Winner & Champion

The best victories are the ones so well prepared that they come easy and seem effortless. Such a victory did Charles de Gaulle win last week. Within one month of earning his overwhelming election mandate, he used that triumph to put himself clearly on top, and clearly in charge, both in France and in Algeria.

De Gaulle's triumph, conducted for the most part in discreet silences and behind the scenes, was nonetheless the climax of an epic political struggle. In Algeria, De Gaulle's first objective had always been to break the illicit power of the Committees of Public Safety--the hard-nosed, ruthless union of right-wing settlers and political colonels that sparked the Algiers insurrection of last May and prepared De Gaulle's way to power (TIME, May 26 et seq.).

De Gaulle did not move against the committees until the referendum gave him true legitimacy and an overwhelming public mandate. Early this month, when a pair of Algerian Moslem visitors privately reported to him that the Algiers Committee of Public Safety had already chosen a list of "approved Moslem candidates'' for next month's election to the French National Assembly, he decided to act. "What imbeciles!" exploded De Gaulle. "The future of Algeria depends on these elections, and here they are circulating lists designed to sabotage all the plans." Still seething, De Gaulle fired off a peremptory directive to General Raoul Salan, French commander in chief in Algeria. In it De Gaulle ordered that:

P: Moslems of every political stripe must be free to run for office, excepting only active members of the rebel F.L.N. with criminal charges against them. Even candidates who favor outright Algerian independence must be allowed to run.

P: All soldiers must resign "without delay" from Committees of Public Safety.

P: Seizures of newspapers in Algeria must stop unless Salan's administrators were prepared to bring legal charges against the editors involved.*

Raoul Salan--oldtime professional soldier and no man to be caught in the midst of a fight if he could help it--characteristically tried to avoid trouble by keeping these orders to himself. Relentlessly, De Gaulle forced his hand. One morning last week an aide came into Salan's office to find the general shaking with dismay. "Paris," wailed Salan, "has published the directive!"

Man in Armor. The time had come to stand up and be counted. Paratroop General Jacques Massu, the figurehead co-president of the Algiers Public Safety Committee, promptly if grumpily strode into a committee meeting, accompanied by subordinates in white uniforms, to announce: "Gentlemen, in execution of the order of the chief of government, we quit." Undeterred, the civilian members of the committee called for a general strike against De Gaulle's directive.

But the cold fact was that without the army's support, the European diehards of Algiers had lost their power to blackmail Paris. And when Paratrooper Massu warned, "If there is trouble in the streets, the army will have to oppose it," the Committee of Public Safety began to deflate like a leaky tire. Three Moslem members expressed "total disagreement" with the strike plans. From Paris the committee's secretary-general. Algerian Publisher Alain de Serigny, telegraphed his resignation. Undone, the remaining members of the committee swallowed their pride and called off the strike. Said one: "There's no point in punching a man who is wearing a suit of armor."

The Challenger. De Gaulle's bloodless triumph in Algeria electrified all France. Even so outspoken an opponent of De Gaulle's coming to power as ex-Premier Pierre Mendes-France declared: "We only ask to share the effort led by the man who has rendered such great services to his country."

But this triumph in Algeria was only one phase of an even more important battle that De Gaulle was simultaneously fighting in France. In Paris, De Gaulle's authority has largely been made manifest by his burly and ambitious Information Minister Jacques Soustelle. As the man who had masterminded the Algiers revolt, Soustelle served as the key link between De Gaulle and the Algerian right-wingers. Starting from this base, Soustelle hoped to build a power position so strong that De Gaulle, as President, would be forced to name Soustelle Premier following next month's election. Already, without De Gaulle's encouragement, Soustelle had welded 100 small Gaullist factions into a well-organized party called The Union for the New Republic. Capitalizing on the De Gaulle name, Soustelle, with his one-party bloc, planned to dominate France's government.

Blasted Dreams. De Gaulle's first move against Soustelle came fortnight ago, when the general laid down the rules for electing the first Parliament of the new Fifth Republic. To Soustelle's dismay, De Gaulle rejected the old system of proportional representation--in which voters could choose only party lists, instead of individual candidates--in favor of single-member constituencies, much like U.S. congressional districts. As De Gaulle well knew, the system he had chosen was one that would give a big electoral edge to old-line parties (particularly the Socialists), instead of the one-party movement organized by Soustelle.

Next blow to Soustelle's ambitions was De Gaulle's directive to Salan. Confident that the Algerian settlers and the soldiers would get the "right" kind of Moslem candidates elected, Soustelle had counted on having the 70 Deputies from Algeria and the Sahara in his pocket. Free and direct elections would change all that.

Furious at his setbacks, Soustelle stalked into De Gaulle's office in the Hotel Matignon one night late last week, for the last round in his long battle. Bluntly he demanded permission to form a massive right-wing coalition in De Gaulle's name. Unmoved, Charles de Gaulle icily refused to give way.

The Birth of Hope. With Soustelle under control and the Committees of Public Safety reduced to impotence, De Gaulle had finally put himself in a position to experiment with a liberal policy in

Algeria. Ruefully impressed by De Gaulle's sweeping referendum victory in Algeria (TIME, Oct. 6), the rebel F.L.N. has in recent weeks repeatedly proclaimed its willingness to negotiate with France. As one index of its peaceful intentions, the F.L.N. arranged to release some of its captured French prisoners this week.

So far, despite the fact that De Gaulle has sent emissaries to Cairo to sound out the rebels, no serious cease-fire negotiations have taken place. But last week both Tunisian and Moroccan leaders were trying to persuade the rebels to keep quiet during next month's elections, on the understanding that the Moslem Deputies to be elected in Algeria would be regarded by De Gaulle as his intermediaries with the F.L.N. Whether or not the rebels agreed to this scheme, it was a measure of Charles de Gaulle's political accomplishments that, for the first time in four bloody years, responsible men saw cause to hope for a peaceful settlement of the Algerian war.

*Among the newspapers recently confiscated in Algeria was Le Monde of Paris. Le Monde's of fense: reprinting TIME'S Oct. 13 interview with Algerian Rebel Leader Ferhat Abbas.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.