BGuthrie Photos: DC -- International Spy Museum -- 5. Spies Among Us

DC -- International Spy Museum -- 5. Spies Among Us:

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. SPYAMO_141026_001.JPG: Spies Among Us Operating in Enemy Territory: Americans welcomes a "return to normalcy" after World War I. Even when Depression hit and turmoil roiled much of Europe in the 1930s, Main Street America seemed remote from foreign threat. Yet, beneath the surface, spies spun their webs... and waited. Deep conviction inspired some agents, greed motivated others. Many feared reprisals against loved one. In peacetime, all lay low, building trust while awaiting the signal to act.
2. SPYAMO_141026_004.JPG: The Newsstand: The shady underworld of spies, detectives, murder and intrigue captured the fancy of countless Americans. Spies at the Nearest Newsstand: Newsstands dotted the streets of America in the 1930s, and Americans looked to them for the daily news. Spies were big news back then, and stories of espionage and intrigue made front page news. Where these real-life spy stories left off, fiction took over. Comics and 10-cent novels filled with cloak-and-dagger adventures crowded the shelves alongside the papers. From Dick Tracy to Batman, detectives and superheroes captured America's imagination as they fought against criminals and foreign agents.
3. SPYAMO_141026_007.JPG: "Aunt Minnie" on Vacation: Intelligence agencies could glean meaningful information from photographs of buildings and other places of interest. Spies often posed as tourists to take those pictures. To add to their cover, they positioned women accomplices -- "Aunt Minnies" -- in front of their target.
4. SPYAMO_141026_009.JPG: Radio Shop: Families gathered around the radio to hear news and entertainment, including stories about espionage. Spies on the Airwaves: Both here and abroad, radio was the first mass media to bring the latest news and entertainment directly into people's homes. Radio infused the news with a larger-than-life immediacy. Families gathered around their sets listening to unfolding reports of spying and espionage from around the world. When the news ended, they say enthralled by radio dramas like "The Shadow" -- filled with shrewd detectives and sinister secret agents.
5. SPYAMO_141026_014.JPG: Toy Store: While G-Men fought spies and mobsters, admiring boys played Junior G-Men with model cars, games, badges and secret decoder rings. Heroic G-Men to the Rescue: In the years between the world wars, adventurous tales of FBI government agents -- G-Men -- and their fight against evil-doers played out daily in newspapers. G-Men became the popular heroes of the era. Kids all across the country dreamed of becoming agents, and the toys and games of the time played to the craze. Toy stores did a brisk business selling G-Men pistols, fingerprint kits, secret decoder rings and guides that told how to spot spies.
6. SPYAMO_141026_019.JPG: Movie Spies: In a scene from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's film, Rendezvous, William Powell advises the cipher disc operator. Spies on the Silver Screen: Spy films were extremely popular in the period between the two world wars. People flocked to see films such as Hitchcock's classic "39 Steps" and "The Lady Vanishes," which portrayed ordinary people forced into extraordinary acts of heroism as they fought to outwit foreign operatives. in other films, such as the original version of the "Scarlet Pimpernel," suave professionals risked life and limb to thwart diabolical schemes that threatened the world.
7. SPYAMO_141026_021.JPG: William Sebold: The FBI used double agent William Sebold to feed misinformation to Frederick Duquesne and to crack Duquesne's spy ring. After two years, Sebold had provided enough information for the FBI to round up all the members of the ring. Illegal Immigrant and Double Agent: German-born William Sebold had a secret. He had entered the US illegally but had somehow managed to become a US citizen. In 1939, while visiting family in Germany, German intelligence threatened to expose his secret unless he agreed to become their spy. Facing loss of his US citizenship, Sebold agreed. But instead, he reported the plan to the US and became a double agent. By infiltrating the Duquesne spy ring, he led to their demise, delivering the deathblow to German spy operations here.
8. SPYAMO_141026_023.JPG: Opening a New Front: While the war was fought overseas, German intelligence opened a secret front in the US by building a network of spies in New York. The 33 men and women of the Duquesne spy ring provided a wealth of strategic information to German intelligence.
9. SPYAMO_141026_025.JPG: A Model Spy: A high-living artists' model, Lilly Stein also spied for Germany while working for the US State Department. She pried secrets from high-ranking official and passed them along to William Sebold. Beautiful and intriguing, she captured the imagination of the American public.
10. SPYAMO_141026_028.JPG: Spy and Counterspy: This clandestine photo taken by the FBI documents the German spy, Frederick Duquesne (right) together with William Sebold (left), the US double agent who helped the FBI feed misinformation to the Duquesne Spy RIng and set them up for capture.
11. SPYAMO_141026_033.JPG: Spies on the Inside: Franz Stigler, a member of the Duquesne Spy Ring, worked as a crewmember aboard this ship, originally the SS America, and in wartime, the USS West Point. Like Stigler, many members of the Duquesne ring drew on their knowledge of ships and shipping to gather information about America's war readiness.
12. SPYAMO_141026_038.JPG: Home Front: In 1937, Abwehr sent agent Nikolaus Ritter (left) to New York to steal US military blueprints and plans. Spies on the Home Front: During the 1930s and early 1940s, Germany's military intelligence organization, Abwehr, planted scores of German agents in New York City. Called the Duquesne Spy Ring, after one of its leaders, agents infiltrated shipyards and lurked along the waterfront gathering information about shipping schedules sailing routes and cargoes. Some slipped into factories to gain access to new technologies. Others manned short-wave radios to sent secret messages back to Germany. It was the largest spy ring ever to operate in the United States.
13. SPYAMO_141026_040.JPG: Spies on 42nd Street: Double agent William Sebold met with German spies in the Knickerbocker Hotel on 42nd Street in New York. The FBI set up a secret camera in his office so he could document his meetings with the Germans.
14. SPYAMO_141026_043.JPG: The Spy Next Door: Josef Klein operated out of his tiny New York flat, using a short-wave radio to transmit secret information to Germany. Like other members of the Duquesne ring, he kept a low profile as just another next-door neighbor, hiding in plain sight.
15. SPYAMO_141026_046.JPG: Portrait of a Spy: Frederick Duquesne led the largest spy operation in the US before being caught and sentenced to prison in 1942. This photograph shows him highly decorated in uniform. But the medals may not be real; he often lied about his rank and the awards he received.
