France in Chaos: When Reality Surpasses Fiction: An Interview with Laurent Obertone

'There's nothing surprising in what France is living through, as those with eyes to see have been saying for decades. But nobody listened to them.'

From The European Conservative

By Hélène De Lauzun

There's nothing surprising in what France is living through, as those with eyes to see have been saying for decades. But nobody listened to them.

Laurent Obertone is a French journalist and essayist who made a name for himself in 2013 with the publication of a shocking monograph, La France Orange mécanique, which unambiguously denounced the ruination of France through uncontrolled immigration. From 2016 to 2022, he published a three-volume trilogy, Guérilla, which imagines a day when the country finally descends into total chaos. The situation he depicts is strongly similar to what France’s been experiencing for more than a week, putting a new light on his prophetic work and provoking public commentary. He agreed to answer a few questions for The European Conservative.

The first volume of your novel Guérilla was published in 2016. At the time, did you feel that you were writing a work of anticipation, or that you were simply ‘a little’ ahead of our time?

Not really, I had the impression that I was in the present, and even overtaken by it. As I wrote, various events and terrorist attacks occurred, sometimes forcing me to change certain passages because they were so similar. It’s very difficult to anticipate, because things move far too fast—and not in the right direction.

It’s not often in the career of a futurist that his prophecies come true … The similarities between the situation we’ve been living in for the last week and the starting point of your novel Guérilla are striking. You’re certainly not surprised! In your opinion, is reality surpassing fiction, or are we still on the brink of the worst that could happen?

There’s nothing surprising in what we are living, as those with eyes to see have been saying for decades. But nobody listens to them. The disease of lucidity makes you a pest, kept away from the mainstream media, which abhors the bearers of bad news, at least those likely to challenge the dogma of ‘vivre ensemble’ (living together). Here it was just a dress rehearsal, the crystallisation of a guerrilla war that is already latent, daily, and that can only get worse, as long as we refuse to apply the law, and completely turn the tide on immigration.

In your novel, you bet on the fact that the police and the army—except for a tiny minority—remain on the side of the state and let themselves be overtaken by events. Don’t you think that a significant proportion of them could, on the contrary, go against orders?

Indeed, it’s possible that they could end up pulling the pin. There have been hundreds of resignations. No one wants to go through what they are going through, abandoned by the authorities, criminalised by the media, hounded by left-wing activists, and faced with constant barbarity. Within the police and the army, revolt is brewing. But for the time being it’s content to simmer. The same goes for the general population, who grumble and disapprove, but in the end remain fairly passive, continuing to pay taxes, and expecting the state to act in their place. 

What do you think of the phenomenon of self-organised militias? Are they marginal or a sign of a deeper movement?

We can only understand such reactions: if no one can defend you anymore, if the monopoly of legitimate violence is abandoned to the rioter, then the citizen must take note, and do what he can to defend his life, his family, his property. Private security is exploding. The state is being challenged by gangs, and we’re moving towards atomisation: a balkanised population and ultra-secure neighbourhoods, like Brazil. 

Is it now possible for the state to restore order without appearing fascist?

No, that’s the whole problem. If the French state adapts its response to the barbarity of the street, which is worthy of the Third World, there will be an outcry from the world’s progressives. So the government will do what it always does: communicate, shower the suburbs with public money, talk about discrimination, pass a raft of laws that will never be enforced, ask its police to keep a low profile, and so on, until the next time. 

At least the world’s progressives won’t have anything to say about it.

Apart from Macron, if he manages to buy social peace once again with billions, who do you think can benefit politically from the situation? Are the right-wing parties credible and audible?

It’s clear that this can benefit the so-called nationalist opposition—Le Pen, Zemmour, and in general the unapologetic Right. Many hitherto very moderate citizens have suddenly become radicalised toward the Right as if they were just waiting for the opportunity to express the depth of their thinking. They are frustrated with excessive immigration permissiveness and they crave the restoration of order. It’s a view that is now widely shared, perhaps even in the majority. 

Many mainstream journalists draw parallels between the French riots and the pro-George Floyd mobilisation in the USA. To what extent do you think that the current unrest is simply another case of an American disease being imported into France? 

The Left’s response is very similar: it unreservedly sides with the street, against the police and society, hoping to win the votes of the suburbs. To my mind, it’s a very bad calculation, because the Left doesn’t understand that there’s nothing political about this revolt; it’s not even a revolt. The riots are just an occasion for a section of the population that doesn’t feel French to loot and to enjoy the fruit of their depredation. 

Wokism is very prevalent in the academic and media world, but its discourse is becoming less and less tolerated by the population.