This site is a mock-up of the World War I intercept site in Verdun, France. The exhibit is based on two pictures of the original shack. Just as American combat troops in the "Great War" frequently had to fight with foreign equipment, intercept activities were also often conducted with foreign equipment: in this case, the radios shown are of French manufacture.
Intercepting the enemy's radio communication was imperative for success during WWI. At the outbreak of war in August 1914, the German Army successfully used vital radio intercepts, enabling them to defeat the Russian 2nd Army in the Battle of Tannenberg. Soon all the major participants in World War I would go on to use more encompassing communications intelligence (COMINT) with varying degrees of success.
U.S. Army radio intercept operators went into the field during General Pershing’s Punitive Expedition, an attempt to capture the Mexican revolutionary, Pancho Villa, along the Mexican Border in 1916. But the first large scale use of Army radio intelligence personnel was during World War I.
Although signals intelligence was in its infancy, and radio was the new communications technology, the U.S. Army’s Radio Intelligence Section used their newfound capabilities to “spy” on enemy conversation. Signals could be intercepted without being in close proximity to the transmitter or transmission lines and could provide vital information about enemy tactics and strategy. This information was gained from direction finding, radio intercept and decryption and was used for tactical planning by the American Expeditionary Forces.