Plus ça change...

The "liquid bomb plot" trial has highlighted the fact that evidence which has been obtained as a result of intercepting 'phone calls or e-mails is inadmissible in English courts unless the interception happened abroad and the information has been passed on to us by that other country. Somewhat of an anomaly and I'm sure it will be corrected in due course, but it immediately reminded me of the shenanigans surrounding the Zimmermann telegram. Not that I'm old enough to remember that of course, but the story is well reported. In early 1917 the Americans were dithering about whether to enter the war in Europe or not. The Germans of course desperately wanted them to stay out of it. To this end they proposed making an approach to the Mexican government that if they (the Mexicans) attacked the US from the south - and there were plenty of historical territorial disputes which could be used to justify such an attack - the Germans would give them logistical and diplomatic support. The hope was of course that America would not fancy trying to fight on two fronts, and therefore would stay out of the European war. Zimmermann, who was the German Foreign Minister sent a coded telegram to the German Ambassador in Mexico instructing him to approach the Mexican government with this offer. The telegram was intercepted and decoded by the British, but for various reasons it was considered essential that when it was made public, it had to appear that the interception and decoding had been done by the Americans, so a complicated plot was hatched to allow the Americans to "discover" the telegram and publish the contents. The resulting public outrage in the US was such that they entered the war just a few weeks later, so from the Germans' point of view the plan backfired spectacularly.