French politician Pierre Laval (1883-1945) served as chief minister in the World War II Vichy regime. He was later tried for treason and executed.

Pierre Laval was born on June 28, 1883, the son of a café owner at Châteldon. Financing his legal education by tutoring, he entered politics on the extreme left. After earning a reputation as a labor lawyer, he was sent to Parliament in 1914 as a Socialist deputy by the working-class voters of Aubervilliers. During World War I Laval first demonstrated the extreme ideological flexibility that marked his entire career. Aligned for 2 years with Joseph Caillaux, who advocated a negotiated peace with Germany, Laval was known as a defeatist. Sensing that Caillaux's views were increasingly unpopular, Laval adeptly switched sides in 1917. Soon he clamored for the return to power of the ultranationalist Georges Clemenceau, who became prime minister in November 1917 and immediately jailed Caillaux...