The Greenpeace protest ship Rainbow Warrior was sunk on the evening of 10 July 1985 when it was berthed at Marsden Wharf in Auckland after arriving on 7 July. Two limpet mines had exploded against the hull below the waterline near the engine room. The first blast blew the generator to pieces and the second damaged the propeller, stern-shaft and rudder, and cracked the stern frame creating a massive hole. The inrush of water drowned Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira. 

Who was responsible?

Team of French Secret Service agents 

The French government had authorised a team of French Secret Service agents of the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE) to plan and carry out the bombing, codenamed Opération Satanique. The aim was to prevent the Greenpeace ship, the Rainbow Warrior, from leading a protest flotilla to Mururoa (also known as Moruroa) in French Polynesia, where France had begun the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons in 1966 and was planning to conduct further nuclear tests during 1985. 

France began nuclear tests in Algeria (1960) & relocated to Mururoa (1966)

France had commenced it's Force de frappe weapons programme in the French colony of Algeria and tested its first atomic bomb on 13 February 1960. France's intent was to strengthen its own protection if there was a Western European invasion by the Soviet Union (which had begun nuclear testing in 1949 and launched Sputnik 1, the world's first artificial satellite, in 1951) or by another force. When Algeria gained its independence from France in 1962, it banned nuclear testing in 1966. France relocated its nuclear programme to French Polynesia where it held its first test in July 1966 at the Mururoa Atoll. Its military support base for the tests was set up on the Hao Atoll to the north-west of Mururoa.    

Growing world-wide opposition to atmospheric testing

After the French began its testing programme at Mururoa in 1966, there was a growing world-wide opposition to the radioactive fallout from atmospheric testing. Three years earlier, on 5 August 1963, the Partial Test Ban Treaty (PTBT), which proposed to prohibit atmospheric tests and allow underground tests, was signed by the United States, Great Britain and the Soviet Union. After it was opened for signature by other countries, NZ and Australia signed, whereas France and China were amongst those countries who did not sign. The Treaty came into effect on 10 October 1963.   

 During 1972 and 1973, opposition to France's ongoing atmospheric testing at Mururoa escalated. In 1972, the environmentalist group Greenpeace sent protest flotillas of private vessels to the Mururoa Atoll. The following year, in May 1973, the NZ and Australian governments initiated proceedings in the International Court of Justice (ICG) for France to cease its nuclear testing in the South Pacific. The ICG's ruling in June 1973 that testing was to cease was ignored by France who proceeded with plans to conduct further tests in July.  In protest, Greenpeace sent another flotilla of vessels to Mururoa. The third Labour government, led by Norman Kirk, sent two navy frigates, HMNZS Otago and Canterbury, into the test area, with a Cabinet Minister on board - Fraser Colman, the Minister of immigration and Minister of  mines - who observed two atmospheric tests along with other nations.

France switches to underground testing at Mururoa from 1975

In January 1974, France withdrew its consent to jurisdiction by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and announced its intention to switch from atmospheric to underground testing. (The new French president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, had ordered that the tests move underground at Mururoa). On 20 December 1974, the ICJ delivered its judgement that as France had made a binding commitment to cease testing in the atmosphere, this met Australia and NZ's initial complaints with atmospheric testing. 

Subsequently, from 1975, France began conducting underground tests in the Mururoa and Fangataufa Atolls.     

French govt had infiltrated Canada-based Greenpeace organisation

The French government had infiltrated the Canada-based Greenpeace organisation, which had been involved with anti-nuclear protests in the North Atlantic and the Pacific region, and discovered the following plans for a Pacific Peace Voyage during 1985:

-   Greenpeace intended sending the Rainbow Warrior in May 1985 to protest against the US Star Wars missile testing     programme on the Marshall Islands. The Rainbow Warrior would also be involved with 'Project Exodus' - helping to relocate     the residents of the Rongelap Atoll for health reasons to the Mejato Atoll, as their atoll had been contaminated by    radioactive fallout from the atmospheric nuclear testing held by the US in 1954 on Bikini Atoll. 

-  Afterwards, the Rainbow Warrior would be sailing to Vanuatu and then continue onto New Zealand. 

-   From Auckland, Greenpeace intended to organise a flotilla of vessels, with the Rainbow Warrior as the flagship, to carry out a     non-violent protest against the upcoming French nuclear weapons tests at Mururoa. During previous nuclear tests at      Mururoa, many of the protest vessels had been boarded by French commandos when they were in the shipping exclusion     zone around the atoll. Greenpeace's aim was for the Rainbow Warrior to escort the smaller yachts and monitor the impact of     nuclear tests (past and present); and place land protesters on the island to monitor the blasts.  

