Operation Jungle

Overview

Operation Jungle was a programme by the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) early in the Cold War from 1949 to 1955 for the clandestine insertion of intelligence and resistance agents into Poland and the Baltic states. The agents were mostly Polish, Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian exiles who had been trained in the United Kingdom and Sweden and were to link up with the anti-Soviet resistance against the communist governments. The naval operations of the programme were carried out by German crew-members of the German Mine Sweeping Administration under the control of the Royal Navy. The American-sponsored Gehlen Organization also got involved in the draft of agents from Eastern Europe. However, the MGB penetrated the network and captured or turned most of the agents.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

Operation Jungle was an MI6 programme running from 1949 to 1955 that attempted to sustain anti-Soviet resistance in Poland and the Baltic states during the early Cold War through the clandestine insertion of trained exile agents. The operation drew on Polish, Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian exiles prepared in the United Kingdom and Sweden, and involved coordination with the American-sponsored Gehlen Organization for agent recruitment from Eastern Europe. Naval insertion was carried out by German crews of the German Mine Sweeping Administration under Royal Navy control. The programme ultimately failed: Soviet counterintelligence, the MGB, penetrated the network and captured or turned the majority of agents, neutralizing the effort and demonstrating the severe difficulty Western intelligence faced in projecting clandestine influence behind the Iron Curtain in this period.

Commanders (8)