By the fall of 1944 Schellenberg became more inventive in approaching the West. He had some leeway to operate -- he could always claim he was trying to cause trouble among the Allies -- but he did not have Hitler's or Himmler's approval, and Kaltenbrunner was likely to oppose whatever Schellenberg tried. Defector Carl Marcus, closely associated with Jahnke in Schellenberg's inner circle, gave British intelligence a mixed assessment of him in early 1945. Schellenberg had seen for some time that the war would reach a disastrous conclusion unless something was changed. He saw Hitler, Bormann, and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels as the main obstacles to German negotiations either with the West or with the Soviets: he and Himmler could have obtained satisfactory terms for Germany in a separate peace. [65]
Schellenberg, however, wanted his own trusted officials to handle any overtures to the West. He helped to scuttle a proposal from Wilhelm Harster, commander of the Security Police and SD in Italy, to use an Italian industrialist named Marinotti as a secret envoy, because Schellenberg and Harster were not on good terms. Harster's operation, code named "West-Wind," was rejected at the highest levels of the RSHA. [66]
The idea of using an Italian as an intermediary to launch German negotiations with the West in Switzerland, however, remained alive. In a November 1944 meeting of RSHA foreign intelligence officials in Verona called by the SD expert on Switzerland, Klaus Huegel, Guido Zimmer suggested contacting Allied intelligence in Switzerland through Baron Luigi Parrilli, formerly the representative of the Kelvinator and Nash companies in Italy. Parrilli had worked with Zimmer, but he also had contacts with Italian partisans. Other German officials backed this approach through Parrilli, and after considerable delay they received approval in principle from Berlin. In mid-February 1945 they also got support from Karl Wolff, Highest SS and Police Leader in Italy. Parrilli's mission was code named "Operation Wool." [67]
Another German emissary preceded Parrilli in getting Dulles' attention. In January 1945, Hans Wilhelm Eggen, Schellenberg's economic representative in Switzerland, met with American diplomat Frederick R. Loofborough. Eggen first took a hard line: Germany had no choice currently but to fight to the end, even if all Germans were killed. The result then would be the triumph of Bolshevism over all of Europe. But he suggested a meeting in Switzerland between Schellenberg and Dulles to avert such disaster. Schellenberg, he said, could bring Dulles proof that the Russians were not playing fair with the West. Loofborough quickly sent a report of this conversation to Dulles, who mused about the possibility of finding someone within the SS willing to sell out on a big scale. [68]
Lacking clearance from Himmler, Schellenberg at first hesitated and held back from authorizing Operation Wool. But Parrilli showed up to see Dulles in late February 1945 anyway. As an Italian with major assets, he had his own reasons for wanting to avoid a German scorched-earth policy in northern Italy. In negotiations with Dulles' assistant Gero von Gaevernitz, Parrilli reported that he was working for Zimmer in the SD and that German authorities were interested in sparing northern Italy from a horrible fate. Though skeptical, Gaevernitz asked for evidence of high-ranking German support -- Zimmer by himself meant little. Dulles believed that German military forces in northern Italy were nervous. There had been some informal talks between Italian partisans and the Germans, with the Germans seeking some assurance that they would not be attacked if they should withdraw from Italy. The Germans offered to refrain from destroying Italian factories and power plants in return. But through his contacts Dulles learned that the Italian partisans firmly opposed such a deal. [69]
On March 3, 1945, Zimmer, Parrilli, and Eugen Dollmann, Himmler's representative in Italy, met with OSS official Paul Blum in Lugano, Switzerland. This meeting set the stage for a visit by Karl Wolff and his adjutant to Dulles himself on March 8. Wolff had not yet concluded that all was lost, but he had convinced himself of the value of opening a line to the West. [70] With that move by Wolff, the Americans had no need for Schellenberg. Still, even in early April Schellenberg apparently passed word through General Henri Guisan, commander of the Swiss army, that he was willing to meet with Dulles for the purpose of halting the fighting on the western front (while continuing the war in the East). [71]
The details of on-again, off-again bargaining between Dulles and Karl Wolff during March and April 1945 (and the misunderstandings on both sides) have been revealed previously. Wolff was unwilling to take extreme risks, and that in any case he had very little influence on Field Marshal Albert Kesselring and General Heinrich Vietinghoff, who would not agree to surrender army forces until the military situation forced their hand (and after Hitler's suicide had become known). Dulles and Wolff finally brought about a German surrender in Italy, but it came late: the fighting in Italy stopped on May 2. What might have been a boon to Allied forces in Italy turned out to be a saving of only five days before the end of the war in Europe. According to historians Bradley F. Smith and Elena Agarossi, the lives saved were limited in number -- and mostly Italian and German. [72]
Unable to lead Himmler into separate peace discussions against Hitler's will, Schellenberg found other ways to sanitize his own record, particularly using neutral contacts to intervene on behalf of groups of concentration camp prisoners. Schellenberg first met with Himmler's friend Jean-Marie Musy, former federal president of Switzerland. On January 22, 1945, Schellenberg ordered a subordinate named Franz Goring to obtain the release of specific Jewish families from different concentration camps and turn them over to Musy on the Swiss border at Constance, an arrangement Himmler had reportedly approved in principle. By his own newly declassified account, Goring was able to track down some of his targets, but never found the whereabouts of others.
