physics

Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior

Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior rather than just read about it. In short: The sinking of Rainbow Warrior, codenamed Opération Satanique, was an act of French state-terrorism carried out on 10 July 1985. The event was described by France as a "covert operation" by the "action" branch of the French foreign intelligence agency, the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE).

Key takeaways

Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The sinking of Rainbow Warrior, codenamed Opération Satanique, was an act of French state-terrorism carried out on 10 July 1985. The event was described by France as a "covert operation" by the "action" branch of the French foreign intelligence agency, the Directorate-General for External Security (DGSE). During the operation, two operatives (both French citizens) sank the flagship of the Greenpeace fleet, Rainbow Warrior, at the Port of Auckland on her way to a protest against a planned French nuclear test in Moruroa. Fernando Pereira, a photographer, drowned on the sinking ship. The sinking was a cause of embarrassment to France and President François Mitterrand. They initially denied responsibility, but two French agents were captured by New Zealand Police and charged with arson, conspiracy to commit arson, willful damage and murder. It resulted in a scandal that led to the resignation of the French defence minister Charles Hernu, while the two agents pleaded guilty to manslaughter and were sentenced to ten years in New Zealand prison. Despite being sentenced to ten years' imprisonment, due to pressures from the French state they spent merely two years confined to the French Polynesian island of Hao before being freed by the French government. France was also forced to apologise and had to pay reparations to New Zealand, Pereira's family and Greenpeace.

Background France began testing nuclear weapons in 1966 on Mururoa Atoll in the Tuamotu Archipelago of French Polynesia. In 1985, the South Pacific nations of Australia, the Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu signed the Treaty of Rarotonga declaring the region a nuclear-free zone. Since being acquired by Greenpeace in 1977, Rainbow Warrior was active in supporting several anti-whaling, anti-seal hunting, anti-nuclear testing and anti-nuclear waste dumping campaigns during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Since early 1985, the ship was based in the southern Pacific Ocean, where its crew campaigned against nuclear testing. After relocating 300 Marshall Islanders from Rongelap Atoll, which had been polluted by radioactive fallout by past American nuclear tests, it travelled to New Zealand to lead a flotilla of yachts protesting French nuclear testing at the Mururoa Atoll. During previous nuclear tests at Mururoa, protest ships had been boarded by French commandos after sailing into the shipping exclusion zone around the atoll. For the 1985 tests, Greenpeace intended to monitor the impact of nuclear tests and place protesters on the island to monitor the blasts. French agents, posing as interested supporters or tourists, toured the ship while it was open to public viewing. DGSE agent Christine Cabon, who had previously worked on intelligence missions in the Middle East, posed as environmentalist "Frederique Bonlieu" to infiltrate the Greenpeace office in Auckland. While working for the Auckland office, Cabon secretly monitored communications from Rainbow Warrior, collected maps and investigated underwater equipment.

Opération Satanique

Three agents on board the yacht Ouvéa imported the limpet mines used for the bombing. Two more agents, Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart, posing as the newlywed couple "Sophie and Alain Turenge", picked up the mines and delivered them to the bombing team, consisting of the divers Jean Camas ("Jacques Camurier") and Jean-Luc Kister ("Alain Tonel"). After sufficient information had been gathered, Camas and Kister attached two limpet mines to Rainbow Warrior berthed at Marsden Wharf. They were detonated seven minutes apart. The first bomb went off at 23:38, blasting a hole about the size of an average car. While the ship was initially evacuated, some of the crew returned to the ship to investigate and film the damage. Portuguese-Dutch photographer, Fernando Pereira, returned below deck to fetch his camera equipment. At 23:45, the second bomb went off. Pereira drowned in the rapid flooding that followed, and the other ten crew members either safely abandoned ship on the order of Captain Peter Willcox or were thrown into the water by the second explosion. Rainbow Warrior partially sank four minutes later.

New Zealand reaction and investigation

After the bombing, the New Zealand Police started one of the country's largest police investigations. They identified two of the French agents, Captain Dominique Prieur and Commander Alain Mafart, as possible suspects. Prieur and Mafart were identified with the help of a Neighbourhood Watch group and arrested. Both were questioned and investigated. Because they were carrying Swiss passports, their true identities were discovered, along with the French government's responsibility. The other agents of the French team all escaped from New Zealand. Christine Cabon, whose role had ended before the bombing, had left for Israel immediately before the sinking. After she was identified as a participant in the operation, Auckland police requested that the Israeli authorities detain her. Cabon was tipped off and fled before she could be arrested. Three other agents, Chief Petty Officer Roland Verge ("Raymond Velche"), Petty Officer Jean-Michel Bartelo ("Jean-Michel Berthelo") and Petty Officer Gérard Andries ("Eric Audrenc"), who had carried the bombs to New Zealand on the yacht Ouvéa, escaped by that yacht and were arrested by Australian police on Norfolk Island. New Zealand sent a team of detectives and a forensic scientist to Norfolk Island to interview the suspects and collect evidence. They required time to analyse the evidence before making arrests. The Australian authorities gave the New Zealand team a day to make a decision, after which the suspects were released. They were then picked up by the French nuclear submarine Rubis, after they scuttled Ouvéa. New Zealand issued arrest warrants for the Ouvéa crew on 26 July on charges of arson and murder, by which time the crew had left Australian jurisdiction.

Several agents, including Jean-Luc Kister, one of the bombers, had posed as tourists. They took a ferry to the South Island, went skiing at Mount Hutt, and then left the country using false documents about ten days later. Another agent, Louis-Pierre Dillais, possibly the commander of the operation, was also never captured.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior: Fernando Pereira, a photographer who was trapped and drowned in the sinking ship — Fernando Pereira, a photographer who was trapped and drowned in the sinking ship

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior

In research: Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1980s in Auckland, 1980s murders in New Zealand, 1985 crimes in New Zealand, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in simple terms?

Why does Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior.