Missing Pieces: - Royal Australian Navy

10 Missing Pieces
facing RAN commanders as they embarked upon operations in the face of their enemies,
as illustrated in the case histories reconstructed in this book. However, I need to sound a
note of caution about the completeness of the record. First, there are some peculiarities
in the recording of intelligence, as quotes from two other researchers demonstrate:
Because so much of the work goes unrecorded on paper, lost forever
in scrambled talk and burnt teleprinter flimsies, any account must be
incomplete. One runs, therefore, the risk of arousing the historian’s
interest without fully satisfying his curiosity. 18
Intelligence is a fascinating and infuriating subject. Deceit, mystification
and secrecy are inherent in intelligence. You know from the outset that
you will not get the full story, nor will you even be correct in all you
write. In few fields of research will you meet more obstruction and be
told more lies. 19
I encountered all these diffculties and more in researching this book. Quite odd
restrictions placed on access to official records by modern-day security and intelligence
agencies complicated the task. However, a larger problem is that of the destruction
of records. Enormous damage has been done by the inappropriate disposal of records
by many government authorities without regard to the need to preserve their past.
So let me state quite plainly that the accounts in this book have necessarily been
constructed from fragmentary and often conflicting evidence. The reconstructions,
therefore, can only be approximations but I am as confident as one can be that they
are substantially accurate.