France: On to Moscow!

Gaullists, who refer to France's still inoperative nuclear deterrent as the force de dissuasion, have never been very precise about how or what it would dissuade. In the April issue of France's National Defense Review, General Charles Ailleret, chief of the general staff, comes up with a nuclear strategy custom-made to fit the force itself.

Dismissing U.S. and Soviet theories of massive annihilation as "highly improbable" unless "confirmed madmen" were in charge, Ailleret, a veteran infantryman, argues that it would take only a few nuclear strikes, "cleverly applied," to reduce the enemy to terror. Then, he reasons, "a rapid and brutal invasion by mechanized forces" would cause the enemy to "collapse through panic." Ailleret does not say flatly which side would panic first in such a war, but concludes confidently that victory would go to the government that is "capable of assuring the nation, through a sufficiently solid framework, of a stability that will permit its nerves to hold as long as possible." Meaning France?