Death of a Diehard

While the Fourth Republic tottered and Moslems in Algerian cities mingled with French colonists in a new and still-uneasy friendship, what of the rebels?

The rebel newspaper El Moudjahid briefly noted last week that one Ramdane Abbane had "died of wounds while inspecting F.L.N. troops on Algerian territory." Behind that brief notice lay a significant story.

Moslem Joan. Abbane, 38, was typical of the single-minded fanatics who emerge from every revolutionary situation. Asked how he managed to stand the strain of terrorist activity, he snapped: "It's easy. I get up angry in the morning and I go to bed angry at night." Abbane was a Kabyle, a member of a rugged mountain race that looks down on the other Berber tribes and especially on the Arab Algerians of the cities. The Kabyles' history is old and militant: under King Jugurtha, they held off the might of ancient Rome for five bloody years; they battled the Arab and Turkish invaders of North Africa; led by a "Joan of Arc" called Lalla Fatma, they fought the conquering French longer than any other tribe in Algeria. Kabyles in the tens of thousands served in the French army in both world wars, and their fighters are considered the most spirited of the rebel troops.

The son of a poor farmer in the Great Kabylia region between Algiers and Bougie, Ramdane Abbane graduated from a French lycee, managed to get one of the few civil-service jobs open to Moslems. From the first a hot-eyed revolutionary well-read in Marx, Abbane at 27 belonged to the inner council of the Algerian nationalist movement. Betrayed by an informer, he served five years in French prisons, emerged from jail in 1955 just as the rebellion was gathering strength.

Once he had joined the Kabyle guerrillas in the hills, Abbane brought all the local bands under a unified command, created a system of taxing inhabitants on the French model, set up recruitment and training centers. Practically under the guns of the French army, he called an all-Algeria conference of F.L.N. leaders in the Soummam valley, rammed through his entire program of no compromise, no quarter, no mercy.

Solitary Meal. From Soummam, Abbane moved on to his toughest job: Algiers itself. By December 1956 eleven bombs a day were exploding in the streets, and the city was on the verge of collapse. The French replied with General Jacques Massu and his paratroop division, who fought the F.L.N. terror with equally brutal terror. In two months Abbane's underground was smashed, and he escaped to Tunis minutes before he was to be arrested.

His failure in Algiers cost him his power. Though still in the high command, he became less influential than the more moderate Ferhat Abbas or the two military commanders of the Kabyles, Amar Ouamrane and Belkacem Krim. The newer leadership aimed at combining the fighting in Algeria with diplomatic maneuvers and appeals to world opinion. Abbane protested against the new line loudly and ineffectually, was often seen eating a solitary meal in cheap restaurants. One day he disappeared from Tunis, was rumored under house arrest until last week's notice of his death.

Since it was no longer part of his job to be "inspecting F.L.N. troops on Algerian territory," French intelligence sources insist that Abbane was killed not by French bullets, but by F.L.N. executioners in the time-honored method of liquidating an unsuccessful and "fractional" leader.

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