Today’s episode is the first of two on the extraordinary treason trial of Marshal Pétain in the summer of 1945 that ended up putting wartime France in the dock. David talks to historian of modern France Julian Jackson about how Pétain found himself so quickly charged with treason and who was judging him. What was the essence of Pétain’s crime? Conspiracy? Surrender? Collaboration? Complicity in genocide? And what on earth was his defence?

Julian Jackson’s France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain is available wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/4oTHcRP

Available now on PPF+: our second episode on the Moscow Show Trials in which David and Edward Acton discuss the 1938 trial of Nikolai Bukharin, the most celebrated defendant of them all, whose case inspired some of the world’s great political literature.  To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus

Next time in Politics on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain Part 2

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