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

press agency of the time: Fritz Kolbe left school with a certificate of completion of primary education ( einjähriges Zeugnis ). “I was not a very good student but I learned quickly.” Autobiographical document, May 15, 1945.

of the German railroads: In German: Zivil-supernumerar.

“freight, and currency administrator”: In German Oberbahnhofs-Güter-und Kassenvorsteher. Fritz Kolbe was in charge of the freight department of the Silesia station ( Schlesischer Bahnhof ). Curriculum vitae of Fritz Kolbe prepared after the war (undated), personal archives of Fritz Kolbe, Peter Kolbe collection, Sydney.

Ministry in March 1925: “He wanted to learn about the rest of the world and he joined the Foreign Ministry in order to be sent abroad.” “The Story of George.” Fritz Kolbe joined the Foreign Ministry on March 16, 1925 and was sent to Madrid in October. German Foreign Ministry, Berlin, Fritz Kolbe file.

native of Moorish origin: The details about the professional development of Fritz Kolbe are found in the autobiographical document of May 15, 1945. Many details are also found in the “Fritz Kolbe” file in the archives of the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin. Fritz replaced the German consul in Seville from September to November 1930 and from October to November 1931.

of the “original God”: The project led to the publication of a book entitled Das Reich der Antike in Baden-Baden in 1948, which was intended as the first volume of a great “universal history” based on a “spiritual vision of history,” as opposed to the materialist vision of the Marxists.

Madrid early in 1936: Because of his wife’s illness, Fritz Kolbe spent only three months at his post in the Polish capital (January to March 1936) and asked for an early transfer to Berlin.

Cape Town, Fritz Kolbe: “Officially, I was acting consul at the German consulate in Cape Town.” Autobiographical document, May 15, 1945. Fritz Kolbe had been transferred to Cape Town in February 1938. German Foreign Ministry, Fritz Kolbe file.

never forget that look: Most of the details about Fritz Kolbe’s time in South Africa are based on statements from Peter Kolbe given in Sydney in November 2001.

in Pretoria, Rudolf Leitner: Rudolf Leitner (1891–1947) was Austrian. Before joining the NSDAP in 1936, he had been consul in Chicago in the 1920s, and then a diplomatic counsellor in Washington for a part of the 1930s. He was appointed envoy of the Reich to Pretoria in October 1937. He died in captivity in a Soviet detention camp. German Foreign Ministry, Rudolf Leitner file.

former ambassador to Spain: Rudolf Leitner was then vice-director of the political department of the ministry.

years of mismanagement: Curriculum vitae of Fritz Kolbe prepared after the war (undated, in German).

controlled all foreign appointments: The liaison office between the Foreign Ministry and the NSDAP was called the “Organization for Foreign Countries ( Auslandsorganisation or AO). The head of this office, Ernst Bohle, was one of the most powerful figures in the ministry and held the rank of junior minister. Born in Cape Town in 1903, and having spent his youth in South Africa, he closely examined the files dealing with that country. Döscher, Das Auswärtige Amt im Dritten Reich.

with an aching heart: “If I had stayed in South Africa, I would have caused a good deal of harm to Leitner, who had really stood up for me.” Autobiographical document, May 15, 1945. Same argument in “Course of Life.”

with no legal accountability: Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS (Reichsführer SS), controlled all the police machinery of the regime through the many police tentacles of the RSHA (Reichssicherheitshauptamt, or “Central Security Office of the Reich,” responsible notably for the Gestapo).

record his license plate: Anecdote recounted by Peter Kolbe, Sydney, November 2001.

brutality to his subordinates: In internal documents of the Foreign Ministry, Joachim Ribbentrop was known as the “RAM” (Reichsaussenminister, or Minister of Foreign Affairs). Ribbentrop had not joined the Nazi Party until 1932, which caused him serious problems of internal legitimacy. To compensate for this insufficiency, the minister was a member of the SS brotherhood, with the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer, equivalent to general. The esprit de corps of the SS was comparable to that of the Knights of the Round Table. Source: German Foreign Ministry, and Döscher, Das Auswärtige Amt im Dritten Reich.

in the key positions : Career diplomats continued to head the three principal departments of the ministry (political, economic, and legal affairs), but their real influence was in steep decline, The closest collaborators of the minister were new men who had come from the “Ribbentrop Office” ( Dienststelle Ribbentrop ), a kind of shadow cabinet set up when the head of diplomacy for the Reich was still Baron Constantin von Neurath, an opportunistic career diplomat who had been replaced by Ribbentrop in February 1938.

belonged to the SS: Döscher, Das Auswärtige Amt im Dritten Reich.

the Reich in Europe: There were veritable pro-Nazi mass movements in South Africa, like the Ossewa Brandwag and the Grey Shirts, that counted several hundred thousand members. These sects seized every occasion to give violent expression to their anti-Semitism, for example when the liner Stuttgart arrived at the port of Cape Town in October 1936 with six hundred German Jewish refugees on board. The Afrikaner nationalists denounced the “cosmopolitan network” of Jewish financiers of Cape Town, associated in their mind with the “Freemason international” and the despised big British banks.

its clearly German origins: The port of Lüderitz was built by indigenous prisoners who had survived the terrible massacres carried out by the Germans during the war against the Nama and the Herero between 1904 and 1908.

a vast colonial project: The “colonial office” of the NSDAP, directed by Franz Ritter von Epp, intended to split Africa into four zones that would have been divided among Spain, Italy, Germany, and England.

of training overseas imitators: There were even a few “Winter Assistance” ( Winter-hilfswerk ) centers, a kind of soup kitchen invented by the Nazis, distributing clothing and providing meals.

member of the SS: Walter Lierau was selected for the post in Windhoek after training in agitation and propaganda as consul in Reichenberg (Liberec, Czechoslovakia) in the early 1930s. Döscher, Das Auswärtige Amt im Dritten Reich.

wood in the forest: Fritz explained after the war why he had not brought his son back with him to Germany: “I did not want him to be contaminated by Nazi ideology, nor did I want him to be plunged into the chaos of Europe, which I foresaw as inevitable at the end of the war.” Autobiographical document, May 15, 1945.

refugees from Germany: Fritz says that he gave German émigrés in South Africa—political refugees and Jews—stateless person passports (or “Nansen passports,” delivered under the authority of the League of Nations), which allowed them to avoid deportation to Germany and internment as German citizens after the onset of World War II. Memorandum of August 19, 1943 (9 pages), OSS Bern, National Archives, College Park. See also the biographical document by Gerald Mayer and Fritz Kolbe.