Goring also learned that Musy and Himmler had discussed a broader plan to release all remaining Jews in German concentration camps. Musy had met with Dr. Isaac Sternbuch, representative of an Orthodox Jewish rescue organization, Vaad Hatzalah, based in Montreux, Switzerland. Sternbuch allegedly told Musy that all released Jews would be sent to the United States after only a brief stay in Switzerland. Himmler had supposedly consented to this plan in order to improve Germany's image -- and his own. In return, Sternbuch's organization had to give Musy 5 million Swiss francs, the money allegedly to be used to relieve the suffering of German civilians.'1 Schellenberg commented in his own minihistory: "Considerations of internal politics made him [Himmler] bring up the question of a quid pro quo, often in an ugly way." [74] This was little more than a veiled statement that Himmler did not dare to go through with such a deal unless he could demonstrate to Hitler or other hard-liners clear benefits for the war effort. [75]
Ironically, Himmler's "rabbit" Ribbentrop was experimenting with a similar option in early March 1945. Ribbentrop sent a diplomat named Fritz Hesse to Sweden with Ribbentrop's own draft of Germany's negotiating position. Sooner or later, Germany would have to surrender on one front. The West had a strong interest in seeing that Germany did not surrender to the Soviet Union. In return for Western acceptance of a separate peace, Germany was prepared to release 400,000 Jews still in the Reich. With the aid of Werner Dankwort and Heinz Thorner of the German Embassy in Stockholm, Hesse made contact with Swedish banker Marcus Wallenberg to pass along this message, and he also met directly with Iver Olsen, representative of the American War Refugee Board in Stockholm. The German diplomat and the American official cast their discussion as an exchange of views on humanitarian issues, not as any kind of political negotiation. But articles in the Swedish press about Hesse's peace mission brought about his abrupt recall to Germany. The publicity apparently enraged Hitler and other hard-liners. [76]
Ribbentrop himself spoke with Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte along similar lines: if the West showed no consideration for Germany, it would go Bolshevist. Ribbentrop alerted Bernadotte (who later informed Schellenberg) to his private channel to Stockholm (Hesse). Schellenberg thought that Bernadotte had taken Ribbentrop's comments as an insult. The combination of Hesse's "humanitarian concern" and Ribbentrop's threat of Germany becoming Bolshevist was a bit much. [77]
In his postwar account Schellenberg alluded to another problem -- he, Goring, and Musy faced formidable competition within the SS itself. Kurt Becher, an SS officer with close ties to Himmler and with experience extorting Jewish assets in Hungary, was involved in direct negotiations with Hungarian Jewish activist Rudolf Kasztner and through him with Saly Mayer, representative of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee in Switzerland. These contacts predated Schellenberg's and Goring's efforts with Musy. [78] In Wildbad, on January 15, 1945, Musy urged Himmler to arrange a "generous" solution to the Jewish question. Himmler then told Musy about the ongoing negotiations with Saly Mayer, which came as a complete surprise to Musy. Himmler and Musy agreed that Musy should try to determine (in Himmler's inimitable prose) "who is it who really had a connection with the American government. Is it the rabbinical Jew or is it the Joint?" [79] The OSS received an intelligence report that Himmler had asked Musy whether better treatment of the Jews and other refugees would help modify Western public opinion toward him. [80]
Himmler wanted Musy's negotiating partners in Switzerland, Sternbuch's group (linked to the Agudas Israel World Organization), to pay a hefty sum because he was trying to assess these two channels that "world Jewry" had to the Allied Powers. It never entered his mind that neither one had even a remote chance of arranging major shipments of Jewish refugees to the United States.
