The Battle of Algiers Trailer

Lately, I've been somewhat obsessed with the 1966 film The Battle of Algiers. I wrote a review of it recently: here. Today, I did a simple youtube search and found the trailer. It gives a taste. It's one of the greatest movies I've ever seen.

Snapshot of a Failed State

Recently I had seen, and written a review of the movie: Battle of Algiers. It depicts a successful guerilla campaign to force the French out of Algeria.

This movie had a great affect on me. I have been studying guerrilla/insurgencies/terrorism movements. It is with interest that I read this compelling AP article: In Algeria, al-Qaida extends franchise

What we see in Algeria is a failed state.

Four years ago, the Algerian terrorists — then known as the Salafist Group for Call and Combat — were running out of steam.

Born in an insurgency in 1992, the group took part in a near-civil war the next decade that killed about 200,000 people. But its fighters had lost popular support after killing Muslim civilians. Many leaders had turned themselves in during government amnesties, and the group was weak from internal feuds.

So its new emir or leader, Abdelmalek Droukdel, reached out to the superstar of international jihad: Al-Qaida.

(....)

Still, violence is persistent. Data obtained by the AP from Western diplomats in Algeria shows 85 significant bombings in 2008. Some 639 people died that year because of terrorism-related violence: 409 suspected militants, 158 security force members and 72 civilians.

This year, there were 64 bombings from January to April alone, with deaths of 19 civilians and 61 security force members. The data also shows 167 suspected militants killed amid police sweeps, army raids and aerial bombardments.

Construction entrepreneur Mohammed remembers his terror in February, when he and his son returned late from a construction site, unarmed. They saw five gunmen blocking the road and waiting for them, said Mohammed, who asked to be identified only by his first name for fear of retaliation.

Clearly, the lesson is that once terrorist, insurgent tactics take hold in a society, it's hard to get rid of them. The French are long gone but the civilian Algerians live a miserable life in fear of bombings and kidnappings.

The extent of Al-Qaida in North Africa is shocking to read. Quietly, that too is becoming a major front for the war on terror. The Europeans are seeing it spread to their own soil:

It shows that the battle against radical Islam in Algeria has become crucial — and not only for North Africa. Intelligence officials throughout Europe are convinced that AQIM [Al-Qaida of the Islamic Maghreb] wants to expand in their region.

A senior counterterrorism official in France, who was not authorized to talk on the record, told The Associated Press that his services work "daily, constantly" with Algerian security to contain this threat. He says at least six AQIM-related cells, dormant or getting ready for action, have been dismantled across Europe in recent years.

Last month, the Spanish judiciary announced it had caught 12 Algerians from a suspected support cell. And last week, Italian authorities issued arrest warrants for two Tunisians, two Moroccans and an Algerian suspected of plotting attacks on a church and a subway line.

"For now, we've been good," the French official says. "But we've basically been lucky."

This is a very disturbing article. It's seems like yet another smoking volcano in that region. After eight years in the war on terror, it seems the situation is worse, not better.

Thomas Ricks: Obama Only Now Realizing How Screwed He Is On the Iraq War

Thomas Ricks, Pulitzer Prize winning military journalist, who has written two best selling books on the Iraq struggle was on the Huge Hewitt Show yesterday. Transcript. Audio (see May 14)

Hewitt is a Pro-Bush hawk, and a leading defender of both the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns. It took some nerve to have him on, and it makes for fascinating listening. Here are some highlights:

HH: What is your assessment of Pakistan right now, Thomas Ricks? Over at your blog at Foreign Policy, which is http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com, you have a caption – Pakistan: Have I Seen This Movie. What are you talking about?

TR: I’m talking about Algeria, commando raids that the French did in Algeria in the 1950s, which are captured in that movie, Battle Of Algiers, were tactically productive, but strategically counterproductive, that is they had some battlefield success, but it undercut the political will to do much there. And the French ended up losing the war. The Pakistan military strikes me as being very much on the same course, which is they don’t want to do counterinsurgency, they don’t know how to do it. Instead, they’re going in and whacking people in neighborhoods, they’re antagonizing the locals, they’re losing support, and increasing support for their enemy Taliban.

(...)

This is timely for me. Last week I wrote a review of the film, read it here: Battle of Algiers

(...)

TR: I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing. I’m just telling you the fact of the matter is twice now, the military has confronted him and made him throw out existing positions that he has taken. He campaigned on getting a brigade out a month in Iraq, every month, for the first year he was in office. Almost the first thing he did when he began talking about Iraq was throw that campaign promise overboard. Now I’m not saying I agree with it or disagree with it. I’m just saying that a lot of people voted for him to do what he promised to do. It’s a bad thing, I think, if a guy gets elected on one thing and does another thing. On the other hand, I do think yeah, number one, Obama is a strategic thinker, and is willing to make short terms course corrections to achieve a long term goal. And second, I think he’s only now realizing just how screwed he is on Iraq, that this was the biggest mess in the history of American foreign policy, invading Iraq was the worst decision in the history of American foreign policy, and it’s going to take him years, and it’s going to take the president after him many more years to clean up the mess that George Bush made.

HH: Of course there’s a counter-argument to that, but I’m running low on time....

Great comeback Hugh.

If you have the time, give it a listen. It's very interesting.

