An Interview with Mitterrand

'Everything is a struggle. Everything requires courage and effort"

"I loved this country where everyone greets passers-by and opens his door wide. Looking at America, every voyager has the eyes of Christopher Columbus." So wrote Franc,ois Mitterrand about his first visit to the U.S., when he was a young politician in 1946. This week America's doors will open wide again for France's new President as he travels to Yorktown, Va., to join President Ronald Reagan in celebrating the bicentennial of the Franco-American military victory that ended the Revolutionary War. In addition, Mitterrand will spend five hours in meetings with Reagan before continuing on to Cancun, Mexico, for a 22-nation summit meeting to discuss economic cooperation between rich and poor countries. Last week, after engineering a devaluation of the franc (see following story), Mitterrand was interviewed by TIME Correspondents Jordan Bonfante and Sandra Burton in the gilded salon dore of the Elysee Palace. Throughout, the President exuded the confidence of someone who had occupied the office not for five months but for years. Asked what had surprised him most on coming to power, Mitterrand replied: "Nothing at all. It was just as I had foreseen it." Excerpts from the interview:

Q. What kind of relations do the French and U.S. governments have across their socialist-conservative ideological gap?

A. Good, naturally with variations according to what issue we are dealing with. On the East-West balance, our approaches, without being identical, are sufficiently close that we do not have serious problems. Very real, on the other hand, is the divergence with regard to people under the thumb of Latin American oligarchies. But by and large, Franco-American policy is based on dialogue. We discuss and seek agreement. And we are, both of us, faithful to the Alliance that unites us in defense of peace and that expresses a common civilization.

Q. What is the extent of your differences on North-South issues?

A. France is more committed than the U.S. to reforming the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund [so they can better help developing countries] and to supporting the price of commodities such as cocoa and coffee. France also advocates public aid, whereas the U.S. believes more in the play of free enterprise --in other words, private aid, the intervention of multinational firms. But this different approach does not prevent us from maintaining a good dialogue. The Americans have taken account of some of our suggestions. And I listen to theirs with the greatest attention, with the respect that a great country deserves. The industrialized countries need the economic recovery of the Third World, need these billions of human beings, potential buyers of our products. This is not only a generous attitude, it is a self-serving one.

Q. What led you to recognize the guerrilla movement in El Salvador as a legitimate political force?

A. Reality. The reality is that El Salvador lives under an unbearable, dictatorial oligarchy and that massacres occur there and that all this must be denounced. We believe that the prolongation of these outdated systems in Latin America is a danger for the whole world. Do we speak of Communism? That is how it is introduced! Communism is born out of misery, and if the West does not show more understanding, those people will take up arms and turn to others, that is the Soviet Union. We wind up driving into the adversary camp people who are not natural adversaries of the West but who become so through the logic of the situation we impose upon them. I know the president of the Salvadoran revolutionary movement, Guillermo Ungo, very well. He is a very quiet social democrat. I had lunch with him a week ago here. He is in no way a Communist.

Q. Is this week's devaluation of the franc symptomatic of a greater disorder within the international monetary system?

A. It is one of the consequences, but not a cause of the monetary disorder. There is a currency war, an economic war, and this is one of the most disquieting points for the future of Western relations. Today, it is every man for himself. The U.S., so it says, needs a very high interest rate. That's its business. But it cannot ignore the fact that this measure exacerbates already dangerous movements of capital. Likewise for the fluctuations in the dollar exchange rate. This disorganizes the Western economic system. Since each nation is undergoing a crisis, they all tend toward egotism. Each country first wants to rescue itself, whereas they will only be rescued together.

Q. To what extent are you concerned by the trend toward neutralism in Europe? Is it a limited problem or a real danger?

A. Neutralism is a word that must not be used lightly. As far as I am concerned, I try to understand. And I understand the West German reaction, because West Germany is a country loaded with nuclear explosives that are not under its control. This contradiction is difficult to bear. It gives rise to a series of questions about which a Frenchman must speak with caution. Nations that have a nuclear capability find it easier to avoid such crises than nations that have none and that feel themselves prey to the decisions of others. I believe these tensions would ease if the Americans, who have expressed their willingness to do so, were to begin arms negotiations with the Soviet Union without further delay. I believe they must do it.

Q. You've always claimed to be a staunch supporter of the Atlantic Alliance. On the other hand, in French domestic policy, you have been for many years the promoter of the union of the left, the alliance with Communists. How can you reconcile those two positions of principle?

A. These are not positions of principle. These are facts. In global terms, we are in the Atlantic Alliance. The Communists are not asking us to withdraw from it, In France, my aim is to carry forward a popular movement. And I want the social classes of which this popular movement is comprised to have a say in the business of the nation and the government. To do that, they must be united. Otherwise they will always be dominated [by the bourgeois classes]. If you understand that, you understand my strategy for a union of the left. I must add that the Socialists in France have an absolute majority and that the government is applying the program of the Socialist candidate that I was. It cannot be said that our strategy was not a good one!

Q. There was a commotion in the U.S. about the appointment of Communist ministers ...

A. So I've heard.

Q. Americans have been quite struck by your program of nationalizations.

A. It is our business, not theirs. American interests, like those of all foreigners, will be entirely respected.

Q. Some people, even fellow leftists, say you are acting rather Gaullist in style, as well as substance. Do you find such observations justified?

A. I stand up, people say, "De Gaulle stood up." I look out the window, "That's where De Gaulle looked." I speak of France, "De Gaulle spoke of France." This sort of thing is not sufficient to justify the comparison, which in any case is only a facile device for hackneyed pens. De Gaulle and I are different on essential points.

Q. Will a Mitterrand style evolve?

A. I am the way I am, and I have no need to evolve in order to affirm my identity.

Q. You once quoted Historian Raymond Aron saying that one of defeated President Valery Giscard d'Estaing's problems was that he did not understand that "history is tragic." Is it healthy for a head of state to accept that premise?

A. I believe this dimension is necessary. I was born during one world war, and when I was 20, I fought in a second world war. I was young at a time when Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Salazar, Stalin and a few others were on European soil. All that passes under our eyes proves that we do not live in a peaceful and harmonious world. Everything is a struggle, everything requires courage, effort. There is no response to history without effort, and effort is required because everything is difficult: passions, interests, rivalries, mankind just emerging from prehistory. Just look around us. Yes, history is tragic.

Q. Does that mean you are a pessimist?

A. No, I am not a pessimist at all. Man learns to master himself in order to master history. I believe in the capacity of man, and his failures, his faults do not make me despair.

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