A. No, but General George was. I want to give you my evidence in the form of a firsthand quotation from a French friend, but before I do so it is important to point out that between General Gamelin, commander in chief of all the Allied land forces, and General George, commander of the French armies fighting against Germany, there existed a jealousy so strong that it amounted to hatred, and their headquarters staffs became so permeated with it that they actually withheld information from each other. Here then, were the principal elements and forces involved in the great conspiracy: First, Pétain, towering above all other figures and forces; then the Deuxième Bureau, the famous Second Bureau in charge of Intelligence of the French Army; General George and General Dusseigneur and Colonel Eugene Deloncle; the Cagoulards, that secret society of so-called Hooded Men, which most people considered merely absurd but whose importance turned out to be greater than that of any French secret society since the Revolution; the group operating the Fascist weekly, _Je Suis Partout_; and on the German side Otto Abetz, now Hitler’s ambassador to France, and the unlimited money and propaganda of Himmler’s Gestapo, Goebbels’ Ministry, Ribbentrop’s Foreign Office, and the Ausland’s Buro. * * * * * _Now I shall let my French friend talk. This is his report: from here to page 262 he is speaking in the first person._ On June 17, 1940, I found myself standing outside a wayside tavern in France. I was one of the millions retreating southward from occupied Paris ahead of the German Army. I had stopped by the roadside because, through the open window of the inn, I heard a radio broadcasting the pathetic voice of an old man. Marshal Pétain was telling the French nation that he had decided to ask Hitler to grant France an armistice. Standing beside me was a young artillery lieutenant. As the last words of the old Marshal died away, he turned toward me, pale as ivory, and exclaimed: “Now I begin to understand! They forced us to retreat so that we would have to accept this armistice, so that the Germans could come in to do their dirty work for them!” I didn’t dare understand. “How do you mean?” I asked him. “Don’t be so naive!” he exploded. “Can’t you see what’s happened? Don’t you remember that handful of enthusiastic young fools who were always shouting ‘Pétain in power!’ Well, now he is in power. He can govern with the aid of German troops. He has opened the way for them to occupy the country. The Germans will make the arrests and carry out the executions, and when their opponents have all been put out of the way, Pétain and his friends will be in possession of the kind of Nazified country they like. Mark my words--this is not the end, but only the beginning. This is not war; it’s a domestic political maneuver!”