Petit-Clamart attack

Petit-Clamart attack
Bullet holes embedded in the exterior of de Gaulle's vehicle. Despite being bombarded, nobody was injured in the car.
Location	Clamart, Seine, Paris Region, France
Coordinates	48°47′00″N 2°11′00″E
Date	22 August 1962
Target	Charles de Gaulle
Attack type	Assassination attempt
Deaths	0
Injured	1 (Panhard driver, caught in crossfire)
Perpetrators	Organisation armée secrète Jean Bastien-Thiry (organizer)
No. of participants	18
Motive	Anti-communism, Opposition to French recognition of Algerian sovereignty
Verdict	1 participant (Jean Bastien-Thiry) executed by firing squad All other participants eventually released
Convictions	3 participants sentenced to death 10+ participants sentenced to various prison terms

The Petit-Clamart attack, also referred to by its perpetrators as Operation Charlotte Corday after Charlotte Corday, was an assassination attempt organized by Lieutenant-Colonel Jean Bastien-Thiry with the Organisation armée secrète (OAS) that aimed to kill Charles de Gaulle, president of France at the time. The attack was carried out on 22 August 1962.

No one was killed and only one person, who was caught in the crossfire, was injured during the attack, which was followed by an intensive investigation led by French authorities. The manhunt ended with almost all participants being caught within a few months. Bastien-Thiry was brought before a military court where he justified his act by claiming that de Gaulle was a tyrant. Bastien-Thiry was sentenced to death and executed by firing squad in the spring of 1963, and remains the last person to be executed by firing squad in France.

Background

On 5 July 1962, the French Republic led by Charles de Gaulle recognized the independence of Algeria following the Evian Accords, which established a ceasefire between both countries during the Algerian War. The war ended with the repatriation of a million pieds-noirs of European origin, and Sephardic Jews, who fleed the abuses caused by the rejection of the guarantees of the Evian agreements, particularly after the massacre of Oran the same year.

In May 1958, in Algiers, a coup was carried out jointly by Pierre Lagaillarde, who was the sitting Deputy of Algiers and a reserve paratrooper officer, generals Raoul Salan, Edmond Jouhaud and Jean Gracieux, Admiral Auboyneau, with the support of the 10th Parachute Division of General Jacques Massu and Jacques Soustelle's allies. Its aim was to allow the return of power to de Gaulle who was then retired. The supporters of de Gaulle were banking on a radical change in government policy based on maintaining the integrity of the republican territory, and therefore the continuation of the policy of "pacification" in the French departments of Algeria that has been maintained since 1954.

Pierre Lagaillarde, as seen in April 1961.

After reassuring a European and Muslim Gaullist crowd fraternizing in Algiers on 4 June 1958, with a historic “I understand you”, followed by an unequivocal “ Long live French Algeria” in Mostaganem, de Gaulle, once he became President of the Republic in 1959, undertook to complete the decolonization policy that he had initiated in 1943 with Lebanon and Syria during his campaign to rally the colonies to Free France with a view to liberating the metropolitan territory itself occupied by Hitler's Nazi Germany. Later, on October 2, 1958, de Gaulle granted independence to Guinea following its rejection of the new constitution.

On 16 September 1959, de Gaulle used the term "self-determination" for the first time in relation to what was still in the media only "the Algerian affair", certain voices of protest began to arise, which were heard among certain Gaullists in Algeria and in mainland France. The protesters interpreted the policy reversal of the head of state, whom they themselves had helped to bring to power, as a “betrayal".

A few months later, on 24 January 1960, extremist defenders of the maintenance of French Algeria carried out a siege in the Algerian capital, then the second largest city in France, in what would become the "week of the barricades". Following statements to the West German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, de Gaulle was immediately transferred to mainland France. Later, Massu was assigned to the occupation zone of the FRG, in Baden-Baden, from where he played a historic role in May 1968. It was the dismissal of the man who had allowed the "Gaullist putsch" of 1958 which served as a trigger in what the media described as “the events in Algiers".

