Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion 20140915

Retired cia operative Kenneth Daigler looks at u. S. Intelligence efforts and revolution were and the war in defeating the british. From George Washingtons interest and use of counterintelligence practices, an Espionage Network operate in your city. This is just under one hour. Good afternoon and welcome to the International Spy museum. My name is vince houghton, oms pod museum the story and curator of like to welcome all of you to another author debriefing. Today subject will be the american revolution, and intelligence. Were joined by an exceptional often will introduce momentarily. Before that i watched a couple words about the revolution itself and history about intelligence. This is one subject that is vastly underrepresented in historical literature, the impact of intelligence on the revolution. Most of us when we went through school, even in College Level dont delve into the importance of intelligence operations on the american revolution. Thats quite problematic because if you look at the strategic imbalance of the revolution, the advantages the british had over the americans, ignoring intelligence aspects you dont get the story about how the United States wins the war. The british at almost every advantage. That a modern professional our method and Battle Tested was the colonists did not. They had a small army reinforcereinforce d by malicious that could not be counted on to win the battle begin. The british had the greatest navy in the world. The americans didnt have a navy to speak out. Of. We have privateers, pirates essentially that we gave the ability to steal and pillage for their pay. Most of the americans didnt actually support independence. Less than half of continental americans supported independence. Thousands fought for the british. Many of the others just want to be left alone. Thats not to mention the thousands of german soldiers and the thousands of native americans that sided with the british cause. Not to mention the fact that the british had the worlds greatest economy. The United States didnt have one at tha the time. We had no central bank and we had a very hard time raising money. So how did we win . Its not that we just wanted it more than they did pick it have a lot to do with the fact we used intelligence better than the british did. That George Washington among others was really good at utilizing information they came in from a network of spies, a network of intelligence apparatus that the setup during this time. Thats what i just will talk about today. Kenneth daigler holds a ba in history from the Center College of kentucky and the masters in history from the school at syracuse university. After he cut his majesty served in the United States marine corps in the late 1960s and quickly thereafter joined the cia. He was a cia Operations Officer in East Asia Division of the National Clandestine service from 1969, 2003 when he returned. Hes written of the things. Under the a pain in the author the Founding Fathers of american intelligence and black dispatches, both written for the cia, both available to the public on the cias website. I advise you to check those out. Hes written numerous articles for Intelligence Community publications industry name as well as pseudonym regarding american intelligence activities from 1765 all the way through the end of the civil war including articles about intelligence with the cia studies of intelligence and the association of former Intelligence Officers journal. He is here to talk about his newest book, spies, patriots, and traitors american intelligence in the revolutionary war id like to introduce him now, wherever he may be. There he is. Please join me and the International Spy museum and welcoming Kenneth Daigler. [applause] thank you. Okay. Let me start by telling you when you write a book, the person youre supposed to do is have a business plan. I did it kind of backwards. I just wrote the book and assume someone would actually read it. Heres the point i want to make. This is the cover of the book, a very distinct of cover. Not my choice but was the publishers choice and they were correct about it. My point is ive just come back from the beach. I thought im going to walk around the beach, maybe a little over at do it and take a look and see what teenagers are reading my book. Ive had to take, i found not one single male or female teenager reading my book. So off you say thats not the target audience. The target audience instead really consists of people are interested in the revolutionary war, because as the introductory said, this is a brandnew way of looking at the war. To see where intelligence activities have impacted that we accept t a popular myth as with the revolutionary went on. The second audience are my fellow colleagues in the intelligence profession. Because here a very interesting opportunity to learn history. As we get into the revolutionary war you find all three of the key elements in the intelligence profession, positive intelligence, counterintelligence and covert action, lady key role in the americans ability to win. And because im doing something that is 250 years old i had the latitude here of naming names, aiming identities, naming sources of information, show what the intelligence reports looked like, showing what the impact they had and talking about sources and methods. Something i cant do obviously in my own background. Why this is the city is because over