Not that long ago we had a discussion on the attitude of some members of the British aristocracy and the German Nazi party before and during the World War2.

What is not so well known is the story of Lord Sempitt

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/churchill-protected-scottish-peer-suspected-of-spying-for-japan-1173730.html

But again the question what has often been asked in connection with some other aristocrats who feeling were towards Adolf Hitler , why did Winston Churchill shielded them?

And another interesting British character who also passed on information was Frederick Rutland ( aka Rutland from Jutland )


Dirk

I think you mean Sempill, Dirk?

Forbes-Sempill must have fitted every criteria for MI5 at the time for being a budding candidate for disinformation - known to have big money problems, known to have many contacts in Japan's foreign office and Japanese business, and certainly quickly found out when he started selling info through these contacts. Besides using him in that manner they would have also had a problem with "decommissioning" him, especially suddenly. Payments and communiques travelling from Japanese sources in his direction were coded, using a naval version of enigma in fact, and at the time the Japanese were unaware that their codes had been broken by the UK. Taking Sempill too quickly out of the picture would have only alerted the Japanese to the fact they had been compromised.

Churchill didn't seem to be "shielding" him as much as in a quandary as to how best to proceed with the guy, especially when they intercepted minutes from a meeting between Churchill and President Roosevelt in August 1941 discussing Japan's potential military threat to the USA. This seems to have brought matters to a head, though it was seemingly still thought it best to at least make it appear that Sempill still had a leading admiralty position (they moved him to Scapa Flow but chained him to a desk job basically in charge of stationery and office supplies, though he retained his Fleet Air Arm job title), though Sempill himself seems to have realised that the game was up at that point and went "quiet". We don't know if intelligence kept him going for a while using impersonation (pretend communiques from him), they may well have done so if only to ensure that he didn't abruptly disappear from Japanese view too quickly.

After the war with Japan concluded there was certainly a case for him, and a few others whose espionage had been detected, to face trial. However the Americans faced the same dilemma and decided it was best not to risk publicising their own cases. I assume the UK therefore had no real option but to go along with this too - it would have been a very difficult problem to contain had all these people been implicated in others' treason trials.

Sempill may have been effectively neutralised as an agent in 1941, but his money problems continued, and led him into equally imaginative methods of trying to raise a buck. In 1944 he even went so far as to attempt to use one of his hereditary titles "Baronet of Nova Scotia" to pressure the governor there to "sell" him the ground rent of most of the province, including some prime property around Halifax. This allegedly enraged Churchill when he heard it about it - probably more even than when he had been caught selling military secrets. One rather ironic result of British Intelligence keeping quiet about Sempill was that after the war he was well received in various countries where he had helped set up or modernise their airforces in pre-war days (including Japan, it must be said). Sweden even went so far as to award him their highest honour for a foreigner - The Order of The Polar Star - in 1956.

I can understand why it was not thought prudent to openly prosecute Sempill. However, having been found out selling secrets to Japan in 1925, and having worked as a consultant for Mitsubishi in the 1930s, why, on outbreak of war in 1939 was he given a senior position in the Department of Air Materiel at the Admiralty, which gave him access to both sensitive and secret information about the latest British aircraft? He was a known risk so why was he ever recruited into such a position?

Nordman,

thanks for pointing out my misspelling  the name of the person concerned.
My fault as I should have double checked before posting.
Let's blame old age.

Dirk

No problem Dirk - I had spelt him as "Simpell" in my own post before I spotted it.

Regarding his "elevation" in 1939 I imagine he could very well have been "owned" by MI5 then. Though when it comes to espionage who of us will ever know ...?

The Japanese were provided with a gold mine of secret information due the capture of SS Automedon by the German raider Atlantis in late 1940:

SS Automedon

nordmann wrote:

Regarding his "elevation" in 1939 I imagine he could very well have been "owned" by MI5 then. Though when it comes to espionage who of us will ever know ...?

Yes, I wondered whether MI5 had been trying to use him, through his Japanese high-level technical contacts, to get information from Japan, and ultimately relying on him, as a British peer and a gentleman, to remain loyal to his King and Country. Perhaps they succeeded, but as you say, who of us will ever know?

Of course the first time Semphill had gone to Japan was as head of the British government-santioned technical mission in 1921, with the full approval of the Air Ministry and the Foreign Office who were both hoping it would lead to lucrative arms contracts. This was when relations with Japan were still covered by the 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance that had directly led to Japan fighting on the allied side in WW1. Sempill's mission, which comprised about 30 specialist engineers, designers, pilots and trainers, remained in Japan for 18 months. During this time, they, with full British government backing, handed the Japanese details of most of the latest British naval aviation technology, including details of the latest British aircraft carriers and carrier aircraft, as well as training Japanese pilots in carrier operations, torpedo bombing etc.

But then fearing a clash of interests in the apparently increasingly likely future confrontation between the US and Japan, Britain decided to realign its alliances and the Anglo-Japanese Alliance was formally ended in in 1923. And with the termination of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, Sempill should have ended all close military contact and discussions with Japan. However on his return to the United Kingdom in 1923 he kept in contact with the Japanese Foreign Ministry through the Japanese Embassy in London.

If Lord Semphill did pass on information and messages to the Japanese, especially about the attack on Pearl Harbour why didn't  the American intelligence agency asked for his extradition after WW2 to stand trial in America.

https://nypost.com/2012/05/27/the-traitor-of-pearl-harbor/#content-wrapper


Dirk

Triceratops wrote:

The Japanese were provided with a gold mine of secret information due the capture of SS Automedon by the German raider Atlantis in late 1940:

SS Automedon

Triceratops,

thank you very much for this interesting, nearly a book, about the secret information available to the Japanese, possible by the negligence of the British and then the later cover-up by the higher "échelons"
And it reads as a novel (at least to me   )
Many times more is revealed by would-be historians (I guess Alan Matthews is such one) than by the official ones
https://www.forcez-survivors.org.uk/
Look at the "about us"

And it is all as intriguing as the conversation between Abelard and me about the statement that the higher French command and even Daladier knew beforehand about the German planned breakthrough through the Ardennes and did nothing before the event happened to avoid it...
https://reshistorica.forumotion.com/t1139p100-case-yellow-case-red-and-sealion

Kind regards from Paul.