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Algeria as a French protectorate

R

Ricardolindo

Well-known member
Location
Portugal
What if France ran Algeria as a protectorate like they did Tunisia and their portion of Morocco? I think such an Algeria would have gained independence peacefully and have better relations with France, like Tunisia and Morocco.
 
Doesn't fit the timeline at all. France started using protectorates in the Maghreb, some Subsaharan states and Indochina mostly from the 1880s.

Anyway, the point was that after a spectacularly brutal conquest, the French state wanted to put in settlers on land they would expropriate from the Algerians. Direct military then civilian rule was more likely to achieve that goal than protectorate status.

But if it's a protectorate and there are still settlers in numbers akin to OTL, of course the fight for independence is going to be violent and of course relations are going to be terrible. Do you think one million people will readily agree to leave the land just because it's been called a protectorate and not départements?
 
Redolegna said:
Doesn't fit the timeline at all. France started using protectorates in the Maghreb, some Subsaharan states and Indochina mostly from the 1880s.

Anyway, the point was that after a spectacularly brutal conquest, the French state wanted to put in settlers on land they would expropriate from the Algerians. Direct military then civilian rule was more likely to achieve that goal than protectorate status.

But if it's a protectorate and there are still settlers in numbers akin to OTL, of course the fight for independence is going to be violent and of course relations are going to be terrible. Do you think one million people will readily agree to leave the land just because it's been called a protectorate and not départements?
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I know France began their conquest of Algeria decades earlier than Tunisia and Morocco but large scale European settlement only began 3 decades after the initial conquest.
I don't see large scale European settlement in Algerian as a protectorate. It didn't happen in Tunisia and Morocco. Even small scale settlement may not happen as that in Tunisia and Morocco was inspired on that in Algeria.
 
There was also Abdelkader’s emirate in the 1830s and 40s, though it only consisted of part of Algeria and I’m not sure if it could have lasted with the French occupying part of the region.
 
Ricardolindo said:
I don't see large scale European settlement in Algerian as a protectorate. It didn't happen in Tunisia and Morocco. Even small scale settlement may not happen as that in Tunisia and Morocco was inspired on that in Algeria.
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The point was, the French state and its leaders wanted to settle people there. And a lot of them. And would do anything, as they did OTL, to throw people out of their own lands to replace them with European settlers.
 
Redolegna said:
The point was, the French state and its leaders wanted to settle people there. And a lot of them. And would do anything, as they did OTL, to throw people out of their own lands to replace them with European settlers.
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Again, large scale European settlement in Algeria only began 3 decades after the initial conquest.
 
Once "pacification" ended, it would always end up with attempts at settlement. You don't spend three decades waging an incredibly brutal war of conquest just so people finally agree to recognize you as overlord, you do it to displace them entirely and substitute another landowning class of your choosing.
 
Redolegna said:
Once "pacification" ended, it would always end up with attempts at settlement. You don't spend three decades waging an incredibly brutal war of conquest just so people finally agree to recognize you as overlord, you do it to displace them entirely and substitute another landowning class of your choosing.
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As @Gary Oswald mentioned, albeit not in details, Napoleon III proposed dividing French Algeria between a coastal colony for the few preexisting settlers and a protectorate and the coastal colony wasn't planned to encourage more settlement.
 
Ricardolindo said:
As @Gary Oswald mentioned, albeit not in details, Napoleon III proposed dividing French Algeria between a costal state for the few preexisting settlers and a protectorate.
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Right, but like that meant give the desert to the natives, while the settlers get the rich bits and like if you look at precedent everywhere, the borders would be adjusted in the settlers favour once more of them arrived.

That's how settler colonisation works.
 
Gary Oswald said:
Right, but like that meant give the desert to the natives, while the settlers get the rich bits and like if you look at precedent everywhere, the borders would be adjusted in the settlers favour once more of them arrived.

That's how settler colonisation works.
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I actually addressed that in an edit to my reply before you finished your own. The coastal colony wasn't supposed to encourage more settlement. Also, the planned Arab Kingdom wasn't the desert. There are 3 maps in a thread at the other place, in which I inspired myself: https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...rotectorate-not-settlement-department.479155/.
 
Ricardolindo said:
I actually addressed that in an edit to my reply before you finished your own. The coastal colony wasn't supposed to encourage more settlement. Also, the planned Arab Kingdom wasn't the desert. There are 3 maps in a thread at the other place, in which I inspired myself: https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...rotectorate-not-settlement-department.479155/.
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Right and the intent of the trail of tears was to give indians land which would be theirs forever and the intent of the agreement with the herero was to guarantee their land was free from settlement.

The intent is rarely the problem.
 
Gary Oswald said:
Right and the intent of the trail of tears was to give indians land which would be theirs forever and the intent of the agreement with the herero was to guarantee their land was free from settlement.

The intent is rarely the problem.
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Again, though, Tunisia and Morocco, which are far better parallels and which were protectorates, saw no such thing.
 
If you want to make Algeria a French protectorate like Tunisia, you need to avoid Charles X’s conquest of Algeria in the first place, and then you also need to keep France from viewing Algeria as a potential zone for settler colonialism in the decades afterwards.

It must also be remembered that even an Algeria becoming a French “protectorate” in the late nineteenth century would still face the horrific indignities of colonialism - I can imagine this Algeria would be used as a breadbasket for France, which would be definitely bad for the Algerians.
 
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Indicus said:
If you want to make Algeria a French protectorate like Tunisia, you need to avoid Charles X’s conquest of Algeria in the first place, and then you also need to keep France from viewing Algeria as a potential zone for settler colonialism in the decades afterwards.

It must also be remembered that even an Algeria becoming a French “protectorate” in the late nineteenth century would still face the horrific indignities of colonialism - I can imagine this Algeria would be used as a breadbasket for France, which would be definitely bad for the Algerians.
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Even then like the med coast would be vulnerable to french settler colonialism i would bet on some cities being carved on being given to France.
 
Creekmench said:
Even then like the med coast would be vulnerable to french settler colonialism i would bet on some cities being carved on being given to France.
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So you could avoid the full war for independence by Algeria being a protectorate and then instead get a running conflict from (say) French Oran's Algerian population wanting to reunify and Algeria prodding France hard for a handover?
 
Charles EP M. said:
So you could avoid the full war for independence by Algeria being a protectorate and then instead get a running conflict from (say) French Oran's Algerian population wanting to reunify and Algeria prodding France hard for a handover?
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yes like the rif or western sahara in iotl
 
Indicus said:
If you want to make Algeria a French protectorate like Tunisia, you need to avoid Charles X’s conquest of Algeria in the first place, and then you also need to keep France from viewing Algeria as a potential zone for settler colonialism in the decades afterwards.

It must also be remembered that even an Algeria becoming a French “protectorate” in the late nineteenth century would still face the horrific indignities of colonialism - I can imagine this Algeria would be used as a breadbasket for France, which would be definitely bad for the Algerians.
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Agreed. Algeria was deeply vulnerable. If you can postpone an invasion to the late 19th century, then the odds of a relatively unpromising Algeria becoming an arena for French-directed colonization from southern Europe become lower. There were large European colonial populations in both Moroccos and Tunisia, but those.countries had much less disruptive colonial experiences
 
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