David M Thomas - The Schneider Papers

Contents

Imprint 5 Imprint All rights of distribution, also through movies, radio and television, photomechanical reproduction, sound carrier, electronic medium and reprinting in excerpts are reserved. © 2022 novum publishing ISBN print edition: 978-3-99130-077-9 ISBN e-book: 978-3-99130-078-6 Editor: Ashleigh Brassfield, DipEdit Cover images: Navarone, Bowie15, Ruslan Huzau, Liligraphie | Dreamstime.com Cover design, layout & typesetting: novum publishing www.novum-publishing.co.uk

Summary 6 Summary 1936: Squadron Leader Harald Mason, a German-born naturalised British airman, is sent by a concerned Foreign Office to Berlin to unearth Luftwaffe expansion plans and investigate the sustainability of high-octane aviation fuel supply in times of war. A narrative of disparate characters, from the leonine intelligence chief Major Alastair Cartwright MC in London, to the clever and elegant Elisabeth Schneider, economist, and a Soviet spy embedded in IG Farben AG, the most powerful chemical combine in Europe. Ivan Mikhailovich Maisky, the Soviet Ambassador to the Court of St James’, s needs something to turn national rancor away from the Soviet Union and towards Germany. It was Elisabeth who enlightened the Soviet NKVD to the extent of American banking and industry funding of the nascent pre-1933 Hitler regime, and subsequent Wall Street and business relationships with IG Farben. Mason befriends Werner Scribner, a technical draftsman, a Catholic and a Bavarian monarchist at the new Luftwaffe Air Ministry in Berlin – determined to bring down the Anti-Christ Hitler – juxtaposed with his father Klaus Scribner, who was spiritually re-born in the chaos that was Weimar Germany. It’s the conflict and accord of characters in a discorded and dangerous European world. This is a story of American business funding Nazi Germany, and the rebuilding of Soviet Russia, as part of President FR Roosevelt’s New Deal programme to get ‘America working again.’

Chapter 1: 1931 – the Industrial Resource Section 7

Chapter 2: 1932 Moscow: Ambassador Maisky 18

Chapter 3: 1936 – Joint Intelligence Committee 24

Chapter 4: IG Farbenindustrie AG, Frankfurt and Ludwigshaven 32

Chapter 5: Wednesday, 9th September 1936 49

Chapter 6: Monday, 14th September 1936 57

Chapter 7: Monday, 21st September 1936 73

Chapter 8: Tuesday, September 22nd 1936 87

Chapter 9: New York: Tuesday, September 22nd 1936 103

Chapter 10: Berlin: September 22nd 1936 – evening 109

Chapter 11: Joachim von Ribbentrop 118

Chapter 12: Berlin: Wednesday, 23rd September 1936. 122

Chapter 13: Werner Scribner – to 1930 134

Chapter 14: Werner Scribner 1930–1933 150

Chapter 15: Berlin: Wednesday, 23rd September 1936: an afternoon with Werner Scribner 160

Chapter 16: Berlin: Thursday, 24th September 1936: lunch with Lefoy in the Tiergarten 171

Chapter 17: Berlin: Thursday, 24th September 1936: an evening at the Red Finger 178

Chapter 18: Berlin: Thursday, 24th September 1936: the Keppler Circle 192

Chapter 19: Elisabeth Schlyer goes to university 199

Chapter 20: 1925: Elisabeth Schlyer joins the Party 207

Chapter 21: 1925: Elisabeth Schlyer goes to America 212

Chapter 22: 1930: Elizabeth Schneider née Schyler 218

Chapter 23: New York: Standard Oil and IG Farben 222

Chapter 24: Elisabeth Schneider in Zurich, December 1933 232

Chapter 25: Moscow: Feb – March 1936: Yagoda 240

Chapter 26: Berlin: Wednesday, 23rd September 1936: dinner with the Schneiders’ 247

