A Savage War of Peace

Posted on 09 September 2017 by Alistair Horne

The Algerian War lasted from 1954 to 1962 It brought down six French governments, led to the collapse of the Fourth Republic, returned de Gaulle to power, and came close to provoking a civil war on French soil More than a million Muslim Algerians died in the conflict and as many European settlers were driven into exile Above all, the war was marked by an unholy marriage of revolutionary terror and repressive torture.Nearly a half century has passed since this savagely fought war ended in Algerian independence, and yet ,as Alistair Horne argues in his new preface to his now classic work of history,its repercussions continue to be felt not only in Algeria and France, but throughout the world Indeed from today s vantage point the Algerian War looks like a full dress rehearsal for the sort of amorphous struggle that convulsed the Balkans in the 1990s and that now ravages the Middle East, from Beirut to Baghdad struggles in which questions of religion, nationalism, imperialism, and terrorism take on a new and increasingly lethal intensity A Savage War of Peace is the definitive history of the Algerian War, a book that brings that terrible and complicated struggle to life with intelligence, assurance, and unflagging momentum It is essential reading for our own violent times as well as a lasting monument to the historian s art. Best Download A Savage War of Peace [ By ] Alistair Horne [ Kindle ePUB or eBook ] – kino-fada.fr When the New York Review of Books republished this in 2006, a lot was made of its relevance to modern US led adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan This is kind of true, but also a bit irritating because a well told history like this shouldn t require modern parallels to be worth reading , and for that matter also overstated the differences were reallystriking to me than the similarities America was fighting in a foreign country France was not, and that was really the whole point I don When the New York Review of Books republished this in 2006, a lot was made of its relevance to modern US led adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan This is kind of true, but also a bit irritating because a well told history like this shouldn t require modern parallels to be worth reading , and for that matter also overstated the differences were reallystriking to me than the similarities America was fighting in a foreign country France was not, and that was really the whole point I don t think I had appreciated before quite how French Algeria ... All our so called civilization is covered with a varnish Scratch it and underneath you find fear The French, even the Germans, are not torturers by nature But when you see the throats of your copains slit, then the varnish disappears. Paul Teitgen, former French prefect of Algiers, to the authorBoth on the front and back covers of the NYRB edition of this book are ringing endorsements by pundits and politicos, warning the reader about the total resemblance between this disaster and that of th All our so called civilization is covered with a varnish Scratch it and underneath you find fear The French, even the Germans, are not torturers by nature But when you see the throats of your copains slit, then the varnish disappears. Paul Teitgen, former French prefect of Algiers, to the authorBoth on the front and back covers of the NYRB edition of this book are ringing endorsements by pundits and politicos, warning the reader about the total resemblance between this disaster and that of the then looming Iraq debacle But despite some major similarities in the wars, Algeria is not like Iraq There are not one million American civilians settled in Iraq before the war, Iraq is not five hundred miles off the coast of the United States, and the Kurds are better friends to us than the Kabylians were to the French Finally, not even in the greatest folie of the Bush administration was Iraq ever to become part of the United States That being said, the relationship betwe...Prior to reading A Savage War of Peace, I knew as much about Algeria as I do about Sanskrit morphology A bit of Camus, a few memorable scenes from The Battle of Algiers, the puzzling lyrics to Rock the Casbah that was pretty much the extent of my knowledge I was dimly aware that France had fought a nasty colonial war there back in the 50s, but I had no idea just how terrible and terribly momentous the conflict was I don t think I can put it anysuccinctly than the jacket copy of my Prior to reading A Savage War of Peace, I knew as much about Algeria as I do about Sanskrit morphology A bit of Camus, a few memorable scenes from The Battle of Algiers, the puzzling lyrics to Rock the Casbah that was pretty much the extent of my knowledge I was dimly aware that France had fought a nasty colonial war there back in the 50s, but I had no idea just how terrible and terribly momentous the conflict was I don t think I can put it anysuccinctly than the jacket copy of my NYRB edition The Algerian War lasted from 1954 to 1962 It caused the fall of six French govern...This is an excellent book, but a book emotionally difficult to read A book filled with detailed information A challenging book It is thorough and well researched.It is balanced All warring combatants are fairly presented.Details of the war atrocities, and they are numerable, are not excessive This is what happened, and if you are going to read about this terrible war you need to be given all the facts, all the atrocities committed Only then do you fully understand Atrocities of war are co This is an excellent book, but a book emotionally difficult to read A book filled with detailed information A challenging book It is thorough and well researched.It is balanced All warring combatants are fairly presented.Details of the war atrocities, and they are numerable, are not excessive This is what happened, and if you are going to read about this terrible war