Pierre Lagaillarde took charge of the insurrection operations and Colonel Gardes took military command. Civilians showed solidarity with the rebels but, to the surprise of the insurgents, Jean Crépin, replacing Massu, remained faithful to the army's duty of reserve and did not fraternize with them. Isolated, Lagaillarde had to make himself a prisoner to his superior after a week of siege. He was extradited to mainland France actions.

In 1960, Lagaillarde took advantage of his conditional release to escape and went into exile in Madrid. In February 1961, following an agreement with Raoul Salan, who had also gone underground, the pair began the Secret Army Organization (OAS).

In April 1961, following the failure of the generals' putsch, this time aimed at overthrowing de Gaulle, who talked with a delegation of separatists, and replaced his authority with a military junta, as the OAS increased its clandestine operations.

These actions, the most radical of which involved political assassination and terrorism, were carried out both in the French departments of Algeria and in mainland France, the OAS having a “Metro” branch, by the “Commando Delta”.

The OAS logo at the time of the attack.

In Spain, Pierre Lagaillarde, who was still a fugitive, stood with colonels Charles Lacheroy and Antoine Argoud, who were key members of the generals' putsch in mainland France, at the head of the dissident branch OAS-Madrid, which opposed the Salan command by advocating a steering committee coordinating operations from abroad. Lagaillarde was arrested by the Spanish Civil Guard and placed under house arrest in October 1961.

On 20 May 1962 in Italy, Georges Bidault, former Minister of Foreign Affairs under de Gaulle, then during the Indochina War, was elected president of the National Council of the Resistance by the executive committee, which included Jacques Soustelle and Colonel Antoine Argoud. Bidault had held the position of president of the council following Jean Moulin in 1943. Several analysts criticize the amalgam practiced by the founders of the council of 1962, an amalgam which suggests a possible equivalence between Algeria and Alsace-Lorraine, as well as an identification of de Gaulle to Adolf Hitler.

Attack

On August 22, 1962, at around 7:45 PM (UTC+1), two unmarked Citroën DS 19s escorted by two motorcyclists left the Élysée Palace to take de Gaulle and his wife to the Villacoublay Air Base, where they took an airplane to Saint-Dizier to then reach Colombey-les-Deux-Églises by road. In the first car were de Gaulle, returning from a Council of Ministers, and his wife Yvonne; Colonel Alain de Boissieu, son-in-law and aide-de-camp of the president, who was seated next to the driver, Gendarme Francis Marroux. In the second car, led by police brigadier René Casselin, were the police commissioner Henri Puissant, bodyguard Henri Djouder, and military doctor Jean-Denis Degos.

Leaving Paris via the Châtillon-Montrouge Station, the procession took National Road 306 and headed towards Vélizy-Villacoublay where the presidential plane was waiting. When he arrived, at 8:20 PM, at the crossroads of rue Charles-Debry, RN 306 and rue du Bois, approximately 300 metres (980 ft) before the Petit Clamart roundabout, the Bastien-Thiry commando was hidden various stopped vehicles, waiting to fire.

The commando was composed of Jean Bastien-Thiry, Alain de La Tocnaye, László Varga, Lajos Marton, and Gyula Sári, all of whom were fiercely anti-communist. The rest of the group was made up of Metropolitians and Pieds-noirs. The latter intended to avenge the abuses committed against their community, in particular the 1962 Isly massacre, which left 80 dead and 200 injured, as well as the loss of French Algeria. The 12 members of the commando were equipped with automatic weapons, explosives and four vehicles.

Bastien-Thiry was hidden in a Simca 1000, from where he gave the signal to fire by waving a newspaper. Five men (Buisines, Varga, Sári, Bernier and Marton) were in a yellow Renault Estafette, equipped with machine guns; La Tocnaye was on board a Citroën ID 19, with Georges Watin and Prévost, equipped with submachine guns; the final vehicle was a Peugeot 403 van, from which Condé, Magade and Bertin were hidden from view, also with automatic weapons.

