Financial Times: European Comment: Not all that far-fetched: “Total’s cautious boss Thierry Desmarest has shown he can pull off big takeovers, with Elf and Petrofina. He has plenty of cash and more to come”
By Paul Betts
17 August 04
It may be silly summer season speculation. At least this is how the markets on Monday took revived talk of French oil champion Total bidding for Royal Dutch/Shell. But is it really so far-fetched?
The odds of Air France merging with KLM always looked slim. How could the French succeed where British Airways failed?
If anyone was to take over the Dutch airline, the British seemed best placed considering the once much-admired Anglo-Dutch business model long established by the likes of Unilever and Shell.
The French, however, confounded the sceptics. The new Franco-Dutch airline has just reported its first quarterly revenue figures, showing it is off to a flying start. The recent problems of Anglo-Dutch multinationals, not just Unilever and Shell but also steel group Corus, – suggest the model may be falling apart. Corus’s revival, incidentally, has been entrusted to a Frenchman. Time to replace the model with a Franco-Dutch alternative?
Total’s cautious boss Thierry Desmarest has shown he can pull off big takeovers, with Elf and Petrofina. He has plenty of cash and more to come when he disposes of his large Sanofi-Aventis stake.
Shell is finally considering changing the dual structure that has given it bullet-proof takeover protection, sheltering its now embattled management from the market’s ultimate sanction.
This could eventually provide Total with an opportunity. The French company is toying with buying into Russian oil. Shell, for all its troubles, would represent a safer prize, offering Total a big opening in America where it has trailed its peers. Not to mention the tax advantages of a Dutch registered company.
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
