The Battle for Algeria. Jennifer Johnson

by numerous rights-based declarations, including the Atlantic Charter, the UN Charter, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, and the Geneva Conventions of 1949.⁸² However, these documents were intended to ensure Western security and European power, not enfranchise the entire world.

      The United Nations, created in 1945, was the cornerstone of this internationalist spirit and served as the foundation for the ideals of global governance.⁸³ There had been three prior comprehensive attempts at international treaties: the Peace of Westphalia (1646), the Congress of Vienna (1815), and the Treaty of Versailles (1919), none of which were able to definitively resolve the tension between international cooperation and domestic jurisdiction.⁸⁴ These agreements also disproportionately favored Western European nations and the United States, a trend that bristled against the sweeping changes that decolonization introduced to international politics after World War II. The geographic span and the number of people affected by the war instilled a sense of urgency to work together, and notably every continent except Antarctica was represented in the original UN membership in 1945. But this unprecedented level of representation also meant that national delegates each had their own vision and priorities for the organization and they struggled to agree on the contents of the charter.

      Algerian nationalist Ferhat Abbas closely followed the UN proceedings. On 29 April 1945, he publicly stated that “the United Nations conference assured the liberty of all people,” which he thought would soon translate into Algerian independence.⁸⁵ But neither the charter nor the representatives who met in California that spring guaranteed independence, and the colonial question dominated internal debates for years to come. For example, in an effort to clarify the UN’s position on anticolonial movements, several committees debated the rights of non-self-governing territories in the early 1950s, an issue the General Assembly revisited year after year.⁸⁶ Members struggled to include a colonial policy clause that, on the one hand, supported the right of all people to self-determination as articulated in Article 1(2) of the UN Charter and, on the other hand, permitted colonial governments to run their own affairs.⁸⁷ By the end of the decade, as “anti-colonialism gathered momentum,” the UN had no choice but to adapt itself despite “objections from the Western powers involved.”⁸⁸

      Western countries tackled the conundrum of trying to ensure peace without dissolving their right to rule within their borders by intentionally omitting enforcement mechanisms.⁸⁹ For instance, in a private meeting, Eleanor Roosevelt, a U.S. representative at the United Nations, who also played a critical role in writing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, reportedly explained that the best way “to deal with Resolution A [on self-determination] was to amend it so that neither the timing nor the means of applying the principle would be automatic or rigid.”⁹⁰ Even an eminent leader in the fight to protect all people acknowledged the interests of imperial nations behind closed doors. None of the agreements were legally binding nor could any member state or fellow signatory require that another party follow the prescriptions. Meaningful assistance and intervention of any kind were nearly impossible under these conditions often leading the Great Powers to use their commitments to human rights and humanitarianism as a weapon against each other rather than as a firm anchor to protect individuals.⁹¹

      The United Nations and its charter became a prominent feature of postwar politics. Their architects had no control over who and how they were appropriated. The French did not intend to extend political rights to their empire, and colonial officials were unprepared when nationalists started articulating claims to French representatives and international organizations couched in the same terminology. But this is precisely what Algerian FLN members did. As discussed in Chapter 6, the FLN appealed to the United Nations, which provided a physical and theoretical stage for them to be heard by a broad audience and where colonial inequalities were mitigated.⁹² The General Assembly floor in New York, and, by extension, international organizations, temporarily removed the preeminence of state sovereignty and leveled the political playing field. Algerian nationalists expressed their grievances and publicly exposed what sovereigns previously strained to keep private, transforming international organizations and the nature of political power and authority in the twentieth century.

      The revised Geneva Conventions of 1949, what historian David Forsythe calls “a moral pillar for international relations after 1945,” were a third international development upon which the Algerian nationalists later relied to claim their sovereignty.⁹³ Between 1946 and 1949, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) led a team of international jurists, Red Cross delegates, and state government representatives in updating the three existing Geneva Conventions and ensuring better protection for civilians during times of war.⁹⁴ The prestigious international organization, a beacon of moral authority in world affairs, recognized a need for broadening the scope of its humanitarian safeguards and embarked upon a contentious process during which officials struggled to balance national sovereignty and more rigorous international laws.⁹⁵

      State power and global security often interfere with one another, as national delegates discovered in San Francisco when they met to create the United Nations. However, ICRC neutrality was supposed to eliminate politics and national interests from the equation. But, as Mark Lewis has shown, that was not the case during the Geneva Convention revision debates.⁹⁶ “The revision project,” he writes, “was dominated by a European/North American perspective, reflecting both post-war imperial politics and the ICRC’s Eurocentric perspective.”⁹⁷ In light of the ICRC’s overall neglect of the Jewish population during the war and the harsh criticism it received for this, in 1946, acting president Max Huber was interested in revising the conventions in order “to gain enhanced powers to inspect prisons and camps, improve the rules for the treatment of POWs, establish baseline rules for the treatment of detained civilians, and strengthen the ICRC’s legal and practical ability to deliver food and clothing to POWs.”⁹⁸ The legal parameters set out in the final version of the Geneva Conventions did not pertain to civil or internal conflicts, technically what the French colonial administrations called the Algerian war. Yet, they provided a legal framework that was respected by its signatories and recognized worldwide as an ideal to strive for. Algerian nationalists would work both of these angles, especially after 1957. The FLN and the Algerian Liberation Army became well versed in the Geneva Conventions and tried to hold the French government, a signatory of the 1949 conventions, and its military accountable to them, while also claiming to recognize and follow the prescribed guidelines for proper codes of conduct in war. This post–World War II text laid out a how-to guide for nonstate actors to engage in diplomatic, military, and humanitarian negotiations with powerful army leaders and representatives from the renowned ICRC.

       Conclusion

      The evolution of nationalism in Algeria was a competitive forty-year process, the results of which could not have been predicted even in 1950. FLN members in 1954 lived through numerous iterations of political parties and failed reforms and most felt they had exhausted every viable option for achieving their aims. The FLN had a firm agenda for complete independence and was in a unique position in November 1954 to set off coordinated attacks throughout Algeria. However, as the opening vignette on the 1956 Soummam Congress showed, not all Algerian nationalists agreed that the FLN was the sole party capable of winning the war for the Algerian people, and, beyond that, there were massive divisions within the FLN reflecting decades of ideological sparring. The nationalist leadership continued to work through these differences that threatened to derail their ultimate objective.⁹⁹ In spite of these differences, the FLN managed to keep a firm grasp on dissenters and detractors and forge ahead in its mission of attracting international attention and support for its cause.

      But for all of the nationalists’ ingenuity and creativity, other tectonic shifts at the regional and international levels enabled them to attain their position and experience an unprecedented degree of success in shaping public opinion and forcing the French to recognize Algerian sovereignty. FLN representatives explored numerous diplomatic and military strategies. But, as the following chapters demonstrate, it was their appropriation of medicine and health-care, humanitarianism, and rights discourses, all products of World