The appointment of the current prefect of the Rhône must be announced during a next council of ministers.
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It is the epilogue of a shadow battle as the French state knows how to offer them. Diplomats and prefects have scraped for four months to impose one of their own at the head of the National Intelligence Coordination and the Fight against Terrorism (CNRLT), a position directly attached to the Head of State. It was ultimately Pascal Mailhos, prefect of the Rhône, who was selected to succeed Laurent Nunez, appointed, in July, at the head of the Paris police headquarters. His appointment must be validated and announced during a next council of ministers.
Son of an academic and an inspector general of national education, he joined the ENA after a master’s degree in public law. In 1986, he entered the office of Philippe Séguin, then Minister of Social Affairs and Employment, before making a solid career within the prefectural including, in 1993, another passage in ministerial cabinet. His first real contact with the intelligence world dates from January 22, 2004, when he succeeds Yves Bertrand at the Directorate of General Intelligence (RG). He will stay there two years then return to prefectural.
Those, including Le Monde, who crossed it in the premises of the RG remember a man displaying such great prudence that could be hesitated between the hypothesis of a low interest in matter and That of a fear of taking your feet in the trays left by its sulphurous predecessor, Yves Bertrand, remained twelve years as a function. Some of the latter’s low political police practices led, in part, to the merger, in 2008, of this service with the Directorate of Territory Surveillance. The future has shown that the second option was the right one.
Direct access to the Head of State
In recent months, Bernard Emié, Director General of External Security (DGSE), a training diplomat, has not spared his efforts for a colleague to win the position. The prefects defended this bastion, because the coordinator guarantees them direct access to the Head of State, like diplomats with the head of the diplomatic cell of the president and the military with the chief of staff particular. The great bodies of the state watch over the main posts of the Republic as in the apple of their eyes. The final choice was played between Pascal Mailhos and another prefect, Patrice Faure.
In the Elysée spies, Floran Vadillo and Alexandre Papaemmanuel (Tallandier, 2019), radiograph this coordinator. Born, in fact, in July 2008 and introduced, only in December 2009, in the Defense Code, they are, they say, “far from being the head of the intelligence services, he rather plays the role of belt transmission between administrations or ranks which usually ignore themselves “. For lack of legitimacy and means, its role is to watch over the intelligence community and its means, to dialogue with Parliament, to lock the legal security of espionage activities and to streamline dialogue between often rival agencies.
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