French govt concerned negative publicity could shut down its testing programme

The French government set up Opération Satanique as it was concerned that an anti-nuclear protest led by the Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior to Mururoa would draw negative publicity, creating pressure to cease their testing programme altogether.  

THE FOLLOWING SUMMARISES:

1.  Greenpeace ship: Rainbow Warrior

2.  French Secret Service (DGSE): Opération Satanique 

3.  Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, Wed 10 July 1985

4.  Refloating and scuttling the Rainbow Warrior

5.  Police investigations

6.  Diplomatic row between NZ and France

                                >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

1. Greenpeace ship: Rainbow Warrior

The Rainbow Warrior was purchased in London by the environmentalist group Greenpeace UK in 1977. It had been built in Aberdeen in 1956 for the UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) as a diesel-electric fishery research trawler named Sir William Hardy.  The ship was 131 feet long; 27 feet and 11 inches wide; 13 feet and 3 inches in depth; and weighed 418 tonnes.

After an engine refit, the trawler was relaunched by Greenpeace on 2 May 1978 as the Rainbow Warrior after the book "Warriors of the Rainbow" which includes the passage: ”The world is sick and dying, the people will rise up like Warriors of the Rainbow". On the Rainbow Warrior's bow was a dove of peace carrying an olive branch symbolising the vessel's mission and around her hull were the colours of the rainbow.  

From 1978, the Rainbow Warrior was involved in Greenpeace's campaigns in the North Atlantic against whaling, sealing and nuclear waste dumping. In 1981, the ship went to North America where the engine was replaced. Two masts and sails were fitted in early 1985 for its Pacific trip to the Marshall Islands, New Zealand and Mururoa in French Polynesia.  

Pacific Peace Voyage

In May 1985, Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior sailed from North America into the Pacific region and arrived at Rongelap in the Marshall Islands on 15 May.  As part of 'Project Exodus', the Rainbow Warrior helped relocate c.300 residents and building materials over the next ten days to the Mejato Atoll. The US had been conducting tests at the Bikini Atoll between 1946 and 1962. The largest of the hydrogen bombs named 'Castle Bravo' which was detonated on 1 March 1954, was a thousand times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, and led to radioactive fallout on the neighbouring atolls, including Rongelap. Whilst visiting the Marshall Islands, Greenpeace also protested against the US Star Wars missile testing programme which had been held at the Kwajaleing Missile Range since 1984. Afterwards, the Rainbow Warrior continued onto Vanuatu; then arrived at Auckland on 7 July 1985, to begin preparations to lead a protest flotilla against French nuclear weapons testing at Mururoa. 

2. French Secret Service (DGSE): Opération Satanique  

Reconnaissance by Deputy Director of DGSE to NZ:

According to French sources, Général Roger Emin (Deputy Director of DGSE) went on a reconnaissance mission to NZ in early 1985. He had been sent by Admiral Pierre Lacoste, Director of DGSE, to see if the scale and distance of the bombing operation ordered by the Minister of  Defence Charles Hernu was possible.

“The plan changed from placing a small charge on the ship's propeller shaft rather than on the hull, given the risk that shrapnel and flooding posed to anyone inside the ship. Seeking to find the most effective spot that posed least danger, the DGSE acquired the drawings of the Rainbow Warrior and even carried out tests in the Mediterranean to ensure that the crew cabins in the aft of the ship would not be hit by shards. But things changed in mid-April, when the order came that the ship was to be sunk in a spectacular but still non-lethal message to the nuclear protest movement. A second bomb was to be placed on the hull."

Source:  NZ Herald, “'Practice' to sink Rainbow Warrior” (27 June 2015)

DGSE teams of agents:

The following teams of French Secret Service-DGSE agents were identified as being involved with the planning and carrying out of the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior to prevent it leading a flotilla of protest vessels to Mururoa:

-   Reconnaissance and logistics                                                                                                                                                                 -   Crew of the Ouvéa yacht who brought the mines, dinghy and outboard motor into NZ                                                                   -  Diving/frogmen team and dinghy pilot 

Mission commander of  the DGSE operation in NZ was allegedly Colonel Louis-Pierre-Dillais (alias Jean Louis Dormand) who was a senior officer at the underwater combat centre at Aspretto in Corsica. He was also reportedly the pilot of the dinghy that carried the divers/frogman and mines to the Rainbow Warrior.

