Pierre Sidos | |
|---|---|
 Pierre Sidos in 1976 | |
| Born | (1927-01-06)6 January 1927 |
| Died | 4 September 2020(2020-09-04) (aged 93) Bayeux, France |
| Movement | Mouvement Franciste (1943–45) Jeune Nation (1949–58) Parti Nationaliste (1958–59) Occident (1964–65) L'Œuvre Française (1968–2013) |
| Parent(s) | François Sidos Louise Rocchi |
Pierre Sidos (6 January 1927 – 4 September 2020) was a Frenchfar rightnationalist,neo-Pétainist, andantisemitic activist. One of the main figures of post-WWIInationalism in France, Sidos was the founder and leader of the nationalist organizationsJeune Nation (1949–1958) andL'Œuvre Française (1968–2013).
Sidos was convicted in 1946 of joining the fascistMouvement Franciste at 16 years old in the midst ofWWII andNazi occupation of France. After spending two years of internment inNatzweiler-Struthof, he founded in 1949 Jeune Nation, the most prominent French neo-fascist movement of the 1950s.[1] Famous for its insurrectional violence during theAlgerian war,[2] the organization was dissolved by official decree in 1958.
Convicted a second time in 1963 of "recreating a disbanded league" and "compromising State security", Sidos foundedOccident the following year, but soon broke with the group. He eventually established anotherVichyist movement in 1968, L'Œuvre Française, of which he was the leader until he stepped down in 2012. The movement was banned a year later, making it the fourth association founded by Sidos to be dissolved by the French authorities, and the fifth he had been part of, in a 70-year period of political activism.
Pierre Sidos was born on 6 January 1927 inSaint-Pierre-d'Oléron, the son of François Sidos (1891–1946) and Louise Rocchi.[3] He grew up in a familial background strongly tainted with nationalism and far-right ideologies.[4] As a child, he had fun recreating theMarch on Rome in the family house staircase[4] with his brother Jean, laterkilled in action by the German forces in 1940. Pierre Sidos has asserted that the death of his brother was the event that made him swing into political action.[5]
His father, aCatholic and anti-republican right-winger, had been a member of theJeunesses Patriotes, afar-right league dissolved in 1936. Born inMouzaïaville (then inFrench Algeria) and serving in thecolonial army, he had traveled across theFrench empire where he met his wife Louise.[3] AFirst World War hero, François Sidos eventually collaborated with theVichy regime during WWII.[4] His mother Louise was ofCorsican descent and his grandfather, Jean Rocchi, a ferventBonapartist and friend ofPierre Taittinger, future leader of the Jeunesses Patriotes.[5]
In 1943, then 16 years old (the minimum required age), Pierre Sidos joined the youth movement of theParti Franciste, one of the maincollaborationist movements under theVichy regime. In January 1946, he was tried by a court inLa Rochelle—along with his father, mother and his brother Jacques—convicted and received a 5-year jail sentence for his membership in the Parti Franciste. The conviction was reduced as Sidos was still a minor at the time of the events. His father François was sentenced todeath, guilty of unlawful arrests ofresisters organized with theMilice, and of his participation in the armed conflict with the Nazi forces against theAllies. Before his execution on 28 March 1946, François wrote a letter to his sons, urging them to avenge his "unjust death".[4]
His brother Jacques was sentenced to 10 years in jail for his past in theVichy intelligence services, his mother released with all charges dropped, and Pierre was sent in autumn 1946 to theNatzweiler-Struthof concentration camp inAlsace. The place, originally built by the Nazis in 1941, had been recently transformed by the French authorities to include elementary needs, such as central heating or electric lighting. The inmates—most of them former Nazi-collaborators—could even organize free-fights, running competitions or put on a play.[4]
While serving his sentence, Pierre Sidos spent most of his time reading and running. He met Marcel Bibé, a formerBezen Perrot militant who initiated him in Celticesoterism. Sidos then began to write aboutdruidism and theCeltic Cross, which he described in his prison notes as the allegory of the "walking sun and universal life", a symbol he would later use in all the organizations he created:Jeune Nation,Occident andL'Œuvre Française.[4]
In 1948, the French authorities made an offer to the inmates: their release against an enlistment in theIndochina War. Sidos refused the proposition, while hundreds of former Nazi collaborators were sent to fight within the French army in southeast Asia, diffusingWehrmacht andSS songs they had learnt during their internment in Natzweiler-Struthof.[4]
