Damien Van Puyvelde, "The DGSE: A Concise History of France's Foreign Intelligence Service" (Georgetown UP, 2026)
About this episode
Damien Van Puyvelde discusses his book on the history and evolution of France's foreign intelligence service, the DGSE.
France is a leading intelligence power, but we know very little about its premier intelligence agency: the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE). Damien Van Puyvelde's latest book, The DGSE: A Concise History of France's Foreign Intelligence Service (Georgetown University Press, 2026), examines France's foreign intelligence service from its rebranding as the DGSE in 1982 to the present. It covers the legacies of the Second World War, how decolonization and the Cold War shaped the organization, the organization's workforce and leadership, as well as public and (pop) cultural perceptions and representations of intelligence in France. The emergence of the DGSE, following the election of socialist President Mitterrand, opened an era of change, marked by a series of reorganizations and new threats over the horizon. Some readers will recall the Rainbow Warrior fiasco, when DGSE operators sank Greenpeace's flagship, causing the death of a photographer in 1985. Others will be more familiar with the popular TV show The Bureau, which portrays the lives of non-official cover DGSE officers operating in contemporary hotspots. These vignettes, just like much of the media…
People in this episode
Host: Marshall Poe
Guest: Damien Van Puyvelde
Topics covered
- French intelligence
- DGSE history
- Cold War
- decolonization
- intelligence agency
- media representation
- international security
Keywords
- DGSE
- France
- intelligence
- history
- Cold War
- Rainbow Warrior
- The Bureau
- decolonization
- security threats
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure, Georgetown University Press
Books & works: The Bureau
Places: France
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