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Pavillon royal de la France

The fleur-de-lys, France's pre-Revolutionary flag, was the banner of the Action Francaise Party and became France's flag again after the Party took control of the country.

The Action Française was a Monarchist (Orléanist) counter-revolutionary movement and periodical in France, founded by Maurice Pujo and Henri Vaugeois, and whose principal ideologist was Charles Maurras.

It was founded in 1898 during the Dreyfus affair, partly in reaction to the left-wing revitalization which materialized in defense of the French Army captain. Originally a nationalist organization, which attracted figures such as Maurice Barrès, it became monarchist under the influence of Maurras, following the earlier ideas of counter-revolutionary theorist Joseph de Maistre. The Action Française was a prominent proponent of far right integral nationalism, which regarded the nation as an organic entity of blood and soil, akin to Germany's Nazi Party.

During World War II, many Action Française members collaborated with the occupying Germans. The party was dissolved following the Allied Forces' reclamation of France in 1944, but was reformed in 1947. With the deaths of Maurras in 1952 and Pujo in 1952, the party lost most of its momentum, yet exists in an abbreviated form to this day.

In 1965, the German historian Ernst Nolte claimed that Action Française was fascist. He considered Action Française to be the first fascist political party.

Action Francaise in Southern Victory[]

Action Française came to power in France after the country was humiliated again by Germany at the end of the Great War. Beginning in the early 1920s, it steadily built up support over the next decade by playing to the frustrations of the French people, and ultimately took power in the wake of the stock market crash of 1929. The party installed Charles XI as king.

In 1941, Action Française demanded the return of captured territory from Germany. Though the outcome of this was delayed by the ill-health and subsequent death of Kaiser Wilhelm II, his son Kaiser Friedrich Wilhelm V eventually refused. In response France went to war.

By 1943 France and the party had been overshadowed by Britain within the Entente. French forces were driven from German soil and into France itself. In the late winter of 1944, Germany dropped its second superbomb on Paris, killing King Charles and destroying much of the city. Louis XIX took the throne and concluded an armistice with the Germans, leaving Britain on its own to face Germany in Europe.

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