International Scandals

The Eulenburg Affair in Germany (1906-1909) reverberated through Paris. The exposure of homosexuality in Kaiser Wilhelm's inner circle delighted French republicans seeing Prussian moral superiority undermined. French newspapers published salacious details while hypocritically condemning German decadence. The scandal's homophobia went unquestioned—the issue was German hypocrisy, not persecution of homosexuals.

The theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre in 1911 became international sensation. The painting's two-year absence embarrassed French cultural pretensions. When recovered from Italian nationalist Vincenzo Peruggia, who claimed to be returning it to Italy, the scandal revealed security failures and bureaucratic incompetence. Guillaume Apollinaire's brief arrest as suspect added artistic scandal to administrative failure.

Russian revolutionaries in Paris created diplomatic incidents. The 1907 "expropriation" of jewelry from rue Lafayette shops by Bolsheviks claiming revolutionary necessity strained Franco-Russian relations. French authorities, torn between alliance obligations and sympathy for political refugees, satisfied neither side. The scandal showed how international politics complicated domestic crime.