“That, I’m afraid, is correct. But as far as I’m concerned—”
“Bill,” the President interrupted, “I need irrefutable evidence. Can we get that?”
Donovan considered the question a moment before replying.
“If the villa did explode,” the OSS director said, “then all we’re going to find there, basically, is a mass of rubble.”
“And if the ship did have the nerve gas?”
Donovan looked down, his memory flashing images of the bloody battlefields of France in the First War—and of the unspeakable horror that was mass death. It was a mental image that had faded with time but would never completely go
away.
He gathered his thoughts for a moment, then looked back at FDR.
“If the nerve gas was on there,” Donovan said slowly, “then the evidence of it is right now all over Palermo.”
The President frowned. He understood that meant that the Germans had in a roundabout fashion—with the help of one OSS agent—caused a heinous death on the very citizens of Sicily they were there, in part, to help protect.
“The Germans will be quick to cover their tracks,” Roosevelt said.
“You can’t just go in and clean up something like that. Lingering signs—the irrefutable evidence—will be around a long time. Weeks, maybe months. Longer, if they use mass graves instead of burials at sea.”
Roosevelt nodded thoughtfully. Then he said, “I’ve long feared that that damn Hitler would eventually use chemicals. Not so much germs, but certainly gas, never mind the Geneva Protocol.”
Formally, the “Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare,” the Geneva Protocol, signed in 1925 and put in play in 1928, outlawed the use of chemical and biological weapons. It read, in part: “Whereas the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases, and of all analogous liquids, materials, or devices, has been justly condemned by the general opinion of the civilized world….”
Donovan knew that in war any number of ruthless dictators—those clearly not civilized—might regard it as nothing more than a piece of paper.
Which was to say, patently ignore it.
“Technically, the Germans did not set off those munitions,” Donovan offered. “And the Geneva Protocol forbids the use of such weapons. It doesn’t address storage or shipment—”
“Which,” Roosevelt interrupted, “you well know is why we have Arkansas and Colorado working day and night.”
By “Colorado,” the OSS director knew that the President was referring to the Rocky Mountain Arsenal there. And that “Arkansas” was the Pine Bluff Arsenal. The U.S. Army secretly manufactured chemical warfare (CW) munitions at the huge facilities. Testing of the nerve gas had taken place in mock CW exercises in Utah. Tons of the munitions had been and were being stockpiled in top secret locations…including overseas.
Roosevelt motioned with his cigarette holder as he added pointedly, “I meant it when I said that we would retaliate in kind.”
Donovan nodded solemnly.
The President paused in thought, then went on:
“Let’s suppose that the ship did in fact contain nerve gas. Hitler doesn’t know that we know who set off the munitions. He’s likely going to think that we think the Germans or Italians did it knowingly, either intentionally or accidentally. He cannot take the chance that somehow we do not know about the incident, because that would mean not being prepared for any possible retaliation on our part. Regardless that it would be retaliation for something he didn’t do.” He looked at Donovan. “You with me?”
“Yeah.”
“So he’s going to spend a lot of effort making sure we don’t find out about the use—”
Roosevelt suddenly had an extended coughing fit. After it ended, he took a sip of water, cleared his throat, then added: “Yes?”
“Yeah,” Donovan repeated. “You’d certainly expect that.”
Roosevelt snorted.
“He’s just damn lucky Churchill doesn’t know about it,” FDR said. “With the slightest excuse such as this, Winston would in a moment float Berlin away on a cloud of mustard gas.”
Donovan nodded solemnly again.