In his mid-January 1945 memo for the files, Himmler wrote that he told Musy to seek tractors and machinery, rather than money, in exchange for Jews. But as late as February 6 Musy asked Sternbuch (who asked the American War Refugee Board) for SF 5 million to be deposited in an account in Musy's name -- Himmler would not insist on goods, Musy said. War Refugee Board representative Roswell McClelland concluded: "Himmler must be interested in negotiating for something more important to him and to the Nazis than the release of the Jews ... Musy is even in closer contact with Schellenberg than with Himmler and ... Schellenberg is very willing to assist in such questions as the Jewish [one] ... " [81]
Schellenberg's side came out second best in the battle of the two Swiss connections. McClelland was authorized to play along with Becher if it meant saving some lives: he even met once in person with him in Switzerland. As a result, some American money was deposited in a blocked account in Switzerland as a sign of American interest; in return, Becher, Kasztner, and Mayer brought about the release of 1,684 Jews from Bergen-Belsen to Switzerland. Schellenberg, Goring, and Musy managed to release 1,210 Jews from Theresienstadt, in return for which Sternbuch allegedly paid SF 5,000, or by another report $13,000. [82] But no one on the American side wanted to deal with Musy, let alone Schellenberg. Perhaps it was because the United States alerted the British and the Soviet Union after the first transfer of funds: the Soviets responded that such negotiations were neither feasible nor permissible. [83]
Friends of Julius Streicher, Nazi gauleiter and editor of the rabidly anti-Semitic newspaper Der Sturmer, reportedly sent a protest to Hitler and Himmler about the release of Jews from Theresienstadt. Hitler later insisted that no Jews be released unless he gave authorization and Germany got something concrete in return. [84] Musy was undeterred, telling American diplomat Sam Woods that on his forthcoming trip to Berlin he would take up with Himmler the release of seventy thousand more Jews. Musy believed that if Himmler were granted safe haven somewhere, he would come to terms. Musy also offered the by now popular argument that Germany needed a strong central government to prevent chaos and Communism. [85] Schellenberg's strategy of seeking political objectives with the West through playing on fears of Communism and negotiating for the turnover of Jews had taken on independent life.
Schellenberg was also active in the northern theater. He and Goring linked up with Himmler's Finnish masseur Felix Kersten and with Count Bernadotte, who was the point man of a Swedish humanitarian initiative. They successfully lobbied for the release of Scandinavian prisoners brought to a camp at Neuengamme, as well as some Jews and other prisoners from Buchenwald, Bergen-Belsen, and Ravensbruck. [86]
Goring also tried to arrange for orderly turnover of all prisoners in these camps to Allied forces, but internal opposition from Kaltenbrunner and Muller turned out to be too strong. [87] Musy told American War Refugee Board representative McClelland that Himmler had originally wanted political-military concessions, such as agreeing to leave prisoners in fifteen major concentration camps and not march them away until they collapsed in exchange for a guarantee that there would be no Negro occupation troops in Germany. Musy claimed he overcame their resistance. Himmler and Schellenberg in the end had only one condition -- that the SS guards and administrative personnel of the camps be treated as soldiers and regular prisoners of war (and not shot on the spot). [88] Despite these efforts, each camp went its own way, and some camp inmates were "evacuated" -- sent on death marches -- even as Allied troops approached. But Schellenberg had been a key part of a group that accomplished something: he had Goring, Bernadotte, and, to a lesser extent, Musy to vouch for his efforts.
Schellenberg really believed in preparing for all options: he had a forged American passport prepared with his photo. [89] In the end, he found a safer course. After Hitler's suicide, Admiral Donitz became chancellor and appointed Schellenberg as German envoy to Sweden, allegedly in order to negotiate (with Sweden) evacuation of German troops from Norway. Schellenberg flew to Stockholm on May 4 and received a Swedish passport from authorities there. He came under the protection of Bernadotte, with whom he had just worked on humanitarian projects.90 There his rewriting of history began.
In June 1945, Schellenberg composed an abbreviated autobiography that anticipated the tone and interpretation of his book The Labyrinth. He alleged that he had worked early for a compromise peace and against a two-front war, efforts that led Hitler and Kaltenbrunner to threaten to imprison him for defeatism. Yet Himmler, an exception to the whole corrupt government setup, frequently listened sympathetically to Schellenberg's arguments. Only his indecision doomed Schellenberg to failure. [91]
Schellenberg even fashioned an account of how he and Himmler planned to kill Hitler in early April 1945 -- the gist of the story was leaked to the Daily Express when Schellenberg was brought to London in July 1945 for extended interrogations (Schellenberg was first interrogated at Frankfurt). It turned out that even by his own account Schellenberg hesitated to voice this goal explicitly and Himmler refused to endorse it in Schellenberg's presence, let alone commit to do it personally. Schellenberg conjectured that Himmler had arranged for Hitler to be poisoned by his doctors. [92] But it never happened.
