ABOUT SECRET SERVICE.

Northland Age, Volume IV, Issue 47, 13 July 1908, Page 8

ABOUT SECRET SERVICE.

f Among European Powers the Russian secret service is probably the finest, but it embraces many thousands of people who are merely volunteers, or who report confidential information with a view tq escaping official interference. In France and Germany the secret service is supported by systematic investigation that cannot be said to rely in any material way on casual assistance. In England the service is controlled to a great extent: by the intelligence divisions of the Admiralty and the War Office, but such a system of pri- ■ vate inquiry has not been elevated in England to the exact science that it is, let us say, in Russia or Japan. Undoubtedly the most perfect seri vice in the world is that possessed by the Japanese, who devote to it all the patience and care for which the Oriental is famous. The late war in Manchuria offered ample evidence of the value of the work accomplished by it. In Pekin, Harbin, Port Arthur, and Seoul the centres of an elaborate system were established by which secret service men, disguised as barbers, servants, itinerant merchants and travelling priests, swarmed all over north-eastern Asia. There was not a village nor a military post that escaped observation ; and many of the earlier successes of the Japanese were due to the excellence of the information supplied by the members of the secret service before hostilities began. Under the Japanese system, the more delicate work is frequently ! carried qut by officers of high standing in naval and military services, while it is a fact that for years past i the whole of Asia has been covered by a perfect network of Japanese secret service men. Every point of importance in the possession of Great Britain, Russia, France, and Germany, east of Suez, has been secret- j ly surveyed, the headquarters of the several squadrons receiving particular attention. Indeed, it would be no exageration to say that the char- j acter of the approaches and the po&- j sabilities of defence of each naval ! base held by the powers in Far j Eastern waters have been most care- | fully studied by the spies of our ally. ! I