Special Intelligence Service The Special Intelligence Service was a covert counterintelligence branch of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) located in South America during World War II . It was established during the term of U . S . President Franklin D . Roosevelt to monitor Axis activities in Central and South America . In 1934 , President Roosevelt began to grow concerned about activities of Nazi groups within the United States . The FBI was ordered to begin investigating these groups operating within the country . The goal of this work was to determine if foreign agents were working within these American Nazi groups . In 1940 , the government decided to expand the scope of this mission . There were more than 1 . 5 million expatriate Germans living in South America , including Argentina and Brazil . As a result this area had become an active area of Axis espionage , propaganda and sabotage . In June 1940 , President Roosevelt ordered the formation of the Special Intelligence Service to monitor these activities . The SIS allied with the BIS ( Basque Intelligence Service ) in Latin America . It is presumptive that Assistant Director Percy E . " Sam " Foxworth was the first chief of the SIS . He died in a plane crash on 15 January 1943 with agent Harold Dennis Haberfeld . The second chief appears to have been Jerome Doyle . The headquarters of this organization was located on the 44th floor of the International Building , in the Rockefeller Center plaza in New York City . The front for the organization was actually an operating law firm . It took some time to become fully operational , due to language and cultural differences , but within a year the SIS had a number of agents in place under various covers . This organization placed more than 340 undercover agents in regions of Latin America . They operated for seven years , and by 1946 a total of 887 axis spies had been discovered . Also found were 281 agents of axis propaganda , 222 smugglers shipping important war materials , and more than 100 saboteurs and other operatives . It located 24 secret Axis radio stations and confiscated 40 radio transmitters and 18 receiving sets . Following the war the SIS was disbanded , having been in operation in 1940 - 1946 . After it was disbanded , its region of operation was incorporated in those of the newly formed Central Intelligence Agency . Argentina . The SIS oversaw the destruction of the Abwehr radio HDZ , which transmitted messages to Nazi receiving stations in Europe . It was instrumental in breaking the code of the German Enigma machine . Bolivia . An investigation labeled the " Jar case " remains classified . Chile . German radio transmitter PQZ was silenced . Guiflermo Hellemann , one of the leader of the spy and sabotage ring was deported to the United States and interrogated . Colombia . The apprehension of a German agent in Colombia led to the identification of German agents in the United States . Cuba . The SIS report : Paraguay . On 31 March 1945 , Special Agent Jeremiah Cordes Delworth was " presently serving " as the FBI Legal Attache in Asuncion , Paraguay . He died in a plane crash on 3 December 1945 near Laguna Ibera , Santo Tome , Corrientes Provence , Argentina . The Argentine Death Certificate gives the names of Gordon Brittain Whelplay and Richard William Scheitzer as witnesses . The aircraft of the crash was a U . S . Army C - 47 , No . 8602 . According to Argentine reports , bad weather was the cause . Fourteen were killed in the crash . The flight was from Asuncion to Montevideo , Uruguay . The pilot was Lt . Orville Mitchelsen of California and 3 crew members . The other military victims were Lt . Zane Glicher of Massilon , Ohio ; Lt . Chester Lowe of Washington , D . C . ; Lt . William Nunnemaker of Kansas ; Lt . Ruben Klein of New York ; Sgt . James Roberson of St . Louis , Mo . ; Sgt . Clarence Setko of Superior , Wis . ; Sgt . Richard Schweitzer of Gloversvflle , N . Y . ; Cpl . Frank Dubinskas of MeKees Rocks , Pa . ; Cpl . David Kellogg of Newtonville , Mass . ; Charles Brown and E . S . King , crew members , and ( first name unavailable ) Leopold . The burned aircraft was found in rough country twenty - three miles south of the hamlet of Pellegrini . The purpose of the military passengers was a U . S . Army " geodetic mission " . A geodetic mission collects Geodetic datum . It was deemed too difficult to recover the bodies and a gasoline can was parachuted to the search party that located the wrecked plane for the purpose of cremation . Venezuela . Ten sabotage agents were interned in the town of Rubino by the Venezuelan government . Special Agent Robert Howard Calhoun arrived in Venezuela on his first SIS assignment on February 18 , 1943 . He was assigned as Vice Consul in Ciudad Bolivar , Venezuela , as a cover story . While in Ciudad Bolivar , Agent Calhoun handled investigations involving espionage , sabotage , subversive activity and diamond smuggling . After ten months , he was transferred to Caracas as Assistant Legal Attache . In January , 1944 , all cases relating to political and Communist activity were assigned to him . Thomas J . Maleady , Second Secretary of the United States Embassy , was dependent upon Calhoun ’ s reports for his information . Calhoun developed contacts and confidential informants . Many contacts and confidential informants developed by him in Ciudad Bolivar continued to furnish him with information , although he was not able to contact then personally while in Caracas . Calhoun led and directed raids against fascists and participated in dangerous assignments . He later transferred to the New York City FBI division , probably around October 1944 . Safehaven Project . Identified the transfer of capital out of Germany .