Word: debre
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...every reason for weariness and despair. News of the insurrection in Algiers first reached him on Sunday at his country home in Colombey-les-deux-Eglises. When his black Citroën reached the capital shortly before midnight, De Gaulle was greeted by the proffered resignation of Premier Michel Debré, long privately opposed to De Gaulle's offer of self-determination to Algeria. Imperiously, De Gaulle refused Debré's resignation and fired off orders to General Maurice Challe, French commander in chief in Algeria. The orders: finish off the settlers' uprising "during this night...
...Uncommunicatively, he listened while one group of ministers headed by Novelist André (Man's Fate) Malraux called for "launching fire'' against the insurgents, and another led by Minister for the Sahara Jacques Soustelle urged negotiations. In the end, all that was decided was to send Debré to Algiers to scout out the situation. Said De Gaulle fatalistically: "This is either the best thing to do or the worst...
...came close to being the worst. Debré arrived at Challe's headquarters with the brusque announcement: "General de Gaulle expects every general to do his duty." With icy defiance, a cabal of five generals and eleven field officers told him flatly that 1) the army would not fire on Frenchmen, 2) De Gaulle had no choice but to renounce his offer of self-determination and proclaim unequivocally that he would keep Algeria French. Grey-faced, Debré returned to Paris unnerved; worse yet, the furtiveness of his trip-his arrival in Algiers was not made public until after...
Giving Ground. With that, things began to fall apart. Once again Debré offered to resign, urged De Gaulle to replace him as Premier with Soustelle, one of the leaders of the 1958 uprising in Algiers. Soustelle himself, War Minister Pierre Guillaumat, Veterans Minister Raymond Triboulet and Communications Minister Bernard Cornut-Gentille. all submitted their resignations later...
...mistake." Within 24 hours after Kempski's interview hit France, Massu was on his way to Paris to explain. From Algiers, spokesmen for the diehard European settlers' organizations loudly warned De Gaulle not to make them choose between him and the popular Massu; even Premier Michel Debré wanted to accept Massu's ambiguous repudiation of the interview. But at that point De Gaulle blew up. Outraged by the implication that the army had supported him only "for lack of a better man"-the one remark Massu wholeheartedly insisted he did not make-De Gaulle summarily ordered...