“That’s ridiculous!” Jerry O’Sullivan blurted. “Everybody knows they committed suicide. Hitler married her, then shot her, then bit on a cyanide capsule.”
“On May one,” Dulles said, “Grand Admiral Doenitz went on the radio and announced that Hitler had met a hero’s death on the battlefield.”
“Oh, bullshit,” Tony Pelosi said.
“That suggests,” Dulles went on, “that Hitler died—or that Admiral Doenitz wants us to believe he died—on April thirtieth, or even earlier. We’ve heard he took his life on April twenty-eighth. Timewise, there would have been plenty of time for him to fly to Norway and get aboard U-977.”
“Presuming he wasn’t dead,” O’Sullivan said with some sarcasm.
“According to Zhukov,” Dulles said, “he isn’t dead, and neither are Frau Hitler, Martin Bormann, Herr Doktor Goebbels, and a half dozen other important Nazis. Suggesting, if true of course, that Operation Phoenix was indeed known all the way to the top.”
“According to who did you say, Mr. Dulles?” Clete asked.
“Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgi Konstantinovich Zhukov,” Dulles said. “The victor of the Battle for Berlin. Eisenhower’s counterpart.”
“He actually said that?” Peter von Wachtstein asked.
“His interpreter told Ike he said just that, and that most of them, including Mr. and Mrs. Hitler, are on their way to a safe haven in Argentina. If nothing else, this bit of what my gut tells me is disinformation is a classic example of why our having Gehlen’s intel about the Russians is absolutely critical. They are not to be trusted.”
“Jesus!” Frade said. “It’s incredible. Ike can’t believe him, can he?”
“Ike thinks it has something to do with General I. D. White,” Dulles said.
“Who’s he?”
“The commanding general of our Second Armored Division. General White not only moved into what will be the American sector of Berlin without asking Ike, but he also ignored Zhukov’s order that he was required to wait for permission. The rape of Berlin—which has been ghastly—bothered General White. He ordered the Russians out of the American sector. When they refused to go, he issued a proclamation stating that anyone but Americans found with a weapon in the American sector would be presumed to be Germans refusing to obey the surrender order and would be shot on sight. As would rapists, armed or not.”
“Good man!” Ashton said, raising his glass in salute. “Here’s to General White.” He took a sip, then looked at Frade and added, “Colonel, no disrespect intended, but can I go work for him when we’re disbanded?”
That earned him a couple chuckles and at least one grunt of agreement.
Dulles went on: “White could have started World War Three right there, but after a half dozen of Zhukov’s troops had in fact been shot, the Russian caved in and ordered all his troops out of the American zone. Eisenhower believes, not with a great deal of conviction, that what Zhukov is up to, in case there is anything to the inevitable rumors that Hitler did not commit suicide and escaped Berlin, is to blame it on General White. In any event, Eisenhower has ordered the OSS to look into it as a high priority, and David Bruce is doing just that.”
“The OSS guy in London?” Frade asked.
Dulles nodded.
“I’m surprised Bruce didn’t turn that wild-goose chase over to you,” Frade said.
“It was the other way around, Clete. Unfortunately for poor David, he takes his orders from me.”
“I’m afraid to open this can of worms,” Schultz said, “but how the hell was Hitler supposed to get out of Berlin? It was surrounded, right?”
“Yes, it was, Jefe,” Dulles said. “But we’ve heard that Hanna Reitsch flew into Berlin on April twenty-eighth, just before Hitler’s suicide, and then supposedly flew out with the newly appointed chief of the Luftwaffe, General Robert Ritter von Greim, a day or two later.”
“I thought,” Ashton said, “that we had total air superiority over Berlin. How did this Hanna Reitsch manage to do that?”
“The story is that a Fieseler Storch landed on the Unter den Linden,” Dulles said. “Is that possible? Who do I ask, von Wachtstein or Frade, if that’s possible?”
“It’s possible,” von Wachtstein immediately replied. “No problem whatsoever.”
“What’s the Unter den Linden?” Clete asked.
