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“The good Gehlen Germans shoot the Nazis on sight.”
“Is that what happened to von Deitzberg?”
Clete nodded. Niedermeyer, carrying an identity document in the name of Otto Körtig, had shot SS-Brigadeführer von Deitzberg in the men’s room of the Edelweiss Hotel in San Carlos de Bariloche—an act that both removed a severe threat to the OSS and proved whose side Niedermeyer/Körtig was on.
Leibermann said: “I was about to ask why the OSS is being so good to General Gehlen, but why don’t I hold off until you’ve read some more?”
Clete’s eyes went back to the message:And finally there is the May tenth “escape” from the Fort Hunt Senior POW Interrogation Center of two German officers who had been attached to the German embassy in Buenos Aires. When informally approached by the Director, who had learned that the two had been taken from the facility by a Marine Lieutenant Colonel named Frade, General Donovan replied that while the OSS had nothing to do with it, he was not surprised or even especially upset by what had happened. He said that both officers had not only been “turned” by Frade, but that both had been closely associated with the bomb plot to kill Hitler. He said that the father of one of them, a German general, had been hung with piano wire from a butcher’s hook for his role in the failed assassination plot.
General Donovan also told the Director that he doubted Colonel Frade would obey an order to come to the United States to answer for his actions. Donovan told the Director that Frade has had some “unfortunate experiences,” w
hich he did specify, with officers of the OSS and trusts “only Colonel Graham.” Donovan said, “It is much harder to get a young bull back into the barn than it is a cow.”
Donovan says Frade enjoys dual citizenship, and under Argentine law, its citizens may not be extradited. And General Donovan suggested there would probably be reluctance to court-martial Frade on any charge but murder, as he’s been awarded the Navy Cross and became an ace on Guadalcanal.
The Director found it interesting that Donovan included neither Mr. Dulles nor himself with regard to those whom Frade trusts, and feels this suggests Donovan is not aware of the close relationship between Mr. Dulles and Frade.
General Donovan also told the Director he knows of no OSS activities by anyone involving the Gehlen organization. The Director often says that while he and General Donovan often disagree, they never lie to one another.
“Your Gangbuster pal is right about that, too, Milt. Donovan does not know about the deal Dulles struck with Gehlen,” Clete said.
“Which is?”
“Gehlen turns over everything Abwehr Ost has—including agents in place in the Kremlin—to the OSS in exchange for keeping his people, and their families, out of the hands of the Russians.”
“Read on, Clete,” Leibermann said, and nodded once at the sheets of paper.
I’m sure I don’t have to connect the dots for you, Milt, but let me tell you the scenario the Director has reached, with these very important caveats. First, the patriotism of Mr. Dulles and Lieutenant Colonel Frade is beyond question. Second, the interest of the Bureau is solely to protect the United States from Soviet espionage, with the emphasis here on absolutely ensuring the Soviets do not gain access to the secrets of the Manhattan Project.
The Director believes we can proceed on the following premises:
That for the reason given—that any information General Donovan passed to President Roosevelt or President Truman now would soon be known to the Soviets—both Colonel Graham and Mr. Dulles (most likely together) decided that their oath to protect the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic, gave them the authority to not give to General Donovan certain information.
The Director believes this was a very difficult decision for them to make, as he knows both of them hold General Donovan in the highest possible personal and professional regard. The Director personally feels that if General Donovan were in the shoes of either Dulles or Graham, he would have done as they did.
The damage to the OSS and to Mr. Dulles and Colonel Graham if any of this came out would be cataclysmic and would spill over to the Bureau and the Director personally. There are powerful figures in the government who would hold that if the Bureau or the Director personally even suspected anything like this, it would be the FBI’s duty to bring it to the attention of the President.
The Director believes there is a strong possibility that Mr. Dulles has established a relationship with General Gehlen. This would neatly explain where he got the names of the Soviet agents who have infiltrated the Manhattan Project, and why they were “slipped under the door” to the Bureau. It would also explain the disappearance of Gehlen’s officers in the latter months of the war. The rumor that they have found sanctuary in Argentina becomes a credible scenario if one considers they may have been flown there from Lisbon on Frade’s SAA aircraft.
The question then becomes, “Why would Dulles do something like that?”
Gehlen had something Dulles wanted, and offered to exchange it for Dulles arranging to have his officers and their families taken to sanctuary FROM THE SOVIETS in Argentina. That has to be intelligence, possibly even assets, German agents in place in the Soviet Union. Gehlen knew the war was lost and that when inevitably Abwehr Ost fell into the hands of the Soviets he and his people—including their families—would be interrogated under torture and then eliminated.
He knew that somewhere in the United States there was a person or persons who regarded the Soviet Union as a serious threat to the United States, and who would accordingly place a high value on Gehlen’s intelligence assets, and who could arrange the sanctuary he was after in exchange for them.
It is also possible, of course, and an equally credible scenario that Mr. Dulles went to Gehlen and made the advance himself. If this was the case, he was the man Gehlen was looking for.
The Director, who is fully aware of the furor that would erupt in the United States if such a deal became known, nevertheless feels that Mr. Dulles has acted in a courageous, patriotic manner.
“At the risk of repeating myself, Milt, this Mormon pal of yours is very good,” Clete said as he handed another page of the letter to Dorotea.
“At the risk of repeating myself, never underestimate the FBI. Read on—you’re almost through.”
The question now becomes, “What’s going to happen to the Gehlen assets?” Compounding this question, “Especially since the OSS is about to go out of existence?”
This brings us to your mission, Milt, my old friend, something we would have considered a fantasy, if we ever considered it at all, in our days at the Academy.
You are to get to Mr. Dulles, obviously through Frade, and convince him first that if we know what he’s been up to, eventually, sooner or later, probably later, but inevitably, so will the Army Intelligence, Naval Intelligence, and the State Department.
