Brave Genius

by Sean B. Carroll

  I have noticed that it is especially the close relatives of the assassins, saboteurs, and agitators who have helped them before or after their action. I have decided then to deal the most severe punishments not only to the assassins, saboteurs, or agitators themselves once arrested, but also in case they are on the run, to the families of the criminals, if they do not appear in ten days at a German or French police station. As a consequence, I announce the following penalties:

  1. All of the male relatives up and down the family line as well as the brothers-in-law and cousins over the age of eighteen will be shot.

  2. All female relatives to the same degree will be sentenced to forced labor.

  3. All of the children, up to the age of seventeen, of the men and women affected by these measures will be placed in a reformatory.

  It was common practice for the Germans to question, threaten, or arrest the relatives of those they were seeking. Since Odette and the children were living away from Paris with Jacques’s parents in Cannes, none of them were likely to be in immediate danger should Monod get caught. With his family safe, or at least as safe as he might hope them to be under the circumstances, Monod mulled over how to escalate his efforts in the Resistance. Several of his Sorbonne colleagues were members of the Francs-Tireurs et Partisans (FTP), a militant organization that grew out of the first Communist efforts to organize armed attacks against the Germans. One spring evening, Francis Cohen, a former laboratory colleague and also an FTP member, came to Monod’s apartment to try to recruit him into the group. After talking long into the night, Monod agreed to join the FTP.

  Monod soon learned that there were many factors that undermined the effectiveness of the Resistance—a lack of weapons, a lack of funding (which was needed to obtain arms and to support resistants who were living on the run and had no income), and a lack of coordination among the many different Resistance groups. Communications were also difficult and fraught with risks. Because each Resistance organization grew out of the efforts of a small number of people in different regions of the country, and because it was imperative to maintain secrecy so that most people knew only a few others in the same group, there was little communication across the groups. There were also the political divisions, largely carried over from before the war. De Gaulle was an unknown when he left France and was looked upon suspiciously by the Communists, for example. While he purported to speak for all of France that yearned to be free, what happened if and when liberation came was of deep concern to those who were risking their lives inside France to bring that about. The Communists were not about to simply hand over the reins of the country to one who did not share their worldview.

  But the first objective that had to be achieved before any such concerns could be relevant was to get the Germans out of France. So most parties and organizations recognized a need for coordination in anticipation of an Allied invasion to retake the country. The first attempt at coordination was the formation of the Conseil National de la Résistance (National Council of the Resistance). De Gaulle’s delegate, Jean Moulin, succeeded in gathering representatives of eight Resistance groups, six political parties, and the major trade unions to a meeting in Paris in late May. At the meeting, the representatives agreed to unite behind de Gaulle as France’s authorized representative among the Allies.

  Such gatherings were not only difficult to coordinate but also dangerous, as they presented great targets for the Gestapo. Indeed, just four weeks after the first council meeting, Moulin and a number of other Resistance leaders were arrested together at a meeting in a Lyon suburb. As had become standard practice, Moulin was tortured—by the notorious SS officer Klaus Barbie—in an attempt to extract information about Resistance operations and leadership. Moulin died without divulging any secrets.

  In the FTP, Monod soon learned that Communist suspicions extended to anyone who, like himself, was not a member of the Party. They would not allow non-Communists any say in the planning or decisions within the FTP. Monod had long held serious reservations about Communism, and he had told Francis Cohen that he had no illusions about the French Communist Party. But he wanted to get more deeply involved in the FTP, so after a sleepless night he put his reservations aside and joined the Communist Party.

