Georges Watin

Georges Watin, known as the Limp, is one of the most dangerous OAS gunmen in the account of the Petit-Clamart attempt on Charles de Gaulle. A former agricultural engineer from Algeria, he had re-emerged as a feared trigger-man and participated directly in the attack. While arrests, trials, and death sentences closed in around other conspirators, Watin repeatedly escaped capture; his continued freedom also made him a name invoked when OAS leaders considered who might carry out another assassination.

Identity and Background

Watin was thirty-nine at the time of the Petit-Clamart plot. The narrative identifies him as a bulky-shouldered OAS fanatic, originally trained as an agricultural engineer in Algeria, who had become one of the organization’s most dangerous gunmen over the preceding two years. His nickname, the Limp, came from an old leg wound. That injury marked him physically, but it did not remove him from the role of an active operative: he was among the men selected for the attack on the presidential convoy.

The account distinguishes Watin from the younger, more nervous amateurs in the group. He belonged to the older and less visibly anxious contingent, and his reputation was established before the attempted ambush began. The description of him as a dangerous trigger-man therefore carries practical weight: at Petit-Clamart, he would personally fire on the car carrying the President.

Role in the Petit-Clamart Attack

The plot had been prepared with close attention to the road, the convoy’s movement, and the attackers’ firing positions. Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry had spent days measuring angles, speed, distance, and the firepower needed to stop the vehicles. The first group was to open fire on the presidential car along the straight Avenue de la Libération, before the road reached the main crossroads at Petit-Clamart. A roadside Estafette van would provide cover, while the shallow angle of attack was intended to reduce the marksmen’s need to adjust their aim.

Watin took part in the second commando’s attack. As the convoy approached the intersection with the Avenue du Bois, Alain Bougrenet de la Tocnaye drove out from the side road and came alongside a car carrying a marksman bodyguard and Commissaire Ducret, rather than the President’s car. Leaning out of the right-hand window, Watin fired his submachine gun at the rear of the Citroën DS 19 ahead. Through its shattered glass he could see Charles de Gaulle’s profile. The attack came close enough for the President to see the gunmen, but the security car remained behind him, and the convoy continued through the junction toward Villacoublay.

Watin’s action is striking for its proximity and its failure to stop the convoy. The attackers had planned positions and timing in detail, yet the second group’s sudden interception placed Watin beside the wrong car. His burst of fire still reached the vehicle carrying de Gaulle, but the presidential party escaped the ambush. Watin’s participation thus links the operation’s elaborate preparation to the confusion and speed of its execution.

Escape and Continued Threat

The investigation eventually identified the participants through the interrogation of Magade, who named the men involved in the attempt as well as others who had helped with planning or equipment. Watin nevertheless remained beyond the police’s reach. The account states that only one participant escaped capture and that Watin was presumed to be living in Spain with most of the other OAS chiefs among Algeria’s civilian settlers. His escape was not a brief delay in the investigation: he had never been caught at the time of the narrative.

His name resurfaced in a later assassination plot directed at de Gaulle. The plan was to shoot the President from the eaves of a building beside the Ecole Militaire as he entered to give a lecture. Watin was to be the trigger-man. The plot was uncovered before the attack, and a rifle fitted with a sniper scope was found at Robert Poinard’s flat; those facing trial included Jean Bichon, Poinard, and Paule Rousselet de Lilac. The conspirators had sought advice on getting Watin and the weapon into the Academy, but a warrant officer went to the police. De Gaulle attended the ceremony as scheduled, though he arrived in an armoured car, a precaution he greatly disliked. Watin again got away.

After the Supreme Military Court delivered its verdict in the Bastien-Thiry case, Watin was among three men still at large who were sentenced to death. De Gaulle commuted two death sentences to life imprisonment, but Bastien-Thiry’s condemnation stood. Watin’s sentence did not bring him into custody; instead, it underlined the gap between the state’s formal judgment and its inability to seize him.

Significance in the OAS Plot

When OAS leaders later met the English professional they intended to hire for the assassination of de Gaulle, they initially invoked the possibility of using men already committed to the cause. Watin was named alongside Curutchet as one of the surviving gunmen who might still do the job. The Englishman’s answer was that the organization’s infiltration by French secret-service agents and the police’s familiarity with its members made an outsider necessary. Watin’s earlier record helps explain both sides of that exchange: he was dangerous enough to be proposed, but his identity and association with the OAS were already too exposed to make him a secure choice.

Watin is therefore not presented as the planner or political leader of the plots. His significance lies in the combination of operational violence and continued elusiveness. He fires at de Gaulle’s car at close range, is selected again for a later sniper attack, and remains a usable name in OAS discussions even after the first attempt has been exposed. Across these episodes, the Limp’s old wound is a visible mark of recognition, while his escapes keep him beyond the reach of the investigations and sentences closing around the organization.