Fabien Théofilakis's book examines a little-known aspect of wartime and especially postwar European history, namely, the detention of German prisoners of war (POWs) by the French. Although the history of military captivity has become a growth field in recent years, hitherto little has been known about these particular POWs, who numbered about one million at the end of 1945. With Théofilakis's lengthy study, it is safe to say that this is no longer the case. Based on a truly staggering array of archival sources from several countries, encompassing local and national, as well as public and private records, along with fifty or so interviews with former POWs, the book provides an exhaustive—and sometimes exhausting—treatment of the subject.

Théofilakis divides his study into three parts. Reflecting the emphasis in French historiography on lived experience (the vécu) of the two world wars, the first and by far the longest part explores captivity largely from the perspective of the POWs, beginning with their capture during the war and ending with their eventual release—a process that began in earnest in 1947 and was completed by 1949. It is interesting that the majority of prisoners, around 70 percent, were captured by the Americans and handed over to the French following a February 1945 agreement. In an immediate postwar period marked by critical shortages of basic goods for the general population across much of Europe, the French military and political authorities were woefully ill-prepared to administer this influx of prisoners, a situation that helps to explain the difficult conditions of German POWs who found themselves lacking food, clothing, and other basic necessities. This led to considerable suffering on their part, and Théofilakis estimates that between thiryt-five to forty thousand German POWs died in 1945 and 1946. Fortunately for the POWs, third-party intervention, particularly that of the United States and the International Red Cross, led to improved conditions.

Their subsequent experiences were marked less by hardship than by hard work. In the difficult context of postwar reconstruction, the French viewed German POWs as an indispensable reservoir of labor. Consequently, some 75 percent of German POWs were put to work, the great majority of them (almost 90 percent) for various French enterprises outside the POW camps. Of these, three quarters worked in the private sector, with the greatest number in agriculture and a smaller number in mining; a still smaller number (on average twenty-three thousand) worked clearing land mines, an activity with comparatively high death and injury rates, especially early on. This was clearly not a system of free labor, but it was not one of slave labor either. In some of the best sections of the book, Théofilakis describes the evolving efforts of French authorities to balance the imperative of labor with the need both to protect POWs against abuses and to encourage them to work. Athough the situation varied across localities, overall it appears that the vast majority of POWs were able to improve their sitiuation (access to food, clothing, etc.) by working. Also worth mentioning is the widespread phenomenon of escape, rendered possible by lax surveillance: during 1945–1947 the number of escapes averaged well over two hundred per day. If conditions became too onerous, many POWs could and did simply leave.

The second, shorter part of the book deals with the international aspects of the topic. Although claiming not to write a “classic diplomatic history” (407), Théofilakis's approach is largely an intergovernmental one that traces the interaction between various French and American authorities. For the French, the subject of German POWs presented an opportunity and a problem. As a “detaining power” responsible for a significant number of POWs, France could rightly claim a prominent voice in any inter-Allied negotiations concerning POWs—a claim that served the larger purpose of reaffirming France's place among the so-called great powers. At the same time, the French came under mounting American pressure to speed up the release of German POWs—pressure that not only conflicted with France's need for labor, but also highlighted its relatively weak bargaining position. Forced to compromise, the French agreed to the progressive release and repatriation of POWs, beginning in 1947 at a rate of twenty thousand each month.

The last and equally brief section of the book explores the interconnections between German POWs and France's occupation zone (Zone française d'occupation, or ZFO) in Germany. As Théofilakis shows, the plight of the POWs stirred considerable sympathy among the local population in the ZFO, which lobbied for their prompt return. It is significant that the local French authorities also had an interest in the release of German POWs, viewing them as a much-needed source of labor for the zone, as well as a potential means of promoting Franco-German reconciliation—even if the integration of returning POWs proved to be a strain on already limited resources.

There is little doubt that Les prisonniers de guerre allemands will become the definitive study on this subject. Its thoroughness, rooted in truly impressive research, will likely deter other scholars from approaching this topic for years to come. But thoroughness can have its drawbacks: Théofilakis's understandable reluctance to generalize means that the study occasionally gets bogged down in details. More generally, his focus on the French case makes it difficult to advance any larger argument about his subject. In the conclusion, Théofilakis suggests that German POWs acted as “pioneers” and “mediators” (573) in a more general process of Franco-German reconciliation and rapprochement after 1945. The reconciliation paradigm is always a tempting one when it comes to postwar Franco-German relations, but it remains unclear how France's treatment of German POWs—which appears to compare unfavorably to that of the United States (and perhaps to that of Britain, a country largely ignored in the study)—contributed concretely to this process. If Théofilakis has not necessarily written the last word on the subject, he has nevertheless provided a valuable study that combines the perspectives of German POWs with those of French authorities in Paris and in the ZFO.