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BRITANNIA CHALLENGED:

THE CREATION OF MI5 AND MI6

CHAPTER 3  NINETEENTHCENTURY INTELLIGENCE

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Throughout most of the nineteenth century, the powerful Royal Navy had seemed

sufficient to protect British interests. But in the early 1900s, a new anxiety arose in

Britain that its security was being undermined by threats at home and abroad.

The rapid expansion of the Imperial German Navy in the early years of the twentieth century caused alarm in

Britain, its position of naval supremacy under threat from a potentially hostile power. This alarm grew into a

paranoia—stoked by the popular press—that Germany was preparing to invade Britain, and that there must

be an army of German spies already operating in the country to aid the invasion attempt. It was against this

background that Britain created an organized intelligence and security service.

The Secret Intelligence Bureau was formed in 1909, with military and naval

sections. A year later, they were divided into two separate organizations. The

military section became a security service responsible for counterespionage

in Britain (later designated Military Intelligence 5, or MI5), and the naval

section was uprated into a secret intelligence service, running agents

abroad (subsequently MI6).

MONITORING GERMANS

The first head of MI5 was Captain Vernon Kell, a man

of limited intellectual horizons but an efficient

administrator with a knack for empire building.

MI5 initially consisted of a single office, a

desk, and one filing cabinet—plus Kell and

seven assistants. Working closely with

the police, who provided much of the

manpower, Kell set about compiling

an “Alien Register”—a list of

foreigners in the country that,

by 1914, had grown to a figure of

16,000 (11,000 of them German).

MI5 received its first lucky break in

1911 when the police became suspicious

of a German journalist named Max Schultz.

Below: The SMS

König Albert

, pictured in 1913, a heavily armed

Kaiser-class battleship that strengthened the German navy.

Right: Kaiser

Wilhelm II came to

the throne in 1888

with a long-term

plan to expand

Germany’s navy.

Above: Vernon Kell