I've mentioned that that I've read several times that Louis XV had a secret service that was at odds with official French policy. Well, in my reading, I've finally come across a concrete example.

The "Secret du Roi" was headed by the Comte de Broglie (whom we've met, not the wave-particle guy ;)), who supported King August III in Poland in the 1750s/1760s, when he was having conflicts against the nobility in France. Whereas Choiseul, the official Foreign minister, supported the Saxons and Poles in their efforts to get *rid* of August III.

And the footnote says that it was, predictably, actually way more complicated than that! "This is only a brief and greatly simplified description of a far more complex internal and international situation." It then goes on to cite 8 different sources in English, French, and German, all of which look fascinating.

I might look into this at some point, you know how I am about complex foreign policy situations. ;)

But in the meantime, that does sound incredibly confusing for anyone who was getting orders from two French chains of command!

ETA: Oh, the book I got this from is Liaisons Dangereuses: Sex, Law, and Diplomacy in the Age of Frederick the Great. It hasn't been quite as exciting as I'd hoped from the title (what a title!), because it's focused on four obscure people in Hamburg and only tangentially mentions any events or individuals that we've heard of (Heinrich comes up a couple times as the former regimental commander of one of the individuals), but a lot of that is my concentration being absolutely shot and unwilling to do anything these days but write Medici fix-it practice German and to a lesser extent French. selenak might get more out of it. It does at least seem to be well researched.