Geopolitical Monitor - Energy Security

GeopoliticalMonitor.com
November 20, 2008

1. Executive Summary
2. Coup and Initial Conflict Phase
3. Jamel Zitouni Takes Charge
4. The Terror Comes to France
5. Aftermath
6. Endnotes

1.    Executive Summary

Following the December 1991 cancellation of elections by Algeria’s governing National Liberation Front (FLN) after gains by the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) in the first round of voting, Islamist guerrillas launched a decade-long civil war of horrific brutality that claimed upwards of 200,000 lives. Yet there is compelling evidence that suggests the covert manipulation of opposition forces by elements of the Algerian government, supported by the West, as well as military collusion in massacres officially ascribed to Islamic rebels.


2.    Coup and Initial Conflict Phase

In the wake of anti-government riots in 1988, President Chadli Bendjedid initiated a policy of gradual democratization, leading to the multi-party contest of 1991. When it appeared the FIS was set to wrest power from Algeria’s ruling FLN the military intervened, canceling the election, banning the FIS, rounding up tens of thousands of its supporters into detention camps, and forcing Bendjedid from office in January 1992.[1]

Western powers such as the United States and France supported the coup “in an effort to prevent Islamic fundamentalists coming to power through the ballot box.”[2]  “A democratically elected Islamist government hostile to American hegemonic aspirations in the region…was considered unacceptable in Washington…. More important was the army government’s willingness to collaborate with American regional ambitions.”[3]

Armed opposition initially coalesced around the Islamic Armed Movement (MIA), the ad hoc guerilla wing of the FIS, and its targets were typically selective, principally army and police units. In early 1992 MIA (later reconstituted as the Islamic Salvation Army (AIS)) was eclipsed by a previously unknown group, the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), which quickly became notorious for its ferocity and uncompromising ideology.

3. Jamel Zitouni Takes Charge

From its inception, GIA had been infiltrated by assets of the Algerian secret service (DRS). In 1994, as the Algerian government engaged in talks with the imprisoned leadership of the FIS, a DRS agent provocateur named Jamel Zitouni assumed leadership of GIA.[4] Under Zitouni, GIA responded to the prospect of an easing of tension by conducting even greater massacres and declaring war on both the FIS and AIS.[5]

4. The Terror Comes to France

In January 1995, a meeting of Algerian political parties representing 80% of the electorate reached an accord in Rome, agreeing to call for an inquiry into the violence and a return to civilian governance and constitutional rule.[6] Soon after, for the first time, GIA extended its reach beyond the borders of Algeria, finding targets in exile such as prominent FIS leader Abdelbaki Sahraoui, who was assassinated in France on July 11, 1995. “Most Algerian journalists knew the GIA emanated from the security services attached to the ministry of defence but they could not write it.”[7]

“Yussuf Joseph”, a 14-year veteran of the DRS who defected to Great Britain, attested in 1997 that “the GIA has been infiltrated and manipulated by the government. The GIA has been completely turned by the government.”[8]

Two weeks after Sahraoui’s assassination the Paris Metro was bombed, resulting in 10 deaths and 200 injuries. Another result was the French government’s abandonment of its support for the Rome initiative.[9]. According to Joseph, the bombings “were part of a sophisticated black propaganda psy-ops war aimed at galvanising French public opinion against the Islamists.”[10]

The former Deputy Chief of the army’s counterintelligence unit, Mohammed Samraoui, defected in Germany on February 12, 1996 (Samraoui claimed he had been asked to participate in the Sahraoui assassination and others, but chose rather to resign his commission, and was reassigned to the diplomatic posting of military attaché).  Samraoui identified GIA’s leader in France and the bomb-plot mastermind, Ali Touchent, as an Algerian intelligence “agent tasked with infiltrating Islamist ranks abroad and the French knew it.” Though Samraoui allows that the French “probably did not suspect their Algerian counterparts were prepared to go so far.”[11]

5. Aftermath

Algeria’s civil war wound down at the end of the 20th century, having claimed an  estimated 200,000 deaths, nearly all of them Islamists themselves, and soured the anti-government cause abroad by an indiscriminate bombing campaign.[12] Former Army General and Defence Minister Khaled Nazzar claims that its Western allies are now more inclined to understand Algeria’s own “War on Terror”: “What happened in Madrid and what happened on the 11 September is what happened in Algeria. Today the West has woken up, but why didn’t it defend the Algerians – why did it close its eyes?”[13]

6. End Notes

[1] Amirouche, Hamou, “Algeria’s Islamist Revolution: The People Versus Democracy?”, Middle East Policy (January 1998, 5(4)).

[2] Lombardi, Ben, “Turkey: The Return of the Reluctant Generals”, Political Science Quarterly (Summer 1997, 112 (2)).

[3] Entelis, John P., Democracy Denied: America’s Authoritarian Approach Towards the Maghreb – Causes & Consequences, XVIIIth World Congress of the International Political Science Association, Quebec, 1-5 August 2000.

[4] Bouteldja, Naima, “Who Really Bombed Paris?”, The Guardian, September 8, 2005
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/sep/08/france.comment

[5] http://looklex.com/e.o/algerian_civil_war.htm

[6] Gumbel, Andrew, “Extremists Tighten Grip on Algeria”, The Independent, February 5, 1996
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_/ai_n14027253

[7] L Ait-Hanlouda, Le Monde Libertaire, No 1098, 30 October – 5 November 1997 (quoted in An Inquiry into the Algerian Massacres, Hoggar, 1999)
http://www.hoggar.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=102&Itemid=32

[8] Sweeney, John and Leonard Doyle, “We Bombed Paris for Algeria”, The Observer, 9 November 1997

[9] Bouteldja, Naima, “Who Really Bombed Paris?”, The Guardian, September 8, 2005
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/sep/08/france.comment

[10] Sweeney, John and Leonard Doyle, “We Bombed Paris for Algeria”, The Observer, 9 November 1997

[11] http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a0795frenchwave#a0795frenchwave

[12] Ahmed, Nafeez Mosaddeq, “Algeria and the Paradox of Democracy,” Media Monitors Network, May 11, 2001
http://www.mediamonitors.net/mosaddeq4.html#_ednref3

[13] Smith, Tamsin, “Algeria Winning from the War on Terror”, April 26, 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3659555.stm

Tags:  Military - Politics - Covert Ops - Africa - Algeria