“Okay, a couple of givens in here. Germany doesn’t want the Russians to get their hands on the atomic bomb, or the details of how one makes an atom bomb.”
“I would suggest, Colonel, that keeping the Russians from getting the atomic bomb is also in the interests of the United States.”
“Well, we’ve found something to agree on,” Graham said sarcastically. “Let’s see if we can build on that. So you know there are Russian spies at Oak Ridge. Why didn’t you just give their names to the FBI?”
Von und zu Waching did not reply.
Graham went off on a tangent: “As Admiral Canaris’s Number Two, I presume that you are privy to most of his communications with others?”
The question surprised both Dulles and von und zu Waching.
“I would say that I am privy to just about all,” von und zu Waching said, more than a little arrogantly.
“If I wasn’t clear about this, Colonel Graham,” Allen Dulles said, “I have it on good authority—from the admiral himself—that the fregattenkapitän is indeed Vice Admiral Canaris’s deputy.”
I don’t really know, Graham thought, if that remark was intended for von und zu Waching or me.
Is he trying to convince von und zu Waching that he has a friend?
No!
What he’s doing is more or less politely suggesting that he doesn’t approve of the way I’m dealing with von und zu Waching.
Allen, you’re wrong!
Von und zu Waching is a sailor, a navy officer, and I know how to deal with navy officers.
You think like a diplomat, Allen, and a diplomat is the last thing I need right now!
“I’m going to show you one of those communications, Captain,” Graham said, “and ask you to explain what it means. If I like your answers, that means you have told me the truth. That will be another step in our blossoming relationship. Fair enough?”
Von und zu Waching nodded.
Graham went into his briefcase, pulled out a manila envelope, and took from it two photographs of a message—obviously pages one and two of the message—which he handed to von und zu Waching.
“May I ask what that is?” Dulles asked.
“You may, but I’m frankly shocked that you would ask. Have you forgotten what Secretary of State Stimson said?”
Dulles shook his head in disbelief.
“‘Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail,’” von und zu Waching said, smiling after he quoted Henry Stimson’s 1931 justification for shutting down the government’s small—and only—cryptographic office.
“Listen to the Captain, Allen,” Graham said.
“Would that we were all still living in such an age of innocence,” von und zu Waching said.
“Amen, brother!” Graham said.
“Actually, I wrote this,” von und zu Waching said, holding up the message. “And frankly, I’m amazed . . .”
He stopped in midsentence.
“That it was compromised so quickly?” Graham finished for him.
Von und zu Waching nodded.
“Show it to Mr. Dulles, Captain. Curiosity is about to consume him.” He gave him just enough time to do so before asking, “So who’s the senior officer?”
Von und zu Waching looked into Graham’s eyes for a long moment.
“SS-Brigadeführer Ritter Manfred von Deitzberg,” von und zu Waching said. “He is de facto, if not de jure, Himmler’s deputy.”
“But he was just in Argentina—wearing the uniform of a Wehrmacht general.”
Von und zu Waching knew it was more of a question than a statement. He began: “There are three reasons why he’s going to Argentina—”
“On U-405?”
“You even know the number?”
“And the name of her skipper,” Graham said. “Kapitänleutnant Wilhelm von Dattenberg.”
“Yes, on the U-405. For three reasons. The Bavarian corporal inquired of Himmler if the ‘mechanism for the transport of senior officers’ to South America was in place. The admiral told me Hitler had a half-formed idea that Il Duce, once he’s freed, might be the first senior officer to seek asylum under Operation Phoenix.”
“My God! Really?” Dulles asked incredulously.
“According to the admiral, Himmler said he had disabused the Führer of that notion. But Hitler wanted to know, as I said, if the mechanism is in place.”
“I want to hear about freeing Mussolini,” Graham said. “But first, let’s get to the other two reasons von Deitzberg is being sent to Argentina.”
