The Spymasters (Men at War 7)

FOR OSS LONDON -- COL BRUCE

OSS ALGIERS -- CAPT FINE

COPY OSS WASHINGTON -- GEN DONOVAN

FROM OSS BERN

BEGIN QUOTE

DAVID AND STANLEY,

AS PROMISED IN MY MESSAGE OF 30MAY43, I SHARE WHAT I HAVE JUST LEARNED FROM MY MEETING WITH WOLFGANG KAPPLER. TO WIT:

1. FRITZ THYSSEN. WE KNEW THAT THYSSEN FLED GERMANY WITH HIS FAMILY AND THEN HITLER NATIONALIZED HIS STEEL WORK INDUSTRIES. WE NOW KNOW THAT FRITZ IS NO LONGER HEADED TO ARGENTINA, THAT INSTEAD VICHY FRANCE TURNED HIM AND HIS WIFE OVER TO THE GESTAPO, THAT HITLER HAS HAD THEM LOCKED UP IN A BERLIN ASYLUM, AND THAT THEY SOON WILL BE INTERNED IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP.

2. WOLFGANG KAPPLER. MARTIN BORMANN HAS ESSENTIALLY THREATENED KAPPLER WITH SAME FATE AS FRITZ. TO START, HITLER HAS NATIONALIZED HIS CHEMISCHE FABRIK FRANKFURT. AND BORMANN HAS THREATENED HARM TO KAPPLER’S FAMILY IF HE TRIES TO FLEE GERMANY AND/OR HIS DUTIES TO THE THIRD REICH. THE WIFE AND DAUGHTER -- HANNAH, 53, AND ANNA, 19 -- ARE LIVING IN BERLIN. SON OSKAR, 32, AN SS-OBERSTURMBANNFUHRER, IS SECOND IN COMMAND AT SS PROVISIONAL HQ IN MESSINA. I OFFERED -- AND WOLFGANG DECLINED -- FOR OSS TO GET WIFE AND DAUGHTER OUT OF GERMANY. KAPPLER WORRIES THAT SHOULD THAT HAPPEN, BORMANN WILL TARGET SON. IT IS CRITICAL TO THE SUCCESS OF WOLFGANG’S MISSION THAT HE NOT WORRY ABOUT THE SAFETY OF HIS FAMILY. TINY IS REACHING OUT TO SON TO GAUGE HIS COMMITMENT TO NAZISM. IF IT IS DETERMINED THAT SON MUST BE TERMINATED -- WE COULD LAY BLAME ON SS OR ITALIAN SECRET POLICE -- SO BE IT. TO THAT END I AM REQUESTING (A) THAT DAVID PUT TOGETHER A CONTINGENCY PLAN THAT WOULD HAVE MOTHER AND DAUGHTER DISAPPEAR TO SAFETY AND (B) THAT STAN PUT TOGETHER SAME FOR SON -- AND HIS POSSIBLE TERMINATION -- IN SICILY. BOTH OPS SHOULD BE ACTIONABLE WITHIN SEVEN (7) DAYS OF THIS DATE.

3. SS-STURMBANN

FUHRER KLAUS SCHWARTZ. KAPPLER SAYS HE WORKED FAITHFULLY FOR HIM AS CHIEF CHEMIST AT CHEMISCHE FABRIK FRANKFURT FOR TEN YEARS BEFORE HIMMLER QUOTE POISONED HIS MIND UNQUOTE AND SCHWARTZ RADICALLY EMBRACED NAZISM. WITHIN LAST WEEK SCHWARTZ WAS KNOWN TO BE TRAVELING UNDER ORDERS OF HIS BOSS, WERNHER VON BRAUN, BUT HIS WHEREABOUTS ARE BEING KEPT QUIET DESPITE INQUIRIES BY TINY’S SOURCES. KAPPLER IS LOOKING INTO WHAT IF ANY UNUSUAL PROJECTS SCHWARTZ MAY HAVE HAD WORKING AT CHEMISCHE FABRIK FRANKFURT BEFORE HE LEFT TO ASSIST VON BRAUN.

4. STATION CHIEFS LONDON AND ALGERS REQUESTED TO ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT OF THIS AND COMPREHENSION OF CONTINGENCY PLANS.

FONDLY,

ALLEN

END QUOTE

TOP SECRET

* * *

The tall, thin Stevens, after putting the message on the coffee table, leaned back on the couch and crossed his outstretched legs.

“With Kappler’s connections in the High Command, I can understand why Allen seems anxious,” Stevens said. He then chuckled and added, “Think we should tell him the reason they can’t find Schwartz is because he’s dead?”

“Who the hell does Dulles think he is, Donovan himself?” Bruce suddenly said, coldly furious.

Ed Stevens raised his eyebrows.

“‘Station chiefs requested to acknowledge receipt’!” Bruce quoted, gesturing at the message on the table by Stevens. “‘Ops actionable within seven days’! We’re just supposed to drop everything? And he copies Donovan on the message so it in essence becomes an order, a fait accompli.”

Bruce then looked thoughtful as he sipped his coffee.

“I suggest that he’s playing to Donovan,” Bruce said.

“In what way?” Stevens said.

“Clearly Donovan also floated his idea of an ‘extra-legal’ contingency plan with Dulles.”

“Which is?”

“A code word for wholesale assassination. The elimination of Axis sympathizers, a hit list of those who would be the next Hitler. Starting with taking out the top one hundred Nazis. Summarily execute them. Donovan told us about it when he was just here. And if he told us, he certainly bounced it off Dulles, who now is running with his own version of it.”

“Okay,” Stevens said after a moment, reasonably, “I can see how that’s playing to Donovan.”

“It would not surprise me if Dulles has this industrialist Kappler, with all his connections, being groomed for something like that.”