FRANCE
the high
S
SECRET FASCIST
officials
ARMY
and individuals
37
to
whom
their investigations
did not dare go further with it, or, if they did, sup
the information. Some of it, however, came out.
pressed
At the top of the Cagoulards is a Supreme War Council or
General Staff whose members have not been disclosed. Working
led, either
with them are several other organizations, all with innocent
names, as for example the "Society of Studies for French Re
activities are divided into broad
generation." The Cagoulards
general lines, each directed by an individual in complete com
mand and
embracing:
Buying war materials within France and smuggling war ma
terials into the country from Germany, Italy and Insurgent Spain,
along with the simultaneous weaving of an espionage network
under Nazi and fascist direction and leadership.
Building concrete fortresses at strategic centers and storing
smuggled arms in them.
Military training of secretly organized troops.
Getting the money to carry on these extensive activities.
Extreme care was, and
still is,
taken to conceal the identities
of the ordinary members and especially the leaders. For instance,
one of the leaders known to his subordinates as "Fontaine" is in
Georges Cachier, director of a large company in Paris
"Third Bureau," which is in
charge
of military movements. Cachier is an Officer of the French Le
gion of Honor and a reserve Lieutenant-Colonel in the French
reality
and
chief of the Cagoulards
Army.
The Cagoulards are still very active. Members are being re
cruited with leaders pointing out to the fearful ones that there
is
nothing to worry about almost all of those arrested in the
early days of the investigation are free, out
"gentleman s
please.
As
is
"Our
confinement"
power
is
on
bail or kept in a
as they
where they can do virtually
great,"
new members
are told.
customary in secret terrorist societies, the
members
are