1. Annual of French Studies 2022: The French outside of France (2022)
2. Memoires of Ch.-A. Faux-Pas-Bidet about his stay in Russia in 1917-1918

Memoires of Ch.-A. Faux-Pas-Bidet about his stay in Russia in 1917-1918

Galkina Yulia

The revolutionary events of 1917-1918 and the Soviets Russia’s withdrawal from the First World War necessitated the representatives of the Entente to look for effective means of influencing on the complicated situation to restore a combat-ready front in the East. The French secret services took an active part in it. One of the main figures in these events was the Commissioner of the Parisian Police’s Prefecture Charles-Adolphe Faux-Pas-Bidet. The activity of representatives of the Third Republic in the escalation of the Civil War in Russia and their role in the intervention is still little-known. The author managed to establish that the French counterintelligence agent had informants capable of providing information from the highest echelons of Soviet power. The article sheds light on the role of the French in establishing the myth of the Bolsheviks as “paid German agents” and on the assassination of the German ambassador Mirbach, identifies the personnel of the counterintelligence department of the French military mission and highlights the level of awareness of the French special services about the events taking place in Soviet Russia. The article also provides an opportunity for further identification of French counterintelligence informants. After a mission in Russia Сh.-A. Faux-Pas-Bidet continued to work in the special services on the Russian section, devoting his activities to the fight against the “Soviet threat”. The article is based on his memoirs. The author used also the documents from the French archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Historical Service of the French Ministry of Defense.

Keywords: Russian Revolution, World War I, Third Republic, counterintelligence

Link: Galkina Y. Memoires of Ch.-A. Faux-Pas-Bidet about his stay in Russia in 1917-1918 // Annual of French Studies 2022: The French outside of France.М. P. 191-204.

The study was supported by a grant from the Russian Science Foundation, project No. 20-78-10014 “From Consent to the Pact: Franco-Russian/French-Soviet Relations in the Period of the 1890s-1930s”.

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