Britain and the United States were more interested in what Schellenberg had to say about possible Nazi resistance and continued intelligence activity after the surrender. On July 11, 1945, the Counter-Intelligence War Room in London reassured Allied Headquarters that, according to Schellenberg, Nazi plans for underground intelligence activity never matured. His information was consistent with their other sources on this point, and he had given so many details of his office's work that they accepted the thrust of his testimony. [93]
The best thing Schellenberg had going for him after the war was that he had developed the right internal enemies. British and American intelligence had independent information that Schellenberg was on the opposite side of an RSHA faction led by chief Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Gestapo chief Heinrich Muller, Otto Ohlendorf (SD domestic intelligence), and sabotage/specialist operations man Otto Skorzeny, most of them obvious war criminals. [94]
British and American intelligence had access to several types of independent sources about Schellenberg: decoded radio messages of the SD Foreign Intelligence, wartime information from one or more key defectors and British penetration agents, and postwar interrogations of other key officials in SD Foreign Intelligence who gave more complete or more accurate testimony than Schellenberg himself.
The new material declassified by the IWG allows us to write a much better history of Schellenberg and SD Foreign Intelligence; however, there are strong indications that additional information resides in unreleased British files. An FBI agent brought to Frankfurt in July 1945 noted that British intelligence had more to go on than he did:
The Special Interrogator sent down from the War Office in London, a Mr. Johnson ... Johnson is a man who has made a study of Schellenberg for the past five years and has had a penetration Agent in close contact with the man for some time. In fact he knows Schellenberg almost as well as he knows himself. [95]
How long did British intelligence have a penetration agent working with Schellenberg or the SD? Who was he? To the best of our knowledge, British files on any agent in contact with Schellenberg have not yet been released. [96]
_______________
Notes:
1. A German POW who had served in the Forschungsamt gave a very detailed account of its activities, which cannot be covered here. See "Research Bureau" of German Air Ministry as a Secret Intelligence Information Service, 18 June 1945, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 70, folder 299. Additional information about contacts between the Forschungsamt and SD Foreign Intelligence are in Statement by Klaus Huegel, 10 July 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, London X-2 PTS Files, box 54, folder 1583-Huegel.
2. The Gestapo is treated in chapter 6; the activity of the German army's Foreign Armies East intelligence organization under General Reinhard Gehlen is treated separately in chapter 14.
3. David Kahn, Hitler's Spies: German Military Intelligence in World War II (New York: Macmillan, 1978) and Heinz Hahne, Canaris: Hitler's Master Spy, trans. J. Maxwell Brownjohn (1976; New York, 1999). Kahn's work covers more than just the Abwehr; Hahne's study is as much organizational history as biography.
4. Saint, London to Saint, Washington, 28 Nov. 1945 re. Bibliography of the GIS, NA, RG 226, entry 190, box 392, folder 570 -- Incoming Memos 1141-1228.
5. Early information from Wurmann is in NA, RG 65, 65-37193-EBF 34, box 125.
6. British fortnightly summaries for specific regions were passed to U.S. Naval Intelligence. See Record Group 38, CNSG Library, box 74, U.S./U.K Intelligence Exchange. For weekly summaries, code named CIRCLE in OSS, see NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 9, folders 1-3.
7. War Room Monthly Summary No.2, 16 May 1945, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 109, Washington Registry Intelligence Files, box 26, folder XX7260-XX7289.
8. Karl Heinz Abshagen, Canaris, trans. A. H. Broderick (London: Hutchinson, 1956).
9. This is Hahne's portrait in Canaris: Hitler's Master Spy.
10. CSDIC Interrogation Report on SS-Standartenfuhrer Canaris, Constantin, 12 July 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 171, Washington X-2 Personality Files, box 22, folder 344- Washington X-2 PTS 85, document 40.
11. One of them was his deputy, General Hans Oster, who was a key figure in the anti-Nazi resistance.
12. Gerald Fleming, Hitler and the Final Solution, trans. James Porter (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 80-87.
13. Fleming, Final Solution, 82.
14. Andrew Ezergailis, The Holocaust in Latvia, 1941-1944: The Missing Center (Riga: Historical Institute of Latvia in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 1996).
