The Muslim turn-out in the parliamentary elections that were to follow in November fell discouragingly to sixty-five per cent, but, reflecting as this did in part vexation with having to go to the polls a second time so soon after the first, the results still showed—statistically at least—a handsome backing for de Gaulle. What was far less satisfactory about them, however, was the orientation of most of the candidates returned, who were largely drawn from the ranks of the “integrationists”. There was thus a serious dearth of moderate nationalists among them, acting in defiance of the F.L.N. death-threats of those participating in this “colonialist election”. The F.L.N.’s curt rebuff to de Gaulle’s paix des braves overture, which had come in the middle of the November election campaign, also provided an additional deterrent to this eroded middle position.
Constantine plan and the “paix des braves”
Still in the full flush of his referendum triumph, on 3 October de Gaulle was in Constantine to make an important speech. In order that “this country, so vital and so courageous, but so difficult and suffering, should be profoundly transformed”, an ambitious Five-Year Plan was to be launched, with the object of turning backward Algeria into an industrialised nation. 400,000 new jobs were to be created; 250,000 hectares of new land distributed to Muslim farmers; salaries and wages raised to a par with metropolitan France; and administrative posts made available to Muslims on a ratio of one to ten with those of the mother country; vast new horizons of schooling to be opened to Muslim children. In Paris Lacoste grumbled in disgruntlement that it all offered nothing new over his discarded loicadre; maybe, but the important difference was that the Constantine Plan had the name of de Gaulle, and all his newly acquired authority and weight, attached to it. In his speech de Gaulle added a reminder that in the forthcoming legislative elections Algeria would vote under the same conditions as the mother country, but that “at least two-thirds of her representatives will have to be Muslim citizens”, and he concluded with a direct appeal to the F.L.N.:
Why kill? We must enable people to live. Why destroy? Our duty is to build. Why hate? We must co-operate.
Stop this absurd fighting and you will see at once a new blossoming of hope all over the land. You will see prisons emptying; you will see the opening of a future big enough for everybody, and for yourselves in particular….
To lend additional enticement to this revelation of a promised land, de Gaulle began to accelerate the number of rebels amnestied. On Armistice Day, a thousand would be released; on New Year’s Day 1959, another 7,000; on de Gaulle’s accession to the presidency all capital sentences would be commuted (among whom Yacef was to be a notable beneficiary); while Bastille Day 1959 would be chosen, appropriately enough, for the release of a further 5,000. Then, at his Press conference of 23 October, de Gaulle threw out his memorable soldier’s offer of a paix des braves:
I say unequivocally that, as for most of them, the men of the insurrection have fought courageously. Let the peace of the brave come, and I am sure that all hatred will fade away and disappear. What does this mean? Simply this: wherever they are organised for combat, their leaders need only enter into contact with the French command. The old warrior’s procedure, long used when one wanted to silence the guns, was to wave the white flag of truce. And I answer that, in this case, the combatants would be received and treated honourably.
The paix des braves utterance made an immeasurable impact. Jacques Fauvet of Le Monde confessed to being “arrested by the nobility of the tone, the harmony of the thought”; less romantically, Alain de Sérigny put forward in the Écho d’Alger the simple interpretation, “The white flag means surrender.”
The overture was also to bring with it (inevitably, it seems in hindsight, because the political intent behind it remained so imprecise) the first major reversal to de Gaulle’s hitherto triumphant procession. But already, soon after the initial exhilaration of June had begun to dissipate, little puffs of cloud had been appearing from a variety of directions. First of all the concept of integration, brought out of store and burnished-up by the Cinquième Bureau of the army during those heady moments of “fraternisation” in May, came swiftly under attack. In France serious intellects standing well outside the anti-Gaullist Left, such as Raymond Aron, pointed out the flaws by pragmatic arguments. On demographic calculations alone, Aron reckoned that within twenty-five years an integrated Algeria 18 million strong would swamp a metropolitan France of 48 million, politically if not numerically. Acting as a bloc, the seventy-five Muslim deputies which it would be Algeria’s right to send to the Palais Bourbon could provide a balance of power to whichever side of the Assembly they wished, thus preventing it from functioning normally. Integration would also slow down, if not halt, any rise in the French standard of living, and he concluded, “An Algerian France, if it pretends to regenerate France by governing it, will irremediably tear asunder the nation.” On the other hand, as de Gaulle points out in his memoirs, in Algeria the pieds noirs tended to regard integration in totally false terms “as a means of warding off the evolution towards equality and Algerian autonomy, of not only avoiding being engulfed by ten million Muslims but of submerging them instead among fifty million Frenchmen”. This was how they tended to interpret the idealistic slogan of the time: “Fifty-five million Frenchmen from Dunkirk to Tamanrasset.”[1] It was a matter of mathematical juggling; the Muslims of Algeria saw the equation simply in the ratio of ten-to-one; the pieds noirs tried to fix it in a ratio of fifty to ten. But the basic fact was that, whereas integration, if honourably entered into, might have worked happily in 1936 and less probably in 1945, by 1958 it had become at best a romantic delusion, at worst a confidence trick.
