X-Nico

8 unusual facts about Office of Strategic Services


25th Tactical Reconnaissance Wing

'Redstocking' was the label given to top secret missions flown for the OSS (Office of Strategic Services.

Archimedes Patti

Archimedes L.A. Patti (1913–1998) was an American U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and former Office of Strategic Services officer who headed OSS operations in Kunming and Hanoi in 1945.

Ellery Huntington, Jr.

In World War II, Huntington worked directly for William J. Donovan in the Office of Strategic Services and was instrumental in secret work for the Allies, especially during the invasion of North Africa.

Glossary of cryptographic keys

poem key - Keys used by OSS agents in World War II in the form of a poem that was easy to remember.

Harvey J. Levin

In World War II, he served as a Research Analyst and Foreign Language Officer in the Office of Strategic Services (later reorganized as the Central Intelligence Agency) in Washington, D.C. and Japan, drawing largely on his Japanese language skills.

Mission to Venice

On the flight back to America Hawk tells Carter that he and Manfrinto were best friends during World War II – Hawk as OSS liaison and Manfrinto as leader of a group of Yugoslav Partisans fighting the Germans.

Roger Wolcott Hall

Roger Wolcott Hall (May 20, 1919, Baltimore, Maryland - 20 July 2008, Windsor Hills, DE; congestive heart failure) was an American Army officer and spy in the Office of Strategic Services during World War II and the author of a humorous memoir of his experiences in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), entitled You’re Stepping on My Cloak and Dagger (1957).

Science and technology in the United States

While President Harry S. Truman refused to provide sanctuary to ideologically committed members of the Nazi party, the Office of Strategic Services introduced Operation Paperclip, conducted under the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency.


Antonio Ferri

He eventually made his way to Rome after it was liberated by the Allies, where he made contact with OSS agent Moe Berg and began to work with him translating key documents from the trunk, also passing on his knowledge of the achievements of German science during the war.

Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs

Helen Grace Scott Keenan, Office of U.S. Chief Counsel for Prosecution of Axis War Criminals, Office of Strategic Services

Hans Landa

Landa even manages to negotiate a deal including a house on Nantucket Island, his military pension, public recognition as an operative working with the American Office of Strategic Services and to be awarded the Medal of Honor.

Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency

The Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA) was the organization directly responsible for Operation Paperclip, an OSS program for capturing and taking Nazi German scientists to the United States at the end of the Second World War.

Nelson Glueck

During World War II, Glueck used his intimate knowledge of Palestine's geography to help the Office of Strategic Services develop a contingency plan for a retreat from Rommel's advance through Northern Africa.

Old Naval Observatory

The Central Intelligence Agency's forerunner, the Office of Strategic Services was a tenant on the Hill during World War II, and the United States Public Health Service had a hospital there.

Strategy and tactics of guerrilla warfare

Peers, who later became a general, commanded OSS Detachment 101 in Burma and authored a book on its operations following the war.

The Girl in the Kremlin

Zsa Zsa Gabor plays a dual role, Stalin’s nurse and lover as well as her twin sister who, unaware of Stalin’s plot, hires an ex O.S.S. agent (Lex Barker) to find her sister.

Winston M. Scott

Winston Mackinley Scott (1909 - 26 April 1971) was a Central Intelligence Agency officer who served as Mexico City station chief from 1956 to 1969, having joined the Office of Strategic Services in 1943 from the Federal Bureau of Investigation.


see also

Toyon Bay

The Office of Strategic Services was the precursor to the Central Intelligence Agency.