French chief of the defence staff who replaced Navarre as high commissioner and commander-in-chief in Indochina after Điện Biên Phủ
Born in Thessaloniki and a Saint-Cyr graduate, he was badly wounded in 1940, joined the Army Resistance Organisation in late 1942 and in 1944 became de Gaulle's national military delegate. The first Chief of the Defence Staff from 1953, he discussed in Washington in March 1954 an American air strike to relieve Điện Biên Phủ (Operation Vulture). Appointed in June 1954 to replace Navarre as high commissioner and commander-in-chief in Indochina, he ordered the evacuation of the southern Red River Delta, regrouped the expeditionary corps after the Geneva Accords and agreed to hand the training of the South Vietnamese army to the American advisory group. Sympathetic to the putschists in May 1958, he resigned, returned under de Gaulle to purge extremist officers, and retired in 1961.
Also known as: Paul Ely · Paul Henri Romuald Ély
Activities and affiliations
-
1919–1961
France state institutionsChief of the Defence StaffMain
Military command -
1954–1955
France state institutionsHigh Commissioner and C-in-C in Indochina
Government and administration
Career Timeline
- 1915Volunteers in the First World War
- 1942–1944Army Resistance Organisation; de Gaulle's national military delegate
- 1949–1953French representative to NATO's standing military bodies
- 1953–1954Chief of the Defence Staff
- 1954–1955High Commissioner and commander-in-chief in Indochina
- 1956–1961Chief of the Defence Staff (briefly resigned in May 1958)