A captured rebel leader outwitted French interrogation by feigning defection.
Evidence
In all this saga of upheaval in the echelons of Wilaya 4, French Intelligence suffered one notable reverse at the hands of Major Azedine, the former boiler-maker and deputy military commander to Si M’hamed. In November 1958 Massu had mounted a powerful sweep of the country round Palestro in the course of which Azedine had been captured, with a shattered forearm. Under interrogation Azedine declared convincingly that he was at odds with the conduct of the war by the G.P.R.A. He felt it should now make peace with de Gaulle, whose return to power had made the whole struggle “senseless”. Azedine offered to negotiate a surrender with the leaders of Wilaya 4, and actually made several trips into the maquis to this end, on “parole”. At the same time he fed his captors with quantities of false information, and exploited a local cease-fire to get a shipment of supplies through to his Wilaya. Then one day in December he vanished quietly into the mountains behind Blida and was never seen again—until he emerged as the F.L.N. commander negotiating the take-over of Algiers in the last days of the war. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 985
Categorization
- QUESTION: Azedine’s disappearance and later emergence as the Algiers negotiator invites tracing his path through the rest of the war.
- XREF: Parallels the broader bleuite disinformation theme and counterintelligence battles elsewhere in the chapter.