The German Spy System from Within Part 3

His reputation among the people with whom he is brought in contact may be and usually is a matter of years' standing, for only the absolute a.s.surance of his honesty enables him to carry on his work.

It is the recognised duty of all amba.s.sadors, military and naval attaches, and consuls, to collect information in any possible way, and to pay for it, and it may be guessed that their staff of informers is a large one. Further, under the heading of diplomatic spies must be included the internal espionage of Germany, by means of which all the various members of the Royal Family at Berlin are kept under surveillance and reported on. Potsdam neglects nothing in this way, as the Memoirs of Louise of Saxony prove beyond dispute.

Some time ago the head official of the system of internal espionage in Germany was exposed at the height of his success, and thus an idea of the actual working and extent of the system was rendered obtainable.

The person in question, Colonel Baron von Tausch, established on his own account a _bureau d'espionage_, and carried his investigations to such a point that the Minister of Foreign Affairs, after having made representations to the Kaiser, took action against Von Tausch for libel and conspiracy.

From evidence made public at the trial it appeared that Von Tausch, who wished to obtain information for his master with regard to the nationalist movement in Prussian Poland, had ordered Baron von Luetzow to win the affections of the daughter of a Polish n.o.ble who was in the front of the nationalist movement, and, by this means, to gain the confidence of the girl's father. Luetzow complied, won the heart of the girl and the confidence of her father, and then returned to Berlin, leaving the girl behind. This was one instance of the methods used to obtain information.

Correspondence, produced in court, introduced into the case the name of Count Philip zu Eulenberg, sometime German Amba.s.sador at Vienna.

Eulenberg, one of the boy-friends of the Kaiser, developed into a moral degenerate, and the whole of the Berlin Court--at least, all that part of it which had the best interests of the Kaiser and the Empire at heart--deplored the retention of Eulenberg in the imperial favour. In 1907 Eulenberg's degeneracy was exposed by Maximilian Harden, editor of _Die Zukunft_, who was prosecuted for his audacity in attacking one of the Emperor's friends, and forced the prosecution to withdraw by stating that he had enough correspondence in his possession to ruin the reputations of members of the Imperial family and half the officers of the Imperial Guards.

The correspondence produced at Von Tausch's trial was chiefly noteworthy for a letter addressed by the chief of the secret police to Eulenberg, in which the former claimed that he had successfully accomplished espionage work which, he hoped, would have the effect of mining the Foreign Minister for good. Shortly after, as evidence showed, Eulenberg sent to Von Tausch the ribbon of a high Austrian Order which had been presented by the Austrian Government, evidently as recognition of services performed in connection with the German Foreign Minister.

Numerous scandals were brought to light, all proving that no trick or subterfuge had been too low for Von Tausch's stooping. It was shown, for instance, that Prince Egon Hohenlohe, as bad a character as Eulenberg, had conceived a dislike for one of the chamberlains employed in the establishment of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. He therefore set Von Tausch to work at ferreting out this man's humble antecedents, which were then published anonymously in various German papers. The result was a public scandal, and the unfortunate man had to resign his post in consequence.

Various other people had discovered that Von Tausch was equal to practically any task of spying with which they cared to entrust him, and, as each one rewarded his efforts with some kind of decoration in addition to more substantial payment, he appeared in court loaded with insignia of various Orders. Naturally, his appearance as defendant in a libel case caused consternation in Berlin, for there was no telling where the revelations concerning his doings would end. Eventually the matter was brought to the notice of the Kaiser himself, and, when the intolerable pride of Wilhelm is taken into account, it is easy to understand that he took all possible steps to prevent further revelations concerning the internal espionage maintained on his Court and relatives from coming to light. Von Tausch was, in the first place, under the orders of the Kaiser himself, and, were more revelations to be made, there was no telling how much of the servant's doings would be attributed to orders from the master. Conviction was impossible, for Von Tausch knew too much to permit of his being made the enemy of the Imperial Court by imprisonment, or in fact by any punishment. Still, after dismissal from the bar of the ordinary tribunal, he was tried as a Bavarian before a court of honour, and was adjudged to have been guilty of conduct so unbecoming to one in his position as to render him unfit for further service. As a man unfit to a.s.sociate with gentlemen, he was expelled from the service in disgrace.

But Wilhelm remembered his faithful servant after the court of honour had finished with him. Von Tausch was retired into private life with the honours of a diplomatic servant on the retired list; that is to say, he was at liberty to enjoy his very adequate pension, together with such fortune as he had contrived to ama.s.s during his term of service as chief of the secret police.