Sidos nonetheless benefited from an early release on 4 August 1948. He quickly found a job and contacted another of his brothers, François. The latter, unlike most of the family, had joined theFree French Forces in 1942 and participated inOperation Dragoon along with theAllies in the summer of 1944. They were joined by their brother Jacques following his own release, and together they prepared the ground for the creation ofJeune Nation.[4]
By 1949, the final structure of the organization had been designed and the group ready to be launched, but the Sidos brothers lacked money as far-right financial sponsors were not abundant in the immediate post-war. Pierre Sidos then decided to reach out to Jeanne Pajot, the wife of a rich industrialist. ABonapartist and friend ofPierre Taittinger like his grandfather, she agreed to fund them and "La Jeune Nation"—as it was initially called—held its first presentation on 22 October 1949.[4] Publicly unknown for several years, the movement experienced a sudden fame and a rise in membership after the return of military personnel from south-east Asia following the end of theFirst Indochina War on 20 July 1954.[6]
Labeling themselves the "successors ofthose of 1934" and targeting young people in their recruitment,[6] Jeune Nation was joined in 1956 byDominique Venner, then 21, who would later oppose Sidos and mark a shift between hiseuro-nationalist doctrine and the "nostalgicneo-Petainists of Pierre Sidos."[7] Although they were largely inspired by the ideologies offascist Italy andVichy France,[8] Jeune Nation began to break with thecollaborationist circles that had been protecting them since Sidos' prison time. AsGaullists and former resisters were joining their ranks during theAlgerian war, Sidos furthermore banned any evocation of the period 1933–1945 among its militants, with only a few events like the commemorations ofRobert Brasillach or6 February 1934 allowed to take place.[4]
The group was particularly known for their violent street attacks, especially on communists. On 9–10 October 1954, a commando raid led by Sidoscarjacked a van transporting issues of the communist newspaperL’Humanité Dimanche, then destroyed them and assaulted the driver who died a few months later as a result of his injuries.[2] Jeune Nation was dissolved on 15 May 1958 by an official decree ofJules Moch, thenMinister of the Interior, two days after the putsch of Algiers and the beginning of theMay 1958 crisis. The group had been suspected of a bomb attack that occurred on 6 February 1958 in theNational Assembly.[7][1]
The association was regardless declared again under a new name to theprefecture of police on 7 October 1958, and officially recreated by Pierre Sidos andDominique Venner during a congress on 6–8 February 1959 as "Parti Nationaliste".[9] The new organization was dissolved only four days later, on 12 February 1959, and an arrest warrant was issued on 24 January 1960 for "recreating a disbanded league" and "compromising State security".[10]
From January 1960, Sidos lived in clandestinity in a house ofNeuilly, in the western suburbs of Paris. He stayed in contact with putschist generals and pro-colonial politicians likeJean-Marie Le Pen, and was eventually arrested on 13 July 1962.[10][11] Sidos was released on 19 June 1963 following his trial, and sentenced to a suspended 3-year jail sentence and a 2,000Franc fine.[10]
Jeune Nation was regenerated by young former members of the movement after the launch of theFederation of Nationalist Students (FEN) in 1960. Sidos initially supported the project but eventually dismissed the influence ofDominique Venner on the association, as well as theirneo-pagan andeuro-nationalist leanings. Together with other activists opposed to the FEN, Sidos decided to foundOccident in 1964. During the presidential campaign of far-right candidateJean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour, Occident was largely involved in the grassroots movement Comité Jeunes ("Youth Committee"), which quickly attracted several hundred members. Following a dispute between Sidos andJean-Marie Le Pen, then Tixier-Vignancour's campaign director, Sidos' group was replaced withDominique Venner'sEurope-Action Volunteers.[12] Sidos eventually broke with Occident in 1965–1966.[13]
In February 1966, he created with André Cantelaube the magazineLe Soleil ("The Sun"), which later became the official organ ofL'Œuvre Française from 1968 until it was banned from publicity and sales to minors in 1990 following theGayssot Act, then replaced by a resurrectedJeune Nation in 1994.[14] Sidos was labeled the "bard of antisemitism" by historianPierre Milza, andLe Soleil defended a form of anti-capitalist nationalism that denounced the role of Jews in finance, politics and the industries, as well as the "threat" represented by the state ofIsrael in geopolitics.[15]
