J.R. Seeger
From the beginning of World War II in Europe in 1939, a formal, albeit limited, liaison relationship existed between the intelligence and security services of the United Kingdom and their American counterparts—the Army and Navy intelligence staffs and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Like many modern liaison relationships, the U.S.-UK relationship at the time was problematic, limited by suspicion and, at times, outright hostility. This changed in the 1940 when U.S. presidential envoy William J. Donovan travelled to the United Kingdom with instructions to report back to President Franklin Roosevelt on the likelihood of its survival. The president’s decision to go outside normal bureaucratic channels and send a civilian to answer his questions would change the nature of the intelligence relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom forever.
In the spring of 1941, the British had been at war for nearly two years. Their intelligence services had matured under the pressure of an effective German counterespionage program inside occupied Europe run by an aggressive military intelligence service (the Abwehr), and the Nazi party intelligence and security services—the Geheimstatspolizei (Gestapo) and the Sicherheitdienst (SD). When Donovan arrived in London, the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) leadership saw little benefit in providing their U.S. counterparts with anything other than leads to counterespionage investigations that would prevent Nazi sabotage at U.S. ports.
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