Emmanuel Macron Tries—Slowly—To Reckon With France’s Past

France’s colonial rule in Algeria, as well as the war that brought it to an end, remains an open wound in French historical memory despite ending more than 50 years ago. For the French, it’s a dark era of its history that, like the country’s collaboration with Nazi Germany under Vichy rule, many seem anxious to forget. Few French leaders have been willing to acknowledge France’s colonization of Algeria or the brutal measures employed to suppress revolts against its rule, let alone apologize for it.

But this week, French President Emmanuel Macron came closeAlgeria’s bloody campaign for independence. Though his wife, Josette Audin, pressed the French government for answers about what had happened to her husband, Audin’s disappearance, like that of thousands of others during the war, was never investigated. Before Macron’s revelation Thursday that Audin had been subject to torture by the French army, France hadn’t acknowledged its use of state-authorized torture in that war at all.