Alexandre de Marenches
Count Alexandre de Marenches | |
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SDECE |
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Count Alexandre de Marenches (7 June 1921 – 2 June 1995) was a
Family
He was the son of Captain Charles-Constant-Marie de Marenches, a French
Early life
In his youth, Marenches met many of the Allied leaders of
After the war, he ventured into industry but remained in the Army Reserve and ultimately reached the rank of colonel. In 1962, he resigned in protest to President Charles de Gaulle's policy in Algeria.
Appointment by Pompidou
He was eventually chosen to head the French intelligence services by French President Georges Pompidou mainly because of Marenches's perceived independence and integrity. Pompidou was aware that factions in the intelligence services had been circulating defamatory rumours for the last six months of de Gaulle's presidency on his wife and himself. Other rumours alleged Pompidou's involvement with the film star Alain Delon, whose bodyguard had been found murdered in September 1968.
Some agents had taken the opportunity to smear Pompidou in revenge taking very firm action against some of their colleagues involved in the kidnapping of
In 1970, he was installed as head of the SDECE, the forerunner of the current
Under Giscard d'Estaing
He had such authority that when
Under Giscard d'Estaing, Marenches tried to awaken interest in the former
Achievements
It is difficult to assess Marenches's achievements. Some believed that while he was one of the busiest figures on the intelligence circuit, some of his pronouncements (such as those on the Soviet Union) were based on slander. Others noted how he successfully cultivated his contacts in the Middle East, pushed the sales of Dassault Mirage fighters, and helped to establish a relationship with Iraq that persisted. In Africa, sometimes working with the old Gaullist emissary Jacques Foccart and sometimes behaving as his rival, Marenches strengthened France's traditional strongholds.
He co-founded the Safari Club, a "private intelligence group [which was] one of George H. W. Bush's many end runs around congressional oversight of the American intelligence establishment and the locus of many of the worst features of the mammoth BCCI scandal."[2] The Club involved a number of states, including Saudi Arabia (which financed the operations), Morocco, Egypt and Iran, and was intended to counter Soviet operations in the Middle East and Africa.
An interlocutor with many heads of state in the world and a close friend of King
Im Dans le secret des princes, he states he was asked by an American journalist, who was a distant relative, where he could go in the world to write an article on an important geopolitical situation that was almost unknown. Marenches proposes several places. The journalist answers that he wanted one place. Marenches chooses randomly Afghanistan, because of the threat of a
Marenches also conceived Operation Mosquito. In a meeting with Reagan at the White House, he suggested for the Drug Enforcement Administration to take all the drugs confiscated and supply them covertly to the Soviet Army in Afghanistan. In a few months, he explained, it would be demoralized, and its fighting ability would be gone. Marenches added, according to his published memoirs, that a few trusted people could do all that at a cost of approximately a million dollars.[3]
Marenches also told Reagan that the United States controlled only four of the eight strategic raw materials and that the Soviets controlled all of them.
Édouard Balladur knew Marenches well from when they were both working closely with Pompidou. When Balladur was prime minister, he was due to preside over a medal-awarding ceremony. He was suddenly unable to attend and so asked Marenches to take his place. That was a serious mark of Balladur's respect and friendship.
At 6'4" and heavily built, he was called Porthos in reference to the character in The Three Musketeers. Charismatic and colourful, he was popular for his valour and patriotism.
Resignation
After the
Publication
In 1986, along with journalist Christine Ockrent, he co-authored a book, Dans le secret des princes ("In the Princes' Secret", published in English as The Evil Empire: Third World War Continues) about his days working in secret services. Claims were made on concealed archives with evidence of collaboration with Germans by figures of the French Resistance during the French Occupation.
In 1988, he published in French an Atlas géopolitique.
In 1992, along with David A. Andelman, he co-authored The Fourth World War: Diplomacy and Espionage in the Age of Terrorism, a book in which he predicted the rise of terrorism as a new form of warfare. The book became popular following the September 11 attacks.
See also
- Michel Roussin, Alexandre de Marenches' chief of staff
References
- ISBN 978-1-58617-183-4.
- Salon. Archived from the originalon 2011-03-02. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
- ISBN 978-0-7453-1323-8.