Deuxième Bureau
Introduction
The Deuxième Bureau de l'État-major général ("Second Bureau of the General Staff") was France's external military intelligence agency from 1871 to 1940. It was dissolved together with the Third Republic upon the armistice with Germany. However, the term "Deuxième Bureau" (French: [døzjɛm byʁo]) outlived the original organization as a general label for the country's intelligence service.
French military intelligence was composed of two separate bureaux prior to World War II. The Premier Bureau was charged with informing the high command about the state of French, allied and friendly troops, while the Deuxième Bureau developed intelligence concerning enemy troops. The Deuxième Bureau was celebrated for its cryptanalytical work, but it was criticized for its involvement in the Dreyfus affair and its consistent overestimation of German military formations prior to World War II.
History
19th century
On June 8, 1871, the French Ministry of War authorized the creation of a service charged with performing "research on enemy plans and operations". The creation of a reworked Etat Major Général (or General Staff) came in response to the French loss in the Franco-Prussian War and acknowledgment of poor military planning structures in preparation for those hostilities. The EMG was then divided into two bureaus–the first, composed of civilians, was more of a directorial or leadership branch, charged with general correspondence, troop movements, decorations and decrees, and the second, or the Deuxième Bureau (further subdivided into five sections), was charged with military statistics, archival and historical work, geodesy and topography. This entire structure would be replaced three years later by a reworked general staff, even more similar to the Prussian one in terms of command structure.
In March 1874, the high command was reorganized again, replacing the original two bureaus with six smaller sections. As part of the reorganization, the new Deuxième Bureau, called “Statistique militaire - Bureau historique,” took up the activities that would include intelligence collection.
In 1876, a Statistiques et de reconnaissances militaires ("Military Statistics and Recognition") section was added to the Deuxième Bureau.
In 1886, a law was passed penalizing espionage activity (another would be passed in 1934).
In October 1894 the Dreyfus affair occurred and proved so politically divisive that, in May 1899, the government shifted responsibility for counter-espionage to the Ministry of the Interior. A small intelligence section remained within the General Staff, but the Service de surveillance du territoire (Territorial Surveillance Service, SST), an agency of the Sûreté générale, became responsible for the pursuit of foreign spies on French soil. Counter-espionage was to be handled by special Sûreté police chiefs. The Deuxième Bureau's statistical section remained in operation until 1 September 1899, when it was disbanded.
The name (literally, Second Desk) refers to the organization of the French general staff in four desks: 1st for personnel, 2nd for intelligence, 3rd for operations, 4th for logistics. This numerical designation survives in the first four staff numbers of the continental staff system practiced by most NATO armies: S1 for personnel, S2 for intelligence, S3 for operations, S4 for logistics. (See also the French version of this page.)
1900s–1920
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deuxi%C3%A8me_Bureau