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The Pretender* 43
there is no dispute between the head of free France and the Army in Algeria; these
awkward explanations blow wide open the scandal they are intended to hide. When
General de Gaulle declares that he is prepared to assume the powers of the Republic, he
has already received his praetorian investiture, the only one that counts in his eyes. The
officers and European civilians have designated him to exercise, in the name of the
colonists, an unconditional dictatorship over the people of mainland France. That is
something that General de Gaulle would certainly not accept: indeed his honesty, his
patriotism and his pride forbid him to sacrifice France to her colonies: it is unity that he
wants. And in the interest of both parties. But what does it matter what he wants? What
does it matter what the officers overseas want? There is no doubt that they are totally
devoted to him; perhaps they felt that they were just calling him to their aid, to the aid of
France as he sees her. But the result is there: they have imposed or tried to impose their
chosen leader upon the choice of the Assembly. It must accept or reject him under the
threat of civil war. He will remain there, even if he is temporarily pushed aside, like the
emperor designated by the Roman legions.
At the slightest crisis, tomorrow, in a week, in a year, he may reappear. He is a
permanent candidate (unless a forceful action makes him the ruling emperor) as a result
of this intolerable blackmail. The play of democratic institutions is radically distorted.
And, if de Gaulle does not take power, it will remain distorted by the presence of this
pretender until he officially renounces the false right that force has bestowed upon him.
What does it matter, after that, whether constitutional rules are observed or not? If the
President of the Republic does not summon the pretender, and if the latter intends to use
force, naked violence will be seen. If Monsieur Coty summons Charles de Gaulle, it is a
further capitulation. One of the General’s declarations is particularly significant: ‘The
army must obey the State. Provided that there is one.’ Nothing could be better: the army
cannot disobey you, Monsieur Pflimlin, because you are not the State. ‘I am the State;
that is why it will obey me.’ But since the sovereign is a general, the army is only
obeying itself and the country is obeying the army. And it is quite true that our State is
weak. But whose fault is it if not that of the generals in Algeria and the civilians whom
they support? If not that of the ministers who have all weakened the State by increasingly
culpable and serious concessions? To ‘cover up’ Sakiet, Monsieur Gaillard, was not
simply to blithely assume responsibility for a crime: it was also to leave your successor at
the mercy of a military putsch.
And if Charles de Gaulle had those exceptional powers, what would he do with them?
What are his plans? Which way will his arbitrator’s judgement go? These questions will
remain unanswered as long as he does not come to power, that is to say, perhaps, forever.
For de Gaulle is finishing his portrait of himself in the same way as he began it: by
silence. It is not that he does not have a plan. But he will not let it be known, because –
and this is the gravest danger – he wishes to be elected not on the strength of a
programme but on the strength of his person. Not on what he does now, but on what he
did in the past when, for the Allies, he represented free France.
Our support, if he asks it of us, will not be in spite of our ignorance of his intentions,
but because of it. It is not a question of asking him – with all due respect – what he
intends to do, but of approving in advance all that he will do, on the basis of what he has
done already. Those five years during which he made our history – along with many