De Gaulle seems to have seen this, and as 1958 went on his references to integration became more and more perfunctory, and he assiduously avoided any explicit commitment to it. This in turn annoyed both the army in Algeria and the pieds noirs, both of whom were beginning to chafe at the lack of action and the vagueness of the lofty, ex cathedra pronouncements. During the Constantine speech of October, members of the local Committee of Public Safety had walked off the grandstand in outrage at de Gaulle’s conciliatory gestures towards the F.L.N. Closing ranks, the Left in France condemned the Constantine Plan as “neo-colonialism”: an attempt at “seducing the Algerian peasants by offering to them the urban mirage” declared Francis Jeanson.
But the full storm burst, from all sides, with the paix des braves offer. In France, even some of the left-of-centre moderates condemned it as inexorably leading to negotiations with the F.L.N., which were far too premature. Soustelle was deeply disquieted, and a breach between him and de Gaulle began to open. Speaking for the Left, Simone de Beauvoir said the “generous offer” was tantamount to “capitulation” for the F.L.N. if they took it up. And “capitulation” was equally the word heard in army as well as in pied noir circles in Algeria. The whiplash blow, however, came—perhaps predictably—from the F.L.N. in Tunis. Within forty-eight hours of de Gaulle’s offer of the paix des braves, it was rejected in summary and quite violent terms by the previously moderate Ferhat Abbas. “The problem of a ceasefire in Algeria”, he said, “is not simply a military problem. It is essentially political and negotiation must cover the whole question of Algeria.” He ended with a renewed appeal to the F.L.N. in Algeria for a war to the end, and his words were reinforced by a fresh campaign of terrorism.
First disenchantments
The F.L.N. rejection came as a deep shock to de Gaulle, and it is probably no exaggeration to rate it as one of the bitterest personal blows he ever suffered. It was hardened by the fact that he had already put out feelers towards the F.L.N. in June, through the intermediary of Abderrahmane Farès, former President of the Algiers Assembly, and had hoped for a more cordial response to his overture. He seems to have nurtured a mystical belief that somehow the F.L.N. would melt before his presence; that grandeur and generosity, as guaranteed by his person, had only to be displayed for the F.L.N. to come out of its caves
waving a white flag.[2] Both the offer and de Gaulle’s ensuing discountenance betrayed a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the revolt as well as of the F.L.N. leadership, which could go far to explaining some of the failures of communication in the years to come. At the same time, the slap in the face to de Gaulle produced a powerful reaction among the uncommitted Muslims in Algeria who, since May, had been so enticed by the spell of his stature and authority. It was also to have its influence on the Algerian elections in November. For the French position it was a tragedy that de Gaulle could not have struck with the paix des braves while the iron was hot in June, when it might well have gained substantial Muslim support. By the end of October the momentum was lost.
The growth of disenchantment occurred almost simultaneously within both the Muslim and pied noir communities towards the end of 1958. In “ultra” circles on the Committee of Public Safety there were already rumblings about a “second 13 May” to replace de Gaulle’s Neguib by a Nasser chosen among themselves. After the Constantine speech, but before the paix des braves, Lagaillarde, Ortiz and Martel had tried to call a general strike on 16 October in protest against de Gaulle’s betrayal. The idea was squashed by some plain talk from General Massu. But the seeds of later revolt had been sown; for the “ultras” would never be able to rid themselves of the notion that, as they had brought de Gaulle to power, so they could despatch him from it. Not, however, without the army.
De Gaulle purges the army
Even if it could be said that de Gaulle had dragged his feet in formulating an Algerian policy, the same could not be held against him in his dealings with the army after May 1958. For de Gaulle, in his whole upbringing and career, the French army was everything—or almost everything—and its state of health was a far more pressing worry to him than either the F.L.N. or the pieds noirs. It was, however, no longer the same army that he had known so well in 1940–5, and since February 1956 its over-riding objective had been a political one; to push the authorities into carrying out a policy of Algérie française. “By and large, this great body of men, by nature concerned with the short run rather than the long, clung to the idea that France should keep possession of Algeria, symbol of her ancient power.” Understanding all this, he was well aware that he had to tread warily with the army in Algeria, over-sensitised and vastly powerful as it had become since 13 May. Yet at the same time he appreciated that it cried out for a firm hand and, masochistically, for a restoration of discipline. In the last analysis, he reckoned, “the army would obey”. Thus “On this vast apparatus, effective in preventing the situation from worsening, but incapable of solving the insoluble, a wealth of ingenuity, conscientiousness and patience was expended.” Ruthlessly, but with caution, de Gaulle embarked on a major purge of the “activists” in the army of Algiers. The loyal Gaullist General Ely was brought back as Chief of the General Staff and given the task of scattering the ringleaders of May by posting them, in twos and threes, to units in France or Germany. By the following March only two of those officers were still left in Algeria, while some 1,500 others had either been transferred, or simply retired. One of those remaining was the dependable grognard, General Massu, eternally faithful to de Gaulle and only too delighted to get away from the bordel of politics and back to his regiments.
