Fernand de Brinon

Fernand de Brinon, Marquis de Brinon (feʁnɑ̃ də bʁinɔ̃; 26 August 1885 – 15 April 1947) was a French lawyer and journalist who was one of the architects of French collaboration with the Nazis during World War II. He claimed to have had five private talks with Adolf Hitler between 1933 and 1937. Brinon was a high official of the collaborationist Vichy regime. During the liberation of France in 1944, remnants of the Vichy leadership fled into exile, where Brinon was selected as president of the rump government in exile. After the war was over, he was tried in France for war crimes, found guilty, sentenced to death, and executed. Born into a wealthy family in the city of Libourne in the Gironde département, Fernand de Brinon studied political science and law at university but chose to work as a journalist in Paris. After the First World War, he advocated a rapprochement with Germany. He became friends with Joachim von Ribbentrop. De Brinon married Jeanne Louise Rachel Franck, the Jewish former wife of Claude Ullmann; she converted to Roman Catholicism. The Brinons became leading socialites in 1930s Paris, and close friends of the political right-wing elite and of radical leader Édouard Daladier. In co-ordination with Ribbentrop's personal representative in Paris, Otto Abetz, Brinon headed the France–Germany Committee, which was designed to influence France's political and cultural establishment in a pro-German direction. That was Nazi Germany's main propaganda technique in its attempt to influence French politics before the Second World War. During the Munich Crisis, Brinon sent accounts of the discussions of the French Cabinet that were obtained from two ministers to the German government. A leading advocate for collaboration following France's defeat by Germany in the Second World War, in July 1940 Brinon was invited by Pierre Laval, Vice-Premier of the new Vichy regime, to act as its representative to the German High Command in occupied Paris. Brinon's seat was the confiscated Hôtel de Breteuil in Paris (12 avenue Foch).

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Related concepts (3)

Vichy France

Vichy France (Régime de Vichy; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State (l'État français), was the French rump state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II. It was named after its seat of government, the city of Vichy. Officially independent, but with half of its territory occupied under the harsh terms of the 1940 armistice with Nazi Germany, it adopted a policy of collaboration.

Sigmaringen enclave

The Sigmaringen enclave was the exiled remnant of France's Nazi-sympathizing Vichy government which fled to Germany during the Liberation of France near the end of World War II in order to avoid capture by the advancing Allied forces. Installed in the requisitioned Sigmaringen Castle as seat of the government-in-exile, Vichy French leader Philippe Pétain and a number of other collaborators awaited the end of the war. Battle of FranceZone libre and Vichy regime Nazi Germany invaded France in May 1940 during the early part of World War II.

Pierre Laval

Pierre Jean Marie Laval (pjɛʁ laval; 28 June 1883 – 15 October 1945) was a French politician. During the Third Republic, he served as Prime Minister of France from 27 January 1931 to 20 February 1932 and 7 June 1935 to 24 January 1936. He again occupied the post during the German occupation, from 18 April 1942 to 20 August 1944. A socialist early in his life, Laval became a lawyer in 1909 and was famous for his defence of strikers, trade unionists and leftists from government prosecution.