Word: bidault
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...first fortnight came in a plenary session the day after Molotov had lost in the Rules Committee (actually the same people who make up the Conference) his two-day fight to tie the committee up with a rule requiring a two-thirds vote. France's Georges Bidault, first chairman of the Conference, opened the plenary session: "We are now called upon to vote on our rules of procedure, adopted yesterday by a competent committee." Then he blandly continued: "If there are no observations, will those delegates in favor of the adoption of these rules please raise their hands...
Lack of Ambiance. The conference's first week was hopeful but unexciting. Under the bored and stony stares of Charlemagne and Saint Louis in the Luxembourg Palace, orators and translators droned on verbosely, while temporary chairman Georges Bidault listened politely from the sun flooded rostrum. Prime Minister Attlee did crossword puzzles. Molotov suffered in silence, his hands folded in his lap. Some delegates slept. Even the Gobelin-hung bar was quiet. Americans favored champagne; in the absence of vodka, the Russians went in for cognac. But, sighed the bartender: "Il n'y a pas d'ambiance...
Premier-President Bidault served champagne in the Clemenceau Salon (recently named for the man who really won the game...
...Bidault's opening speech was cautiously optimistic. Said he: "We have all suffered in trying to banish [war]. Gentlemen, it is now time to begin to succeed...
...Cabinet, the Reds supported President-Premier Bidault's stand opposing the Molotov plan. But as good Communists, they knew that Stalin was still Stalin and Molotov his prophet. Its faith unshaken, but its vital gift for rationalization badly disrupted, Communist Humanite babbled: ". . . no insoluble divergence. Subsequent discussions will explain these questions more clearly." An emergency Communist line was appearing, to the effect that Russia was merely trying to keep perfidious Albion's claws off the Ruhr. French Communists would have to take comfort from the thought that their present distress was only a tactical interlude in Communism...