Let’s continue our discussion of the hazards of having to trust strangers for a resistance line. It was possible that the authorities might capture someone the line was helping and get information out of that person. It was also a very real possibility that a German agent might infiltrate an escape line by pretending to be a downed Allied aviator.

But the most serious danger and the one that caused the most damage was the German agents who infiltrated resistance lines by pretending to be resisters. Many of these agents were not themselves German but were French or Belgian or Dutch men or women being paid by the Germans to betray their countrymen and women.

Dutch-Paris itself did not fall victim to one of these V-manner as they were called, but other Dutch resisters working in Paris and Brussels did. These individuals wormed their way into the confidence of resisters but were actually in the pay of and reporting to the German police. It has to be said that it wasn’t always that hard to do. Resisters were not professionals. They tended to be good people with an abhorrence for Nazism who were doing the best they could to right injustices. If they didn’t have contacts with the Allied services such as SOE or training in Communist politics, they had to make it all up as they went along including security measures. So if a fellow Dutchman who seems like a good guy shows up and offers to help or says he has a connection to false documents, it would be very tempting to trust him and take advantage of the offer. Sometimes this nice guy was who he said he was. If it turned out he wasn’t, they all paid a high price for their mistake, which you might also call naivete.

Dutch-Paris did fall victim to a professional spy, but we’ll save that for the next post.