16. SPYAMO_141026_049.JPG: Military Intelligence: Abwehr, Germany's military intelligence organization, specialized in strategic espionage, counter-espionage, and sabotage. "Abwehren" means "to ward off." During World War II, Abwehr was largely ineffective due mostly to Hitler's refusal to believe their pessimistic reports about the progress of the war.
17. SPYAMO_141026_052.JPG: Pastorius: After landing, the saboteurs buried their supplies -- including TNT, blasting caps, and $200,000 in cash -- planning to retrieve them later. Spies Among Us: In 1942, German U-boats brought two groups of saboteurs to the US. The eight men sought to disrupt the US war effort by destroying aluminum plants and railways. One group, led by George Dasch, landed in New York at Amagansett, Long Island, the other near Jacksonville, Florida. But Dasch, determined to save his own skin, betrayed his fellow saboteurs to the FBI soon after landing. The men were quickly captured and tried by military tribunal. Six were executed. Dasch and another saboteur who cooperated with the FBI received reduced sentences and were deported to Germany in 1948.
18. SPYAMO_141026_055.JPG: Captured German saboteurs
19. SPYAMO_141026_058.JPG: Red Orchestra: A German counterspy set up shop here on Rue Royale in Brussels, unaware the Russian spies he sought had an office there, too. Codes Based on Books: During World War II, Russia operated a far-reaching spy ring throughout Western Europe, which German intelligence dubbed the "Red Orchestra." To break the ring, the Germans needed to crack the Russian codes, which were based on obscure works of fiction. Their opportunity came when a maid found a half-burnt code worksheet in the fireplace of a Russian agent. After weeks of trying to decipher the worksheet, they discovered the word "Proctor," which turned out to be a character in a science fiction novel. This clue enabled German agents to dicipher more than a hundred coded messages.
20. SPYAMO_141026_061.JPG: Turning in on the Orchestra: The Red Orchestra had agents all over Europe. They "played" daily, using shortwave radios to broadcast information about Nazi war plans back to Russia. To end the "music," German agents used special receivers to track down the hidden transmitters.
21. SPYAMO_141026_066.JPG: A Russian "Pianist" In spy talk, a short-wave radio was a "piano," and those who used them were "pianists." Russia's Red Orchestra spy network had pianists performing from secret locations all around Western Europe. Here, Olga Hamel sends a message to Moscow.
22. SPYAMO_141026_069.JPG: Closet Transmissions: Alexander Foote -- codename: "Jim" -- handled much of the Lucy Spy Ring's radio transmissions. Broadcasting from a small transmitter hidden in his apartment in Switzerland, he relayed information gathered by the ring on to Moscow.
23. SPYAMO_141026_072.JPG: Spy Ring: Members of the Lucy Spy Ring often met here at the Hotel Gasthof Laufen in Lucerne, Switzerland. Lucy Played On: German intelligence eventually broke up much of the Red Orchestra spy network. But one section, the Lucy Spy Ring operating out of Switzerland, was never silenced. No one knows quite how they did it, but the ring regularly provided top-secret information from the German High Command within hours after decisions had been made. The ring alerted Russia to the exact date and battle plans for German attacks, including the German invasion of Russia on June 22, 1941.
24. SPYAMO_141026_073.JPG: Madonna of Espionage: Soviet secret agent Ursula Kuczynski, codename: "Sonia," was one of the most accomplished female spies in history. Her missions took her from Shanghai to Beijing to Britain. She even provided Russia with information about US efforts to build the atomic bomb.
25. SPYAMO_141026_076.JPG: Codename: Lucy Rudolf Rossler -- "Lucy" -- led the Lucy Spy Ring. The ring provided incredible intelligence, gathering information from high-ranking German officers and sending it to Russian intelligence. Once German general, given information intercepted from the ring, was startled to find the details of a battle he was about to start.
26. SPYAMO_141026_079.JPG: Cambridge Spies: Key members of the ring sprang from The Apostles, a secret society of Cambridge idealists. The Cambridge Give: On the eve of World War II, Soviet intelligence recruited five Communist sympathizers from Cambridge University to penetrate the British government. Eventually, they obtained top positions in British intelligence and the Foreign Office. Known and revered by their Soviet spymasters simply as "The Five," they operated from the 1930s well into the Cold War. The Five were Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess, Harold "Kim" Philby, Anthony Blunt, and John Cairncross. Together, they passed tens of thousands of secret documents to Moscow, including information about the US and British nuclear bomb programs, Allied postwar policies, US military strategy in Korea, and numerous Western intelligence agents -- many of whom consequently lost their lives.
27. SPYAMO_141026_082.JPG: The First Man: A Most Valuable Agent Donald Maclean -- the son of a knighted member of Parliament -- embraced Communism while at Cambridge. But after the Soviets recruited him, he intentionally distanced himself from Communism in order to get a job with the British Foreign Office. Posted at the British Embassy in Washington, Maclean (codename: Homer) passed on reams of information to Moscow, including top secret documents on the US military in Korea. When US decrypts of Soviet diplomatic messages -- the VENONA project -- threatened to expose him in 1951, he and fellow spy Guy Burgess defected to Moscow where Maclean died in 1983.
28. SPYAMO_141026_085.JPG: The Second Man: Socialite Spy An upper class background and charming personality gave Guy Burgess (codename: Madchen) access to Britain's elite. He began spying after graduation and eventually landed a job at the Foreign Office, using his position to betray Britain's foreign policy and nuclear bomb program. Meanwhile, his blatant homosexuality (his codename meant "girl") and drinking binges earned him notoriety on the diplomatic cocktail circuit. In 1951, he and fellow spy Donald Maclean defected to Moscow, where Burgess died twelve years later at the age of 52, a victim of his alcoholism.
29. SPYAMO_141026_087.JPG: The Third Man: No Regrets Cambridge graduate Harold "Kim" Philby was still in his twenties when the Soviets recruited him in 1934 "to penetrate [...] bourgeois institutions." Eventually, Philby managed to join the British foreign intelligence service MI6, rising nearly to the directorship. When his fellow spies and personal friends Burgess and Maclean fled to the USSR, Philby came under suspicion by British security. He defected to Moscow in 1963, where he died 25 years later. Philby (codename: Stanley) betrayed numerous Western agents to Moscow, many of whom were subsequently executed. But, as he uttered shortly before his death, "I have no regrets."
