of Paragraph 9, War Department Bulletin No. 32 (“The President is hereby
authorized to discharge any officer from the office held by him under
such appointment for any cause which, in the judgment of the President,
would promote the public service”), was the easiest and most satisfactory
manner of dealing with cases of individuals against whom it was
impossible to obtain sufficient evidence for conviction by court martial
but whose presence in the army was regarded as constituting a menace
to the national safety. This will explain in some measure, perhaps, the
curt announcements which appeared from time to time during the course of
the war in Army Orders: “Lieutenant (or Captain, or Colonel) So-and-So
has been discharged for the good of the Service.” The great drawback,
however, to this method of ridding the army of undesirables was that it
could not be applied to officers of the regular establishment, as the
terms of the Act restricted its application to Reserve officers and those
holding commissions for the term of the emergency. The policy pursued
by Military Intelligence in the cases of regular officers suspected of
disloyalty—for all suspected officers were not confined to the National
Army or the Reserve Corps—was to have them assigned to posts where their
opportunities for mischief would be reduced to a minimum. An officer
ordered to duty in the heart of Alaska, say, was considered about as
safe, from the point of view of Military Intelligence, as though he were
in a cell at Leavenworth.
Among the nearly 700,000 men swept by the first draft into the
cantonments to be fused into a national army were thousands upon
thousands of men of alien birth, many of them but recently arrived in
this country and all but ignorant of its tongue. It speedily became
apparent that the fusing process was failing to produce in many of
these men, perhaps in the majority of them, the change necessary to
make them into soldiers. Instead of melting and flowing like the rest
of the metal from which was forged the weapon which halted the Huns at
Château-Thierry and beat them back in the Argonne, these men of alien
birth remained a hard, unyielding mass, not only obdurate in itself,
but threatening to leave in the finished weapon flaws that would be
fatal when it was subjected to the test of battle. By the fall of 1917,
therefore, the military authorities had awakened to a realization of the
fact that they were confronted by a serious and difficult problem—what to
do with the foreign-speaking element of our new armies.
These immigrants, particularly the more recent, tend to congregate in the
industrial centres of the country, in New York’s teeming “East Side,”
in the mining regions of Pennsylvania, in the manufacturing cities of
New England, and in the Pacific Northwest. Here they live in swarming
communities, speaking their own languages, reading (if they can) their
own newspapers, attending their own churches, their wants ministered
to by their own doctors, lawyers, bankers, and tradesmen. From such
colonies the drag-net of the draft drew into the army tens of thousands
of foreign-speaking men. Here, then, was the first and greatest source
of difficulty in transforming these aliens from many lands into American
soldiers—ignorance of the English language. Unable to understand the
orders which were given them, they were set down as stupid and surly,
and through a lack of judgment in the selection of the commissioned and
non-commissioned officers put in charge of them, they were frequently the
victims of misunderstanding and ill-treatment. Four illustrations are
typical of a hundred or more similar incidents in the Depot Brigade at
Camp Gordon:
Private Sobolowski, failing to spell his name, was struck in
the jaw by his sergeant, so successfully that the jaw was
broken and a few teeth were knocked out. The private went to
the hospital and the sergeant to the guard-house, pending
court-martial proceedings.
Private Pagarzelski replied to his corporal in Polish, which
the corporal considered highly abusive. The private was
court-martialled and sixty dollars of his pay was forfeited.
As a consequence the man was not only unable to help his aged
mother but was left without a penny for himself.
Private Sznyder, being on guard duty, misunderstood the orders
repeated to him by the corporal of the guard, and naturally
did not comply with them. As a result he was arrested and put
in the guard-house, fifty-seven dollars being taken from him
by a corporal, of which only thirty-five dollars was returned.
The corporal took advantage of his ignorance of English to
appropriate a part of the money.
A Russian was arrested for evasion of military service. After
he had spent six weeks in the guard-house it was discovered
(through an interpreter) that the man was arrested before he
had received notification of being drafted.
From a counter-espionage point of view such conditions were distinctly
dangerous. The foreign-speaking soldiers, if not actually affiliated
with the enemy, were, because of their ignorance and credulity,
especially susceptible to the advances of enemy agents and propagandists.
When herded together in a depot brigade, made surly by the inconsiderate
treatment they received and chafing under the compulsion of being set at
manual labor in this country when their ambition was to go overseas, they
were potentially, if not actually, ripe for mischief.