Sidos set upL'Œuvre Française in 1968 and declared himself "presidor for life" (French:présideur, aportmanteau ofprésident anddictateur).[16] Closer toFrancoist Spain and the PortugueseEstado Novo than fascist regimes, L'Œuvre Française wasantisemitic,neo-Pétainist and nationalist.[17] Sidos then seemed to endorse a blend ofCatholicism,pan-European nationalism and anti-Semitism, with someThird Position influence, as his ideology of choice.[18] Designed as acult of personality, the organization was labeled a sect or "Church of Sidology" by critics even at the far right,[19] while its adherents highlighted the discipline and determination allowed by their organizational style.[5]
He attempted to run in the1969 French presidential election on this platform, seeking to stand as a nationalist andanti-Zionist candidate,[20] but his candidacy was rejected by theConstitutional Council on a technical basis. It has been argued that there was a fear any judgement in Sidos' favour would have been considered a vindication of his collaborationist background in wider society.[21]Le Soleil, organ of L'Œuvre Française, dismissed the Jewish origin of some members in the council, namelyGaston Palewski andRené Cassin, as the reason for their refusal.[22][15] In 1973, Sidos was the only candidate for L'Œuvre in thelegislative election.[15] Sidos was said to have metAntónio Salazar for a short encounter in the 1960s,king Faisal of Saudi Arabia for a one-hour meeting on 28 April 1971 inRiyadh, as well asJuan Perón on 22 October of the following year in Madrid, and former SS colonelOtto Skorzeny in the same city. According to Sidos, Perón declared to him that "Paris [had] been the world capital of subversion since 1789."[5]
By the 1980s he had come to moderate his own position and sought to build a wider alliance with other fringe right-wing movements, includingmonarchists,integrists and the supporters ofMarcel Lefebvre. To this end he joinedFrançois Brigneau,Pierre Pujo andJean Madiran in a commemoration service for the tenth anniversary of the occupation ofSaint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet by theSociety of St. Pius X in 1987. Sidos subsequently sought co-operation with theFront National (FN) although at other times he would dismiss the party as too moderate.[23] In 1996, he announced the rallying of L'Œuvre to the party, despite the opposition of his right hand manYvan Benedetti.[19]
After negotiations with Sidos,Jean-Marie Le Pen eventually allowed someL'Œuvre militants to integrate the FN in 2007.[24] The party however later tightened its policy regarding the association,Marine Le Pen denouncing an "operation ofentryism" to facilitate the seizure of power by her rivalBruno Gollnisch in the FN.[25] Following Jean-Marie Le Pen's departure from the leadership in 2011, replaced by his daughter Marine, Sidos severed all ties with the party, telling far-right newspaperRivarol that he did not feel a woman should have such an important position.[26][27]
In 2012, at 85, he left the presidency of L'Œuvre Française, succeeded byYvan Benedetti.[28]
In 2013, the association he had founded 45 years earlier was dissolved by the authorities.[29]Manuel Valls, thenMinister of the Interior, denounced L'Œuvre Française as a group "spreading a xenophobic and antisemitic ideology, diffusing racist andHolocaust-denying thesis, exaltingcollaboration [with the Nazis] and theVichy regime, paying regular tribute toPétain,Brasillach orMaurras",[30] adding that the movement was "organized like a private militia in paramilitary-like training camps."[31]
On 28 November 2013, the associationLes Amis de Pierre Sidos ("The Friends of Pierre Sidos") was created to "make the works of patriot Pierre Sidos and that of his family known".[32][33]
He died inBayeux hospital on 4 September 2020.[34]
On 6 February 1990, he was invited on the TV talk-showCiel, mon mardi !. To the question "are you an anti-Semite?" he famously answered: "no more no less thanSaint-Louis", in reference to the king of France who forced Jews to wear a distinctive roundel and banned mixed marriages. Sidos further precised in 2013 that "Saint-Louis had a religious hostility but was the godfather of many Jews that converted [to Christianity]."[5] Sidos was also ferventlyanti-Zionist, denouncing Israel as the "avowed metropolis of an invisible and harmful empire […] with dominant aims."[15]
In a 2013 interview, he describedAdolf Hitler as the "GermanNapoléon" andBenito Mussolini as "the last of theCaesars".[5]
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