The revolutionary struggle was headed by the National Liberation Front (NLF), set up on the initiative of the Revolutionary Committee of Unity and Action. The NLF was a broad democratic organisation, which gradually rallied under its banners the peasants, workers, intellectuals, petty bourgeoisie and radical circles of the middle bourgeoisie. The NLF leadership was similarly heterogeneous; it consisted of representatives of diverse social strata, including the bourgeoisie, but the main part in organising the liberation strug- gle was played by revolutionary democratic leaders, connected with the masses, especially the peasantry.

In the very first years of the war, the N.L.F. was joined by members of the Democratic Union, Association of Ulamas and other patriotic organistaions. The latter, after affiliating with the N.L.F., dissolved themselves. Of the nationalist groups, only the Right wing of the Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Freedoms, headed by Messali Hadj, former chairman of this party, remained outside the NLF At the end of 1954, Messali Hadj set up a new organisation, the Algerian National Movement. Although it proclaimed itself a champion of independence, it took a hostile stand towards the NLF and thereby played into the hands of the French colonialists. But the Algerian National Movement did not gain any essential influence among the people.

In the summer of 1956, contact was established between the Algerian Communist Party and the N.L.F. Even long before this the Algerian Communists joined in the armed struggle either by joining units of the National Liberation Army or by setting up independent units of Liberation Fighters. These detachments were formed in accordance with a decision of the Central Committee of the Algerian Communist Party, taken at a plenary meeting in July 1955, in towns and rural areas where the Party had great influence. Many rank-and-file members and prominent leaders of the Party laid down their lives in the struggle for freedom, including Hamma Lakhdar, commander of a guerrilla detachment, and members of the Central Committee Mohammed Guerrouf, Tahar Gomri, Laid Lamrani and Bouali Taleb.

In July 1956, the NLF and the Algerian Communist Party concluded an agreement on the strength of which detachments of Liberation Fighters were incorporated in the National Liberation Army and placed under NLF control. The NLF leadership, however, insisted on the self-dissolution of the Communist Party. The latter, formally remaining outside the Front, continued to support it in every way. The desire of the Communist Party to strengthen national revolutionary unity was also reflected in the Party's appeal to Algerian workers who were close to the Communist Party to join the country's single trade union organisation, the General Union of Algerian Workers, formed under the aegis of the National Liberation Front in February 1956.