Early in 1918 Mr. D. Chauncey Brewer, of Boston, president of the North
American Civic League for Immigrants, was appointed by the Secretary
of War to take the situation in hand. Under his direction a corps of
field agents commenced operations both in the camps and cantonments
and in the large cities and industrial centres, collecting information
about the non-English-speaking men taken by the draft. These agents, who
were carefully picked men of foreign extraction and generally linguists
of ability, observed the general and special influences affecting the
foreign-born groups and investigated propaganda, suspects, complaints
regarding draft evasion, draft boards, soldiers’ allotments, insurance,
and the like. They reported on conditions existing in the camps from
information contained in soldiers’ letters, for many men who were
prevented by their lack of knowledge of English or other reasons from
complaining to their military superiors, would recite their troubles in
their letters to the folks at home. These agents accounted in various
ways for their presence in the camps, most of them announcing that they
were working for the Associated Charities or for the North American
Civic League for Immigrants. They established connections with leaders of
the foreign colonies in the larger cities as well as with the poor. The
foreign-language press, its editors and its influence, good or bad, also
demanded their attention. They reported loyal citizens of integrity and
ability who were later induced by means of correspondence to volunteer
for this kind of service and who could keep Military Intelligence
informed on conditions in their respective cities when the agent had
finished his work or found it advisable to withdraw. Thus was built up a
large volunteer organization composed of loyal citizens of foreign birth
or extraction, who kept the Intelligence Division advised of conditions
among their respective groups or races, and to whom the division could
apply for assistance or information in individual cases or localities.
These volunteer assistants included men in all lines of business
and in all professions. The Boards of Health of cities having large
foreign-speaking populations vouched for loyal foreign-speaking doctors
who, because of the peculiarly confidential relations they enjoyed
with their patients, were able to obtain information of great value
to the section. The same was true of clergymen of many denominations.
The editors of foreign-language newspapers frequently rendered highly
effective co-operation, and correspondence was started with a dozen
or more school superintendents in the larger cities with a view to
enlisting the aid of the high-school boys in promoting the morale of the
foreign-speaking colonies.
Reports received from Camp Gordon in April, 1918, indicated serious
trouble with the unnaturalized Russians and Poles, and, in some
instances, with the Italians, all of whom were perfectly willing to fight
for the lands from which they came but not for this one. Camp Gordon
was a replacement camp, and as such had become a dumping-ground for
divisions having men that they wished to get rid of, a large proportion
of whom were foreigners. Of the 1,500 men of all nationalities who were
transferred to this camp by the 82d Division on the ground of suspected
disloyalty, nearly 1,000 did not speak English. In order to remedy this
dangerous condition, a memorandum was drawn up by M I 3 and was adopted
by the War Department. This memorandum recommended that foreign-speaking
draftees not having sufficient knowledge of English to understand
the commands be segregated by nationalities in companies, both the
commissioned and non-commissioned officers of which should be of the
same nationality as their men, or should at least be familiar with their
language, habits, and psychology. In support of the plan the words of
Napoleon were quoted:
“If I had enough humpbacks in the Army to make a regiment, enough Negroes
to make a battalion, enough dumb men to make a company, I would so
organize them. No stimulus is more potent than the pride of men who have
a common bond either of race, nationality, color, or even affliction.
Men thus put together want to show the rest of the Army their extreme
capability.”
The work at Camp Gordon was put in charge of an officer of Military
Intelligence, who had had considerable experience in social-service
work among the foreign-speaking soldiers at Camps Grant and Custer.
Upon his arrival at Camp Gordon he found that those soldiers (most
of them foreigners) who had been left behind when troops were sent
overseas had been placed in the 5th and 10th Training Battalions of the
Depot Brigade. Forty-one nationalities were represented in this group
of foreigners, classified as Allied Aliens, Neutral Aliens, and Enemy
Aliens, 80 per cent of them being Italians, Slavs, and Russian Jews.
The officer immediately initiated a study of each nationality and of
each individual, the process of personally interviewing each man, 976
in all, occupying two weeks. Thousands of questions and complaints were
answered and explanations made to the men in their native tongue, every
man being recorded and classified according to his nationality, loyalty,
intellect, citizenship, and military fitness. This done, two companies
were formed, one composed of Slavs—the majority of them Poles—and the
other of Italians. Three officers of Polish extraction and one of Russian
were procured for the Slav company and two of Italian extraction for the
Italian company. The first week of training and lectures on discipline
resulted in an amazing impetus of spirit and enthusiasm. Between the
Slavs and the Italians arose the keenest competition for proficiency in
drill. So startling was the change that the battalion commander and the
American officers in charge of the two companies passed rapidly from
discouragement and pessimism to extreme enthusiasm. An elaborate plan
was worked out for giving the men a working knowledge of English and a
series of lectures were given in their own tongues, thus acquainting them
with the requirements necessary for service overseas. Special religious
services were arranged for the Italians and the Slavs, their spiritual
needs being ministered to by priests of their own faiths. The camp diet
was modified in order to give them food which was racially acceptable.
