The German system of military espionage can best be studied by an
analysis of the working of the system in France from the year 1870
onwards. So far as the outside world is concerned, the military
invasion of France by Germany began at the end of July 1870, but in
reality the invasion began in the latter half of 1867, when Stieber,
chief of the German secret police, began the placing of his fixed posts
throughout the country. No less than 30,000 spies were placed in the
departments of Northern and Eastern France, and the feats of this army
made possible the work accomplished by Von Moltke.
In his Memoirs Stieber relates how Bismarck, when informed that Jules
Favre wished to negotiate for the surrender of Paris in 1871, sent for
Stieber and instructed him that Favre was to be kept under observation
while negotiations were in progress. Bismarck and Favre met at
Versailles, where, on Favre's arrival, he was escorted to a carriage
driven by one of Stieber's men, and was driven to an establishment on
the Boulevard du Roi. This, though Favre was ignorant of the fact, was
the headquarters of the German active service police. Favre was
courteously received, and presented with a body-servant to whom the
highest accomplishments were accredited. The body-servant was none
other than Stieber himself.
Favre lodged in this house throughout all the negotiations for the
surrender of Paris. So far as Favre knew, the owner of the house was a
good Parisian and a resident of Versailles; in reality the place was the
headquarters of the German secret-service system, and its owner was one
of the fixed spies placed by Stieber before the war began, and thus
ready to afford all information with regard to his own district to the
German forces on their arrival. For the period of Favre's stay, Stieber
waited on him hand and foot, attending to his meals, to his bedroom and
clothing, and performing all the duties of a valet. Under this pretext
it was perfectly easy for Stieber to ransack all Favre's clothing
luggage, and personal equipment, and the arch-spy claims in his Memoirs
that much of the information he obtained in this way was extremely
useful to Bismarck during the negotiations on which the conclusion of
peace was based.
Certain proposals made by the Minister of the Interior during this
period in which Stieber was at the head of the secret police are worth
quoting with regard to the establishment of spies throughout France,
subsequent to the war of 1870, in order that strict watch might be kept
on the conquered country. The proposals were as follows:
"All the fixed agents must hold not merely salaried positions (that is,
in offices, workshops, etc), for they might at any time be dismissed
from their posts, and in that case would no longer have any plausible
reason for remaining at their points of observation. Such positions,
too, possess considerable disadvantage for our agents, in that they
restrict their actions and hamper their freedom of going and coming, and
bring them too much under notice.
"For these reasons, it must be laid down as a condition of the
employment of a spy that he shall be obliged to keep some kind of an
establishment, which he may select so long as it is, at least
externally, thoroughly in keeping with the commercial or other
requirements of the country in which he is engaged. Whatever
establishment it be, whether an office for the settlement of disputed
claims, or a property register, or a business of a purely commercial
land, such as groceries, cafes, restaurants, hotels, etc, it must be
soundly established and possess a substantial good-will.
"It must be borne in mind that it is necessary for our agents to inspire
confidence in circles where they have their centre of action, and to
inspire that confidence by outward indications of a commonplace
bourgeois existence; by tactful charity and by making themselves useful
in societies, associations, communities, and so forth; and by acquiring
strong social positions, so that they may be well received and regarded
in all quarters.
"While we must limit the expenditure which our agents are permitted to
incur, it is necessary that we should give them absolute assurance that
any deficit of the undertaking which they carry on would be made good by
the service under the head of general expenses."
Since the annual expenditure of Germany for work of this kind is
admitted to amount to 780,000 pounds a year, it may be gathered that the
espionage service is a complete one. The sum stated is admittedly
spent; how much more is spent it is impossible to conjecture. The spies
placed at fixed posts are given salaries varying between two and four
pounds a week according to the importance of the post and the duties
which the spy is expected to perform. To this is added any
out-of-pocket expenses to which the spy may be put in the maintenance of
his business or position. These spies at fixed posts are under the
control of headquarters at Brussels, Lausanne, and Geneva, whence their
salaries are paid monthly under the form of business remittances. There
is also a system of inspectorship by means of which each fixed post is
visited at regular intervals, either by women or by professed commercial
travellers, who collect the written reports in order to avoid possible
inspection of these reports by the French postal authorities. Further,
this system admits of instructions being given verbally by the
travelling inspector to the spy at each fixed post. At the outbreak of
the present war the number of fixed spies known to exist in France was
over 15,000.
