How long can France keep its colonies?

Heard of, yes, but it doesn't mean it holds any special importance.

Sure, Polynesia is important somehow because of Tahiti, but the Iles Marquises and Iles Gambier? I had to look it up!

I disagree.

I know where Rapa is without having to look it up.

And I think more people have heard of Mururoa than of Tahiti.
 
I disagree.

I know where Rapa is without having to look it up.

And I think more people have heard of Mururoa than of Tahiti.
I think more people in France heard of Borah Borah and Tahiti than other places in Polynesia, personally. But that's because of the tourist industry.
 
I disagree.

I know where Rapa is without having to look it up.

And I think more people have heard of Mururoa than of Tahiti.
Well, Mururoa does have a particular echo in the common psyche due to Chirac as I mentioned in passing. But then it's like Djibouti, it has a strategic importance and we probably have a base there but doesn't mean people know it is French territory.

However it is hard to judge this kind of perception as they are just that, perceptions. I doubt the Insee has a study about how many people consider Polynesia an integral part of France.
 
Could France have partitioned Algeria with Soviet style "population transfers" as what happened in Eastern Europe after WWII?

A coastal zone for the Europeans integrated into France, and an independent area (the inland bulk of the country with some access to the coast as compensation) for native Algerians?
 
Could France have partitioned Algeria with Soviet style "population transfers" as what happened in Eastern Europe after WWII?

A coastal zone for the Europeans integrated into France, and an independent area (the inland bulk of the country with some access to the coast as compensation) for native Algerians?
I've seen the idea float around, given the population imbalance between the Oranais (very European) and the rest. I don't have the exact stat, but wikipedia says they were more numerous than the muslims. One point to note though is that European was mostly spanish which was perceived as barely better than the arabs, so even so there are a lot of European, maybe Oran doesn't have that strong a weight in colonial politics. I frankly don't know.

The problem is that a lot of people wouldn't even envision something like this, on both side. Algeria is France/Algeria must be independant is pretty manicheist.

I'll also add a point I forgot to add earlier: a lot of the Algerian mess was due to the army playing out their own "stab in the back" myth after Dien Bien Phu and Indochina.
 
Could France have partitioned Algeria with Soviet style "population transfers" as what happened in Eastern Europe after WWII?

A coastal zone for the Europeans integrated into France, and an independent area (the inland bulk of the country with some access to the coast as compensation) for native Algerians?

I remember reading somewhere that north algeria had 30% of french population in it, and in some cities this number almost reached 50%. if they had made a bigger settlement policy from the late 19th century until the 1960s they could end integrating everything north of the atlas mountains
 
Could France have partitioned Algeria with Soviet style "population transfers" as what happened in Eastern Europe after WWII?

No. The circumstances were very different in Algeria in the 1950s than in Europe in 1945/1946. You might get a lot of voluntary population transfer as Europeans moved out of an Algerian zone to a French zone, but only very limited forced repatriation if at all.
 
"Stab in the back" theory is based on German propaganda.

Consider how many former German soldiers served in the French Foreign Legion immediately after WW2. Regular French Army conscripts referred to them as "DeGaulle's SS". They sang German marching songs and had SS numbers tattooed on their arms.
A major part of SS propaganda included "stab in the back" theories about why Germany lost WW1. It was much easier to blame weak civilians than for soldiers to admit that they fought the wrong war. Nazis preferred to ignore the huge difference between the German pre-war economy versus the size of the pre-war British Commonwealth economy (including former colonies like the USA).
 
Could France have partitioned Algeria with Soviet style "population transfers" as what happened in Eastern Europe after WWII?

A coastal zone for the Europeans integrated into France, and an independent area (the inland bulk of the country with some access to the coast as compensation) for native Algerians?

I don't think so.

For the settlers, this would be unacceptable because they would lose the land they owned in the regions they were expelled from, for the Algerian Arabs, the same problem would apply and for the French in Europe, the people backing the settlers would similarly be upset. And pretty much everyone would find the methods needed to enforce such a policy unacceptable.

The population transfers in Europe were only acceptable because it was part of the suite of actions taken to make sure WW3 never ever happened.

fasquardon
 
From what I remember from reading Elgey was that during the Pinay government (Feb. 52-Jan. 53), there were two major initiatives to change the course of the conflict.

« A la fin de 1952, Antoine Pinay étant encore président du Conseil, le gouvernement demande au général Salan d'établir un plan général de campagne qui puisse assurer la fin victorieuse de la guerre d'Indochine. Ce plan 38 fut rédigé fin février 1953. Il était échelonné sur la fin de 1953, sur 1954 et sur 1955. Nous espérions arriver à une solution sérieuse en 1955. Son économie était la suivante : au fur et à mesure que l'armée vietnamienne se développait, on lui confiait la responsabilité des zones les plus tranquilles. On pouvait ainsi récupérer les troupes proprement françaises et les transformer en unités mobiles affectées à la reconquête des positions ennemies. Dès que ces nouvelles zones auraient été pacifiées, les Français auraient cédé la place à l'armée vietnamienne. Le plan prévoyait quatre ou cinq périodes d'opérations. En 1955, l'armée vietnamienne aurait été suffisamment importante, les zones reconquises assez étendues pour que les deux tiers des forces françaises, transformées en unités mobiles, puissent rechercher le grand affrontement avec le corps de bataille viêtminh au Tonkin, sans plus se préoccuper de ce qui se passe ailleurs dans le pays. En mars 1953, j'ai été à Washington présenter ce plan au Pentagone. Les Américains ont approuvé son esprit, mais ils m'ont dit : "Il faut aller plus vite. Le Congrès veut que tout soit fini au Viêt-nam en 1954." On doit préciser que le général Hinh, qui commandait l'armée vietnamienne, leur avait un peu promis la lune, leur garantissant une force qu'il ne pouvait avoir. »

Essentially one of them was Plan 38, that sought to change the nature of the conflict by replacing French troops with the Vietnamese Army in those areas deemed 'pacified' and so, focusing the French Army on reconquering as opposed to more police-like/occupation activities, which would have allowed to free a large section of troops, and hence about two 2/3 of the French contingent would be used against the enemy.

In parallel I believe that Pinay and co. also tried to reach out to the Vietcong and reach some kind of peace deal, whereby an independent Vietnam would opt in or out of the French Union, of which in any case it'd be essentially independent. But although Ho-Chi-Minh or at least his entourage appeared to be favourable to it, Letorneau (the Minister for relations with the Associated States) never told Pinay that they could have started back room negotiations, since the Vietnamese appeared willing to do so. As to why that was the case, well, the MRP was very hawkish when it came to foreign policy, or simply he did not think the exchanged notes meant anything. I lave that up to anyone to decide.

The extract and the information are from Georgette Elgey's La République des contradictions (1951-1954).
 
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