Social entertainments were planned, so that prominent citizens of Atlanta
could meet the foreign-speaking soldiers and make them feel that they
were as dear to the country whose uniform they were wearing as though
they were American-born. The immediate result of this interesting
experiment was the conversion of potentially dangerous malcontents into
loyal, enthusiastic, and efficient soldiers. Furthermore, the reaction
upon the families of the soldiers and upon the colonies from which they
came was highly gratifying, for their letters from the men, filled
with their suddenly awakened enthusiasm for army life and with glowing
accounts of the kindness and consideration which were being shown them,
did much to counteract any latent disloyalty among the foreign-speaking
population. To each new group of foreigners who entered the battalion
the question was put: “How many of you men are willing to go abroad and
fight?” In most cases the affirmative responses were pitifully few. In
fact, the Slavs practically all refused to put on identification tags,
asserting that should they be sent abroad they would be as willing to
help the Germans as the Allies. But when, after a few weeks’ stay in the
battalion, the question, “How many of you men are willing to go abroad
and fight?” was again put to them, the response was as remarkable as it
was thrilling, for practically the whole battalion stepped forward as
one man. Properly treated, the metal had fused at last. They were all
Americans now.
So successful did the experiment prove at Camp Gordon that a few months
later the same officer was ordered to introduce his plan at Camp Devens,
where there were approximately 6,000 men who did not have sufficient
knowledge of English to be effectively trained. In three days he, with
proper assistance, personally examined upward of 2,000 men, and on the
fourth day divided them into four companies, Company No. 1 consisting of
250 Slavs (three-fourths of them Poles), Company No. 2 of 230 Italians,
Company No. 3 of 200 Greeks and Albanians, and Company No. 4 of the same
number of Armenians and Syrians. A number of non-commissioned officers
who could speak the necessary languages were transferred from the depot
brigade and assigned to assist in the training of the new companies. The
results obtained were beyond all expectations. The spirit and enthusiasm
of the men advanced by leaps and bounds. They entered into competitive
drills as enthusiastically as though they were schoolboys playing a game.
The guard-house, which, until the introduction of the plan, had always
been full of foreign-speaking soldiers, suddenly became deserted. From
being the worst organization at the camp, the “Foreign Legion,” as it was
called, became the model battalion.
The plan, followed both at Camp Devens and Camp Gordon, of providing the
foreign-speaking organization with foreign-speaking non-commissioned
officers of unquestioned loyalty served an additional purpose in that
it provided the Intelligence Division with new and valuable sources of
information, for the non-commissioned officers, being familiar with
the language, customs, and modes of thought of their men, could easily
detect any undercurrent of disaffection or disloyalty. Their common
speech would at once establish a bond of sympathy that would be likely
to disarm the suspicions of an enemy agent or sympathizer. Moreover, the
speech and characteristics of peoples living in close proximity to each
other, though divided by an international frontier, are usually so nearly
identical that no one can distinguish between them save a person who
himself comes from that region. Only a man who had himself lived on the
Russo-German frontier, for example, would be able to say with certainty
whether a certain soldier came from Russian, Austrian, or German Poland;
from Galicia or Lithuania; from Transylvania, Besserabia, or the Ukraine.
An incident which occurred at one of the camps illustrates this principle
as applied to the Oriental races. A civilian agent of the Military
Intelligence Division, who was an Armenian, noticed that a soldier who
claimed to be a Syrian refused to eat pork. Being perfectly familiar
with both Turkish and Syrian customs, and knowing that the Turks, who
are Mohammedans, are forbidden to eat pork, while the Syrians, who are
Christians, are not, the operative sharply questioned the pretended
Syrian, who at length confessed that he was a Turk, and, consequently, an
enemy alien. Such a slight indication would have passed unnoticed save
by one familiar with Oriental customs, and a dangerous enemy agent might
thus have escaped detection.
To M I 4 was intrusted the extremely important work of counter-espionage
among the civilian population. It investigated the activities of
the enemy in propaganda, in sabotage, and in the establishment of
communications with the home country; it investigated such of his trade
activities and financial transactions as might impede our successful
prosecution of the war; it discovered enemy influences among political,
racial, and religious groups and in labor organizations, and it watched
persons throughout the nation who, though not associated with the enemy,
were nevertheless engaged in pacifist, revolutionary, and similar
activities which were likely to interfere with our military operations.
