Evening star. [volume], July 21, 1940, Page 2, Image 72

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
FOR A BETTER AMERICA
THE SABOTEUR AT WORK
The saboteur is one of the most poten
tially dangerous members of the fifth
column now working inside America.
Whether he seeks to destroy our machinery,
to bum our materials, to block the orderly
functions of our government in time of emer
gency, to poison our food or water supplies
— or whether he merely specializes in the
plain bungling of work — he is a serious men
ace to our internal security.
When it is skillfully performed, by even
small groups of foreign agents, sabotage is
often more disastrous than results secured
by a regiment of soldiers in time of war. The
explosion on Black Tom Island, New Jersey,
in 1916, is proof of this. Three men were killed
and many others were injured in that blast.
Thirty-three carloads and ten barges of am
munition, valued at over $20,0X30.000, were
destroyed. The explosion shook the entire
area of metropolitan New York, causing a
million-dollar loss in shattered glass in Man
hattan alone.
The horrors of well-executed sabotage be
come obvious when we consider a city in
darkness, its water supply polluted or its
transportation system wrecked. Last summer
the nation was shocked by news of the wreck
age of a crack streamliner in the West. Fre
quent similar disasters could be expected once
the experienced saboteur moved into action.
Sabotage has none of the romance often
associated with espionage. It is a grim, sordid
thing. Waste and horror follow in its wake.
It is carried on by the espionage agent or the
traitorous individual who works with him.
The spy is very often the advance agent of
the saboteur, who, with torch and bomb and
destructive weapons, may spread desolation
throughout the country, cripple the nation's
industrial plants, make it difficult to feed and
supply troops, destroy the morale of the civil
population and undermine national-defense
programs.
The saboteur invariably attacks the source
of supply. He strikes at the fountainhead of
our power. It is not practical, of course, to
draw a definite line of demarcation between
the efforts of spies seeking to discover secrets
of our military and naval defense and offense,
and that part of the army of spies and asso
ciated saboteurs that strikes at our industries.
Aims at Supplies
^Jbviously, our military and naval secrets
would be of little avail to us if supplies and
materials could not be promptly transmitted
to our military and naval forces. An army
in the field, possessing the most modern,
effective arms, is useless without an ample
supply of ammunition. The saboteur strikes
at this flow of ammunition. Our Army and
Navy cannot defend us unless they are fed.
They cannot engage the enemy unless the
supply of steel from our steel plants is suffi
cient to provide the implements of defense.
It is the saboteur's goal to hamper the man
ufacture and delivery of these supplies.
The saboteur operates in as many ways as
there are methods of disabling plants, dam
aging material and supplies, crippling power
and interfering with the manufacture of every
type of product in a modern, industrial com
munity.
Fire is a favorite weapon of this enemy
agent. The damage done by disastrous fires in
industrial plants is difficult to estimate. The
saboteur in his work seeks to veil his activi
ties so that fires and explosions will appear to
be accidental. This is fundamental. He en
deavors in every possible manner to make
these disasters appear to have been caused by
human frailty on the part of plant employees
or by defects in the operation of machinery.
His methods have vastly improved with
the advance of science. Explosions and fires,
the favorite weapons of these agents, may be
arranged so that the saboteur may be many
miles away from the scene when the disaster
occurs. For instance, a small vial may be
placed in a supply of coal destined for the
engines of a transport or a merchant vessel
carrying goods of vital value to our armed
forces. Chemicals inside the vial slowly eat
their way through the container. This process
can be timed so that the vessel will be miles
Copyright. 1940. United Newspapers Magazine Corporation
Second in a series of important articles about
the activities of the Fifth Column in America
by J. EDGAR HOOVER
Diroctor of tho Fodoral Bvroau of Invottigafion
U. S. Amy Air Cor pi
We need first-class workmen who are also first-class Americans—like these
at sea before the chemicals cause the conse
quent fire.
Foreign agents practice similar schemes in
industrial plants. And, when the time is ripe,
they strike at power lines, public utilities,
boilerhouses, engine rooms and railroad
bridges. During the months and years pre
ceding a war, they plan, chart, sketch and
devise the specific methods to be employed at
the appointed hour. They do everything that
a skillful general does who knows that he
must fight a battle against superior forces at
some future time.
The saboteur does not always arrive from
an enemy country at the outbreak of war or
shortly before war is declared. For years,
even for decades, a staff of agents may be
working in key industrial plants in various
countries. By reason of their long employ
ment these agents will be almost completely
immune from suspicion, thus making it ex
tremely difficult to detect their activities.
