1. Jacques Doriot fought personally in German uniform on the Eastern Front, with the rank of lieutenant.
12 Facts About Jacques Doriot
1. 2.
Jacques Doriot moved to Saint Denis, near Paris, at an early age and became a labourer.
3.
In 1923, Jacques Doriot was arrested for violently protesting French occupation of the Ruhr Area.
4.
Jacques Doriot was released a year later, upon being elected to the French Chamber of Deputies by the people of Saint Denis.
5.
Around this time, he opposed the "social fascism" theory and came to advocate a Popular Front alliance between the Communists and other French socialist parties with whom Jacques Doriot sympathized on a number of issues and worried that exclusion would alienate valuable political allies.
6.
When France went to war with Germany in 1939, Jacques Doriot was mobilized and fought at the front as a sergeant.
7.
Jacques Doriot became a staunch pro-German and supported Germany's occupation of northern France in 1940, specifically due to Hitler's anti-Bolshevik policy.
8.
Jacques Doriot resided in collaborationist Vichy France for a time and was made a member of the National Council of Vichy France in January 1941, but he eventually found that the Vichy regime was not nearly as Fascist as he had hoped it would be and moved to occupied Paris, where he espoused pro-German and anti-communist propaganda on Radio Paris.
9.
Jacques Doriot fought with the LVF and saw active duty on the Eastern Front when Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 and was awarded the Iron Cross in 1943.
10.
In December 1944, Jacques Doriot travelled to Germany and made contact with the former members of the Vichy regime and other collaborators who had gathered together in the Sigmaringen enclave.
11.
Jacques Doriot's PPF struggled to assume a leadership role within the French expatriate community, basing itself in Mainau and setting up its own radio station, Radio-Patrie, at Bad Mergentheim and publishing its own paper Le Petit Parisien.
12.
Jacques Doriot was killed on 22 February 1945 while traveling from Mainau to Sigmaringen when his car was strafed by Allied fighter planes.