Vichy France, Fascism, Petain, Catholic Church
September 22, 2025
by William P. Meyers

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What counts as fascism?

The word fascist is being thrown out quite a bit today in the United States, mainly as a leftist curse label of Donald Trump's policies. I have written considerably about the reality of fascism, particularly the Deutschland, National Socialist, Adolf Hitler version. Here I am finally getting to a brief analysis of occupied France, or Vichy France, during World War II. Preparing for this task I read Vichy France, Old Guard and New Order, 1940-1944 by Robert O. Paxton. Unfortunately, though the book was detailed on the relationship of the Vichy regime with the German occupiers, it had relatively little to say about my favorite subject in this context, the relationship of fascism to the Roman Catholic religion.

However, the book did show that current Trumpian political trends do not differ much from right-wing trends in France both before and after the occupation.

France was a Republic, if a strange one by our standards, when it declared war on Germany following the invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939. France, with America and Great Britain, had defeated Germany in World War I, taken parts of Germany to reward itself, and with its allies had created the nation of Poland out of the Polish-majority areas that had been parts of either Germany or Russia before the war.

France did not allow women to vote before World War II. It enslaved huge areas of the world with its empire (though it had no emperor). Its electoral politics broke down in the usual modern spectrum: communist admirers of Stalin on the far left, then, moving towards the right, democratic socialists, the center-left liberals, the center-right conservatives, and then the far right, which included groups ranging from monarchists to nationalists fairly described as fascist.

France assumed it would win its new war with Germany, and had good reasons for that belief. Because the Communists under Joe Stalin had cooperated with Hitler to divide up Poland, the French Communist Party was not keen on the war. The fascists were not keen on fighting Hitler, but then again they were nationalists who wanted French fascism to dominate the world, not the Italian, German, or Spanish version.

So when the French army was defeated, in 1940, who got blamed for that varied. Basically the left blamed the right, the right blamed the left, and the center parties blamed both the right and the left. In some sense everyone blamed the government of the Republic.

So the Vichy regime did not come to power through a revolution. To stop the slaughter, France needed a deal with Hitler, who did not want to waste troops occupying all of France. The Republic's legislature voted to hand over power to a new regime under Marshal Petain (Philippe Pétain). In return Germany did not occupy southeastern France. Petain had led the victorious French Army of World War I, but was no longer in command of it when Germany invaded in World War II. Hence he was not blamed for the defeat. He rejected Winston Churchill's proposal that France should conduct Guerrilla warfare, pointed out that Britain had retreated rather than sending reinforcements, and instead negotiated an armistice. The old French Chamber of Deputies and Senate voted 569 to 80 to accept the armistice terms and allow Petain's cabinet to write a new Constitution.

Petain and his government were more traditional conservatives than fascists, but despite an authoritarian tone there were many internal differences. Certainly the Vichy government was paternalistic, anti-liberal and anti-socialist, pro-Catholicism, and emphasized traditional family values. However, most of its energies were spend trying to minimize the harm done to France by the German occupation. There had been strong anti-English sentiments before the war, partly because France had not done well in its global imperialist rivalry. Petain and other Vichy leaders lobbied for a peace treaty that would allow the German army to withdraw, allow France to stay neutral towards Britain. When Hitler invaded the USSR, Petain would have been happy to declare war on the communists, if in turn he got a peace treaty with Germany. But Hitler hated the French because of the way they treated Germany after World War I, so he kept Petain and France on a tight leash.

We can only imagine what Petain and France would have done if Germany had withdrawn. If the French Army had joined the Germans in fighting Stalin it is possible the war would have turned out differently. Would they have set up a truly fascist regime. What is a fascist regime, anyway?

Most Americans have little understanding of real-world fascism. After World War II American conservatives painted the fascists as atheist dictators, and liked to remind people of the Socialist part of German National Socialism. On the other side, the liberal to leftist spectrum wanted fascists portrayed as authoritarian, nationalist, capitalist, right wing thugs. Since American nationalism was reaching new heights, the differentiator (seldom said explicitly) was that we were democratic nationalists.

