Service d'Action Civique

The SAC (French: Service d'Action Civique; or Civic Action Service), officially created in January 1960, was a Gaullist militia founded by Jacques Foccart, Charles de Gaulle's chief adviser for African matters, and Pierre Debizet, a former Resistant and official director of the group. Important members included Charles Pasqua, part of the Gaullist movement and known as Jacques Chirac's mentor, Etienne Léandri, a friend of Pasqua, Robert Pandraud or Christian Fouchet. The predecessor of the SAC was the service of order of the Rassemblement du Peuple Français (RPF) Gaullist party. The SAC was dissolved in 1982 under François Mitterrand's government, after a particularly gruesome multiple murder triggered by internal rivalries.

The SAC was officially created as a 1901 law association on 4 January 1960, in the proclaimed aim of providing unconditional support to de Gaulle's policy. It was then officially directed by Pierre Debizet, a former Resistant, but its real leader was Jacques Foccart, in charge of the African policy of France for several decades.

The SAC recruited among the Gaullist movement, but also in the organized crime. Etienne Léandri, a friend of Charles Pasqua, was thus a former Collaborationist, reconverted in illegal drug trade and protected by the Central Intelligence Agency for his anti-communist activities. Others famous gangsters of the time who were SAC members include Jo Attia or Christian David ("le beau Serge"). Some of these criminals had taken part in the Resistance during the war, and even been deported, thus creating lasting links with future politicians, while others had been collaborationists.

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