French naval officers had to manage upward through governments whose average cabinet lasted eight months and ten days. Nineteen people served as prime minister between November 1918 and September 1939, but the period produced thirty separate cabinets, sometimes with multiple navy ministers in one government. Presidents Alexandre Millerand, Gaston Doumergue, Paul Doumer, and Albert Lebrun held longer tenures without supplying a consistent defence strategy, and they concentrated largely on domestic politics and Germany. Each cabinet reshuffle could bring new ministers and new budget priorities. The result was administrative discontinuity even when individual admirals remained in office for years.
Chapter · 27:02-33:02
Thirty cabinets kept naval policy in motion
Between November 1918 and September 1939, thirty cabinets under nineteen prime ministers repeatedly changed the ministers and budget priorities confronting French naval planners.