Could fascists be both capitalists, as our left declared, and socialists, as our right declared?

First, on almost every issue, the main fascist states, Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, and Franco's Spain, differed somewhat, sometimes by a great deal. Mussolini stressed changes made necessary by modern conditions (like capitalism and the industrial revolution), but promoted traditional values like Catholicism. National Socialism was more openly anti-capitalist. Though after Hitler came to power to liquidated the socialist arm of the party (killed its leaders), he nevertheless won worker support by creating New Deal type programs like old age pensions, shorter work weeks, and ramping up employment. He liked traditional (family) values like women being child-bearers and home workers. He allowed for some displays of ancient German and Nordic religious nonsense, but himself remained Roman Catholic and forced the Lutheran Church in Germany to merge back into the Catholic Church. At the same time he subordinated the power of his Church to his State. Francisco Franco was the very model of a modern major fascist. Under him Catholicism thrived in Spain and all, capitalists and workers alike, were subject to state control.

Petain and Vichy France, in contrast, came across as more traditionally nationalist that fascist. In theory authoritarian, in fact they had little control over Vichy (unoccupied) France and no control over Nazi-occupied France. They mostly liked the Catholic Church [see Pius XI, Petain and the Rise of Fascist Vichy France], but there were protestants and likely agnostics in high places. There was also a small liberal wing of Catholics in France who opposed the Vichy regime. Petain wanted workers and capitalists to work together towards the future glory of France. He promoted the corporatist-syndicalist model associated with Italian fascism, but as in Italy in association (by industry) the business owners captured almost all decision making power.

Antisemitism is often seen as a key component of fascism, but that is a false impression. Mussolini was no more antisemitic than your typical Catholic priest until it became a requirement for the alliance with Hitler. Franco's Spain took the ancient Catholic approach: Jews are bad, but leave them alone. Petain tried to protect Jews in France, but under pressure from Germany gradually turned them over to the Holocaust (first allowing the Germans to take only non-French Jews, later not being able to stop the roundup even of French Jews.)

Germany occupied all of France in November 1942, though the Vichy regime was allowed to persist in theory. So the Vichy government had limited power for just over 2 years. That makes it hard to judge.

When Britain and America invaded (Normandy landing, June 1944) suddenly a lot of French factions who had tolerated the Germans saw an opening to post-war power. Lots of people joined the Resistance. Those who led the Vichy regime were labeled traitors and collaborationists.

Were they? Petain and friends claimed they did what they could to protect France and resist German demands. With no army of consequence, it is hard to see how they could have done less to follow German orders, without being replaced by other puppets. Petain was nearing 90 years of age when he was put on trial (by Charles de Gaulle) in the summer of 1945, shortly after Germany surrendered. He was sentenced to death, but remained in prison until 1951, when he was released to a hospital. He soon died.

Most of the bureaucracy of France from before the war remained the bureaucracy during the war, and then continued to be employed after the war. Leaders were usually ousted at transition points, but that had been true of the highly unstable prewar governments.

After the war everyone, and every institution, that could distanced itself from Germany and fascism as best they could. The Catholic Church relabeled fascists as atheists and pretended they played no roll in bringing Hitler or Mussolini to power. But the Pope did give Francisco Franco a gold medal, to thank him for keeping Spain nearly 100% Catholic.

Right wing groups, of course, had the most trouble establishing distance. They emphasized their nationalism and support for democratic institutions.

The contradictions in society that led to the rise of fascism in the second decade of the 20th century have not gone away. People are still confused by the results of democracy, by the changing nature of the work force, and by the realization that there is no God running human affairs. Nationalism is an easy way to be proud when your own life is not going well. Following orders relieves most people of the strain of thinking for themselves. Looking to a supposedly better past, with little detailed knowledge of what life was really like for most people in that past, will continue to appeal to certain types of personalities.

The Vichy regime, to me, barely qualifies as Fascist. It was mainly a powerless caretaker regime that failed at almost everything it attempted. However, after reading a different history book I took a slightly different view. See Philippe Petain and Fascism in France.