Cuba et la lutte pour l’indépendance de l’Algérie, 1959-1962

This article examines Cuba’s involvement on the side of the Algerian National Liberation Front between 1959 and 1962, from its stance at the United Nations to the material and military assistance provided to the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic (GPRA). Drawing on French and U.S. diplomatic archives, UN debates, and Cuban and Algerian sources, it argues that Havana went far beyond rhetorical support and turned the Algerian struggle into an early testing ground for its state-led internationalism. The shift from Batista’s pro-French alignment to Fidel Castro’s open backing of Algerian self-determination, the recognition of the GPRA, consistent pro-independence voting at the UN, and the dispatch of arms and wounded fighters reveal a principled choice, maintained despite U.S. pressure and the risk of damaging relations with Paris. The study highlights the diplomatic shock this reversal produced in France, as well as the way in which Algerian-Cuban convergence came to embody, in Washington’s eyes, the threat of an emerging anti-colonial and anti-imperialist front within the Third World.