Edward Bancroft, or, Most Spying is Useless

Edward Bancroft was probably the most successful spy of the American Revolution. Attached to the American mission to France, he kept the British government very well informed about the ongoing negotiations. In particular, he warned Lord North that French recognition and aid would come very quickly after the American victory at Saratoga, which led North to send a commission to America offering everything the Americans sought in 1775. Bancroft was also a scientist, physician, and explorer, whose most significant discovery was probably the electrical activity of the electrical eel, so an all-around fascinating character, and I may end up reading the new biography by Thomas J. Schaeper.

What I find particularly interesting is the question of whether Bancroft's spying did the British any good. Benjamin Franklin famously refused to take precautions against spying on the grounds that nothing he did was worth keeping secret. Schaeper, after reviewing Bancroft's career carefully, seems to agree with Franklin:

What difference, if any, did Bancroft’s espionage really make? The basic answer seems to be, not much, if any at all. Information obtained in Europe could provide the British with a great source as to how much support the Americans were gaining from their alliance, but translating that into operational advantage, either at sea or an ocean away in North America, was virtually impossible. This was not the age of Magic or Enigma, and distant disclosures of critical intelligence rarely if ever had immediate application. On the diplomatic side, the major determinants of wartime diplomacy were the Americans’ October victories at Saratoga in 1777 and Yorktown in 1781. One brought alliance, the other brought peace, and Bancroft’s disclosures on both occasions did nothing to alter the course of diplomacy.

Even when spies deliver accurate information on future plans, politicians often cannot tell whether to believe them, and they often guess wrongly. (George III refused to believe that France was acting as quickly as Bancroft said they would.) Enormous investments in spying are made with the idea that perfect information will lead to better policy, but the evidence that this is so is very thin.

What difference did the enormous American and Soviet investment in Cold War espionage make to history? None, I say; the course of the conflict was determined by political and economic developments within the two countries. And no amount of information about American diplomacy could have saved the British government from their basic error of treating the colonists with contempt.