As the commando opened fire on the presidential car, the front tires of the vehicle were punctured. Georges Watin sent a burst of MAT 49 rounds into the back of the car where de Gaulle and his wife were sitting. The rear window, on the de Gaulle side, shattered. During the attack, Alain de Boissieu shouted to the de Gaulles to duck, which prevented them from being hit. De Gaulle reported that his son-in-law ordered him to take shelter, telling him “Down, Father!" Boissieu ordered the driver to accelerate, which he did, despite the condition of the car and the wet ground, to reach the Vélizy-Villacoublay airfield at high speed.

Charles de Gaulle during a motorcade in 1963, the year after the attack.

Of the 187 bullets fired by the commando, 14 impacts were identified on the presidential vehicle, including one in the front passenger backrest where de Boissieu was sitting and several at the level of the faces of the de Gaulles. Around the scene of the attack, several stores were riddled with bullet holes. Realizing the failure of the attack, Gérard Buisines tried to ram the presidential car with the Estafette, while at his side Alain de La Tocnaye, beyond the door, tried to shoot at the car with a machine gun.

Upon arrival at Villacoublay Air Base, the general told those greeting them: "Cette fois c’était tangent" ("This time it was close"). To the surprise of the police supervising them, Yvonne de Gaulle uttered "J'espère que les poulets n'ont rien eu" ("I hope the chickens didn't get anything"), and in response de Gaulle whispered in the ear of his wife, sitting next to him on the return plane, "Vous êtes brave Yvonne" ("You are brave, Yvonne").

During the attack, a Panhard, traveling on the other side of the road and in which there was a couple and their three children, came under fire from the shooters. The driver suffered minor injuries.

Investigation

Manhunt

An extensive manhunt was launched on the evening of 22 August to find the perpetrators of the attack. The investigation first focused on the yellow Estafette, with several witnesses declaring that among its three occupants, one of them was limping. The police thought they recognized engineer Watin, known as “the Boiteuse”, a member of the OAS, but did not succeed in apprehending him. Two men were arrested by chance at a Tain-l'Hermitage road checkpoint. Among these two men was a deserter who bragged, saying, “I’m from the OAS.” First transferred to the Regional Judicial Police Service in Lyon, he admitted to Commissioner Geneston that he was part of the commando. Then, transferred to Paris, he continued his confession, giving Commissioner Bouvier all the names or nicknames of the conspirators that he knew.

After two weeks, around 15 suspects were arrested by the men of Divisional Commissioner Bouvier, while some of them were developing a new operation targeting de Gaulle. The last arrest was that of Bastien-Thiry on 15 September, which was carried out as he left his home in Bourg-la-Reine. Another suspect, OAS commander and retired French Army major Henri Niaux, hanged himself in prison the same day.

Trial

The trial was held at the Fort of Vincennes. During the first session, nine accused commando members appeared before the Military Court of Justice on 28 January 1963: Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry defended by Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, Alain de La Tocnaye, Pascal Bertin, Gérard Buisines, Alphonse Constantin, Étienne Ducasse, Pierre-Henri Magade, Jacques Prévost and László Varga. Six other defendants were tried in absentia; those absent, on the run, were Serge Bernier, Louis de Condé, Gyula Sári, Lajos Marton, Jean-Pierre Naudin, and Georges Watin. The latter had fled to Switzerland where he was arrested in January 1964 and was held in solitary confinement to prevent him escaping from French authorities. There he met Marcel Boillat. False papers were provided to him, and reached South America with those documents. He died in Paraguay in 1994. All of the accused were charged with attempted intentional homicide by ambush and attack against state authority with the use of weapons.

This Military Court of Justice had been declared illegal by the major judgment of the Council of State of 19 October 1962, on the grounds that it infringed the general principles of law, in particular by the absence of any appeal against its decisions. Despite this, de Gaulle extended the existence of the Court for this case. Reading the decision of the Council of State on Friday, 19 October 1962, referring to the presidential order of 1 June 1962 establishing the Military Court of Justice, indicated:

"Considering that it does not follow from the investigation that, having regard to the importance and seriousness of the attacks that the contested order brings to the general principles of criminal law, with regard, in particular, to the procedure which therein is provided for and the exclusion of any means of appeal, the creation of such an exceptional jurisdiction was necessitated by the application of the government declarations of March 19, 1962; that the applicants are, therefore, justified in maintaining that the said order, which exceeds the limits of the delegation granted by article 2 of the law of 13 April 1962, is tainted with illegality; that it is therefore necessary to pronounce its annulment".

