Lee

fone ar (nl Ltt |

HERE were_ unbelieving

smiles in oil company board
Tooms when the French gov-
ernment announced at the end
of last year that big reserves
had been struck in the Sahara.

But all doubts disappeared
When a Minister of the Sahara
Was appointed who prophesied
that France would solve all her

€conomic probléms in _ the
desert.
In March this year, while

France was still smarting un-
der the Suez fiasco, the finance

‘Minister told industrialists that

ing
- Needs.

Self-sufficiency to

\

France, which imports 27 mil-
lion tons of oil a year, would
Within five years be supply-
more than half of her
; Four months later, Mr. Le-
Jeune, the first Minister of the
Sahara, advanced the day of
1960 and
told how this “miracle of the

Sahara” was to come about.
The

hot waste that this
Name conjures up, stretching
500 miles south of coastal
Algeria, 20 times the size

Of. Britain, is.a vast mountain-
Cus area with peaks rising to
11,000 feet.
® It is the hottest spot on
earth, and the temperature
varies from 40 to 120 de-
grees Fahrenheit -between
night and day.
It comprises nine-tenths of
Algeria but contains only
800,000 people, less than
one twelfth of Algeria’s
population.
From this terrain the French
Tuling class is now making a
desperate bid to extract and
Control a monopoly of these
Taw materials which will put
France back in the Big Power
Tace with West Germany and
Britain.

It is because its system is
deeply committed that its poli-
tical representatives shout so
hystericaly in the French As-
Sembly, “Algeria is French.”

Prospecting, which started
Soon after the war, had by the
€nd of last year begun to pro-
duce its first results, and to
lay bare potential wealth
Which excited hardboiled oil
Companies in Britain and U.S.

SRS aks

he onl ‘miracle’
in the Sahara

to start bargaining for con-
cessions.
Here is in part what the

prospectors revealed:

WATER. Before man can
strike oil in the desert, he
must have water to drink and
to cool his machines.

At Ourgla, where oil-boring
is going on, a well producing
3,000 gallons of water a min-
ute has been driiled.

From experience elsewhere
the prospectors conclude that
there is likely to be water
where there is oil.

OIL. At the most advanced
boring, Hassi Messaoud, the
estimated yield by the end of
this year is 1,200 tons a day.

French troops hold people at bay in Casablanca.

By Bill

The -reserves are estimated,
at 100 million tons. Work has
already begun on a 100-mile
pipeline which would take oil
to the rail-head at Touggourt.

At this well alone 3,000
men are at work, the miners
doing three eight-hour shifts
in 122 degress Fahrenheit.

In order to keep them going,
they are housed in air-con-
ditioned huts and_ supplied
with iced drinks. t

IRON ORE. Away on the
west coast. of Algeria, not far
from the Moroccan border,
which the Moroccans claim
has only been delimited to suit

French interests in iron ore,
lies Tintouf.
Here the reserves of iron

ore are estimated at 3,000 mil-
lion tons, one of the five larg-
est reserves in the world;
farther south, near Fort
Gouraud, there is 4 further re-
serve of 100 million tons with
an iron content equal to the
finest Swedish ore.

ATOMIC AND OTHER
MINERALS. Over other parts
of the Sahara, geologists and
scientsts, with the use of heli-
copters, are still discovering
deposits of uranium, wolfram,
manganese, copper and phos-
phates.

SAHARA’S SEA. On June
14 this year, the Paris Journal
Officiel gave notice of the for-
mation of a research asociation
for the study of an inland sea
in the Sahara.

The plan is to build a canal

tion,

CARRITT

91 miles long between the
Gulf of Gabes and the Chott
Djerich, a large salt lake on
the Tunisian-Algerian border.

This done, the whole region,
which lies below sea - level,
would be flooded.

Canal and inland sea would
perform a dual purpose, the
canal providing a waterway
for the oil and iron ore, and
the sea, because of its evapora-
tion, changing the climate.

In order to organize the ex-
ploitation of these riches under
its own control, the French
ruling class decided this year
to set up a special organiza-
tion,jthe Common Organization
for the Regions of the Sahara.

By means of this organiza-
with its economic and
military aspects, the French
aimed to detach the whole
desert area from Algeria in
hope that it could be insulated
from Arab nationalism.

They also wanted to provide
guarantees that would attract
foreign capital, but at the same
time make sure that the U.S.
oil companies never got hold
of a more than 49 percent con-
trol of any one concern.

The Tunisian arms deal is
the first move in a most intri-
cate struggle which is about to
bring the peoples of North
Africa on to the stage of world
affairs.

France wants to hold on to
her swag. The United States
wants to relieve her of it. And

the people of North Africa will
do their best to come into their
own as the thieves fall out.

But the French realize they
cannot hold on to North Afri-
ca, nor ‘bring out the wealth
they have begun to exploit
without reaching some sort of
agreement with the ruling cir-
cles of Algeria, Tunisia and
Morocco.

The United States, itching to
get its hands on the oil, is pre-
pared to back the people of
North Africa against the
French, and U.S. oil companies
are reported to have entered
into discussions with the Al-
gerians behind the backs of the
French.

But they are aware how fast
the Arabs are learning to look
after their own interests and
make use of the greed of the
imperialists.

The Algerians, Tunisians
and Moroccans not only want
full national independence and
sOvereignty, but they want to
enjoy what the French pros-

pectors have discovered in
their lands.
That, they know, requires

about one billion dollars capi-
tal. That is where one day, in
the not distant future, the
Socialist sector of the world,
with its policy of economic aid
without political strings, will
come in.

Then the full liberation of
the peoples of North Africa
will be on the agenda.

December 13, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 9