30. SPYAMO_141026_091.JPG: The Fourth Man: Art Advisor to the Queen Anthony Blunt led two lives -- renowned art historian and Soviet spy. His book Art and Architecture in France remains a classic. Yet as an MI5 (British counterintelligence) officer during World War II, he betrayed the identities of all of his colleagues to Moscow. When MI5 learned of his espionage in 1964, Blunt (codename: Tony) confessed and in turn obtained immunity from prosecution. In 1979, he was publicly identified as a Soviet spy and stripped of his knighthood. Four years later, Blunt died in London. In his posthumously published memoirs, he called his decision to spy for Moscow "the biggest mistake of my life."
31. SPYAMO_141026_094.JPG: The Fifth Man: Atomic Spy After graduating from Cambridge, John Cairncross -- a brilliant man from a working class background -- went to work for the British Foreign Office. During the war, he drove carloads of documents from his office in Bletchley Park to the Soviet Embassy in London -- including information on the US and British atomic weapons programs. Cairncross (codename: Moliere) came under suspicion after his fellow spies Burgess and Maclean defected in 1951, but it wasn't until 1967 that he made a full confession in exchange for immunity. In his later life, he travelled around the world for the UN, using this passport. Cairncorss died in Southern France in 1995.
32. SPYAMO_141026_098.JPG: John Cairncross's passport
33. SPYAMO_141026_104.JPG: Paraphernalia of a Master Spy: A tobacco aficionado and heavy drinker, Philby frequently sported his trademark pipe and kept a supply of alcohol in his engraved flask. Whether he used his personal camera for espionage is unknown.
34. SPYAMO_141026_108.JPG: Breaking the Code: Britain Combats Firepower with Brainpower: Learning enemy secrets was vital as Britain battled for survival in 1939. British intelligence gathered an eclectic array of mathematicians, linguist[s], artists, and thinkers at Bletchley Park. Their assignment was simple: break Germany's codes. But with the Nazi's Enigma machine capable of 150,000,000,000,000,000,000 combinations, this task was dauntingly complex. The first team of 100 code-breakers mushroomed to 10,000, mostly women. Working day and night, they repeatedly defied the odds. Equally remarkable, they successfully kept Bletchley's secret throughout the war... and for 30 years after.
35. SPYAMO_141026_111.JPG: The Unbreakable Enigma: Compact and easily portable, the Enigma machine was used by German army, navy and air force field units to receive and send "unbreakable" coded messages throughout World War II. Code Making Machine: Originally manufactured to encipher business communications, the Germans adapted the Enigma cipher machine for use in World War II. The machine linked a keyboard to a series of rotors using electric currents. The rotors transposed each keystroke multiple times. The message was then sent in Morse code. Enigma generated billions of combinations. The rotor order, starting positions and plug board connections were reset daily. The decipher a message, Enigma's daily settings key -- sometimes encoded in the message itself -- was needed. The Germans believed Enigma provided an unbreakable cipher. The Allied codebreakers' solving of Enigma messages was a stunning achievement. In another time it would have been awarded a Nobel Prize, but was done with such secrecy that the feat was not recognized until some 30 years later.
36. SPYAMO_141026_114.JPG: M-94 Cipher Device Issued by US Army, circa 1922-1943 M-209 Cipher Machine US Army, 1943 The M-94 cipher device was used from 1922 to 1943 by the US Army. Using the same principle as Thomas Jefferson's cipher device, discs are rotated to encipher a message. During World War II, the M-94 was replaced by the more complex M-209.
37. SPYAMO_141026_122.JPG: Confederate Civil War Cipher Disk: Confederate Signal Service Bureau, circa 1862 This replica of a substitution cipher wheel simply replaces one letter with another. Only the Confederate Army used cipher disks during the Civil War.
38. SPYAMO_141026_128.JPG: Secret Cipher Ashtray Unknown issuer, circa 1930-1940 Disguised in full view as an ashtray, this device could be used to encipher and decipher messages.
39. SPYAMO_141026_133.JPG: One-Time Pad (Silk) Issued by SOE, circa 1940-1945 One-time pads were intended for one use only. Sender and recipient held identical pads. Each sheet was used for one message and then destroyed -- an unbreakable system.
40. SPYAMO_141026_137.JPG: Enigma Germany, circa 1944 Enigma cipher machines were used by the German military during World War II to send secret communications. This three-rotor model was used by the Luftwaffe.
41. SPYAMO_141026_147.JPG: "There was a great degree of tolerance at Bletchley for eccentricities. There had to be because so many of the people were very, very, eccentric indeed. At least half of the people were absolutely mad." -- Owen Davies, Bletchley Park veteran
42. SPYAMO_141026_149.JPG: Behind the Walls: Fifty miles north of London, on the grounds of a peaceful Victorian estate, the Allies quietly won the "brain battle" of World War II -- the cracking of the Nazi Enigma cipher systems. For decades after the war, no outsiders knew what had gone on at Bletchley Park. At Bletchley, also known as Station X, members of Britain's Government Code and Cipher School worked furiously to produce ULTRA -- their name for decrypted Enigma messages -- and to break other Axis cipher systems. The effort recruited brilliant cryptoanalysts, mathematicians, linguists, eccentric creative geniuses, and hard working young people from all over Britain. By war's end, over 10,000 people were employed, each committed to the secrecy of Bletchley Park.
43. SPYAMO_141026_152.JPG: "... After you had done it for a few hours you wondered whether you would see anything... But then the magic moment comes when it really works... There is nothing like seeing a code broken, that is really the absolute tops." -- Mavis Lever, Bletchley Park veteran
44. SPYAMO_141026_155.JPG: Working Women: The British Army established the Women's Royal Naval Service (WRENS) and the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (FANY) to perform shore duties while men served during World War I. During World War II, thousands of WRENS and FANYs were the backbone of code-breaking operations. While others received glory and praise for breakthroughs, these women tirelessly performed the daily duties of monitoring and processing coded messages and moving the reams of paper generated in the pre-computer age.
