COURTING A RELUCTANT ALLY - National Intelligence University

Since the Tizard Mission had only a temporary mandate, the two U.S. militarydepartments and the NDRC were extremely interested in setting up permanenttechnical exchange missions, as the benefits of the cooperative endeavorwere so manifest. In October 1940, Knox and Secretary of War Stimson formalizedtheir agreement on the exchange of technical secrets with the British and,in November, the Navy notified Professor Cockroft, Tizard’s successor, that theNavy desired to continue with technical exchanges on a permanent basis. 242 InJanuary 1941, the British made non-reciprocal exchange of information withthe Americans a standing policy and by April 1941, the Navy’s desires concerninga permanent exchange mechanism had become a reality when a U.S. technicalexchange mission, under Dr. James Conant of the NDRC, was established inLondon and a similar British mission, under Sir Charles Darwin, was establishedin Washington DC. 243 In large measure, this mission burst the shackles ofmistrust and bargaining that had inhibited the exchange of information betweenthe two countries. The Tizard Mission was designed to exchange technicalsecrets, but a significant amount of general intelligence was also shared duringthe course of this undertaking. 244Zimmerman’s final assessment of the Tizard Mission was that it did much toalleviate the deep mistrust the two countries had for one another and “played acritical part in building the special relationship that characterized the WesternAlliance.” 245 The archival evidence and the research done by James Leutze bearout Zimmerman’s contention, as the period from August to October 1940 demonstrateda marked change in the attitudes of the Navy Department concerninginformation exchange with their British counterparts. As evidenced by Knox’sletter and RADM Bowen’s reactions, the British openness had a positive effect onthe Americans and vindicated the policies that Godfrey, Tizard, Hill, and Poundhad advocated so strenuously. The Tizard Mission was just one of a number ofBritish attempts to tie America more closely to its war effort. Other efforts, suchas the Standardization of Arms Talks, would set the stage for the move towardalliance in 1941.242 Leutze, “Technology and Bargaining,” 59; Walter S. Anderson, RADM, USN, Director ofNaval Intelligence, Letter to Professor Cockroft, 20 November 1940, DNI Correspondence, 1.243Zimmerman, 182; Leutze, “Technology and Bargaining,” 60.244 Although the Tizard Mission primarily focused on exchanging scientific secrets, it alsoaddressed the exchange of information about specific capabilities that each of the countries possessed,capabilities developed to address the threats identified by their intelligence organizations.Moreover, the British briefings on their capabilities would follow a pattern whereby a scientistwould brief the technology and an operator would brief on the employment of the system in actualcombat, sometimes accompanied by a film of the system being used against the Germans. Thesebriefings had a very powerful effect on the Americans, as they contained valuable intelligence inaddition to useful technical information. For additional information see Zimmerman, 120-121.245 Zimmerman, 6.68