{{Short description|German spy (1896–1977)}} {{Infobox military person |name =Hermann Joseph Giskes |image = Hermann Giskes 1945.jpg |image_size = |alt = |caption = Giskes {{circa}} 1945 |birth_date = {{Birth date|1896|9|28|df=y}} |death_date = {{Death date and age|1977|8|28|1896|9|28|df=y}} |birth_place = Krefeld, Germany |death_place = Krefeld, Germany |burial_place = |burial_label = |burial_coordinates = <!-- {{Coord|LAT|LONG|display=inline,title}} --> |nickname = |birth_name = |allegiance = Germany |branch = Abwehr |service_years = 1939–1945 |rank = Oberstleutnant (Lieutenant colonel) |service_number = |unit = |commands = |battles = World War II |relations = |other_work = |signature = }}
'''Hermann Josef Giskes''' (28 September 1896 – 28 August 1977) was a German intelligence officer of the ''Abwehr'', the military intelligence department of the German military forces during World War II. He is best known for being the head of the counter-intelligence department of the Abwehr in the Netherlands from 1941 to 1944. He carried out an operation called Englandspiel or '''Operation North Pole''' which resulted in the capture of more than 50 agents of Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE) and the confiscation of tons of military equipment, including weapons, which SOE had parachuted into the Netherlands to arm Dutch groups resisting the occupation of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany. Most of the captured agents were executed after being forced to participate in a disinformation campaign which led SOE to believe that its agents were being successful in organizing and supplying the Dutch resistance.
==Early life==
Hermann Josef Giskes was born in Krefeld, the third of four children of Wilhelm and Maria Giskes. The father was a merchant and owner of a tobacco factory. After attending elementary school, he was a student at the high school in Krefeld from 1905 and in Karthaus-Konz from 1911/12. In 1913/14 he attended the higher commercial school in Krefeld. <ref name="Interim Report">''Camp 020 Interim Report on the Case of Hermann Giskes.'' 1945. In: The National Archives, Kew, [http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C11090201 KV 2/962], page 60.</ref>
On October 1, 1914, he served as a volunteer in the 1st Lower Alsatian Field Artillery Regiment No. 31 in Hagenau in Alsace during the First World War. In December 1914 he was transferred to the Snowshoe Battalion No. 2, with which he took part in battles in the Carpathians, South Tyrol and Serbia. In 1916, Giskes and his unit were deployed on the Western Front, where he was wounded several times and received the Iron Cross, Second Class. In March 1917 he became a lieutenant in the reserve and, as he was unfit for front-line service, was an instructor with the mountain infantry replacement battalion in Immenstadt in the Allgäu until April 1918. From April 1918, Giskes was again on the Western Front with Infantry Regiment No. 471, where he was taken prisoner by the French on October 12, 1918.<ref name="Interim Report" />
Released from captivity in March 1920, Giskes went back to Krefeld, initially worked for his father as a tobacco dealer and was married in 1925. He had no children. In 1926 he became self-employed as a tobacco importer and dealer. A first lieutenant in the reserve since 1929 , he took part in reserve exercises from 1936 and was promoted to captain in the reserve in 1938.<ref name="Interim Report" />
==World War II== Giskes is best known as the leader behind the ''Englandspiel'' operation. His activities were responsible for supplying a great deal of disinformation to British intelligence services for much of World War II, and for the arrest of more than 50 Special Operations Executive (SOE) agents, nearly all of whom were executed. Giskes first succeeded in forcing captured SOE agent Huub Lauwers under duress to send encrypted messages back to the British SOE headquarters at Giskes' direction. Lauwers attempted to warn SOE that he had been captured by omitting security checks from his messages, but the SOE failed to recognize his warning. As a result, dozens of SOE agents parachuted into the Netherlands and were captured by the Germans on their arrival, along with tons of equipment.<ref name="Books">{{cite magazine |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,818692,00.html |title=Books: Operation North Pole |date=10 August 1953 |magazine=TIME |accessdate=30 March 2012 |url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref name="Lashmar">{{cite news |last1=Lashmar |first1=Paul |last2=Staerck |first2=Chris |date=20 September 1998 |title=Spy fiasco cost Britain 50 agents |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/spy-fiasco-cost-britain-50-agents-1199631.html |newspaper=The Independent |access-date=2 March 2018}}</ref>
