Georges Bonnet

Georges Bonnet ( born July 23, 1889 in Bassilac in the Dordogne, † June 18, 1973 in Paris) was April 10, 1938 to September 13, 1939 French Foreign Minister.

Bonnet was first elected in 1924 for the Radical Socialist Party in the Chamber of Deputies. On April 10, 1938, he was appointed by Édouard Daladier to the Secretary of State. In November 1938, he visited his German counterpart Ribbentrop, in which he did not protest against the November pogroms, but stressed " how much you would be interested in a solution to the Jewish problem in France." His country would not accept any more Jews from Germany, so he asked if they could not make " any action " so that they no longer come to France. In addition, he noted that France also wanted to " get rid of somewhere " ten thousand Jews. Bonnet supported the Munich Agreement in August 1939 and still tried to avoid the Second World War, by proposing Mussolini as mediator in the conflict between Germany and Poland.

During the German occupation Georges Bonnet took an opaque position, as he entertained both contacts with the Vichy regime and the Resistance. In 1945 he was expelled from the Radical Socialist Party. To escape persecution because of his collaboration with the Vichy regime, he evaded to Switzerland, but soon returned to France. In 1955 he joined again as a leader of a small left-liberal party, without, however, again to gain greater political importance. From 1956 to 1968 he was a member of the Dordogne in the French National Assembly, 1955-1965 Mayor of Brantome.