L'enfant de l'ennemi, 1914-1918: viol, avortement, infanticide pendant la Grande Guerre

The “children of the enemy”: this is what the results of the rapes perpetrated by German soldiers were called in France during the Great War. But which future was reserved for these children? Would they be capable of becoming good Frenchmen? Was it permitted, or even recommended, to “get rid” of these children? In this book, which has become a classic, the author unveils the little-known aspects of thte conflict and nourishes reflection on the way “a culture of war” was forged. Between 1914 and 1918, semantic prohibitions were lifted, and the story of the rapes helped in the construction of a now-animalized enemy. The debate surrounding unborn children reveals a French opinion traumatized by unprecedented war violence, in which moral norms were upended.