508 • SPECIAL LIAISON
and diplomatic covers. Numerous American-owned international
firms were approached to supply business covers for the FBI Special
Intelligence Service personnel who operated independently of the
local diplomatic missions.
The FBI Special Intelligence Service developed in response to a
perceived Nazi threat to South America and an inability on the part
of the United States to gather intelligence about the region or monitor
the growth of German espionage. Hoover dispatched two senior of-
ficers to London in 1940 to study British techniques, and theSecret
Intelligence Serviceallowed the FBI to make a tour of its stations in
South America, which were later used as a model. By the end of the
war, the FBI Special Intelligence Service had established legal at-
tache ́s at many missions overseas, including London, Lisbon, and
Paris. However, while these posts remain to the present day, the busi-
ness covers were closed down at the end of the war. Many of the
FBI Special Intelligence Service personnel opted to join theCentral
Intelligence Agencywhen it was established in 1947.SPECIAL LIAISON.Immediately after World War II,Biffy Dunder-
dalewas placed in charge of a secret, dedicated organization concen-
trating on signals intelligence operations against the Soviet Union as
controller, Special Liaison. The organization was divided into two
subsections, Atlantic (dealing with certain types of intelligence relat-
ing to the Soviets) and Non-Atlantic (liaising with the U.S.Office of
Strategic Services,Polish intelligence, and French intelligence).
The Atlantic Section collected intelligence from radio traffic inter-
cepted by the Poles at their stations in Stanmore and Scotland and
decrypted at Boxmoor; radio telegraph messages en clair; radio-tele-
phone intercepts; and open sources such as the Soviet press. The en
clair traffic was read by a system run by Major Heal ofSection X
of theSecret Intelligence Service(SIS), responsible for telephones,
telegrams, and liaison with the General Post Office and telegraph
companies. The intercepted material was passed to Captain Eddie
Hastings atGCHQand then returned to Dunderdale’s operational
headquarters, accommodated at Firbanks, in Roehampton, where
Major Allen and Squadron-Leader Macdonald represented SIS. The
radio-telephone intercepts were supervised by a crippled White Rus-
sian named Bunakov, who collected material from as far away as