15. Hahne, Canaris: Hitler's Master Spy.
16. Ian Kershaw, Hitler, 1936-1945: Nemesis (New York: W. W. Norton, 2000).
17. Detailed Interrogation Report: Notes on German Atrocities, 29 Apr. 1945, NA, RG 498, entry 47752 ETO-MIS-Y, box 93, folder 22-39. The interrogator, who wrote a summary of Bruns' various comments about atrocities he had seen, appraised Bruns as a mild-mannered "bureaucratic" officer who was anti-Nazi and eager to cooperate with the Allies. Both the source and the information were judged reliable (B-2).
18. Bruns' account diverged from Fleming's reconstruction on some particulars, including the fact that Bruns witnessed some of the killings.
19. CSDIC (UK) G. G. Report S. R. G. G. I 158(C), 25 Apr. 1945, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 108A, Washington Registry SI Branch Field Files, box 145, folder S. R. G. G. 1129-1245. 20. Richard Breitman, Official Secrets: What the Nazis Planned, What the British and Americans Knew (New York: Hill and Wang, 1998), 84.
21. Altemeyer told Bruns that his report was apparently the cause of the new orders. Detailed Interrogation Report, 29 Apr. 1945, NA, RG 498, entry 41752 ETO-MIS-Y, box 93, folders 22-39-6824 DIC/MIS/CI.
22. This document, dated 10 Dee. 1942 (copy 15 Mar. 1945), was found in the files of the Belgian office of the Abwehr, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 119A, London X-2 PTS Files, box 25, folder 636 -- London X-2 PTS 8 Captured Documents. Emphasis in original document. 23. One example is covered in Hahne. Canaris: Hitler's Master Spy, 466. As many as five hundred Jews ftom the Netherlands were sent to South America, allegedly as agents.
24. NA, RG 226, entry 119A London X-2 PTS Files, box 25, folder 636 -- London X-2 PTS 8 Captured Documents.
25. Summary of report drawn up by Abwehr rr C 2 for a conference in Prague on 18 May 1942, translated copy in NA, RG 226, entry 109, box 57, folder XXI 0660-10687, document XX 10673.
26. MI-5 Interrogation, 8 Nov. 1944, copied to Major I.I. Milne of S.I.S., 14 Nov. 1944, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 304, folder 8. This interrogation may not yet be available in the United Kingdom.
27. I am grateful to Professor David Meier of Dickinson State University, ND, for sharing his unpublished manuscript on the postwar tribulations of Otto John. David A. Meier, "Spies, Lies, and a Berlin Mystery: The Case of Otto John," [2002].
28. Some of the individuals, meetings, and events mentioned in his account appear, more or less in the same light, in historian Peter Hoffmann's massive and reliable the History of the German Resistance 1933-1945, trans. Richard Barry (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1977).
29. This at least is the interpretation of Professor Meier (see n. 27).
30. Irving H. Sherman to Hugh Wilson re. Lee Lane, 17 July 1943, A, RG 226, entry 110 Field Intelligence Reports: Theater Officer Correspondence, box 53, folder 526 -- The Lane Project.
31. See Walter Laqueur and Richard Breitman, Breaking the Silence: the Germans Who Exposed The Final Solution (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England for Brandeis University Press 1994), 213. See also chapter 5.
32. Saint to Saint, Amzon, 11 July 1946, NA, RG 226, entry 213, box 12, folder 12. This recommendation seems to have been originally written during mid-1945. It did not prevent Waetjen from running into trouble with suspicious American officials outside OSS, and even Gaevernitz had some difficulty establishing his bona fides in the postwar period. See Laqueur and Breitman, Breaking the Silence, 237-38.
33. X-2 Report, Wiesbaden, 1 Oct. 1945, for Sept 1945, A, RG 226, entry 210, box 100945, folder 3. Memorandum: Berlin GIS Personnel Uncovered by Zigzag to SCI Amzon, 31 Oct. 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 213, box 2, folder 7.
34. AB 16, Saint, Berlin to AB 24 Saint, Amzon, 9 Jan. 1946, NA, RG 226, entry 213, box 1, folder 6.
35. For the most detailed account of how the SD became involved in foreign intelligence, see Katrin Paehlet, "Espionage, Ideology, and Personal Politics: The Making and the Unmaking of a Nazi Foreign Intelligence Service," (PhD diss. American University, forthcoming).