“A wide boulevard near the Reichschancellery,” von Wachtstein explained. “It used to be lined with linden trees. You could get in and out of there in a Storch without much trouble at all.”
“Presuming,” Dulles said, “that there were not perhaps fifty or so Russian fighters in the area supporting the Red Army who would welcome the opportunity to shoot down such an airplane.”
“Who’s this Hanna Reitsch flying the Storch?” Frade said. “How good a pilot is he?”
Von Wachtstein laughed.
He then explained: “Hanna Reitsch is a woman, Clete. And she’s a much better pilot than you or me.”
Clete raised his eyebrows and nodded. After a moment’s thought, he offered: “And Russian fighters wouldn’t be a problem for the Storch if the pilot knew what she was doing.”
“What?” Ashton challenged. “You think a fighter couldn’t shoot down that little observation plane.”
“Once upon a time, Bacardi,” Clete said by way of explanation, “on an island far, far away called Guadalcanal, a Marine pilot was flying around over the jungle in a Piper Cub that he ‘borrowed’ from the Army. He was directing artillery fire and suddenly became aware of a string of tracers coming his way. He looked over his shoulder and saw that he had two Zeros on his tail. Not knowing what to do, he made a sharp right turn and went down on the deck. The Zeros made a three-sixty and had another go at him.
“The Marine went even lower in his humble Cub, then made another right turn. The first Zero flew over him, and the second tried to make a right turn and flew into the trees. The first Zero made two more passes at the little Piper Cub and then gave up. I tried to claim the Zero that went into the trees as a kill, but they said no dice. For one thing, you can’t claim a kill if the enemy plane went down because of pilot error, and for another, you can’t claim a kill if you are flying a Piper Cub stolen from the U.S. Army.
“So, to answer your question, Major Ashton, a female who is a better pilot than Hansel or me, flying a Storch—which stalls at about thirty miles an hour—would have no trouble avoiding Russian fighters.”
Dulles said, “You’re agreed that it’s possible that Hanna Reitsch could have flown Hitler—for that matter, any two people—from Berlin to Norway. Is that so, Peter?”
“Yes, sir. It’s possible,” von Wachtstein replied. “I submit, however, that the real question is: Is it plausible?”
Dulles looked at him a long moment. He said: “We have to proceed on that possibility. The mission obviously is to locate U-997. How nice it would be if we could capture her. And even if the outrageous tale proves to be exactly that—the Hitlers and others are not aboard—then she most certainly will be carrying other valuables.”
“How the hell can we possibly do that?” Frade said. “Definitely not with SAA’s aircraft or certainly not Peter’s Storch. We’d need heavily armed military assets in order to actually capture a sub—and certainly to sink one, if it came to that.”
“Right, Cletus. What’s been discussed is that there are enormous numbers of long-range aircraft—bombers, B-17s and B-24s—now available in Europe to search for submarines. But I don’t think that’s going to be of much help except in the waters between Norway and the English Channel. Once the submarines get into the Atlantic—as some of them probably have already—they will head southwest for the Atlantic and soon be beyond the range of any aircraft looking for them.
“Similarly, although a bomb group has already been ordered to Sidi Slimane in Morocco, I don’t think it will be of much use. As soon as they can get there, the submarines will be deep into the Atlantic, beyond the reach of aircraft.
“At some point west of Europe and North Africa, Eisenhower’s—SHAEF’s—authority ends, and the military command is that of the Navy. They will be ordered—as soon as I can get to Washington and convince Admiral Leahy of the necessity to do so—to begin searching for these submarines. I don’t think they’ll have much luck, but the effort will have to be made.
“Insofar as sending B-17s and/or B-24s here to Argentina or Brazil, that has been considered and decided against. Brazil has asked for such aircraft in the past and, in the probably justified belief that they would use them against Argentina, their request was denied. And obviously we couldn’t send them to Argentina and not to Brazil.
“So, what happens now is that when I get to Washington, I am going to try to get you authority to call upon the B-24s we presently have at Canoas should you need them to deal with any enemy submarines you find, either offshore or within Argentine waters.
