Analysis of the Battle of Algiers

The Battle of Algiers: Terrorism, torture & ethics

The Battle of Algiers, directed by Gillo Pontecorvo, produced in 1966 depicts the 1950’s Algerian war of independence with chilling authenticity. Cast almost entirely with nonprofessional actors, and filmed in documentary neorealist style in the serpentine alleys, stairways and archways of Algiers’s Muslim Kasbah. Pontecorvo used newsreel film stock, telephoto close-ups, and a percussive, hard-driving musical score to create a swiftly moving political thriller (Hornaday, 2004). It is an anatomy of terror and counter terror that remains unsurpassed (Rainer, 2004). The film does not romanticize terrorists, demonize the French, or valorize violence in the name of some sort of people’s revolution; instead the director goes at once deeper and higher, examining each side’s motives and contradictions (Hornaday, 2004). Bombs and bullets do not choose their targets, individuals do, both sides do savage things and both can supply rational arguments to prove that they are on the side of morality. The film is poignant because it shows a level of bitter reality (Ebert, 2005) there are no heroes, only perpetrators and innocent victims. Children shoot French officials at point blank range. Women plant bombs in cafes. Men fire automatic weapons indiscriminately into crowds. Soldiers brutalize their captives and the military indiscriminately razes buildings and threaten civilians.

The film begins with the Front de Libération Nationale, or FLN, issuing a communiqué calling for the expulsion of all French from Algeria, followed by the murders of policemen, shot and stabbed seemingly at random by nondescript Arab perpetrators who then disappear into the crowd. The incidents multiply and the prefect, moving outside the law, arranges the clandestine bombing of a building in the Arab quarter associated with the rebels. Thereafter the FLN begins it notorious civilian bombing campaign. In the film’s strongest scene, three Arab women dressed as chic French girls infiltrate the European Quarter, which has been isolated from the Kasbah by checkpoints, in order to plant bombs in two cafes and an Air France office. We see businessmen at the bar, travelers waiting to board planes, teenagers dancing, and children eating ice cream cones… all about to be incinerated. The bombs detonate simultaneously, littering the French Quarter with maimed bodies and debris, sending the populace into a panic. Paris responds by deploying French Special Forces to Algiers, and a news bulletin informs, “The Inspector General has taken drastic steps to ensure law and order and to protect people and property.” It goes on to say that the Army will, “take over responsibility for law and order … using all civil and military measures necessary.” The Army, led by Lt. Colonel Philippe Mathieu, has a strategic plan to track down and stop the terrorists by using severe interrogation, i.e. torture.

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Thus we have the ethical dilemma of the film, at least from the French point of view. Is torture a justifiable counter measure to terrorism? Can it be justified at all, if so then on what grounds and on whose authority? The stakeholders in the film are threefold: The public, the French military, charged with protecting the public, and the FLN terrorists, who’s goal is to wage war against the French in Algeria. It would seem that protecting innocent people is good, and killing them is bad, therefore measures taken in pursuit of the good are moral. It also seems that torture, the deliberate infliction of physical suffering intended to elicit intelligence (Peters, 1985) is also wrong. However, it cannot be that simple. The film deals in dark subject matter, about which there are no clear answers. Condemning French brutality outright, comes with the corollary of implicitly approving the terrorist’s acts. Likewise, utter disapproval of the terrorists implies unspoken sanction of French actions.

From a utilitarian perspective, protecting a majority against a minority of murderers can be seen as grounds to torture those who have relevant information. Col. Mathieu recognizes that fact. He tells his men, “The problem, as usual, is: first, the enemy; second, how to destroy him. There are 400,000 Arabs in Algiers. All against us? Of course not. There’s only a minority that rules by terror and violence.” Moreover, under utilitarian thinking torture is obviously justified, and the single right thing to do, when it is the only way to prevent a serious and imminent threat (Allhoff, 2005). To Mathieu, the needs of the French community at large out way any and all needs of those in military custody. Further utilitarian judgment could lead to the assumption that even those French not in Algiers, and not directly threatened by the FLN are being tormented by them through terror and intimidation, and that their needs should also be considered. Ending the terror campaign will certainly improve their well being, by alleviating their fear, by promoting the common defense and by restoring order.

