Double O . . . . Pigeon? What???

 

You may have seen a pigeon today, perhaps you have seen many pigeons today, perhaps thousands. But perhaps instead it has been you who has been under constant surveillance. Perhaps each pigeon you have spotted today has reported on your every action, your comings and goings, your meetings and all those who you have interacted with. Perhaps you thought that your dead drop was slick and unobserved? Wrong! Perhaps you thought you were able to switch out of enough cars and engage in enough twists and turns in the city to alleviate yourself of all the tails you were trying to  avoid. Wrong!! All observed and reported. 

     Though the lead in above is tongue-in-cheek, I recently read a book which absolutely fascinated me with the way that pigeons were actually used in World War Two, and how the intelligence they gathered could have significantly changed the course of the war, potentially saving many many lives. In Gordon Corera's Operation Columba: The Secret Pigeon Service, Corera describes in explicit detail the way that the British ran a pigeon intelligence operation that was not only extremely serious, that not only demonstrated its value in a communication that was received via pigeon, but that sadly was halted from realizing its full potential due to internal strife and politicks within the British war effort. 

     In the initial parts of this book, Corera lays out the reality of war at a time before modern communication equipment, even radio was at that time very primitive. From a military perspective, though radio would permit nearly instant communication over long distances, it would not provide the secrecy needed to gain a tactical advantage via the communication of up to the minute information. But as he points out, Pigeons like to return to where they grow up. That is, if you have a pigeon that is being grown in a particular cubbyhole at Person 1352's house, and you then release that pigeon from some distance away, then that pigeon will instinctively fly toward its cubbyhole at Person 1352's house. Upon reading this reality, it made immediate sense to me why this was desirable. If some pigeon could be made to carry sensitive tactically advantageous material from behind enemy lines, even from deep within enemy territory, it could more than likely be expected to fly to its cubbyhole within a few hours, sufficiently fast at that time to permit the exploitation of a strategic advantage. 

     From this purely technical aspect and the manner in which the British outfitted and sourced these pigeons, it became clear how they were used for the war effort. Reading these technical details opened my eyes to an aspect of intelligence work to which I had up until that moment remained utterly ignorant. Never before had I ever wondered why some pigeons were referred to as "homing pigeons", never before had I ever looked at a pigeon and thought intelligence asset, never before had I considered them as a military animal. I felt utterly green, a total beginner. 

     At the same time, it was entirely clear to me why such a technique would have remained unknown to me. For one thing, this particular program - "Operation Columba" - was utterly secret and the documents surrounding this program were hidden in British Archives until Mr. Corera read them and compiled them into his book. For another thing, such techniques are really no longer needed, as secret means of communication in real time are much more available to intelligence agents. Moreover, such techniques as the use of a pigeon to transmit information seems to be something that is unlikely to emerge in popular culture, as it seems so mundane and boring to include, even though most spycraft is actually mundane and boring. For example, imagine pitching a film producer on the idea of a scene where the spy hero is going to attach a message to a bird which will return to the spy's handlers. It seems to me that such a pitch would end up with the producer laughing, the pitcher being escorted out, or if listened to, being discouraged from including such a detail in the film. As opposed to a heated chase scene or something of this nature, the mundane ordinary reality of statecraft is something that is less sexy than one might think, and is less convincing to producers as something that will look good on film. I have to confess just briefly that I am well aware that there are great producers and directors out there who would have used such minutia in their films, and have seen such great films before, but these are of course the unfortunate exception. It is easier to sell a shoot-it-up production, which I of course - I must admit with great shame - also enjoy. One such great film is the legendary The Day of the Jackal, which I recommend without any hesitation or reservation whatever.  As a final reason I would be unlikely to have previously become aware of this technique is the simple fact that as time passes, the different techniques that previous humans used for different tasks begin to be lost to history. Writers who grow up in a world absent of these old techniques have less chance of being exposed to these techniques, and hence less chance to write about such techniques, and little by little the transmission of such techniques begins to diminish to a trickle, later to drips, and finally silence.  