Giskes continued to use captured SOE radios to mislead the SOE, who failed to recognize, despite many clues, that its operations in the Netherlands were controlled by the Germans. When the Royal Air Force refused in May 1943 to continue clandestine flights delivering agents and arms to the Netherlands because of heavy losses of airplanes and crews, no more agents could be sent to the Netherlands by the SOE.<ref name="Olson">{{cite book |last1=Olson |first1=Lynne |title=Last Hope Island |date=2017 |publisher=Random House |location=New York |isbn=9780812997354 |page=178}}</ref> In fall 1943, two Dutch SOE agents escaped German imprisonment and informed SOE in London that its operations in the Netherlands had been a sham.<ref name="Lashmar"/>
When it became apparent to the British that SOE's operations in the Netherlands were under the control of the Germans, Giskes on 1 April 1944 sent the following taunting message in clear (unencrypted text) to London: <blockquote> To ''[the SOE section chiefs]'' Messrs Blunt,<ref group="nb">'Blunt' refers to a pseudonym used by Major Charles Blizard, Head of N (Dutch) Section SOE.</ref> Bingham<ref group="nb">Major Seymour Bingham, his successor as Head of N Section.</ref> and Succs Ltd., London. In the last time you are trying to make business in Netherlands without our assistance stop we think this rather unfair in view of our long and successful co-operation as your sole agents stop but never mind whenever you will come to pay a visit to the Continent you may be assured that you will be received with the same care and result as all those who you sent us before stop so long.<ref name ="HCN1">{{Cite book |last=Marks |first=Leo |title=Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker's Story 1941–1945 |year=1998 |publisher=Harper Collins |location=London |isbn=0-00-255944-7 |page=499}}</ref> </blockquote>
In 1945, near the end of World War II, Giskes was captured by Allied forces and interrogated by both the British and the Americans. He was released in September 1946, and became an employee of the Gehlen Organization, an intelligence company that worked with the American occupation authorities in a defeated Germany.<ref>{{cite book |last=Whiting |first=Charles |title=Ghost Front: The Ardennes Before The Battle Of The Bulge |url=https://archive.org/details/ghostfrontardenn0000whit |url-access=registration |quote=Hermann Giskes. |date=18 April 2002 |publisher=Da Capo Press |isbn=978-0-306-82035-9 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/ghostfrontardenn0000whit/page/203 203]-204}}</ref>
In 1953, he published a memoir, ''London Calling North Pole'', recounting his experiences in World War II.<ref name="Books"/>
==References== ===Notes=== {{reflist|group=nb}}
===Footnotes=== {{reflist|2}}
;Bibliography * {{cite book |last=Marks |first=Leo |author-link=Leo Marks |date=1998 |title=Between Silk and Cyanide |location=London |publisher=HarperCollins |isbn=0-00-255944-7}} *{{cite web |url=http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+Eureka-Rebecca+compromises%3A+another+look+at+special+operations...-a0140243189 |title=The Eureka-Rebecca compromises |last=Burton |first=Chris |date=22 December 2005 |website=The Free Library}} * {{cite book |last=Hastings |first=Max |author-link=Max Hastings |title=The Secret War: Spies, Codes and Guerrillas 1939-1945 |url=https://archive.org/details/secretwarspiesco0000hast |url-access=registration |publisher=William Collins |location=London |date=2015 |isbn=978-0-00-750374-2}} * {{cite book |first=H.J. |last=Giskes |title=London Calling North Pole |publisher=Bantam |date=1982}} (Originally published by Bastei Lübbe as ''London ruft Nordpol : das erfolgreiche Funkspiel der deutschen militärischen Abwehr'')
{{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Giskes, H. J.}} Category:1977 deaths Category:1896 births Category:Abwehr personnel of World War II Category:German Army personnel of World War I Category:German prisoners of war in World War I Category:Military personnel from Krefeld Category:World War I prisoners of war held by France