Movie Review: The Battle of Algiers (La Battaglia Di Algeri)

I had been hearing about The Battle of Algiers since I was in university. The 1966, Italian film is considered the great Marxist, anti-colonialist film. A must see for radicals. For this reason, I had avoided it all these years. Often cited as a rally cry and blueprint for Islamic, or anti-western uprisings, I thought it was a fitting time to watch it. Besides, it is considered a masterpiece of cinema.

I was blown away.

It’s a gripping docu-drama based on the real events, and people of the Algerian War of Independence, between 1954-1962, when the Muslim-Arabs struggled for independence from France. The film is based entirely in Algiers the capital. There is a divide between the European Quarter where the French live and the famous Casbah, the section around the old citadel in the hills where the Arabs live.

To begin with, the film focuses in on the Arab FLN (Front de Libération Nationale). Main character, Ali Lapoint, from his prison window witnesses an Arab scream “Allah Akbar!” before getting the guillotine from the French. Afterwards, free and listless, Ali is recruited by the FLN, and they test his loyalty. Ultimately he becomes a fighter and killer for the cause.

The FLN is not just a guerrilla organization but intends to be the governing and moral authority of the Arab population. The French educated, intellectual leaders wage a propaganda war. With a brilliant use of voice over, the film depicts the FLN announcing several decrees to the population to resist French rule. For example, wanting to rid themselves of French/infidel vice they decree the ban of alcohol, drugs and prostitution. They want to create an Islamic rallying point, in areas they control. We see the results of this plan, as a pimp is shot and then a group of children are urged to beat and harass a drunk, yelling: “Wino! Wino!” It’s a masterful cinematic segue from idea to result.

Ramping up, the FLN launch a campaign of assassinating French police officers, and the viewer witnesses the action. Reeling from that sequence, the film uses voice over again, this time decrees from the French police, about the consequences of harbouring Muslim radicals. As a solution, the French army cordons off the Casbah with barbed wire, and Arabs have to cross a checkpoint to get out. The assassinations continue, through organized, covert activity.

Frustrated, the police unofficially plant a nighttime bomb in a crowded civilian area, known for radical activity in the Casbah. The blast kills a dozen men, women and children, (that we can see), perhaps there are more under the rubble. Incensed, the FLN plan a bombing campaign of their own, for the European Quarter. What follows is one of the most intense scenes I have ever experienced, as we follow the Muslim bombers on their grizzly task. I won’t cheapen it by trying to sum it up. The suspense is nearly unbearable.

Algiers is an exotic and compelling setting. The Casbah is an ancient fortress of walls, stairs, a maze of alleys, and doors that lead to courtyards or different building complexes or dead ends. (Metaphorical of the French understanding of the Arabs.) What came to mind were descriptions of Prague from friends, except with white box-like Arab-style architecture. In contrast, the coastal European Quarter has wide open boulevards, populated with cars, shops, cafes and fashionably dressed whites. It looked like it could have been the Montreal of the 50’s that my parents grew up in.

The bombing campaign angers the French who summon the Foreign Legion Paratroopers, headed by Colonel Mathieu, an outstanding character, played by actor Jean Martin. He states clearly that this is a war and as a soldier, his only goal is to win. He is no caricature, but thoughtful and intelligent. In briefing his troops, he explains how the FLN operate in self-contained cells, very much what he have heard on the news for the last decade in our own time.

Faced with the new force, the Arabs change tack and wage a one week general strike in support of the FLN. World observers were starting to weigh in on the conflict, and the FLN ordered non- violence and used the strike to impress the UN and world opinion. (They were not stupid.) However, Col. Mathieu uses this as leverage to break the strike and round up any Arab suspects to interrogate and if necessary, torture for information leading to cell members. (Included are rough torture scenes. Blow torch, jumper cables and car battery. And water torture.) Ultimately his counter-insurgency breaks the top cells. The negative result is that it has inflamed Arab opposition even more.

Mathieu understands that the most important player for the French cause is not the army but the free press. They question him on torture and he says to them at a press conference: "Do you think the French should stay in Algeria? If yes... then you must accept the consequences.” At the beginning of the conflict, even the communist papers were supporting the war effort, but now everybody was turning to accept the Algerian cause. Sound familiar? My head was spinning watching this.

I have to mention the film score by Ennio Morricone and Gillo Pontecorvo was phenomenal as well. I don’t have the best music vocabulary, but during tense scenes there was pulsating, hypnotic music that obviously adds to the film’s critical acclaim.

This film inspired many western Marxists, but to me, it does not do their cause any good. These days we tend to think of a Marxist as a pot smoking, professional student, wearing a Che Gueverra t-shirt. But serious Marxism and Communism believes in violent means to achieve an end. Ideas are more important than human rights. The film depicts merciless, unflinching assassinations and bombings. When it goes from cop killing to civilian killing, it’s appalling to watch. I don’t know how a person brought up in western society would approve. Just like, on the other hand, it’s impossible to support the French for torturing people.

Growing up in my generation, it’s obvious that colonialism is bad. The Algerians beat it. Tragically, we look ironically at the modern Algiers which is a destroyed and forgotten city. The natives threw off the colonial yoke, but ended up their own worse enemies.

Most importantly though, the Algerians won their independence. This film is a “how-to” for running an insurgency. The western powers still do not have a strategy to defeat a guerrilla war.

This movie is relevant to today’s situation. I bet Obama saw it in his student days. Does he remember the lessons, as he sends an American Col. Mathieu to clean up the Afghan insurgency?