history, intelligence methods dont change. The fact that the culper ring left her parchment reports in a leather pouch under a rock in a long island cow past year and effective today someone will lealeave an encrypted notes on n obscure website, its the same technology in terms of communication and separation of the individual reporting in the individual who is going to receive the information and use it. So theres a real learning experience here i believe in studying the revolution activity strictly from the point of view of being an intelligence officer. Before i get into the book ive been told by much more experienced officers the first thing youre always asked is why did you write the book. Out the exact started writing the book. I have retired from the agency and spent time consulting with the department of defense. After about four or five years you have really done all you can in terms of transferring what experience and capability of to another organization. So i decided i would retire again and this time i would actually retire and take up a lot of my own personal interests and hobbies and what have you. That worked for about two, two and a half weeks. It all came to conclusion when one saturday, my wife was quite a good potter, had gone to a stooge work and i decide i was going to fix myself lunch it was going to be a bit more than he himself which. I found a vacation was very disorganized. I could not find what it wanted in terms of the ingredients but i couldnt find the plates and glasses i wanted. I had to prepare times are we organized the kitchen. That didnt work out too well. Shortly thereafter i went to work actually writing a book. But the genesis of the book actually comes from over 20 years ago. In the mid 1990s i was in a management position at the agency, and you got to take this timeframe into consideration. This is the mid 90s, the cold war is over with. We defeated the soviet empire. But the issue here is that now, like we always do, because we have one, were going to downsize because we dont have any other enemies out there. Everything is going to be peaceful and wonderful. The order came down from above from the senior management, budgets going to be cut, we will have to do more with less. That phrase normally strikes fear in the heart of any government employee. But the way we decide to do it at the agency was to increase our efforts latest on. So from the security and intelligence liaison. First step was have to a larger facilities so they could hold more meetings with them. So for reasons that are esoteric to the job i was in, i had to create some new spaces. Luckily i had technical architects and interior designers and others who could handle the hard lifting and all i have to do is centralize a little bit. I found out if i went around talking to divisions of the handle the actual liaison, that one of the main issues was well, the Liaison Services understood we had money compared to them to spend. We are very good technically, but we hadnt done it been in business that long, only since world war ii and maybe we didnt quite understand how to handle the more sophisticated aspects of human intelligence. We had to address this problem. I did a Little Research and ended up writing a pamphlet that you had mentioned, the Founding Fathers of american intelligence where we identified George Washington as a key figure in the collection of positive for foreign intelligence, Benjamin Franklin as a key figure in terms of covert action, particularly propaganda. And john jay, surprise a enough, as the key figure in terms of counterintelligence. Wrote the pamphlet. It was kind of well received. We put a printer copies in the liaison rooms and we named each of them after one of these principal figures. Over the years its become institutionalized and as was mentioned it is nowebsite and ir download on the website. Somewhat to my surprise actually quoted in some history books on the revolution. So that basically is the way this all came about. As i said before, the key point behind this book is to look at the revolution intelligence point of view. Im not history but i wouldnt claim to be i have got about 40 years and intelligence so i can claim a little expertise or knowledge in that area. They key is as we go to the revolutionary revolution started in 1765 right through the evacuation of new york in 1783, the book chronicles who was involved in intelligence, the impact it had, the mistakes that were made and how it was done. When we first start, rather than review the book for you i think probably the best approach is to take a couple of key issues that probably everybody in this room knows about from the basic history on the american revolution. I guess weve got to start with one principle that always comes to my when you talk about the revolution, and that, of course, is George Washington. George washington was as chief of the Continental Army, they key consumer for all intelligence during the revolution. Is a small battle staff was his analytical arm, ma but in addition to that he also functioned very much because of economies of scale, his relationship to the small number of troops he had. He also functioned as one of the key intel managers to would actually write specific orders on tradecraft to various and sundry spy rings. Very unusual. Youve got the key consumer, a chief Operations Officer. And even though it was a rather small element then, the tensions that exist today with the same tensions that existed