French countermeasures such as ratissages and prison drove Algerians into the F.L.N.

Evidence

Quickly he realised both that poverty was far more dire and that the revolt was far more serious than metropolitan France yet appreciated. “Terror had taken hold. No one spoke,” he wrote later. “The population as a whole, without throwing in its lot with the rebels … remained frightened and noncommittal.” He also saw the futility of General Cherrière’s grandiose and elephantine ratissages, the ill-named Operations “Véronique” and “Violette” that were then under way, and agreed with the analysis Vaujour prepared for him on his return to Algiers: “To send in tank units, to destroy villages, to bombard certain zones, this is no longer the fine comb; it is using a sledgehammer to kill fleas. And what is much more serious, it is to encourage the young — and sometimes the less young — to go into the maquis.” — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 342 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Persuasively he pointed out to Monteil how the French ratissages operations were “our best recruiting agent”, and after this extraordinary first meeting between a F.L.N. leader and a French official, Monteil left with the firm impression of “a man of faith, and of good faith, pushed to the limits by a lively sentiment of the injustice that has hit his people”. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 348 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

When the Blum-Viollette Bill collapsed, however, an impossible predicament confronted the liberals: on the one hand, they saw themselves looked on as renegades by Messali and the Ulema; on the other, they were rejected by the French. It was a bitter personal disillusion for Abbas, who, from this moment, began to move away from the ideal of assimilation towards some form of autonomy for Algeria. Thus, at least ideologically, he and his supporters were brought a long step closer to the “revolutionaries” — a progression, tragic for France, that was to be repeated each time “moderate” Algerian nationalists found their overtures repulsed by the government of France, or by the pied noir lobbies. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 115 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: France regrouped a million Algerians to sever the army from the people — Frantz Fanon, A Dying Colonialism, 99; Regroupment camps won militarily but drove Algerians into F.L.N. ranks; French punitive failures drove uncommitted Auresians to join the F.L.N. (+16 more)

Related

• Regroupment camps won militarily but drove Algerians into F.L.N. ranks (similarity 0.92)
• French failed counterinsurgency reprisals drove the uncommitted into the F.L.N. (similarity 0.91)
• Heavy-handed military reprisals in Algeria drove more Algerians to join the rebels. (similarity 0.91)
• France’s refusal to restrain settler fascism drove liberal Algerians to the F.L.N. (similarity 0.87)
• French army sweeping operations drove Algerians into the F.L.N. (similarity 0.87)
• FLN gained most from French brutal strike-breaking methods. (similarity 0.87)
• French punitive failures drove uncommitted Auresians to join the F.L.N. (similarity 0.87)
• Fear of castration conditioned brutal French reprisals against Algerians. (similarity 0.87)
• Closing legal channels of protest pushed Algerians toward violent resistance. (similarity 0.85)
• France regrouped a million Algerians to sever the army from the people (similarity 0.84)
• Rural Algerians underwent a profound revolutionary politicization that French administrators could not reverse. (similarity 0.84)
• Brutal French reprisals backfired by deepening Algerian hatred of France (similarity 0.84)
• French regroupment policy severed the FLN from village support (similarity 0.82)
• Guerrilla warfare made French suppression of the insurgency fail (similarity 0.82)
• French repression’s martyrs and the F.L.N.’s mere survival drove its 1955 recruitment (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Heavy-handed military reprisals in Algeria drove more Algerians to join the rebels. #corroborates (0.90) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 342
• French army sweeping operations drove Algerians into the F.L.N. #corroborates (0.85) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 348
• France’s rejection of moderate Algerian reformers radicalized them into revolutionaries #expands (0.50) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 115
• Torture became institutionalized in the French army during the Battle of Algiers #expands (0.40) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 592