  Monod kept up the appearance of a normal routine. He continued to conduct his experiments at the Sorbonne, and he also continued to play and conduct music. Monod met the great blind organist André Marchal, who played at the historic Saint-Germain-des-Prés church and had a close following of many young musicians, especially students at the National Conservatory of Music (Le Conservatoire). Marchal had an organ in his home, at which he held musical gatherings every Tuesday evening. Marchal introduced Monod in turn to Norbert Dufourcq, a professor of music history at the Conservatoire who had founded a youth chorus called Le Mouvement Musical des Jeunes (The Young People’s Musical Movement). Dufourcq, knowing of Monod’s experience with his La Cantate chorus before the war, asked him to direct the chorus. Monod accepted, and the students were soon rehearsing Bach, in German, which was generally not being performed anywhere during the Occupation. Monod reminded the students: “Do not forget that before becoming the language of Hitler, German was the language of Johann Sebastian Bach.” That was bold talk at the time, which, along with his conducting, earned Monod the admiration of many students.

  Monod was to conduct the chorus on May 21, 1943, in a concert at the Conservatoire, accompanied by a student orchestra. Odette made the long trip all the way to Paris from Cannes to see the performance, leaving the children behind with their grandparents. She arrived in time to see the dress rehearsal two days before, and saw that her husband was clearly enjoying himself. She reported to her in-laws, “He is in great form and I admire the sang-froid and the ease with which he commands together the orchestra, the singers, and the organ.” The all-Bach program included three cantatas directed by Monod, and a concerto for violins performed by the student chamber orchestra.

  Monod’s new conductorship would turn out to be short-lived, as Marcel Prenant, chief of staff of the FTP and chair of comparative anatomy and histology at the Sorbonne, had a different job for the maestro. An infantry officer when he was wounded in the previous war, and a committed anti-Fascist between the wars, Prenant was stationed near Sedan before being taken prisoner in May 1940. He was released in 1941 because of his veteran status, and joined the Resistance. In 1943, he was put in charge of cooperation with the other Resistance organizations on military matters. Toward the end of September, he recruited Monod’s brother-in-law, Georges Teissier, also a biologist, to become his deputy. Teissier and another Sorbonne FTP member, Charles Pérez, in whose laboratory Monod had conducted his thesis research, recommended Monod to Prenant. Prenant charged Monod with recruiting members with military training who could in turn train and lead action units.

  In the fall of 1943, the question on everyone’s mind was: When are the Allies coming? While no one knew the timetable, the leaders of the Resistance anticipated that it would launch into widespread action at the time of the landing and mount an insurrection against both Vichy and the Germans.

  Another uncertainty concerning the anticipated invasion was where it would take place. The Allies might come from the west (from England) or the south (from North Africa or Italy). Cannes, on the Mediterranean coast and fewer than forty miles from the Italian border, could become a battle zone and need to be evacuated. In early October 1943, Odette and the children left Cannes and moved back north, not to Paris, but to Saint-Leu-la-Forêt, a small suburb about twelve miles north of the city. It was thought to be relatively safer than Paris itself for Jews or, in Odette’s case, for a Jew living under a false identity. Her sister Lise had moved there beforehand with her daughter Françoise and found Odette a house to rent on the same street. Monod and Georges Teissier (Lise’s husband) took the train to Saint-Leu to be with their families. In order to manage his priorities, Monod established a new routine. He spent every Wednesday night until Thursday morni
ng, and Saturday evening until Monday morning, in Saint-Leu being a husband and father. The rest of the time he divided his efforts between being Monod the scientist at the Sorbonne and being “Marchal” the FTP organizer. The latter alias sometimes took him far from Paris.

  DANGEROUS LIAISONS: “MARTEL” IN SWITZERLAND

  Whatever success Monod might have in enlisting military-trained recruits into the FTP, their effect would be limited by the shortage of weapons. It was a problem that plagued all Resistance groups across the country, and the FTP in particular. Marcel Prenant had made repeated appeals to de Gaulle’s representatives for weapons to be delivered by parachute drops, and while he received many promises, he had not secured weapons. Monod, however, had one special contact in another group whom he thought might be able to help the FTP—his brother Philo, who was working for the Resistance across the border in Geneva, in neutral Switzerland.

