my is dr. andrew hammond and i'm

a historian and curator at the international spy museum which is where we are honor. at the moment we are in the home our george washington last that's a significant because this is a letter written by essentially america's first spy master to set up america's first espionage ring. that's a significant for all kinds of reasons one allows a

smaller less continental army to have an edge on the british, another one, for example, as as the spying ring that leads to the discovery of the notorious traitor, benedict arnold. so george washington writes letter to nathaniel sackett. nathaniel sackett sets up a spy ring not long after its socket would be replaced by someone else called benjamin tallmadge. but benjamin tallmadge is responsible for a network that takes place across new city, long island and connecticut, which is the base of operations for the british. this network gathers crucial intelligence on british operations, on various plans that they have, and thus gets back to washington to allow him to make plans to try to evade the british, to attack the british and just keep the army in the field long enough so that america can ultimately, when the

revolutionary war. so we are jumping forward in time to world war two. so this is a exhibition that we opened last on one of the most incredible spies that you have ever heard of or may never have heard of. so virginia hall was a young woman who defied all kinds of convention she spoke multiple languages. she went to elite colleges. she wanted to join the u.s. foreign service. the expectations at the time were that she would marry well and she would become wife and a mother. for jack. he had different ideas. when war water broke out, she joined the french army as an ambulance driver. then she joined the british special operations executor and went behind enemy lines and nazi germany. then she joined the office of

services. so the american equivalent of the special operations executor and she went behind enemy lines before d-day again. and the twist to the story as that she lost her leg and a hunter accident. so she only had one leg. she had a prosthetic leg that she called cuthbert, which she used, for example to hike over the pyrenees to escape the so-called of lyon close barbie the gestapo, the ss were looking for. she hiked over a mountain chain between france and spain to escape. so we have some incredible that help to tell her story. so virginia hall learns to become a radio operator. when you think about a world war two communications are really really she a spy ring she has communicate with her handlers in london to do all of this she

needs to be able to communicate and not caught so that's radio is something that she would carry around is disguised as a suitcase but you can imagine have to carry something that's probably four or five times as heavy as a real suitcase. when you're using the radio, it has to be in a secure location. so, for example, in a farmhouse working at the home of one of her agents whom she trusted and remember trust is very and the espionage business you would set up you would communicate you would wrap operations back up and you would get on the move again, trying never to stay in the same place for too long or fall into any kind of pattern where your activity can be detected. so again, the life of a radio operator, generally speaking, was very short. she came out of world two with a quite a gear and order of the british empire and has

languished service across from britain, france and the united states. so here the international spy museum, we have over 10,000 artifacts from across the entirety of and intelligence history on these walls beside here are a lot of tools the trade things that are used in the field to help you recruit agents and steal secrets. so we have artifacts that people use everyday shoes jackets hearts, chess games, all sorts of things that are not quite what they seem because this is often the case and the secret world of intelligence and espionage. so behind us we have an incredible story basically in the form of an artifact. so behind us is the great seal

of the united states. so this was a gift given to the americans, to the soviet union and, the late 1940s, unbeknownst to the american ambassador, subsequent american ambassadors. there was a revolutionary new bug or device back then to the great seal. so the device has became known as the because no one really knew have functioned. so you see the seal the thing is this desk with the long antenna out, it was hidden inside this piece of wood and. it was essentially undetected for many years. we take the story forward to the fifties this artifact as discovered the take out has electronics source. they don't know how it functioned, how it worked. they eventually they just it's

what's called a passive cavity resonator, broken down for the average person. it's silent. it doesn't have anything. but when the rate waves are sent towards it from outside the embassy, it comes life lessons and. and then when those radio waves outside the embassy are stopped, it goes back to sleep. so this is something that was really revolutionary for the time. so i was there for a number years, silent activated, listening and back to silence. no one knew it was there. eventually it was discovered and an espionage. if you find out that you're adverse, is some new piece of technology you try to replicate it. so that's essentially what was done. another thing in case that's really interesting as, the pride march, everybody that watches