“That brings us back to that basic premise. The best—indeed almost the only—hope we have to either sink or capture the submarines in question is Team Turtle. And in doing so, you will not only be up against the Nazis involved in Operation Phoenix but against substantial numbers of our countrymen, in and out of uniform.”
Dulles stopped, looked thoughtful as he sipped his drink, then went on:
“Considering how everyone now has the OSS in their crosshairs, I was about to make an attempt at giving you a stirring pep talk about overcoming great obstacles. Then I remembered the best pep talk I ever heard. How many of you have seen the movie Knute Rockne, All American? With Pat O’Brien playing Rockne?”
I don’t believe this! Clete thought.
Our distinguished OSS deputy director is going to inspire us by quoting from a movie?
Is that the booze talking?
Everybody indicated that they had seen the motion picture, and Clete now saw some of the men showing curious expressions.
“All right then,” Dulles went on. “There was a scene in that motion picture where Coach Rockne went to the hospital bed of one of his players who was terminally ill. At the moment, I can’t think of his name, either in the film, or in real life—”
“Gipp,” Master Sergeant William Ferris furnished. “They called him the Gipper.”
“Right,” Dulles said.
“The actor’s name was Richard Reagan,” Frade said. “He’s now the only aerial gunner in the Air Force who’s a captain.”
“His name is Ronald Reagan,” Ashton quickly corrected him. “And he’s a first lieutenant in the Signal Corps making those venereal disease movies they make everybody watch.”
“You know,” Schultz chimed in, “you pick up some dame in a bar, diddle her, and two weeks later your dick drops off.”
That produced laughter.
“Clark Gable is the only commissioned officer aerial gunner in the Air Forces,” Ferris said. He then quoted Gable’s most famous line: “‘Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn!’”
“You would if it was your dick about to drop off,” Schultz said.
More laughter.
Clete saw the look on Dulles’s face.
“Silence on deck!” Frade barked.
And when he had it, Clete said, “Please go on, Mr. Dulles.”
“I don’t think that would be a very good idea,” Dulles said. “And it was my mistake to open the bar so soon.”
Frade said, “Inasmuch, sir, as we obviously need a pep talk, I really wish you would. Please, sir.”
After a long moment, Dulles shrugged.
“Very well,” he said. “I think I should make the point that not all motion-picture actors in uniform find safe sinecures for themselves. Jimmy Stewart is also in the Air Forces. He has led his B-17 group on twenty-odd missions over Germany and was recently promoted colonel. Closer to home, Captain Sterling Hayden, a Marine, has been infiltrating fellow members of the OSS into—and out of—Albania for some time.”
He paused to let that sink in.
Ashton then popped to his feet, stood at attention, and said, “Sir, I started that unfortunate silliness. I hope you will accept my apology.”
“We are all under something of a strain, Major,” Dulles said after a moment. “No apology is necessary. Please take your seat.”
Ashton did, and after a moment, Dulles said: “Now, where was I? Oh, yes, in the film Rockne goes to the bed of the terminally ill football player known as the Gipper. As difficult as this will obviously be, try to think of me as the character, the Gipper, that Lieutenant Ronald Reagan played.
“This is what he said to Coach Rockne: ‘Rock, sometime when the team is up against it and the breaks are beating the boys, tell them to go out there with all they’ve got and win one for the Gipper. I don’t know where I’ll be then, but I’ll know about it and I’ll be happy.’”
There was silence in the quincho.
Frade thought: The silence of embarrassment.
“The point I had hoped to make,” Dulles said, “and obviously failed so completely to make, was that I know that Team Turtle is really up against it. But I haven’t seen a suggestion that any of you are thinking of throwing in the towel. And I wanted you to know how much I appreciate that. I’m proud to be associated with all of you.”
There was a moment’s silence.
Then O’Sullivan stood up.
“And I want you to know, Mr. Dulles, that this Irishman will be proud for the rest of his life that he was privileged to work for you.”
