23. Laval Met a Well-Deserved Traitor’s Death
Pierre Laval was convinced that Germany would win WWII, so he eagerly collaborated with the Nazis to secure France a favored position after the war. During the Vichy Regime, he served as vice president of the Council of Ministers for five months in 1940, until dismissed by Petain. Laval returned to power and headed the Vichy government from 1942 until the liberation of France in 1944. In an infamous 1942 speech, he declared his hope that Germany win the war. A traitorous jerk through and through, he avidly persecuted the French Resistance.
Laval also rounded up Frenchmen for labor in Germany and the German war effort, and helped round up and deport French Jews to the concentration and extermination camps. Arrested by the Free French after the liberation of France, he was tried alongside Petain after the war on charges of high treason. Laval tried to justify his treason by arguing that he had France’s best interests in mind all along, but to no avail. He was convicted and sentenced to death. After a failed suicide attempt by poison, he was executed by firing squad on October 15, 1945.