Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945

by Tony Judt

Contacts made in the Resistance did sometimes survive—the post-war ‘depillarization’ of Dutch society, for example, the breaking down of the centuries-long denominational divide between communities of Catholics and Protestants, began with personal links forged in wartime. But plans for a post-war ‘Resistance Party’ failed everywhere. They came closest to fruition in Italy, where Ferrucio Parri became Prime Minister in June 1945 and promised that his Action Party would pursue the spirit and goals of the Resistance. But Parri was no politician and when he fell, six months later, political power shifted definitively into the hands of the traditional parties. De Gaulle, in France, was a far better political strategist but he, too, abandoned office (one month after Parri) rather than accommodate his wartime ambitions to parliamentary routine—thus paying unintended tribute to his own success in re-establishing the continuity of the Republic.

War-time leaders/politicians did not last long in power after the war, even De Gaulle.