This documentary film captures the arrival of the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland on 7 July 1985, the bombing that occurred on the evening of 10 July, and the aftermath: Youtube: Greenpeace International (2005): The boat and the bomb (51:32 min) 

Rendezvous between Turenges & Ouvéa Skipper, 8 July 1985:

On 8 July, Prieur and Mafart, using their alias of Turenge, had visited Newmans in Auckland to swap their campervan which had a broken windscreen. Newmans staff also gave them a map. They had intended to rendezvous with the Ouvéa skipper Roland Verge in the Topuni forest, north of Wellsford, to pick up the equipment for the bombing brought to NZ by the Ouvéa. Later that day, two forestry workers felling trees in the Topuni forest saw a campervan (driven by the Turenges) pull up, circle and drive off. Soon after, a station wagon pulled up in the same area and the driver (Verge) asked if they had seen the campervan; then sped off. Suspicious, one of the workers wrote down the registration number of the station wagon. Several days after the bombing, the worker called the police to report what he had seen. A later search of the Ouvéa had found the Newmans map with Mafart's fingerprint; thus connecting the Turenges with the Ouvéa crew.  

Later on, when interviewed by the police, the Turenges had denied meeting the Ouvéa crew, claiming the campervan witnessed by the forestry workers was not theirs, but the map proved otherwise. 

Source:  Eugene Bingham, "Bit players in Rainbow Warrior drama". NZHerald (2 July 2005)

3. Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, Wed 10 July 1985 

4. REFLOATING & SCUTTLING THE RAINBOW WARRIOR

5.  Police investigations

Prieur & Mafart (alias Sophie & Alain Turenge):

On the evening of the bombing, at 9.30pm, a neighbourhood watch group had seen gear being transferred from a dinghy to a campervan at 9.30pm. They had noted the registration number and contacted the police in case it was a robbery. This information led police to trace that the campervan belonged to a rental firm, Newmans, and had been hired by Sophie and Alain Turenge. When the Turenges returned the van the morning of 12 July, they were offered a refund for its early return. Newmans staff were able to detain them on the pretext of sorting out the refund, until the police arrived. The police detained the Turenges and carried out immigration checks which revealed their Swiss passports were false.  

This set off a chain of events which led to their identification as DGSE agents Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart.  On  22 November 1985, both were sentenced  to ten years in prison for manslaughter and seven years in prison for wilful damage - the sentences to be served concurrently.   

Ouvéa crew:

Swiss police arrest French agent Gerald Andrias (Eric Audrenc), Nov 1991: 

On 26 November 1991 Swiss police arrested and held French DGSE Rainbow Warrior bombing team leader Gerald Andries on an outstanding 1985 Interpol warrant as he tried to enter Switzerland from France.

The Financial Review reported (17 Dec 1991), that extradition proceedings had begun in Auckland:

Court precedings began in Auckland yesterday [ 16 December 1991] to extradite a member of the French secret service to New Zealand on charges of being involved in the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior... Last month French national, Gerald Andries, was arrested in Switzerland after he was picked up by Swiss police for travelling on a train without a passport.  The Swiss found Andries was wanted for murder on an international warrant, issued by New Zealand police in connection with the bombing of the Greenpeace flagship, Rainbow Warrior, in Auckland Harbour in July 1985.

Source: Wendy Frew (17 December 1991), "Extradition underway for third Rainbow Warrior agent". Financial Review.    

However, the  National PM Jim Bolger decided not to pursue extradition of Andrias for fear of trade reprisals.

Diving team & dinghy pilot:

The police and news media continued to carry out investigations to identify who was the pilot of the dinghy and who were the frogmen/divers who placed the mines; and if anyone else assisted with the operation. Their investigations led to the identification of other French secret agents who had since left New Zealand. In latter years, some of the secret agents, who had since retired, voluntarily opened up to the media about their involvement. However, the information gathered did not eventuate in the extradition of any of the agents from overseas, largely due to the lapse in time.   

Interview with former French agent Jean-Luc Kister (Alain Tonei), 2015:

In 2015, former French agent Jean-Luc Kister (alias Alain Tonei) confirmed in interviews with TVNZ's Sunday programme and Mediapart that he had placed the bombs on the Rainbow Warrior.  TVNZ's Sunday programme had located Kister, who had retired from the DGSE about five years earlier, in north- eastern France. Kister stated that his team were not aware that people were on the ship. He gave his apologies to the family of Fernando Pereira, to Greenpeace members on board the vessel, and to the people of New Zealand. 