Von und zu Waching looked at him, nodded, and went on: “Himmler told Hitler that he had turned over control of U-405 to Admiral Canaris—this was not true—and that Canaris was in the process of seeing if ‘the mechanism was in place’; that von Deitzberg was en route to Argentina is the test of the mechanism.”
“So von Deitzberg had to go,” Graham said. “Reason Two?”
“Himmler wants your man there, Frade, eliminated. Apparently, Cranz has been unable to accomplish this. Von Deitzberg is very good at that sort of thing. And he’s close to Colonel Perón.”
“And Three?”
“That—his connection with Perón—may be Three. But it could be something else. I just know, and the admiral agrees, that there’s more to Himmler’s sending von Deitzberg to Argentina than checking to see if the ‘transport mechanism’ works and eliminating Frade.”
“You said when Il Duce has been freed?” Dulles asked.
“By now the Carabinieri, in whose hands the king placed him, should have moved him to a ski resort—the Campo Imperatore Hotel on the Gran Sasso—” He paused and looked between Dulles and Graham to make sure they understood him, and after they nodded he went on: “From which, in the next few days, a task force of paratroops augmented by some special SS troops will try to rescue him.”
“You’re suggesting that you’re not sure the operation will work?” Graham asked.
“The admiral isn’t sure, either. On one hand, the paratroops are very good, and the SS are special troops. On the other, there’s a battalion of Carabinieri who are also very good.”
“Why is rescuing Mussolini so important?” Dulles wondered aloud. “There is no way he could resume power.”
“Because the Bavarian corporal thinks it is,” von und zu Waching said. “Case closed.”
Dulles nodded a sad agreement.
“Okay,” Graham said. “What is it you want from me in Argentina? And what do you offer in return?”
“Money is the primary thing I want from you,” von und zu Waching said.
“Money is usually the last thing mentioned,” Graham said. “After you convince the other fellow that he really wants what you’re selling, then you tell him how much it costs. What are you going to give me for my money?”
“Abwehr Ost,” von und zu Waching said. “Files, dossiers, analyses, even agents in place. How much would you like to have that?”
“We have a saying, Captain, that when something sounds too good to be true, it usually is,” Graham said. “The first thing that comes to mind is: ‘How could he possibly deliver on that?’ And the second is: ‘Why would he want to?’ ”
“Oberstleutnant Gehlen . . . you know of whom I speak?”
Graham nodded. “He runs Abwehr Ost for Admiral Canaris. I’ve always wondered why he’s only a lieutenant colonel.”
“To keep him from Hitler’s attention,” von und zu Waching said. “He met the Führer for the first time a week or so ago.”
“Okay,” Graham said. “I can understand that.”
“Oberstleutnant Gehlen wants three things,” von und zu Waching went on carefully. “In the following order: To protect the families of his officers and men. To protect, insofar as this may be possible, the lives of his officers and men and agents and assets in place in the Soviet Union.”
Graham nodded, grunted, and said, “That’s two things.”
“You very possibly won’t like his third.”
“We won’t know until you tell me, will we?”
“Gehlen feels it would be a shame—worse, criminal, even sinful—if all the knowledge of Abwehr Ost, acquired at such great effort and the cost of so many lives, should be flushed down the toilet when Soviet tanks roll down the Unter den Linden.”
“What would he like to see happen to it?” Dulles asked softly.
“He believes that his intelligence would be useful, even the determining factor, in defeating the Soviet Union when, inevitably, there is war between the United States and the Soviet Union.”
“And do you believe that war is inevitable between the United States and our Soviet allies?” Dulles pursued.
Von und zu Waching took a moment before replying: “I would say that it is inevitable unless the United States develops and produces atomic weapons before the Soviet Union does and demonstrates its willingness to use them.”
“Even against Germany?” Graham asked.
Von und zu Waching didn’t reply to the question. Graham decided not to push him.