The recruiting of this army of spies was begun by Stieber in 1870, when
he requested that there should be sent, to the fourteen departments of
France in which occupation was essential to the success of a German
attack, about 4,000 farmers, agricultural labourers, and others who
should be permanently employed in the several districts, together with
an even larger number of women servants to be placed among the various
classes of the French population. These, however, were to receive pay
from ordinary French commercial sources, and were to be under the
control of the higher grade of spies established in businesses or
otherwise independently employed at the fixed posts. The latter were
specially chosen from among people of Teutonic origin, not only in
Germany, but also in Switzerland and Belgium, whence they were sent to
take up their posts after receiving the necessary preliminary training
to fit them for their work. The occupant of a fixed post at the present
time, whether in France or any other country, is nearly always a German,
and has at his beck and call a host of other emigrants from Germany, who
are legitimately employed in various capacities, have had no government
training, and expect no fixed salary for their work. They are the small
fry of the business, and do not come into contact with any higher
officials than the fixed agent, who enables them to supplement their
legitimate salaries by retailing bits of slander and gossip. The
absence of one or more of them would make no difference to the system;
as a matter of patriotism, they simply retail what they hear to a
fellow-countryman, and, in this sense, every German in a foreign country
may be reckoned as a spy, though for official purposes only a certain
number of secret-service agents exist.
The recognised agent is placed at some point at which he is able to
maintain espionage over a garrison, a military post, or something
connected with the defensive or offensive organisation of the country
concerned. His business at the outset is to be thoroughly agreeable and
make himself well liked in the circle in which he moves. Assuming that
he is located in a small garrison town, he sets up a business of some
kind which will give him admittance to military circles, and, no matter
how bad times may be, his business goes on. In the meantime he
contributes unostentatiously to charities, attends all entertainments,
and does his best to make himself and his business known in the
community of which he is a member. Sooner or later, he makes friends
out of one or two of his acquaintances; so far as can be seen he leads a
benevolent, open, harmless sort of existence, and is a thoroughly good
fellow, and eventually he gains close contact with some member of the
garrison, either officer or non-commissioned officer. In the latter
case, the spy will take care that the non-commissioned officer is in
some position of trust where he is able to obtain useful information.
So far as his friends are concerned, the spy proves to be not entirely
ignorant of matters military. He manifests a mild interest in drill,
formation of troops, fortifications, guns, etc, but he is not in any way
keen over these matters. Like any other inhabitant of the country in
which he resides, he is willing to discuss the "shop" matters of his
associates, and will even indulge in mild arguments, making mistakes and
submitting to correction from those more experienced. Gradually he gets
more and more into the confidence of his friends, who, while they reveal
nothing of importance, let fall a word here and a word there in his
hearing, knowing him to be thoroughly trustworthy; out of these various
words a fairly detailed report can be compiled. In the meantime, the
small fry of the business are constantly bringing gossip. If a new gun
is to be mounted, the spy hears about it; if the strength of the
garrison is to be altered, the spy is cognisant of the fact; sooner or
later, he gets to know domestic details with regard to the officers of
the garrison. A certain lieutenant drinks too much, or a captain is
very fond of a hand at cards; in the former case the spy is quite
willing to drink level with the lieutenant, and in the latter he is
willing to lose money to the captain, such money being put down to
special expenses, and accounted for in his monthly statement.
