Page 143 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

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Simultaneously during the period 1900-1906 also the Royal Navy began to give
5
greater emphasis to its informative activity organizing an Information Office that in
6
1906 which became a Department, the first one of the Office of the General Staff,
headed by a Captain. It started to be very active, particularly in Dardanelles and supplied
the Information Office of the Command of the General Staff in a cooperative atmosphere
with interesting maps.
7
In 1907 the Office of the General Staff of the Navy was enlarged and modified and
th
the Information Department was given greater importance becoming the 4 Department
of the General Staff of the Navy, with a very articulated structure, in five Sections and a
Secretariat: very interesting, the Fifth one that, in addition to coordinating the military
Police in the various military harbours and arsenals, gathered and communicated in due
form the military information coming from the affected areas; it corresponded with and
managed informers keeping in order also the Archive of Secret Information.
In comparison with the already well structured organizations such as the British
Military Operations (MO3, precursor of MI6), the Austrian Evidenz Bureau, the German
Nachrichtendienst Abteilung III B, and the French Deuxième Bureau, considering
only Europe, in that period the Italian military information system was almost at the
very beginning; especially it seemed to lack good analytical skills, essential for a true
‘intelligence’, i.e. understanding of gathered news, in a global way.
On the eve of the First World War, the intelligence organization improved. In April
1915 it was sought a more rational division of work, within the framework of the
Supreme Command with a complete re-organization of the Office ‘I’ that on May 24,
1915, became Information Office of the Supreme Command, headed by the Deputy
Chief and Chief of General Staff. During the war necessary services of censorship were
instituted, broad-spectrum, another great source for counter-intelligence. The general
organization of the informative activity branched out throughout the Army but it did not
manage to avoid the defeat at Caporetto, despite a series internal bureaucratic re-shaping
in the Service seeking a better performance.
In the same period, the Ministry of Interior had a Reserved Office (then Political and
Reserved Affairs Office), within the Directorate-General of the Public Security, which
was also involved in the general informative activity, certainly not considered a priority,
with skills mainly related to domestic security.
For the collaboration with the Information Office of the Supreme Command, on
September 12, 1913 it was established the Central Bureau of Investigation (in Italian
Ufficio Centrale d’Investigazione – UCI) subordinated to the P.S. Directorate-General.
During the conflict UCI became the Special Office of Criminal Investigation (in Italian
Ufficio Speciale d’Investigazioni – USI) ) which survived until 1921 to be then reabsorbed
in Section I of the General and Reserved Affairs Division, which was responsible for
public order (Criminal Political Central Records Office included), while the Second
one controlled the foreigners. On February 20, 1920 the Director General of the Public

5 R.D. 3.4.1900, no. 76.
6 R.D. 7.15.1906, no. 402.
7 D.M. 2.10.1907 and D.M. 4.5.1907.