ABSTRACT
The one area where the Daladier government did take decisive action was in anticommunist repression. The Nazi-Soviet Pact produced a bitter backlash against the PCF, leading Daladier to dissolve the party, ban L'Humanite and arrest 3,400 activists. Arguably Daladier displayed more elan in persecuting the PCF than in waging the war against Germany and this anti-communism reached fever pitch when the Soviet Union invaded Finland on 30 November. In the following months Daladier's witch hunt gave his government so me sort of purpose and direction. By denouncing the PCF as traitors Daladier made it difficult for those conservatives who were ambivalent about the war to push for a positive response to Nazi peace proposals.
