History Essay

Colonialism and Neocolonialism

Jean-Paul Sartre

Translated by

Azzedine Haddour,

Steve Brewer and

Terry McWilliams

London and New York

First published 1964 in French, as Situations V by Editions Gallimard, 5 rue Sébastien Bottin,

75007 Paris, France English translation first published by Routledge 2001

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© Editions GALLIMARD, Paris 1964 translation © Routledge 2001

introduction © Azzedine Haddour 2001

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from

the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Sartre, Jean Paul, 1905–1980

[Situations. 5. English] Colonialism and neocolonialism / Jean-Paul Sartre ; translated

by Azzedine Haddour, Steve Brewer, Terry McWilliams. p. cm. Includes index.

1. France—Colonies—Africa—Administration—History—20th century. 2. Africa—Colonization—History—20th century. 3. Algeria—

Colonization—History—20th century. 4. Decolonization—Africa. 5. Decolonization—Algeria. I. Title.

DT33.5 .S3713 2001 325′.3–dc21 00–045940

We Are All Murderers *

In November 1956, Fernand Yveton, a member of the Combattants de la Libération (Freedom Fighters), planted a bomb at the Hamma power station, an attempted sabotage, which can in no way equate with a terrorist action. Analysis proved that it was a time bomb precisely set so that the explosion could not occur before the personnel had left. To no avail: Yveton was arrested, sentenced to death, a reprieve was refused, he was executed. Not the slightest hesitation: this man declared and proved that he did not wish to kill anyone, but we wanted to kill him, and we did so without wavering. We had to look intimidating, didn’t we? And, as one idiot said the other day, ‘show the terrible face of an angry France’. How pure and how sure of your purity you need to be to dare to dispense this archangel’s Justice! And even if we agreed with them for a moment that this absurd war has some sense, can we not see what the French military and civilian population would have to demand of themselves if they were to hope to justify the dreadful severity of this sentence?

A little later came the trial of the ‘accomplices’, Jacqueline and Abdelkader Guerroudj. He was a political officer who liaised between the Freedom Fighters and the leaders of the FLN. She was a petty bourgeois from mainland France who wanted to assume her share

* Les Temps Modernes, No. 145, March 1958.

of the risks because she approved of her husband’s activities. She joined the movement well after him, and in November 1956, her immediate superiors assigned her the task of passing on to Yveton the materials for his future sabotage. She obeyed because she was given the guarantee that the explosion would not cost any human lives.

For those who are familiar with the logic of military courts, there was no doubt about the sentence: since they had killed Yveton and since the Guerroudj couple were his accomplices, they would have to kill them as well or go back on their judgement. The expected outcome has been confirmed since: the government commissioner, almost nonchalantly, called for the death sentence. He got it. What does it matter if the complicity of Guerroudj in the Yveton affair has not been established? In Algiers our justice prefers to astound the world by the harshness of its sentences rather than by the strength of the evidence on which they are based.

Will logic be taken to the extreme of executing the Guerroudjs, of refusing to grant a presidential pardon? If it were permitted to address the highest-ranking official of the Fourth Republic, I would respectfully point out to him that these are no longer the good times of 1956. Since the trial of the Guerroudjs, an incident has taken place, just a hiccup, of course, but one which should not be without impact upon our way of administering justice, especially military justice: Sakhiet. There were bombs at Sakhiet, just as at the Hamma power station. Only they did not have a timing mechanism. And those

responsible were not so foolish as to limit the operation simply to damage to property. For Sakhiet, too, the time of the operation had been precisely chosen: it was market time. Yveton clearly had no other aim than to plunge the town into darkness. The aim of our planes was to plunge a village into death. If we had wished to maintain our archangel-like severity, we should, perhaps, have sought out the guilty parties and – who knows? – brought them to trial. But no: Monsieur Gaillard ‘covered up’! With what thick veil or impenetrable mist he hoped to cover up the ruins of Sakhiet I do not know. But the operation was not a success: the stones smoking in the sun were seen by the whole world. Only Monsieur Gaillard is us, is France. When, from his platform, he most officially made the august gesture of the man covering up, he implicated us all. Our foreign friends – as their press takes pleasure in explaining to us each day – are beginning to ask themselves very seriously if we have not become rabid dogs. And here is the question that we could humbly put to the highest-ranking official of our great Republic: is it really a good moment to execute the Guerroudjs? Would it not be in our interest to ease up a little on our arrogant severity? Is a country whose government proudly accepts responsibility for what Monsieur Mauriac, the other day, so aptly called a massacre of the poor, really qualified to allow its representatives to impose the death penalty, in its name, on a man who had no role other than to liaise between groups of communist origin and the FLN, or on a woman who, in taking part in a sabotage operation, took all necessary precautions to ensure that there would be no casualties? It must be repeated every day to the imbeciles who wish to terrify the world by showing it the ‘terrible face of France’: France terrifies nobody, she does not even have the means to intimidate any more; she is beginning to disgust, that is all. In the execution of the Guerroudj couple, if it were ever to take place, nobody would see or admire our archangel-like inflexibility; they would simply think that we have committed yet another crime.

Colonialism and Neocolonialism 30