Zbigniew Brzezinski rewrites history

Until de Gaulle came to power, the government was getting all the time the same kind of advice we now are hearing about the situation in Iraq. It may get better. Yes, three years have been wasted, but maybe we can go on for another three years. And we’re going to do better; we’re going to control Algiers.

[snip]

And then a man came along, de Gaulle, who instead of listening to the same degree of timid consensus — “Gee, we are stuck, but we don’t know what to do, so let’s continue being stuck and maybe we’ll win” — he realized that this is a wrong war.


Brzezinski, is right about Iraq, but his history is seriously twisted. His version of France and Algeria is exactly like writing "Until Nixon came to power, the government was getting all the time the same kind of advice we now are hearing about the situation in Iraq. It may get better. [snip].

And then a man came along, Nixon, who instead of listening to the same degree of timid consensus — “Gee, we are stuck, but we don’t know what to do, so let’s continue being stuck and maybe we’ll win” — he realized that this is a wrong war.

Like Nixon, de Gaulle was in power for about half of the war. He came to power (in a rather less regular way which was not his fault*) at a time when most other politicians were much more nearly convinced that it was time to leave. In the end, he came around too (really has a way of getting real on you).

From the old Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Gaulle#1958.E2.80.941962:_Founding_of_the_Fifth_Republic

" In December, de Gaulle was elected President by the parliament with 78% of the vote, and inaugurated in January 1959.

[huge snip]

In March 1962 de Gaulle arranged a cease-fire in Algeria and a referendum supported independence, finally accomplished on 3 July 1962."

Brzezinski's "then this man came along" ignores over three (3) years of war and death under de Gaulle (hmmm do I read three years in Brzezinski's bit). He is rewriting history. Interestingly, there is no possible advantage gained by his distortion. de Gaulle is hardly popular among those Americans who have to be convinced we should leave Iraq.

I assume he is simply honestly ignorant (no surprise).


*The odd way de Gaulle came to power is that a prime minister was elected who wanted to get out of Algeria. Various generals attempted a coup. Extremely powerful executive President de Gaulle was a compromise between following the constitution and a military dictatorship.

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Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "11/21/2006 11:57:00 PM":

De Gaulle seized power in a popular coup engineered by the French of Algeria to whom he had promised (via General Massu, who was later retired just as he was contemplating a coup) he would put up a real fight Algeria, and he did for a while, torturing and killing hundreds of thousands to show his good will, then he threw the towel in, and was forever considered a traitor by the French of Algeria, as well as by types like Le Pen...

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