there. Consumer wants the information right away. The operator wants to get it as quick as possible to protect the forces, but if they have the capability to information once again. You see that when you look to what washington did. Washington ran an incredibly sophisticated operation when you consider who he was and all the other issues he had to do with in terms of logistics, military strategy, leadership and the politics of the time. Washington was an expert at what i would say is probably the most ethical aspect of intelligence, exception planning. Deception planning. Deception planning allowed him on many occasions all strategic to completely fool the british commanders as to the size of his arm and what he planned to do with it. Yet for deception operations you need three key factors that are very hard to put together. Number one, youve got to be able to control the information that is coming out from your site. So theres a steady stream only of what you want done. No leaking and also often falsifying internal reporting to Junior Officers so that they can inadvertently say whats going on. Number two, youve got to have sources, Double Agents primarily or people who are friendly with the adversary to whom you can purposefully leak information so that you know the information is going to the adversarys command. And thirdly, if this is really the key that most people forget, youve got to have the sources within any command to know that your message is not only Getting Better but also that is coming back and you can reverberate it back in way to make the enemy truly believe theyre making the decision and providing a validation for that information. Pretty darn sophisticated for a guy who was busy with a lot of other stuff. So how did he get to learn this . Obviously its not something you just learned by thinking about it. If you go back to his early diaries as early as 1753, you find the first time he was sent to the ohio country by the royal governor of virginia to see what the french were doing, he started to own his skills not only in elicitation and debriefing, but also in observation. One key point he makes in his journal from the fall of 53 is very fascinating. He was kept at a certain french for intel the Commanding Officer from the French Forces would come in seeking. They knew he was important. He was able to observe and have a good memory are good enough to write it down of what the fort looked like, the number of french soldiers, the number of cannon, et cetera but he could have no feel for those French Forces that were outside the fort or the indian allies ahead. What did he do in his spare time . He walked up and down the river bank and counted all the canoes and extrapolated from their exactly what type of a force could be moved at any given time. You get to 1754, he goes back out and involves himself in fighting with the french and to find he is able to use disorders not on in terms of very sophisticated debriefing but also in terms of getting this information and using them as propaganda value to encourage more assertions from the enemy. I the time you get to 1755 when hes an unofficial aide to general braddock, you find hes also running a great deal about the operational secured aspects of the military movements, of putting out advanced troops, but also the mistake braddock made which was he did not have any intelligence forward of his main attacking force. So 20 years before in august 1775 he takes over the army, hes already starting to develop the intelligence experience. Its not unusual with someone like him it has worked to his advantage. One of the things you need if youre going to start a revolution is you need political organization. In 1765 with the stamp act, you start to have small groups in all of the coastal cities and some of the inland cities who decided theyre going to organize politically against the stamp act and that type of taxation. In the course of 10 years a Group Calling themselves the sons of liberty evolve into a sophisticated United Front Organization as anything weve ever seen that when norma associate with communist party type of organization, the soviet union and the chinese. Whats fascinating is in most American History texts you look at the sons of revolution and you see a caricature, you see a caricature of drunken people, maybe tar and feather in some government administrator are writing him around on a log or dancing drunkenly around a liberty bowl. Let me take him there was a lot more sophisticated than that. Starting in the mid1760s, gentlemen sam adams who gets a lot less credit than he deserves start to organize the various groups of individuals calling themselves sons of liberty all along the coast, although with the massachusetts down to charleston. By the time you get to the mid1770s, this is an organization that is put its people in all the key Political Leadership to the prudential congresses, committees of safety, the militia units and what have you. Youve got a United Front Organization that started out with a very broad idea that they were going to oppose taxation. And by the mid 70s youve got an organization that has decided they want political independence. An organization that can not only put people in the street, often mobs, often much more sophisticated type of groups to send a message, youve got a propaganda element where the majority of the printers who in those days were actual newspaper publishers, members of the sons of liberty and have established