Ben Bella is dead, as the charismatic leader of the FLN in the Algerian war of independence, he was one of the great (though flawed) figures of the wave of post-war revolutionary decolonisation. Obituaries and reports in the New York Times , Guardian, Le Monde .
{ 35 comments }
J. Otto Pohl 04.12.12 at 11:46 am
One of the things that distinguished the Algerian from many other revolutions was how little charismatic leadership mattered. The FLN deliberately cultivated a system where the French were unable to destroy the movement by killing its leaders. Even Ben Bella himself was not all that well known to the outside world during the revolution. Indeed the most famous person to come out of the Algerian Revolution was Frantz Fanon whose position in the Algerian government was ambassador to Ghana.
Barry Freed 04.12.12 at 12:41 pm
Nothing to add but that I was hoping to see Ben Bella’s passing remarked upon at CT so thanks for this post.
Barry 04.12.12 at 1:27 pm
Seconding J. Otto here; I remember reading an account (by Galula?) during the Iraq War which said that of the top 100 leaders at the start, every single one was either killed, or captured, tortured and killed by the French over the course of the war.
J. Otto Pohl 04.12.12 at 3:56 pm
It is also worth noting that Algeria represented one of the last significant victory of secular nationalists in the Arab and even larger Muslim world against outside colonialism. FLOSY ejected the British from Aden in 1969, seven years later. But, after that the secular nationalist forces in Arab world are particularly ineffective in achieving independence. In particular the various secular nationalist movements fighting for Palestinian independence such as Fatah, the PFLP, and the PDFLP failed to emulate the FLN’s success in Algeria. This failure to make headway is one of the principle reasons for the emergence of Islamist movements in the 1980s and 1990s such as Hizbullah and Hamas. The other reason has been the success of Islamist movements. Hizbullah did drive Israel out of Lebanon in 1994.
Chris Bertram 04.12.12 at 4:12 pm
There’s another side to that, Otto. The United States, perceiving the secular nationalists in the Muslim world as pro-Soviet, did its best to screw them and promote the Islamists instead: with results that we now see.
Watson Ladd 04.12.12 at 4:18 pm
Chris, that may be the case for Afghanistan. But in Iran it’s more complex: the Stalinists assisted the Islamist rise to power, against the US-backed Shah.
Chris Bertram 04.12.12 at 4:22 pm
Watson: and who deposed the secular nationalists in Iran? the US.
J. Otto Pohl 04.12.12 at 4:25 pm
Many secular nationalist in the Muslim world were pro-Soviet. The PDFLP mentioned above being one instance. The PDPA in Afghanistan being another example. The US did back the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan after the USSR intervened to keep the PDPA from losing power in 1979. But, I don’t think the US ever promoted Hizbullah or Hamas. Especially since as enemies of Israel they are demonized by many US politicians just as much if not more so than the USSR was during the height of the Cold War.
Chris Bertram 04.12.12 at 4:29 pm
Otto > yes but Israel encourages Islamic radicalism and hence the growth of Hamas as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the PLO. A straight emulation of the US playbook, again with the results we now see. Robert Fisk discusses this in _Pity the Nation_ , and it is also documented here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB123275572295011847.html
rf 04.12.12 at 4:45 pm
There was also the co founder of Hamas Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, who was on the CIA payroll, if my memory of Mahmood Mamdani’s ‘Good Musmlim, Bad Muslim’ is correct. (Although that was more of a consequence of supporting the mujahideen than direct support for Hamas)
Watson Ladd 04.12.12 at 4:47 pm
Chris, both the Shah and Mosaddegh were secular nationalists. The White Revolution was much more a continuation of Mosaddegh’s policies domestically then a break from them.
M 04.12.12 at 5:07 pm
…and now the US is supporting the MEK, which is pretty hilarious.
BelgianObserver 04.12.12 at 5:19 pm
[Faux naive questions for right-winger previously seen parading himself as an “alpha-male” in Maria’s “Sisters under the skin” thread not welcome. CB]
More Dogs, Less Crime 04.12.12 at 5:48 pm
The way I see it, everyone is living on stolen land. And if you don’t know who it was stolen from, it’s because history books don’t go back that far.
I had also heard the story that Israel supported HAMAS. Hezbollah, on the other hand, was created by Iran to oppose Israel.
I was about to say it’s funny that the Algerian government nowadays has a very counter-revolutionary stance, but I suppose that’s the way of most revolutionary regimes.
I don’t know that much about Ben Bella, what made him great relative to other figures?
