“Understood.”
“Just before the war ended, the German general Gehlen, who was in charge of Abwehr Ost—Russian intelligence—went to . . .”
—
“Yeah, I can see why President Truman wouldn’t want that to come out,” Armstrong said, when Clete had finished.
“Is that what he wanted to talk to you about in Berlin?” Ford asked.
Frade nodded.
“What I’m doing with that is holding down the fort, all by my lonesome, until the President can set up a replacement for the OSS.”
“Under Admiral Souers,” Armstrong said. “He told us—Dick and me only—about that. They’re going to call it the Central Agency for Intelligence.”
“Central Intelligence Agency,” Ford corrected him.
Frade nodded, then said, “The second operation—it just came up—is something damned near as important. Just before the war ended, the Germans dispatched a submarine, U-234, ostensible destination Japan. Onboard were a couple of very senior SS officers, some German nuclear physicists, and five hundred sixty kilograms—about three-quarters of a ton—of uranium oxide.”
“Jesus Christ!” Armstrong said. “I heard the Germans had a nuclear program but . . .”
“They were trying to hand it to the Japs, right?” Ford asked.
“It looks that way,” Frade said.
“What’s the connection here?” Armstrong asked.
“We have some reliable intelligence that U-234 came to Argentina, and yesterday we think—operative word ‘think’—we learned where it made landfall. Very close to the Strait of Magellan.”
“That’s almost in the Antarctic, isn’t it?” Armstrong asked. “A lot of ice-covered rock?”
Frade nodded.
“You think it’s just sitting down there?” Ford asked dubiously.
“Personally, I think it unloaded its cargo and then was scuttled. But I don’t know that. What we’re going to do is look for any signs of a landing, and go from there. Play it by ear.”
“How are you going to look for it? On snowshoes?” Ford asked.
“With an airplane,” Frade said. “You ever hear of a Fieseler Storch?”
“I’ve seen pictures, but I’ve never actually seen one,” Ford said.
Armstrong shook his head.
“We have one. Great airplane. They stall at about thirty knots. That ought to be slow enough to have a good look. And the guy flying it has lots of experience in Russia.”
“How are you going to get it down there? Refuel it? Where’s it going to land?”
“A convoy with a Storch, a Piper Cub, a bulldozer, a tanker truck with twelve thousand liters of Avgas, and some soldiers to protect it left here about thirty minutes ago. It’ll take them three or four days to get there. It’ll take another day to put the wings back on the airplanes, and for the dozer to hack out an airstrip.”
“Where does the Flying Brothel fit into all this?” Armstrong asked.
“I’m an optimist,” Frade said. “Thirty minutes into his first flight, Willi Grüner—he went to flight school with von Wachtstein, and they flew Luftwaffe fighters together—is going to look out the window of the Storch and see an arrow and a sign in the snow that says Uranium Oxide Buried Here.”
Both Ford and Armstrong chuckled.
“And, so now that I have it, what do I do with the uranium oxide?” Frade asked, and immediately answered his own question. “I send it to the States. . . .”