However, the Court, which was to be replaced by another jurisdiction, the State Security Court, was extended on 26 February 1963.

On 4 March, at the end of the investigation against Bastien-Thiry, the Military Court of Justice found him guilty of having planned and orchestrated the attack.

Tried as separate perpetrators, the shooters were sentenced to various prison terms and benefited from a presidential pardon in 1968. Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry, Alain de la Tocnaye and Jacques Prévost, defended by Jacques Isorni, were all sentenced to death. Two of the condemned were pardoned; only Bastien-Thiry was executed, shot by a firing squad at Fort Ivry on 11 March 1963. The five absent accused were sentenced in absentia to death sentences or imprisonment and also benefit from a presidential pardon. Bastien-Thiry remains the last French prisoner to be executed by firing squad.

Further information: Capital punishment in France

Bastien-Thiry

On 2 February 1963, following the brief statements of his co-defendants present during the trial, the main accused of the Charlotte Corday operation, Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry pleaded in a lengthy speech self-defense in defense of himself and his "comrades" and against the “men of power” and in particular against the most powerful of them, the one whom his lawyer and future presidential candidate Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour nicknamed the “Prince”.

Constituting the "Bastien-Thiry affair", the Colonel's declaration, which René Wittmann published in a confidential edition on 20 February 1963 and whose publishing house close to the extreme right, Serp, published a 33-page paper the same year, which began with these words:

The action for which we are answering before you today is of an exceptional nature, and we ask you to believe that only reasons of an equally exceptional nature could have induced us to undertake it. We are neither fascists nor factionalists, but national French, French by origin or French at heart. It is the misfortunes of the homeland that have led us to these benches.

— René Wittmann

The trial inspired a number of works from the 1960s to the present day, whether it be criticism of the death penalty, French public opinion then being predominantly unfavorable, or testimonies, the condemned man's family has since worked for his rehabilitation. through the “Bastien-Thiry circle,” or counter-investigations; in Bastien-Thiry: to the end of French Algeria by Jean-Pax Méfret, a senior reporter, asks: "How did a man, endowed with deep Catholic convictions and superior cultural background, could it have come to this?".

In the national press, reactions to the "Bastien-Thiry affair", which led to both the last political execution in France and the last execution by firing squad, were not long in coming. Discussion tended to focus on three points: the virulence of Bastien-Thiry's criticism of de Gaulle's policies regarding Algeria; the fact that the condemned were finally pardoned with the exception of one; and the expeditious nature of the sentence. The day after the execution, in L'Express, journalist Jean Daniel wrote: "In fact, the inhumanity of the sovereign ends up overwhelming even his supporters", while in Le Canard echainé, Jérôme Gauthier wrote that: “It’s shame that tears down walls. A certain justice too, it seems... [...] Lieutenant-Colonel Bastien-Thiry died, I do not say mourned, but pitied by a very large number of French people, even among those the most fiercely hostile to his cause.”

Theories

Mole

According to certain authors, such as singer Jean-Pax Méfret and member of the commando Lajos Marton, the conspirators said they had benefited from support within the Élysée, that of Commissioner Jacques Cantelaube. The latter, who was the sitting controller general of the police and director of security for the president, resigned shortly before the attack. He felt antipathy towards the man whose protection he was responsible for following his conduct of Algerian affairs from 1959. These complicities would have allowed Bastien-Thiry to know the registration of the presidential vehicle, the structure of the convoy and the routes that would be taken by the convoy, including the one that will be chosen at the last moment as a security measure. According to Jean Lacouture:

"[...] thanks to the information, said the leader of the conspirators, of a "mole" that he had within the Élysée: but the countless speculations made on this subject did not lead to any serious information. It seems that Bastien-Thiry, on this level, bluffed, to panic or divide the general's entourage. In fact, it was based on telephone calls from lookouts placed around the Élysée – notably from a certain “Pierre” – as soon as a trip by the head of state was planned".