“The Russians are, of course, aware of Gehlen,” von und zu Waching said, “and almost certainly have the names of his important people on their Order of Battle charts. Probably, they have the names of everyone connected with Abwehr Ost down to the last obergefreiter and female civilian typist. It follows that if we have penetrated them, they have penetrated us.”
“Yeah,” Graham thought aloud.
“But they don’t—self-evidently—know the identities of Gehlen’s people in the Kremlin. They will want those names. We would, and I suggest you would, under the same circumstances. The difference being that we would not torture the wives and children of their officers to get that information.”
“You think the Russians would torture women and children?” Dulles asked softly.
“Probably with about as much enthusiasm as the SS does when they have a Russian woman or child in their hands,” von und zu Waching said.
“What do you want from me?” Graham asked. “I don’t seem to be getting an answer.”
“Gehlen wants to set up an operation something like Phoenix for his people,” von und zu Waching said. “What he wants to do immediately is send one of his officers to Argentina to see what has to be done. That’s why I said he needs—I suppose I mean we need—money. Abwehr doesn’t have warehouses full of no-longer-needed gold wedding rings, dental prostheses, and eyeglass frames that can be turned into cash.”
“You don’t think that anyone would notice that one of Gehlen’s officers—and he would have to be one of his senior officers—was suddenly no longer around?” Graham asked.
“The officer Gehlen has in mind—a major—will ostensibly give his life for the Fatherland on the Eastern Front. We can get him as far as here, or Madrid, one or the other, with identity credentials that should get him past the border guards.”
“And from here, or Madrid, to Buenos Aires?”
“That you’d have to arrange,” von und zu Waching said.
“And what do we get?” Graham asked.
“Eventually everything, and that includes Oberstleutnant Gehlen and myself. And possibly even the admiral. Immediately, we will give you the names of the people the Soviets have at Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, the University of California at Berkeley, and elsewhere. There are eleven names in all. More will be furnished when they turn up, as I’m sure they will. Stalin wants your bomb and is working hard to get it.”
“And how much money are you asking?” Dulles asked.
“It will probably turn out to be several millions of dollars. Not all at once, of course. In the immediate future, probably not more than a hundred thousand dollars.”
Neither Dulles nor Graham said anything.
After a long silence, von und zu Waching said: “And we will, of course, furnish you with whatever we learn about Operation Phoenix and what von Deitzberg is really doing.”
“The idea, if I understand this correctly,” Graham said, “is that once this officer gets himself established in Argentina, he will then arrange for other officers . . .”
“The admiral has told him he can have no more than two more officers. More than that would attract unwanted attention. The next people to be sent will be the families of those officers and soldiers in which we feel the Russians have the greatest interest. In other words, the selection will be on the basis of who the Russians think has the greatest knowledge, rather than on rank.”
Dulles said, “But by those criteria, Captain, the first officer who would go to Argentina would be the admiral. And then Gehlen. And then you.”
“I’m sure Colonel Graham will understand, Mr. Dulles. It’s naval tradition. The admiral and Gehlen will stay on the bridges of their respective sinking ships until all the women and children are safely off and into lifeboats. And then the men. And, finally, the other officers.”
There was a long moment of silence, which Allen Dulles finally broke: “Obviously, Captain, neither Colonel Graham nor I have the authority to accept or reject a proposal like this—”
“Or even to have been having this conversation,” Graham interrupted. “There are those who would consider it trafficking with the enemy . . .”
“Even giving aid and comfort to the enemy,” Dulles chimed in.
“But you have been honest and forthcoming with us,” Graham said. “And we’ll try to be the same with you. What I think Mr. Dulles and I are going to have to do is decide, first, if we should—if we dare—bring Admiral Canaris’s offer to the attention of our respective superiors . . .”
“Which might well carry the risk of seeing one or both of us relieved of our posts,” Dulles chimed in again.