this wear shoes has a pair of shoes with a heel. well, imagine if your heel had a bug in it like one. so an american diplomat in eastern europe hunted two shoes and to get repaired and it came back with a listening device based on see you have heard of the famous enigma machine from the benedict cumberbatch movie the imitation game. if you haven't, this is one of the most incredible devices from world war to so many people know the history of world war two. fewer people know the secret history of this conflict. so the enigma machine is and the background shaping history this operation to break this machine. with 157,000,000 million million possible ways to decode it was

kept a secret until the 1970s. church said that this operation helped to shorten the war by two years. so the enigma machine was a device that was used by the germans to communicate. so essentially, you would press one of the buttons. it would go through number of operations. then something would come out on the other side and that would be transmitted the person on the other side would have the same. let's just key or settings for their machine is the operation would be reversed and they would end up with the original letter that you typed and so it was a way to communicate about moving armies, about attacks, operations. so if you can imagine, if you can listen this stuff, you're going to get amazing information. the germans essentially relied on enigma quite heavily across

of their services and relied on a10x than the actual. it left them vulnerable. the allies broke into this code. it was kept super secret. i think about the dilemma here as well, if you react to every piece of information that you get from then the other side are going to know that something's up. so sometimes you're with these very uncomfortable choices where you have to let bad things to protect the legacy and that secret for war. what was that like alan turing as someone very famous and it's associated the story in fact, even if you've never heard of his name before, you've probably interacted with his very recently. so recapture the annoying thing that you have to do. you try to prove that you're human comes from work of alan

turing. so alan turing as one of the inspirational that's part of the story, but that's was an industrial level operation that took place across a number years the united states was involved, the united kingdom was involved polish codebreakers earlier involved because that was what like an overwhelming feat to do. how you break something with 157 bells and possible eventually they broke it and had enormous effects on conduct of the war. so for example, the battle of the atlantic the effort to make sure that the united kingdom could stay supplied and not drop out of the war because of a lack of food or the material needed to. that was essentially because of a naked command. so this gallery here is all about code making and codebreaker. so some of the things that we

have here include a wound that was used to hide secret code information were have up here. one of the most incredible things from the history of code making in code breaking as called a one time pod. now it looks relatively benign, but this is the only unbreakable way to share information. and so essentially you and someone else will have this exact pod with the same types of five that banks written on it. i will use that through an operation that that involves a few steps. i use that to encode information. i send it you then you use that same pod to decode the information. then we both have to destroy the pod that used as code a one time pod because only use a one time

you destroy. then you start again. and if you perform the function, destroying it and using only one time and another couple of operations, it's essentially unbreakable. so the why people don't use us all the because it's rather cumbersome, it's rather slow. but theoretically this is the completely secure way to share information. so we're now on our gallery on covert action so things like sabotage or stolen water have been we've seen virginia operated behind end rail lines and nazi occupied france. we've looked at the enigma machine that was working silently in the now we're looking something that was invented for blowing up a problem how do you underwater

get to the ship if it's far away you some kind of device to take you from a to b but going to do so secretly and silently. this is where this submersible can do key the sleeping comes on. so this was invented. you would climb aboard, you would have an oxygen mask, you would be underwater sleeping beauty would deliver up to the warship. you would do your business, attach mains bombs, then you use the same device to get the heck out of there before the explodes does go off. so essentially this as an underwater delivery device for and an interesting to the story something similar this used to be by the us navy seals to do the same kinds of work.