Find out more:

• Sharon Gillies (7 Sept 2015), "I hope it allows him to sleep better", RNZ 
• Kim Willsher (6 Sept 2015), "French spy who sank Greenpeace ship apologises for lethal bombing",  The Guardian

Christine Cabon (alias Frederique Bonlieu):

 On 19 July 1985, Christine Cabon wrote to the Greenpeace organisers after she learned about the bombing. The following details, said to have been first reported in a 1986 news story, were recounted in a Stuff.co.nz article in 2017: 

In a letter from Israel postmarked July 19, a week before she disappeared, she lamented Pereira's death: "What can I say about such a news? I feel so choked." She wrote that if the French Government was behind the bombing, its strategy had backfired and given even more support to the campaign against French nuclear tests.  "Why such a monstrosity?" she asked.  

Cabon stated that she was already aboard an Air France flight home from Israel when she heard police were to arrest her. She had left Auckland on 24 May and flown to Tahiti and onto Israel, six weeks before the bombing.

Source:  Cecile Meier & Kelly Dennett (9 July 2017), "Thirty-two years after the Rainbow Warrior bombing, unrepentant French spy Christine Cabon is found", Stuff.co.nz    

Interview with former French agent Christine Cabon (Frederique Bonlieu), 2017:

Reporters Cecile Meier and Kelly Dennett tracked Christine Cabon to a small French village, where she was living in retirement after joining the French army in 1977 when aged 26 years.

"Thanks for giving me the opportunity to express myself but I do not intend to go off the reservation," she says. "It's an ethical question." Sometimes she gets frustrated hearing only one version of the events, but says she will respect her contractual obligation to the army – which forbids her speaking for 50 years after seeing active service.  "My job was what it was," she says. "I entered the army to prevent international and national conflict because my family, originally from Alsace, suffered from the war.  My career choice is my problem but I ended up [involved in the Rainbow Warrior affair] as a result of my choice."I think all military people who serve their countries can find themselves in situations they hadn't wished for." 

Source:  Ibid  

What happened to the other French agents?

Ongoing police and media investigations uncovered the identities of several of the other members of the team of French Secret Service agents involved with Opération Satanique, and arrest warrants were issued. However, no further arrests were made due to some of those agents whereabouts not being known and/or the time that had lapsed since the bombing for extradition to NZ to be granted for trial.  

6.  Diplomatic row between NZ & France

France denies then accepts responsibilty:

Diplomatic row threatens NZ exports trade:

A diplomatic row had ensued between NZ and France, which also impacted on trade between each country. The situation escalated with France threatening to influence the European Economic Community (EEC) to reduce the quota of butter imports from NZ. On the encouragement of the Netherlands Prime Minister, both NZ and France agreed to consult with the United Nations Secretary-General to resolve the situation. 

Apology from France following UN Secretary- General ruling:

To reach a resolution, both NZ and France approached the United Nations Secretary-General on 19 June 1986 for a binding ruling. A tribunal hearing was set up and the findings led to the UN Secretary-General issuing three rulings, which France and NZ agreed to in writing on 9 July 1986:  

-   France to apologise and give US$7 million to NZ

-   France to not interfere with NZ trade agreements

-   The two French Secret Service agents, Dominique Prieur and Alan Mafart, who had been arrested and imprisoned in NZ for      ten years, to be sent to the French military facility on the Hao Atoll in French Polynesia to serve not less than three      years. (However, France allowed both agents to leave the Hao Atoll for Paris within two years for medical reasons without      NZ's mutual consent, and did not return them to complete their sentences despite protests from NZ.)

Prieur & Mafart transferred from NZ prison to French military facility on Hao Atoll: 

Mafart & Prieu leave Hao Atoll early, 1987 & 1988:

On 23 July 1986, Alain Mafart and Dominique Prieur arrived at the Hao Atoll to serve not less than three years imprisonment at the French Military Base, of which the expiration date would be 22 July 1999.

Major Alain Mafart left Hao on 14 Dec 1987:

Mafart left the Hao Atoll's French Military Base on 14 December 1897 for health reasons. That same day,  the NZ Prime Minister David Lange protested to the French PM that Mafart had left without the mutual consent of NZ. 