“So, if you will be so good, Captain, to give Mr. Dulles and myself a little time—say, thirty minutes—to decide between us whether we can take the next step, bringing this to the attention of our respective superiors or not. And if not, what other—”
“I understand,” von und zu Waching said. “I will await your call, your decision.”
Von und zu Waching walked to the door, unlocked it, opened it, turned to look at Graham and Dulles, bobbed his head, and then went through the door.
Dulles waited a full thirty seconds—which seemed longer—before breaking the silence: “The basic question, of course, is whether or not he’s telling us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but.”
“I think that we have to presume he is not, Allen. And further, that he has an agenda we can’t even guess at.”
“And insofar as telling Colonel Donovan about this, can you imagine his reaction if he knew about this meeting?”
“Or that I flew over here to participate?”
“Or what the President would do if he heard about this?”
“Well, he would certainly tell the Vice President, and Uncle Joe Stalin would know within twenty-fours that we know he has spies all over the Manhattan Project. Do you know General Graves, Allen? Know him well?”
Dulles nodded.
“He told me that he thinks at least six of Dr. Oppenheimer’s geniuses are—how did he put it? ‘Far to the left of Vice President Wallace.’ ”
“Graves told me that when he went to J. Edgar Hoover, Hoover told him that when he tried to bring up the subject of Soviet spies in the Manhattan Project to the President, Roosevelt flashed his famous smile at him and said since the Russians knew nothing of the Manhattan Project, how could they have spies trying to penetrate it?”
They lapsed into silence for another long moment.
Finally, Dulles again broke it.
“I would say then that we are agreed we don’t mention this to Donovan?”
Graham nodded.
“What about Hoover?” Graham asked.
“Hoover already knows about the Russian spies. I suspect J. Edgar has some of his best people keeping their eyes on them.”
“Nevertheless, when von und zu gives us the names of his spies, I think we should pass them on to J. Edgar; his spies may not be the same as Canaris’s spies.” Dulles nodded, and Graham went on: “Slip them
under J. Edgar’s door in the dead of night; I don’t think he should know they came from us.”
“That leaves only two minor problems to be resolved,” Dulles said. “Where do we get the one hundred thousand dollars immediately, and the million we will need later? Probably more than a million dollars. Estimates for this sort of thing are invariably far short of what is actually required.”
“I don’t see that as a problem. What’s the other thing?”
“How do we get this officer of Gehlen’s from here to South America? And the families von und zu is talking about? And subquestion a: What do we do with him—with, ultimately, all of Gehlen’s women and children—once they are there? And why isn’t a million dollars a problem?”
“I’ve been giving that some thought. If you and I suddenly spent even the hundred thousand from our nonvouchered funds, Donovan would be all over us wanting to know what we spent it on.”
“Leaving us where?”
“With Cletus Marcus Howell.”
“Who?” Dulles said.
“Cletus Frade’s grandfather, a.k.a. Howell Petroleum. He’s got that kind of money—more important, he’s got it in Venezuela, out of sight of the Internal Revenue Service—and I’m sure that all I’ll have to tell him is that his grandson needs to borrow it for the duration plus six months.”
“And moving all these people to Argentina?”
Graham nodded and said, “Donovan told me the President is really happy that Juan Trippe is really unhappy that South American Airways has established—or is in the process of establishing—regularly scheduled service between Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Santiago, Montevideo, and other places in South America. All I have to do is figure a way to make the President think of how utterly miserable Juan Trippe would be to learn that this upstart airline is offering . . . oh, say, twice-weekly service between Buenos Aires and Madrid? Or Lisbon? Or Casablanca? Or all three?”
“Which they could do if they had a ‘surplus’ Constellation?”
“I was thinking more on the lines of three Constellations,” Graham said.
“Why am I getting the feeling that this Constellation idea didn’t suddenly pop into your head in the last fifteen minutes or so?”
“Because you know how devious—some might say Machiavellian—I am beneath this polished veneer of refined Texas gentleman.”
The Honor of Spies Page 23