According to the Gaullist narrative, France went to war in weakened by internal political struggles. It was quickly crushed in by the superior weaponry of the Germans and, for the next five years, the spirit of resistance was kept alive by de Gaulle and his Free French forces in London, as well as by the French people themselves.
De Gaulle was convinced that this picture of a united nation was a vital prerequisite if France was to take its rightful place among the world powers. This desire for national unity was reflected in his government, which, in order to minimise the chance of disruption by the PCF, included four Communist ministers. But de Gaulle very soon became frustrated by squabbling between the political parties, who were each intent on promoting their own interests at the expense of what he perceived to be the national interest.
In January , unable to secure the adoption of a constitution that would have enshrined a strong executive the president and a relatively weak legislature the parliament , he resigned. In , de Gaulle founded the Fifth Republic, under a new constitution enshrining the strong presidential executive that had eluded him in The struggle over Algeria continued even after de Gaulle had conceded independence in He resigned the following year, having failed to win a referendum on regional reform, and died soon after, on 9 November After the fall of France, the PCF leadership had called for fraternisation with German soldiers and restricted its propaganda to attacks on the Vichy government, French big business and de Gaulle, whom it described as a lackey of the City of London.
It was nothing of the sort, even if individual Communists defied the official line from the very start of the Occupation. It hailed the sacrifices of its members, drawing parallels between their heroism and that of the Red Army. Unlike de Gaulle, the PCF denounced all those who had collaborated with Vichy or the Nazis, most of whom, it claimed, were bourgeois class enemies.
Following the Liberation, the PCF made no attempt at a revolutionary seizure of power. The last thing Stalin wanted was a Communist-led uprising in France; instead, the PCF sought to increase its influence by constitutional means.
