The biggest strike wave since 1948 rolled over France last week. Forming first in the West, where rioting Saint-Nazaire shipbuilders broke through for a big pay increase, the movement swept 150,000 provincial workers into "revolving" strikes of staccato stoppages, protest marches and slowdowns. Foundrymen walked out in Chauny, metalworkers struck in Montluçon, and at Nantes, 15,000 locked-out strikers surged every morning against shipyard gates demanding the same terms granted in Saint-Nazaire. At least a score of French industrial cities in the South, and Southeast were hit.
By week's end the breaker had washed over Paris, swamping the capital's transport system....
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