German "reparations" from Vichy as portion of French GDP?

[lord of the mark]

I just finished a book on the Occupation of France. Germany required Vichy to pay "the costs of occupation" = my book says the payments amounted to over 60% of "French national income". The author does not make it clear if hes using the national income accounting def of national income, in which NI is not that much smaller than GDP - in which case 60% is incredibly high. OTOH I doubt he just means 60% of the govt revenue. Or does he?

Unfortunately I dont have the numbers handy.

Anyone know more about this?

[Ecthy]

1st reaction always: does the author cite a source? If not, does he make any explanations in the bibliography? If not, the book sucks by any basic standards for writing on history.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Ecthy
1st reaction always: does the author cite a source? If not, does he make any explanations in the bibliography? If not, the book sucks by any basic standards for writing on history.

not for that particular fact

Numbers: 20 million marks a day, 400 million francs at the "crippling" exchange rate of 20 to 1. lowered to 300 million in May 1941, raised to 500 million in Nov '42. He also doesnt make clear if the original monetization of of 20 million marks a day is actually specified in the armistice agreement, or is a subsequent determination of the "cost of occupation".

I suppose I could find a text of the armistice agreement online. And now that ive checked the figures, I could find French National Income stats for the period to compare against.

The book is by Martin Ousby, a prof of literature. Given the discussion of Sartre and other literary figures, and the very verbal nature of both Vichy and the resistance, its a topic very amenable to the "history of the discourse" approach Mr Ousby supplies. I happen to have seized on one of the economic facts he mentions, without, as you say, good citation.


He does, in the biblio, cite Alan Milward, "The New Order and the French Economy"which I presume has more, but its not readily available to me, unless I go visit the Library of Congress or a University library (our local public libraries in DC and suburbs are kinda sucky - largely due to our divided govt - other big cities much better)

[Ecthy]

I was under the impression you were in DC, funny public libraries would be such a problem there.

Could you elaborate on that history of discourse aspect please? That sounds interesting. What about the "verbal" nature of Vichy? Authority from mentality?

[Julian Delphiki]

The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich has figures similar to those (IIRC), and has sources mentioned as well - try to get your hands on it. War and Economy in the Third Reich could be helpful as well, but i'm not sure since i have not read it. There's also a newer book about Nazi Germany's economy out, but i don't remember it's name right now and couldn't find it with quick search.

[Ecthy]

Let's be realistic here - anything of economic importance in France was probably outside of the Vichy state. Those are probably figures exalted from occupied France in total - maybe the Vichy regime was just a medium.

I'd be surprised if they'd received more "tribute" from Vichy than from occupied France.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Ecthy
I was under the impression you were in DC, funny public libraries would be such a problem there.

The District has a population of less than 500,000, the central branch of the public library, IIUC, is old and not particularly big. Each suburban county has its own public library system - Fairfax PL, Alexandria, Arlington, Montgomery County, etc. Each of which is adequate, but all are oriented toward local service, not serious research. Unlike say the central libraries in Boston, Chicago, or even Baltimore, which are more serious research libraries. And of course the the NYPL, one of the 4 top libraries in the US.

The Library of Congress of course is also a premier research library, though I think withdrawl privileges are limited without a note from a congressmans office. Though I doubt that would be that hard to get. POTM used the LoC for some research she did for a history project once.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Ecthy
I was under the impression you were in DC, funny public libraries would be such a problem there.

Could you elaborate on that history of discourse aspect please? That sounds interesting. What about the "verbal" nature of Vichy? Authority from mentality?

The emphasis of Vichy on shaping the French view of what was happening - that defeat was the inevitable result of prewar trends, that it was honorable to accept it, that England was the real enemy, etc.

And the resistance, in the early months, putting as much or more effort into distributing pamphlets and newsletters making the opposite case as into anything else.

[Kidlicious]

It seems like an unrealistic figure either way even though the German economy was bigger than the French economy. I doubt they could suck that much out.