Ashton stood and said, “Hear, hear!” and began to applaud.
Five seconds later, everyone was on his feet and applauding.
I’ll be goddamned, Clete thought. Mister deputy director of the OSS looks like he’s going to blubber.
Dulles finally found his voice.
“Colonel Frade,” he said, “I would suggest that these proceedings are at the point where you may reopen the bar.”
That caused the applause to increase in volume.
“Thank you, all,” Dulles said, then drained his glass. “Now, let us really celebrate victory in Europe.”
[THREE]
Aeropuerto Coronel Jorge G. Frade Morón, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina 0905 13 May 1945
As the Red Lodestar turned onto a taxiway, Clete Frade saw that two of the Constellations he’d arranged to have brought down from Los Angeles were already painted in the South American Airways color scheme. Another was in a hangar being painted, and the other two were parked waiting for their new paint jobs.
And then he saw two familiar men walk out onto the tarmac from the passenger terminal. One was his uncle, Humberto Duarte, managing director of the Anglo-Argentine Bank and director for finance of South American Airways. The other was the vice president, secretary of War, and secretary of Labor and Welfare of the Argentine Republic, el Coronel Juan Domingo Perón.
Shit! Tío Juan!
What’s that sonofabitch want?
“Do you see what I see?” Peter von Wachtstein asked from the copilot’s seat as he turned the aircraft from the taxiway to the tarmac.
“Don’t let anyone off the plane until I say so,” Clete said, and quickly unstrapped his seat belt and shoulder harness. He was at the fuselage door in the passenger compartment before von Wachtstein had stopped the plane in front of the passenger terminal.
The original idea the previous day—that after the meeting and lunch Clete would fly Dulles in one of the estancia’s Piper Cubs to Jorge Frade, where he would board South American Airways Flight 717 to Canoas—had failed by increments. First, Clete flying anybody anywhere was obviously out of the question once the bar had been reopened.
The alternative plan—that a South American Airways pilot would fly an Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo Piper Cub conveniently at Jorge Frade to the estancia, pick up Dulles, and fly him back to Jorge Frade so he could catch a plane to start flying to Washington—went out the window during lunch.
There had still been a great deal to talk about with Dulles:
How was the curre
nt status of Boltitz and von Wachtstein going to be affected by the German surrender?
What was to be done with the Germans who had been brought to Argentina in the deal with Oberstleutnant Gehlen? They were divided into three groups—the Good Gehlen Germans, Good Germans, and Nazi Germans—and one answer to that question obviously would not fit all.
There had been no satisfactory answers to these questions. Dulles said that he was either going to have to look into the problem, or they would just have to wait and see what developed, or Clete would just have to use his best judgment.
About three in the afternoon, Clete had realized the discussions were getting nowhere.
“All we’re doing here is kicking a dead horse,” Frade announced. “Or, to quote the distinguished Kapitän zur See Boltitz, ‘All we’re doing here is pissing into the wind.’ I suggest we knock it off. In the morning, on the way to Mendoza, we’ll drop Mr. Dulles off at Jorge Frade in time for him to catch SAA’s oh-nine-thirty Flight 701, nonstop Lodestar service to Rio de Janeiro.”
At that point, Dulles had raised his hand, and when he had everyone’s attention said, “One final thought, Colonel Frade. I am aware that circumstances beyond my control are leaving everyone here—and especially you, as commanding officer—out on a limb. The only thing I can do—and do herewith—is order that any orders you consider it necessary to give will be presumed to be based on my authority.
“In other words, Clete, do what you think should be done. I’ll take responsibility for any action of yours.”
Frade approached Perón and Duarte on the tarmac at Aeropuerto Jorge Frade. Argentine social protocol dictated that Frade wrap his arms around his uncle and make kissing noises with their faces in close proximity. That was fine with Clete; he really liked his uncle.
But the same protocol applied to his godfather, which wasn’t quite the same thing. And Clete had hated every second of their greeting.
That faint tinkling sound is drops of ice falling to the tarmac after a less-than-warm embrace with my Tío Juan.
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