Background
Paul Baudouin was born into a wealthy family on December 19, 1894 in Paris.
Paul Baudouin was born into a wealthy family on December 19, 1894 in Paris.
He was chef de cabinet to six finance ministers. Baudouin was an inspector of finances (1921-26) and headed the Bank of Indochina (1927-40). A protege of Helene de Portes, Baudouin was Reynaud’s chef de cabinet after Reynaud became premier and dismissed the faithful Gaston Palewski. On 21 May Reynaud named Baudouin secretary to the War Cabinet with the official status of undersecretary of state. This made Baudouin privy to all War Cabinet business, all the better to keep his patronne informed. When the latter henpecked Reynaud into forming a new cabinet with more men of her political stripe, Baudouin became undersecretary for foreign affairs on 6 June. (Reynaud took the foreign minister portfolio after ousting Daladier.) From 13 June, the violently Anglophobic Baudouin was among those who advocated an armistice, and he became foreign minister in the Petain cabinet when Reynaud resigned. Holding the post in the Laval cabinet. Baudouin opposed the premier on several important issues, particularly any effort to reestablish diplomatic relations with the British. Baudouin became minister-secretary of state (ministre secretaire d'Etat h la presidence du Conscil) on 28 Oct 1940.
After helping oust Laval on 13 Dec 1941, he collaborated with Flandin, who moved up to be Petain’s deputy. When Flandin was succeeded by Darlan on 2 Jan 1941, Baudouin retired from politics and returned to his post in the Bank of Indochina.
Arrested in Sep 1944, he was convicted of collaboration and sentenced to five years of forced labor. He was conditionally released on 8 Jan 1948. Returning to his financial affairs. Baudouin published Neuf Mois cm gouvernement (1948), showing he was as slippery in print as in life.