The country was divided into six autonomous zones or Wilayas, giving the rebellion an integral structure that it would retain over the next seven and a half years. Operation groups would be formed in watertight compartments, with no more than four or five trusted men knowing each other. On D-Day each group leader was to act in accordance with a very precise plan, and attacks were to be directed against specific public installations, private property of the grands colons, French military personnel and gendarmes, and Muslim collaborators. European civilians — especially women and children — were to be strictly immune; there would be no repetition of Sétif.

XREF: The watertight-compartment structure resembles modern insurgency and terrorist cell networks, suggesting a long lineage of clandestine organizational design.

Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Alge…, loc. 254