  Ten years older than Jacques, Philo was an experienced, well-traveled attorney. After a few years working for the famous Sullivan & Cromwell law firm in New York, he had returned to Paris to work in the firm’s Paris office. He was vehemently opposed to the Munich Pact in 1938. When war was declared in 1939 he was assigned to the Blockade Section of the Foreign Ministry, watched the government unravel in the course of the German invasion, and followed it to its makeshift quarters in Bordeaux. Philo heard de Gaulle’s broadcast on June 18, 1940, and decided immediately that he would follow the general’s lead.

  When he was demobilized in July 1940, Philo headed to his parents’ home in Cannes. He wanted to join the Resistance right away, but he could not at first find a group to join. This was both a matter of the nascent groups being very small and secretive, and of the fact that Philo knew very few people in the south. It was not until François Morin, a friend as well as a member of Jacques’s doctoral examination committee, visited Philo that he found a way in. Morin, aka “Forestier,” was a member of Combat who was responsible for military matters. Philo told Morin of his desire to become an active resistant, and Morin introduced him to Claude Bourdet, one of the founders of the movement. Bourdet invited Philo to join Combat and, using the alias “Martel,” Philo took charge of the Cannes-Antibes region. Philo subsequently replaced Bourdet as head of the Alpes-Maritimes region.

  Philo’s connections with Sullivan & Cromwell proved to be especially valuable. In November 1942, his former supervisor in the Paris office, the American Max Shoop, came to visit him in Cannes on his way to neutral Switzerland. Philo completely trusted Shoop and disclosed his activities in the Resistance. Shoop appeared to take a special interest in what Philo had to say, and for good reasons. Philo did not know it at the time, but Shoop had joined the American Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the forerunner of the CIA, and was working with another Sullivan & Cromwell alumnus, Allen Dulles, who was stationed in Bern, Switzerland, gathering intelligence for the Americans.

  Three months later, Shoop sent a message to Philo. As he had suspected, his friend Shoop’s visit had not been simply that of a tourist passing through. Shoop promised American aid and requested a report on the military strength of the Secret Army, an organization comprised of Resistance fighters from three groups—Combat, Liberation-Sud, and Franc-Tireur (a separate group, not the FTP)—and headed by François Morin. Philo brought the news of Shoop’s interest to a meeting with Henri Frenay, Morin, Bourdet, Pierre Guillain de Bénouville, and other principals of Combat in Saint-Clair, on the edge of Lyon. “Martel” told the gathering that Shoop “wanted to know what kind of military assistance we could offer the Allied cause.”

  Philo was the hero of the day. Starved as they were for funding, arms, and communications gear, Combat’s leaders rejoiced at the Americans’ interest. Frenay suggested that, since the Americans were his contacts, Philo go to Switzerland and work out further arrangements. De Bénouville, who was in charge of “external relations,” was to establish the courier network for communications between Lyon and Switzerland, and a reliable means of slipping back and forth across the border.

  Philo and de Bénouville soon met with Shoop and Dulles, who was posing as an adviser to the American embassy, in Bern. The Frenchmen handed over an organizational chart of the Resistance and outlined their needs, which included (1) funds for maintaining an office in Geneva; (2) 25 million francs per month to develop the organized resistance; (3) additional funds to cover guerrilla actions, including sabotage; (4) reserve funds to take care of réfractaires; (5) arms, explosives, and food rations; and (6) assistance with establishing radio and air links.

  The Americans listened attentively and took voluminous notes. They were astonished by the lack of material aid coming from London. With Washington’s approval, they offered their radio facilities in Geneva so that the groups inside France could communicate with de Gaulle. They immediately agreed to fund a bank account so that a delegation could be set up in Geneva, which would be organized by Philo. Technically, he would be representing not Combat, but Les Mouvements Unis de la Résistance (MUR; the United Movements of the Resistance), which included the same three movements behind the Secret Army. Philo soon secured the commitment of 37 million francs for their operations and was asked to identify one hundred parachute-drop sites for arms. De Bénouville set up a system of transferring funds from Switzerland to banks inside France.

