Paul Aussaresses | |
|---|---|
 Général Paul Aussaresses | |
| Born | (1918-11-07)7 November 1918 Saint-Paul-Cap-de-Joux, France |
| Died | 3 December 2013(2013-12-03) (aged 95) Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines, France |
| Allegiance | France |
| Service | French Army |
| Years of service | 1941–1975 |
| Rank | Brigadier General |
| Commands | 11e Choc 1er RCP |
| Battles / wars | World War II First Indochina War Algerian War |
Paul Aussaresses (French:[pɔlosaʁɛs]; 7 November 1918 – 3 December 2013) was aFrench Armygeneral, who fought duringWorld War II, theFirst Indochina War andAlgerian War. His actions during the Algerian War—and later defense of those actions—caused considerable controversy.[1]
Aussaresses joined theFree French Forces inNorth Africa during theSecond World War. In 1947 he was given command of the11th Shock Battalion, acommando unit that was part of France's former external intelligence agency, the External Documentation and Counter-Espionage Service, theSDECE (replaced by theDirection Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE)).
Aussaresses provoked controversy in 2000 when, in an interview with the French newspaperLe Monde, he admitted and defended the use oftorture during the Algerian war. He repeated the defense in an interview withCBS's60 Minutes, further arguing that torture ought to be used in the fight againstAl-Qaeda, and again defended his use of torture during the Algerian War in a 2001 book;The Battle of the Casbah. In the aftermath of the controversy, he was stripped of his rank, the right to wear his army uniform and hisLégion d'Honneur. A 2003 documentary revealed that, after moving to Brazil in 1973, Aussaresses had advised South American dictators on the use of torture widely used against leftist opponents to the military regimes in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Aussaresses also admitted to advising theCIA for the Americans' Vietnam eraPhoenix Program, which utilized torture.
Aussaresses, recognizable by his eye patch, lost his left eye due to a botchedcataract operation.[2]
Aussaresses was born on 7 November 1918, just four days before the end ofWorld War I, inSaint-Paul-Cap-de-Joux,Tarn department, in Languedoc. His father, Paul Aussaresses senior, was serving in the French military at the time of his son's birth because of the war.
In 1941, Aussaresses served a year as an officer cadet inCherchell,Algeria. The next year, in 1942, he volunteered for the special services unit inFrance. He a member of aJedburgh team and member of Team CHRYSLER which parachuted into France behind the German lines in August 1944. The Jedburghs worked clandestinely behind enemy lines to harness the local resistance and coordinate their activities with the wishes of the Allied Commanders. CHRYSLER deployed from Algeria via an American aircraft to work with the localFrench Resistance inAriège. On 1 September 1946 he joined the11th Choc Battalion and commanded the battalion from 1947 until 1948, when he was replaced byYves Godard. Later, he served in theFirst Indochina War with the 1st Parachute Chasseur Regiment.
In 1955 he was transferred toPhilippeville,Algeria to be part of the 41st Parachute Demi-Brigade as an intelligence officer. He restarted his demi-brigade's intelligence unit, which had been disbanded during peacetime but was deemed necessary by theFrench Army, which wanted to quell the insurgency of the Algerian rebels. On 20 August 1955 theFLN (Algerian National Liberation Front) staged an attack against the police of Philippeville. Aussaresses states that he had information about this attack well beforehand and was therefore able to prevent much bloodshed. The members of the FLN had forced many of the men, women and children of the countryside to march in front of them, without weapons, as human shields. Aussaresses reports that his battalion killed 134 of these men, women and children, and that hundreds more had been wounded. He reports that two men from his own side also died, and that around one hundred others had been wounded. (Aussaresses, p. 41)
In the spring of 1956, he attended a top-secret training camp inSalisbury,England for a one-month training to prepare for thebattle at Suez Canal. He returned toBône,Algeria in May 1956 to continue exercises with paratroopers on their way to theSuez Canal. On 1 June 1956 he received a spinal fracture from a parachuting exercise, which prevented him from participating in theSuez operation.
GeneralJacques Massu, who had noted Aussaresses' work against the insurrections inPhilippeville, ordered Aussaresses to work under him in Algiers as an agent to control theFLN inAlgiers. Aussaresses reported for duty in Algiers on 8 January 1957. He was the main executioner and intelligence collector underJacques Massu during theBattle of Algiers. On 28 January, he broke a citywide strike organized by theFLN using repressive measures. Soldiers forcibly dragged all public utilities workers to their jobs. Store fronts were torn open so that the owners had to open the store for fear of being looted. Later in 1957, he ordered his men to hangLarbi Ben M'Hidi, an important member of the FLN, as if he had committed suicide. In a separate incident he ordered that an officer throwAli Boumendjel, an influentialAlgerian attorney, from the 6th floor of the building he was held prisoner in, claiming that Boumendjel had committed suicide.France decreed that both deaths were suicides, but Aussaresses admitted both assassinations in 2000.[3]
Aussaresses contends, in his book, that theFrench government insisted that the military in Algeria "liquidate the FLN as quickly as possible".[4]
Subsequently, historians debated whether or not this repression was government-backed or not. TheFrench government has always claimed that it was not, but Aussaresses argues that the government insisted upon the harsh measures he took against Algerians - measures which included summary executions of many people, hours of torture of prisoners, and violent strike-breaking.
