Читать книгу The Secrets of Spies - Weldon Owen - Страница 44

The transformation of Europe and North America from mainly

rural societies into industrial powerhouses gave them the means

to dominate the rest of the world in a manner never seen before.

Although the United States largely abstained from empire-building,

the major European powers engaged in an orgy of territorial

conquest in Asia and Africa. The Europeans used both armed

might and intelligence agencies to oversee their subject peoples.

Within the Western nations, the pace of change was bewildering,

not least for spy chiefs and their agents. Advances in communications

transformed the spy’s role, allowing them to travel hundreds of

miles in a day on the new railroads and transmit intelligence reports

via telegraph over even longer distances in a matter of minutes.

The nineteenth century also witnessed a dramatic expansion in

population, leading to the creation of a new social order in the form

of a middle class that helped organize the new industrial system

and a working class that provided its labor. Both classes rocked the

old order, and the establishment devoted much time and effort

to suppress or at least subvert movements for change. Spies and

secret agents offered their services to all sides in these conflicts.