Stephen 04.12.12 at 7:21 pm
To quote from the Guardian’s obituary, which is unlikely to be violently prejudiced against him:
“public disillusion set in when Ben Bella began mismanaging the country. He spurned the FLN tradition of collective leadership by interfering in the jurisdiction of ministers and redistributing land through a corrupt bureaucracy … Backed by Houari Boumediene’s force … he ousted Algeria’s provisional prime minister, Ben Youssef Ben Khedda. In April 1963, Vice President Rabah Bitat resigned after accusing Ben Bella of betraying socialist principles, but soon went into exile … Boumediene unseated Ben Bella in June 1965 … Ben Bella saw Muslim values as the surest guarantee of rights in Algeria”.
Leaves me wondering how great he really was.
Stephen 04.12.12 at 7:29 pm
[Reply to deleted Belgian Observer – makes no sense without his comment. CB]
J. Otto Pohl 04.12.12 at 7:33 pm
Stephen:
He is generally not remembered for being a great statesman, but rather one of the few Algerian revolutionaries that anybody can remember by name. But, nonetheless the French set the bar low in Algeria. The estimates are that during the war the French killed around a million Algerians out of some eight million. Winning against such odds made Algeria a model for revolution throughout the Middle East and Africa. But, as I noted above aside from the pro-Soviet FLOSY there were no more successful secular nationalist revolutions in the Arab world. In particular the dismal military failure of Palestinian secular nationalists in their struggle against Israel has led to the eclipse of secular nationalists by Islamist movements throughout the Arab and even greater Muslim world.
LFC 04.12.12 at 7:52 pm
M@12 — re the MEK, see the Dec. 2011 WaPo article linked in this post. I’m not sure what has happened since then.
Salem 04.12.12 at 10:09 pm
“But, after that the secular nationalist forces in Arab world are particularly ineffective in achieving independence. In particular the various secular nationalist movements fighting for Palestinian independence such as Fatah, the PFLP, and the PDFLP failed to emulate the FLN’s success in Algeria. This failure to make headway is one of the principle reasons for the emergence of Islamist movements in the 1980s and 1990s such as Hizbullah and Hamas.”
Oh, c’mon.
The decline of secular Arab nationalism has little or nothing to do with the failure to create a Palestinian state. It’s because secular Arab nationalist governments have been huge failures in the countries where they took power – which is every large Arab country except Morocco and Saudi Arabia. By the 1980s these governments had been in power for a generation, and were obviously corrupt and autocratic failures, so people naturally looked for alternatives. Unfortunately it wasn’t possible to go back to Nuri al-Saeed et al because the middle classes had been crushed/emigrated, so political Islam was the only available legitimating dialogue.
bexley 04.12.12 at 10:49 pm
Okay I know you love the British Empire deeply and Nuri al-Saeed allowed a lot of British influence in Iraq, but what was so awesome about Nuri al-Saeed for actual Iraqis?
bexley 04.12.12 at 10:50 pm
oops thought that it was Stephen promoting al-Saeed. Scratch the part about loving the British Empire.
J. Otto Pohl 04.13.12 at 8:42 am
Salem:
The appeal of secular nationalists was more in their ability to throw out foreign colonists like in Algeria rather than their ability to rule. Which is why the failure to liberate Palestine is a crucial factor in the rise of Islamic movements. Widespread opposition to secular nationalist regimes like Assad in Syria or Mubarek in Egypt is much more recent than the turn to political Islam by organizations directly fighting against Israel. Yes, the PLO was corrupt and the PA authoritarian. But, the rise of Hamas is ultimately tied to the PLO’s failure to secure a Palestinian state. The success of Hizbullah in actually defeating the Israelis is not something that should be underestimated either. Palestine is still a Pan-Arab issue on the street just as apartheid was a Pan-African issue. Its symbolic importance as the last settler colony in the Arab world should not be downplayed.
Salem 04.13.12 at 11:15 am
bexley – I never said that Nuri al-Saeed was “awesome.” Try re-reading my post for what it actually says, rather than what you imagine.
Otto: “The appeal of secular nationalists was more in their ability to throw out foreign colonists like in Algeria rather than their ability to rule.”
Totally disagree. Perhaps the two classic Arab nationalist states are Egypt and (pre-2003) Iraq. The Arab nationalists took power after the colonial power had already left and the promise was that they would rule better through economic reform etc than the supposedly corrupt existing rulers. The narrative is similar in Syria.
“Which is why the failure to liberate Palestine is a crucial factor in the rise of Islamic movements. Widespread opposition to secular nationalist regimes like Assad in Syria or Mubarek in Egypt is much more recent than the turn to political Islam by organizations directly fighting against Israel.”
