The Centre d'Expérimentations Militaires des Oasis (CEMO) was later built in the Hoggar Mountains, near In Ekker, 150 km north of Tamanrasset, to carry out underground nuclear tests.

The French government hastily ordered the detonation of Gerboise Verte on 25 April 1961 immediately following the generals' putsch, so that the nuclear device could not fall into the hands of the putschists.

[7][10] Yves Rocard recounts that meteorological precautions were not taken, so much so that the bomb was tested in a sandstorm whose intensity masked even the light of the explosion.

[11][12][13] Like Gerboise Rouge, a joint exercise in the contaminated area, codenamed Garigliano was conducted to see how infantrymen and armored vehicles could protect themselves and then operate after the explosion.

[12][19] The novelist Christophe Bataille published a story in January 2015 based on this nuclear test: L'Expérience (Grasset).