Desjardins was not the sole rebel attempting to wipe out the rizzutos but the most prominent member of first an alliance with Joe dimaulo...his brother in law and those allied with dimaulo. Along with Giuseppe DeVito and members of his large drug network. Sal Montagna arrived in Apr 2009 and slowly became involved with that group.
Desjardins at an earlier point did have allies within the Quebec HA.
But remember that most of the full patch HA were imprisoned awaiting trial in the massive operation sharq arrests by 2009.
Vittorio mirarchi of course was Desjardins closest Italian Allie next to dimaulo.
Mirarchi being so close to Desjardins has been the source of rumors trying to connect the coup against the rizzutos to Toronto based 'ndrangheta.
Time however has shown that the ndrines of toronto were not as involved if at all in the 2009-2011 war in MTL.