The History of Military Intelligence

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the origins of military intelligence from its beginnings in the ancient world, through the middle ages to its status today. It provides an insight into the beginnings of American military intelligence from its first agency formed in 1889 by Gen. R. C. Drum known as the Military Information Division, or MID. It plots its course of its history including Van Deman's first complete, national level, intelligence agency in 1915 which was responsible for counterespionage, cryptology and included a Corps of Intelligence Police. It also looks at the formation of G2, the intelligence branch of the Army and ONI, which handled naval intelligence as well as the Office of Coordinator of Information (COI), the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and finally the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1947.

From the Paper:

"OSS was also responsible for the development of new technologies. Smaller, more reliable weapons were constantly being created in the secret research facilities the OSS operated. In addition to new technologies, OSS was also responsible, as mentioned above, for providing reliable information. To do this it needed agents in foreign countries. To keep them supplied with the correct currency became a tedious task. The Axis, aware that there were OSS agents abroad, began marking bills, rendering certain series useless. It was often necessary to obtain funds off the black market at outrageous exchange rates."

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