In 2015, Lajos Marton also revived the hypothesis of the involvement of the Minister of Finance at the time, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, who, under the code name “B12", would have informed the OAS of the movements of the head of the state.

Objective of the attack

There is an alternative and controversial thesis according to which the primary aim of the operation was not to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle in Clamart, but to kidnap him in order to bring him before the Council tribunal. This thesis was defended by Maître Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, lawyer of Bastien-Thiry, to acquit the nine conspirators present during the trial. Subsequently, it was taken up and defended by Agnès de Marnhac in her work; My father, the last of the shot published by Michalon on 7 April 2005. A psychogenealogist and therapist by profession, she also supported a thesis based on psychogenealogy according to which: "by donating his life, my father redeemed the fault of his ancestor the Duke of Massa who had sent sent an innocent man, the Duke of Enghien, to the firing squad." Agnès de Marnhac died on 28 June 2007 following cancer.

The thesis of the kidnapping was denied by the media in 2005 (including the daily newspaper Present and the talk show program Tout le monde en parole) by the very members of the Petit-Clamart commando including Louis Honorat de Condé, Lajos Marton and Armand Belvisi.

Head of the attack

Agnès de Marnhac also rejected Bastien-Thiry's membership in the OAS, claiming that his father acted on orders from the CNR. However, some members of the commando dispute this version. The head of OAS-Métro was Captain Pierre Sergent and that of Mission III was André Canal, known as “the Monocle”. Bastien-Thiry was not part of the OAS organization chart and had already organized the Pont-sur-Seine attack on his own initiative.

De Lajos Marton added that in 1961 Bastien-Thiry contacted Colonel Argoud, disgraced since the "week of the barricades" in January 1960, who appointed in Metz to a “closet” post where he spent most of his time preparing the putsch which took place on 21 April 1961. Despite the sympathy that Bastien-Thiry inspired in him, Argoud could not take the risk of associating him with the action in progress, and even less providing him with help for the project to execute de Gaulle. He nevertheless saw Bastien-Thiry again in 1961. Bastien subsequently made contact with Jean Bichon, a former resistance fighter, liaison officer between the “Old Staff” and the High Command of the OAS.

In The Attack: Indicative Echo-Gabriel, Armand Belvisi writes: “I contacted the Monocle so that he could give me the weapons I needed. We were the only ones at Mission III to have a large stock of ammunition. Neither the Old General Staff nor Jean Bichon could help Bastien-Thiry. They had almost nothing left. [...] I hid all of this in my studio [...] and, on 27 April, with Bernier, I went to try them in the woods".

After the Algiers putsch of April 1961, General Raoul Salan took charge of the OAS with General Edmond Jouhaud as his deputy. On 25 March 1962, Jouhaud was arrested in Oran; and on 20 April 1962 it was Salan's turn to be arrested in Algiers. On 24 April, General Paul Gardy announced on Oran pirate radio (the only transmitter of the OAS) that he was taking his place at the top of the organization chart, but command was also claimed by Jean-Jacques Susini. In fact, General Gardy only exercised complete control over the OAS of Oran. On 20 May 1962, Georges Bidault, in exile in Munich, founded the Council in Milan with Jacques Soustelle.

Vehicle involved

The replica presidential car that de Gaulle and his wife sat in during the attack, as seen on display in 2012. The original vehicle was too damaged to be repaired.

Two years after the attack, the damaged DS 19 was restored, the bullet holes were erased from the exterior, then the car sold on 15 October 1964 to General Robert Dupuy, former military commander of the Élysée. He seriously damaged the vehicle a few years later during an accident with his son during the winter of 1971, near Verdun. It is stored in a garage in Lissey, awaiting possible repairs. In 1980, seven years after the death of Dupuy, his family donated the DS in very poor condition to the Charles-de-Gaulle Institute. Citroën agreed to restore the vehicle free of charge, but it was too damaged.

