Ihe started writing after the 2015 attacks. Georges Salinas was deputy head of the BRI (Research and Intervention Brigade) on the evening of November 13, 2015. He intervened at the Bataclan with his team. BRI leaders lead the left column. He, who was in charge of the right side of the auditorium.
After seeing the horror, he hopes his third novel will be published in the fall of 2024 (By the word, by the sword), begins with a scene of a terrorist attack that mimics what he experienced that night. For the title, the police officer chose the motto BRI, a service he left several years ago for a new function but with which we think he still identifies. He attended today’s commemoration to remember the victims and still gives lectures on terrorism.
The main thing is: You were in one of Hypercacher’s assault columns during the January 2015 attack, and at the Bataclan on November 13 of the same year. How have you experienced this anniversary week?
George Salinas: Terrorism still exists, it is still rampant. We need to show how we recover from these attacks. No one escapes unscathed. I think of the victims, their families, all those who intervened, rescue workers, and law enforcement. This shows that our country, if it is running, will continue to run. We must provide testimony and most importantly not be careless in facing the scourge of terrorism.
Why did you start writing novels after November 13?
I want to leave a trace of what happened. Some go to psychologists; I write. My three books focus on terrorism and the origins of terrorism. It was first associated with my father, who was a police officer and worked in anti-terrorism at the time of the Algerian war. When we were faced with the attacks of November 13, I likened it to him, I realized that, decades later, I experienced the same things as him, scenes of war, attacks on cafe terraces, explosions. We both have to deal with endemic diseases.
I wanted to pay homage to him, by making him the hero of my first novel, Oran Cat – that’s his nickname, because he escaped several assassination attempts. His enemies considered him to have many lives. In the second novel (Whispers of Lost Souls), it was father and son who intervened in cases characterized by the porosity between terrorism and organized crime, because that is what I observed when I worked at Brimob.
I usually say that my books are pure fiction. I combine what different people experienced that day.
Why did you include what happened on November 13 in your latest book? By the word, by the sword, published by Mareuil Éditions?
I think it should just be said that way. It’s like a way out. I wrote it in novel form because I wanted to get away from the biography side, I didn’t want to focus on raw facts. I usually say that my books are pure fiction. I combine what different people experienced that day.
I would like to pay tribute to the BRI and I was also involved in the function I then held, in the GSPR (Republican Presidential Security Group). I took inspiration from the worst-case scenarios we worked on at Presidential Security. Bataclan is mass terrorism, the second part of this book is terrorism that attacks institutions and heads of state.
Your new function, as head of DCIS (Directorate for International Security Cooperation), has kept you away from terrorism-related questions…
My current job is to develop a network abroad to try to detect and stop problematic individuals before they find themselves in France. This includes, for example, ensuring that drug traffickers still in Colombia are arrested before they load their narcotics shipments onto ships and arrive in France.
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Is there a fourth book in the works? Is this also related to terrorist threats?
Yes, there is a fourth one, which is almost finished, but it doesn’t talk about terrorism. I touched on it a little, but no more, because we are dealing with organized crime and the question of recidivism. This is a more intimate book, I tell the journey of the thugs together with the police and I play in duality to show that even the thugs are also people, with families, mothers, children.
