Abstract The Algerian War of Independence took place on two main fronts: Algeria and metropolitan France. In both cases, the National Liberation Front (Front de libération nationale [FLN]) paid little heed to national borders as they sought to internationalize their cause. Serving as the linchpin of Algerian nationalism, immigration was instrumental in the emergence and development of a clandestine organization with totalitarian aspirations: the French Federation of the FLN. Manned by a politico-administrative organization coupled with a military organization, the Federation sought both to combat Algerian opponents in Europe and to bring the struggle for independence to metropolitan France. Algerian immigration thus came under the purvey of the FLN’s general strategy and further spread the conflict to metropolitan France and, by extension, to Western Europe. Although the human costs of the war are still difficult to establish, this does nothing to diminish the long-standing stigma that it continues to bear on French postcolonial society.