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Reviewed by:
  • Then Came Disaster: France and the United States, 1918–1940, and: Marketing Marianne: French Propaganda in America, 1900–1940
  • John C. Cairns
Then Came Disaster: France and the United States, 1918–1940. By Marvin R. Zahniser. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2002. ISBN 0-275-97716-1. Maps. Photographs. Notes. Index. Pp. xvii, 249. $69.95.
Marketing Marianne: French Propaganda in America, 1900–1940. By Robert J. Young. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8135-3377-5. Notes. Index. Pp. xxii, 247. $60.00.

"On my arrival in the United States," Tocqueville observed, "I was struck with surprise on discovering how common was a high degree of merit among the governed, and how rare it was among the governing." The best part of two succeeding centuries has not done a great deal to soften this unvarnished French dictum, nor to abate a certain tension in Franco-American high politics. Though Americans continue to despatch their youth to France almost as a rite of passage, the consequences of this pilgrimaging remain ambiguous. Less than forty years ago, Crane Brinton judged that "the prospects for immediate and considerable betterment in Franco-American relations are slim indeed." Who would recast that formula today? Maybe no two great nations have more persistently nurtured their grande querelle. Aspects of this encounter in the early twentieth century are examined in these two books: imperilled France seeking the sympathy and support of the United States; the United States feeling its way toward the responsibilities of power.

Most Americans know little of France, Marvin R. Zahniser believes, and find even that annoying. The French disaster of 1940 remains the focal point of American contempt for France (vide the opprobrium loosed, in high places and low, in 2003). His title suggests the long Franco-American prelude to 1940; he tells the story briefly, weaving through the 1920s and 1930s. Occasionally a set piece is inserted: a short introduction to Hitler; a discussion of Roosevelt's mind and method; a perceptive ramble through the career of U.S. Ambassador to France, William Bullitt, assigning to him and his master responsibility for raising false hope of American aid. Once he cuts to the impending disaster, his account fills out at the political level. The blow-by-blow of the May-June campaign is properly avoided. Rather, he comments on the attitudes and activities of selected dramatis personae: Reynaud, Churchill, Roosevelt, Bullitt. Curiously, a sizeable calendar of events, May-July, is popped in—almost, one might guess, in a despairing attempt to bring a little order to the intractable realities of the time.

When Profesor Zahniser discusses reaction to the catastrophe, one thing leads to another. The text wanders around a bit in the fields of an introversive [End Page 988] American culture, high and low, making reference to diverse phenomena such as the Andrews Sisters, Cab Calloway, Reinhold Niebuhr, Seabiscuit, Ted Williams, Clark Kent, John L. Lewis, Edmund Wilson, Spicy Adventure Stories, and the like. The recollection serves to situate the dire fact that what befell France "did not long remain on American minds" (p. 188). For decision makers, however, it was different. American leaders now focussed intensely on the plight of Europe, their own security and rearmament. Thus, the apparent self-absorption of the masses notwithstanding, the French disaster became "America's fire bell in the night" (p. 193). What had happened that spring would "cast a very long shadow," at the time and in the half-century to come (p. 208). Having attached brief notes on the subsequent lives of some of the principal actors, Professor Zahniser concludes with the admonition that "evil must be met" (p. 215)—a line written, perhaps, after September 11.

In all, one must say this is a slightly idiosyncratic work, informative but breaking no new ground. Relevant English-language literature is drawn on, but virtually none of the French. Some British and American archival papers are used. One might guess it is a teacher's book, spelling out certain ABCs, rendering moral judgments, occasionally repeating weary caricatures ("Better Hitler Than Blum") (p. 13), and inevitably from time to time, as in the classroom, misdating events, misusing words, mixing images...

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