Lucas Delattre - A Spy at the Heart of the Third Reich

The OSS soon had to turn to a new kind of source: German prisoners of war. In the course of the liberation of France, the Americans had captured tens of thousands of enemy soldiers. The Allied generals wanted to take advantage of this resource. They came up with the idea of transforming some Wehrmacht officers into secret agents and sending them behind enemy lines in their original uniforms but with false identities, forged documents, and clandestine radio transmitters.

The new agents selected by the OSS in the prison camps had an exclusively operational role: They were asked to indicate the location of arms factories, Wehrmacht units, and the like. “Though no doubt our efforts in the last nine months of the war were useful, they could not replace Fritz, who after all produced intelligence of strategic importance,” according to Peter Sichel, who was one of the handful of American officers of German origin assigned to select this new variety of agent. Peter Sichel came from a Jewish family in Mainz that had fled Germany in 1934. Back in Europe in an American uniform, he had arrived in Annemasse in October 1944 with the Seventh Army of General Patch. There he learned of the existence of “George Wood,” “a spy who greatly enhanced Dulles’s prestige,” Sichel recalls.

Also in the fall of 1944, some German émigrés in London and the United States began to return to German territory in order to work secretly for the Allied cause. A Social Democrat, Jupp Kappius, was parachuted into Germany by the OSS in September 1944. Hidden in the Ruhr region, he lived in Bochum, from which he sent regular reports to the Americans. Kappius was surprised at the relative “normality” of the living conditions of the German people. The factories were operating, the mail was delivered, the telephone lines were not cut, nor was gas or electricity. Food was rationed but no one was dying of hunger. People were well dressed. “They eat butter, not margarine!” he wrote, while noting the astonishing spiritual impoverishment of the population, that was living in a state of doubt, cynicism, and the pursuit of narrow self-interest.

Rastenburg, September 1944

Fritz spent the end of August and almost the entire month of September in the “Wolf’s Lair” ( Wolfsschanze ), Hitler’s headquarters in East Prussia. Ambassador Karl Ritter needed him to replace an ailing colleague. Here, very close to the front, he had the unpleasant feeling of having no control over events. In Berlin he could take action. Here he felt he had become a spectator of history. There was no possibility of contacting Bern, and he had a painful awareness of the passage of time. He had no way to predict whether the war would last for another month, or another year. A few dozen kilometers away, the soldiers of the Red Army were preparing their next great offensive.

In the course of this long stay in the “wolf’s lair,” Fritz spent most of his time drafting reports for his boss. He was bored and wished only to return to Berlin as soon as possible. Instead of calming him down, the aromas of nature and the sound of the wind in the birch trees only increased his irritation. But he did cross paths by accident with a mysterious figure whose appearance reminded him of a composer or orchestra conductor (Fritz noticed that he had “long fingers” and a face that was “like Wilhelm Furtwängler’s”). He learned that this high official frequently went to Stockholm, where he had been in contact with Soviet diplomats for more than a year. Who was this man? Fritz wondered. What was the purpose of his negotiations with the Russians? Who had asked him to take these steps: Ribbentrop or Hitler in person? Fritz was stunned to discover the existence of secret exchanges between Berlin and Moscow. He did not at the time find out what was really at stake in the discussions between the emissaries from the two capitals.

After a few days, he learned that the man’s name was Peter Kleist and that he was close to Ribbentrop. Kleist had gone to Stockholm in early September to meet some Russian diplomats, but they had refused to see him. The wish to negotiate thus originated in Berlin! Fritz came to the conclusion that high German diplomatic officials were not about to abandon their efforts and that other secret attempts would be made in Stockholm. Unable to find out anything further, Fritz was nevertheless very pleased to have in his possession a piece of information of the highest importance that he would transmit to the Americans in Bern as soon as he returned to Berlin.

With nothing further to do at the führer’s headquarters, he decided to make every effort to return to the capital. He faked a stomach ailment and stopped eating, despite the superior quality of the meals in the “wolf’s lair.” He complained of complications from an appendicitis operation he had had in 1940. His colleagues realized that Fritz was really ill when they saw him refuse cold chicken at breakfast one morning. Soon, armed with a medical certificate, he returned to Berlin around September 20, 1944. On his return, he had himself treated by his doctor friends at the Charité hospital, who agreed to prescribe fictitious treatments.

Bern, September–October 1944

“In the early part of September 1944, Dr. Bruno [ sic ] Kleist, Ministerial Dirigent of the Ost Ministerium, made a trip to Stockholm as the agent of high ranking German officials… in order to attempt to make contact with the Russians. In Stockholm, however, Soviet Counsellor of Embassy Semenov served notice that this action was not suitable. In spite of this, the Germans are said to be continuing efforts along these same lines…. Hitler has not entirely abandoned the idea of reaching an agreement with the Soviets.” This OSS document was written on the basis of information supplied by Fritz Kolbe in early October 1944. It provoked disbelief among the experts in Washington who considered it “of great importance, if it is true.” Colonel McCormack’s staff turned up its collective nose and thought that the cable should be treated with great wariness. McCormack thought it was impossible for the German authorities to enter into contact with the Soviets, despite the fact that the Japanese wanted a separate peace with the Russians. Less negative than McCormack, Allen Dulles thought that the hypothesis of a new German-Soviet agreement was now in the realm of the possible and that everything had to be done to prevent it. He did not at all appreciate the announcement in late September of the “Morgenthau Plan,” which envisaged the deindustrialization of Germany and its transformation into a vast agricultural zone. This kind of American initiative could in his view only strengthen certain pro-Soviet tendencies that were beginning to appear in the higher reaches of the German government.

The information that Fritz had gleaned in the Wolfsschanze reached Bern in early October. The Foreign Ministry courier Willy Pohle himself handed the confidential package to Ernst Kocherthaler. Instead of using the usual mailbox, the two men met for lunch in a Bern restaurant on October 6. In the envelope there were about thirty documents on film—this was the first time this method worked—and a handwritten note from Fritz dated October 3. This was little in comparison to the usual delivery. Fritz apologized and explained that an increasing quantity of diplomatic cables were no longer reaching the foreign ministry because they were carried directly to Hitler. The most important document in this batch was the one revealing the activities of Peter Kleist in Stockholm. But there were also very interesting details about the atmosphere in the führer’s headquarters: “The climate is worse and worse,” wrote Fritz, adding that “the pressure is unbelievably high.” Der Druck ist unerhört stark: the sentence was repeated in German in the summary prepared by Allen Dulles. In addition, Fritz no longer said anything about his “militia” but asked the Americans whether he would now be more useful in Bern than in Berlin. “Recommend a reconciliation with my wife, and that will mean that I should join you.”