Horst Goltz - My Adventures as a German Secret Service Agent

Germany does not depend upon one spy alone for even the smallest item. Always the work is duplicated. Always the same information is being secured by several men, not one of whom knows any of the others; and always that information is transmitted to Berlin through so many diverse channels that it is impossible for the most vigilant secret service in the world to prevent a goodly part of it from reaching its destination.

How that information is transmitted I shall tell in a moment. First I wish to explain how more important facts are secured the secret plans of the Government, such, for instance, as the course which had been decided upon for the squadron which carried the first American troops to France.

It is obvious that such facts as these could not have been deduced from a mass of miscellaneous reports. That secret must have been learned in its entirety. Exactly how it was discovered I do not pretend to know, nor shall I offer any theories. But here, in a situation of this sort unquestionably, is where the real spy the "master spy," if you wish to call him so steps in.

Now, it is impossible, in spite of the utmost vigilance, to keep an important document from the knowledge of all but one or two people. No matter how secret, it is almost certain to pass through the hands of a number of officials and possibly several clerks. And with every additional person who knows of it the risk of discovery or betrayal is correspondingly increased. If in code, it may be copied or memorised by a spy who is in a position to get hold of it, or by a person who is in the power of that spy! Once in Berlin, it can be deciphered. For the General Staff and the Admiralty have their experts in these matters who are very rarely defeated.

You may be sure that Germany has made her utmost efforts to put her spies into high places in America, just as she has tried to do elsfwhere. You may be sure, also, that she has? neglected no opportunity to gain control over any official or any naval or army officer however important or unimportant whom the agents could influence. That has always been her method; nor is it difficult to see why it frequently succeeds.

Imagine the situation of a man who in time of peace had supplied, either innocently or otherwise, a foreign agent with information which possessed a considerable value. It is probable that he would revolt at a suggestion that he should do it in time of war but with his neck once in the German noose, with the alternative of additional compliance or exposure facing him, it is not hard to see how some men would become conscious traitors and others would be driven to suicide.

By a system of blackmail and intimidation the Germans have attempted to force into their ranks many people from whom they extort information that would now be regarded as traitorous, although formerly it might have been given out in all innocence.

Undoubtedly it was for purposes of intimidation that von Papen carried with him to England papers incriminating Germans and German-Americans who had been associated with him in one way or another. And why did von Riritelen return to America and aid the Government in exposing the German connections of people who had no German blood in them? The obvious answer is that those people had refused to aid him in some scheme he had proposed. Therefore he made examples of them, with the double purpose of demonstrating to the United States the extent of German intrigue and of filling other implicated people with fear of the exposure that would come to them if they were not more compliant.

Once in possession of secret information, the spy is faced with the necessity of transmitting it to Berlin. Here again the spy who is a German would meet with considerable difficulty. He may mail letters if no mail censorship has been instituted; but these are liable to seizure and are not so useful in the transmission of war secrets as they were in informing his Government before the war of more or less standard facts about the strength of fortifications and the like. He may use private messengers as do all spies but the delay in this method is a severe handicap.

In sending news of the movements of troops speed is the prime essential. Consequently he must communicate either by wireless or by cable. How does he do it?

There are innumerable ways. There may be in the confidential employ of many business houses which do a large cable business with neutral countries men who are either agents or dupes of the German Government. These men may send cables which seem absolutely innocent business messages, but which if properly read impart facts of military value to the recipient in Holland, say, or in Spain, or South America. It is not a difficult matter to use business codes, giving to the terms an entirely different meaning from the one assigned in the code-book. Personal messages are also used in this way, as is well known. As to the wireless, although all stations are under rigid supervision, what is to prevent the Germans from establishing a wireless station in the Kentucky mountains, for instance, and for a time operating it successfully?

But in spite of all cable censorship, the spy can smuggle information into Mexico, where it can be cabled or wirelessed on to Berlin, either directly or indirectly by way of one of the neutral countries. Even in spite of the most rigid censorship of mails and telegrams this sort of smuggling can be accomplished.

When I was in the Constitutional Army in Mexico I used to receive revolver ammunition from an old German who carried it over the border in his wooden leg. Could not this method be applied to dispatches?

There are numerous authenticated cases of spies who have sent messages concealed in sausages or other articles of food. Moreover, the current of the Rio Grande at certain places runs in such a manner that a log or a bucket dropped in on the American side will drift to the Mexican shore and arrive at a point which can be determined with almost mathematical precision.

I mention these instances merely to show how little of real value the censorship of cables and mails can accomplish. The question arises: What can be done? I shall try to indicate the answer.

HOW TO GET RID OF THE SPY SYSTEM

I say frankly that I think it absolutely impossible to eradicate spies from any country. Certainly it cannot be done in a week or a year, or even in many years. It is more than probable that the German spy systems in France and England are more complete to-day than they were at the beginning of the War. Three years ago the spies in these countries were made up of both experienced and inexperienced men. Now the bunglers have been weeded out, and only those who are expert in defying detection remain. But these are the only men who were ever of real use to Germany; and fortified as they are by three years of unsuspected work in these countries, they are enabled to secure information of infinitely more worth than they formerly were.

What is the situation in America?

I have shown you the structure of that system. Let me repeat again that Germany has installed in America thousands of men whose nationality and habits are such as to protect them from suspicion, who work silently and alone, because they know that their very lives depend upon their silence, and who are in communication with no central spy organisation, for the very simple reason that no such organisation exists. There is no clearing-house for spy information in the United States. There are no "master spies."

Do you think that the German Government would risk the success of a work so important as J,7f this by organising a system which the arrest of any one man or group of men would betray? The idea of centralisation in this work is popular at present. In theory it is a good one. In practice it is impossible. By the very nature of the spy's trade he must run alone, and not only be unsuspected of any connection with Germany now, but be believed never to have had such a connection. If the secret service were a chain, the loss of one link would break it. With a system of independent units, endlessly overlapping, eternally duplicating each other's work, they continue their practices even though half of their number are caught.