The section operated through many agencies. As a branch of the War
Department, it employed intelligence officers serving with troops in
the various camps and cantonments, who furnished the section with much
valuable information relative to civilian activities which reacted
upon the army. Similar information was furnished by the departmental
intelligence officers, stationed at the headquarters of the several
geographical departments of the army, and by the military attachés in
foreign countries. The Department of Justice, the State Department, and
the Office of Naval Intelligence also actively co-operated with the
section. By the establishment of a system of counter-espionage in foreign
countries the section succeeded in frustrating many of the German plans
at their source and in counteracting enemy propaganda which, had it
gone unchecked, might have had the gravest results. The German method
of organized propaganda was well illustrated by the operations of the
Chilean-German League, which was founded in October, 1916, by Chileans
of German descent, its membership including commercial agents, priests,
professors, physicians, merchants, and school-teachers. In a circular
dated Valparaiso, October 24, 1917, and marked “Confidential,” the
management of the local branch of the league at Valparaiso announced
a meeting to be held jointly with the representatives of all German
societies of the city for the purpose of founding a propaganda committee.
The necessity for starting a propaganda on a large scale was pointed
out, and the main object of the league, that of urging the maintenance
of neutrality by the Chilean Government, was described in detail. The
importance to the Allies of the German ships in Chilean waters was
also emphasized, the circular saying, in part: “... if we succeed in
postponing the rupture of relations by this propaganda only for weeks,
we have aided Germany and her allies to the extent of millions, harming
the Allies at the same time by millions.” Though the league succeeded
in preventing Chile from joining the Allies, the vigilance and energy
displayed by the agents of our counter-espionage service in that country
practically nullified the effects of the league’s propaganda in South
America.
From the beginning of the war until its end the American public was
constantly thrilled by the sensational and usually highly circumstantial
accounts which appeared in the press, particularly the Sunday
supplements, of the operations of German secret agents in the United
States. Every one, I suppose, has heard, in some one of its many
versions, the story of the German spy who was shot in the telephone-booth
of a New York hotel by a Secret Service operative while giving a
confederate information relative to the sailing of American transports.
Though I have heard that story related, with minutest detail, in clubs,
over dinner-tables, and in the smoking-compartments of Pullmans, I never
heard any one ask the quite obvious questions as to why it was necessary
for the operative to shoot the spy instead of taking him alive, or how
the confederate proposed to transmit the information to Germany. One
picturesque version of the story laid the scene in a crowded New York
Subway train, the Secret Service man having his automatic in his pocket
and firing through the cloth of his coat. Then there was the equally
sensational story of the Hoboken family in whose employ was a German spy
disguised as a maid of all work. One day she mysteriously disappeared,
and a few hours after her disappearance Secret Service agents called at
the house and searched the belongings she had left behind her. Their
search was rewarded by discovering, under a false bottom in her trunk, a
complete set of the plans of the defenses of New York harbor. Variations
of that tale placed its locale in Stamford, Conn., in Chittenango, N.
Y., in Newton Centre, Mass., in Key West, and in Los Angeles, while
the papers discovered in the mysterious trunk ranged all the way from
drawings of coast-defense guns to a copy of the German Naval Code.
The same hysteria which led the public to accept these ridiculous
concoctions at their face value, and to beg for more, caused them to
suspect all sorts of well-known persons of being engaged in espionage
activities—the general commanding a certain American division, a famous
woman aviator, a still more famous prima donna, a Jewish banker noted
for his philanthropies, the chancellor of a great university, and even
the secretary to the President having been discovered—so the rumors had
it—to be German spies. At one period of the war, indeed, it was popularly
reported that spies were executed every morning at daybreak on Governor’s
Island. Now I dislike to destroy illusions and to spoil perfectly good
stories, but the dictates of truth compel me to assert that not a single
spy was executed on Governor’s Island or anywhere else in the United
States, though it is my personal opinion that a few such executions would
have brought to an abrupt end the series of fires, explosions, strikes,
and other cases of sabotage for which the agents of the Wilhelmstrasse
were responsible. For stating this opinion, quite early in the war, at a
dinner in Boston at which I was a speaker, I received a mild reprimand
from the Adjutant-General of the Army. On the occasion in question I
remarked, if I remember rightly, that I was convinced that the most
effective method of dealing with spies was not to intern them but to
inter them. And I am still of the same opinion.