Statue of General Charles De Gaulle at memorial Museum Colombey les deux Eglises France 132668_Charles De Gaulle
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle; French; 22 November 1890 – 9 November 1970) was a French general and statesman who led the Free French Forces during World War II. He later founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and served as its first president from 1959 to 1969. A veteran of World War I, de Gaulle came to the fore in the interwar army as a proponent of mobile armoured divisions. During World War II, he attained the rank of brigadier general (retained throughout his life), leading one of the few successful armoured counterattacks during the 1940 Battle of France in May in Montcornet, and then briefly served in the French government as France was falling. De Gaulle was the most senior French military officer to reject the June 1940 armistice to Nazi Germany right from the outset. When France's new prime minister Marshal Philippe Pétain, gave a radio address to convince the French people to accept defeat, de Gaulle was in Britain and responded with a famous radio address, broadcast by the BBC on 18 June 1940, exhorting the French people to resist Nazi Germany. DeGaulle became famous as the leader of the Free French opposition to Petain's Vichy regime. He made Free France one of the Allies. He and organized the Free French Forces with French officers in Britain. As the war progressed, de Gaulle gradually gained control of all French colonies except Indochina. By the time of the Allied invasion of France in 1944 he was heading what amounted to a French government in exile. From the very beginning, de Gaulle insisted that France be treated as a great power by the other Allies, despite her initial defeat. His pretensions to French greatness greatly annoyed Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt, as did his refusal to participate in the D-Day landings in June 1944. Nevertheless he was allowed to liberate Paris and France was given a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council in 1945.
Size: 3840px × 5759px
Location: Colombey les deux eglises France
Photo credit: © Daniel Valla FRPS / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 1890-1970, boisserie, bronze, bust, charles, colombey, commander, de, deux, eglises, forces, free, french, gaulle, general, la, les, statue
