A graduate of Saint-Cyr and Chasseur Alpin, he served as a ski instructor in Poland during 1939, but after World War II began he returned to France.

He was part of the occupation force in Austria, then a general staff officer of the French Army before taking command of the 11e Bataillon Parachutiste de Choc in 1948.

At the suggestion of Captain Paul-Alain Léger, a former SAS-trained Jedburgh and a veteran of Indochina, he authorised the bleus-de-chauffe system, by which paratroopers and loyal Algerians disguised as young workers roamed the Casbah and arrested FLN militants.

Paul Delouvrier contemplated his transfer but hesitated, as "he holds all the security services of Algiers in his hands [and what would happen] if, immediately after his departure, bombs and grenades started exploding again?

When the putsch failed, he joined the Organisation Armée Secrète, helping model it after the structure of the FLN,[5] but left Algeria in the summer of 1962 and stayed underground until 1967.