This paper uses a 400-page-thick archival file on Elias Medawwar, who started rising through the ranks of the Lebanese Gendarmerie in 1916 and became Lt. Col. in 1938 , to raise a series of questions about French Mandatory colonial rule. Throughout his years of service, Medawwar impressed his French superiors with his courage, displayed most brazenly in many raids against bandits in the Bikaa, his intimate knowledge of many terrains and cities, and the air of authority he exuded. These traits earned him several medals - and helped him to advance in the Gendarmerie. At the same time, he was a serious headache for his superiors. He was ac cussed of smuggling and often fined for disciplinary infractions. Most problematically, several archbishops repeatedly urged Gendarmerie head Colonel Boivin to reprimand Mudawwar for abusing his uniform to propagate Free Masonic ideas; also, he had an incorrigible reputation as a womanizer and frequenter of brothels. Concerned about Medawar's moral, political, and criminal activities, Boivin kept close tabs on him, tried to placate public opinion and powerful private complaints, and slowed down promotion; but in his internal evaluation reports, he also underlined that the Gendarmerie could not lose him (and that he had very influential friends of his own). Medawwar's case helps us re-think certain features of Mandatory colonial rule. One concerns tools of rule: while the French-run Gendarmerie implemented French policies, it was easily (ab)used by officers and their friends for personal ends. Far from serving French interests only, colonial state instruments were llicitly and systemically co-opted by social interests. A second question concerns French responsiveness to societal demands. Boivin and his aides assiduously tracked Mudawwar's love life. They feared that an officer's 'immorality' would sully the Gendarmerie and taint French rule; if anything, they were even more worried about arch-bishopal demands. Clearly, in the colonial officials' mind, their rule needed to look moral - perhaps precisely because they did not have the means and will to turn violence into the key tool of rule. Still - problem #3 - ties of dependence on local society needed to be balanced against security needs; and all too often, here, the French depended on one local's knowledge to combat another local. In sum, Mudawwar's file offers a way of examining the extent, limits, and nature of French colonial power and the manifold ties that folded it into - rather than simply propped it on top of - local society.