A Fascist France in the 1930s?

No.
There is no major fascist movement in France at that time. (Also, La rocque was not a fascist today political analyst called the PSF (Party of La Rocque) as proto-gaullist). Britain have more "luck" to become fascist than France at that time(Britain have the British Union of Fascist there is no equivalent in France).
 

Yuelang

Banned
Wonder if Fascist France means stronger alliance with Fascist Italy who in turns end up isolating the Nazis even more.
 
Wonder if Fascist France means stronger alliance with Fascist Italy who in turns end up isolating the Nazis even more.
I think it's pretty clear that Fascist France and Nazi Germany would be enemies (I wonder why... :rolleyes:). For Italy, the idea is interesting but now, France would be the number 1 enemy in Europe.
 
Not that hard to make France fascist or proto-fascist, you just need to shift some things around. There were plenty of right-wing/far right groups active in the interwar period (not to mention the fact that Vichy France proved that a not insignificant portion of the French populace/government was pretty okay with fascist-like policies), it wouldn't take much to have one of them catch on.

I think it's pretty clear that Fascist France and Nazi Germany would be enemies (I wonder why... :rolleyes:). For Italy, the idea is interesting but now, France would be the number 1 enemy in Europe.

France and Germany would probably come to blows again, either as a result of Germany trying to restore prestige, or France acting pre-emptively to prevent Germany from attacking them (regardless of whether or not Germany actually planned to attack).

Italy would be the wild card, and in this scenario would probably follow Britain's lead. My guess is that a Fascist/Far-Right France would probably lead to Perfidious Albion 2: Electric Boogaloo, and they'd be happy to sit one the sidelines and let France and Germany bloody each other.
 
Most historians do not classify the various *ligues* of the 1930's, including the Croix-de-feu, as fascist, and the same is true of the Croix-de-feu's successor, the Parti Sociale Francais. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Social_Party There have been dissenters, however:

http://www.cairn-int.info/article-E_VING_090_0003--revisiting-french-fascism-la-rocque.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Soucy

Fascist or not, the PSF enjoyed considerable electoral success: "The true measure of the party's electoral potential, however, came with the municipal elections of 1938-39, in which it won 15% of votes nationally.[11] As a result of the proportional representation law passed by the Chamber in June 1939, this promised to translate into approximately one hundred deputies in the legislative elections planned for 1940. By 1939, the party's elected officials, its eleven deputies aside, included nearly three thousand mayors, 541 general councilors and thousands of municipal councilors.[12]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Social_Party#Electoral_success
 

Yuelang

Banned
Heck if we go World History : Electric Boogaloo, let's say that due both Fascist France and Nazi Germany believe in both their superrior races and getting stronger through conflict, things would get weirder as both countries end up routinely schedule for Wars and agreed on the rules. We end up ending with bloodier version of Euro Cup waged with rifles and bayonets in a bizzare periodic bloodsport.
 

Archibald

Banned
There was a great TL on the subject a while back (by a French member) https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/crossfires-an-alternate-france-of-the-1930s.126624/

De La Rocque was certainly a nationalist but not a fanatic racist in league with the Nazis. Closer from a Franco or Salazar than from Mussolini.

De La Rocque didn't really cared about jews. When Vichy France come into being in 1940 he was not particularly happy with it and was quickly sidetracked, then emprisonned in 1944.

Les croix de feu was first and foremost a league of WWI veterans before being a nationalist party. The true fanatical fascist were l'Action Française and people like Leon Daudet (the son of the famous writer Alphonse Daudet, himself a racist in the days of Dreyfuss)
 
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And there was an AH comic trilogy about that subject. It had Fascist France crush Germany when the latter tried to remilitarize the Rhineland, followed by France starting that TL's version of WWII a few years later.
 
Lyauteeeeeey


Lyautey was a French mareshal, very reknowned and publicly liked. He veered toward far-right toward the end of his life and died in 1934. He was actually approached by far-right extremists to lead the movement.

If the riots happened earlier, when he was a tad younger, he could have spearheaded the movement.

Say after 1925 when he was ousted from Morocco.
 
People should really read about the Croix de Feu and the PSF before writing crap about them. While La Roque was certainly right wing, he was no fascist. He actually respected the constitional order of the day, he wanted to seize power, but legally. This leave us with the Action Française (which wasn't really fascist, except if you consider every dictatorial right wing ideologies fascist), or the parti Franciste. But both were hilarously small compared to the size of the left wing parties. Even with the stupidity of Moscow strategy, if the fascists try to take power, they would have a lot more people opposing them (and no, the army wouldn't join the coup, given that it was a conscript army, people who were in the army were left wingers in the same proportion as the population), which would probably stop the coup.
 

Deleted member 1487

I don't think French politics really had enough right wing people to make it work. They were generally pretty anti-military in peacetime due to their history of coups in the 19th century and had a very well developed political Left. Winning WW1 really didn't create the impetus for a right wing political movement to grow, rather it gave the left wing parties a boost as they demanded rewards for their sacrifices during the war. Germany on the other hand or even Italy did not have that long of a democratic tradition, had a much greater pro-military view due the way they unified within living memory, while in the case of Germany had a strong authoritarian political history and a discrediting of their political left. Even in Germany's case, despite being much more tempermentally conservative based on their unique history, it required a much larger, more organized FAR right movement to have a major stroke of luck based on the economic situation in Germany to seize power with 1/3rd of the electorate voting for them and the rest of the main stream conservative parties falling apart and a senile noble general surrounded by right wing noble Prussians freaking out about Communist electoral victories to hand them power. France never even got close to having anything like what existed in Germany or even Italy to get a Fascist movement close to power.
 
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