Since the Committee of Secret Correspondence put much of its efforts into gaining patriot sympathy abroad to be used during the American Revolution, they requested of the Continental Congress that the members and actions of the committee be kept confidential, so that Great Britain would not hear about the United States forging foreign alliances for the looming revolution. Another reason the Committee wanted its members and actions kept quiet was because the committee had many undercover agents on missions overseas gaining information about the political and economic situation in other countries, and if other countries heard about these undercover agents they would be exposed and their missions ruined. For example, in 1776, the Committee was instructing Silas Deane, an undercover agent in France, on how to interact with the French government and encourage them to provide munitions and ships to the United States.