Surpassing Himself

In 15 press conferences studded like black pearls through his nine-year rule of France, President Charles de Gaulle has often enough demonstrated his unique mastery of the power of negative thinking. Last week, in Press Conference No. 16, he surpassed himself. "In 100 minutes," as Paris Le Populaire tidily summed it up, "General de Gaulle in the name of France called for secession of French-speaking Quebec in Canada, tossed England out of Europe, threatened the Common Market with destruction, called the U.S. the principal enemy and suavely knifed Israel." But the broadside effort took its toll. The general's skeins of rationality grew considerably tangled in spots, and he tried to make up for the lack with an extra dosage of sarcasm and heavy humor.

Gathering questions at the outset from the 1,100 newsmen assembled in the Elysee Palace's elegant Salle des Fetes, he broke in when someone asked if it were true that he had said he wanted to see Britain "stripped naked" be fore allowing it to enter the Common Market (see box, opposite page). "I am going to answer you at once," he said slyly. "Nudity for a beautiful creature is natural enough, and for those around her is rather satisfying. But whatever attraction I feel for England, I never said that about her." Having got his guffaws and proved himself one of the boys, he then went on to collect the rest of the questions and to deliver his memorized peroration, all the important questions having been planted with newsmen in advance.

Guilty on Three Counts. After lauding the French economy's advances during his reign, De Gaulle denied that France was in any way responsible for the current "squalls" in the world's monetary system. Those problems would be solved very simply if the world went back to the gold standard with all its "universality, immutability and impartiality." In particular, he said, the U.S. balance of payments deficits for the past eight years precisely equaled the total of American investments in Europe. De Gaulle's obvious solution for the U.S. payments problem: get out of Europe.

He found Israel guilty on three progressively perturbing counts. It went to war against his admonition, which was bad enough. It won, which was even worse. But most heinous of all, the victory benefited the image of the U.S. as Israel's main supporter. So, in a long historical ramble on Israel's origins that shocked the French by its antiSemitism, De Gaulle described the lews as "an elite people, sure of themselves and dominating." The state of Israel after 1956, he said, was a "warrior, and determined to enlarge itself."

Unacceptable & Intolerable. Not content with the uproar he caused in July by visiting French Canada and calling for a free Quebec, the general went even further in a boldly irredentist bid. Canada, he lectured Ottawa, putting on his glasses for the first time in a press conference, must rewrite its constitution, turning Quebec loose to elevate itself "to the rank of a sovereign state." Then Quebec and France must organize for the "solidarity of the French Community on both sides of the Atlantic." How else, he asked, could the French of Canada "cope with the encroachment of the U.S.?"

As for Britain, clad or unclad, entry into the Common Market was out of the question, despite his "exceptional esteem, attachment and respect" for the British people. To admit Britain now with all its economic ills and un-Eu-ropean ways of doing business would be to destroy the Common Market, he said. Europe and Britain are "incompatible." However, De Gaulle added generously, France would be glad to consider some form of second-class associate membership for Britain to "favor commercial exchanges."

With the back of his hand for just about everyone, De Gaulle naturally succeeded in evoking outrage around the globe. Prime Minister Harold Wilson told a cheering House of Commons that "we have slammed down our application on the table. There it is and there it remains." But in the face of so vehement a second veto, Britain may eventually have to come around to accepting some form of transitional association with the Common Market until De Gaulle is gone. Prime Minister Lester Pearson of Canada angrily denounced the general's "intervention" in Canadian domestic policies as "unacceptable" and "intolerable." Said Pearson: "I believe the statement distorted some Canadian history, misrepresented developments and wrongly predicted the future." The Frankfurter Rundschau suggested sarcastically that De Gaulle might next order "the Bundeswehr into action for the liberation of French Canadians." Combat, the Paris daily that grew out of the Resistance movement during World War II, sadly observed: "The international reactions to General de Gaulle's press conference have given the measure of the isolation of France: it has never been greater or more total."

Rare Admission. Charles de Gaulle, at 77, seldom acknowledges any intimations of mortality. But last week he wound up his press conference with the rare admission that "there is always an end to everything. Everyone comes to an end." The advent of the era of apres-De Gaulle, he said, "could be this evening, in six months' time, or in one year. Or it could be in five years, since that, according to the constitution, is when the mandate entrusted to me expires. And if I wanted to make some people laugh, or others groan, I could say that I might equally well last another ten or 15 years." While the laughter was still subsiding, the general added, in perhaps the most realistic remark of the entire conference: "Frankly, I do not think so."

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