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When the pre-cursor to MI5 would interrogate suspected German spies during the war, they would ask them to talk about squirrels, and they'd mangle the word so b

When the pre-cursor to MI5 would interrogate suspected German spies during the war, they would ask them to talk about squirrels, and they'd mangle the word so badly, no matter who well trained, that it was an easy tell. Related: after the war, they were concerned that there were Nazi spies still in England they hadn't uncovered. When the files in Berlin were seized, they went through every single asset sent to England. Not only had they successfully identified every agent, and turned quite a few into double-agents, they also noted that very few agents going the other way had ever been detected.

ceejayoz 1y ago
Yup. They managed to catch and frequently turn literally everyone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-Cross_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-Cross_System > There was even a case in which an agent started running deception operations independently from Portugal using little more than guidebooks, maps, and a very vivid imagination to convince his Abwehr handlers that he was spying in the UK. This agent, Juan Pujol García (Garbo), created a network of phantom sub-agents and eventually convinced the British authorities that he could be useful. He and his fictitious network were absorbed into the main double-cross system and he became so respected by Abwehr that they stopped landing agents in Britain after 1942. The Germans became dependent on the spurious information that was fed to them by Garbo's network and the other double-cross agents.
- philwelch 1y ago
  Juan Pujol Garcia was awarded both the Iron Cross from Germany and the MBE from the UK, which makes him a very literal "double cross" agent having received cross-shaped medals from both sides.
  - ceejayoz 1y ago
    I'm very curious to know if he ever wore them both. Would be a fun double-take to someone in the know.
bobmcnamara 1y ago
The problem was of course that they were looking too far west.

ceejayoz 1y ago

Yup. They managed to catch and frequently turn literally everyone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-Cross_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-Cross_System > There was even a case in which an agent started running deception operations independently from Portugal using little more than guidebooks, maps, and a very vivid imagination to convince his Abwehr handlers that he was spying in the UK. This agent, Juan Pujol García (Garbo), created a network of phantom sub-agents and eventually convinced the British authorities that he could be useful. He and his fictitious network were absorbed into the main double-cross system and he became so respected by Abwehr that they stopped landing agents in Britain after 1942. The Germans became dependent on the spurious information that was fed to them by Garbo's network and the other double-cross agents.

philwelch 1y ago
Juan Pujol Garcia was awarded both the Iron Cross from Germany and the MBE from the UK, which makes him a very literal "double cross" agent having received cross-shaped medals from both sides.
- ceejayoz 1y ago
  I'm very curious to know if he ever wore them both. Would be a fun double-take to someone in the know.

bobmcnamara 1y ago

The problem was of course that they were looking too far west.