The Foundations for MI5 and MI6
Both of today’s security services, namely MI5 and the Secret Intelligence Service (known popularly as MI6) derive from the original Secret Service Bureau (SSB), founded in October 1909. The SSB was established in response to the Anglo-German naval arms race and several scare stories that a nest of German spies was operating in Britain. The Daily Mail ran an article suggesting that Swiss waiters might actually be German spies and the same newspaper, in 1906, commissioned Wil