Lipstick pistols, poison pens, explosive rats – a Paris exhibition reveals real-life spy gadgets and tells the story of how secret agents around the world were recruited, trained and equipped during clandestine missions from World War I to the end of the Cold War. "Secret Wars," now up at Les Invalides, offers a chance to relive the days before espionage went online, displaying about 400 objects, devices and archives from French, British, American and German collections, most of which have never been shown before.
Since the creation of permanent intelligence services at the end of the 19th century, scientific and technological progress enabled experts to make spy devices and weapons ever smaller, more silent and less visible.
During times of war, agents could be considered as war prisoners and face trial – and potentially a death sentence.
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