Bull - The secret agents pocket manual 1939-1945

For Kerstin

First published in 2009 by
Conway
An imprint of Anova Books Ltd
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Compilation and introduction Dr Stephen Bull 2009
Print Volume Conway 2009
First eBook 2012

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Publishers Note
This facsimile compilation contains material of historic interest. The techniques described herein must be considered in the context of their original publication and the publishers exclude liability arising from reliance on the information provided to the fullest extent of the law.

References to material not included in the selected extract have been removed to avoid confusion, unless they are an integral part of a sentence. In these instances the note [not included here] has been added.

First eBook publication 2012
eBook ISBN: 9781844862139

Also available in hardback
Hardback ISBN: 9781844861033

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DUTCH RESISTANCE CARTOON

The discomfort of the conqueror atop the volcano of occupied Europe. A key task of the secret agent was to make occupation as difficult as possible. In France, divided initially into German occupied, Vichy, and Italian occupied, and with Alsace and Lorraine quickly annexed by Germany, the situation was already complex.

There have been operations conducted by secret agents as long as there has been war from the first attempts to creep up on an unsuspecting enemy to basic camouflage and simple ruses and sabotage. Rebellions against occupying forces occurred in biblical times, and sophisticated military espionage was well established by the seventeenth century. Bomb-throwing anarchists and spies such as Marta Hari helped usher in the violent twentieth century. Yet it is probably the secret armies of World War II that grasp the popular imagination more than any other, and while, for the English-speaking world, British- and US-sponsored ventures into occupied Europe loom largest, these operations were conducted by citizens of all occupied territories in both the European and Far Eastern theatres. Some English-language espionage instruction manuals were quickly translated into other languages, such as French, Dutch, Polish, Norwegian, Serbo-Coat, Chinese and Malay.

Our fascination with the activities of these secret agents is fully justified and three reasons for the significance of these particular missions are immediately apparent. The first is geographic, for, unlike World War I, when the German army was held in the West at Verdun and Ypres, Hitlers victorious Wehrmacht swept over much of Europe from the autumn of 1939 to late 1941. In addition to the conquest of France and Belgium, Denmark, Norway, and the Netherlands were all swallowed. The Czech lands and Austria had been seized and annexed respectively even before the fall of Poland, and later yet more territory would be taken in the Balkans. Italy was an early partner in crime, and several Eastern European states subsequently fell into line. These mind-boggling successes not only swelled Nazi ambitions to global proportions, but left populations of many millions occupied. A few resisted from the start: but for many more shock, humiliation, and disappointment turned more gradually to resentment, passive resistance, and finally active measures, as it became clear that the enemy war machine was being sustained by factories, food, and labour from all over Europe. Often hardship crept up incrementally with shortages, labour conscription, ominous disappearances and increasingly iniquitous regulations piling upon each other.

The second reason for the great significance of secret operations in World War II is technological. For, as long as aircraft were feeble and short range, and radios large and inefficient, the possibilities for running successful undercover warfare at a distance were limited. However, once bombers could strike virtually anywhere, and radios could be hidden in suitcases, it became a different story. By the end of World War II it proved possible for resistance aircraft homing devices to be concealed in biscuit tins. Few places were now completely civilian or fell genuinely behind the lines.

Finally it has to be acknowledged that the war was ideological in a new way. Some saw it as national, but for the Nazis increasingly as time progressed the conflict became one of politics and race. Ultimately, in the mind of the Fhrer, the war became a battle of annihilation that the German people would either win or else disappear into total obscurity. In order to prevent their own annihilation, therefore, it thus became necessary for many civilians of all nationalities in occupied territories to become secret agents to some degree, no matter how apparently insignificant. Churchill urged that Europe should be set ablaze following the fall of France, but it has to be said that British subversive and clandestine activities got off to a slow, unfocused, and amateurish start.

The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) headed by an official, conventionally code-named C had been in existence since 1909, and already there were two branches involved in clandestine work. These were MI5, for counter intelligence and security, and MI6 for gathering intelligence. A new Section D, tasked with Destruction, was formed in 1938 under Major Lawrence Grand, and this succeeded in investigating German railways, and putting a few agents into the field. The War Office department GS (R), renamed MIR (Military Intelligence R) just before the war, also had a tiny staff working on aspects of clandestine warfare under Colonel J.C.F. Holland. The Royal Navy likewise had its own intelligence gatherers.

Another body formed in 1938 was EH, or Electra House on the Embankment in London, a branch of the Political Intelligence Department with a remit for propaganda. EH supervised the printing of leaflets and, in theory, gave policy directives to the BBC which was in practice already a larger and more experienced organisation attempting to maintain its authority by avoiding active misinformation. Although progress was modest in 1939, lines of responsibility were drawn between MIR and Section D, in which the former was assigned tasks that might be tackled by troops in uniform, and the latter was assigned undercover work that might be publicly deniable. Contacts were established in Bohemia, Scandinavia and Poland, whence Major Colin Gubbins of MIR had to make his escape at the time of the German invasion. Thought was also given to the need to help Allied personnel escape from enemy territory, overseen by MI9. There was also a foray to Romania later recounted by Geoffrey Household, one of the participants preparing an ultimately abortive attack on oil installations.

Perhaps the most important secret legacy of MIR would be the idea of the Auxiliary Units the nucleus of a British guerilla force. These would ultimately be regarded, for purposes of cover and administrative convenience, as a part of the Home Guard. The Auxunits operated from well-concealed underground shelters (technically Operational Bases or OBs), in groups of half a dozen to a dozen people, with stocks of munitions and food. Their job would have been to harass invaders, cut communications and, if necessary, be the beginning of full-blown guerilla war. Later a secret training establishment for the Auxunits was set up at Coleshill House near Swindon, and a sabotage instruction book was issued under a false cover bearing the title Countrymans Diary , 1939. Guerilla techniques were also taught to the wider Home Guard, often in battle schools through the auspices of experts who had fought in the Spanish Civil War notable practitioners included Bert Levy, author of the 1941 Guerilla Warfare , Tom Winteringham, and John Langdon-Davies .