Making Sense of Bonner Fellers

[Fatboy Coxy]

Hi all, researching the battle of Gazala, I came across the American military attaché in Egypt, Bonner Fellers, who was given access to British sensitive military information.

Reading Wiki, (yes, I know, but that’s why I’m asking) I’m left with “the most violent Anglophobe” who, by sending detailed reports of British OOB’s, among other sensitive information, by radiogram, to President Franklin Roosevelt, the head of American intelligence, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, helped the Axis, who were reading his reports. Unfortunately, the code he used had been stolen from the US Embassy in Rome, and was being intercepted by the Italians, and hence the Germans.

Oh dear, that’s not very good, and I’m left with numerous conundrums about him.

Firstly, having said that he is anti-British, is there any suggestion that what he did was with malice towards Britain. A countenance to this is his advocacy for quick reinforcement and supplies for the British following Gazala.

Secondly, is there any blame on his part, over the Italian interception and reading of his reports. Should he have done things differently, or was this standard practice?

Thirdly, what advice was he giving to Roosevelt, and how did this clash with General Marshall.

Fourthly, how damaging were his reports, how much can we apportion British failures due to his reports, given various other British Army failures, including the successful wireless interception of British Radio traffic by a unit of Rommel’s.

And lastly, did this incident damage his career, at a time when many American army officers saw rapid promotion.

[LineDoggie]

Well first of all Fellers was sent to make those observations and reports as an Attache does.

Secondly he was forced to use those State Department codes over the War Departments codes, he was overridden. So no not his fault, when he and his successor switched codes the interceptions stopped.

As to damaging his career, he was awarded the DSM, Promoted to Brigadier General & went onto General MacArthur's staff

the Movie "Emperor" with Tommy Lee Jones has Fellers as the main role

[Fatboy Coxy]

Hi LineDoggie, thank you. I'll try and find the movie and watch it.

The little I read, neither Eisenhower or Marshall liked him, maybe he was dumped on MacArthur?

[Carl Schwamberger]

War in the Shadows by Gershom Gorenberg has over 25 entires on Fellers listed in the Index. I don't have time to search all that out and summarize it this morning, but its hard to see anything malicious by Col Fellers in this incident. In his politics he was more of a ultra conservative & his Anglophobia seems to have been secondary and similar to a lot of other Yanks. My relatives descended from Irish immigrants were a example of the truly virulent on that subject. Its possible Fellers was overly negative about British military skill, but there's no evidence he was consciously spying or assisting the Axis.

Marshal, the State Dept, and others wanted detailed information from Egypt concerning the British forces in the ME for planning Lend Lease & other assistance to Britain, and planning Allied global strategy. Like any sensible leaders Churchill and company were asking for everything they could think of & Rosesevelts crewe were more interested in sending what they thought was needed. The detailed information from Fellers & two dozen like him was part of that interaction.

[Carl Schwamberger]

Skimmed thru the references to Feller in Gorenbergs book. Was reminded that the code Fellers was using was not unique to him or his station at the US Consulate in Egypt. The same basic code was used by military attaches in many US consulates of Embassys. So the Italians had the option of fishing for useful information in a broad mass of radio traffic. Also was reminded replies and questions from Washington DC to Fellers (and others) were also in this code. That is Fellers was not quite a unique source from penetrating this code, just one at a very important location.

A few other hasty notes from todays skim: The code Fellers was using & the Italians penetrated/stole was for the use of the the military attaches at the embassies. The State Department had a number of other codes it used. Gorenberg identifies three basic levels, from British sources. 1. A hyper secure code used only for the most important sensitive messages. The Brits felt the never broke this one. 2. A good quality code/s for sensitive messages. The Brits records indicate they were able to read 30% or less of the messages in this code group. Often less depending on resources and other conditions. Last there was a 'fast' low grade code/s for routine traffic, which the Brits easily penetrated & read as much of as they could afford to divert staff to. Why? Churchill & his staff needed the information to help them in squeezing assistance out of the US, persuading the US to follow British strategy, and for the Brit counter intelligence effort in searching for leaks in US message security. The Brits estimated the Axis might be intercepting and reading up to 10% of the mid grade State Dept code system, and 30% of the lowest grade code group. How accurate that might be I cant say.