a courier route so that within weeks the same perspective on a political event or an opposition approaches to the administration of the brisk in, all the way from massachusetts down to the southern colonies with exactly the same message. A very Strong Political force. In addition youve got a paramilitary force. By the time you get to about 1773 the british recognized where they dont physically have military, i have virtually no control. These paramilitary forces, these militia forces are at this point making sure that they take over the powder, take over the arms from the various ministerial colonies. By the time you get to 73 and 74, youve got these forces forming up, not engaging in forming up to stop British Forces from coming back to try and these arms or try to we occupy a force. By the time you get to 1775, of course you have concord and lexington. What is fascinating about this is that the very final evolution of the United Front Group from an intelligence point of view, it becomes an Intelligence Organizations and thats what happened the first with the committees of safety were able to monitor exactly what the british were doing at the major installations and locations. For example, thanks to the committee of safety in boston, the militia and the sons of liberty is exactly what route the british were going to take to get to concord because two months earlier they had monitored the two officers that colonel gage sent out to go down there. So all they had to find out than was timing and they were able to do that to a Second Organization they set up which in theory is the founding of the First American Intelligence Organization called the mechanics, a group led operationally by paul revere, but more leadership wise by two other members, dr. Joseph warren and dr. Benjamin church. This organization actually was offensive and had penetrations of general gages command. So that by the time t they got o lexington and concord they not only knew what place is going to be attacked, when the movement started but the exact route that was going to be taken down there and, obviously, back. It puts an entirely different light on why the bridge took so many casualties and why these diverse militia groups from all over Central Massachusetts were able to hone in as well as they were on the march back because they had advanced knowledge of it. I always say if you want to connect something to modern affairs, lets look at what another former intelligence officer, Vladimir Putin it did recently in tiny. If you want to look and see how he was able to very effectively shut off the greater government of ukraine from crimea, all you got to do is look at the way the sons of liberty did it because its the exactly the same structure he worked over a period of time. You find many other examples of that in the book. If you extrapolate, you will see is still going on today. Now, i think the second thing i would like to talk about is a covert Action Campaign that we really dont get enough credit to. After the conflict actually started, the colonial forces actually found that the very little in the way of what you sticks necessary to carry on a war. In the colonies there was virtually no capability to create gunpowder. Very little capability to great firearms, very little capability to create cannon or any type of heavy artillery. They found they needed that. How do you handle like Something Like that if youre a Revolution Organization . You create a covert Action Campaign which is what was done with the assistance of france. Like all good covert Action Campaigns, this started on a dark and stormy night in december in 1775 at Carpenters Hall in philadelphia when Benjamin Franklin, the head of a newly created Continental Congress committee called the committee of secret correspondence, met with an individual traveling as a flemish merchant who in reality was a secret agent from the king of france. Now come on talking december 1775 or in the course of three nights they discussed what helped france would provide, and the americans, franklin, promised to think. He promised, number one, we will declare political independence from great britain. Number two, he promised we will defeat the british army. What was the result . The result was the creation of a company phenomenal led by an individual named pierre beaumarchais. For those of you who are literary oriented you might know beaumarchais because he wrote the marriage of figaro which became quite well known. He actually was another secret agent operating for the king of france. Under him, he created a company that by 1778 had over 100 sailing ships that delivered hundreds of tons of gunpowder, stacks of weapons, tannins, other military supplies for two years not allow the Continental Army to exist. Without these military supplies, it was doubtful that washington wouldve been able to fight as long as he had. At bunker hill, for example, before the ships started rolling in, they had two shots per person. By the time you get to december 1776, a very crucial time, they are down to about three shots per person but a much smaller army, effective probably 3000 people. A very important asset. Three people connected with that were of course Benjamin Franklin who at that point became the diplomatic head of the paris commission, u. S. His first diplomatic session in paris and, of course, beaumarchais operating behind the scenes under an alias running his company and then thirdly agenda been named Robert Morris in