To combat these far-flung sabotage activi
ties. the FBI has instituted surveys of hun
dreds of industrial plants that have contracts
with the Army and Navy to supply material
for national defense. Specially trained Special
Agents carefully consider every possible vul
nerable point in these plants and then devise
means by which they can be protected. Sug
gestions are made to plant executives and
employees. I have never encountered a finer
spirit of patriotism than is being exhibited
by these industrial workers, who are helping
in every way they can to make our national
defense secure.
The necessity for insuring continued pro
duction of the commodities needed in our
national preparedness cannot be overesti
mated. Let me illustrate the ways in which
f*IS
Pag*
The Saboteur at Work. *
by J. Edgar Hoover
Working Press. *
by Richard Powell
Illustrated by O. F. Schmidt
The Further Adventures
of Jiminy Cricket. 6
Queer Ducks, Aren't We?. «
by Kathleen Masterson
Romance in the Night. 7
by Pat Frank
Illustrated by Worren Baumgartner
Lifelines for Summer Swimmers. 8
by Paul W. Kearney
Rhymes About Town. 10
by Margaret Fishback
The Little Dog Laughed. 11
by Virginia Woolf
Illustrated by Morgan Dennis
Pag*
For Beautiful Feet -. i*
by Sylvia Blythe
Definitions: Wise and Otherwise. u
by Jno. Garland Pollard
Try These Dishes From Poland. n
by Grace Turner
What to Do About Poison Ivy. 14
by William Evans
Wally's Wagon. is
by Wally Boren
Coyer by Paul Hesse
The names and descriptions of oil characters that appear in
short stories, serials and semifiction articles in THIS WEEK
MAGAZINE are wholly fictitious. Any use of a name which
happens to be the same as that of any person, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental.
sabotage threatens this production, and the
steps that can be taken defensively to meet
these attacks. The objective of a saboteur is to
break the continuity of the supply of neces
sary emergency or war materials. The expert
saboteur discerns, usually through employ
ment in a key plant, the particular buildings
or the exact machinery vitally necessary to
the continuance of production. Then he tries
to halt or to slow down that production.
The following incidents that have actually
occurred in some of our industrial plants show
how the saboteur works, and emphasize the
threat he holds for us:
Nails have been driven through cables
causing short circuits; tools have been placed
on ledges over generators so that vibration
would cause them to fall into spinning gears;
pieces of bent wire have been placed over the
terminals of a switchboard; metal rods have
been placed in generators; wiring has been
changed so that meters and gauges did not
accurately reflect the working condition of
certain machinery; bricks have been lodged
in troughs which carried off molten steel, thus
causing an overflow.
To meet these threats experienced FBI
Special Agents are sent to survey plants and
to give defensive suggestions. These Special
Agents are as well equipped, perhaps better
qualified than the saboteur, to discern these
vulnerable points of possible attack. They
often can tell at a glance the points that are
not sufficiently protected. They may recom
mend additional guards, or additional flood
lights. They may recommend twenty-four
hour guard service where none exists.
Identity Badges
They may suggest that steps be taken to
see that any visitors entering the plant are
carefully scrutinized upon entry, their iden
tity fully established; that they are required
to wear distinctively marked badges while in
the plant; that the time of their entry be reg
istered; that they be escorted to the plant
official with whom they claim to have busi
ness; that they be escorted to the gate upon
exit, and that the time of their exit be duly
registered and the badge taken from them.
They will suggest that no individual em
ployees in positions of trust and particu
larly no employees who are members of the
police forces of these plants — should be con
tinued in such employment unless their per
sonal histories have been thoroughly investi
gated to determine their reliability and their
immunity to enemy solicitation or corruption.
Since the saboteur seeks to make his acts
appear to be accidents, we emphasize that
no fires of mysterious origin should go unin
vestigated. And because saboteurs are always
seeking to learn how they can do the most
damage, workers in positions of trust are
urged to show their patriotism by refusing to
disclose — to anyone — the confidential na
ture of their duties.
Fortunately, sabotage has been circum
vented to a great extent during the present
emergency, yet it cannot be denied that sev
eral serious plots have been averted only by
the prompt action that has been taken.
There was the case of the skilled employee
in an airplane factory who stole secret plans
of a new bomber from the plant. Fortunately,
we got them back and sent the thief to prison.
And here is another case of a different type
that occurred recently. One day when a work
man returned from lunch he found emery
dust in the mechanism upon which he was
working. This mechanism was designed to
steer a highly precise implement of war —
and, if it were faulty, it would have resulted
in a costly loss. Yet one employee who worked
on the mechanism admitted that he had put
an abrasive on the gears because he had a
grudge against a fellow workman who worked
too fast. The case is now pending trial.
The country’s industries must continue
operating at full force if our internal defense
is to be maintained on a proper basis. Ade
quate defense of our industries against the
saboteurs of the fifth column will help to spell
certain national security.
Next Week: How Spies Operate
7-21-40