Aussaresses was quite candid in his interview inLe Monde forty years later (May 3, 2001):
Concerning the use of torture, it was tolerated, if not recommended.François Mitterrand, the Minister for Justice, had, indeed, an emissary with Massu in judge Jean Bérard, who covered for us and who had complete knowledge of what went on in the night.[3][5]
Aussaresses justified the use of torture by saying how shocked he was by the FLN's massacre at theEl Halia mine. He suggested that torture was a small but necessary evil that had to be used to defeat a much larger evil of terrorism. Aussaresses also claimed that he used these methods because it was a quick way to obtain information. He also defended its use by saying that the legal system was meant to deal with a peacetime France, not a counter insurgency war that the French army was faced with in Algeria. In 2001, Aussaresses during an interview stated:
The FLN were involved in a savage terrorist movement. My role in Algeria was a struggle against unbridled terrorism — blind attacks against the innocent. The conflict was not Algerians vs. French. The fight was not a political one nor was it an ideological one. That holds no interest for me. Most Algerians, as well, were not interested in political problems. They only wanted to be able to go out on the streets and live in peace. I, who judge no one … often ask, considering what happens in a city today — with those blind attacks which decimate the innocent — why someone does not understand within a few weeks that the high authorities must utilize all means in order to put an end to the terror?...I am a patriot. I take full responsibility for my actions. I do not seek to justify my actions but simply try to explain that from the moment when a nation demands of its army to fight an enemy that terrorizes the population and forces it into submission, it is impossible for the army not to resort to extreme means....In the interest of my country I had clandestinely carried out operations unacceptable to the ordinary moral standards, had often circumvented the law: stolen, assassinated, vandalized, and terrorized. I had learned how to pick locks, kill without leaving traces, lie, be indifferent to my suffering and to that of others, had forgotten and made others forget. All for France.[6]
In an interview toMarie-Monique Robin, Aussaresses described the methods used, including the creation ofdeath squads (escadrons de la mort), the term being created at this time.[7]
Following Aussaresses' revelations, which suggested that torture had been ordered by the highest levels of the French state hierarchy,Human Rights Watch sent a letter to PresidentJacques Chirac (RPR) to indict Aussaresses forwar crimes, declaring that, despite past amnesties, such crimes, which may also have beencrimes against humanity, may not be amnestied.[8] TheLigue des droits de l'homme (LDH, Human Rights League) filed a complaint against him for "apology of war crimes," as Paul Aussaresses justified the use of torture, claiming it had saved lives following the Necessity Defense [AKA: Choice of Evils] and/or the Self-Defense (although he did not explicitly use this expression). He was condemned to a 7,500 Euros fine by theTribunal de grande instance de Paris, whilePlon andPerrin, two editing houses who had published his book in which he defended the use of torture, were sentenced each to a 15,000 Euros fine.[9] The judgement was confirmed by theCourt of Appeal in April 2003. TheCourt of Cassation rejected the intercession in December 2004. The Court of Cassation declared in its judgment that "freedom to inform, which is the basis offreedom of expression" does not lead to "accompany the exposure of facts ... with commentaries justifying acts contrary to human dignity and universally reproved," "nor to glorify its author." Aussaresses had written in his book: "torture became necessary when emergency imposed itself."[10]
Aussaresses had a successful military career after the war. Unlike many of his fellow officers, he did not choose to join theOAS militant group to continue the fight in Algeria after the French military began to withdraw their forces. In 1961 he was appointed as a military attaché of the French diplomatic mission in the USA, along with ten veterans of the Algerian War formerly under his charge. In the USA, he also served atFort Bragg, North Carolina, USA, alongside the10th Special Forces Group, a military unit that specialized in tactics ofunconventional warfare. There he taught the lessons of the Battle of Algiers, which allegedly included counter-insurgency tactics, interrogation, and torture.[11]
According to Aussauresses, he specifically taught lessons fromColonel Trinquier's book on "subversive warfare" (Aussaresses had served under Trinquier in Algeria). The Americans'Vietnam eraPhoenix Program, which utilized torture (including electric torture, simulated drowning, and rape) against those suspected ofViet Cong membership, was inspired by these American students of Aussaresses, after they had sent a copy of Trinquier's book to CIA agentRobert Komer.[12] U.S. Army Colonel Carl Bernard later recalled that "starting with that book [Modern Warfare] Project Phoenix was conceived".[13] However, Robert L. Miller, in a foreword to Aussaresses' later book, has stated that American officers actually rejected Aussaresses' instructions that torture and summary execution were useful in defeating insurgencies.[14]
Aussaresses located toBrazil in 1973 during themilitary dictatorship, where he maintained very close links with the military.[15] According to GeneralManuel Contreras, former head of the ChileanDINA, Chilean officers trained in Brazil under Aussaresses' orders and advised the South American juntas on counter-insurrection warfare and the use of torture that was widely used against leftist opponents to the military regimes in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay.[16]
The character of Julien Boisfeuras in the novelsThe Centurions andThe Praetorians byJean Larteguy was according to Larteguy not based on anyone, but many believe that he was at least partially inspired by Aussaresses andRoger Trinquier.[17]
An inmate in the asylum for 'noble executioners' in theJens Bjørneboe novel Powderhouse shares the same biography as Aussaresses; he is described as having served in Algiers and later teaching his methods to South American death squads.
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