45. SPYAMO_141026_158.JPG: "That's it!" Frank B. Rowlett, upon cracking the Japanese Code Purple. The team then celebrated by sending out for bottles of Coca-Cola and going back to work.
46. SPYAMO_141026_160.JPG: Code Cracking Campus: On the quiet grounds of a former Virginia girls' school, the US Army's Signal Intelligence Service cracked the Japanese Purple code. William Friedman's team of "magicians" celebrated their success -- after at least 18 months' work -- on September 20, 1940. Arlington Hall Station was home to many Army intelligence divisions, and early in the war the campus had a guarded relationship with their British counterparts at Bletchley Park. But by May 1943, the two nations signed the first cooperative code-breaking agreement in history.
47. SPYAMO_141026_163.JPG: The Great Migration Geneticist William F. Friedman was employed by a wealthy patron near Chicago to determine through cryptoanalysis whether Francis Bacon had written works attributed to William Shakespeare. Literary puzzles led to code-cracking, and the young scientist found himself at Arlington Hall. Friedman was assigned in 1938 to lead the effort to break the Japanese Purple codes for the US Army's Signal Intelligence Service. A year and a half later his team, including top cryptanalyst Frank Rowlett, cracked the code. The intelligence derived by these decryption activities was codenamed MAGIC, and the team that worked on it -- magicians.
48. SPYAMO_141026_166.JPG: Purple Analog No. 1
49. SPYAMO_141026_170.JPG: Native Speakers: Choctaw code talkers kept American plans secret in the final battles of World War I. [sic] Navajo Code Talkers: A complex language, unknown to the Germans and Japanese, hard even to intercept... a perfect code. World War I veteran Philip Johnston recognized that the Native American Navajo language met the military requirements for an undecipherable code, and in 1942 he convinced the US Marines of its potential. By 1945 over 400 Navajos had eagerly enlisted as "code talkers." They used a code based on Navajo words -- for example, "turtle" in Navajo would stand for "tank." The system was never broken by the Japanese.
50. SPYAMO_141026_174.JPG: "It was a terrific human experience and I've never matched it since... Nothing gave the total personal satisfaction that Hut 6 did, because this was a totally dedicated group working together in absolutely remarkable teamwork." -- American Capt. Bil Bundy, member of US Army Special Branch at Arlington Hall, assigned to Bletchley Park later served as Assistant Secretary of State; From the book, Station X.
51. SPYAMO_141026_177.JPG: First Computers: These first electronic devices used thousands of vacuum tubes and took hours to program a single task. Digital Dawning: Deciphering Enigma's trillions of combinations couldn't be done by hand. A fast, efficient number-crunching machine would be required -- and the bombe was that machine. Like many early attempts at automation, the bombe could be programmed to do only one thing. But these machines were sophisticated for their time. Devices like the original bombe and the Colossus used at Bletchley Park were important milestones in the history of computing. The urgent need to crack wartime codes brought funding and attention to new technologies. After the war, breakthroughs in computer science ushered in a new era.
52. SPYAMO_141026_180.JPG: Code Buster: The original electro-mechanical "Bombe" -- named by its Polish inventors either for its ticking sound or a popular ice cream dessert called a bomba -- decrypted prewar three-rotor Enigma messages. Up to 1938, this sufficed. Then the Germans added two extra rotors, making the Enigma too sophisticated for the Poles' limited technical capacities. Led by Alan Turing, a British team at Bletchley Park devised a high-speed Bombe. With five hundred electrical relays, eleven miles of wiring, and a million soldered joints, it tested guessed plaintexts against intercepted cryptograms to see whether any Enigma setting would produce that result. If one were found, it would be the key for all messages sent on that cryptonet for that day.
53. SPYAMO_141026_182.JPG: Genius Among Geniuses A Cambridge graduate and Princeton PhD, Alan Turing was the mathematical genius at the heart of Bletchley Park. Critical to Allied success, Turing was one of many hard-working, brilliant eccentrics working there. He wore a gas mask to prevent hay fever and chained his coffee mug to a radiator. At age 26, Turing conceived the theory of programmable computers, and he was one of the first scientists to address the problem of artificial intelligence. He designed the high-speed Bombe and, though he did not work on Colossus, after the war he was a pioneer in computer science at the National Physical Laboratory and the University of Manchester.
54. SPYAMO_141026_199.JPG: Disinformation: Loose Lips and Lies: Espionage is not only about learning the truth; it is also about planting lies and misleading foes. Disinformation also can include a more subtle form of falsehood: propaganda. The taunts of American Mildred Gillers ("Axis Sally") and Briton William Joyce ("Lord Haw Haw") on Radio Berlin, and the fabrications of "Tokyo Rose" broadcast from Japan, spread ominous, false battle reports and rumors. Their goal was not to hoodwink Allied intelligence, but to discourage and dishearten Allied troops and civilians.
55. SPYAMO_141026_202.JPG: Mildred Gillars: GIs nicknamed Gillars "Axis Sally" after hearing her radio propaganda. Axis Sally: American Traitor: American-born Mildred Gillars was working as a translator in Berlin when World War II broke out. She swore loyalty to the Third Reich and began broadcasting propaganda for the Nazi radio service. She co-hosted the Home Sweet Home Hour, a music program laced with declarations of hatred toward Jews, FDR, Winston Churchill, and others. Gillars also posed as a Red Cross worker and recorded messages from war prisoners to their loved ones. She later broadcast these comments, claiming that even POWs preferred Nazi rule. After the war, she was convicted of treason and served 12 years in prison.
56. SPYAMO_141026_204.JPG: Lord Haw Haw: Nazi Propagandist: Born in New York but living in England, Nazi sympathizer William Joyce slipped away to Berlin just days before Britain declared war on Germany. He landed a radio job broadcasting Nazi propaganda, opening each show with his trademark, "Germany calling, Germany calling!" Nicknamed Lord Haw Haw for his affected accent, Joyce blamed the war on international Jewish financiers and invented news reports to demoralize British listeners. Though millions tuned in, most listened for comic relief and did not take him seriously. After the war, Joyce was captured and hanged for treason.
