Atmospheric Pressures
From DARSIE G1LLIE
PARIS
Alast PreSident de Gaulle has got the window open. Preliminary conversations between representatives of the rebel 'government' and the French Government are to take place at once in order to arrange a meeting between a delegation led by M. Ferhat Abbas himself and . And whom? Here the difficulties begin already. M. Ferhat Abbas said the delegation would go to see President de Gaulle. Was the President's `we' collective or royal? There can at all events be no question of the President personally con- ducting the whole negotiation, which will be pretty technical and mainly military in so far as it simply concerns a cease-fire. It is only to a negotiation on a cease-fire that the Algerian rebels have been invited. President de. Gaulle is categorically committed not to enter a bilateral negotiation about the political future of Algeria. That is reserved for a round-table conference in which other Algerian organisations beside the FLN would participate. There are the Moslems who have chosen France and risked their lives for her. There are the Europeans. There are groups of nationalists other than the followers of the FLN. These survive mainly in France and even there the MNA has been much reduced in its gang war with the FLN.
But though the President cannot, withihis com- mitments, negotiate politically with the FLN, he dan talk about other things than a cease-fire and listen to talk. The other groups must be given a chance to speak, but it is scarcely disputable that the FLN constitutes today the most important single group in Algeria. It has its 150,000 dead. It would seem a shocking waste of 'opportunity if the presence of M. Ferhat Abbas in Paris was not used for a large exchange of ideas. But also it may be doubted whether such an exchange could be avoided. Would M. Ferhat Abbas come, if he did not think there was to be one? Would not the mere pace of events make it necessary? When such a conversation does take place it will be useless for it to be held with anyone else than the fount of policy, that is to say President dc Gaulle.
But it is here that we run into the heart of the drama. The President has skilfully manoeuvred until he has at last framed an invitation that could be and has been accepted. He has accom- panied these invitations with assurances to a frightened French opinion and a distrustful army
that they have a limited consequence. The French Right and Left have this in common : they do
not believe you can start without going on. The conduct of the Algerian war has something in common with navigation in the stratosphere. It has made possible, and indeed necessary, the exclusion of the outer atmosphere from within the ship. There has been, it is true, a consider- able adjustment of the internal pressure; pro- grammes of social advancement, of education and investment have been set going. The recruit- ment of Moslems for public service has been speeded up. The share of elected representation guaranteed to Europeans has been reduced from one-half to one-third. But the most important internal arrangements have not been changed.
The infiltration of Moslems into seats of authority, which had just begun before the rebel- lion started, has been altogether stopped, and the European Algerian who tried to carry it out, M. Jacques Chevallier, the former Mayor of Algiers, was cast out of office by the movement of May 13, 1958: A cease-fire on any basis other than complete military victory (rejected by President de Gaulle) must be followed within a short time by a re- newal of this infiltration with much greater pressure behind it. Some, no doubt, of the newly elected town and county councillors will discover that all along their heart was with the rebellion. But apart from that, once the war stops, once the next stage to which the rebel leaders no less than the French authorities direct everyone's attention is a referendum, the youthful energy that went into war and death will find a thousand ways of bubbling up, breaking through the pres- surised surface that has preserved a purely French authority throughout the rebellion. It will start a transmutation of the entire internal structure of Algeria. The moderate-minded Frenchman, confident in the excellence of his own intentions when he does think about Algeria, may imagine that the fighting can be stopped and moderate men take over in a sunny expectation of peace, prosperity and inevitable gradualness. The realists to the right and left of him do not believe it. One may suppose that the astronaut at the head of the State does not suppose it either. He has shown an ability for readjustment in black Africa that has caused surprise in some quarters and in others has confirmed the view that he is a black-hearted traitor. It must be hoped that he will show equal agility as he approaches the Algerian political rapids.
The trouble is that he has not prepared the general public for an acceleration of events. The whole purpose of his policy is no doubt to limit this acceleration; to save the morale and the unity of the army; to launch a regime in Algeria with which intimate relations are possible for France. But the great mass of French opinion, formed by the big dailies and the broadcast news, is very little prepared for change of the kind that can be felt and, in fact, hurts. There is therefore a very real danger that as the next phases of the Algerian problem unroll, the Right-wing opponents of the Government will succeed in swinging over to themselves a section of French opinion which is still approving though hesitant. The leaders of the Right include able and experienced politicians- Soustelle, Bidault, Lacoste, Duchet, Andr6 Morice. The President has disadvantages as well as advantages in conducting the campaign from his isolated fortress, the Elysee Palace. He has discouraged the forces that are essentially in sym• pathy with him. In the coming weeks he will be preoccupied with the home front no less than the rebel negotiators.
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