What is "abwehr"

The Abwehr (, "Defence") was a German military intelligence organization which existed from 1920 to 1945. Despite the fact that the Treaty of Versailles prohibited the Germans altogether from establishing an intelligence organization of their own, they formed an espionage group in 1920 within their defence ministry, calling it the Abwehr. The initial purpose of the Abwehr was defence against foreign espionage—an organizational role which later evolved considerably. To this end, the Abwehr gathered domestic and foreign information, most of it in the form of human intelligence. Under General Kurt von Schleicher the individual military service intelligence units were combined and in 1929, placed under his Ministry of Defence, forming the foundation for the more commonly understood manifestation of the Abwehr. Each Abwehr station throughout Germany was based on army districts and more offices were opened in amenable neutral countries and in the occupied territories as the greater Reich expanded. When Adolf Hitler replaced the Ministry of War with the OKW and made the organization part of the Führer's personal "working staff" in June 1938, the Abwehr became its intelligence agency and Vice-Admiral Wilhelm Canaris was placed at the head of the organization. Its headquarters (HQ) was located at 76/78 Tirpitzufer, Berlin, adjacent to the offices of the OKW.