philadelphia. It was his job to get the colonies to produce the Agricultural Products that could be sent back to europe to repay the various loans. Now, there is a very famous cartoon, political cartoon, and i think it was from the Chicago Tribune that are not absolutely sure but it mightve been in a new york paper. It had to do with world war i went like Jack Pershing made the famous line, lafayette, we are here, meaning were returning the favor of which help with during the american revolution. Its a beautiful drawing. It has the american doughboys with the tin hats and rifles and long bayonets landing on the coast of france. And then up on the cliffs is a ghostly figure of lafayette. And the voice coming out of the american troops, lafayette, we are here. The french historian told me that what lock it should have responded was yes, but did you bring your checkbook . The reason for that is we never paid back any of the loan that the british i mean the french gave us in assistance against the british. We are talking millions of dollars which in those days was big money. Never paid it back. Interesting point to keep in mind when they get so concerned other countries dont pay us back on the aid we gave them. Let me to you about probably what i think is the key point in the war where intelligence played such an important role. Theres a couple of points here. Affect time out i going to another one but it was december 1776, washington had just been swept out of new york. He was pushed across new jersey. Its snowing. Is down to about maybe an army of 5000 people effective, maybe 3000. They have no ammunition. These guys are marching literally barefoot through the snow. Enlistments are about to go up in january. This is a low point. Washington actually is thinking at this point because if i cant do something, im going to take what troops ive got an ongoing was to the alleghenies am going to conduct a protracted war from back there. God knows how that wouldve worked out. But then it turns all around because we all know what happened. We all know he decides to move across the delaware and to attack trenton, and some schooling attract attack princeton which turns the whole morale of the army around, causes the colonies to resupply them with troops. And you start to see supplies coming in. It allows him to have a safe winter. Why did that all happened . It all happened because of intelligence. It happened because he knew exactly the order of battle, who was sitting in princeton. He knew it was colonel raul hession regiment, who had fought all the way from long island to manhattan and through new jersey. Knew they were a Battle Tested group, tough guys. He also knew that they had been in constant combat now for about five months. He knew that the new jersey militia had basically had them surrounded at trenton, had been picking away at them, and hindered any of their efforts to go and get logistics such as firewood or local Agricultural Products, have it constantly attacked the outposts, had kept them on guard all the time since the established the position at princeton. He also knew, in my belief, a lot about colonel raul, primarily from an individual named John Honeyman. Theres some debate about whether John Honeyman sister is true. I happen to believe it is explain the. Honeyman new raul and was a spy for washington and was able to to washington that raul was a strong prussian character who i dont respect for the american soldier whatsoever. To the point he refused to build fortifications around written. His famous quote is, if the americans are foolish enough to attack, we will repel them with our bayonets. He understood the enemy and understood weakness of the enemy. Syncing is true with princeton as well. Thanks to some crucial debriefing of deserters and his knowledge of the troops who were at princeton and the fact that a spy, only referred to as a young gentleman, was able to tell him the defensive positions around princeton and the one unguarded area that the british had not put up a defense. Okay, so washington was unable to take princeton, another victory, another bit of morale and few more troops go some more enlistments. At a very crucial time in our history. He ends it all up with an excellent exception plan that causes deception plan. This is a classic deception plan to among other things, writing a false estimates of troop strength, leaving them in places where merchants inventory connections are traveling through and just happened to see them on a persons desk when a person is called out of the room. Or taking this includes and as a british prisoners were being exchanged having them take a route right past a troop concentration were troops with different flags are marched in circular to indicate that he had more than he had. Or lighting up certain buildings to indicate occupancy that isnt there. All of which saves them in the crucial, crucially were buried from december of 76 until well in the spring of 77. Finally let me Say Something about yorktown. I think were all over of yorktown and how important that was. Why we seldom dwell on is that yorktown was made possible because of the strong destruction plan that washington used for some nine months against the british commander general clinton in new york making him believe that as the French Forces and the American Forces were meeting above new york, that their intent was to attack new york city which kept clinton from reinforcing cornwallis down in the tidewater