a Polish/British spy in the nazi high command
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article7025406.ece
Hmmm, interesting, it true. I think it's also possible that the British would have "created" this spy from their signals intelligence, (ULTRA, etc.), to see if word got back to Germany, thus exposing an agent in their own ranks. It would also be useful in causing paranoia and perhaps purges in Hitler's inner circle, (rumors are that the CIA was able to do something similar to this in Bulgaria during the Cold War). "The spy who wasn't there"...
Or it could have been one of Canaris' men, they were all over the place, politically. It'd be interesting to learn more.
I should also point out that I've always been a bit cynical about the last 30-40 years' worth of bragging about how much Britain "knew" of German war efforts through ULTRA, etc. In my opinion, much of the war in the West went on about as one would expect with out super code-breaking or super agents - both the successes and the failures. When one looks at situations like Arnhem, the Battle of the Bulge, Anzio,the destruction of the entire Dutch intelligence network, and the belief in the Tyrolian "Final Redoubt", it's difficult to mesh that with the near-perfect strategic intelligence that's often trumpeted.
I've often wondered if the claims on all of this weren't in some way meant to influence the Russians during the cold war. By claiming that we'd broken Ultra, etc, we were attempting to influence them away from a form of cryptography that we were having problems with, to one that we could break. One wonders. It's circles in circles...
Hmmm, interesting, it true. I think it's also possible that the British would have "created" this spy from their signals intelligence, (ULTRA, etc.), to see if word got back to Germany, thus exposing an agent in their own ranks. It would also be useful in causing paranoia and perhaps purges in Hitler's inner circle, (rumors are that the CIA was able to do something similar to this in Bulgaria during the Cold War). "The spy who wasn't there"...
Or it could have been one of Canaris' men, they were all over the place, politically. It'd be interesting to learn more.
I should also point out that I've always been a bit cynical about the last 30-40 years' worth of bragging about how much Britain "knew" of German war efforts through ULTRA, etc. In my opinion, much of the war in the West went on about as one would expect with out super code-breaking or super agents - both the successes and the failures. When one looks at situations like Arnhem, the Battle of the Bulge, Anzio,the destruction of the entire Dutch intelligence network, and the belief in the Tyrolian "Final Redoubt", it's difficult to mesh that with the near-perfect strategic intelligence that's often trumpeted.
I've often wondered if the claims on all of this weren't in some way meant to influence the Russians during the cold war. By claiming that we'd broken Ultra, etc, we were attempting to influence them away from a form of cryptography that we were having problems with, to one that we could break. One wonders. It's circles in circles...
posted by mendip at
11:31 AM
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