You cannot talk about this without talking about Iran. That’s the crucial factor, not Palestine. That is where the turn to political Islam started. And the effective loss in the Iran-Iraq war followed by Gulf War 1 changed things profoundly. It was the loss of all credibility for the last pseudo-credible Arab nationalist regime, and it cemented the change in popular identification from Arab nationalist to Muslim. And I don’t think you should see Palestine as merely a pan-Arab issue. It is also a pan-Islamic issue. In fact, probably more so.
J. Otto Pohl 04.13.12 at 2:44 pm
Salem:
You are right Iran is much more important than I have given credit for in my earlier comments. It was the first modern successful Islamic Revolution. But, I think its inspiration is not on being a more successful economic model than Nasser, Assad, or Saddam Hussein. Despite managing to do fairly well on the economic front I don’t think it did significantly better than the secular regimes. The delegitmization of secular nationalism was on a political rather than an economic level. At the same time being Persian and Shia I think limits the direct influence of the Iranian Revolution in much of the Arab world. The Sunni Arab Islamists differ from the Iranian Islamists on a number of points. So while it did inspire a number of Islamist movements in the Arab world local factors have dictated the exact form these movements have taken.
bexley 04.13.12 at 3:18 pm
@ Salem – if you prefer I’ll rephrase my question: Why was it “unfortunate” that the Iraqis couldn’t go back to him? Your use of the word unfortunate suggests that he was actually good for Iraq.
Salem 04.15.12 at 7:38 pm
Bexley – I think that Arab countries generally would benefit from leadership that is generally secular, educated, pro-Western, modernising and liberal. The pre-1958 Iraqi system generally represented these values, albeit imperfectly. I would say that the best current exemplar of those ideas is Adnan Pachachi. The best exemplar of political Islam is Moqtada al-Sadr. I make no apologies for saying that it’s unfortunate that the latter has more popular support than the former.
I do not know what it means to say that Nuri al-Saeed was “good for Iraq.” What’s the comparison? Qasim? Saddam? Jamal Pasha? He was obviously the best ruler of Iraq in the 20th century, but it’s a low bar to clear.
ajay 04.16.12 at 10:55 am
. The US did back the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan after the USSR intervened to keep the PDPA from losing power in 1979.
Before, actually. US support predates the Soviet invasion (albeit not by long). The US was involved when the Afghan war was a purely Afghan vs. Afghan affair.
ajay 04.16.12 at 2:39 pm
Also, I wonder how many people read this and thought not “who is Ben Bella” but “wow, Ben Bella was still alive until a few days ago?” I only knew he wasn’t dead already because I read A Savage War of Peace recently and googled around, feeling sure that he must be long gone.
Also not dead: Vo Nguyen Giap! (Not only still cutting about very briskly, but celebrated his 99th birthday by becoming a feisty environmentalist.)
Barry Freed 04.16.12 at 2:53 pm
General* Giap is 100 now.
(If anyone is deserving of promotion to Field Marshal status it is Giap. Do they have Field Marshals in the VPA?)
Alex 04.16.12 at 2:59 pm
No – they stop with 4 stars.
ajay 04.16.12 at 3:04 pm
General* Giap is 100 now.
An occasion marked with due ceremony and reverence on B&T, if I remember…
bexley 04.16.12 at 3:04 pm
Ok I see where you are coming from now Salem. My own thought process on reading “Unfortunately it wasn’t possible to go back to Nuri al-Saeed” was along the lines:
“If you’re thinking about leaders of modern Iraq who aren’t possible why not wish for someone a lot better than Nuri al-Saeed (and a pony too) ?”
PS al-Saeed doesn’t strike me as having been particularly liberal or any better than Qasim. I’m not an expert on Iraqi history though.
Barry Freed 04.16.12 at 3:07 pm
An occasion marked with due ceremony and reverence on B&T, if I remember…
Yes, I knew you knew you remembered that. Here’s to the General making making it to 101 this August (and beyond).
Stephen 04.16.12 at 7:42 pm
Bexley@21
You are mistaken if you believe that I love the British Empire: I merely think that, like many empires, it had in many cases something to be said in its favour, in retrospect if not by the ephemeral standards of today.
The recent empire I most sincerely admire is that of the United States, from its inception as transatlantic British colonies to its development to its current imperfect but still very promising condition.
You are welcome to disagree with me, since we both live in free countries. Please state clearly why you believe that either (a) the USA cannot be said to be colonialist/imperialist, or (b) the USA is not, as distinct from other comparable states, worthy of admiration.
Will 04.18.12 at 3:22 am
When I was a student in college, I assembled a collection of pictures of revolutionary leaders on my bedroom door. Ben Bella was the only one whose picture I could never locate in the vast UC Berkeley stacks.
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