The Three-Stage Rocket

With the cold judgment of the professional soldier, Charles de Gaulle faced up to the fact that he was surrounded. For weeks past, the Soviet Union had been pointedly stepping up its propaganda support to the Algerian rebels, while Peking trumpeted promises of military aid to them. The U.N. debate on Algeria, scheduled for early next month, was sure to create strains with the French Community nations in Africa. And with the advent of Jack Kennedy, who three years ago publicly spoke up for Algerian independence, De Gaulle suspected that he could no longer count on Washington's tolerance. The only hope was to drive for some kind of end to the six-year-old bloodletting in Algeria before this sea of troubles could sweep down upon France. Abruptly, the steel-nerved general last week informed his Cabinet that he would submit his Algerian policy to a nationwide referendum in the first weeks of 1961.

As usual, just what De Gaulle's Algerian policy was remained somewhat uncertain. In a front-page editorial, Paris' normally pro-Gaullist Le Figaro grumbled that "it is not excessive for a democratic nation, in circumstances as grave as these, to ask to be informed--and clearly." Yet even such senior Cabinet officers as Foreign Minister Maurice Couve de Murville were still unsure of De Gaulle's ultimate aim: whether he still hopes to keep Algeria federated with France or is reconciled to its total independence.

Terrified Thanks. Whatever his end, De Gaulle had chosen as his means a kind of three-stage rocket designed to surmount the towering divisions and dissensions of present-day France. Stage I of De Gaulle's plan, which will precede the referendum, consists of a series of administrative reforms in Algeria. A High Commissioner for Algeria (probably tough-minded Education Minister Louis Joxe) will take office in Paris, but his Deputy Commissioner in Algiers itself will be a Moslem. (Reportedly, two prominent Moslems have already been sounded out about the job and have declined with terrified thanks.) The political map of Algeria is to be redrawn, converting the present departments into new, decentralized administrative areas that will make easy the partitioning of the land between Europeans and Moslems, should that become necessary. The explosive highlight of Stage I is slated to be a De Gaulle visit to Algeria next month "to acquaint and explain himself." His closest advisers are arguing against the trip for fear of an assassination attempt.

Stage 2 of the plan presupposes a smashing victory in the referendum next year; De Gaulle himself is said to feel that anything less than a 65% majority would be a defeat. With the nation behind him, De Gaulle can then confront the disgruntled army and the rebellious European settlers of Algeria with a "provisional"--and primarily Moslem--Algerian executive, legislature and judiciary. Stage 3, for which no precise plan exists, would find the new "Algerian Algeria" deciding whether to retain ties with France or go its separate way.

Truncated Puppet. Frenchmen peered hopefully through the glorious opacity of De Gaulle's prose to see whether his rocket promised to go into orbit--or to fizzle. So far, the signs were not encouraging.

In Tunis a rebel spokesman said flatly: "We will have nothing to do with a truncated puppet state. We have made this point of view abundantly clear." In Algiers, Europeans crowding bars and cafes spoke freely of mass insurrection should De Gaulle seriously try to set up a Moslem Deputy Commissioner. Rumors spread that the police, in the event of an uprising, would throw a cordon around the city and starve it into submission. Sneered an ultra leader: "De Gaulle wants to turn Algiers into a second Budapest."

Biggest unknown quantity was the army--which has spent an estimated 16,-ooo lives trying to stamp out the F.L.N. guerrillas. Defense Minister Pierre Messmer and General Paul Ely, in Algiers on a "fact-finding" mission, discovered one self-evident fact: the Army's "consternation" at the possibility of an Algerian republic or a unilateral cease-fire by France. At the burial ceremony last week of ten Foreign Legion paratroopers killed in battle with the F.L.N., tough Colonel Jean Dufour, with tears in his eyes, said: "It is not possible their sacrifice has been in vain. It is not possible that our cries of anguish should be ignored by our compatriots in France!"

Slapped Face. In yet another gloomy portent for the future, De Gaulle--who this week celebrates his yoth birthday--was finding the Fifth Republic's hand-tailored governmental apparatus increasingly balky and unreliable. In the National Assembly, despite their awareness that they would surely be outvoted, opposition Deputies introduced a motion of censure protesting De Gaulle's cherished bill to create a French nuclear force. Even the trial of the men who led last January's right-wing insurrection in Algeria backfired when the nine-man military tribunal granted "provisional liberty" to ex-Paratrooper Pierre Lagaillarde, the flamboyant Deputy who dominated the Algiers barricades. "It's a slap in De Gaulle's face," crowed one ultra. "Even the judges he chose saw the light." And in the top echelons of the government, doubts as to the wisdom or workability of the new Algerian program were so strong that half a dozen Cabinet members, including Finance Minister Wilfrid Baumgartner and Interior Minister Pierre Chatenet, were rumored to be on their way out.

Given Charles de Gaulle's hazardous past, and his uncanny ability to emerge seemingly unscathed from crisis after crisis, no one could rule out the possibility that his three-stage rocket might yet reach its destination, i.e., peace in Algeria and cohesion in France. But if it succeed ed, it would be the luckiest gamble of a career founded on audacious gambles.

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