
A French army officer and statesman who led Free France against Nazi Germany and later founded the Fifth Republic, serving as its first President.
Một sĩ quan quân đội và chính khách người Pháp, người lãnh đạo Nước Pháp Tự do chống lại Đức Quốc xã và sau đó thành lập Đệ Ngũ Cộng hòa, trở thành Tổng thống đầu tiên của nó.
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Charles de Gaulle was born in 1890 into a family with a strong tradition of patriotism and Catholicism. A career soldier, he fought with distinction in World War I, where he was wounded and taken prisoner. In the interwar years, he became a vocal advocate for mechanized armored warfare, though his visionary ideas were largely ignored by the French military establishment. When France fell to Nazi Germany in 1940, de Gaulle fled to London, refusing to accept the armistice signed by the Vichy government.
On June 18, 1940, de Gaulle delivered a historic broadcast on the BBC, declaring that "France has lost a battle, but France has not lost the war." As the leader of the Free French Forces, he tirelessly worked to maintain French sovereignty and legitimacy among the Allied powers. After the liberation of Paris in 1944, he presided over the provisional government but resigned in 1946 due to disagreements over the new constitution. He retired from public life, waiting for the moment when his country would truly need his leadership again.
That moment arrived in 1958 during the Algerian War of Independence, which threatened to spark a civil war in France. De Gaulle returned as Prime Minister and drafted a new constitution that strengthened the executive branch, creating the Fifth Republic. As President, he ended the Algerian conflict, modernized the French economy, and pursued an independent foreign policy, famously withdrawing France from NATO's integrated military command. His vision of "Gaullism"—emphasizing national independence and a strong state—continues to be the bedrock of modern French political identity.