Propaganda created unrealistic expectations about easily exploiting the African interior

Evidence

I continued to have discussions with my Moslem friends. Little by little, I was beginning to understand the meaning of the armed struggle and its necessity. But I expressed doubts as to the value of the armed action that was being carried on. Having no other source of information than the local press, we were subjected daily to the colonialist propaganda that made the fellagha out to be extremists and highway bandits. We partly accepted these views, but it could not be gainsaid that the horrors of the repression fully counterbalanced the “horrors” of the maquisards. Between the two we were looking for a third way out. — Frantz Fanon, A Dying Colonialism, 554 (#expands, via linked claim)

In 1830, the country lay nominally under a loose suzerainty of Turkish military rule. Successive generations of French historians have, for fairly obvious reasons, claimed that a state approximating tribal anarchy prevailed. This view is now contested by “neutral” as well as Arab historians. In 1847 de Tocqueville declared to the French National Assembly that “The Muslim society in North Africa was not uncivilised; it only had a backward and imperfect civilisation.” He went on to claim “we have rendered Muslim society much more miserable and much more barbaric than it was before it became acquainted with us”. Even some of the early French conquerors paid tribute to signs of Algeria’s civilisation, however rudimentary, with one general noting in 1834, “nearly all the Arabs can read and write; in each village, there are two schools”. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 83 (#contradicts, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Colonial lobby propaganda created unrealistic expectations about African wealth; French colonial propaganda falsely depicted pre-conquest Algeria as anarchic — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 83; Colonial press propaganda shaped even sympathetic settlers’ early views — Frantz Fanon, A Dying Colonialism, 554

Related

• French colonial propaganda falsely depicted pre-conquest Algeria as anarchic (similarity 0.91)
• Leclerc suppressed racist propaganda because it destabilized French control (similarity 0.84)
• Pre-conquest Algerian society was ordered, not anarchic, before French rule degraded it (similarity 0.83)
• Colonial press propaganda shaped even sympathetic settlers’ early views (similarity 0.81)

Broader Connections

• Colonial lobby propaganda created unrealistic expectations about African wealth #corroborates (0.85)
• Colonial press propaganda shaped even sympathetic settlers’ early views #expands (0.60) — Frantz Fanon, A Dying Colonialism, 554
• French colonial propaganda falsely depicted pre-conquest Algeria as anarchic #contradicts (0.40) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 83