The Guinea of Sekou Toure was the first country to say ‘NO’ to the General de Gaulle. Sekou Touré, proud descendent of one of the great African leaders who fought colonialism, Samori Touré, said, on 25 August 1958, Sekou Touré said: “Il n’ya pas de dignité sans liberté. Nous préférons la liberté dans la pauvreté à la richesse dans l’esclavage.” [There is no dignity without freedom. We prefer freedom in poverty to wealth in slavery].

After Sekou Toure said ‘No‘, De Gaulle did not take it lightly and reacted harshly to crush the new Guinean state, and ensure that no other African countries followed the Guinean example.  The Washington Post back then, observed how brutal the French were in tearing down all what they thought was their contributions to Guinea: “In reaction, and as a warning to other French-speaking territories, the French pulled out of Guinea over a two-month period, taking everything they could with them. They unscrewed light bulbs, removed plans for sewage pipelines in Conakry, the capital, and even burned medicines rather than leave them for the Guineans.” Imagine that, they unscrewed light bulbs! It is said that they even poured cement on water pipes!… the French reacted like a really angry boyfriend who had been thrown out.

Maurice Robert, head of the African cell for the Service de documentation extérieure et de contre-espionnage (SDECE), France‘s external intelligence agency from 6 November 1944 to 2 April 1982 said in an interview, « Nous devions déstabiliser Sékou Touré, le rendre vulnérable, impopulaire et faciliter la prise du pouvoir par l’opposition. Une opération de cette envergure comporte plusieurs phases : le recueil et l’analyse des renseignements, l’élaboration d’un plan d’action à partir de ces renseignements, l’étude et la mise en place des moyens logistiques, l’adoption de mesures pour la réalisation du plan. Avec l’aide d’exilés guinéens réfugiés au Sénégal, nous avons aussi organisé des maquis d’opposition dans le Fouta-Djalon. L’encadrement était assuré par des experts français en opérations clandestines. Nous avons armé et entraîné ces opposants guinéens pour qu’ils développent un climat d’insécurité en Guinée et, si possible, qu’ils renversent Sékou Touré. Parmi ces actions de déstabilisation, je peux citer l’opération Persil, par exemple, qui a consisté à introduire dans le pays une grande quantité de faux billets de banque guinéens dans le but de déséquilibrer l’économie. » [“We had to destabilize Sékou Touré, make him vulnerable, unpopular and facilitate the seizure of power by the opposition. An operation of this scale involves several phases: the collection and analysis of information, the development of an action plan based on this information, the study and implementation of logistical means, the adoption of measures to implement the plan. With the help of Guinean exiles who had taken refuge in Senegal, we also organized opposition groups in Fouta-Djallon. Supervision was provided by French experts in clandestine operations. We have armed and trained these Guinean opponents so that they develop a climate of insecurity in Guinea and, if possible, overthrow Sékou Touré. Among these destabilizing actions, I can cite Operation Persil, for example, which consisted of introducing a large quantity of counterfeit Guinean banknotes into the country with the aim of unbalancing the economy.”]

Thus, the strategies to destabilize Guinea were, among others, 1) Make Sekou Toure weak and impopular by financing and arming his opponents; 2) using exiled Guineans in neighboring Senegal, training them militarily to create zones of insecurities in the country to eventually topple off Sekou Toure’s government; 3) economically weaken the country by using fake currency.

There are numerous examples of how these strategies were used in recent years: in Cote d’Ivoire during the presidency of Laurent Gbagbo with the armed rebellion financed from external forces, terrorist forces’ attacks in the AES countries, and much more…