36. George C. Browder, "Walter Schellenberg-Eine Geheimdiensr Phantasie," in Die SS: Elite unter dem Totenkopf; 30 Lebenslaufe, ed. Ronald Smelser and Enrico Syring (Paderborn: Schoningh, 2000), 424.
37. Walter Schellenberg, The Labyrinth: Memoirs of Walter Schellenberg, Hitler's Chief of Counterintelligence, trans. Louis Hagen (1956; New York: DeCapo, 2000).
38. I owe this information to Katrin Paehler. On Himmler's stress of ideological instruction within the SS, see Richard Breitman, "Gegner Nummer Eins," in Ausbildungsziel Judenmord? "Weltanschauliche Erziehung" von SS, Polizei und Waffin-SS im Rahmen der "Endlosung," ed. Jurgen Matthaus, Konrad Kwiet, Jurgen Forster, and Richard Breitman (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Taschenbuch, 2003), 21-34.
39. Browder, "Walter Schellenberg," 422.
40. Eighth Detailed Interrogation on SS-Sturmbannfuhrer Dr. Klaus Huegel, 26 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 71, folder 1829. On the reorganization, Fifth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, 14 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307-Huegel, Klaus Dr. Huegel said that Himmler gave Schellenberg a one-year trial. The source on Bormann and Schellenberg is the [British] Interrogation Report NO.2 on Karl Marcus, alias Martenhofer [later code named "Dictionary"), Public Record Office KV 2/64. I am grateful to Stephen Tyas for a copy of this document.
41. Eighth Detailed Interrogation Report on Dr. Klaus Huegel, 14 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307-Huegel, Klaus Dr. The comment about Schellenberg's having frequent contact with Himmler is confirmed by entries in Himmler's office logs.
42. Fourth Detailed Interrogation Report on Dr. Klaus Huegel, 10 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307-Huegel, Klaus Dr.
43. Himmler and the Sicherheitsdienst (R.1. S. 16), 27 Sept. 1943, Public Record Office HW 19/347. I am grateful to Stephen Tyas for a copy of this document.
44. Appendix, Group 13, Sept. 1943, PRO HW 19/347. Stephen Tyas kindly provided a copy of this document.
45. Abwehr and SD, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 24, folder 635.
46. Extract of SIS Interrogation of Carl Marcus, Feb. 1945, PRO KV 2/94. I am grateful to Stephen Tyas for a copy of this document. Himmler to Schellenberg, 5 Dee. 1942, NA, RG 242, T-175, roll 129, frame 2655073.
47. The details of Zimmer's activities are revealed for the first time in the transcription of his shorthand notebooks, NA, RG 263, Guido Zimmer Name File.
48. Eighth Detailed Interrogation on Huegel, 26 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 71, folder 1829.
49. Extract of SIS Interrogation of Marcus, Feb. 1945, PRO KV 2/94. I am grateful to Stephen Tyas for a copy of this document.
50. Jahnke and (he Jahnke-Buro, Appendix 15 to Final Report on (he Case of Walter Schellenberg, copy in A, RG 65, 100-00-103569-Bulky 39, box 4.
51. Berlin to Argentine, 6 June 1943, [INCA 60), NA, RG 38, entry CNSG Library, box 79, folder 382413 CNSG-German Clandestine (2 of 3).
52. Berlin to Argentine, 12, 15, J 7 June 1943 [INCA 83), folder 2 of 3; Berlin to Argentine, 12-13 Aug. 1943, [INCA 178); both in NA, RG 38, entry CNSG Library, box 79, folder 382413 C SG-German Clandestine (2 of 3).
53. Argentine to Berlin, 7 Aug. 1943, NA, RG 38, entry CNSG Library, box 80, folder 382414 German Clandestine Translations-Argentina to Berlin (2 of 3).
54. Ibid. This information supposedly came from the first secretary at the American Embassy in Argentina.
55. Fourth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, 10 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307-Huegel, Klaus Dr. On Luther generally, see Christopher R. Browning, The Final Solution and the German Foreign Office: A Study of Referat D III of Abteilung Deutschland 1940-43 (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1978); the section on Luther's ouster (113-14) is based on sources with a more benign interpretation of Schellenberg's motives. In any case, Luther and Ribbentrop had longstanding disagreements; the incident described here was the coup de grace.
56. See Richard Breitman "A Deal with the Nazi Dictatorship: Himmler's Alleged Peace Emissaries in Fall 1943," Journal of Contemporary History 30, no. 4 (1995): 411-30.
57. OSS to Bern, Carib for 110,29 Mar. 1944, NA, RG 226, entry 134, box 165, folder 1056- Out D. 27 Bern, March-June 1944.