area. The book goes into some detail as to exactly the sources he used, some of whom were some of his most valuable intelligence sources because they were individuals with the british had recruited three and four years, and actually used as couriers to carry the command instructions up to canada and down to the south. So he was willing to use some of his best collection capabilities at this point for the deception operation. Obviously, extremely effective. But we never hear much about that. What we hear about is how cornwallis was defeated. And it was due primarily to the deception plan that kept clinton be leaving that new york was the target until all of the americans, and most of the French Forces have actually moved south to the city. At that point it was too late because the french fleet had effectively blocked off the tidewater. Now, ive got to also say a couple words about the two people that we always associate with spying in the revolutionary war. If you know anything about the revolutionary war, if you read any books on it but its a biography or an actual book on the war, if you look under spies you were probably going to find two names, youll find nathan hale and Benedict Arnold. But the truth of the matter is most of what we know about nathan hale is frankly a myth, created by merit in the early 19th century. From an intelligence point of view the one thing to note the nathan hale is if you want to run a good intelligence operation from selecting an agent to having an objective to how you train to value the do communication, you do everything opposite than what was done with nathan hale. He was a very brave man, deserves a lot of respect for being willing to die for his country. But he was an incredibly poor choice for his job. Ill give you one prime example. This was a man who did not believe in telling a lie. Let me tell you, you dont want an intelligence agent behind enemy lines who was not willing to tell a lie because it doesnt work out very well. And also with all his faults and how badly the operation was structured, and i frankly blame washington for this in the book because he had the ultimate responsibility, it turned out that the reason he was caught was not inherently because of mistakes that were made. Its because the british had a better counterintelligence officer working against them, and individual named Robert Rogers who some of you might remember as the head of rogers rangers in the french and indian war. Second one, Benedict Arnold to Benedict Arnold is a very interesting figure because there still people today who say well, he was a hero at a certain given point and weve got to give him some latitude. He was really harassed by the Continental Congress, the politics of this really bad, he paid out of his own pocket and wasnt reimbursed, et cetera. Some of this is true although it happened to many of the people and they did not become traitors. But when you analyze this strickland from an intelligence point of view as i did in the book, defined as opposed to this being a huge blow to the american cause, in reality it was probably one of the two biggest blunders that British Intelligence made. Because they handled him so badly. His volunteering effort was almost put aside for other things. He was not vetted before. All because the officer handled it, young major andre, was a staff officer much more attuned to handling the social responsibilities of being an aide to the commanding general than the intelligence aspects of the. Had the Benedict Arnold been properly handled and kept in place, the damage he couldve done to the revolution at that point may not have changed the course of the war would have changed the course of negotiation which lead to peace. So i honestly believe if you look at the revolution from a political point of view or a leadership point of view or an economic point of view, ive read books that looked at it from a marxist point of view, that adding the intelligence overlay allows the individual to take a much better look at why things happened the way they did. Another aspect that frankly i think has been to a large degree ignored except perhaps in four or five books since the 1940s. [applause] am i on . Thats better. Thank you. Now well have the opportunity to ask questions. After the question and answer period he will be in the back signing books if youre interested. We have a pretty significant supply of these books. They have been selling well. First, opened it up for any questions. Wait for the microphone, please, that way we can pick it up on the camera. Well, my question is not directly related to the book itself but im just curious as most people are im sure during the museum. We know most cia agents are spies who are kind of sign, but then every now and then you hear people say i retired from the cia. So are they supposed to know that they work in the cia or not everybody is a spy in the cia . So i dont know what the difference is. I we supposed to know or not . When you are on active duty, if youre an Operations Officer you are connecting your connection is not made public in most cases. But also gets misconstrued. A spy is a windows access information with valley. The cia officers seldom has the. Normally a cia officers job is to recruit and effectively manage and collect reporting from what you would call a spy, someone who has the access. So in the cia person refers to himself as a spy or herself as a spy, youve got to kind of wonder what the thinking is. I dont