This is the forgotten story of FranceÕs attempt to free itself from British Foreign Policy and not be dragged into BritainÕs plans for a new war.
Dr. Hoggan utilizes first hand data to show that France gradually abandoned its policies to be the premier power in Europe in line with the new realities of GermanyÕs resurgence. Rather it sought a just peace for all countries on the European continent and revisions to the Versailles Treaty which had stripped Germany of so much territory and population after the First World War.
BritainÕs duplicitous police of appeasement, as actually biding time to ready itself for the new war it was preparing against Germany is well documented. The Third French Republic by 1939 had signed a friendship treaty with Germany, and HitlerÕs Germany had renounced Alsace-Lorraine to remove any causes for war between the two powers.
However, the French diplomats were not up to countering BritainÕs desire for war. This is the history of the run-up to war from the French standpoint, which destroyed the Third Republic.