7 Charles de Gaulle 7Return to Public Life
De Gaulle was popular with the French army, and in 1958 a
group of officers in Algeria appealed to him to restore
order to the French government. De Gaulle then went to
Paris for an interview with Pres. René Coty, who asked
him to try to form a new government. De Gaulle agreed
but only if the National Assembly would grant him the
executive powers that he had long sought. France’s Fifth
Republic was formed in December, and de Gaulle took
office as its first president on January 8, 1959.
De Gaulle’s greatest challenge in his early years as
president was to find a way to resolve the bloody and
extraordinarily divisive Algerian War. De Gaulle promoted
peace negotiations in Algeria, and in a nationwide referen-
dum, the voters of France overwhelmingly supported a
cease-fire agreement he had announced in March 1962. De
Gaulle attributed the attainment of peace to his broad
presidential powers. He declared Algeria’s independence
on July 3.
In 1962, de Gaulle proposed that future presidents be
chosen by popular election. His plan was approved in a
national referendum. De Gaulle also increased his efforts
to make France a leading world power. He moved to
strengthen the country’s economy, and, at his urging, the
French developed a nuclear force and a space program.
From 1962 until his reelection as president in 1965, de
Gaulle used the European Economic Community (EEC;
now part of the European Union) to serve French interests.
France’s participation in the supranational North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO) was progressively withdrawn,
because de Gaulle’s policy for France was one of “national
independence” and of international cooperation based
only on agreements between nation-states. This was the