Ramdane Abane crossed the ts by explaining that: "Even if we take risks, our struggle must become known. We could kill hundreds of colonialist soldiers without this ever being publicly announced." The F.L.N. leaders felt that the combination of Yacef's grip of terror on Algiers and the F.L.N.'s acquired influence among the trade unions as a whole — in the shape of the recently-formed U.G.T.A. (Union Général des Travailleurs Algériens) — made them strong enough to accept the risks involved, and over so prolonged a period as eight days. In fact, it was to turn out to be perhaps the F.L.N.'s gravest tactical error of the entire war.

XREF: Connects to broader literature on urban terrorism and how terror campaigns can alienate the very population they target, as later seen in various insurgencies.

Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Alge…, loc. 571