Front of Socialist Forces" got equally favorable handling in the October 12 issue of The Newsletter. The editors even engaged in friendly “socialist" competition with the pair in throwing epithets at Ben Bella.
. They charged Ben Bella with "maintaining regular telephone contact with the Elysee Palace in Paris" while "his own press and broadcasting services have to keep the Algerian people completely in the dark about the past. week's events,"
According to The Newsletter, "Ben Bella is clearly taking into account the opposition brewing up throughout the country as a result of his inability to solve even the basic problems in Algeria. In his hesitant position he has attempted to divert attention from the rebellion with his tanti-imperialist! campaign to nationalize the land of the French settlers.
"But this line fell rather flat when the French government, according to 'Le Monde,! expressed complete acceptance of it."
The Newsletter's explanation for Ben Bella's allegedly carrying out nationalizations to "divert attention" and please de Gaulle is that "all
on me the middle-class nationalist politicians tend to gravitate towards the policies of the imperialists."
From this, the particular conclusion is easily reached in Ben Bella's case thet "he ends up grovelling at their feet." .
The Newsletter also tells us that "Sections of the capitalist press. have played the rebellion down. . 24
‘Apparently The Newsletter does not follow other sections of the capitalist press that have played it up. Otherwise the editors could. scarcely have missed the extremely sympathetic treatment which this rebel~ lion received in some of the most powerful as well as reactionary sectors. In truth there was considerable excitement in these circles over the 'Pront of Socialist Forces." .
David Willie wrote in The Sunday Times of London (October 6) that "Ait Ahmed and the Colonel have been getting a lion's share of. attention this week as car loads of journalists have been crawling up the narrow mountain roads to reach rebel headquarters. ... Tne modest Hotel des Voyageurs (12 beds) has-become an international Press HQ." , ... Colonel Mohand Ou El Hadj got a full half hour on nation-wide Ameri-~ “can TV networks, a not inexpensive or well played-down piece of. publicity.
The Associated Press gave its clients a glowing account of the same personage (October 6): "El Hadj -- 'The Old One! -- at 52 Is Called _ Military Genius" was the headline used. for the dispatch by the New York © ‘Herald Tribune, a staunch Republican shéet.
"Hard life and years of guerrilla fighting for Algeria's independence have made him look older, more worn-out than he really is," the dispatoh informs us.
"In fact, he looks more like a patient, good-natured grandfather than a bough guerrilla who has survived hair-raising raids and pursuits. "
A romantic "socialist" this colonel. And quite natural that he should look older and more worn-out than he really. is, since the Associated Press got his age wrong. He is really 62.
The Associated Press indicated’ the basic views of the .Colonel in a delicate way. Before becoming a military genius he was a "shopkeeper" who “sold imitation jewelry to Berber women in colorful striped robes and cheap watches to men who frequently saved for years to afford one."
The Associated Press would obviously like to see a budding capitalist like that back in business.
The same American big business news service gave a similarly favorable write-up for Hocine Ait Ahmed on October 4. The Herald Tribune headlined it: "Ait Ahmed Is Political Brain of Berber Revolt in Algeria."
‘This "political brain" speaks in “staccato sentences" that have brought the "bearded Berber patriarchs" rallying to the "son of these
aD me mountains" to "show loyalty to ethnic ties stronger than anywhere else in | Algeria." .
Besides hypnotizing them with ethnology, the brain Neleotrified then with his voice and assurance" that victory is certain. pe
-As for program, the Associated Press gave its clients a broad editorial wink: "Mr. Ait Ahmed's clandestine Front of Socialist Forces has little in the way of a solid political program. He speaks vaguely of 'scientific socialism,' of nationalization accomplished ‘progressively without brutality.!"
-This amiable attitude toward the machinegun wielders in the Kabylie extends to the highest levels in American big business and politics. . Leo Sauvage reported in the October 16° issue of Le Figaro, the rightist Paris daily:
"Pinally and above all, leading American circles who were inclined to go along with the 'Castroist! Ben Bella out of political realism, that is, as long as he appeared to them to be the unchallenged master of _. Algeria, have been impressed by the Kabyle affair."
ve On October 1, a Washington dispatch appeared in the New York Times, undoubtedly written in the light of a State Department "background" briefing. It professed that puzzlement exists in Washington over Ben Bella's course <= suspicion that he might "be tempted to veer toward the path of Premier Fidel Castro of Cuba" but uncertainty over whether he can be expected to actually take the plungé. When Ben Bella visits the U.S., maybe to see Kennedy, they hope to have "a new chance to take his measure,"
"In the meantime," concludes this informative article, "the United States, which has been tapering off its emergency food shipments to - Algeria, is unlikely to make any large, new commitments of foreign aid to that country. "
The New York Times, the most powerful editorial voice of American big business, gave Hocine Ait Ahmed a paternal pat on the back (October 8). It noted that he was the son of a well-to-do land owner, that he got his doctorate in law at the University of Paris. and that "Even his bitterest. foes concede he is bright."