so with the history of espionage and intelligence, one of the problems has that it was always meant to remain secret. so sometimes with artifacts we know specific stories that are connected to artifact. other times we're seeing an example of a technological development that we know was important, that we know influenced the project of of the history of intelligence and espionage. but we don't know necessarily what that device was used for. sleeping beauty. we know that it was invented. we know that it was probably used. but for this particular one. we don't have a story to tie to the story that that's ties to as the technological evolution of covert operations. so the case behind me are many from the history of covert operations. anybody that's ever been involved and special operations

will probably recognize the iconic sex for being dating life. so this is the veil during world four commando style operations as very thin as, designed to go and between the robes and silently kill. it became thus iconic marker of these types of operations and give you an example of how that lives on today as part of the logo of the green berets and delta force amongst many special operations units and communities. more. so that's from is meant to evoke the infamous palace hotel or foreign dignitaries would come to stay and a hotel that was wired sound and sight almost everything and some the hotel

rooms was live the telephones the candle stacks, the books one of the most nefarious examples, i think as child is toys. imagine bugging toys, chess boards, books, hands, statues, telephones, iron even clothing umbrellas, shoes, gloves, all sorts of things were lessening and what you were doing. and it became very, very difficult to just a normal person and east germany because the level of surveillance and because of the amount of people that had been caught did enter the system to watch and surveil one another. so the stasi at one level they're looking at diplomats and dignitaries, seeing if they are trying to spy on germany or see if they've got secret

information that they acquire and steal its own citizens. it's essentially making sure that the told the line that they're good communists, that they're not barking against the regime, that they're not trying to fight back too much. so it the system of control and that becomes a byword for a state surveilling its own citizens to the nth degree possible. so now we're looking at one of our most recent displays and featuring some of our most recent artifacts. so these are really, really rare artifacts. they're captured would be spies and assassins from north korea. so for example, we have a poisoned lipstick it was captured on a north korean spy. so the lipstick wasn't used to poison someone else. you walk up to them and apply the lipstick in the high.

it would if you were captured and you compromised, you could apply lipstick. and if you're around, you can't talk. another one that we have as a poisoned so and the world of intelligence and espionage a lot of things are in plain sight. so there's something there that just looks like what to us. but it may have a secret life or a secret dimension. so this pen just looks like a normal parker pen. nothing or unique looking about a but actually it can be used as an assassination. you press the button, a needle comes out your job. someone with a they die from the poison. and it looks like you've just got pen and you bump into someone that was captured on a would be north korean assassin who tried kill a defector from north korea who became an act of

us against the regime there. so these artifacts came us through a partnership we have with the south korean embassy here in washington, d.c. so they are all involved in an ongoing and constant counterintelligence operation against north korea, who have a history of assassination and telling people who are saying things that make them feel uncomfortable. these are some examples of artifacts that came through that with the south korean embassy. so these artifacts are from the 21st century and that the story up to date. so the spy museum is nonprofit organization and like many museums we are dedicated just preserving and telling the story of the past. so here at the museum we get artifacts from all kinds of collectors, all kinds of partners, and we get them. we take of them, we keep them

safe, and then we try to use them to. help tell the secret history of the past. i hope you've enjoyed journey through the international spy. so we've been from the revolutionary war all the way up to the 21st century, but there's many things here that you should come and invest. gift we have pieces of a story that take us 17,000 feet under the surface, the pacific ocean, we have stories that take us 80,000 feet above surface of the earth. we have stuff takes us to outer space. we have things that involve assassinations like the icebox that was used to kill leon trotsky and a covert operation in the 1940. so one of the questions that i often get, as are the movies reveal, the question, of course, as it depends, few them are

documentaries. some of them are influenced by the real life espionage and intelligence of the authors. so, for example, the tv show is written by a cia officer. the james bond novels. then movies are written by a former british intelligence officer does. that means that they are an accurate representation of that happens and that world. no but there is some crossover between fact and fiction and that's one of the things that we explore here at the museum because we realize that what many people know about this world comes from watching tv, reading novels and, watching james bond movies. so if you're interested in the links between fact and fiction, i encourage you to come and explore some of this fast history that we have here in washington, dc, right.

so