“Call the Army Security Agency, tell them you need the radios and some expert who’ll know how to set them up. We’ll send him and the radios down there on the first Lodestar.”
“And what do I respond to Frade?”
“Why don’t you wait until you have his reaction to the news that you’re sending the first of fourteen Lockheed Lodestars that will be of little or no use to the OSS in Argentina?”
“And what about the financing of this enterprise?”
“You can ask the President that, too. I would guess that since he would have to repay Frade that two point two million from his unvouchered funds, he would be pleased if Frade used his own money. As you point out, he’s got lots of it.”
“That’s not fair, Bill.”
“We’re in the OSS, Alex. The word ‘fair’ is not in our lexicon.”
[TWO]
Embassy of the German Reich Avenida Córdoba Buenos Aires, Argentina 0855 13 July 1943
Manfred von Deitzberg, a tall, slim, blond forty-two-year-old wearing a brand-new gray double-breasted pin-striped suit, marched through the door of the office of Ambassador Manfred Alois Graf von Lutzenberger. Von Deitzberg thrust out his arm. “Heil Hitler!”
Von Lutzenberger returned the salute, none too crisply, then said, “If you please, gentlemen, give the Herr Generalmajor and me a moment alone.”
First Secretary Anton von Gradny-Sawz—a tall, almost handsome, somewhat overweight forty-five-year-old with a full head of luxuriant reddish-brown hair—SS-Sturmbannführer Erich Raschner—a short, squat man of the same age—and Korvettenkapitän Karl Boltitz, the latter two also wearing obviously new suits of clothing, and all of whom had obviously intended to enter von Lutzenberger’s office, stopped so suddenly that they bumped into each other.
“And close the door, please,” von Lutzenberger said, then waited until it was before he said, “And how was the voyage, von Deitzberg?”
Von Deitzberg, unsmiling, ignored the question. “I presume there was an important reason why you summoned me here?”
“I was complying with my orders,” von Lutzenberger said, and handed him a sheet of paper.
MOST SECRET
The Foreign Ministry
Berlin
7 July 1943
By Hand
Manfred Graf von Lutzenberger
Ambassador of the German Reich
Buenos Aires
Heil Hitler!
1. On receipt of this document, you will immediately hand deliver enclosures (1) and (2) hereto to Generalmajor Manfred von Deitzberg.
2. Foreign Service Officer Grade 15 Karl Cranz is appointed commercial attaché of the embassy of the German Reich, Buenos Aires, with immediate effect. Vice Foreign Service Officer Grade 15 Wilhelm Frogger will return to Berlin to assume new duties in the foreign ministry as soon as the turnover can be effected.
3. Kapitän zur See Karl Boltitz is appointed naval attaché to the embassy of the German Reich, Buenos Aires, with immediate effect. In this position, Kapitän zur See Boltitz will be the senior military officer of the embassy.
4. Major Hans-Peter Baron von Wachtstein is appointed attaché for air to the embassy of the German Reich, Buenos Aires, with immediate effect.
Concur:
Heinrich Himmler
Reichsprotektor Joachim von Ribbentrop
Foreign Minister
Wilhelm Canaris
Rearadmiral
MOST SECRET
“By hand, Herr Ambassador?” von Deitzberg asked.
“That was hand-delivered to me by Herr Cranz. Yesterday afternoon.”
“And where is he?”
“He and the pilot of the Condor, a Captain von und zu Aschenburg, accepted von Wachtstein’s invitation to have dinner with von Wachtstein’s family at their farm. Cranz called the duty officer later to say they would be spending the night there, and coming here at nine this morning.”
“It’s nine now.”
“Then they should be here. Sometimes there is traffic.”
“May I have the enclosures mentioned, please?”
“Certainly,” von Lutzenberger said, opened his desk drawer, and handed von Deitzberg a bluish-gray note-sized envelope and a large thick manila envelope.
Von Deitzberg opened the small envelope first. It contained a sheet of Reichsprotektor Heinrich Himmler’s personal notepaper.
Der Reichsprotektor
7 July 1943
Brigadeführer von Deitzberg,
You are immediately needed here.
If necessary, you are authorized to delay the return flight of the Condor by as much as twenty-four hours until the turnover to Cranz, who will assume all your responsibilities in Argentina, is accomplished.
Heil Hitler!
Himmler
The large manila envelope was so securely bound that von Deitzberg couldn’t open it until von Lutzenberger’s secretary, Fräulein Ingebord Hässell, a middle-aged spinster who wore her graying hair drawn tightly against her skull, was summoned and finally produced a huge pair of shears.
It contained a letter and several packets of charts and data.
MOST SECRET
Reichssicherheitshauptamt
Berlin
7 July 1943
SS-Brigadeführer Manfred von Deitzberg
By Hand
(One): You will immediately make these orders known to Ambassador von Lutzenberger and SS Obersturmbannführer Cranz for the necessary actions on their part.