57. SPYAMO_141026_207.JPG: Iva Toguri: Anti-Japanese fervor after World War II led military investigators to brand Iva Toguri as the traitorous Tokyo Rose. The Myth of Tokyo Rose: "Tokyo Rose" was the name given to various women who broadcast anti-American propaganda for Radio Tokyo. They told morale-damaging tales of unfaithful sweethearts and bogus casualty figures. Meanwhile, an American-born employee named Iva Toguri, in Tokyo to care for an ailing aunt, dreamed of returning home to California. But when she did, it was as a war prisoner. Toguri was falsely accused and convicted of being THE Tokyo Rose. She served six years in prison, finally receiving a presidential pardon in 1976.
58. SPYAMO_141026_210.JPG: Yoshikawa Years after the war, unable to find work in his homeland, Yoshikawa asked bitterly, "Why has history cheated me?" Our Enemy was Japan's Hero: At age 29, Takeo Yoshikawa was Japan's top military spy. To gather the information needed to pull off the Pearl Harbor attack, Yoshikawa posed as a tourist, a laborer at the naval base, and a waiter at an exclusive military club. To avoid suspicion he never wrote anything down, instead relying on his photographic memory. American officials imprisoned him but could not prove he was a spy, and he returned to work in Japan. After US troops occupied Japan in 1945, he fled to the countryside and posed as a monk to escape arrest.
59. SPYAMO_141026_214.JPG: Birth of the CIA: OSS director William Donovan urged President Roosevelt to form a permanent central intelligence office. But after FDR's death in 1945, President Truman disbanded the OSS. Two years later, Truman reconsidered, and he formally established the CIA.
60. SPYAMO_141026_217.JPG: Planning the Attack: Japanese pilots used a scale model of Pearl Harbor to plan their attack. Agent Takeo Yoshikawa provided many of the details needed to build the model.
61. SPYAMO_141026_221.JPG: Evidence Ignored: The Germans gave Popov a list of questions about US military capabilities at Pearl Harbor.
62. SPYAMO_141026_224.JPG: Distrust Leads to Disaster: In August 1941, Dusko Popov arrived in the United States with detailed information about a planned attack on Pearl Harbor. Popov had been spying for the Germans but reported everything he learned to British intelligence. He presented his evidence to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. This included a microdot -- a photograph reduced to the size of a pinhead -- containing instructions for Popov to gather intelligence in Hawaii. But Hoover didn't trust Popov and was convinced he was really loyal to Germany. He dismissed Popov and ignored his warnings. On December 7, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.
63. SPYAMO_141026_227.JPG: Hoover's Deceit: J. Edgar Hoover never told FDR about Dusko Popov's visit. He waited for weeks to send him the microdot, implying it was an FBI discovery. He also included a sample of information contained in the microdot -- but nothing related to Pearl Harbor.
64. SPYAMO_141026_229.JPG: No Choirboy: Dusko Popov (shown years later with his wife) enjoyed an extravagant lifestyle and having affairs with many women. When J. Edgar Hoover condemned his playboy image, Popov replied, "I don't think a choirboy could do my job."
65. SPYAMO_141026_232.JPG: Espionage in Miniature: Nazi spies smuggled entire documents by photographically reducing them to the size of a small dot. Unfamiliar with this technology, Americans took nearly two years to decode them. J. Edgar Hoover called them "the enemy's masterpiece of espionage."
66. SPYAMO_141026_236.JPG: Communication Breakdown: History shows that FDR realized Japan might attack the US, but because of jumbled communications he had no way of knowing the target would be Pearl Harbor. Could We Have Stopped Pearl Harbor? President Roosevelt did not learn of Japan's plans to attack Pearl Harbor until it was too late. This was partly the result of clashing between the Army and Navy over who would monitor diplomatic messages from Japan. Finally, they compromised: they would alternate even- and odd-numbered days. As a result of this inefficient system, communications broke down and valuable information about Japan's intentions slipped through the cracks.
67. SPYAMO_141026_238.JPG: In Plain View: Much of the information used to plan the Pearl Harbor attack was readily available. The Japanese military used postcards to make aerial maps of the naval base. Spies gathered details about the area of sight-seeing trips to tourist spots.
68. SPYAMO_141026_249.JPG: Infamy: Surprise Attack ... or Intelligence Failure? On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, killing and wounding thousands and crippling the US Navy. America's people and military reeled from the unexpected blow. But should the attack have come as a surprise? A team led by William Friedman had broken Japan's diplomatic code. Spies in the field issued warnings. Yet, intercepted messages went unread and unanalyzed; reports were unheeded. American isolationism and over-confidence had nurtured inefficiency, allowing internal rivalries and a complex chain of command to hobble intelligence-gathering.
69. SPYAMO_141026_252.JPG: Moe Berg
70. SPYAMO_141026_254.JPG: Moe Berg: While playing ball in Japan, Berg took "home movies" that were used to plan World War II bombing raids. Third-String Catcher, All-Star Spy: Ivy League-educated and fluent in several languages, Moe Berg was not your typical pro ballplayer. Grateful to the country that had welcomed his Jewish immigrant parents, he volunteered as a spy when World War II broke out. On one mission, he slipped into occupied Norway and discovered a Nazi nuclear weapons plant. In Switzerland, Berg met with a top Nazi scientist, with orders to shoot him if Germany was close to building an atomic bomb.
71. SPYAMO_141026_260.JPG: Marlene Dietrich
72. SPYAMO_141026_263.JPG: Marlene Dietrich As one of Germany's best-known stars, Marlene Dietrich was an especially valuable propaganda agent for the US. German Star Becomes American Patriot: Marlene Dietrich became a US citizen after defying Hitler's orders to return to her native Germany. The sultry performer risked her own safety to entertain American troops at the front lines during World War II. In 1944, the OSS tapped Dietrich to record songs to broadcast to German troops. Her nostalgic reading of German lyrics was intended to lower morale and promote defection. After the war, she received the Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor.