It can also be argued that the terrorists, by their involvement in vicious terror plots, have surrendered their rights not to be tortured. As a result, torturing them is not per say immoral because they have no ethical appeal and no rights to violate. Even supposing their rights are indivisible and cannot be taken away, do the innocent’s rights to not be killed not supercede the rights of those who are to be tortured? Even if all rights violations are equally undesirable, it seems appropriate to torture one or two captives to obtain relevant information to prevent further rights violations of innocent people (Allhoff, 2005).

For these reasons, the French have decided that, given their circumstances, torture is justifiable. From this perspective, it can be assumed that since the military is charged with protecting the populace and rooting out the terrorists, not torturing for information would be against their duty and therefore immoral. Consequently, torture can be seen as not only justified in the situation, but in the context, the ethical thing to do. In addition, the military officers have an ethical duty to destroy the terrorist cells with all expediency. They are charged with doing anything possible to stop more attacks from happening. Would they not be shirking their moral duty by making the decision not to use every available means to complete their mission? Assuming they did not torture and more attacks continued, would they not be morally responsible for the deaths they could have otherwise possibly prevented?

Of special significance in the film is the fact that no one actually raises any objection to the use of torture, ethical or otherwise. The FLN does not list it specifically as a grievance against France. The characters are more or less ambivalent about it, and it is treated as a consequence. When journalists praise Col. Mathieu for his troops’ successes, but express reservations about “the methods that they [the soldiers] have employed,” he responds with simple logic, “The successes obtained are the results of those methods. One presupposes the other and vice versa.” In the film’s most important dialogue, Mathieu confronts the journalist’s moral ambiguity and that of the French public at large:

“The problem is the FLN wants us to leave Algeria and we want to remain. Now, it seems to me that, despite varying shades of opinion, you all agree that we must remain. When the rebellion first began, there were not even shades of opinion. All the newspapers … wanted the rebellion suppressed and we were sent here for this very reason. … We are soldiers and our only duty is to win. Therefore, to be precise, I would now like to ask you a question: Should France remain in Algeria? If you answer “yes,” then you must accept all the necessary consequences.”

The greatness of The Battle of Algiers lies in its power to embrace moral ambiguity without succumbing to it (Hornaday, 2004). Murder and torture are immoral; those who engage in such activity are only ethical in their own eyes. There are no heroes, the sorrow of the film cannot be suppressed and leaves viewers with the sense that all sides in the conflict have in a way, lost their souls (Rainer, 2004). The series of escalating skirmishes seem to culminate not in victory but in a deflating sense of lost virtue. Though the French win the battle in Algiers, their victory is shamed by their actions, and they ultimately lose Algeria.

References

Allhoff, Fritz. “Terrorism and Torture.” International Journal of Applied Philosophy. (2005): 106-110.

University of California Santa Barbara. 30 Sept. 2005 .

The Battle of Algiers. Dir Gillo Pontecorvo. Perf. Jean Martin, Brahim Haggiag, and Saadi Yacef. 1966.

Beary, Kevin. “Battle of Algiers.” LewRockwell.com. (30 Jun. 2003). 3 March 2006.

Ebert, Roger. “The Battle of Algiers.” Chicago Sun Times. (2005). 20 Sept. 2005.

Hornaday, Ann. “The Battle of Algers: A Revolution in Film.” Washington Post. 9 Jan. 2004.

Peters, Edward. Torture. New York, NY: Basil Blackwell Inc., 1985.

Rainer, Peter. “Prescient Tense.” New York Magazine. 12 Jan. 2004.

Sailer, Steve. “French Lesson.” The American Conservative. 2 Feb. 2004.

Sailer, beary

Analysis of the Battle of Algiers

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