On July 3, 1962, Jean-Paul Margnac, ambitious hobby photographer and sublieutenant in the French army in Algeria, left the quarters of his unit in Bab El Oued, a popular neighborhood in Algiers. He and his comrades had received orders to stay put; on the streets of the capital, crowds were celebrating the end of colonial rule in exuberant spontaneous gatherings, and the French authorities wished to avoid anything that might be interpreted as a provocation. Being a very curious young man, however, Jean-Paul disobeyed these orders. Changing his uniform for plain clothes, he sneaked outside, taking his camera and some rolls of Ektachrome film with him. The photos he shot that day constitute a beautiful series and a most valuable historical document, not least because of their vivid colors that stand in impressive contrast to the far more common black-and-white images that we have come to associate with the Algerian War.

One of Jean-Paul's photographs adorns the cover of this book. It shows young men and boys piled onto a truck, waving flags as they make their way down the broad seaside boulevard in the center of Algiers. The truck's bumper is marked with ALN – the Algerian Liberation Army, the military branch of the national liberation movement FLN. When the photo was taken, the FLN had just achieved its ultimate victory: It was announced that day that in a referendum on Algeria's future, no less than 99.7 percent of voters had approved Algeria's independence from France, and it was this freshly acquired freedom that the men on the truck were celebrating with their proud display of the new nation's flag. Prior to the referendum, the FLN had challenged French army and police forces during eight years of protracted and extremely violent conflict. The Algerian War was fought simultaneously in the French colony of Algeria and in metropolitan France, and with both sides complementing their military efforts with diplomatic warfare and propaganda, it was also waged in French and international media, in diplomatic circles, and in the United Nations. While the French dominated the FLN militarily at all times, they lost the war politically, in a defeat that was comprehensive, irreversible, and heavy with ramifications that extend well beyond the summer of 1962 and Franco-Algerian history.