In October Massu and the other army officers were instructed by de Gaulle to withdraw from the Committee of Public Safety (which was subsequently stood down altogether). That same day an order to Salan announced categorically: “The moment has come when the military must cease to take part in any organisation with a political character…” Algiers seethed, and this was the casus belli for the “ultras” to attempt a general strike. But de Gaulle won, and for the time being the power of the army and the “ultras” was effectively separated. Next, in December, Salan, who since May had with plenipotentiary powers combined the roles of both Commander-in-Chief and de facto civil governor, was himself despatched into “gilded retreat” as military governor of Paris. De Gaulle had promised to recall him for “high destinies”, which had made Salan hope for nothing less than General Ely’s top job. Yet here, after all he had achieved in his two years in Algeria, as well as the outstanding services rendered in May—not least in the name of de Gaulle himself—was an almost insultingly sinecure appointment. On leaving Algiers shortly before Christmas, Salan received this glowing testimony from the man by whom it was painfully clear he was neither liked nor entirely trusted: “You have conducted yourself with honour…I don’t regard you just as a loyal supporter of great quality, but as my companion and my friend.” But this was hardly enough to allay the deep resentment felt by Salan, chief among the many purged army officers, and in view of his subsequent career these were to become bitterly ironical words. The chagrin was increased when de Gaulle apparently lacked the thoughtfulness to inform Salan about the identity of his successor until he actually arrived in Algiers.
Exit Salan: enter Delouvrier and Challe
To replace the all-powerful Salan, de Gaulle appointed a duumvirate—Paul Delouvrier and General Maurice Challe. The civil and military powers would be divided between them but, in contrast to the past, both posts would be more subject to control from Paris. Aged only forty-four, Delouvrier had been an unknown technocrat in Luxembourg when summoned by de Gaulle that October. A practising Catholic from the Vosges, he helped a Resistance maquis near Fontainebleau where he had joined hands with General Patton during the Liberation of 1944. Considered to be one of France’s outstanding financial brains, Delouvrier had been picked out by Jean Monnet to work on his team with the embryo European Community, and currently he was head of the financial division of the Coal and Steel Community in Luxembourg. Here he had demonstrated a remarkable capacity for work, and a certain high seriousness and authority in office. His tall, distinguished figure with a trim hairline moustache purveyed what the French tended to describe as a certain British elegance; but behind it lay a rather nervously sensitive personality. In no way did he resemble any of his predecessors in Algiers, and it appears that it was through his personal friendship with Michel Debré that Delouvrier first came to de Gaulle’s notice. He was aghast when told in October that de Gaulle had him in mind to succeed Salan, and that he was to go forthwith on a month’s “information tour” of Algeria. On his return he was received by de Gaulle at the Matignon, who asked for his impressions. Having noted how the attitude of the Muslim majority had now hardened towards independence since the initial euphoria of May, Delouvrier remarked: “Mon général, Algeria will be independent.”
At which de Gaulle is said to have waved him aside with, “In twenty-five years, Delouvrier, in twenty-five years….” Delouvrier was unable to decipher anything more precise about de Gaulle’s views on the future of Algeria. At a subsequent meeting Delouvrier remarked diffidently to de Gaulle that he felt he did not possess the “stature” for the job offered, to be told simply, “You’ll grow into it, Delouvrier….” His principal, and first, task would be to get the Constantine Plan under way, for which he would be allocated funds of 100 milliard (old) francs. “You are”, said de Gaulle with pointed emphasis, “France in Algeria—and not the representative of the Algerians in France.” Apart from this, Delouvrier’s instructions were extraordinarily vague—and would remain so.
Delouvrier’s other half, Maurice Challe, already mentioned in the context of the events of May, was a robust fifty-three with an open face and the physique of a rugger player. The two men together gave a good impression of youth and vigour. Working for the Resistance, Challe, a regular airman, had skilfully obtained the Luftwaffe order-of-battle on the eve of D-Day and transmitted it to London, for which he was awarded the British D.S.O. and a personal citation from Winston Churchill. His next contact with Britain was during the Suez campaign, as Mollet’s military envoy to Eden, and since then he had been deputy to the chief-of-staff. Well-liked by both equals and subordinates, Challe was as open as he looked: a calm, solid and tenacious pipe-smoker. There was nothing of th
e secretiveness of the “Mandarin” Salan about him; in fact, if anything he had a habit of speaking his mind too readily, which had slowed down his promotion on at least one occasion. He was a good Republican, an “unconditional Gaullist” but leaning marginally to the Left and maintaining close contacts with Guy Mollet. Above all, he was a highly competent airman, but also with a rare capacity for understanding land warfare; as such he was to prove the ablest of all the French commanders sent to Algeria. At their first meeting under the aegis of de Gaulle, Delouvrier and Challe took to each other instantly and were to work together throughout in the most outstanding harmony. Thus the omens could hardly have looked better. Challe’s brief was to mount the most crushing military offensive yet against the F.L.N., the success of which would be intended to give de Gaulle freedom to dispose the future of Algeria as he wished. Behind there also lay the perhaps more cynical secondary motive of distracting the army from any political discontents; “Give them tasks, they will think less…!” de Gaulle had declared at one of his first cabinet meetings.
A Savage War of Peace Page 45