ASC-075287668-2887-01

FM 62 Afaires Politiques: AOF-AEF (affaires communes) 1920-1957.FM 64Affaires Politiques: Mauritanie – Soudan – Niger – Sénégal– Ht Sénégal-Niger.FM 73 Affaires Politiques: Moyen-Orient – Palestine – Sahara –Syrie –Tunisie.In these series, I have concentrated on files concerning French Sudan, Mauritaniaand the Sahara. Many of these files, especially those in FM 73 concerningMauritania, the Nahda al-Wattaniyya al-Mauritaniyya, the Sahara andthe French Moroccan conflict are still under embargo, with embargo dates varyingbetween 2019 and 2020. I have received permission (dérogation) from theFrench Ministry of Culture to access these files under Archive law 79-18 of 3January 1979 and decree 79-1038 of 3 December 1979 (permissions de dérogationCAOM 98/1844, CAOM 98/ 1655, and CAOM 98/ 1539). These permissionsdid not allow me to quote documents, but paraphrasing (and translation isperceived as such) was allowed. The archive codes given in the footnotes arethose used in the ANSOM archives’ digital database. These codes are the onesnecessary to demand access to the pertaining file within the series. As footnotesserve to facilitate reference, these codes are the quickest way to the file or documentreferred to.In the Service Historique de l’Armée de Terre (SHAT) I have used the series5H1K297Inventaire provisoire, Afrique Occidentale Française (A.O.F.)Fonds privées, fonds Colonel LesourdDuring my research, SHAT underwent a restructuring of its repertoire andclassification system. The series 5H starts with AOF in general, followed byseries on the various Territories within AOF in a more or less chronologicalorder. The series on French Sudan run from 5H 186 to 5H 204. For thisresearch, a more interesting series runs from 5H 23 to 5H 140, dealing with theorganisation and activities of the French Military forces in the late 1950s, andwith French military support for and intelligence on the new national armiesand states of the former territories in the early 1960s. These files, however, arestill under embargo and I have not received permission to access these files, dueto logistical circumstances. A last very useful series is the series K – Fondsprivées, containing the personal archives of various former army officers. Ofthis series, I have made use of 1K297, which contains the private archives ofColonel Lesourd, who had kept an archive of his personal interests, but also ofhis activities in the Maghreb and Sahara, concerning the OCRS and MohamedMahmoud ould Cheick, the Qadi of Timbuktu in the late 1950s.Research in the Archives du Cercle de Kidal (ACK) were initially hamperedby two problems. The first is that they lack a repertoire. The archives do notxxiii