know. Im sorry, that would be a whole course in itself. I just when we went to world war ii and we helped the french against the nazi germany, do you think that we felt indebted to the french on some level because of their help to us over the revolutionary war . I think we probably we paid that did after world war i with horrible bloodshed and the amount of money that we poured into a. I think that the point of world war ii it was simply they need for a strong ally presents to overcome a vastly superior german army at the time. Thank you very much. You made only brief mention, and, of course, this is a brief talk of Robert Kohlberg junior, samuel called virginia, to name Robert Townsend. I have long wondered why the cia theres a statute of nathan hale who failed and not one of Robert Townsend it was a Great Success . You also mentioned andrea andre, and o honesty that westminster not westminster, yeah, westminster, dick cheney has the king had a lengthy what do you call it . Yeah, epitaph, thank you. Epitaph which includes the phrase that he showed too much zeal, which, of course, is what killed them and what destroyed their chance to have arnold as a longterm asset. Exactly. I agree with you but i often wondered why we had nathan hale there. There is a statute outside of the auditorium between the Main Building and the auditorium at cia headquarters of nathan hale. Hale. Its the pakistan gc probably in 150, 175 places around the u. S. Their heroic pose as an individual. Truth of the matter is what no idea what nathan hale looked like. Its yet another part of the entire myth. But he deserves credit because he was more than willing to die for his country. Others work. The culprit of course have a renewed interest now because of the amc series turn. And a book that is a historical fiction book called the secret six that is able to play out characterizations a little bit better because theyre able to use this, a fictional approach to it. The issue of spying on allied powers as currently surfaced. Im wondering, during the revolution were their espionage operations against our french allies . By the british and the bridge did an excellent job of penetrating the french government and also penetrating extremely well our diplomatic spying on the french . No. We were too busy basically hanging on. There was however one proven, well, in paris the french government watched the three commissioners, the american commissioners very carefully, and there is reporting on the. But in the army itself one of the foreign contractors, this is an interesting point, they started a tradition that today people seem to think started during one of the gulf wars which was the hiring of contractors to serve in the u. S. Army. At Continental Congress hired a lot of Foreign Military officers and specialist fields and engineering and artillery because the expertise didnt exist in america. One of those officers, dekalb, was a french spy who, while, he died gallantly leading maryland troops by the reported back privately his view of how the war was going to the french government. Something that a military attache would do today was attached to a foreign government. In my previous experience in National Interests of the various countries are always different. So consequently it was always good for policymakers to know somebody elses agenda is. My understanding is that spine was not a very gentlemanly thing to do in the 18th century. Whats interesting about nathan hale is he was a gentleman. I believe that his friends tried to talk him out of taking on this mission because it wasnt a very gentlemanly thing to be a spy. And i wondered if you might talk about that a little bit, and if George Washington had any feelings about that . He did. Thats a very good point. The first individual selected by colonel knowlton, and colonel knowltons rangers was the army claims to be the First Military intelligence group, which is the reason the insignia of 1775 on it, that was the group that washington asked to select someone to go behind the enemy lines in new york. The first individual that knowlton wanted to do this job refuse for exactly the reason you said. He said no, im a gentleman. Youre right, many of nathan hales friends did try to talk about accepting it because it was not considered gentlemanly. To comment on washington is are interesting, it goes back to what burton was saying about the culper ring. While the war was going on, washington was very generous with his money, and even more generous with his advice on how this very complex espionage ring in new york was supposed to be run, known as the culper ring. Right after the war was over with, and i note in my book the absolute truth that after the war, the infantrymen and intelligence agent is really considered a much less fronted like than ever during a war. He writes very tellingly, now i am not sure that all the money i spent on the culper ring was worthwhile. Truth of the matter it was, but for exactly that reason because washington also was a gentleman, and im not suggesting that townsend wasnt or anything like that, but youre right, that concept of its beneath me to spy, that, i think frankly today is still true. Now, this is directed towards the french. In the world wars, do you think it we would and have cried out for french to help us, do you think the wars would have gone quicker and more swiftly . The french government was in a position where they were not adequately prepared to actually declare war on