Starting from July 1st, a new internal intelligence organization will be implemented across the national territory. This operation, decided by the Elysรฉe and approved not without some reluctance by the Minister of the Interior, Michรจle Alliot-Marie, aims to merge part of the Central Directorate of General Intelligence (DCRG) with the Directorate of Territorial Surveillance (DST) to create a single Central Directorate of Internal Intelligence (DCRI), better equipped to directly respond to the threats outlined in the recent “White Paper on Defense and Security.”
Simultaneously, what remains of the former DCRG is integrated into the Central Directorate of Public Security under the name of the General Information Sub-Directorate (SGIG). It will be particularly responsible, at the departmental level, for social, economic, and institutional monitoring, phenomena related to urban drift, hooliganism, and the analysis of social facts, particularly sectarian deviations.
“Les Alpes-Maritimes are the first department to have completed the implementation of this reform,” congratulated Prefect Dominique Vian during a press conference held at the Nice central police station on June 24th. Operational de facto since June 1st, the “departmental-level application” of this new SDIG (also called SDIG but now meaning Departmental Service of General Information) is commanded by Chief Commissioner Bruno Picard, under the orders of the Departmental Director of Public Security (DDSP), General Police Controller Pierre-Marie Bourniquel. This is, of course, the visible part of this new structure: for reasons of security and confidentiality, no information leaks about the local members of the DCRI. The latter is more concerned, commented the Prefect, with the “fight against belligerent threats,” whereas the SDIG’s goal remains the “awareness of societal deviations.” We indirectly learn that DCRI agents will primarily be based in Nice.
The White Paper on Defense allowed, according to the Prefect, to “reassess threats” after the September 11th attacks, threats now “multiform” and “no longer just state-to-state.” Emphasizing the “importance” attached to “intelligence,” Dominique Vian notably highlighted the need to have “offensive and defensive means” in information systems to tackle cybercrime. He also stressed the necessity of “human intelligence,” an essential complement to intelligence of technological origin. This intelligence must focus on “all societal events that lead to conflictual situations.” This new internal intelligence organization, in his opinion, provides a “more significant territorial foundation” and a “finer grid” strengthened by the “consolidated intelligence structure at the Presidential level.” In simple terms, the new National Intelligence Council established at the Elysรฉe under the direction of Ambassador Bernard Bajolet will ensure the coordination of different services, with the Prefect playing an essential role in this territorial network.
Taking the floor next, the National Police General Controller Pierre-Marie Bourniquel, Departmental Director of Public Security, under whose authority the Departmental Service of General Information operates, expressed his satisfaction with the “strengthening and coherence of intelligence” resulting from the reform. “A good police force,” he indicated, “is a well-informed police force, but this intelligence must be geared towards ‘operational purposes,’” ironically noting the proliferation of “reports and reflections” on urban violence. A probable dig at Alain Bauer, a criminologist and author of numerous studies on this topic. Describing as “thugs” those who seek to “take over areas” and who constitute “levers of urban violence,” Pierre-Marie Bourniquel also spoke of the “coherence” of intelligence that should not “scatter.” Among the thirty-two police officers, twenty-two of whom are “active,” he specified, this new departmental service includes, besides a chief commissioner, seven officers, fourteen ranked and guards, and ten administrative assistants. “I can no longer say,” exclaimed the General Controller, “it’s the RG’s fault!”
Following him, the head of the SDIG of Nice, Bruno Picard, opted for a more emotional tone in addressing his “troops,” urging them to “serve loyally” the authority: “We say goodbye to a house,” that of the RG “for which we have nothing to be ashamed of,” he explained. A notable change in tone that might resemble a hint of nostalgia. The Prefect had, however, dismissed the idea in his introductory remarks, stating that “overall, satisfaction prevailed regarding postings.”
However, it seems that the merger hasn’t pleased everyone: rather than a merger, some in the Nice police circles quietly talk of a “takeover of the RG by the DST,” risking making the already different intelligence cultures even harder to reconcile. Despite the undeniable successes of the Directorate of Territorial Surveillance โ about ten jihadist networks dismantled in one year โ the distribution of new competencies raises some questions: while traditional Islam, like other monotheisms, remains within the SDIG’s purview, radical Islam falls under the DCRI’s responsibility. “What will happen on the ground?” wonder the concerned personnel here and there. Presented as the visible part of this “iceberg” of the new internal intelligence, some members of the SDIG worry about being reduced to a mere alert role for the other service and question the “passage of information,” the “transfer,” and the “treatment of sources” to the DCRI agents. The same goes for counter-terrorism, a crucial action domain of this second structure. How can the grid established by the new SDIG be effective in an area that, on the surface, is not within its official competence?
One detail also catches attention: while economic intelligence issues now integrate as part of “heritage protection” within the DCRI’s “enclosed environment” work, its agents are based in Nice, not in Grasse, which is territorially competent for the Sophia Antipolis site. The latter nevertheless houses high-tech companies and one of the competitiveness poles among the 71 selected in France, for which the President of the Republic has just announced the renewal of a total envelope of 1.5 billion euros. At what point, one wonders, should a union tension or an economic conflict within a company, an area of “knowledge” devoted to the SDIG, be perceived as risks likely to lead to a leak of a technological secret, thus justifying giving way to the more “clandestine” fight led by the DCRI?
We see that the merger of internal intelligence services will take as long as needed to develop trust, which everyone acknowledges in these services builds rather than decrees. This might be the spirit in which Chief Commissioner Bruno Picard concluded his intervention with a subtly enigmatic note: “We will continue to be what we were… differently.”
