French premier proposed merger with England in 1956

Guy Mollet

Entente cordiale, yes,....on good days..., but a bonding of the souls, not on your life! Yet that was what was on the table half a century ago when the then French premier, Guy Mollet, proposed to his UK homologue that France and Britain merge, becoming one country... ruled over by Queen Elizabeth II.

I love the idea of the Queen coming to Paris, in fact Paris is a more regal city, in many ways. But she has to be careful: you know we cut the neck of one King in France.

The astonishing idea - brought to light by a BBC documentary - was born out of Mollet's desire to find an ally with whom to combat the Egyptian president Gamel Abdel Nasser, who had recently nationalised the Suez Canal, and who was funding independentists in French Algeria..... Tension was mounting along the border between Israel and Jordan - Israel being a French ally, and Jordan a British one. France needed to have Britain on side in the Middle East in order to secure its help in winning back Suez.

So the anglophile Mollet came to England on the 10 September 1956 for talks with his British counterpart Anthony Eden, during which he proposed a union between the two countries, with the British monarch becoming the French head of state.

Anthony Eden

Philippe Chassaigne, professor of modern and contemporary history at the University of Tours says that at the time France had many weaknesses which help explain why it put itself in such a subservient position.

"The French economy was not dominant in Europe. From a political point of view, France was weakened because of instability. Diplomatically, France was weak both on the European and on the world stage. I think that trying to get together with a country which was booming economically, and which had a colonial empire - even if it was called the Commonwealth, it was still basically an empire - could have strengthened the French position on the world stage."

The British Prime Minister, Anthony Eden, turned down Mollet's proposition for a union between France and England.... but the French premier was, apparently, determined to relinquish his country's sovereignty. He then suggested that France be allowed to join the British Commonwealth, telling Eden that he thought there would be ... "no difficulty" over France accepting the headship of "her Majesty".

But, judging by reactions to the idea on the streets of Paris today, it seems Mollet may have had a poor understanding of his fellow citizens:

"It would be absolutely impossible to think that it could have happened, and especially as France and England have such different points of view on so many things."

Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

"I don't know which would be the hardest: convincing the French to be English, or the English to be French. I don't think the French people would have agreed to that... well I know I wouldn’t have agreed to become British!"

But would the British public have accepted to merge with their neighbours, admired as they are for their savoir vivre. I put the questions to the Daily Mail's French correspondent, Peter Allen:

"If you look at the terms - it was on British terms - and Britain did the best out of it... remember Britain was once the proud owner of Calais, and British kings were always coming over to France to conquer French armies, of course it was the other way round sometimes as well - they might have accepted it, but in the long term I think it certainly would have all ended in tears."

Shortly after Mollet's proposal was made the British pulled out of Suez - the struggle with president Nasser was lost, and the idea of a Franco-British union was dropped. A year later France signed the Treaty of Rome, laying the foundation stones of the European Union, with France and Germany as the central players. One can only speculate how a possible 'Frangleterre' would have transformed squabbles over European integration....