L’Irak et La bataille d’Alger

L’Irak et La bataille d’Alger

14 février 2005 — Nous nous arrêtons à un texte consacré à la question du terrorisme et à la façon dont, à cette lumière, la guerre est menée en Irak. Cette analyse est originaire de la grande presse américaine (UPI) et elle est (pourtant) absolument remarquable. En cela, c’est déjà, sur la question délicatissime qu’il traite, un événement remarquable. Il s’appuie sur la référence de la guerre d’Algérie et du film La bataille d’Alger, — la vision de ce film par l’auteur est même la cause conjoncturelle de l’analyse, — sur lequel tant de sornettes ont été écrites. Richard Sale, Intelligence Correspondant chez UPI, évite lestement le piège des sornettes.

(Nous reviendrons sur le cheminement du film La bataille d’Alger dans les réflexions US, essentiellement au Pentagone, sur la guerre contre le terrorisme. C’est à l’été 2003 qu’a été signalé pour la première fois que ce film, et la guerre d’Algérie par conséquent mais la guerre d’Algérie principalement au travers de ce film, servaient de références aux experts du Pentagone et d’ailleurs pour essayer de comprendre la guerre contre le terrorisme. C’est dans un texte de David Ignatius, dans le Washington Post du 26 août 2003, qu’il est fait mention du fait dans la presse pour la première fois, dans ces termes: « Pentagon sources report one hopeful sign that the military is thinking creatively and unconventionally about Iraq. The Pentagon's special operations chiefs have scheduled a showing tomorrow in the Army auditorium of “The Battle of Algiers,” a classic film that examines how the French, despite overwhelming military superiority, were defeated by Algerian resistance fighters. » Comme on le lit plus bas, Richard Sale rapporte cette remarque judicieuse d’une de ses sources sur l’effet de cette initiative: « Everyone seems to take away from it the message they want rather than the message the film conveys. » C’est évident dès la remarque d’Igniatius, qui affirme que les Français furent battus par le FLN, ce qui est historiquement et militairement faux: la guerre d’Algérie fut militairement gagnée par la France (c’était fait à l’été 1960, après le succès des opérations Jumelles et du plan Challe, qui brisèrent les structures politico-militaires de l’ALN) mais la politique décidée par le général de Gaulle fut de donner l’indépendance à l’Algérie.)

Richard Sale cite un de ses amis, colonel de l’U.S. Army, lui-même citant le colonel Roger Trinquier, qui fit la guerre d’Indochine et la guerre d’Algérie (notamment à la tête du 2ème RPC, — Régiment de Parachutistes Coloniaux, devenu RPIMa, ou Régiment de Parachutistes d’Infanterie de Marine, — et non comme “officier de renseignement”, comme l’indique Sale). Effectivement, Trinquier a été une des principales sources de l’U.S. Army dans son étude de l’histoire et de la technique de la “guerre contre-révolutionnaire” (comme l’appelait Trinquier).

C’est notamment à la lumière des écrits de Trinquier que Richard Sale propose son analyse (très) critique du problème américain face au terrorisme et à la guérilla, principalement en Irak. Cela permet à Sale de proposer des remarques bien inhabituelles sous une plume américaine, comme celle-ci qui implique que tous les terroristes ne sont pas des créatures du Diable à brûler immédiatement et que la thèse philosophique du bien contre le mal de GW Bush n’est pas nécessairement l’extrême de la pensée politique occidentale :

« But Trinquier notes that the FLN terrorist should not be considered a criminal because he “fights within the framework of his organization, without personal interest, for a cause he considers noble and for a respectable idea.” Trinquier's fairness of portrayal of the French attitude toward Algerian terrorism and the Frenchman's refusal to talk cant from some melodramatic high ground of good vs. evil is refreshing, and his respect for the enemy clearly required great moral courage. »

L’ensemble de l’analyse est à cette aune et montre aussi bien l’extraordinaire erreur générale qui caractérise le comportement américain en Irak. Il s’agit principalement des rapports des Américains avec la population, ce par quoi, selon Trinquier et les Français, se gagne ou se perd une guerre anti-guérilla. «  For the French, this was another principle to be observed. Your forces had to be in constant contact with the populace to develop rapport. If you withdrew to fortified areas, you left those vacated areas in control of the enemy. There were no Green Zones in Algiers. »

Au-delà de l’analyse de la guerre et de ses échecs, il est manifeste qu’on se trouve devant deux conceptions du monde, deux attitudes psychologiques collectives profondément étrangères l’une à l’autre. Rappelant la guerre d’Algérie et les conceptions françaises en général, l’analyse montre que toutes les conceptions sur le terrorisme, sur la guérilla, sur les affrontements soi- disant de civilisations, présentés aujourd’hui comme des conflits postmodernes, caractéristiques du XXIème siècle et inaugurant une ère nouvelle, sont en réalité des phénomènes bien anciens, qui ont toujours existé d’une façon ou l’autre, particulièrement dans le cadre des conflits de la colonisation et de la décolonisation.

Voici le texte de Richard Sale, publié le 11 février 2005.

Review: “Battle of Algiers”

By Richard Sale, UPI Intelligence Correspondent, February 11, 2005

New York — Over the weekend I viewed the film ''The Battle of Algiers,'' which I had not seen since the mid-1970s. Made by leftist filmmaker, Gille Pontecorvo, the film was startlingly real and, given its highly charged subject, displays an amazing fairness toward both sides.