Chapter 27: 1914–1921: Klaus Scribner, father of Werner Scribner 259

Chapter 28: May 1921: Klaus Scribner in Munich 274

Chapter 29: Berlin: Friday, 25th September 1936: the Haus Vaterland 287

Chapter 30: Berlin: Saturday, 26th September 1936: Aviation Museum 298

Chapter 31: Berlin: Sunday, 27th September 1936: Klemper family 307

Chapter 32: Berlin: Monday, 28th September 1936: Mason learns about synthetic oil 321

Chapter 33: Leipzig: Tuesday, 29th September 1936 335

Summary 359

Chapter 34: Leuna: Wednesday, 30th September 1936 362

Chapter 35: Berlin: Klaus Scribner at home 371

Chapter 36: Moscow: October 1st 1936: Savostin interrogated 381

Chapter 37: Berlin: Thursday, October 1st 1936: Wener Scribner 393

Chapter 38: Berlin: Tuesday, October 6th, 1936: Werner Scribner 399

Chapter 39: Berlin: Wednesday, October 7th 1936: Werner Scribner goes home 403

Chapter 40: Thursday, 8th October 1936: train journey 408

Chapter 41: Ostend: Thursday 8th October: celebratory dinner 442

Addendum 454

Principal Characters 456

Imprint

All rights of distribution, also through movies, radio and television, photomechanical reproduction, sound carrier, electronic medium and reprinting in excerpts are reserved.

© 2022 novum publishing

ISBN print edition: 978-3-99130-077-9

ISBN e-book: 978-3-99130-078-6

Editor: Ashleigh Brassfield, DipEdit

Cover images: Navarone, Bowie15, Ruslan Huzau, Liligraphie | Dreamstime.com

Cover design, layout & typesetting: novum publishing

www.novum-publishing.co.uk

Summary

1936: Squadron Leader Harald Mason, a German-born naturalised British airman, is sent by a concerned Foreign Office to Berlin to unearth Luftwaffe expansion plans and investigate the sustainability of high-octane aviation fuel supply in times of war. A narrative of disparate characters, from the leonine intelligence chief Major Alastair Cartwright MC in London, to the clever and elegant Elisabeth Schneider, economist, and a Soviet spy embedded in IG Farben AG, the most powerful chemical combine in Europe. Ivan Mikhailovich Maisky, the Soviet Ambassador to the Court of St James’, s needs something to turn national rancor away from the Soviet Union and towards Germany. It was Elisabeth who enlightened the Soviet NKVD to the extent of American banking and industry funding of the nascent pre-1933 Hitler regime, and subsequent Wall Street and business relationships with IG Farben. Mason befriends Werner Scribner, a technical draftsman, a Catholic and a Bavarian monarchist at the new Luftwaffe Air Ministry in Berlin – determined to bring down the Anti-Christ Hitler – juxtaposed with his father Klaus Scribner, who was spiritually re-born in the chaos that was Weimar Germany. It’s the conflict and accord of characters in a discorded and dangerous European world.

This is a story of American business funding Nazi Germany, and the rebuilding of Soviet Russia, as part of President FR Roosevelt’s New Deal programme to get ‘America working again.’

Chapter 1: 1931 – the Industrial Resource Section

Major Alastair Cartwright MC convinced his superiors that although military intelligence was obviously crucial, industrial capacity, skilled manpower, and access to strategic commodities were equally if not more important in assessing a country’s ability to fight a war.

He impressed upon his audience one spring morning in 1931 the story of the totally brilliant and simple Schlieffen Plan of 1914, based on the successful German invasion of France in 1870 under Count Alfred von Schlieffen, late Chief of the Imperial General Staff. It was totally brilliant because it was simple and it worked, and there were no new impediments to stop it working again. While a small force would contain Russia in the east, the bulk of the German army would brush aside poor old neutral Belgium, smash into France and bring about its collapse before anyone knew about it. Simplicity itself.

Cartwright continued his story. As a blueprint for war it was bold, clear, but seriously flawed. Germany’s military leaders in 1914 had convinced themselves that France’s army would be no more able to withstand the destructive power of sophisticated weaponry than it had been a generation earlier and would consequently surrender in a few weeks.