The Times, unlike most American capitalist newspapers, assumes that at least Some of its readers are politically sophisticated and so it. often indicates the program of people in whom it takes a kindly interest. "Mr, Ait-Abmed," said the Times, "is a nationalist with a strong touch of a vague Marxism, He condemn 3 Communists and has the taste for rhetoric of a French intellectual, a
Someone who has that kind of taste for rhetoric, it is well known, is not easily pinned down to definite programmatic statements, France's leading capitalist paper, Le Monde, which observes rather high. journalistic standards, noted this October 8:
"But the movement remains essentially circumscribed. . . it is neces sary to take account of the evidence: . the rest of the country is not. following it. . .. Certain people have been tempted to join the dissi-
Qe dents, but they have been genuinely repelled by the inconsistency of the program of the Front of Socialist Forces. You can't build an opposition on the basis of simple accusations. . i
"¥his weakness constitutes one of the strengths af Mr. Ben Bella. The movement proves itself in action and as long as the head of the state follows his socialist policy and his struggle against the bourgeoisie, the Algerian masses will maintain their confidence in him."
Socialists would do well to study the attempt at objectivity in these sentences, The editors of Le Monde do not permit themselves to be blinded by demagogy. They look for program.
The political analysts in the service of the Vatican likewise sometimes reveal caution about being deluded by demagogy. The October 10 Témoignage Chrétien (Christian Testimony), a French Catholic paper, — Orfered the following instructive view of the basic situation:
"The measures of socialization and nationalization are not specially advantageous in the Kabylie, a mountainous region where property consists of very small holdings and where the big European estates are not-very . numerous. On the contrary it hurts the numerous small Kabyle capitalists, owners in Algiers and elsewhere of restaurants, hotels, cafes, businesses “threatened by the policy of complete socialization announced by Ben Bella.
- This is at the bottom of the psychological and social discontent — which Ait Ahmed and the other leaders. of the FFS are trying to exploit | and to convert into a political movement."
Témoignage Chrétien does not believe that the masses will respond bo appeals consisting of nothing but the exhortations of former freedom fighters and once popular figures like Mohand Ou El Hadj. "In the eyes of the people, and of the peasant masses, Ben Bella remains not only the historic chief who unleashed the insurrection but the man of the state who, in one year, gave the land to the fellahs [poor peasants}. This is a title that makes those of the other 'ex=historics! quite pallid."
It is not necessary, however, for our socialists of The Newsletter and similar publications to take lessons from the political analysts of the Vatican on how to determine the class character of mountebanks, They need but read more attentively the material turned out by the "Front of Socialist ‘Forces.
World Outlook of October 11 provided extensive quotations from an interview which Ait Ahmed granted the reactionary French Candide, a rightwing de Gaullist weekly. The sympathetic treatment given the armed rebellion by this rag should have tipped off everyone on the real views of . French reaction toward the Political Brain and the Military Genius. The declarations by Ait Ahmed, the accuracy of which he has not yet denied, should have removed the last lingering doubt.
This week we point to another item, a communiqué issued in Paris on. stationery of the "Front of Socialist Forces, * parts of which went out on the press wires October 9, long enough ago for rectifications to have been made by the "Front" if its leaders felt that any were necessary:
_=1L0~
“We speak to the ordinary French people who live among us, " the com~ muniqué is reported as saying, “because their OAS [Secret Army Organiza-. tion} was betrayed by its chiefs exactly as the FLN [National Liberation Front] is being betrayed by Ben Bella. . .. They need us as we need them for the new Algeria," 7 Be
_ This appeal to the French people living in Algeria to support the. armed rebellion against Ben Bella may strike a sympathetic chord among the thousands of smaller holders of land whose property was recently “demagog= ically" nationalized. Perhaps the appeal will win some fresh recruits to the "Front of Socialist Forces." .
On the other hand, it constitutes an additional bit of evidence pointing to the class character of the real program on which the armed uprising stands. If.it is "socialism," it is a reactionary petty=bourgeois variety that is not incompatible with the interests of imperialism, . Both Washington and Paris know it, as well as the leaders in Kabylie who launched this counterrevolutionary attempt.