This may seem an odd time to review a film made in 1966, but it is a film that has been frequently viewed within the last two years or so by senior Bush administration officials, according to serving U.S. intelligence sources. “Everyone seems to take away from it the message they want rather than the message the film conveys,” one of these told United Press International, speaking on condition of strict anonymity.

But what made the film stand out for me was that the principles of counterinsurgency are so accurately presented.

I had a recent angry e-mail from a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel in Iraq who said that modern masterpieces of intelligence writing such as “Modern War” by Roger Trinquier, an intelligence officer of the French Army who played a major part in helping Paris win the Battle of Algiers, were being neglected by everyone in Iraq, but especially people in the press.

So this column may be the appropriate place to give Trinquier's principles some attention.

Very early in the film, the Algerian insurgent organization — the FLN, or National Liberation Front — issues a directive aimed at the populace. The directive is quite paternal and dictatorial in its tone. The FLN, the directive says, knows what is best for the populace to do and believe in order to rid Algiers of the French yoke, and, on the grounds of this worthy aim, indicative of superiority, demands the support of the populace.

Thus, a key objective of any insurgency very quickly emerges: in a guerrilla war, the allegiance of the civilian population becomes the most vital objectives of the struggle. Failing that, control of the populace is next in importance, a difficult goal to attain since insurgents often can impose themselves on the bulk of the population by means of terror, and in spite of the population's own views. As a result, even a cowed population can be used against the legitimate power, providing cover and support, etc.

In the film, it's clear the FLN was quick to use terror as part of its recruitment and assertion of authenticity. In seeking to control the Algerian people, the FLN chose terror and the murder of innocents as an appropriate weapon, and its effectiveness is undeniable.

What one sees next in the film is that the FLN, a clandestine group of 1,200 armed men supported by another 4500, is very clear about its aims: it wants to overthrow French authority and replace it with its own.

Trinquier says in his book: “What characterizes modern terrorism, and makes for its basic strength, is the slaughter of generally defenseless persons.”

Trinquier also adds another strength utilized by insurgents: “Agents of the (FLN) have a free hand to organize and to manipulate the population at will.” The atrocities committed by the FLN to increase its hold over the population of Algiers were “innumerable,” says Trinquier, a real echo of the slaughter of innocents in Iraq.

But Trinquier notes that the FLN terrorist should not be considered a criminal because he “fights within the framework of his organization, without personal interest, for a cause he considers noble and for a respectable idea.” Trinquier's fairness of portrayal of the French attitude toward Algerian terrorism and the Frenchman's refusal to talk cant from some melodramatic high ground of good vs. evil is refreshing, and his respect for the enemy clearly required great moral courage.

This same exacting balance is accurately portrayed in the film.

How did the French win the battle of Algiers? By means of information, the careful collection of intelligence.

I read somewhere that when Napoleon captured cities in the Rhine in 1806, he first made an inventory of the houses there, giving each a number. He then had his officials interview the oldest inhabitant of the house and got from him or her a list of tenants. Any tenants who remained missing or unaccounted for were presumed to be suspects and became objects of investigation and/or pursuit.

A friend of mine in England, Colin Rowat, told me recently that the British intelligence had done something similar when they entered Iraq in the 1920s, undergoing a very careful program of mapping the tribes.

In the film, a French paratroop colonel is shown before a blackboard outlining what they know about the organization set up so each member knows only the man who chose him to serve and the two men he chose as his subordinates.

According to Trinquier, French intelligence was very methodical. It divided the city into districts, each of which had a chief and two or three assistants. These divided the district into sub-districts, and so on, until each building or group of buildings got a chief and two or three assistants who were in direct contact with the populace.

For the French, this was another principle to be observed. Your forces had to be in constant contact with the populace to develop rapport. If you withdrew to fortified areas, you left those vacated areas in control of the enemy.

There were no Green Zones in Algiers.

And the French, unlike U.S. forces in Iraq, were delicately tactful in their dealings with the populace — they knew the inhabitants would reject any cooperation that would subject them to enemy retaliation and so were very canny and careful.

The French also conducted a census of the city's entire population. Once a relation was established with the populace, the chiefs of sub divisions were designated. The chief qualification of the sub-district leader was that he have “firm attachments in the sub-district,” whether it was a shop, business, or large family that would be “difficult for him to abandon.”

The sub-district leader stood at the apex of an organization that was parallel to the terrorists'.

As a next step, all the city inhabitants were given a census card, one of which was in the hands of French intelligence or French police.

The French immediately understood that the chief object of their warfare was the protection of the population, not the pursuit and killing of bad guys.

The film makes clear that to gain information on FLN cells before those cells could regroup, merciless torture was employed. The French colonel of intelligence admits this to the French press, but asks them, do they want France to remain in Algiers or get out? If they want Algeria to remain French, then they must be willing to bear the moral risks and heavy ethical costs.

In no way do I condone torture, but I have not been forced to face the necessities that the French had to face in getting intelligence swiftly in order to collapse the terrorist cells.

In any case, the film is a masterpiece well worth seeing. Considering the scriptwriter, Franco Solinas, was a communist, the work has remarkable evenness of characterization throughout. It may not be just, but it is fair. And the message is clear: The French won the battle, but lost the war.

Algeria became independent, and the film ends with joyous Arab crowds in the streets, celebrating, keeping out of sight the slaughter by the FLN of between 30,000 to 150,000 Arabs who had remained loyal to France, this figure according to military historian John Keegan.

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