In July 2020, members of a separatist movement on the French controlled island of Corsica announced the revival of the National Liberation Front of Corsica or the FLNC. This group had conducted violent attacks for the cause of Corsican nationalism for decades until their ceasefire was announced in 2014. With their return, Springtime of Nations takes a look at the source of Corcisan nationalism and the methods used to promote it.

Corsica spent much of the middle ages as a realm of the maritime Republic of Genoa, and at one time was the exclusive possession of a powerful Genoese bank, the San Giorgio. In 1729 a tax rebellion led to a full fledged national uprising by the Corsicans against their colonial rulers. They enlisted the help of a German noble Theodor von Neuhoff who was crowned “king” of Corsica in an unrecognized ceremony in 1736, having landed on the island with the help of the ruler of Tunis. Real independence was not achieved until 1755, with the Genoese losing control of all land except some well defended forts. The Corsicans wrote a liberal constitution, one lauded by liberals all over the world including by Americans like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson and inspired one of the founders of the Revolutionary group the Sons of Liberty to name his son after Pasquale Paoli, the author. This constitution even included female suffrage, a radical idea at the time. Paoli, a veteran of the fight for freedom and the author of the constitution was voted the president of the Republic. The Genoese did not give up control of the coastal forts they held, and the Corsicans were overtaken by a French invasion in 1769 after Genoa sold them the “rights” to the Island. Britain supported what was left of Corsican resistance for a time, and founded a short-lived Anglo-Corsican Kingdom during the French Revolutionary Wars from 1794-1796 headed by Paoli as regent, but after that there was no serious threat to French dominance of the Island. Paoli died in London in 1807, far away from his home shores.

Dormant for over a century, by the 1920s Corsican Nationalism rose again as a reaction to the poor economic conditions on the island, perpetuated by French protectionism and leading to mass emigration of young people. During this period many Corsicans supported unification with Italy, and were attracted to the irredentist ideas of the Italian Fascist Party. After the fall of France in 1940 a number of them became open collaborators and urged the annexation of the island by Italy, for which they were punished by execution or exile after the end of World War Two. The liberation of Corsica in 1943 was not the last military action the island would face, as it was the site of the 1958 attempted coup d’état that ended the French Fourth Republic, being invaded by French paratroopers led by a cadre of officers who demanded a change in the policies in the Algerian War of Independence. Thankfully no one was killed in the operation, but the French government resigned and Charles de Gaulle was elected president the following year.  Corsica continued to be ignored by the French State, and to suffer economic decline. This led to the formation of the FLNC in 1976 which bombed military and government targets across the island following a declaration of war on the French State. Bombings and other explosive attacks, such as with grenade launchers and RPGs were the favored method of FLNC during the 1970s and 80s, both in Corsica and mainland France, expanding their targets to banks as well to cripple the French and terrorize them into leaving. In fact, the FLNC engaged in even more bomb attacks than the Irish Republican Army did, numbering in the hundreds. Like the IRA there is some evidence that the Libyan dictator Mummar Ghaddafi bankrolled their efforts to  The FLNC’s terror campaign, mostly bloodless until this point culminated in the 1998 assassination of regional prefect Claude Erignac, a highly unpopular action which backfired on the FLNC and led to a breakdown in the organization and its ability to mount the kinds of operations it had been so skilled at in the 70s and 80s.

After sporadic attacks through the 2000s, the FLNC finally announced the end of their campaign. This coincided with a rise in a desire to solve the Corsican crisis politically instead of militarily. Parties such as Femu a Corsica and Corsica Libera formed in the 2000s and have grown steadily in popularity, with Corsican nationalists having an overwhelming control of the (mostly symbolic) Corsican assembly since the elections of 2017. The revival of the militant wing of the Corsican nationalists may be out of frustration at the lack of progress towards independence after “playing by the rules”. France has not shown any interest in decolonizing Corsica like it did eventually with Algeria and dozens of other places now free of their paternalism. To conclude I will read the words of Pasquale Paoli, the founding father of free Corsica: We are Corsicans by birth and sentiment, but first of all we feel Italian by language, origins, customs, traditions; and Italians are all brothers and united in the face of history and in the face of God … As Corsicans we wish to be neither slaves nor “rebels” and as Italians we have the right to deal as equals with the other Italian brothers … Either we shall be free or we shall be nothing… Either we shall win or we shall die (against the French), weapons in hand … The war against France is right and holy as the name of God is holy and right, and here on our mountains will appear for Italy the sun of liberty….] Long live Corsica and may 1000 flowers bloom!