Zeller, Bernard Un Quarteron de Généraux avant le Putsch

On 22 April 1961, Generals Challe, Zeller and Jouhaud, soon joined by Salan, staged a coup in Algiers. The next day, General de Gaulle addressed the nation: "A rebellious power has established itself in Algeria [...]. This power has a face: a handful of retired generals. It has a reality: a group of officers, party members, ambitious individuals and fanatics. This group and this handful of people have quick and limited expertise. While the events were described in detail, the motives of the coup leaders remained unclear. How could these men, who had been appointed to the highest offices by General de Gaulle after a career marked by discipline and service, come to join a movement that was completely alien to French military tradition? The author draws on previously untapped sources and had access to the private archives of the protagonists of the event. He traces their careers from their entry into the army to the top of the hierarchy and provides explanations as to how, despite their different backgrounds and temperaments, they decided to cross the Rubicon. In doing so, he reconstructs an entire chapter of French military history, from the 1914 war in which Zeller and Salan took part to Syria, the A-OF, the Italian campaign, the landing in Provence, the liberation of Alsace and the Indochina War, right up to the Algerian War. A unique journey from the battlefields to the prison in Tulle. An important and necessary work that dispels many prejudices.