     But it is the very human drama that Mr. Corera brings up surrounding the internal politics of the pigeon operation, the posturing and battle behind the scenes in the British Ministry of Defense, the different personalities and their squabbles for power, and the very real impact that their bickering had on the war that makes reading Mr. Corera's book worth it. It is a sobering tale of what-if that crushes with its tantalizing possibility of the opportunities lost to petty internal bickering. 

Some literary use of birds to gather Intelligence

From the Bible:

Probably one of the earliest written records of humans relying on birds to gather intelligence is the famous scene in Genesis where Noah releases a raven and later a dove to determine whether the great flood had yet subsided. 

And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth. Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground. But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark. [Genesis 8 6-12] 

In light of the use of birds for intelligence gathering in World War II, this story takes  on new meaning. 

From Animal Farm:

In Animal Farm there were several episodes where pigeons are engaged in intelligence gathering and dissemination. Granted that the means by which the intelligence was shared from the pigeons to the pigs and vice versa was largely different from the manner that intelligence gathering was done in real life use of spy pigeons, it was still the use of spy pigeons. Furthermore, prior to my reading of Operation Columba, I read these passages as a natural consequence of the personification of the pigeons and the animal's ability to communicate with one another via speech. 

There were several different places where pigeons are used for the purposes of intelligence activities. The first is almost immediately after the ouster of Mr. Jones and the success of the rebellion of the animals in Animal Farm. Its purpose is to try to foment rebellions in other farms by other animals. One example can be found in, "Every day Snowball and Napoleon sent out flights of pigeons whose instructions were to mingle with the animals on neighboring farms, tell them the story of the rebellion, and teach them the tune of the Beasts of England."[pg 54] 

The success of these efforts can be found in a later passage 

"Bulls which had always been tractable suddenly turned savage, sheep broke down the hedges and devoured the clover, cows kicked the pail over, hunters refused their fences and shot their riders on to the other side. Above all, the tune and even the words to the Beasts of England were known everywhere."[page 56]

This can be likened to the leafleting that was done originally with balloons and later with planes behind enemy lines to convince the population of a military enemy either to betray their leaders and defect, provide information, or even rise up in rebellion themselves. 

Another intelligence scenario can be found in Chapter 4 paragraph 6 in which Mr. Jones's approach to retake Animal Farm is communicated to the Animals at Animal Farm.  ". . . a flight of pigeons came whirling through the air alighted in the yard of Animal Farm in the wildest excitement. Jones and all his men, with half a dozen others . . . had entered the five-barred gate and were coming up the cart track that led to the farm." [Orwell, page 56]

This is of course the type of information that was most sought by the British War Ministry in Operation Columba. More generally, this is one of the most basic types of intelligence that is sought by intelligence agencies, the information that can prevent one from being attacked under the condition of surprise. 

In a different moment, Mollie had disappeared from the farm, perhaps we might want to say defected, and the pigs wanted to know what had happened. Later they were to receive their answer: "Three days later Mollie disappeared. For some weeks nothing was known of her whereabouts, then the pigeons reported that they had seen her on the other side of Willingdon." [pg 62] Here we see basic information being gathered via pigeon. 

In one final moment of the use of pigeons in Animal Farm, we see the pigeons returning to Animal Farm with intelligence written on a scrap of paper which has been attached to the pigeon. "But at this moment the four pigeons, who had been sent out on the day before, returned, one of them bearing a scrap of paper from Plinkington. On it was penciled the words: "Serves you right."" [ page 107] This was the closest that Animal Farm's use of pigeons as intelligence agents comes to the real way pigeons were used in war. In WWII, a small special plastic tube was attached to the legs of the pigeons to permit the placement of intelligence for transport to England. 

Some Everyday Phrases which seemed related to the content above

Reading Operation Columba gave the idioms "a little birdie told me" and "sing/sang like a bird" new meaning. The first  of course means that someone has told you about something to the surprise of others who think you remain in ignorance of some novel fact. The second is less close to the content of this work, but references a bird as something that talks about secret information. 

References 

Orwell, George. Animal Farm (Signet Classics). United Kingdom, Signet Classics, 1999.