On arrival in Paris, Mafart was hospitalised until 6 January under medical supervision. After being discharged from hospital, he lived in a house on the hospital grounds with weekly supervision by Professor Daly. A NZ doctor, Dr Croxson, was sent to verify Mafart's medical condition and he reported on 16 January that Mafart could return to Hao as the medical emergency was over. However, on 27 January, Professor Daly issued his final medical report which stated, in accordance with the rules of fitness for French military personnel, "Major Mafart was declared unfit to serve overseas for an indeterminate period" and should remain in France to enable medical follow-ups. 

Mafart was subsequently declared "repatriated for health reasons" on 11 March 1988.  He was assigned to work on a temporary basis at the Head Office of the Nuclear Experimentation Center. Then, on 1 Sept 1988, he began studying at the War College in Paris. On 1 Oct 1988, Mafart was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He teceived France's National Order of Merit in May 1991, and retired three years later as a Colonel aged 43.   

As Mafart was not fit for military service overseas, the French had invoked, inter alia, the French military law to not return him to Hao.  However, the UN Secretary-General original ruling for Mafart to spend not less than three years on Hao was not dependent on being able to give any military service at the military base. 

Source: Reports of International Arbitral Awards Recueil Des Sentences Arbitrales, "Case concerning the difference between New Zealand and France concerning the interpretation or application of two agreements, concluded on 9 July 1986 between the two States and which related to the problems arising from the Rainbow Warrior Affair", (30 April 1990 XX, p.240)

Captain Dominique Prieur left Hao on 5 May 1988:

Dominque Prieur left the Hao Atoll's Military Base on 5 May 1988 with her husband Joel, when she was six weeks pregnant with her first child. She had also received the news that her father was unwell and was receiving cancer treatment in Paris. After visiting her father in hospital (who then passed away on 16 June), Prieur was placed on maternity leave, as per the French military code. 

After the baby's birth on 15 December 1988, France asserted that Prieur could not be sent back with a baby to Hao Atoll.  NZ argued that just as Prieur's husband was allowed to live with her in Hao, her husband and child would be allowed to accompany her or not, as she chooses.

Source: Ibid, p.245

NZ protested non-return of Prieur & Mafart to Hao Atoll:

When questioned by New Zealand, the French Government had responded that it believed that legitimate reasons had prevented the return of Mafart and Prieur to the Hao Atoll Island. 

When NZ protested to the United Nations during 1989, that Mafart and Prieur should return to the Hao Atoll, the response was that too lengthy a time had passed. The obligation for them to return to the Hao Atoll no longer fell within the period of being imprisoned until 22 July 1989 - the three-year expiration date of the 1986 agreement that had been signed by NZ and France.

Source: Ibid, p.258 

                               >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Find out more:

• Cecile Meier & Kelly Dennett (9 July 2017), "Thirty-two years after the Rainbow Warrior bombing, unrepentant French spy Christine Cabon is found", Stuff.co.nz
• Eugene Bingham, "Bit players in Rainbow Warrior drama". NZHerald (2 July 2005) 
• Greenpeace: The bombing of the Rainbow Warrior
• Kim Willsher (6 Sept 2015), "French spy who sank Greenpeace ship apologises for lethal bombing",  The Guardian
• New Zealand Security Intelligence Service, Rainbow Warrior, October 1996
• Phil Taylor, "The Rainbow Warrior: 30 years on", NZHerald
• Reports of International Arbitral Awards Recueil Des Sentences Arbitrales: "Case concerning the difference between New Zealand and France concerning the interpretation or application of two agreements, concluded on 9 July 1986 between the two States and which related to the problems arising from the Rainbow Warrior Affair", 30 April 1990 XX, pp. 215-284
• Samia Henni, "Nuclear powers: France’s atomic bomb tests in the Algerian Sahara", The Architectural review (22 June 2022)
• Sharon Gillies (7 Sept 2015), "I hope it allows him to sleep better", RNZ 
• Stanley Meisler, "Fabius Challenges New Zealand to Offer Proof of French Guilt in Bombing of Ship", Los Angeles Times, 28 Aug 1985  
• Steve Erwood (2011),The Greenpeace chronicles: 40 years of protecting the planet, (The Netherlands: Greenpeace International)
• Torpedo Bay Navy Museum: Salvage of the Rainbow Warrior
• Wendy Frew (17 December 1991), "Extradition underway for third Rainbow Warrior agent". Financial Review.     
• Wikipedia: Dominque Prieur
• Toutube: Greenpeace International (2005): The boat and the bomb (51:32 min)  

This DigitalNZ story was compiled in July 2023.