Over the previous six months there had been more than eighty shooting incidents on the Tunisia—Algeria frontier. These had culminated on 11 January in the ambushing of a strong French patrol by F.L.N. bands operating in the unusual strength of a failek (a battalion, or three hundred men). The band had come across from Tunisia (allegedly driven to the frontier in Tunisian army trucks), laid their well-prepared ambush, in which fifteen French troops were killed, then escaped back into Tunisia, taking four French prisoners with them, before a riposte could be mounted. A few days later, in this same sector of the frontier, an investigating French plane was shot down by machine-gun fire from a Tunisian village called Sakiet, which gave every appearance of being a strong F.L.N. base. Angry warnings emanated from the French authorities, but early on the morning of 8 February another French plane was hit by machine-gun fire from Sakiet, and made a forced landing behind the Morice Line. Three hours later a squadron of American-built B. bombers appeared overhead and flattened the village with a massive bombing retaliation.

Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Alge…, loc. 777