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Africa: North

Algeria marks 50th anniversary of war of independence with France

2004-10-28

I believe that this war is one of the prototypes used by al-Q in its current operations. Note that the scheme was cooked up and nurtured in Egypt. And also that the UN was used to provide the appearance of legitimacy for terroristic acts performed in the name of "self-determination."
Fifty years ago Sunday, Algerian nationalists sparked what was to become one of the African continent's bloodiest independence wars with a series of some 60 nearly simultaneous explosions and attacks that left a dozen people dead. Their meticulously planned surprise operation targeted symbols of French rule such as police stations, municipal buildings, bridges and electrical facilities, stunning the colonial authorities only months after France lost Indochina at Dien Bien Phu.

Multiple coordinated explosions, check. Infrastructure targeted along with civilians, check. Complete and utter surprise, check.

It would take the French political class nearly nine more blood-soaked years to grasp the amplitude of the rebellion, and to break ranks with proponents of an eternal French Algeria.

Elites in France completely clueless and in denial, check.

The National Liberation Front (FLN), announcing in Cairo its intent to wrest independence from France after 132 years under its rule, was immediately embraced by charismatic Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser, at a time when European colonial powers, weakened by World War Two, faced a wave of nationalism encouraged by the defeat of Nazi totalitarianism.

Someone more knowledgeable about Nasser's role will have to comment here.

Nasser getting revenge for Suez, 1956, check.

Posted by:Seafarious

#6 An interesting site is anp.org, the Free Algerian Officers Movement, an pro-democracy organization. I'm not vouching for its authenticity, but according to it, Algeria is run by a mafioso military, the rancid leftovers of the original FLN. Even El Para is considered to be on the payroll of the generals.

Posted by: chicago mike 2004-10-28 3:28:54 PM

#5 OAS Rules!

Posted by: borgboy 2004-10-28 12:29:59 PM

#4 not quite Chuck. Yeah, algeria was theoretically part of France, like New mexico part of the US. But suppose New Mexico was 90% Apache, and Apaches could vote only if they renounced Apache customs, and few did so.

Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-10-28 10:33:00 AM

#3 Remember the heroes of the 13th Demibrigade!

This was the equivalent of giving New Mexico back to the Apaches.

Posted by: Chuck Simmins 2004-10-28 10:30:38 AM

#2 I've always thought it was odd that France tested its first nuclear bombs in Algeria while the war was in progress, though the test sites were in remote parts of the Sahara very far from the urban centers of the conflict (French forces had almost eliminated organized rural resistance by then.)
The French in Algeria pioneered some of the techniques that were later used in Vietnam, including extensive use of helicopters. It also presaged Vietnam in deploying air power of all kinds on an unprecedentd scale for guerrilla warfare. In 1958, according to British historian William Green, L'Armee de L'Air had more than 800 aircraft in Algeria, with more from the Navy and Army.
Two American aircraft that figured prominently in the Vietnam War, the T-28 and The AD Skyraider, (later re-designated A-1) saw extensive service in Algeria, as did the H-34 helicopter and several other US aircraft.

French AD-4 (A-1D) Skyraider as used in Algeria, 1960 (1/48 model)

Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2004-10-28 2:30:47 AM

#1 The very first victim of the Algerian rebellion was an Algerian, seconds later were killed the couple of French teachers he had persuaded to come to teach the children of his village.

Quite a symbol since the FLN main feature was its brutality toward suppressing any Algerian who didn't support it (including those supporting other liberation movements): entire villages were destroyed and its population (children included) put to death in the most sadistic ways. The other feature is that after the independence the Socialist Algeria created the most backward woman legismlation of all Maghreb and, in order to Arabize the Berber population, it brought Egyptian "teachers" who had zero qualifications and were mostly from the Muslim Brotherhood (outlawed in Egypt). Ah, the Berber websites tell that the operation who allowed the French Army to decapitate the Berber resistance was allowed by info given by the Arab leaders of the FLN

Posted by: JFM 2004-10-28 1:47:55 AM

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