NATO's Secret Armies by Daniele Ganser

Author:Daniele Ganser [Ganser, Daniele]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General
ISBN: 9780714685007
Google: _5kcvgAACAAJ
Publisher: Frank Cass
Published: 2005-01-15T15:52:19+00:00

11

THE SECRET WAR IN THE NETHERLANDS

As in neighbouring Belgium, the stay-behind secret army of the Netherlands originated from the country’s Second World War occupation experience. The Netherlands, as Dutch strategists later lamented, had not erected a stay-behind before the Second World War due to lack of money, lack of visions and concerns in the context of neutrality. Then in May 1940 the Netherlands were occupied by the German Army and the Dutch government together with the Dutch royals and privileged figures of the political, military and economic sphere had to leave Dutch soil hastily and chaotically for Great Britain. GS III, the Section Intelligence of the Dutch General Staff, had warned too late of the German attack and had thus failed bitterly in what would have been its most important task. Due to the hasty retreat there was logistic distress in many areas, and the Dutch ministers who in May 1940 arrived in London could hardly carry out their work for a lack of crucial documents. For many within the military and security services it was clear that such a chaotic escape was never to happen again and that after the war preparations against a potential future invasion had to be taken very seriously.

After the chaotic escape of the government in May 1940 the homeland was occupied for almost five consecutive traumatic years by the Germans. The Dutch government in London, which almost completely lacked reliable intelligence on its occupied home country, sent agents into the Netherlands with the task of collecting intelligence, organising resistance and engaging in small-scale covert action operations. As in Belgium these Dutch operations were carried out in close cooperation with the British, above all together with the newly created British Special Operations Executive (SOE). However, the Germans with disastrous effects quickly infiltrated the hastily created units. In one of the greatest disasters for the SOE, the so-called Englandspiel, the Dutch section of SOE was secretly penetrated by the Germans who thereafter controlled the transmitters and read the communication. Dozens of agents fell straight into enemy hands as a result and never returned.

During the war the Dutch and the British established intimate ties and London advised the Dutch on the reorganisation of their destroyed and chaotic secret service apparatus. According to the advice of the British two new services were created in the early 1940s during the London exile. The Bureau Inlichtingen (BI) was established in November 1942 with the task of collecting intelligence. And the Bureau Bijzondere Opdrachten (BBO) was created with the task of carrying out special operations. Together with the British SOE special units, the BBO parachuted into the occupied country. When the war was over both the BI and BBO were closed down. But in subsequent years much of their personnel was directly involved in setting up the Dutch stay-behind.

BI member C. L. W. Fock had insisted during the war that in the future the Netherlands had to be better prepared and in peacetime a stay-behind should be erected in the country. Also his superior J.

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