Getting back to Fellers politics. He was raised on a Indiana farm & found his way to a officer commission in the Army late 1918. So, his formative years reflected the attitudes of rural Midwest & then the booming urban & university culture of the first two decades of the 20th Century. That is white working class and small business rural and urban cultural mix. And, at its core WASP. His early education was one where history was presented as the Brits were the evil losers American heroes kicked out, and heroic French helped. Like most of the US citizenry after the Great War he was exposed to the revisionist narrative of the Entente leaders betraying the ideals & hope at the end of the war to preserve their privileges and empires. These influences may seem simplistic or superficial, but they do at a basic level reflect the thinking of a large part of the US population in the first half of the 20th Century.

Gorenbergs book has a lot more references to Fellers and his messages than I identified earlier. This is not the focus of the book, which is a 450 page dive into the Allied and Axis intelligence war in the Middle East & Egypt. The detail provided on Fellers & his message provide context for how the intelligence war fit into the gun fighting and strategy sides of it.

[LineDoggie]

Hi LineDoggie, thank you. I'll try and find the movie and watch it.

The little I read, neither Eisenhower or Marshall liked him, maybe he was dumped on MacArthur?

Ike didnt like anyone who he served with under MacArthur esp anyone who didnt share his opinion of mac

Marshall allowed him to be made a Brigadier

[jbroshot]

Reports and messages from US Military Attaches in Egypt from NARA were posted to Internet Archive about a month ago.

The link was posted here

viewtopic.php?f=56&t=266357

[Carl Schwamberger]

Picking further through Gorenbergs 'War in the Shadows' I found one of the sections (Pg 353-354) where he identities some of the message traffic other than from Fellers. Contrary to some other narratives he presents evidence the Italians passed along the penetration information to the OKW radio intel office and to the Japanese embassy in Rome or Berlin. TheJapanese found the information interesting, but made little or no use of it. The Luftwaffe found information on the set up and operations of the Lend Lease route for aircraft from the US to the USSR. Ciano mentions in a memo a intercept from the US military attache in Moscow, complaining about delays in Lend Lease deliveries.

[Urmel]

War in the Shadows by Gershom Gorenberg has over 25 entires on Fellers listed in the Index. I don't have time to search all that out and summarize it this morning, but its hard to see anything malicious by Col Fellers in this incident. In his politics he was more of a ultra conservative & his Anglophobia seems to have been secondary and similar to a lot of other Yanks. My relatives descended from Irish immigrants were a example of the truly virulent on that subject. Its possible Fellers was overly negative about British military skill, but there's no evidence he was consciously spying or assisting the Axis.

Marshal, the State Dept, and others wanted detailed information from Egypt concerning the British forces in the ME for planning Lend Lease & other assistance to Britain, and planning Allied global strategy. Like any sensible leaders Churchill and company were asking for everything they could think of & Rosesevelts crewe were more interested in sending what they thought was needed. The detailed information from Fellers & two dozen like him was part of that interaction.

I provided quite a few of the reports from Bonner Fellers to Gershom, as I had acquired copies years previously. I am glad to see they went to good use. Having read them, they are harsh but fair on the British command, and anyone suggesting that this was anti-British sentiment is either a whinger or hasn't read up on the desert war. They are professional reports.

It is arguable that they had way too much detail in them, given the security risks of transmitting them, but that's just a risk people had to take in those days. The British started cottoning on to that after the MF3 convoy, but the Americans clearly didn't pick it up.

https://rommelsriposte.com/2009/05/10/the-good-source/

[Urmel]

The Italians found the information interesting, but made little or no use of it.

I think that's a bit besides the point. There was good info in these reports, and what use was made of them is hard to decipher, unless you define 'use' in the most narrow sense of 'used in near-term future operations', for which most of these reports arguably weren't helpful. But they provided a larger part of the picture, together with tactical intel from 3./N56, radio traffic analysis by the B-Dienst etc.

[Carl Schwamberger]

I think that's a bit besides the point. There was good info in these reports, ...

Italians was a typo. Corrected it to Japanese

[Urmel]

Ah, that I wouldn't know anything about.

[Fatboy Coxy]

Thank you guys, that's tidied things up in my mind