In a startling incident, a television documentary about France’s external intelligence agency went on the reveal that honeytraps are ineffective against French spies because their wives are accustomed to them having affairs with other women.
According to intelligence agents at the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE), their Russian opponents realized that blackmailing French spies over their relationship with their respective girlfriends were useless.
The standard reaction of the French spies to the blackmailers was “Go ahead, my wife already knows,” according to one agent in Making of Secret Agents, a 90-minute documentary that secured unprecedented access to the intelligence agency over several weeks. It was slated to appear on the French public television station France 2 on Tuesday night.
The agent known only as Nicolas, whose speech and persona were blurred was quoted as saying, “Defectors from the Soviet Union used to talk about the ‘French paradox’, namely if you surprised a Frenchman with a mistress by telling him, we’ve caught you red-handed with a 22-year-old called Tatyana, work for us or we’ll tell your wife, it didn’t work.”
He said that when Russians threaten them with blackmailing after honeytraping them using women, a French spy usually says that his wife already knew about it, or ‘Go ahead, show her, she’ll understand’. Cameras were allowed into the DGSE for the documentary Making of Secret Agents, which aired on French television channel France 2 on Tuesday.
In one segment of the 90-minute show, former French espionage head Bernard Emie denied that his operatives were oblivious to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine after Putin massed soldiers on the border.
Both the UK and the US had warned that Putin was scheming to start a war, but French intelligence insisted that there was no imminent threat. Emie claims in the documentary, however, that France was well aware of the situation but chose not to disclose it.
“When Russia unleashed its war on Ukraine, the DGSE had the same technical information as its American partners. The problem is then how you exploit and analyze that information and the way in which you think an event will or won’t take place. The CIA made the totally respectable decision to divulge the intelligence it had with the aim of dissuading the Russians from launching their operation. This is a policy that we don’t pursue. But in terms of intelligence, we had the same level of knowledge. In plain terms, nobody was party to someone within President Putin’s entourage with access to his personal way of thinking,” he said.
The documentary features interviews with agents who explain why they joined, as well as footage of them learning how to use firearms and defend themselves. Agents describe how difficult it is to keep their work from their families, with one stating that they learn not to ask questions.
The documentary begins with DGSE members distinguishing between “secret agent” and “spy,” which is a more rigid job description that only covers a portion of the agency’s activities. The secret agent’s job is to “gather information abroad to protect France”. However, this is commonly done from behind a desk.
