AN EXCEPTION OF EVENTS

Prefaced by General Maurice Faivre, this book goes off the beaten track, especially the war track.
The introduction recalls the official justification of the french attack on Algiers in 1830.
Then the story becomes anecdotal and romanticized, even intimate. We meet François, a trainee reservist in Algeria, at the time of an "Army-Youth" training. It is 1959, and François observes that the pacification is relative and that the "pieds-noirs" he meets have a rather irresponsible view of the situation. He fraternizes with Hassan - when he suspects of being active in the FLN - who confides to him his pessimism about the continuation of the events.
In the days following the putsch, in 1961, we find François again, still a reservist, now a sub-lieutenant, commanding a SAS (Specialized Administrative Section), revealing his recipes for firmly, yet humanely, resolving the problems he has to confront :
insurrections, training of "mechtas", integration to (and not from) the population, guerilla warfare, disciplining his escort, the painful matter of the "harkis", and so on.
He has the the luxury of being the invitee of the person in charge of the organization of the Algerian Independance celebration in a large Algerian city, and discovers the kindly behaviour of people toward him, while tragedy lies a few hundred kilometers in the west.
The majority of the book is focused on the period from 1961 to 1962 with a short epilogue about the actions of french politicians and soldiers from 1860 to ... 2030, on the occasion of the various conflicts in which France has been involved. This "bonus" is in the form of a discussion between the author and his character, 45 years later, in a form evocative of philosophy.