Project Eagle: The Top-Secret OSS Operation that Sent Polish Spies Behind Enemy Lines in World War II (03/20/25)

Join us for a book talk with John S. Micgiel, author of Project Eagle: The Top-Secret OSS Operation that Sent Polish Spies Behind Enemy Lines in World War II. Micgiel has served as director of the Institute on East Central Europe, associate director of the Harriman Institute, executive director of the Institute for the Study of Europe, and adjunct professor of international and public affairs—all at Columbia University. Now retired from Columbia, he teaches at the University of Warsaw.

Co-sponsored by the International History Institute. Moderated by Igor Lukes, Professor of History and International Relations, Boston University.

Thursday, March 20, 2025
Pardee School of Global Studies, 121 Bay State Road
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About the Book

After the Battle of the Bulge—which had begun with a German attack that American intelligence failed to anticipate—the Office of Strategic Service (OSS), forerunner of the CIA, revamped its intelligence operations in Europe. Confronted with staff shortages and needing native language speakers, the OSS decided to enlist the cooperation of volunteers from occupied countries for intelligence-gathering operations. As part of Project Eagle, Polish soldiers were recruited and trained to go behind the lines of the Third Reich. Project Eagle tells this fascinating World War II story of intelligence and espionage that until now has been hidden away in the archives of the OSS.The OSS had worked with Polish exiles throughout the war, but Project Eagle would mark a new and dramatic chapter in their cooperation. In early 1945, American intelligence recruited thirty-two Poles—a unique group of men who had been forcibly conscripted into the German Wehrmacht, were captured in France and Italy, and were pulled from Allied prisoner of war camps. They were then trained in intelligence gathering as well as espionage to assist the Allies in their invasion of Germany. Not long after—in March 1945—they parachuted behind enemy lines, equipped only with falsified documents and radios. For six weeks, up until Germany’s surrender, the Polish spy teams roved Germany, assisting ground commanders and providing counterintelligence assistance.