📜 On This Day — Without Illusions

1917 – The Fatal Woman and the Rational State

The Arrest of Mata Hari in Paris

On February 13, 1917, in Paris, Mata Hari was arrested on charges of espionage.

Legend would later insist she was the woman who could bring down men and empires with a single glance. Reality is more prosaic — and far more instructive. Born Margaretha Geertruida Zelle, she was an exotic dancer who skillfully reinvented herself in the salons of Europe. Oriental mystique, veils, slow gestures — and men who believed that proximity to mystery elevated their own importance.

But war is not cabaret.

In 1917, France was bleeding. Tens of thousands had fallen at the front, morale was fragile, and political leadership needed explanations. In wartime, hysteria becomes a strategic resource. Mata Hari proved to be an ideal target: foreign, independent, sexually autonomous, and socially connected to high-ranking officers. If she had not existed, the climate would have required inventing her.

The trial was swift. The evidence ambiguous. The verdict — death. She was executed in October 1917. Many historians today consider her less a master spy and more a convenient scapegoat. The French state needed a narrative in which military setbacks were not the result of strategic miscalculations but of betrayal. It is a familiar dramaturgy.

Illusions Not Included: power rarely enjoys admitting incompetence. It is far more elegant to point at a fatal woman. The public, in turn, is grateful for a well-choreographed villain. A narrative soothes better than structural self-examination.

And if we imagine this mechanism belongs only to the era of trenches and telegrams, we should take a closer look at modern political communication. Scapegoating is no longer an emergency reflex; it is a refined instrument. When inflation rises, when deficits widen, when social tensions intensify, there is always a “foreign force,” an “internal enemy,” a neatly outlined figure to absorb public frustration. Distraction is more efficient than reform. Blame travels faster than accountability.

Mata Hari’s image survives in films, novels, and cultural references. The myth outlived the verdict. Perhaps because the story tells us more about ourselves than about her. In moments of crisis, we still prefer symbolic enemies to systemic responsibility.

The story of the alleged spy is not merely an erotic legend. It is a political mirror. And mirrors, when approached honestly, tend to reflect our own faces — not just the veil.

Earlier essay related to this theme: