Duo or Duel: Can Morocco and Algeria Overcome Their Tumultuous History?

In a statement to Morocco’s Parliamentary Foreign Relations Committee on November 7, Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita warned that Morocco-Algeria relations could be shifting “from opposition to confrontation.” This statement came just days before a provocative attack by the Polisario Front on Al Mahbas in the Assa Zag region, fortunately causing no casualties.

A similar attack in October last year targeted the city of Smara, resulting in one fatality and three injuries. Are Morocco and Algeria heading toward a more intense conflict? Is this escalation the result of rogue elements within the Polisario, or does it signal a miscalculation by Algeria’s military leadership?

In his Green March speech on November 6, King Mohammed VI extended an olive branch to Algeria, inviting it to join the South Atlantic Initiative, a significant diplomatic opening that could offer Algeria an honorable path to end its costly half-century-long cold war with Morocco. However, Algeria has yet to officially respond to this proposal. Crucially, President Abdelmajid Tebboune has tellingly described Algerian-Moroccan relations as having reached “a point of no return,” lamenting the fact that Morocco has still not apologized for imposing visa restrictions on Algerians after a 1994 terrorist attack in Marrakech.

Morocco, for its part, may deplore that it is yet to receive an apology for the 1962 incursion by Algerian forces, during which 12 Moroccan police officers were killed, nor for the detention of Moroccan POWs by the Polisario on Algerian soil for three decades. Or for the impulsive and unprovoked expulsion from Algeria of thousands of Moroccan families in 1975 and, more recently, for the Algerian government’s blatant failure to adequately address the 2023 killing of two young Moroccans who had inadvertently crossed into Algerian waters. Or still more concerningly for Algeria’s continued support of a separatist project in southern Morocco. In fact, Algiers is estimated to have spent 400 billion dollars on the Polisario Front’s war against Morocco’s territorial integrity over the past 50 years.

Such entrenched grievances have bred deep-rooted mistrust.

Morocco’s Steady Progress

Yet Morocco for now appears to have concentrated much of its focus on constructive domestic and regional initiatives. With an area of 710,850 square kilometers and a population of nearly 37 million, the North African kingdom boasts a strategic Mediterranean and Atlantic coastline of 3,500 kilometers. It holds a dominant position in the global phosphate industry, critical for food security, and has invested heavily in infrastructure, from a high-speed rail system—the first in Africa—to the Tangier Med port, ranked among the top 20 container ports globally.

In addition to diversifying its economy, Morocco has made strides in the automotive, aerospace, and military industries and has invested substantially in water management to combat regional droughts. Desalination plants and water management “highways” are part of an overarching strategy to secure vital resources for its growing population, which is projected to reach 43 million by 2050.

Algeria: Wealthy, but Economically Strained

Algeria, Africa’s largest country by land area, faces a different set of challenges. Its vast territory is dominated by the Sahara, limiting agricultural potential and aggravating food security issues. With a shorter coastline and a population projected to swell from 45 million to 61 million by 2050, Algeria faces mounting resource demands. Despite substantial hydrocarbon revenues, a recent increase in defense spending, combined with economic sanctions imposed on key trade partners like Spain and France, has further strained the economy, reflected in Algeria’s unprecedented $61 billion budget deficit.

Algerian leaders often tout the nation’s lack of foreign debt as a point of pride. Yet this economic conservatism has stifled essential growth, creating a heavy reliance on imports for basic needs and military supplies. Despite significant financial assets, Algeria’s reliance on the military’s influence in policy decisions hampers both economic innovation and broader diplomatic engagement.

The Futility of a Zero-Sum Rivalry

Examining these two neighboring nations’ economic landscapes reveals a clear potential for complementary partnerships. Yet the enduring standoff over the Moroccan Sahara has entrenched a division that time and numerous third-party mediation efforts have failed to bridge. Previously, people and goods could travel by rail from Morocco to Tunisia, even amid political disagreements. Today, however, this connectivity has given way to a rigidly enforced border and hardened stances.

In his book “How states think: the rationality of foreign policy,” co-authored with Sebastian Rosato, John Mearsheimer argues that states with effective deliberative mechanisms tend to use a high degree of rationality in the pursuit of the outcomes they intend to achieve. Undemocratic states, on the other hand, focus on building their capabilities to match their intentions.

Algeria falls into the latter category because its foreign policy is militarily driven and, in the aggregate, weaponized to serve a regional hegemonic agenda. The problem is that this irrational way of thinking has reached its paroxysm, leading the Algerian military to consider an active role in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, as President Abdelmajid Teboune proclaimed recently. Campaigning for another mandate, the Algerian president told a cheering crowd that if only Egypt would allow the Algerian army access to Gaza, “many things could be done.”

This nationalist and manipulative discourse is a smokescreen to hide the country’s economic and social ills. It is also clearly used to denigrate Morocco, which is relentlessly attacked by the Algerian media and Algerian officials for normalizing relations with Israel. But when the Algerian president met the Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah Sissi, during a state visit to Cairo on 10 October, this inflammatory language was completely absent from his discussions with his Egyptian counterpart.

The same President Teboune stated in an interview that the main obstacle to the resumption of diplomatic relations between his country and Morocco was the resumption of relations between Rabat and Tel Aviv. This constant, layered approach to closing the door to any possible normalization of diplomatic relations between Algiers and Rabat is Machiavellian and deceitful.

During a game of chess, a player may have an advantage that can only be used once. As soon as he decides to move on, he automatically loses his advantage. The normalization card with Morocco seems to be seen by the Algerian leaders as a key element in their negotiating script. However, the timing of this card is rather complicated for them, because if Morocco hypothetically ceased to be the enemy one day, the Algerian government would lose any justification for the hardships the Algerians are going through under the guise of national unity against the “Moroccan threat.” This is why the Algerian leaders are buying time for their own sake.

Ultimately, Algeria’s problem is that its windscreen seems narrower than its rear-view mirrors. Until its leaders shed their fixation on the past and stop being pigeonholed by their selective memory, the state of their relations with Morocco is likely to remain at a standstill. The Algerian leadership’s intellectual software is in dire need of an update, sooner rather than later, to take stock of the momentous paradigm changes the world has witnessed since the end of the Cold War and to adjust its foreign policy orientations accordingly.