Historical Dictionary of British Intelligence

EDMONDS, SIR JAMES• 167

ECONOMIC WARFARE INTELLIGENCE (EWI).One of the two
divisions of the Ministry of Economic Warfare’s Intelligence
Branch, the EWI in November 1939 took on the role of theSecret
Intelligence Service’sIndustrial Intelligence Centreand collected
economic information throughout World War II for distribution to
other government agencies.

EDEN, SIR ANTHONY.As foreign secretary and prime minister, An-
thony Eden, later Lord Avon, was an enthusiastic consumer of intelli-
gence, a supporter of theSecret Intelligence Service(SIS), and a
wartime critic ofSpecial Operations Executive. He was severely
embarrassed by the BusterCrabbincident at Portsmouth in April

1956. Eden ordered two assassinations by SIS. The first, of Egypt’s
      Colonel Abdel Nasser, prompted the resignation of his minister of
      state at the Foreign Office, Sir Anthony Nutting. The second, of Col-
      onel George Grivas, theEOKAleader in Cyprus, was accepted by
      SIS, although the opportunity to carry out the directive never oc-
      curred.

EDMONDS, SIR JAMES.Commissioned by theCommittee of Im-
perial Defence(CID) to undertake a report on the failure of British
Intelligence during theBoer War, it was James Edmonds who rec-
ommended the creation in 1909 of a Secret Service Bureau. His re-
port, submitted to the secretary of state for war, (Sir) William
Haldane, was considered by the CID subcommittee consisting of
Lord Esher, Mr. Buxton, and Sir Charles (later Lord) Hardinge. Ed-
monds recommended his former subordinate, MajorVernon Kell,
who had served in the Far East Section of the War Office, as leader
of the new organization.
In 1891 Edmonds was involved in an exchange of information
about Russia between the German and British general staffs, and he
acquired an insight into the methods adopted by the German General
Staff as a result. On returning from a visit to Russia, which he made
for the Intelligence Division of the British General Staff, Colonel Ed-
monds was ordered to report at the Ministry of War in Berlin and was
introduced to Major Dame, head of the German Secret Service in the
Herwathstrasse. The Nachrichtendienst then had two branches, one
to conduct operations in France, the other in Germany. Edmonds and