L'AFFAIRE RAINBOW WARRIOR DEEPENS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201060003-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: September 27, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STnT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201060003-3
I..-T;CLE APi ED
C PAGE
L'affaire
Rainbow
Warrior
deepens
By Curtis Cate
SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
PARIS - The ambivalent attitude
of the French toward the Green-
peace scandal is highlighted by two
results of a public opinion poll pub-
lished yesterday.
More than half of those ques-
tioned responded they believed that
President Francois Mitterrand and
his government were aware of the
NEWS ANALYSIS
operation that led to the sinking of
the Rainbow Warrior from its begin.
nings. The president and his prime
minister have consistently denied
that the knowledge extended further
than the defense minister and the
chief of intelligence, both forced to
resign over the affair.
Only 29 percent of those polled
believe the government's claim that
the two leaders were fooled by the
secret intelligence service, while 52
percent believe that they were
involved from the beginning.
Despite this heavily skeptical
view of their political leadership, a
modest 9 percent of the polled saw
the Greenpeace affair as having any
significant effect on next March's
parliamentary elections, while 54
percent believe it will have no effect
whatsoever,
These findings confirm what a
professor of political science
recently said to me: "We French are
not like you Americans, who have-an
almost puritanical notion of how
politicians should behave. You
expect your politicians to tell the
truth, or at least to make the effort.
We, on the other hand, expect our
politicians to lie, and if they lie a
little more than usual - as in this
Greenpeace affair - well, we shrug
our shoulders and say,'What after all
can one expect? "
WASHINGTON TIMES
27 September 1985
Continuing its investigation of the
episode, the government announced
yesterday that five military men
have been charged with threatening
national defense through leaks to the
press about the Greenpeace matter.
The affair began on July 10 when the
ship, which was about to lead a flo-
tilla protesting French nuclear test-
ing in the South Pacific, was sunk in
the harbor of Auckland, New Zea-
land, killing one man.
The newsmagazine LExpress
reported in today's edition that doc-
uments related to the Greenpeace
scandal, reported by the goverment
to have been destroyed, are still in
existence. Yann de l'Ecotais, the edi-
tor of L'Express, said in a radio
broadcast that his information came
"from very good sources:'
The report contradicts
statements by Defense Minister
Paul Quiles, who took office Friday
after the resignation of his prede-
ces8or, Charles Hernu. Mr. Quiles
has said that important documents
on the July 10 sinking had been
destroyed. The contents of the doc-
uments have not been made known.
Four of those charged yesterday
were identified as Col. Joseph Four-
rier?57; Capt. Alain Borras, 34; War-
rant:Officer Richard Guillet, 32; and
Master Sgt. Bernard Davier, 27, all
current or former members of the
General Directorate for External
Security, the spy agency involved in
the sinking.
The fifth man, who was charged
later in the day, was national police
Capt. Paul Barril, 39, believed to
have acted as an intermediary
between the press and the four
secret service men. The national
police are a branch of the military.
All five formally were charged
with "revealing information of a
nature to harm national defense ...
without intention of treason or espi-
onage," a charge that carries a maxi-
mum sentence of five years in jail.
The case of Capt. Barril may have
larger political implications.
He is described by French
sources as a gifted gendarmerie offi-
cer who helped make the French
GIGN - a special-operations anti-
hijacking group - into one of the
world's finest anti-terrorist com-
mando forces. An expert skier, para-
chutist, karate fighter, rapid-fire
marksman and frogman, Capt. Bar-
ril and two of his non-commissioned
officers in November 1979 were sent
to Mecca at the specific request of
the Saudi Arabian minister of inte-
rior to help regain control of the
sacred mosque that had been seized
by Islamic terrorists.
When the Socialists came to
power in 1981, Charles Hernu con-
vinced Mr. Mitterrand that a special
GIGN unit be assigned to take over
security functions at the Elysee Pal-
ace. This angered the police unit tra-
ditionally entrusted with the job of
guarding the French president, as
well as a number of influential police
chiefs in other branches, who were
jealous of the GIGN's growing pres-
tige.
In September 1982, Capt. Barril
and his GIGN men, acting on a tip,
arrested an Irishman named
Michael Plunkett, who was sus-
pected of planning a bombing in
Paris' eastern suburbs. Although
Plunkett was wanted by the British
because of his suspected
involvement in the assassination of
British Member of Parliament P.
Airey Neave, a personal friend of
Margaret Thatcher, Capt. Barril's
enemies in the Paris police force
mounted a furious press campaign
against him and his "GIGN cow-
boys" As a result, the case was taken
out of his hands, most of the
incriminating evidence - pistols,
guns, sticks of dynamite - were
carelessly lost, and Plunkett and two
of his IRA accomplices were allowed
to go scot-free because of "insuffi-
cient evidence"
Suspended from further service
in the GIGN for a period of five
years, Paul Barril wrote a book of
reminiscences that provoked an
angry clash between Pierre Joxe,
the minister of the interior, who
wanted to have book banned, and
Charles Hernu, the recently fired
defense minister who is an
unabashed admirer of Capt. Barril
and his crack GIGN unit.
Mr. Hernu won out, the book was
released, and has since sold 170,000
copies - making Capt. Barril many
friends and a few unforgiving
enemies. The foremost of these
enemies today is Pierre Joxe, an
avowed Marxist who, now that his
enemy Charles Hernu has been
fired, is seen by some political ana-
lysts as out to get Capt. Barril's scalp
as well.
The prime minister's office also
remains in the spotlight. French
newspapers have recently been
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2 .
focusing on the way in which secret
funds - at least 1.7 million francs
(or roughly 200,000 dollars) - were
disbursed for the anti-Rainbow War-
rior operation. Among other things,
each disbursement needed the sig-
nature of the head of Mr. Fabius' own
secretariat, Jacques Fournier.
France took the offensive as its
best defense at the United Nations
yesterday, vowing to press its own
claims against New Zealand.
This analysis is based in part on
wire service reports.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201060003-3