58. Dulles was nonplused when Washington told him of this message, stating that Schellenberg undoubtedly knew something of his operation and would like to know a lot more. Bern to OSS-SI, For Carib, 3 Apr. 1944, NA, RG 226, entry 134, box 191, folder 1214.
59. German I.S. -- Recent Developments (15 Sept. 1943-15 Oct. 1943), copy in NA, RG 226, entry 194, box 60, folder 260. This operation, known as Unternehmen 7 or V7, began to leak when the Gestapo arrested one of the participants, Wilhelm Schmidhuber, who talked. See Hahne, Canaris: Hitler's Master Spy, 507.
60. Eighth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, 26 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 71, folder 1829. See also Hoffmann, History of the German Resistance, 294. 61. Eighth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, 26 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 71, folder 1829; Fifth Interrogation Report on Huegel, 14 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307; Camp 020 Interim Interrogation Report on SS Standf. Martin Sandberger, 8 July 1945, NA, RG 226, entry I 19A, box 33, folder 871.
62. Camp 020 Interim Interrogation Report on SS Standf. Martin Sandberger, Oct. 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 33. folder 871.
63. Fourth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, NA, RG 226, entry 174, box 39, folder 307 -- Huegel, Klaus Dr.
64. Bern to OSS-SI, Washington, 5 Mar. 1944, NA, RG 226, entry 134, box 219, folder Breakers -- Jan.-Mar. 1944; Washington, SI to Bern, 7 Mar. 1944, NA, RG 226, entry 134, box 298, folder 170 -- Bern, Mar. 1944.
65. This June 1945 extract of an interrogation of Marcus on 3 Feb. 1945 was recently declassified in the United Kingdom. See PRO KY 2/94. I am grateful to Stephen Tyas for discovering it and sending me a copy.
66. Sixth Detailed Interrogation Report on Huegel, 2J June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 71, folder 1828.
67. Ibid.
68. Meeting of 493 with Hans Ecken [sic] of the SS, 15 Jan. 1945, and 110 to Sasac and Saint, Washington, London, Paris, 18 Jan. 1945, both in NA, RG 226, entry 214, box 7, folder 38-WN25833-25843. On Eggen generally, see NA, RG 263, Hans Eggen Name File.
69. Details of Zimmer's interaction with Parrilli are Zimmer's diaries in NA, RG 263, Guido Zimmer Name File. For Parrilli's interaction with Gaevernitz and Dulles' views, see Bradley F. Smith and Elena Agarossi, Operation Sunrise: The Secret Surrender (New York: Basic Books, 1979), 68-80.
70. Smith and Agarossi, Operation Sunrise, 81-82.
71. Bern to OSS Washington, 5 Apr. 1945, re. Schellenberg, NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 364, folder 2.
72. Smith and Agarossi, Operation Sunrise, 184-91.
73. Franz Goering, "Extract from my diary concerning the release of persons from German concentration camps," NA, RG 226, entry 109, box 45, folder 261, XX9626 (11-13-45).
74. Schellenberg's draft autobiography, 10 June 1945, p. 10, NA, RG 226, entry 125A, box 2, folder 21 -- Schellenberg. The manuscript is thirty-five legal-size pages, single-spaced.
75. Franz Goering, "Extract from my diary concerning the release of persons from German concentration camps," NA, RG 226, entry 109, box 45, folder 261, XX9626 (11-13-45).
76. CSDIC/WEA [British] Preliminary Interrogation Report on Gesandschaftsrat Heinz Karl Eduard-Thorner, undated, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 125, box 28, folder INP-83 Thorner. Johnson to Secretary of State, 7 Mar. 1945, NA, RG 59, Central Decimal File, 848.48 Refugees, 3-745 KFC (Records of the Department of State Relating to the Problems of Relief and Refugees in Europe Arising from World War II and Its Aftermath, 1938-1949, M 1284, roll SS). Olsen, who worked for OSS as well as the War Refugee Board, met directly with Hesse on March 8 with the understanding that he could exchange views only on humanitarian issues. See Johnson to Secretary of State, 11 Apr. 1945, NA, RG 59, Central Decimal File, 740.0011, E. W. 4-1145 (Records of the Department of State Relating to World War II, 1939-1945, M 982, roll 216). Meredith Hindley, "Negotiating the Boundary of Unconditional Surrender: The War Refugee Board in Sweden and Nazi Proposals to Ransom Jews, 1944-1945," Holocaust and Genocide Studies 10, no. 1 (1996): 52-77, sets Hesse's meeting with Olsen into a broader context of Nazi peace feelers.
