Editing Pierre Messmer (section)

== After World War II ==
After World War II, he returned to the colonies and was a [[prisoner of war]] of the [[Vietminh]], during two months in 1945, after the outbreak of the [[First Indochina War]].<ref name=Monde /> He was named the following year general secretary of the interministerial committee for [[French Indochina|Indochina]] and then head of staff of the high commissary of the Republic.<ref name=Monde />

=== Colonial administrator in Africa ===
Messmer began his high-level African service as governor of [[Mauritania]] from 1952 to 1954, and then served as governor of [[Ivory Coast]] from 1954 to 1956, when he briefly returned to Paris in the staff of [[Gaston Defferre]], Minister of Overseas Territories who enacted the Defferre Act granting to colonial territories internal autonomy, a first step towards independence.

That same year, Messmer was nominated as governor general of [[Cameroun]], where a civil war had started the preceding year following the outlawing of the independentist [[Union of the Peoples of Cameroon]] (UPC) in July 1955. He initiated a [[decolonization]] process and imported the [[counter-revolutionary warfare]] methods theorized in Indochina and implemented during the [[Algerian War]] (1954–62).<ref name=R89>David Servenay, [http://rue89.com/2007/08/30/pierre-messmer-un-soldat-que-le-cameroun-na-pas-oublie Pierre Messmer, un soldat que le Cameroun n'a pas oublié] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070903154547/http://www.rue89.com/2007/08/30/pierre-messmer-un-soldat-que-le-cameroun-na-pas-oublie |date=3 September 2007 }}, ''[[Rue 89]]'', 30 August 2007 {{in lang|fr}}</ref>
Visiting de Gaulle in Paris, he was implicitly granted permission for his change of policies in Cameroon, which exchanged repression for negotiations with the UPC.<ref name=R89 /> 

A "Pacification Zone" – the ZOPAC (''Zone de pacification du Cameroon'') was created on 9 December 1957, englobing 7,000 square km controlled by seven infantry regiments.<ref name=R89 /> Furthermore, a civilian-military intelligence apparatus was created, combining colonial and local staff, assisted by a civilian militia. [[Mao Zedong]]'s [[people's war]] was reversed in an attempt to separate the civilian population from the guerrilla. In that aim, the local population was rounded up in guarded villages located on the main roads that were controlled by the French Army.<ref name=R89 />

Messmer served as high commissioner of [[French Equatorial Africa]] from January 1958 to July 1958, and as high commissioner of [[French West Africa]] from 1958 to 1959.{{cn|date=November 2022}}

=== Minister of Armies (1959–1969) ===
From 1959 to 1969, under [[Charles de Gaulle]]'s presidency and in the turmoil of the [[Algerian War]], he was [[Minister of Armies (France)|Minister of Armies]]. He was confronted with the 1961 [[Generals' Putsch]], reorganised the [[French Army]] and adapted it to the [[France and nuclear weapons|nuclear era]].<ref name=Monde />

In 1960, Messmer visited Lisbon and expressed lament for the United Nations resolutions against colonialism and approved of the ''[[Estado Novo (Portugal)|Estado Novo]]'' regime's hardline stance against decolonisation on the grounds that Portugal represented the last vestige of white Western civilisation on the African continent.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Byrnes |first1=Melissa K. |date=26 May 2019 |title=Diplomacy at the end of empire: evolving French perspectives on Portuguese colonialism in the 1950s and 1960s |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14682745.2019.1597857 |journal=[[Cold War History (journal)|Cold War History]] |volume=19 |issue=4 |pages=477–491 |doi=10.1080/14682745.2019.1597857 |s2cid=191733021 |access-date=15 March 2023|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Messmer gave permission for former [[Algerian War]] veterans to fight in [[Katanga Crisis|Katanga]] against the newly independent [[Democratic Republic of the Congo|Congo]] and [[United Nations]] peacekeeping forces. He confided to [[Roger Trinquier]] that it was de Gaulle's ambition to replace the Belgians and control a reunited Congo from [[Élisabethville]].<ref>{{Cite book|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=d3MTDQAAQBAJ&pg=PP117|title = Katanga 1960–63: Mercenaries, Spies and the African Nation that Waged War on the World|isbn = 978-0-7509-6580-4|last1 = Othen|first1 = Christopher|date = 7 September 2015| publisher=The History Press |access-date = 24 April 2018|archive-date = 14 December 2021|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20211214235100/https://books.google.com/books?id=d3MTDQAAQBAJ&pg=PP117|url-status = live}}</ref>

Along with the Minister of Research, [[Gaston Palewski]], Messmer was present at the [[Agathe (atomic test)|Béryl nuclear test]] in Algeria, on 1 May 1962 during which an accident occurred. Officials, soldiers, and Algerian workers escaped as they could, often without wearing any protection. Palewski died in 1984 of [[leukemia]], which he always has attributed to the [[Beryl incident]], and Messmer always remained close-mouthed on the affair.<ref name="Hum">[http://www.humanite.presse.fr/journal/2007-02-21/2007-02-21-846342 La bombe atomique en héritage], ''[[L'Humanité]]'', 21 February 2007 {{in lang|fr}}</ref><ref>{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070927223331/http://www.hns-info.net/article.php3?id_article=11912 Pierre Messmer : désinformation et opacité sur le nucléaire civil et militaire]}}, ''[[Sortir du nucléaire (France)|Sortir du nucléaire]]'', ''[[Hacktivist News Service|HNS]]'', 2 September 2007 {{in lang|fr}}</ref>
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De Gaulle said that along with [[Maurice Couve de Murville]], Messmer was "one of his two arms.<ref name=RFI /> " In [[May 68]], he advised de Gaulle against the use of the military.<ref name=Monde />{{clarify|date=July 2016}}

Messmer became a personality of the [[Gaullist Party]] and was [[1968 French legislative election|elected deputy in 1968]], representing [[Moselle (department)|Moselle]] ''département''. A member of the conservative wing of the Gaullist movement, he criticised the "New Society" plan of Prime Minister [[Jacques Chaban-Delmas]] and thus won the trust of [[Georges Pompidou]], [[1969 French presidential election|elected President in 1969]].<ref name=RFI /> He quit the government after de Gaulle's resignation and founded the association ''Présence du gaullisme'' (Presence of Gaullism).<ref name=Monde />