73. SPYAMO_141026_269.JPG: Josephine Baker
74. SPYAMO_141026_273.JPG: Josephine Baker: Josephine Baker proudly wears the uniform she received after being made an honorary sub-lieutenant by the French Air Force. "I am ready to give the Parisians my life." Singer-danger Josephine Baker moved to France to escape racism in America and became the toast of Paris. In gratitude, she became a World War II spy for her adopted country. Her fame enabled her to attend parties with high-ranking Japanese and Italian officials and to report back what she heard. Baker also smuggled important information out of France. No one suspected that her sheet music was covered with messages written in invisible ink or that her dress contained hidden photographs.
75. SPYAMO_141026_275.JPG: Star Power: People You Know... Agents You Didn't: Actress Marlene Dietrich. Singer Josephine Baker. Director John Ford. Behind many famous faces lurk secret stories. During wartime, citizens of all sorts rallied to their homelands and defended their values. On a 1934 Asian tour, Major League ballplayer Moe Berg filmed Japanese military installations for US intelligence. During the war, actor Sterling Hayden left Hollywood to join "Special Services," while singer Josephine Baker smuggled sheet music annotated with invisible ink. Countless others made headlines in public ... and worked behind the scenes in private.
76. SPYAMO_141026_277.JPG: Award of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: The Oscar for best documentary film of 1942 was awarded to Director John Ford for "The Battle of Midway."
77. SPYAMO_141026_282.JPG: John Ford
78. SPYAMO_141026_284.JPG: John Ford Ford, who was also a naval captain, was awarded the Purple Heart for wounds sustained while filming the Battle of Midway under enemy fire. As Oscar-Winning OSS Mission: The OSS made great use of Oscar-winning director John Ford's filmmaking talents. Before World War II, Ford reported on Japanese activity while sailing the South Seas. Then he became chief of the OSS Field Photographic Branch, which performed aerial surveillance and mapping. In 1942, Ford and his crew risked their lives to film the Battle of Midway up close from every vantage point. His 18-minute documentary was acclaimed for its unflinching view of the realities of war.
79. SPYAMO_141026_286.JPG: Sterling Hayden
80. SPYAMO_141026_290.JPG: John Hamilton: Hayden enlisted in the Marines as "John Hamilton," to keep from drawing attention to himself. From Silver Screen to International Espionage: Proclaimed "The Most Beautiful Man in Hollywood," Sterling Hayden left acting to fight in World War II. The OSS recruited Hayden, an expert seaman, to command a fleet of ships that ran guns and supplies to Yugoslavian guerillas who were fighting the Germans. Hayden later wrote, "Everything shimmered in secrecy, and it was a rare man who knew what his fellows were doing." Hayden returned to acting after the war and went on to star in the classic Cold War satire, Dr. Strangelove.
81. SPYAMO_141026_294.JPG: Julia Child
82. SPYAMO_141026_298.JPG: Julia Child Adventurous Julia was one of only a few women who worked for the OSS in Ceylon, and later in China. Appetite for Adventure: Years before she learned to cook, Julia Child worked for the OSS during World War II. At the organization's Ceylon office, she filed and routed many classified documents from enemy sources. Though Child said, "I was not a spy, only a lowly file clerk," she received an Emblem of Meritorious Civilian Service. Her superiors praised her drive and cheerfulness, saying she inspired other workers. These same qualities later made her a hit as a TV chef and beloved American icon.
83. SPYAMO_141026_305.JPG: Behind Enemy Lines: The Battlefield's Secret Soldiers: No assignment was so terrifying -- and so vital -- as operating behind enemy lines in war-torn Europe. Threatened at every moment by the fear of capture, torture, and death, agents risked everything to complete missions that only they could carry out. To evade detection, spies took refuge in basements and sewers, in fields or ramshackle shelters such as French farmhouses. There, the whiff of gunpowder was a constant reminder of the surrounding peril, a crackling radio often their only lifeline to friendly forces.
84. SPYAMO_141026_313.JPG: Sabotage: SOE sabotage and subversion missions were designed to trip up Nazi advances and prepare for an Allied invasion. Underground Allies: Disguises, hidden weapons, secret suitcase compartments and radios became tools of the underground during World War II. Everyday people worked with secret organizations, including the British SOE and American OSS, to thwart German progress in occupied France and throughout Europe. Unlikely spies spent days in hiding, awaiting the signal that would activate their missions. That signal often came from a Jedburgh team -- an elite alliance of British, American and French intelligence officers jointly trained by the SOE and the OSS.
85. SPYAMO_141026_315.JPG: SOE and OSS: Worldwide, camps trained spies in skills from camouflage to silent killing. "Set Europe Ablaze" This was the instruction from British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to his secret force, the Special Operations Executive (SOE). With local resistance groups, the SOE instigated action by the people of occupied Europe against their Nazi invaders. The American Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was modeled after the SOE. Recruits possessed a rare combination of steady nerves, superb physical condition and linguistic flair -- and selectivity paid off. In 1944, OSS agents generated over 500,000 intelligence tips and smuggled 20,000 tons of supplies into occupied France.
86. SPYAMO_141026_320.JPG: Suitcase Radio, Type B MKII: Issued by SOE, circa 1943-1945 This suitcase radio was a powerful, portable transceiver that could send and receive messages using Morse Code over a 1,000-mile range.
87. SPYAMO_141026_321.JPG: Poisonous "L Tablets": Issued by OSS, circa 1942-1945 The OSS provided suicide pills to agents operating behind enemy lines so they could avoid divulging secrets under torture. These pills belonged to Lieutenant Owen Conrad, a radio expert in the Special Operations Branch.
88. SPYAMO_141026_326.JPG: Virginia Hall: Hall posed as a milkmaid in the French countryside, tending animals while she observed German troops and potential landing sites. "La Dame Qui Boite" Initially rejected for US foreign service because of her wooden leg, American Virginia Hall joined the French Ambulance Service and the British SOE. Posing as a journalist, Hall radioed communications from within occupied France. In 1943, Hall bravely returned to France with the OSS despite Gestapo orders that, "the woman who limps is one of the most dangerous Allied agents in France. We must find and destroy her." In new disguises, Hall directed French Resistance sabotage missions in support of Allied advances after D-Day.