  The MUR provided intelligence reports to the Allies via the Swiss delegation, which quickly established the utility of the Resistance as an already “landed army.” That is, the MUR wanted to be viewed as a military organization that was already in place within France ahead of the anticipated Allied landing. The intelligence reports also demonstrated the importance of the Geneva office. Two pouches per week were sent to Geneva from Lyon that contained reports on sabotage missions and enemy troop movements, detailed maps, and results of Allied bombing missions to help with the design of subsequent missions. The pouches also compiled information on life in France, which was shared with the press and reported to the world. Couriers from Switzerland in turn sent requests to the Resistance for specific intelligence, as well as consignments of arms, munitions, explosives, and sheets of counterfeit ration cards.

  The FTP, however, was not part of the MUR. The formation of the latter organization was aided by the fact that its three constituent organizations all started in the south, in the unoccupied zone, and thus each had much greater freedom of movement than their counterparts in the north. Indeed, while the MUR had the Secret Army, the FTP was by necessity a guerrilla organization using very small teams to carry out sabotage and other actions using hit-and-run tactics. The FTP had not competed successfully with the other organizations for London’s attentions, and its members were suffering for lack of arms.

  In October 1943, de Bénouville called for a meeting of the major Resistance groups in Geneva in order to discuss the problems of the lack of weapons and money, and to present the situation to the Americans to see what they could do. Jacques Monod was chosen as the FTP liaison to the MUR and made contact with de Bénouville. He was already well apprised of the Geneva delegation’s activities through his brother. Philo and de Bénouville raised the possibility of helping the FTP, so Jacques proposed to his superiors that he go to Switzerland to try to secure arms shipments. They agreed.

  It was very risky crossing the border. The Swiss tightly controlled their border to avoid being swamped with refugees and to preserve their neutrality. On the French side, there were both customs agents and German patrols on the lookout for réfractaires, refugees, black marketeers, and resistants either trying to get out of or back into France. Jacques knew of the dangers and did not want to chance being caught with any compromising papers. After chorus rehearsal one night, he walked toward the Métro along with Geneviève Noufflard, a twenty-three-year-old student at the Conservatoire and member of the chorale, as the two had done on several previous occasions. Noufflard had noticed that Jacques carried a very fine, soft Moroccan leather briefcase. He turned to Noufflard and said, “I have somethin
g to ask you … I am leaving tonight to [do] something dangerous; and I would like you to keep this for me.” He handed Noufflard the briefcase, adding that, if he did not come back in a number of days, “Please see that my wife is told.”

  Noufflard understood and agreed.

  DE BÉNOUVILLE HAD set up a system for sneaking into Switzerland through the border town of Annemasse. After arriving at the train station, Jacques and other delegates were led across the border by French customs agents who had been recruited by de Bénouville. They were received on the other side by members of Swiss border security, Services de Renseignements Suisse (SR), who were complicit in the scheme, and then were taken the few miles to Geneva, where they were welcomed by Philo and the Geneva delegation.

  Along with Jacques and de Bénouville, the meeting brought together Gen. Pierre Dejussieu (“Pontcarral”), chief of staff of the Secret Army; Louis-Eugène Mangin (“Grognard”), military delegate of the French National Committee; Pierre Arrighi (“Charpentier”), representing military groups of the northern zone; Marcel Degliame (“Fouché” or “Dormoy”), chief of L’Action Immediate, comprised of several militant groups; and Emmanuel d’Astier de la Vigerie, of the MUR. The delegates brought a number of reports with them to meetings with the Allies, including a table summarizing the forces that were available presently for direct action and the projected effectiveness of the Secret Army and the Resistance by the time of an Allied landing. Of the roughly 200,000 men who could fight in the Secret Army and the FTP, fewer than 15,000 had any kind of arms. To attain their potential effectiveness, they would need altogether more than 80,000 submachine guns or automatic pistols, a quarter of a million grenades, and 40 tons of explosives per month. Jacques was promised arms for the FTP and given the instructions on how to inform his contacts of where the parachute drops were to take place.