Von Tausch is typical of the German service of internal espionage; there is nothing romantic about his work, nothing that is worthy of memory or that shows him in other than a detestable light--and yet the German Courts are constantly under such supervision as he maintained, and with the full concurrence and encouragement of Wilhelm, who believes in vigilance at the cost of honour and of everything that normal men hold as compatible with honour. The private diary of Louise of Saxony has details of the pettiness and meanness of these agents of discord and destroyers of confidence among the highest personages of German Courts.

"The King's spy," says the diary, "const.i.tuted herself post office of Villa Foschwitz--a duty appertaining to her rank, and I wager that she works the black cabinet to perfection. [_Cabinet noir_. The secret-service headquarters of the German post office.] Of course, I am now careful in all that I write, and advise my friends to be. The spy planted in my household has been permitted to see much of the innocent correspondence pa.s.sing between me and Leopold. She has reported that I have turned over a new leaf. Result: my debts have been paid. Further result: a gracious letter from the King's House Marshal praising me for the good influence I am exercising over Leopold. Truly, the world wants to be deceived."

Another extract states: "Caught the Tisch stealing one of my letters.

Happily there was nothing incriminating in it, though addressed to Ferdinand--just the letter the Crown Princess would write to a Privy Councillor. But the petty theft indicates that she suspects. Prince George, I am told, receives a report from her every day."

The note of the diary emphasises the littleness of life that permits of the existence of such a system as this, a perpetual sowing of discord by means of the repet.i.tion of t.i.ttle-tattle which can have no real bearing on affairs of moment. The lady designated "Tisch," by the way, was but a clumsy exponent of her art, for, discovering that her royal mistress kept a diary, she reported the fact to Frederick, Louise's husband, who taxed his wife with the existence of the diary and its indiscretions.

Thereupon Louise turned upon the Tisch, and informed her that, since she was planted in the royal household for the purpose of playing the serpent, she must confine her work to reporting on comings and goings, on external conduct, so far as Louise herself was concerned.

In every royal household of the Empire similar spies are placed, and in every government office as well. Every government office is kept open in Berlin at all hours of the day and night, and, when the Emperor wishes to a.s.sure himself that all is working as he would have it, he rings up the particular office from which he requires a.s.surances of efficiency. Or, by means of one of the many telephones that are at the disposal of the War Lord at all hours, he turns out a garrison at the dead of night, in order to be certain that there is full watchfulness and efficiency there. The idea of being always on the alert, always prepared, is at the root of these tricks, and the secret service for internal espionage is maintained for the same purpose--that the people of the Empire and their rulers may be always ready against "the day."

An instance of indirect diplomatic espionage is afforded by the publication of one of the plans for the invasion of England, drawn up by Baron von Edelsheim, a few years ago. Edelsheim proposed to turn into England a force of about two hundred to three hundred thousand men, commanded by officers who have _a perfect knowledge of the country_. He says: "The preparation for landing operations must be furthered in time of peace to such an extent that in time of war we may feel sure of having the advantage of surprising the enemy by our celerity in mobilising and transporting our troops. The troops which are to be mobilised must be determined in time of peace, their transport by railway, their harbours of embarkation, and the preparations for embarkation, must be prepared in order to ensure the greatest possible celerity. The aim of our operations must be kept entirely secret, and attempts should be made to deceive the enemy, at least with regard to the purpose for which the first operations are undertaken."

Now, the publication of such a paragraph as this, with the certainty of its being translated and republished in English, could serve no useful German purpose on the face of it. Edelsheim was no theoriser speaking without Imperial sanction, or devising a plan apart from the plans of the Junker party. He stated the obvious, and moreover stated an obvious thing which on the face of it was not a wise one for the Junker party to confess, for, if absolute secrecy were an essential, then the very declaration that such a thing as invasion of England was remotely contemplated was against the spirit of the plan. The publication of the paragraph, we may rest a.s.sured, was not decided on without good reason, and Edelsheim must rank as a diplomat rather than as a diplomatic spy, for the act comes scarcely under the heading of espionage, widely as that term must be interpreted in the case of the German secret service.

As for the diplomatic spy abroad, he is to be found--but not to be recognised--in official circles. It is extremely doubtful whether his pay comes out of the 780,000 pounds set apart annually by Germany for secret-service purposes, for the pay of such men as are employed in hunting out the secrets of foreign diplomatic circles is necessarily extremely high. With regard to the work itself, very little is known.