89. SPYAMO_141026_329.JPG: Sir William Stephenson "Little Bill" Our Man in New York: Immortalized in the book, The Man Called Intrepid, William Stephenson orchestrated the World War II strategic and intelligence alliance between Great Britain and the US. A veteran World War I pilot and self-made millionaire, Stephenson was charismatic and smart. After Winston Churchill became Prime Minister, Stephenson was sent to New York to insure US support for Britain's fight against Hitler. Stephenson led a massive campaign that resulted in public support of Britain and the establishment of the first US government intelligence service -- the OSS. Churchill recommended Stephenson for knighthood, noting that "This one is dear to my heart."
90. SPYAMO_141026_332.JPG: William Donovan: "Wild Bill" Big Plans: In 1941, with a critical need for international intelligence collaboration, it became evident that US intelligence was... lacking. There was no central coordination or formal training for agents. William Donovan, known worldwide for his diplomacy, was the man for the job and was named Coordinator of Information (COI). With the strong support of British intelligence leaders, Donovan lobbied President Roosevelt -- amid protests from Army, Navy, and FBI intelligence agencies -- for the creation of the OSS. Under Donovan's direction, the fledgling agency grew quickly and became the basis for today's CIA.
91. SPYAMO_141026_335.JPG: Resist: A maquisard -- member of the French resistance -- shields himself from German fire. Ordinary people, Maquis fighters risked their lives every day. A Call to Action: When German troops invaded France, ordinary men, women and students mobilized. A network of underground resistance groups -- the Maquis -- coordinated this dangerous work. Resistance groups arranged escapes and provided shelter, false identities, food and clothing for Jews, prisoners-of-war, and downed Allied pilots. Anyone could, and did, help. Railway workers disrupted German transport, doctors hid Jews in clinics and transported them in ambulances, and the media -- using anonymous writers and underground publishers -- rebutted German propaganda to symphathizers inside and outside France.
92. SPYAMO_141026_338.JPG: Coal Camouflage Kit and Explosive Coal: Issued by OSS, circa 1942-1945 The device, shaped to resemble a large piece of coal, was hollowed out to conceal explosives. Using the camouflage kit, an agent painted the shell to match the color of the local coal> When the coal was shoveled into a boiler, the device detonated.
93. SPYAMO_141026_343.JPG: Garotte and Pouch Issued by OSS and SOE, circa 1943-1945 These weapons were designed to be easily concealed and effective in close combat.
94. SPYAMO_141026_355.JPG: Liberator Pistol with Ammunition and Manual Issued by OSS, 1942-1945 The Liberator Pistol was an inexpensively manufactured, single shot .45 caliber weapon. Easy to use, it was distributed to civilians in the Resistance. It was designed for mass production and manufactured in the US by a division of General Motors.
95. SPYAMO_141026_363.JPG: Consequences A captured agent is bound hand and foot. His Gestapo torturers took this photo to document and improve their technique. Cost of Silence: Spies knew the consequences if caught. Of 393 SOE operatives in France, 104 were captured and killed. SOE Wing Commander Yeo-Thomas tried to take his own life rather than disclose information to his captors, but he was restrained. Interrogators beat and tortured him for days, yet Yeo-Thomas remained silent. Despite the great risks and sacrifices of its agents, the SOE was never fully accepted by more established intelligence services, who dismissed its "cloak and dagger" warfare.
96. SPYAMO_141026_366.JPG: Forest Frederick Yeo-Thomas "White Rabbit" Silence at Any Cost: SOE agent Yeo-Thomas worked in France to unify the French underground. On a rescue mission, he made the fatal error of waiting for a contact. The delayed courier betrayed him, and Yeo-Thomas was captured. Refusing to cooperate, he was sent to Buchenwald. Near death, he exchanged identities with a corpse and escaped. Following the war, Yeo-Thomas testified against war criminals -- and returned to his earlier career selling women's fashions.
97. SPYAMO_141026_368.JPG: Violette Szabo "The Bravest of Them All" To avenge her husband's death, perfume saleswoman Violette Szabo joined the SOE. On D-Day she parachuted into France to assist a resistance group. Captured within days, the sharpshooter killed several German soldiers in a desperate struggle. Szabo remained silent despite Gestapo rape and torture. She was sent to a concentration camp and executed at the age of 24. A year later, Violette Szabo's young daughter accepted her mother's George Cross and Croix de Guerre, awarded posthumously.
98. SPYAMO_141026_372.JPG: Odette Sansom A Marriage of Life or Death: This housewife's determination and French patriotism qualified her for SOE service. Assigned as Captain Peter Churchill's radio operator, the two were betrayed, arrested and tortured -- Sansom handicapped for life when her toenails were pulled. Her wits still about her, Sansom convinced the Gestapo she and Churchill were married and related to Winston Churchill. German agents spared their lives and sent them to concentration camps. Both survived, and married in 1947.
99. SPYAMO_141026_378.JPG: Retaliate: Members of the resistance faced immediate arrest and punishment if discovered. Torture, deportation to concentration camps and execution were typical. A Whole Community Paid: To protect agents in France, the SOE masterminded the assassination of Gestapo commander Reinhard Heydrich in Czechoslovakia. Nazi retaliation was swift, bloody and cost 5,000 innocent lives -- every male inhabitant of the Czech village of Lidice was slaughtered, the women deported to concentration camps and the children sent to gas chambers. The Lidice massacre, together with German reprisals in other cities, essentially liquidated the Czech Underground.
100. SPYAMO_141026_383.JPG: Vera Laska began her career in the Czech resistance when she was a student and only 15 years old. The mountainous terrain in southern Slovakia was familiar to her from years of hiking and skiing there. She became a "conductor" on an underground railroad which moved prisoners of war and Jews out of Poland and into Hungary and Yugoslavia. She was eventually captured, sent to Auschwitz and two other concentration camps. She survived. Laska went on to earn a doctoral degree in American History from the University of Chicago and now teaches at a college in Massachusetts.
101. SPYAMO_141026_389.JPG: Double Cross by Committee: In wartime Britain, the XX Committee -- a group of professional and amateur spies -- double-crossed German intelligence. The plan revolved around British double agent, Arthur Owens. The Germans, believing Owens worked for them, used him as the contact for their other spies in Britain. These spies were then persuaded to turn against Germany. The plan was amazingly successful, allowing Britain to control the German spy system working inside its borders.
