“What France lacks is a general”

Graduated with a master’s degree in diplomacy and international relations from the American University in Washington DC, Louis Sarkozy is the author of Napoleon’s Library : The Emperor, His Books, and Their Influence on the Napoleonic Era (2024).

«I wake up in the middle of the night“, recounted former Conservative Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli, then five years old, “and I think of the past“. Whether out of love of History or socio-economic nostalgia, he is not alone. Le Figaro reports that in France, “only 13% of people feel satisfied with the current situation“. According to Ipsos, 64% of French people “would like their country to return to the way it was before“. It is important – before being overwhelmed by accusations of “reactionary!” – to ask why. Experts tell us that this nostalgia is just an illusion. Four years ago, Éric Dupond-Moretti affirmed that the feeling of insecurity was only a “fantasy“. Cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker wrote that “nothing is more responsible for nostalgia for the “good old days” than a bad memory“. Less than two weeks ago, the new Minister of Justice, Didier Migaud, assured us that judicial laxity did not exist.

This contrasts sharply with popular opinion. Indeed, 73% of French people believe that the quality of our education system has deteriorated, and a similar percentage considers that the country’s economic trajectory is worrying. In addition, 92% believe that insecurity is increasing in France. Meanwhile, much of our political class dreads the idea of ​​a referendum on immigration, fearing the mass rejection the move would likely provoke.

In reality, the figures prove the population right, not the elites. Virtually all studies show an increase in crime and insecurity. The meager measures adopted by our Parliament, particularly on immigration, are either ineffective or simply not implemented. Only 8% of OQTFs are implemented, and 10% of prison sentences are simply not applied, for reasons that defy logic. The increase in our national debt is staggering, and the state of our public finances is precarious, despite the fact that we are among the most taxed countries in the world! Our social system is unsustainable and doomed to implosion if it is not profoundly reformed. We lack teachers, nurses, doctors and money. But “everything is for the best in the best of all possible worlds», Pangloss repeats to us.

The people cannot be “managed”, appeased or deceived, they must be led. The chronic nostalgia of our compatriots is not for an easier time, but for a cause that can unite them.

Louis Sarkozy

The most serious is undoubtedly the erosion of our national identity. Overwhelmed on one side by pervasive political Islamism, and on the other by indigenous cultural relativism, that is, a culture that wishes to destroy ours accompanied by those who think its destruction is a good thing, we are losing the feeling of being French. Because, French people, effort is not something new in our History. We are an old country. The difficulty is not foreign to us. Neither does tragedy. How many pandemics have ravaged our populations? How many wars have devastated our fields and our homes?

How many superstitions and bigotry have divided us and pushed us against each other over the long centuries of which we pride ourselves? There are still people walking the streets of our towns and villages today, who were already alive when the invader sat triumphantly at the Hôtel Meurice in Paris. When French Jews were rounded up and sent to die. When thousands of French women were raped and French men sent to work under a flag that was not theirs.

We know all this. We endured all this. France endured it. Yet, despite these trials, our ancestors and our mothers never ran the risk of being stripped of their identity. They were and remained French – that is, united by a million social and political ties which then seemed eternal and inspired by a continuity which began millennia ago and continued from their time until to ours.

But today, the very idea of ​​“nation” has become suspect. The religion of multiculturalism and deconstruction is gradually making it disappear. We have observed it: instead of recognizing the extent of the problems, a large part of the political class often prefers to deny their existence. Things were better in the past, not only because education was of better quality, health care was more effective, security was more assured, immigration was less present, and prosperity was more accessible, but also because the effort had a meaning. It is not ease that is lacking, but incarnation. The French fear neither effort nor austerity – the centuries of our history bear witness to this – but rather nihilism, dishonesty and weakness. The people cannot be “managed”, appeased or deceived, they must be led. The chronic nostalgia of our compatriots is not for an easier time, but for a cause that can unite them. “To be tall“, said General de Gaulle, “it’s supporting a big quarrel“. We have quarrels. What’s missing is a general…