In the other branches of the German secret-service failures are usually conspicuous by their appearances in police-courts and criminal trials; but this disability seldom enters into the life of the diplomatic spy.

In the first place, being a man specially selected from among the ranks of naval and military spies, the diplomatic spy seldom makes mistakes-- seldom, that is, in comparison with members of the other two branches, who also are remarkably careful to avoid errors of judgment; consequently, there are very few chances of detecting diplomatic spies through their failures. In the second place, diplomatic spies, by reason of the nature of their work, do not come into the criminal courts when they make mistakes and get caught--the nature of their work precludes this possibility, for usually their tasks do not involve any infringement of the penal code as this refers to the spy and his work.

Again, diplomatic spies are so highly placed, and so thoroughly trusted, that to bring on them the punishment of normal criminals would cause too much outcry and scandal; their work is neutralised as far as possible by systems of counter-espionage, and in case of one being detected he simply ceases to be employed by his own Government, which disowns all responsibility for his acts.

These things render details of the work of diplomatic spies almost impossible to obtain. Several books have been published, purporting to detail the work of diplomatic agents, but their contents may be discounted as far as accuracy goes; they make good reading as fiction, and that is all they are, for the most part. If in any stories detailed in them the writers have told the truth, it may be considered a matter of accident. One case, which may be regarded as authentic, is narrated by Von Blowitz, but it is dated so far back that all the partic.i.p.ators in the incident are dead, and it may be said as a whole that the world grows wiser as it grows older, so that the case of which Von Blowitz speaks is no guide to the doings of to-day. Further, that particular case concerns a woman spy, of which cla.s.s more anon.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

COMMUNICATIONS.

Such reports as the German agents at fixed posts have to make to their employers are communicated, whenever possible, by means of the travelling inspectors, for the postal service is not to be trusted where espionage is concerned. During the French Revolution there was originated what was known as the "Cabinet Noir," or secret service of the post office in France, of which the duties were to intercept, open, and where desirable destroy or replace, such letters as were deemed unfit to reach their senders, in the best interests of the State.

Berlin, with its genius for developing other people's inventions, adopted this idea, and made of it one of the regular weapons of the secret service. It operates not only internally, but also internationally, and any suspected letters are freely opened and read; sometimes they are suppressed altogether from their recipients; sometimes false letters, giving contrary instructions, are subst.i.tuted, and suspected spies of other Powers are caught by this means.

The idea has been generally adopted by most countries; but, in practically any country but Germany, the idea of personal and national honour is sufficiently strong to keep absolutely secret the doings behind official doors. For instance, at the trial of the spy Ernst at Bow Street, it came as a surprise to many people to learn that the British postal authorities possessed powers under which they might open any suspected missives, with a view to ascertaining their contents when deemed essential for the safety and well-being of the State. It is common knowledge in Germany that no letter is safe from being opened, and the powers which the British post offices exercise only in case of genuine suspicion are utilised in Germany to a far greater extent.

Further, the officials at the Berlin post office "Cabinet Noir" do not always maintain the absolute secrecy that their work demands, and sometimes there creep out details of other things as well as espionage.

Apparently, every German official has his price in his own country, and the habit of spying is so ingrained in the race that commercial secrets are bought and sold not only in the interests of German firms as a whole, but in the interests of one rival German firm which desires to steal a market from another firm of Teutonic name and standing. It appears that Stieber, by organising his colossal system of espionage, laid the foundations of national pettiness and deceit--the German character as a whole has been undermined by the knowledge that n.o.body is safe from espionage, and all acts are liable to be reported, while blackmail is a flouris.h.i.+ng industry.

In the event of active service, the German system of communication between spies and the army in the field is very largely on the lines laid down by Klembovski, whose "Military Espionage in Peace and War" is one of the recognised textbooks on espionage. So clearly and well does Klembovski indicate the methods to be followed, that certain pa.s.sages of his work with regard to this matter of communications are worthy of reproduction as they stand in his original work, in order to a.s.sist in a conception of the means employed.

It is not always possible, he says, for the spies to report personally to their chief about the results of their investigations; therefore it is of interest to consider the methods of communication by means of which they can forward the required information to the stipulated place.

These methods of communication are to be grouped in three divisions, according to their nature: 1. Optical signals; 2. Agreed communications by writing; 3. Despatches in cipher.

