Workers’ Committees appointed new directors, foremen, technicians, etc., to work under their control and prepare the factories for a restart of production, and they sent delegates to de Gaulle’s Ministry of Production, of Labour, etc., asking for permission to start work and laying out detailed plans. They were told that it was impossible to start production as there was no power for the machines. The Government, they said, would appoint administrateurs délégués (picked or delegated administrators) to take over the factories whose directors had been arrested. In the meanwhile, nothing was to be done.

Even in the Paris Metro, the staff, on their own initiative, drew up a plan and time-table for the trains, made the necessary repairs, and said to the authorities. “Let us run the Metro.”

At the same time, the workers in the factories drew up “Cahiers de Revendications” (Lists of Demands) which varied from factory to factory, but included commonly, wage increases, workers’ control of and inspection of the books, workers’ control of employment and exchange, control of the canteen, etc.

In some suburbs, the different factories linked up and called inter-factory delegates' meetings, representing several factories in the district, democratically elected by secret ballot.

The “illegal C.G.T.”, and the returned Trade Union official from Algiers, tried to bridle this spontaneous creation of Factory Committees, etc. One example shows the mood in which they were received. At a meeting of district factory delegates in a Paris suburb, an official of the C.G.T. intervened and declared that the meeting had no authority, was not properly constituted, and represented nothing. Whereupon one delegate, not belonging to any party, jumped up and exclaimed: “And who the hell do you represent? I represent ––– Factory, I was elected by so many workers. Who elected you? I have paid my Trade Union dues for 15 years and it (the C.G.T.) has done nothing for us at all.” He was loudly applauded by the rest of the meeting. The C.G.T. official had to withdraw.

Thus, although the Paris insurrection took place under nationalist, “classless” slogans, and although all tendencies in the Resistance, from ultra-reactionary Royalist to the Communist Party, tried to give it a national and classless character—from the very beginning the working class, basing itself on the factories, spontaneously threw up class organs—factory committees, factory militias, etc.—and began to put forward class demands, thus creating the elements of dual power.

In the districts (arrondissements) of Paris, a form of dual power as between the Resistance (mostly Stalinist FTP) and the de Gaulle authorities exists. During the fighting, detachments of the FFI, FTP, etc. took the local mairies (town halls) by storm, and once the Germans were ejected, contrived to occupy them and assure the municipal services. At the same time housewives’ committees sprang up to control the food rationing.

The reactionaries are already trying to liquidate this duality of power which exists between them and the Stalinists who control the FTP and the mairies. (The headquarters of the FTP were raided and searched by the police!) The formations of the FFI are either being integrated into the regular army or dissolved. De Gaulle, in his speech at the Chaillot, was certainly referring to the FFI and the FTP when he warned: “France must have a united army which belongs to France only.”

Role of the C.P.

Undoubtedly, the French Communist Party had a decisive influence in Paris and on the course of the insurrection—in the factories, the FFI, through the FTP, and in the districts. If it had pursued a policy of “Les Soviets Partout” (Soviets Everywhere) and actively pushed the workers’ committees, etc.; if they had called upon the workers to build up their committees as the basis of workers’ power as an alternative to the Provisional Government, the insurrection would very quickly have developed into a workers’ revolution. In fact, all the prerequisite conditions for a revolutionary situation existed, except for the presence of a sufficiently strong revolutionary party.

The Communist Party, by its very nature, representing the interests of the Soviet bureaucracy, could not but play an altogether different, counter-revolutionary role. By pursuing a “Popular Front” national unity policy, and calling for a purely “national” insurrection; by exciting to the highest pitch, the nationalist and chauvinist sentiments of the masses, confused the class issues in the minds .of the workers.

It now finds itself in the dilemma of being faced with an offensive, by the reaction to liquidate, “legally” and peacefully if possible, the duality of power, and of being equally afraid of leaning on the support of the masses. The Trotskyist organisation, on the other hand, calls for the strengthening of the Workers’ Committees in the factories and their co-ordination, on first a local, and then a regional and national plane. It points out that the only way to legalising the power of the municipal councils is to base them on the “comités de Quartier” (District Committees), on the housewives’ and factory committees, through democratic elections, thus confirming them as the teal expression of the will of the masses.

It is because these demands correspond to the needs of the situation and the real interests of the masses, that they are being followed even by rank and file members of the Communist Party in the factories. In several big factories in the Paris region, the initiative in the occupation of the factories, in the formation of workers’ committees, was taken by Trotskyists supported by C.P. militants. In fluid conditions, as existed in Paris, it has been shown that a small body can, with a correct orientation, definitely contribute to the development of the situation.

Conclusions

The problem that poses itself in France is: who will triumph? The workers and peasants, through the development of their own class organs (workers’ committees, peasants committees, etc.) into a Soviet Government—or the bourgeois reaction, in the form of a military Bonapartist dictatorship? There is no middle road possible. A Constituent Assembly might be elected, but the internal contradictions and antagonisms in France are too acute to permit of France going through a more or less lengthy period of parliamentary democracy. Even before the elections for a Constituent can be held, it is quite possible that the contradictions will have developed to a stage that makes the holding of “free” elections impossible. However, the struggle for all the democratic liberties—liberty of organisation, liberty of the press and of speech, right to strike, etc.,—-are in France today of paramount importance and must he fought for and defended vigorously against all attacks. In the long run all these democratic liberties can be guaranteed only by the class organisations of the working class, allied to the peasantry and the lower middle class.

The developments in France, of course, are not separate, but part of the developments in Europe itself. The ruling class, expressing itself through De Gaulle, is staking its claim to a share in the peace settlement, the partition of Germany, and the policing of Europe as a great power. In fact, France no longer has the power to play such a role in view of its economic, political and military weakness, and the preponderant power, economic and military, of the USA. In an attempt to stake his claim, however, De Gaulle plans—as his speech at the Chaillot palace shows—to rebuild the French army and gear the whole economic life of France to the war effort. But such a burden will prove too heavy. France will be like Balaam’s ass. The imposition of such a burden upon the already weary masses, after four years of German occupation, can only be achieved by dictatorial methods. De Gaulle, perhaps, hopes to become a new Napoleon.

The fate of France cannot be separated from that of Europe. Either it will become a Bonapartist state in a Balkanised Europe, or its social revolution, bringing into power a Soviet Government, will be but one part of the European revolution for a United Socialist States of Europe.

September 1944.

P.S. When Jacques Duclos, in a speech at a big mass meeting in the Velodrome d’Hiver (Winter Stadium) said: “We all know that the proportion of two Communists in the Government does not represent the real relation of forces in the country,” he was very vigorously applauded.

If, in Britain, the slogan for the coming period is “Labour to Power”, in France one can similarly say: “Thorez au pouvoir” (Thorez in power!), and let the masses in each case learn from their own experience.