The British intelligence community's handling of Ireland reached a nadir in the summer of 1940. Yet it was followed by a gradual, continuous improvement. British intelligence agencies greatly intensified their involvement with the country. They did this in two ways: first, stepping up covert intelligence operations; second, establishing ever-closer co-operation with the Irish authorities. British intelligence continued to move along these twin tracks of covert activity and official collaboration until late in the war, although there was a gradual shift in emphasis towards the latter as the Anglo-Irish intelligence relationship deepened. In addition, the increased flow of intelligence was accompanied by its better use in London, where it was subject to more sophisticated analysis and dissemination. As a result, the scares and alarms that were such a feature of the first year of the war were gradually debunked, gaps in knowledge were filled, preconceptions challenged. Eventually, and not without stutters, Britain developed a sophisticated intelligence system, which provided a foundation for wiser policy-making and allowed the British government to extract the maximum benefits from Irish neutrality.

This improvement can be seen in the four main tasks that faced the British intelligence community after the summer of 1940. One was investigating the Irish fifth column – republicans, fascist sympathisers, German agents – and taking appropriate counter-measures. The strength of the fifth column depended on Irish attitudes towards the war, so a second task for the British intelligence community was monitoring public opinion, gauging the influence of Axis propaganda and organising an Allied propaganda response. The third task, which retained its importance the longest, was preventing German espionage and leakage of information through neutral Ireland. The response of the British intelligence community to these challenges will be explored in the next three chapters. But the most urgent task in the summer of 1940, which we will look at here, was gathering the sort of intelligence that British forces would need to conduct military operations in southern Ireland. This would remain a priority so long as it was possible that British forces would have to intervene in the south – either to repel a German invasion or to seize Irish bases.