the british until after the battle of saratoga. Where the American Forces proved they were Strong Enough to defeat an army in the field. It was really touch and go. I mean, we came so close in december 1776, 2 totally dissipating as an army that is remarkable. In the faceting aspect of saratoga is that historians estimate that 80 plus or setback at the gunpowder used by the american troops during the two battles that comprise Saratoga Campaign came from ward has and company. Without them there couldve been no win but that allowed Benjamin Franklin to use some propaganda and some other aspects and at that point the french crown had actually turned over its armament by selling off the old armament for shipment to the u. S. To the point that it was able to take on great britain, along with spain. [inaudible] you talked about the fact that since its a long ago, you have the lecture talking about sources and methods and you can use real names. On the other hand, been so long ago, documentary evidence is problematic and certainly when we talk about intelligence and how close to the vest that washington capped a lot of its spy rings, a lot of what ive heard about intelligence from this comes even after the war when washington is building the Continental Congress and the amount of money out of pocket. How difficult was it to come up with actual evidence for writing this book . Something new, because the time in between makes documents very difficult to come up with. The primary documents are often difficult not just because theyre so old, but if youve ever tried to rea read this phoe from someone who wrote in the 18th century, god help you. You will need glasses. But washington is very good about protecting sources and methods. However occasionally he would slip. In the case of the culper ring, and a lot of subsequent documents were found in the papers of certain individuals involved, some of his staff people. But also in the pension records because by the 1830s, youve found extensive pension records explaining what they did during a war and then justifications that involved officers affirmations of the actions that allows you to look at it. Theres one individual, thats because it speaks to your point, named david mcclain, one of washingtons very good Intelligence Officers on several occasions. Not only around philadelphia and also very personal reconnaissance that allowed wayne to eventually to a net charge and take that please. He was also in other places. But his documents are really fascinating because this was a very disorganized guy. This was a guy who when he had a thought would take whatever piece of paper he had and would simply write down what he thought. So you have a bill for a horse dated one time and on the back you had something written such as arnold is involved with the british, which he did right. Of course, you would have no idea when he wrote that. Whether he voted before or after the fact because he had written it on the back of a piece of paper. Its a real challenge to in the case of general greenwald mike Dunn Research but i simply through his 26 lines of correspondence and went back and went to sensei a look at some of your correspondents. Thats what it took 20 years. Where the british, the military spies that were british, were there any other reason other than greed that they were spying for americas . Weve got to be very carefully about who is a spy for the british because everybody was a british until what i mean seriously, its not fair to call someone who is loyal to the crown a spy. Very few examples of high level spies within the american structure. Benjamin church is the best example, and he was a nasty spy. He did it stripper from a this is the guy and mentioned earlier was one of the leaders of the mechanics, the first Intelligence Organization. What i didnt mention was general gates actually the first Intelligence Organization penetrated because he did have church reporting on it, but it put him in a very faceting situation because if you bothered to arrest all of the leaders of the mechanics, then the committee, the son delivery wouldve set up another group and you wouldnt know who they were. So its kind of a ci problem come you constantly have. Its the devil you know versus the devil you dont know if you decide to arrest people as opposed to monitor what they are doing. After we were supplied by the French Company for two years, did we find a way of making our own guns or did that Companies Keep supplying us . After 1778 and the formal alliance with france, french warships could then escort, transport bringing military supplies in. Before then it had to be done covertly, clandestinely through caribbean islands or things like that. Once the weight of the French Military could come to play, it was an entirely different deal. But we never got to the point where we produce the gunpowder or arms in any sizable number and that goes through the war of 1812 for that matter. Please check all right, please join me again in the International Spy museum in thanking someone for taking the time to talk about his book today. He will be in the back sign it if you want to ask any further question or to want to purchase a book and have him sign it for you, he is available for that. So thank you again. [applause] [inaudible conversations] is there a Nonfiction Author or book you would like to see featured on booktv . Send us an email to booktv cspan. Org, tweet us apple tv our posts on our wall, facebook. Com booktv