1. _Optical signals_.--In operations in heavily wooded districts which obstruct reconnoitring by cavalry, or in the operations of detachments which consist only of infantry, the a.s.surance of guarding against danger which is obtained by means of the despatch of patrols in the direction of the enemy embraces no especially broad stretch in the front of the troops. In such cases the duty of reconnaissance can be allotted to spies, who should collect the simplest and fullest possible information about the enemy. For example: presence or absence of the enemy in certain directions and at certain distances; the approximate strength of his troops; whether the enemy is on the march, at rest, or occupying a position. Such information is especially of importance to such detachments as possess cavalry, for the commander of the detachment can, if he has fresh knowledge of the presence and dispositions of the enemy, execute cavalry reconnaissances far better than he could without the knowledge to be obtained by spies. He can estimate the number and strength of the patrols which he intends to send out, and can give them the correct direction of marching to achieve their purpose, etc.

For communicating such information the simplest signals are desirable.

Signals should be employed which on the one hand will not arouse the suspicions of the enemy, and on the other hand will not require special instructions and explanations, and will not occupy too much time either in preparation or sending.

If the country to the front of the troops offers a wide view, a spy sent on in advance can make fires, whose number and arrangement has a previously agreed meaning. Among the enemy's outposts the making of fires will seldom be practicable, since it would at once arouse suspicion. In these cases the spy can make use of houses which can be seen from a distance on all sides, since the appearance and disappearance of a light in the windows, or the opening and shutting of the shutters, can have a recognised sense and meaning for the troops from whom the spy is sent.

Optical communication of news is seldom possible in wooded country, or at any rate only if the troops advance, and not if they retreat or remain stationary. In these cases the spy sent in advance can inform the troops by various agreed signs, such as breaking or tying together small trees and branches, moving turf, writing agreed-on signs with chalk on bark of trees, fences, houses, and big stones or rocks.

Smugglers in some Russian districts use little stones, which they put down by the way on single big stones, heaps of earth, and leaves; as the number and position of the stones with regard to one another varies, so the smugglers mutually impart valuable information to each other. This method should be borne in mind for adoption by an army in the field.

2. _Agreed communications by writing_.--In many cases secret communication by writing can be carried on in the guise of quite ordinary correspondence, in which the speech is of trade and family matters, etc, so that a stranger, who was not initiated into the secret meanings of the special words, would attribute no special meaning to them. Such letters would be addressed to persons who are prominent through their business in official positions--lesser state officials and merchants, for instance.

In July 1887, at the Imperial Court of Justice at Leipzig, the trial took place of the Alsatians--Klein and Greber for espionage. In the indictment of the public prosecutor it was said, among other things, that the defendant Klein had never been directly in correspondence with the Bureau at whose head was Colonel Vincent, but he knew that his despatches had been communicated to the War Office from which Colonel Vincent took his orders. In order to arouse no suspicion, the correspondence was given the appearance of letters which pa.s.sed between relatives; herein lay the reason for the constant repet.i.tion of Christian names, and the good wishes for Uncle, Aunt, and other persons who certainly did not exist, or under whose names personalities would be understood that were very well-known to the French secret service.

Usually the sender of such correspondence agrees with the recipient as to the way in which the communications shall be read. For example, in 1650 Prince Conde, who lay in prison on account of partic.i.p.ation in the plot against the Guises and Catherine de Medici, received a letter which, perused in the ordinary way, could arouse no suspicion. But, in reading it, Conde missed out every other line, obtaining by this means a perfect meaning to fit the situation in which he was placed.

There is also a mechanical method of conducting a secret correspondence, for the deciphering of which both sender and recipient must have "castings," or small metal plates exactly similar, which are divided by lines into squares. Some of the squares are cut out, the two plates being kept exactly similar and then the sender lays the square plate on the paper and writes his message in his usual writing on the cut-out squares; then he takes the plate from the paper and fills in the empty squares with casually chosen words, taking care, however, that some meaning is made from the double writing, so as to replace the real meaning when the plate is applied. On receipt of the letter the addressee lays his square on it, and comfortably reads everything that interests him, since the superfluous words which the sender wrote later are covered by the squares in the plate which have been left by the cutting-out.

All complex codes and similar means of communication occupy much time, so they are not for spies to use in time of war, though one can employ them in peace time. Certain solutions can be employed as inks, so that, when dry, they leave no trace on the paper; then one has only to warm the paper over a lamp, and the writing stands out clearly. This method, however, has been very largely used, and a blank sheet of paper is always an object of suspicion. And, in view of the meaning which an apparently simple letter may bear to eyes that can decipher the hidden meaning, it should be a rule in war to destroy all captured correspondence of the enemy. This rule should also be observed on the arrest of any suspected person.

