France’s Algerian military dominance coexisted with its political weakness at home

Evidence

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. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 952 (#expands, via linked claim)

For the Gaullists the whole “State of France” was what was at issue, of which Algeria was but part. It was admittedly a very large part, but the progressive revelation of its relativity in the mind of de Gaulle himself was to be the source of the bitterest and most dangerous disillusions in the years to come. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 849 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The asymetric strengths of France and the F.L.N. reversed across the home-abroad divide.; Algeria would be lost on France’s interior political front, not on the military front; Defeat in Algeria paradoxically produced a stronger France (+14 more)

Related

• De Gaulle’s Algeria offensive aimed partly to distract the army from politics (similarity 0.91)
• De Gaulle’s allies saw Algeria as subordinate to the French state’s crisis (similarity 0.89)
• Challe’s focus on battlefield offensives blinded him to his colonels’ plotting (similarity 0.86)
• Algeria would be lost on France’s interior political front, not on the military front (similarity 0.86)
• The French army in Algeria transformed from clumsy to effective by 1956 (similarity 0.86)
• De Gaulle’s conciliatory gestures angered the army while winning no concessions from the F.L.N. (similarity 0.85)
• By 1956 the French army’s overriding aim became political, pushing Algérie française. (similarity 0.85)
• Charles X invaded Algeria to distract from domestic unpopularity (similarity 0.85)
• Defeat in Algeria paradoxically produced a stronger France (similarity 0.84)
• Military victory elevated the army to ultimate political arbiter in Algeria (similarity 0.84)
• Algeria was only one element of de Gaulle’s larger ambitions. (similarity 0.84)
• Military pacification ended and politics dominated as the war wound down (similarity 0.84)
• Soustelle predicted France would lose Algeria on the home front, not militarily. (similarity 0.83)
• Challe confined the coup to Algeria to keep fighting the ALN (similarity 0.83)
• De Gaulle symbolically asserted civilian control over the military in Algeria (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• De Gaulle’s Algeria offensive aimed partly to distract the army from politics #expands (0.60) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 952
• De Gaulle’s allies saw Algeria as subordinate to the French state’s crisis #corroborates (0.60) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 849