just as doctors had done during the Algerian conquest beginning in the 1830s. Part of the comprehensive strategy in waging war against the FLN was to engage the population, take hold of it, rally it, and progressively utilize it.70 The SAS were dispatched to areas of strategic value and they were supposed to operate with military precision when establishing contact with villages and attempt to neutralize their suspicion and hostility toward the French. SAS visits would demonstrate to the local population that not only could the colonial state provide for them but that it was also committed to improving their quality of life in ways that the FLN could not. At the same time, monthly medical reports about the number of men, women, and children would be sent back to military officials who would then convert the raw data into reliable intelligence about particular regions.71 With this kind of information, soon the SAS could attempt “to balance in a short time, and with considerable effort, the administrative and social irresponsibility with which Paris had ruled Algeria for more than a century.”72 This was how the SAS were ideally supposed to function. As we will see, the reality of how the SAS operated was quite different.73
Recruiting Personnel
The administration turned its attention to finding qualified staff to carry out pacification, many of whom were likely unaware of the depth and breadth of the medical field’s underdevelopment. This immediately posed a problem. Those that were hired came from a variety of backgrounds, including but not limited to Indochina veterans, Arabic linguists and specialists of the region, and regiment officers.74 The diverse experience of participants made ideological coherence nearly impossible, and they were constantly caught between contradictory military and civilian priorities. Their “intermediary positions” were a source of tension from the outset and hindered what they would achieve.75
When the SAS started, there were fewer than four hundred military physicians working in Algeria and the state of medical facilities remained inadequate to offer comprehensive care to the roughly ten million Muslim and European people living in Algeria at the time.76 Public and private hospitals received twelve million francs between 1949 and 1954, and a May 1955 Monthly Bulletin of General Statistics applauded the expansion of hospital beds in that time from 21,218 to 28,018, but this number would hardly temper the devastation ahead and the deplorable conditions SAS teams encountered.77 Given the nature of SAS units, officials preferred to place military doctors in designated medical positions; however, too few existed and the leadership began coordinating their efforts with civil physicians in Algeria.
The SAS recruited active officers in the French army and reserve officers at home. They were expected to serve anywhere from six months to three years and were enticed with salaries ranging from 5,000 to 18,000 francs, but even with these incentives, the number of volunteers remained feeble.78 Armand Frémont attributes the difficulty of recruiting voluntary military and Foreign Legion enlistees to feelings of doubt and ambivalence about Algeria, some even protesting that “this war [is] not ours.”79 SAS medical officers, frequently drawn from the same pool of volunteers, had to temper these sentiments and find ways to continue their medical outreach to the Algerian people.
The SAS program, looking to develop its staff beyond military recruits, may have found a way of supplementing medical personnel with Algerian staff, but a series of applications from 1955 show that colonial officials privileged political allegiance over technical skill. Late that fall, several hundred men and women, the majority of whom were Algerian, submitted dossiers for consideration to work at hospital facilities such as the Psychiatric Hospital of Blida, the Algerian Cancer Center, the Oran Civil Hospital, and the Sétif Civil Hospital. Upon review, which consisted of checking the person’s education, city and address of origin, police record, and personal conduct, a significant portion of the male applicants were rejected because of their political affiliation. The police wanted to know whether the applicant supported the French government and if he or she had any questionable political ties.80
Abderrahmane ben Abdelkrim Benzine, a twenty-two-year-old male with no prior police record, applied to work in one of the Algiers locations, but an Algiers prefect questioned his political allegiance. Benzine had been arrested in 1949 for distributing Parti du Peuple Algérien (PPA) tracts, and, even though he had not been formally charged with a crime, the prefect thought this provided sufficient evidence that he could not be trusted.81 Benzine’s current position at the Office of Public Transport and ability to speak Arabic and Kabyle were insufficient to influence a favorable recommendation. Instead, the prefect labeled him “a propagandist of separatist ideology,” with a “hostile” attitude “toward the French cause.”82 The official overlooked Benzine’s useful language skills and social connections in the area based on an event six years prior that may not have had any bearing on his ability to perform a job well.
Abdelkader Zerrouki, originally from Orléansville who moved to Tlemcen after the 1954 earthquake, was another young male whose application was rejected based on his alleged political leanings. In Zerrouki’s file, Orléansville subprefect Platt wrote that he received “good information about the candidate’s conduct and morality.”83 However, Platt noted that the applicant’s father, M’hamed Zerrouki, “is a very active UDMA [Union Démocratique du Manifeste Algérien] militant,” and he believed that Abdelkader “was a member of the UDMA in Orléansville,” whose “politics aligned with those of his father.”84 Platt’s general observations about the Zerrouki family led him to conclude that Abdelkader was not a suitable candidate for hire.
Half of the applicants were women, and they were typically recommended for employment. As with their male counterparts, the reviewer vetted their political histories, but unlike many of the men’s applications, the women’s background checks did not reveal a past of organized political activity. In fact, many of the female hopefuls were approved because they “did not express any political opinion,” nor did they generate any concern “regarding their behavior and morality.”85 They were considered politically neutral and deemed less likely to bring their politics to work.
In the spring and summer of 1956, hospitals across the country received another batch of applications from doctors in Algeria and in France who requested personnel positions. In several instances, letters accompanied the file, asking that the application undergo further review. The available material did not provide conclusive information about each case, but some of the applicants were refused employment based on technical credentials. For example, Dr. Xavier Maurin applied for a surgical position at the Oran Civil Hospital in May 1956, but Robert Lacoste denied him the job in July 1956 because Maurin had only passed two of the three required exams.86 This small series of applications revealed that people were applying for medical jobs in Algeria in 1955 and 1956, but a group of officials were not compelled to hire them. Moreover, it is troubling that candidates with viable skills sought out professional positions two years into the war and were passed over.
The SAS also recruited Algerian women to contribute to pacification and sought individuals who could assist them in practical matters such as translating Berber and Arabic and distributing medicine and emergency goods to their communities. If Algerians saw their own working alongside the French, they might be more inclined to receive medical treatment and send their children to school. The SAS drew upon a tested imperial strategy and relied on auxiliaries to promote medical programs and services.87 In the past, they served as crucial linchpins between the indigenous population and colonial doctors, and the SAS recycled the idea in the 1950s.
One major SAS objective was to concentrate on women and the female domain in rural areas, and the Équipe Médico-Sociale Itinérante (EMSI) and Adjointe Sanitaire et Sociale Rurale Auxiliaire (ASSRA) were created in the spring and fall of 1957, respectively, with this aim. In confidential instructional manuals and correspondence, army officials acknowledged that finding trained personnel and providing medical care were “indispensable” first steps “in establishing contact with the Algerians,” but that ultimately “medicine was secondary.”88 The “real objective”