102. SPYAMO_141026_390.JPG: Garbo Completely fooled by his misinformation about D-Day, Germany awarded Garbo an Iron Cross. Britain made him a Member of the British Empire for pulling off the deception. A Make-Believe Spy Network: Spaniard Juan Pujol Garcia -- codenamed Garbo -- worked for the British as one of the most effective double agents in history. A man with a fertile imagination, Garbo fabricated an entire spy network, creating personalities, personal histories, and a unique style of handwriting for each of 25 make-believe agents and contacts. The Germans believed the network was sending them invaluable information. In reality, all the information was false. His greatest role lay in deceiving the Germans about the D-Day invasion of Normandy. Garbo convinced them the attack was a ploy to disguise the real invasion at Pas-de-Calais.
103. SPYAMO_141026_394.JPG: D-Day Members of the French resistance wait by the radio to receive secret messages aired by the BBC. The Poetry of Secrecy: On June 1, 1944, the BBC aired the first line of a French poem by Paul Verlaine: "The long sobbing of the violins of autumn." This was the alert signal before the Allied invasion. Four days later the second line aired: "Wound my heart with a monotonous languour," the signal to act. That night saw 1,000 resistance attacks -- railway lines blown up, phone wires cut and ambushes laid.
104. SPYAMO_141026_398.JPG: Protecting the Truth with Lies: Rows of inflatable rubber tanks and trucks, and squadrons of plywood planes formed the core of two make-believe armies, both part of Operation Bodyguard -- an elaborate web of deception designed to throw the Germans off guard. Misinformation from double agents completed the deception.
105. SPYAMO_141026_401.JPG: Ultimate Deception: Operation Bodyguard used inflatable tanks, trucks and ships to create the illusion of a massive troop build-up near Pas de Calais, a site well north of the actual landing planned for Normandy. Upon close inspection, these lightweight inflatables may not have fooled anyone, but seen from the air they fashioned a believable picture of an imminent invasion. The British Air Force actually led German aircraft over the staging sites, making sure that they didn't get too close.
106. SPYAMO_141026_405.JPG: Bodyguard of Lies The Deceptions that Saved D-Day: "In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies," said British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. A forest of falsehoods can conceal precious information, and thereby save precious lives. Operation Bodyguard, named for Churchill's "bodyguard of lies," proved critical to the Allies' D-Day invasion in 1944. An array of fabulous fakes -- form dummy parachutists to rubber tanks and bogus broadcasts -- misled German intelligence into preparing for an attack in the wrong place, at the wrong time.
107. SPYAMO_141026_408.JPG: Major Martin A deception planned to the finest details, British intelligence outfitted the corpse of Major Martin with ID papers, service ribbons, theater ticket stubs, a love letter, loose change and lodging receipts. The Man Who Never Was: Major William Martin never existed. He was created as part of Operation Mincemeat, a scheme to mislead Germany about Allied war plans. British intelligence dressed a corpse in a Marine uniform, and arranged for it to wash up on the coast of Spain with a briefcase filled with phony documents. Germans found the documents, which told of false plans for an invasion in the Balkans. Fooled by the deception, they moved troops away from Sicily -- paving the way for an Allied attack there.
108. SPYAMO_141026_412.JPG: Atomic Spies: Containing the War's Most Explosive Story: Barely a month before World War II began, Albert Einstein wrote President Roosevelt suggesting that nuclear fission might yield "extremely powerful bombs of a new type..." By 1942, America's Manhattan Project was coordinating secret labs from New York to Chicago to Los Alamos, New Mexico. Developing an atomic bomb posed monumental challenges, in science and secrecy. Researchers were tireless in hiding their work, erecting a cloak of invisibility so impenetrable that not even Vice President Truman knew of it until becoming president. Enemy spies suspected much, but learned little. Allied spies were another matter. Several scientists and technicians at the Los Alamos lab were Communist sympathizers who passed critical information to the Soviet Union, America's wartime partner and postwar rival.
109. SPYAMO_141026_416.JPG: A Scientist's Plea: Scientists in the US were concerned that the German researchers, headed by physicist Werner Heisenberg, were developing new weapons of mass destruction. They prevailed upon Albert Einstein to use his position of power and renown to contact President Roosevelt and urge such research in August of 1939.
110. SPYAMO_141026_424.JPG: The President's Reply: Just a few months later, President Roosevelt gave Einstein's request the attention it was due. His response was concise and understated, and the Manhattan Project planning began.
111. SPYAMO_141026_427.JPG: Chicago's Secret During games at the University of Chicago's Stagg Field, fans in the stands watched football while scientists conducted top-secret atomic research in a squash court below. A Secret Stolen from the Inside: As American atomic research progressed, the Soviets were determined to know more. The top-secret lab at Los Alamos became a hotbed of atomic espionage. A core group of scientists from several countries -- some motivated by ideology, some in it for the money -- began leaking details about the bomb to Soviet agents. They gave such precise information that the Soviet bomb built in 1949 was strikingly similar to the American plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki in 1945. Suddenly, Americans faced a new threat -- a powerful enemy with the same nuclear weapons -- and the Cold War was on.
112. SPYAMO_141026_431.JPG: Sound of the Times: The Geiger counter detects and measures radiation. Although invented decades before in 1928, its unique buzz became a symbol of the nuclear age and the Cold War. Radiation threats are unique because you can't see, hear, taste, smell or feel them until the damage is done and its effects are felt.
AAA "Gem": AAA considers this location to be a "must see" point of interest. To see pictures of other areas that AAA considers to be Gems, click here.
Bigger photos? To save server space, the full-sized versions of these images have either not been loaded to the server or have been removed from the server. (Only some pages are loaded with full-sized images and those usually get removed after three months.) I still have them though. If you want me to email them to you, please send an email to guthrie.bruce@gmail.com and I can email them to you, or, depending on the number of images, just repost the page again will the full-sized images.
Connection Not Secure messages? Those warnings you get from your browser about this site not having secure connections worry some people. This means this site does not have SSL installed (the link is http:, not https:). That's bad if you're entering credit card numbers, passwords, or other personal information. But this site doesn't collect any personal information so SSL is not necessary. Life's good!
Photo Contact: [Email Bruce Guthrie].