you need to be given all the facts, all the atrocities committed Only then do you fully understand Atrocities of war are committed by all involved I love France, but I am not a F...On Page 194 to Page 197 The death of Ben M hidi left, alive and at liberty, only Belkacem Krim out of the original neuf historiques of the F.L.N Like an unsightly molehill, it also threw up the whole ugly but hitherto largely subterranean issue of the maltreatment of rebel suspects, of torture and summary executions or what, in another context and depending upon the point of view, might perhaps be termed war crimes , and what in France came simply to be known as la torture From the Battle of On Page 194 to Page 197 The death of Ben M hidi left, alive and at liberty, only Belkacem Krim out of the original neuf historiques of the F.L.N Like an unsightly molehill, it also threw up the whole ugly but hitherto largely subterranean issue of the maltreatment of rebel suspects, of torture and summary executions or what, in another context and depending upon the point of view, might perhaps be termed war crimes , and what in France came simply to be known as la torture From the Battle of Algiers onwards this was to become a growing canker for France, leaving behind a poison that would linger in the French system long after the war itself had ended The resort to torture poses moral problems that are just as germane to the world today as...This is a subject that I only became interested in because of the film The Battle Of Algiers The film is certainly a great film The book is also a very good to great piece of history Alistair Horne manages to fully interrogate a distressing and controversial world event in such a way as to be fair to all the parties concerned but also not be judgment free.Horne is in control of his facts and with them tells the sordid, painful story of this conflict To his credit it reads like a story, a co This is a subject that I only became interested in because of the film The Battle Of Algiers The film is certainly a great film The book is also a very good to great piece of history Alistair Horne manages to fully interrogate a distressing and controversial world event in such a way as to be fair to all the parties concerned but also not be judgment free.Horne is in control of his facts and with them tells the sordid, painful story of this conflict To his credit it reads like a story, a complex story of effect and counter effect For the non French much of this story is unknown I can only put this down, at least for English speakers, to Anglo Saxon self centeredness This is a story of intrigue and high drama, coups and counter coups The author does not gloss over the atrocities of the FLN, the political short sightedness of the French, the mindless fascist outrages of the OAS and the appalling torture and its consequences o...This is not a book about Algeria The author makes clear that he was unable to access decent sources from the Algerian side, but anyone buying this book should be aware that this is French historythan anything else The author makes some efforts to understand the Algerians, but it often comes back to the same comments about their inscrutable nature If you are looking for insight into Algeria, the wikipedia page would probably be about as useful.The treatment of the French, on the other This is not a book about Algeria The author makes clear that he was unable to access decent sources from the Algerian side, but anyone buying this book should be aware that this is French historythan anything else The author makes some efforts to understand the Algerians, but it often comes back to the same comments about their inscrutable nature If you are looking for insight into Algeria, the wikipedia page would probably be about as useful.The treatment of the French, on the other hand, is superb As an American, this is a whole era I had no awareness of The fact that France was constantly at risk of military take over during the eight year period this book covers was a revelation to me France faced a lot of problems that I formerly associated only with third world banana republics The book is about lossthan anything else The French military is its most interesting protagonist The French militar...I have to admit that this is one of the if not the best historical book I have read and that includes Roy Jenkin s bio of Churchill Not even going to try to summarize this one bitthan saying that it s a book about the 8 year war of independence that Algeria fought with France and with themselves Google Wikipedia any of the f...Algeria, France s Viet Nam, is a conflict most people outside of France and Algeria don t know much about You ve probably heard it was one of the last anti colonialist wars, and that it pitted Muslims against Westerners, and that there were atrocities on both sides But the details are fuzzy for most Americans after half a century It was a conflict happening in a part of the world we didn t care much about at the time, and even during the Cold War, neither the US nor the USSR was heavily inv Algeria,...I confess to not being very knowledgeable on the Algerian war for independence from France during the 1950 s to 1962 So there was much that was new to me in reading this book particularly the plethora of characters introduced It serves onceto emphasis the evils of the entire colonial system But there were some distinguishing features in France s occupation of Algeria There were over one million who settled in Algeria starting in the 1830 s when France first occupied it Some were I confess to not being very knowledgeable on the Algerian war for independence from France during the 1950 s to 1962 So there was much that was new to me in reading this book particularly the plethora of characters introduced It serves onceto emphasis the evils of the entire colonial system But there were some distinguishing features in France s occupation of Algeria T...

English
09 September 2017

Alistair Horne