After serving in World War I he became professor of history in Paris. During World War II he became a distinguished leader of the French resistance movement. He was a founder-member and leader (1949) of the Mouvement Républicaine Populaire. Bidault was Foreign Minister in several administrations of the Fourth Republic (1944, 1947, 1953–54) and Prime Minister (1946, 1949–50, 1958). He subsequently became bitterly opposed to Algerian independence: he became President of the National Resistance Council in 1962, was charged with plotting against the state, and went into exile in Brazil. He returned to France in 1968.