Georges Bonnet - Later Career

Later Career

In the latter half of March 1940, Bonnet together with his "peace lobby" allies such as Anatole de Monzie, Pierre-Étienne Flandin, Pierre Laval, Jean Montigny, Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, Georges Scapini, René Dommanage, Gaston Bergery, René Chateau, and René Brunet, made a major lobbying effort to have Laval appointed foreign minister as a prelude to making peace with Germany. Besides for chairing meetings of the "peace lobby", which met six times during the Drôle de guerre, Bonnet otherwise remained silent as Justice Minister. On 21 June 1940, Bonnet together with Pierre Laval helped to pressure President Albert Lebrun into changing his mind about leaving for Algeria.

Bonnet supported the Vichy government and served on the National Council from December 1940, but the council never met, and his role in Vichy was small. Bonnet spent most of World War II living on his estate in the Dordogne and attempting to secure himself an office in Vichy, though Bonnet was later to claim to have been involved in the Resistance. According to Gestapo records, Bonnet contacted the Germans once in February 1941 to see if it were possible if the Germans would pressure Laval to include him in the Cabinet and again in June 1943 to reassure them that he had no intention of leaving France to join the Allies.

On 5 April 1944, Bonnet left France for Switzerland, where he was to stay until March 1950. After the war, proceedings were begun against him but eventually dropped, but he was expelled from the Radical Party in 1944. During his time in exile, Bonnet was to write a five-volume set of memoirs. Bonnet throughout his career had been very much concerned with his reputation, and during his time as Foreign Minister had a team of journalists to engage in what is known in France as Bonnetiste writing, namely a series of books and pamphlets meant to glorify Bonnet as the defender of the peace and Europe's savior.

After leaving the Quai d'Orsay, Bonnet took with him a large number of official papers, which he then used to support the claims made in his voluminous memoirs, where Bonnet depicted himself as waging a singlehanded heroic battle to save the peace. Many have charged Bonnet with "editing" his papers to present himself in the best possible light, regardless of the facts. In particular, criticism has centered some of the contradictory claims in the Bonnet memoirs. At various points, Bonnet claimed it was British pressure that drove France towards Munich in 1938 and that his government wanted to fight for Czechoslovakia. At other times, Bonnet states the military and economic situation in 1938 was such that France could not risk a war that year.

In the early 1950s, Bonnet had a debate on the pages of the Times Literary Supplement with one of his leading critics, the British historian Sir Lewis Bernstein Namier over some of the claims contained in his memoirs. At issue was whether Bonnet had, as Namier charged, snubbed an offer by the Polish foreign minister Colonel Józef Beck in May 1938 to have Poland come to the aid of Czechoslovakia in the event of a German attack. Bonnet denied that such an offer had been made, which led Namier to accuse Bonnet of seeking to falsify the documentary record. Namier was able to establish that Bonnet had been less than honest in his account, and concluded the debate in 1953 with words "The Polish offer, for what it was worth, was first torpedoed by Bonnet the statesman, and next obliterated by Bonnet the historian".

The real significance of the debate was over Bonnet's freedom of maneuver. In his memoirs, Bonnet claimed that he had been often forced by circumstances beyond his control to carry out a foreign policy that he opposed. Namier charged that Bonnet had other options and was carrying out the same foreign policy that he had wanted to carry out.

In 1953, he was allowed to run for office again, and in 1956, Bonnet returned to his old seat in the Dordogne. Readmitted to the Radicals in 1952, he was once again expelled in 1955 for refusing to support Pierre Mendès France. Nevertheless, he was once again elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1956 and continued to serve in that body until 1968, when he lost his seat.