With the support of Citroën and PSA, a replica of the DS du Petit-Clamart was therefore created with an identical model, notably with the bullet holes marked by white crosses on the bodywork. The license plates of the authentic vehicle are affixed to the replica, and are the only original parts to be re-added. The replica was first exhibited in a veranda of Charles de Gaulle's birthplace in Lille. It joined the Charles-de-Gaulle Museum in Colombey-les-Deux-Églises. The museum does not clearly indicate that this is not the real vehicle, other than the vague mention "DS 19 called du Petit-Clamart", and uses the vague terms "reconstitution" or "restoration" of the historic car.

The replica, presented as the real one, made two trips to China, in 2003 and 2013, during traveling exhibitions on the occasion of the 40th and then 50th anniversaries of the recognition of the People's Republic of China by France in 1964.

See also

• Murder of the Notorious B.I.G, a 1997 murder that employed similar tactics
• List of people who survived assassination attempts

References

Bibliography and further reading

• France. Military Court of Justice, The Trial of the Petit Clamart Attack: [before the Military Court of Justice, January 28-March 4, 1963], stenographic report. Paris: Albin Michel, 1963, 2 vols. (1019-IV p.). (Collection of major contemporary trials).
• Joan-Daniel Bezsonoff, The Year of Syracuse, Balzac editions, 2016, translated from Catalan
• Alain de La Tocnaye, Comment je n'ai pas tué de Gaulle, éd. Nalis, 1969
• Frederick Forsyth a tiré de cette histoire un roman paru en 1971, The Day of the Jackal (Chacal), Paris, éditions Tallandier, 400 p., adapté au cinéma en 1973 (Chacal).
• Jacques Delarue, L'OAS contre de Gaulle, 1981
• Alain de Boissieu, Pour servir le Général, 1982.
• Jean Lacouture, Charles de Gaulle – The sovereign 1959-1970, III, éd. du Seuil, 1986 ISBN 2-02-009393-6.
• Georges Fleury, Kill de Gaulle! History of the Petit Clamart attack, 1996.
• Lajos Marton, We must kill de Gaulle, 2002.
• Jean-Pax Méfret, Bastien-Thiry: Until the end of French Algeria, 2003.
• Gastón Segura Valero, A la sombra de Franco, El refugio de los activistas franceses de la OAS (In the shadow of Franco, The refuge of the French activists of the OAS), Edition B, 2004, ISBN 8466614427
• Agnès Bastien-Thiry, Mon père, le dernier des fusillés, 2005
• Roland Charles Wagner made an uchronia in which the de Gaulle dies during the attack.
• Abbé Olivier Rioult, Bastien-Thiry, De Gaulle and tyrannicide, ed. des Cimes, Paris, 2013 ISBN 979-10-91058-05-6.
• Jean-Noël Jeanneney, An attack. Petit-Clamart, August 22, 1962, Seuil, 2016.
• Simon Treins (scénario), Munch (dessins), (couleurs Scarlett), "Tuez de Gaulle !", Delcourt, coll. Histoire & histoires.

Videography

• Fred Zinnemann, The Day of the Jackal (1973), based on the novel of the same name by Frederick Forsyth. The first minutes of this film are a reconstruction of the attack, closing with the execution of Bastien-Thiry.
• Jean-Teddy Filippe, They wanted to kill de Gaulle (2005)

Audio recordings

• Men and facts of the 20th century: the Petit-Clamart trial, Serp (1963)
• Extract from the sound recording of the declaration of Lieutenant-Colonel Jean Bastien-Thiry at the tribunal of the Military Court of Justice, February 2, 1963 (4 minutes, 10 seconds)
• The Grains of Sand of History: the Petit Clamart attack, RMC Découverte, broadcast on 3 November 2015
• Hondelatte recounts: the Petit Clamart attack, Europe 1, broadcast on 22 July 2017
• Killing de Gaulle, the Petit-Clamart attack, Sensitive Affairs, France Inter, broadcast on 22 June 2020