77. Schellenberg's draft autobiography, 10 June 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 125A, box 2, folder 21, 8-9.
78. See Richard Breitman and Shlomo Aronson, "The End of the Final Solution? Nazi Attempts to Ransom Jews in 1944," Central European History 25, no. 2 (1992): 177-203.
79. Himmler's Niederschrift, 18 Jan. 1945, NA, RG 242, Records of the Reich Leader of the SS and Chief of the German Police, T-175, roll 188, frame 2643519.
80. Activities of Musy; Nazi Plans for Escape, 3 Feb. J 945, NA, RG 200, box 29, folder 361.
81. Niederschrift, NA, RG 242, Records of the Reich Leader of the SS and Chief of the German Police, T-175, roll 118, frame 2643519. Roswell McClelland, Sternbuch-Musy-Himmler-Jewish Affair, Confidential Memo, 6 Feb. 1945, private possession of Richard Breitman.
82. These events are covered in considerable detail in Yehuda Bauer, Jews for Sale? Nazi-Jewish Negotiations, 1933-1945 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1994), 216-38. Bauer's general interpretation is that the German initiatives emanated from Himmler, who was working in opposition to Hitler; Bechet and Schellenberg followed his lead. But Schellenberg's and Goring's accounts indicate that they (and Musy) took the initiative, that they persuaded Himmler to go along, only to find him backsliding as soon as opposition or trouble materialized. For an alternative to Bauer's interpretation, see Richard Breitman and Shlomo Atonson, "The End of the Final Solution?"
83. On the Soviet reaction see George Warren to Joseph Grew, 15 Feb. 1945, Edward R. Stettinius Papers, University of Virginia, Collection 2723, box 745, folder War Refugee Board.
84. Legation, Bern to London, 26 Feb. 1945 re. Musy-Himmler negotiations, NA, RG 84, entry American Legation Bern, American Interests Section, box 94, 840.1 Jews.
85. 224 [D'Oench] to 110 [Dulles], 8 Mar. 1945; 224 to 110, 29 Mar. 1945, both in NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 66, folder 276 -- New York.
86. Bauer, Jews for Sale?, 242-249.
87. This story is told in great detail in Goring's diary extract, NA, RG 226, entry 109, box 45, tab 1, and Schellenberg's draft autobiography, NA, RG 226, entry 125A, box 2, folder 21 -- Schellenberg. For scholarly accounts, see Steven Koblik, the Stones Cry Out: Sweden's Response to the Persecution of the Jews, 1933-1945 trans. David Mel Paul and Margareta Paul (New York: Holocaust Library, 1988); and Raymond Palmer, "Felix Kersten and Count Bernadotte, A Question of Rescue," Journal of Contemporary History, 29 no. 1 (1994): 39-51.
88. McClelland's conversation with Musy concerning his most recent trip to Germany, 9-10 Apr. 1945, private possession of Richard Breitman.
89. Discussion of the false passport in Ayer to Director FB1, 8 June 1945, NA, RG 65, 100- 103569-1, box 2. -The passport itself is to be found in NA, RG 65, 65-47826, EBF 397, box 59.
90. Summary of [British] Interrogation of Schellenberg by Maj. Scott-Harston, 12 Oct. 1945, copy in NA, RG 226, entry 109, box 45, folder 261 XX9620-XX9639, document 9626.
91. An English translation of Schellenberg's autobiography, compiled during his stay in Stockholm, June 1945 NA, RG 226, entry 125A, box 2, folder 21 -- Schellenberg.
92. "Himmler and I Planned to Kill Hitler," Daily Express, 25 July 1945, copy in NA, RG 65, 100-103569-1, box 2. Schellenberg convinced the American Assistant Military Attache in Stockholm that Himmler had poisoned Hitler. See Rayens to Bissell, 30 May 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 119A, box 26, folder 29.
93. War Room Telegram of 11 July 1945, copy in Saint, London to Washington, 13 July 1945, NA, RG 226, entry 88, box 645, folder -- Incoming Plan Saint London July.
94. See Ustavic, London to OSS, S1, 14 Feb. 1945, based on highly confidential information from British intelligence, NA, RG 226, entry 210, box 554, folder 78.
95. Frederick Ayer, Jr. to Director FB1, 6 July 1945, NA, RG 65, 100-100-103569-1, box 2.
96. Stephen Tyas provided this information.