The Chief of the Staff of the French Army (French: Chef d'État-Major de l'Armée de Terre, CEMAT) is the professional head of the French Army. The current Chief of Staff of the French Army has been General Bertrand Ract-Madoux since September, 1st 2011. The CEMAT title has been in use since 1962; prior to that the position for the general in charge of France's land forces was referred to as Chef d'État-Major de l'Armée. The modern form of a general staff for the French Army emerged in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, with Louis Alexandre Berthier being Chief-of-Staff for the Grand État-Major Général (Army General Headquarters) of Napoleon's Grand Armée.
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“The chief imagination of Christendom,
Dante Alighieri, so utterly found himself
That he has made that hollow face of his
More plain to the mind’s eye than any face
But that of Christ.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“Each one threw down his staff, and they became snakes; but Aaron’s staff swallowed up theirs.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Exodus 7:12.
“Vivian Rutledge: So you do get up. I was beginning to think perhaps you worked in bed like Marcel Proust.
Philip Marlowe: Who’s he?
Vivian: You wouldn’t know him. French writer.
Marlowe: Come into my boudoir.”
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“To make an Army work you have to have every man in it fitted into a fear ladder.... The Army functions best when you’re frightened of the man above you, and contemptuous of your subordinates.”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)