SHOCK REPORT

THE VULNERABILITY OF FRANCE

FOREIGN INTERFERENCE AND ESPIONAGE

We can doubt it. The observation is clear. "The new dimension taken by foreign interference reveals persistent vulnerabilities, starting with our naivety, which is as much that of the political and administrative elites as [those] of economic and academic circles", indicates a report of the parliamentary intelligence delegation, published this Thursday, November 2, 2023.

Made up of eight parliamentarians, all authorized for defense secrecy, the parliamentary intelligence delegation is responsible for monitoring the action of specialized services, such as the DGSE, the DGSI or the DRM.

“High threat level”

Foreign interference has mutated to become a “protean, omnipresent and lasting” threat from espionage to the use of cyber space or information manipulation operations. His conclusion is clear: France is not armed enough to confront foreign influences.

The delegation underlines that this danger has taken “a new dimension in recent years, primarily due to a “radical change in the geopolitical context”…

“We have suddenly moved from a world of competition to a world of confrontation with authoritarian regimes on one side and Western democracies on the other (…). This divide between the West and the rest of the world emerges (…) as the dominant marker of the current period,” according to the document. Sacha Houlié, the president of the delegation, speaks of a “new cold era”.

“The informational and reputational war waged by authoritarian regimes.”

This danger arises, in fact, at the heart of a digital and technological revolution which has made cyberspace “the privileged field of confrontation and strategic competition between States”, a war led, above all, according to the DPR, by Russia. , China and Turkey.

The delegation's report dwells at length on "the informational and reputational war waged by authoritarian regimes." Because if classic espionage still exists, “fake news is the weapon of a war waged against the West without, for a long time, having identified the means to defend ourselves.”

And in this game Russia is the strongest. Moscow even has “its signature”, its techniques and they are formidable. Infiltration is part of this, for example the appointment of former European officials to the boards of directors of large Russian companies, such as the former French Prime Minister François Fillon or the former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.

There is also the manipulation of information, even if in France the banning of the media Russia Today and Sputnik has “helped reduce the scope of the information war” of Russia.

We must not neglect Xi Jinping's China, very effective with its “united front”, a “political strategy and a network of public and private institutions and key individuals, placed under the control of the Chinese Communist Party”. Chinese nationals (600,000 in France) are a key link in this system

Finally there is Turkey which since the arrival of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the top of power – in 2014 – no longer even hides its ambition “to control the Turkish diaspora as a relay of the ideas of Ankara’s power, it is i.e. hostile to Kurds and Armenians.” The report points to “religious practice”, “a powerful lever for promoting a political ideology”.

The document highlights the financing of places of worship in France and the assignment of Turkish imams to French mosques which “allowed Turkey to influence Islam in France”.

This system has since been banned... but its effects continue. Ankara also infiltrates through “entry into politics through participation in local and national elections”, through activism on social networks to propagate messages hostile to legislation, such as that on religious separatism.

“Our allies are not always our friends”

But not only that: unlike the fight against terrorism, where France can count on its traditional allies, the area of ​​foreign interference is unique. “Our allies are not always our friends when it comes to espionage and economic interference,” summarized the chairman of the law committee, who cited the cases of the United States, Australia and even Israel. . “We are alone in this.”

Various operating methods, such as the extraterritoriality of law, are used in particular by the United States of America to capture data and undermine our economic security.”

Finally, the document insists on the need to pay attention to more discreet forms of espionage which may be the work of France's historical “allies”, as was the case with the Pegasus affair, named after the famous software Israeli spy that Morocco allegedly used to hack President Macron's telephone data. Since June 2022 the two countries have been at loggerheads and Israel has dried up Rabat's sources.

All these phenomena thrive on the “naivety” of elected officials, senior civil servants but also businesses and academic circles, writes the report. The report calls for a national awakening and intends to reduce the “naivety” and “denial” which are rampant within French society against an evil which undermines national sovereignty in all its forms: political, legal, military, economic and technological.

At the start of 2023, Emmanuel Macron explained that “war is no longer declared, it is waged quietly, insidiously, it is hybrid”. The delegation suggests the creation of an anti-interference bill aimed at detecting the action of foreign intelligence services, through data processing on the Internet.

To compensate for these deficiencies, the deputies propose the establishment of an “ad hoc legislative system for the prevention of foreign interference on the model of American law”, the adoption of a system of freezing assets for “any person or structure engaging in actions detrimental to the maintenance of national cohesion or intended to promote the interests of a foreign power.”

Furthermore, the authors of the report suggest “a European response” and are of the opinion that the different response strategies could be grouped “in a bill dedicated to the fight against foreign interference”.… At the level of national

emergency

The State elevates the fight against foreign interference to the rank of national emergency and devotes most of its annual report to it. Welcoming to see the budget and staff allocated to intelligence constantly increasing – 3.03 billion euros and 19,572 people in 2022 – the DPR also welcomes the injection of 5 billion additional euros planned in the 2024-2030 military programming law.

This will be necessary, say its members, to support “the paradigm shift in French intelligence” that constitutes the new priority given to counter-intervention.