With the new petroleum code setting the rules for the OCRS area and the entry of the majors, the Saharan oil industry boomed. Between 1959 and 1960 four new pipelines came into operation, and by 1962 the port
of Bougie was handling more than 14 million tons of crude per year. Alongside the French and US companies, several European companies, from the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy, started to operate in the area. Production in the Sahara was expected to reach 20 million tons by
1963.56 As of March 1962, when the Évian Accords marked the end of the
Algerian War, £425 million had been spent in the area to give value to
the hydrocarbon reserves.57 At first glance, it seems that the oil industry
was able to operate without any interference from the war. In reality, the construction of the pipelines and the general strategy for transportation was deeply affected by the conflict. As early as July 1956 all activities in the north had had to be abandoned because of safety concerns. A series of attacks on workers’ camps, pipelines and railways required the deployment of military forces along all transportation routes. In November 1957 a team of CPA prospectors was attacked, and many were killed.
At the same time as these military actions against engineers and infrastructure, Algerian nationalists were monitoring developments in the Sahara very closely. Indeed, they were just as active as France in seek- ing the help of the international oil industry to affirm their rights over the desert. Echoing France’s concerns about independence and control of the resource, the FLN repeatedly made clear to oil companies that it would consider any agreements made with French institutions to be void. They did show themselves willing to open the Sahara to international enter- prises, however, as long as they recognized the sovereignty of Algerians over the territory. In an article dated 15 November 1957, the FLN official organ El Moudjahid wrote:
We understand that the development of such an immense territory requires technical and financial means that not even France can pro- vide, let alone a nation subject to foreign domination for more than 125 years. […] However, the Algerians intend to determine by them- selves the conditions and modalities of these indispensable foreign contributions. […] Only a free Algerian government will be entitled to approve such contracts and to grant concessions on the national territory. The foreign companies that have invested their capital in the Sahara and those who refer to the French government to obtain
research permits are building…on sand.58
The approach of the FLN towards the hydrocarbon resources mirrored that of France, in both the geopolitical and economic spheres. Just like France, the FLN was firmly convinced that control over the oil industry would bring economic independence, prosperity and power to
the nation; in other words, freedom. Also, just like France, the construc- tion of integrated hydrocarbon transportation networks and a common market were considered a means of building a union with neighbour- ing countries, in order to gain more geopolitical power. For the Algerian nationalists, however, the Eurafrican perspective was utterly rejected, as well as that of being a part of the European Common Market. The OCRS was described as nothing more than a neo- colonial move:
France hopes to perpetrate in the Southern area a typical example of economic colonialism. In its traditional form, colonialism was characterised by an evident occupation that exploited the country; subsequently, it seized political power to ensure a regime of pseudo- legality. Nowadays, an enclave system has replaced territorial occu- pation, allowing the intensive exploitation of the natural resources of the colonial area. The South of Algeria, with its economic and industrial potential, with its large energy resources under the sand, must now be extremely interesting for those who prefer this new
direction of French colonialism.59
Against the dangers of economic neo- colonialism, the FLN pushed for a federation with Morocco and Tunisia to form a Maghreb Union, a pro- ject to be developed in parallel to the war of independence against France. Following Nasser’s Philosophy of the revolution, the FLN claimed that, together with religion, oil was the unifying element of northern Africa, the weapon against colonial and neo- colonial powers. ‘It is a fact that half the world’s reserves of petroleum are still underground in the Arab regions,’ wrote Nasser in 1952. ‘The great catastrophe is that we do not know the
extent of our strength.’60 It was expected that the oil industry would pro-
vide the basis for joint industrial projects and for the development of an integrated economic system. In an article entitled ‘L’indépendance…par le pétrole?’ (‘Independence…through petrol?’), El Moudjahid outlined that only a united Maghreb could use the Saharan reserves to promote an ‘econ-
omy of liberation’ founded on industrialization.61 A united Maghreb could
count on a market of 25 million people, and an integrated energy network that would provide the capital to start the industrialization process.
