The Menace Within

Abstract

This chapter explores the Italian threats to French authority in the areas that fell within the remit of the Italian armistice and how French officials tackled them at a local level. Italian threats included encroachments on French sovereignty, Fascist propaganda and attempts to undermine French colonial rule. A further potential threat came from the large Italian communities living in France and French North Africa. French responses were complex and multi-layered, with local French authorities sometimes adopting different approaches to those advocated by Vichy. Where Italian actions clashed with Vichy’s defence of France’s colonies or its policies on Jews, the French authorities invited intervention from Berlin. However, as French attentions turned once again towards exploiting the rifts within the Axis, the response from Berlin showed that the strategy of seeking assistance from the Germans was to be no panacea.