Radio War Nerd EP #468 — French COIN in Algeria War, feat. Terrence Peterson
Guest: Terrence Peterson
Recorded: September 6, 2024
We talk to historian Terrence Peterson about myths & realities of France's counterinsurgency in Algeria, and COIN grifters from David Galula to David Petraeus.
Buy Terrence's book Revolutionary Warfare: How the Algerian War Made Modern Counterinsurgency
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Check out RWN EP #199 — Algeria, with James McDougall
Total time: 1:20:29
Direct link to this episode's mp3 here
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Comments (23)
A little bit late to chime in to this one but, good god War Nerd Film Club, you have to watch Battle of Algiers. A fantastic film. It feels like a documentary but some how uses no archival footage. Maybe the greatest insurgent/counter-insurgent movie ever made with Ali la Pointe and Col. Matthieu as fantastic manifestations of their sides of the struggle. It was banned in France so you know they pulled no punches. Dark, hyper-realistic, brooding. Must watch.
Any good sources to read more on the Petraeus COIN grifterdom? Always disliked the guy and how he was built up by the big US media
RWN guest Tim Shorrock wrote a good piece here, more about COIN grifting than specifically Petraeus: https://thebaffler.com/salvos/making-coin-shorrock
Great topic and ideal guest. I know very little about this subject and was happy to learn more.
Damn. Orangina having colonial roots kinda stains some childhood memories for me
I’m in my 40s, and painfully, I have to confess my first childhood awareness of the French “Foreign Legion” came from this moronic comic strip called “Crock,” which was still running in the ‘80s in the local newspaper. Jokes about the barbaric Arab horde always failing to conquer the French desert fort, with the soldiers of the two sides exchanging Beetle Bailey style puns over the battlements. I hadn’t thought about it in years and assumed it was some 1950s relic… but Wikipedia tells me the frickin’ thing started in *1975* and ran until 2012!! And there was a British equivalent called “Beau Peep” that didn’t end until 2016!! (???!!)
My dad also had a 1970s collection of the 1940s Mickey Mouse storyline “Mickey Mouse joins the Foreign Legion,” which, while not as offensive as the 1930s “Mickey Mouse on Cannibal Island” (also real… well, Treasure Island, but the plot involved copious cannibals), was pretty close
Boys, these coin episodes have been fantastic. The histories of the French in Africa has been outstanding- finding these great authors and researchers- mega knee feek, as fancy chefs are wont to say
“Method Men” made my day, i would have loved a Method Man and Redman album about the Battle of Algiers.
How about a movie where they join the Foreign Legion and smoke hash out of Napoleon’s bong?
I don't really have this fully fleshed out, but something I've started to suspect with (broadly) PsyOps is that it's always a lot easier to persuade your audience/managers than it is to effectively change your target's behavior. So there's this perpetual tendency toward mission creep where you start off intending to get the natives to like your soldiers and you end up, basically, doing PR aimed at the folks at home. Case in point, violently coercing a bunch of Algerian women into publicly burning veils on camera. Probably achieved nothing whatsoever toward the actual French objectives here, but makes the psychological warfare division look great (short-term) to the people who are paying them.
This makes perfect sense. I'm sure we can equate this to our own mundane work. We're really just trying to appease our everyday boss to leave us alone, even the long term "success" of the company isn't being considered
I will never read enough to be a guest on my fav podcast 😭
Talking about the use of bases in mountains being such am important factor I am reminded of how you said in Nagorno Karabakh the use of drones negated the Armenian mountain bases. Is the age of resistance taking shelter in mountains passed? I suppose the solution is to build tunnels.
My ears always prick up when there is a RWN Lore Drop - Mark took classes from John? Did I hear that right? I assumed from other episodes that they were at Berkeley around the same time, but I was always curious how they met and became friends.
I think John was a teaching assistant and/or sessional instructor when Mark was attending UC Berkeley. John is a good 10-15 years older if I recall correctly.
I mean to say, south Florida is COIN central. Heck, where is "Southern Command".
On the point on the Manchurian Candidate and the idea of mid-century psychology as an all powerful thing: it's funny to think about the public freakout America had about Chinese brainwashing techniques, and then look into what the Chinese were actually doing in POW camps and finding that it was just basic tactfulness and persuasion techniques. Because it was mostly things like: - Contradicting people just makes them defensive - Overtly trying to bribe people just makes them sanctimonious - Start from common ground and work out - People will identify with things more easily if they write them down/say them out loud So essentially we saw Chinese prison wardens using compliment sandwiches and decided they must have figured out highly refined subliminal messaging techniques to operate people like a switch board. It's truly amazing how insane Cold Warriors were
My guess is that the Chinese found soldiers who were ready to flip. They just needed to offer a little respect . . .
Also, south Florida is where latin america death squad group members retire. It's not just the plumbers, ex military from all our authoritarian allies have interests here, businesses and lives.
FIU is under Governor Desantis, and is in the most far right section in the United States. You guys have no idea how much danger this guys job gets in when you ask him to equate Algeria with Gaza.
Just what the doctor ordered
Just what I needed to relax this Sunday afternoon — counterinsurgency talk. Ce bon, la vie!