It will be seen that in such simple ways these the fixed agent is able
to obtain an immense amount of personal and other information by
perfectly simple methods. It may be urged that the greater part of this
information could be obtained in legitimate ways and with no expense to
the German Government; but the system which Stieber inaugurated is above
all things thorough, and there is a system at Berlin of tabulating and
card-indexing all information received from fixed posts; of analysing,
checking, and comparing, until absolute certainty is reached with regard
to the accuracy of detail. For instance, a certain newspaper may
announce that the armament of certain fortifications has been increased
by a new four-inch gun. A fixed agent will add to this information the
position of gun, weight of shell, rate of fire per minute, name of
officer in control, and the fact that it is mounted on a disappearing
platform--details which are noted and checked with a view to their
possible usefulness in the future. The extent of this usefulness may be
estimated when the fall of Namur or Maubeuge is recalled. The officers
in control of the attacking German batteries knew exactly how many guns
they had to silence, the position, bore, and rate of fire of these guns,
and the points at which their own batteries could best be placed, with a
view to fire effect and invisibility. In the case of Maubeuge they knew
more: they knew where to find the necessary concrete platforms on which
to place their own heavy artillery, in order to silence the French
guns--and this must be attributed to the development of the system of
fixed posts.
Not only does the Great German General Staff know details of
fortifications and technical matters, but it is also kept posted up in
the character and abilities of officers who come under the observation
of the fixed agent. Reports sent in to headquarters are concerned with
personal peculiarities and scandals to an extent undreamed of by the
persons concerned. If any officer is open to bribery, the fact is
ascertained; if any officer's wife is open to blackmail, the blackmail
is instituted, and the price of silence in every case is information
with regard to matters of which the husband is cognisant. Further, the
topographical information supplied includes details of the nature and
state of roads, telegraphs, bridges, depths of rivers and streams,
positions of fords, nature and condition of every building and farm,
supplies of forage and food, horses available, and every detail which is
likely to be of service. The ordnance-maps supplied to German officers
are marvels of map-making; every insignificant cottage, stile, clump of
trees, and peculiarity of the landscape is indicated, and, by the use of
maps of this kind, the march on Paris in 1870 was carried through
without a hitch.
In like manner, all preparations for the Prussian advance through
Belgium, and the projected victorious march on Paris, were made and
completed years ago, with the assistance of the fixed agents. The
German entry into Brussels, when 700,000 men marched through a strange
city without the slightest confusion, has been described as a triumph of
organisation. This it undoubtedly was; but the credit did not lie with
the military commander, for the agents who had been busy through many
months preparing the way of the army were responsible for that army's
successful advance. Officers had only to follow detailed instructions
presented to them by headquarters.
With equal care the entry to Paris was planned: quarters were assigned
to each regiment of the invading army; each officer knew exactly the
part that would be his in the spectacle, and every step of the entry to
the French capital had been arranged in detail by German fixed agents,
who had resided for many years in Northern France, and in Paris itself,
as peaceful citizens. Reports of German occupation of French towns and
even photographs from the theatre of war draw attention to various
houses on which has been chalked--"Spare this house." In many cases,
doubtless, this is intended as a return for unexpectedly hospitable
reception, but in many other cases it indicates that the house in
question was the residence of a fixed agent, to whom German officers
came on their entry to the place in order to learn all that was possible
with regard to resources of the town or village, and all that could be
told of the movements of the enemy.
It has been urged, and with apparent reason, that the value of espionage
ceases as soon as armies take the field, since the work of the spy can
only concern preparations for hostilities, and, when war has begun,
actual strength decides the issue. This, however, is not the case when
German military espionage is in question; in many cases the fixed agents
have been so long established at their posts that they rank in the eyes
of normal inhabitants as a part of the life of the place, and, by
maintaining their positions, they are able to ascertain for the benefit
of their own commanders particulars of the dispositions of hostile
forces. Elaborate systems of signalling are in use; carrier pigeons are
used, but only to a limited extent; the ways of the Red Indians, who
made the most perfect spies ever known, are copied in indicating events
by the movement of stones, chipping of bark on trees, breaking branches,
and other ways little likely to be detected, while the more civilised
method of lamp-signalling is also practised. Altogether, the German
military spy forms a very efficient and formidable part of the German
military force, both before and after the opening of hostilities. His
value decreases to a certain extent when action has been entered on,
and, in a definite battle like those along the line of the Meuse and the
line of the Aisne, he is practically useless, but in case of an advance
on the part of the German forces he is invaluable, by reason of the
information he can give with regard to the nature of the country and the
dispositions of the retreating army.