Gen. Bigeard, who led French forces in colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria, dies at 94

French commander in Indochina, Algeria wars dies

PARIS — Gen. Marcel Bigeard, who led France’s elite parachute forces in colonial wars in independence-seeking Indochina and Algeria after serving in the French Resistance in World War II, has died at age 94.

“He has been called the best paratrooper in the world, and whatever the truth of that, he most certainly has a claim as the most battle-proven,” said Martin Windrow, a British military historian and expert on France’s colonial wars.

But Bigeard also was captured by insurgents while fighting in Vietnam, and he was accused of being ruthless against POWs in Algeria, in a conflict his country eventually lost.

Born Feb. 14, 1916, in Toul in eastern France, Bigeard went into German captivity as a warrant officer in 23rd Fortress Infantry Regiment in June 1940. He escaped on Nov. 11, 1942, made his way to Senegal, in what was then French West Africa, and was commissioned into Gen. Charles de Gaulle’s Free French Forces.

Bigeard’s death came as France was marking the 70th anniversary of de Gaulle’s defiant broadcast on BBC radio urging the French people to resist the Nazi occupation.

Rapidly promoted to major, Bigeard made his first combat jump in 1944, when he was dropped into occupied France to organize local resistance fighters. He ended World War II with many decorations and with the radio call sign that he retained for the rest of his life — “Bruno.”

Bigeard rose to fame during France’s ultimately doomed effort to reassert control over its colony in Vietnam, after it proclaimed independence in 1945. He served three combat tours there, and his crack 6th Colonial Parachute Battalion became France’s spearhead in the war against President Ho Chi Minh’s nationalist guerrillas.

Bigeard argued — unsuccessfully — that the colonial army could only defeat the insurgents if they matched their enemy’s aggression, endurance and fieldcraft.

He was captured along with about 12,000 other defenders when insurgents overran the French fortress of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954 — knocking France out of the war and paving the way for the 20-year American involvement in Vietnam.

“Bigeard was personally fearless, tactically brilliant, and an intuitive master of terrain, who could conduct a battle by map and radio like the conductor of an orchestra. He inspired the absolute loyalty of his officers and men,” said Windrow, who described Bigeard’s exploits during the battle in his book “The Last Valley.”

Within a year of his release, Bigeard — by then in command of a parachute regiment — was back in action, battling Algerian freedom fighters in the capital, Algiers.

His ruthless methods helped stabilize the military situation there. But they also linked him to widespread torture of captured insurgents, an accusation Bigeard always vehemently denied.

Farouk Ksentini, head of the Algeria’s Human Rights Commission, called Bigeard “a war criminal who led a savage repression against the Algerian people. Ksentini in a statement, “He was despicable, outrageous, he systematically used torture in Algeria and what is even more grave, he insisted it was a necessary evil.”

Bigeard was widely credited with winning the battle of Algiers, the brutal 1957 campaign that saw the French army reclaim control of the center of the Algerian capital. The 1966 movie about the campaign, “The Battle of Algiers,” is considered a counterinsurgency classic.

In an interview with The AP several years ago, Bigeard defended his actions, saying: “Whatever we did was much less brutal that what the Americans did in Iraq, or the Russians in Chechnya.”

Wounded five times, he emerged from the Algerian war — which France finally lost in 1961 — as one of the country’s most decorated military officers.

He ended his career as a four-star general and went on to serve as secretary of state for defense in the 1970s, and as a legislator in France’s lower house of parliament.

President Nicolas Sarkozy, in London on Friday to mark the anniversary of de Gaulle’s radio address, expressed in a statement his “deep sadness” at Bigeard’s death, calling him an “ardent patriot.”

Bigeard was known for his acerbic comments and his quick wit.

Once, when asked whether he wanted to be addressed as “General” or “Minister,” he replied: “It took me 30 years to become a general, and 30 minutes to become a minister, so I prefer General.”

No details about the cause or time of death were immediately available. Arrangements for funeral ceremonies were under way Friday.

Slobodan Lekic reported from Brussels.