DST

SHort for Daylight Saving Time, a system where everybody sets their clocks ahead one hour or so, so there's less day in the morning and more in the evening. Everyone forgets which direction to set the clock, so people invent weird mnemonics like spring forward, fall back which is indelibly burned into my memory.

DST is the Direction de la Surveillence du Territoire, or the Directorate of Territorial Security.

The Directorate was created in 1944 as an internal counter-espionage organization, headed by Roger Wybot. Its mission is three-fold: counter-espionage, counter-terrorism, and protection of France's scientific and economic achievements.

With the breakup of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the Soviet Union, the DST has redeployed many of its members, heretofore working on the Soviet threat, to other threats, most specifically the Israelis and the Americans.

Its headquarters since 1985 has been 7 rue Nélaton - 75 015 Paris. The central administration is sub-divided into five directorates, to wit:

Counterespionage

Safety & Protection of the Patrimony

International Terrorism

Technical Administration

General Administration

It also retains a special office of national and international relationships, seven regional directorates in the provinces, and four posts in Frances' overseas territories - Antille-Guiana, Réunion, Polynesia and News-Calédone.

The DST has been instrumental in capturing various terrorists, such as Carlos the Jackal, and numerous others in the wake of the World Trade Center attacks on September 11. Interrogationally, it is generally unhampered by civil liberties, and torture and drugs are not uncommon.

Information garnered from http://www.interieur.gouv.fr/police/dst/dst.htm