It is interesting to note that the oil industry also attempted to pre- sent itself as a liberating force of development, whose mission was eco- nomic growth – providing the newly independent country promoted a free market and the free circulation of capital. In fact, developing coun- tries represented perhaps the fastest- growing market for the oil indus-
try.62 In the Petroleum Press Service, several articles were dedicated to the
relevant role that the oil industry could play in the fight against global poverty. Capital formation was in fact one of the most urgent problems for developing countries, and the oil industry was a major contributor of capital, both through investments and through large sums paid to the local governments of producing countries. In 1957 alone the oil indus- try had poured $2,200 million into the Venezuelan and Middle Eastern treasuries, without counting the income those treasuries received from further oil revenues. Overall, international organizations and govern- ments from the free world had raised some $4,000 million in funds for
developing countries.63 ‘The whole prospects of future peace and eco-
nomic growth in all parts of the world would be seriously affected if the under- developed countries as a group were to fail to attain signifi- cantly higher standards of living within a reasonable time,’ warned the Petroleum Press Service, which also invoked on behalf of the non- aligned
countries ‘a more enlightened attitude towards private capital’.64
Interestingly, up to the end of the war El Moudjahid barely dis- cussed the possibility of nationalizing the oil industry. With regard to the private foreign industry, and especially the cartel, the attitude of the Algerian nationalists was similar to that of France. At times, the outwardly socialist El Moudjahid called for strong state control over the industry, showing antipathy for the cartel and the large multinationals. Indeed, in 1959 Algerian protests against penetration by Standard looked very much like the protests being simultaneously aired in the left- wing French press. On the other hand, the FLN did not want to antagonize forces that could become powerful allies. For this reason, while conducting sabotage and various other attacks, the Algerians also kept up their pronouncements that promised the oil industry very good deals on independence. In 1957 the French secret service, the Service de documentation extérieure et de contre- espionnage (SDECE), wrote that the FLN had secretly contacted foreign oil companies and reassured them that an independent Algeria would seek their collaboration and recognize their legitimate interests in
exchange for their help.65 As we have seen, however, what the SDECE was
reporting in its classified dispatches could also be read openly in the pages of El Moudjahid. The ambiguities of the Algerian position were every bit a product of gamesmanship, as were the French government’s conflicting desires. Both saw oil as the contingent force that governed their vision of the future, and both sought to find corporate allies in this political war.
In this tug- of- war for the oil industry’s favour, France gained an impor- tant advantage with the agreement between CREPS and the Tunisian gov- ernment for the construction of a pipeline between the oilfield of Edjeleh
and the Tunisian port of Gabés.66 The agreement caused a diplomatic
incident between Tunisia and the Algerian nationalists and compromised the federative process in North Africa. Thanks to this pipeline, France found an alternative route to transport the oil to Europe without having to cross the war- ravaged north of Algeria. For the FLN, the agreement repre- sented a stab in the back. In an open letter to the Tunisian government, it protested that, by signing a deal with a French company, Tunis had implic- itly recognized the right of France to dispose of Algeria’s riches, and was therefore taking the side of the colonizers. The FLN warned that it con- sidered the contract equivalent to hostile military action against Algeria, because it severely undermined its strategy of sabotaging oil facilities. Furthermore, the agreement showed that Saharan oil could be immedi- ately available, even with the war, and this incentivized international capital to side with the colonialist powers, damaging the struggle of all
countries fighting for independence.67 Each point scored in this game had
broader ramifications in the battle raging over political control.
By the end of August 1958 the pressures of war forced the Algerians to back down on the pipeline crisis. El Moudjahid reported an official declaration of the FLN saying that, while the French– Tunisian agreement had ‘deeply affected Algerian’s public opinion and deteriorated the North- African front, the common action and Tunisian solidarity to the Algerian cause would continue notwithstanding the difference of opinion on the
pipeline’.68 Any mention of implementing a common energy policy in the
area disappeared from the pages of the newspaper, however. Diplomatic relations could continue in the circumstances, though the political fall- out altered the future vision of independence. The federal project was undermined, in part, by relationships that fractured over oil and inter- national investment. This influence on the future shape of Algerian sov- ereignty, and its envisaged relations with its neighbours, was shaped by the actions of non- state actors, and the incursion of commercial interests into geopolitics. The 1958 agreement with Tunisia was undoubtedly a victory for France, yet the FLN was also able to turn contacts with the oil industry to its own advantage. In particular, as will be analysed in the next section, the Italian national oil company was a precious ally during the peace negotiations in the town of Évian.