Edmond Jouhaud (PJW)

Edmond Jouhaud was the leader of France from 1962 to 1969. One of the most decorated officers in the French military, he had risen to the rank of general during the Algerian War. An avid supporter of French interventionism overseas, Jouhaud conspired with other generals to overthrow President Charles de Gaulle when the president began withdrawals from the Congo War and began negotiations with the Algerian rebels. When members of the Congolese army assassinated de Gaulle in 1962, the plotters saw their opportunity and launched a coup a week later, easily overthrowing the interim government and establishing martial law. A military junta was established, with elections scheduled when the current emergency situation ended.

The communist revolt in Portugal led to a resurgence in far right movements in France, and Jouhaud allied himself with them, accusing leftists of conspiring with the Congolese in the assassination, and using that as an excuse to arrest and imprison thousands of political opponents. Jouhaud made a major effort to strengthen the European Community, and turn it into a major military alliance of Western Europe without the involvement of the United States. Tensions within the Community grew when it became apparently Jouhaud wanted France to lead this supposedly equal alliance, eventually resulting in the withdrawal of France and Spain.

Jouhaud's reign was never peaceful, beginning new campaigns to keep French colonies under the rule of Paris. Rebellions constantly fermented, and in 1967 revolts broke out in the Basque regions. These quickly spread to other regions, and student and workers' strikes nearly shut down the entire French economy. Jouhaud responded to this with further crackdowns, which only inflamed the revolutions. As France burned and nearly a million lay dead during the civil war, Jouhaud fled across the sea to Cameroon, where a government in exile was established.