3. _Cipher correspondence_.--There are a great number of systems of cipher-writing; one of the simplest is described in the following letter of Marshal Soult to General Neil, dated September 26, 1806, in which Soult writes: "His Majesty advises me to agree upon a cipher with you, which you will have to use in future in your correspondence with the Chief of Staff of the Army. In the execution of this you can, in my opinion, best make use of a pamphlet (of which the t.i.tle is given in the letter). The first figure will give the number of the page; the second figure the line, reckoned from above, not counting the heading. The third number will serve as indication of the required word or letter, and give its position in the line indicated by the second figure: if the figure means a whole word, you will underline it; if it only means a letter, you will not do so. Commas must be put between the indicating figures."

The disadvantages of this system consisted in the slowness of construction and deciphering of the message, since it would almost always be necessary to indicate not whole words, but each letter separately, for which three figures are necessary each time. To avoid the latter disadvantage a dictionary can be employed for the execution of the cipher, whereby in most cases one could succeed in giving the whole word with two figures.

A certain officer proposed to set up for this purpose a special military dictionary, similar to the marine signal-books existing in all countries. In this dictionary one could enter in alphabetical order all figures, letters, constantly occurring syllables, and complete military expressions. The officer in question was of the opinion that 3,000 ciphers would be quite enough to form a complete code. Thus all figures, letters, words, etc, would be numbered in the book in succession from beginning to end. In the preparation of reports one could then indicate by one cipher a figure, a letter, a syllable, and sometimes a whole word or even a whole phrase.

The disadvantage of such a system consists in that its foundation is always the same, and that the printed dictionary could easily be secretly obtained from all neighbouring States. In order to obviate this, a few alterations were subsequently proposed. One alteration was to the effect that one could take a given number to serve as a key; in preparing reports the key-number would always be added to the number under which is designated the required word in the dictionary. It may be a.s.sumed that the word "regiment" is required to be coded, and this word is number 500 in the dictionary; the key-number is 25; so in the report the word is indicated by 525. It is of course obvious that one could subtract, instead of adding, the key-number.

Another alternative consists in having two different key-numbers. In the report the words are indicated by figures always changing, first in the case of the one, and then of the other key-number. In this way one and the same word, indicated twice in the report, may each time be indicated differently. For instance, the word "division" is number 765 in the word-book; the key-numbers are 5,000 and 6,125. The first time the word "division" is indicated by the number 4,235 (that is, 5,000-- 765) and the second time by 5,360 (that is, 6,125--765).

The main disadvantage of all these various means of communication lies in that a book is essential, from which the deciphering will have to be done. The book in question is easily lost, or is not at hand at the required moment, and then the cipher is not only useless, but the work caused in obtaining the message is wasted.

An instance of this occurred in 1870, when one of the German generals received a message which he could not decipher at once, since the dictionary which the headquarter staff had arranged with him as a code-book was in a wagon which had been left behind. The same misfortune befell the commander of a French territorial division at Chalons-sur-Marne, who could not decipher a telegram, since by an oversight he had sent his cipher with the archives to Chateau Thierry.

For the ciphering of messages by spies the above systems are also disadvantageous because most spies can carry no books with them on their missions.

Thus writes Klembovski, who made a study of espionage on active service, but was unable to arrive at any method of transmitting messages which should be free of marked disadvantages. As to his contentions regarding the use of ciphers, it has been stated--though on what authority is hard to ascertain--that the German secret service will decipher any message in any language in a given s.p.a.ce of time, no matter what code may be used. In one of Edgar Allan Poe's stories there is a means shown of deciphering practically any code in which the characters are constant-- that is, in which the same sign represents the same letter each time it is used--and it is quite probable that one used to the deciphering of code-messages could work out any code. For a code must be built up on some system, and therefore some reversal of the system must exist by means of which the message can be deciphered without the aid of a key.

Berlin recognises the uses of pseudo-clergy in time of war, for quite a number of German village clergy are impecunious and of a distinctly low cla.s.s, and thus the army is not averse to their imposture. Men of this kind are selected for service in the field, where it is antic.i.p.ated they can make themselves useful, under the pretext of ministering to the wounded, by extracting information about the movements of troops, etc.

It is arranged that, in the event of a retreat, the clerical spy shall convey to the pursuing force detailed information regarding the losses in men and guns of those retreating, the numbers of men still unwounded, and the _moral_ of the troops, by means of signals as detailed above-- broken branches of trees, specially placed stones, and other things.