Canaris

by Mueller, Michael;

  Was Oster correct in this assessment? A weak man like Brauchitsch would never consider treason against the State under any circumstances, but even Canaris would probably not have followed Oster down this road, despite knowing that the contacts through the Vatican verged on treason. In the following months Oster kept Sas informed about the repeated postponements of the attack date;46 although Müller, von Weizsäcker, the later General Warlimont and even the supposedly Nazi General Reichenau passed on the attack dates to potential enemies variously between 1938 and 1940,47 Oster’s act was nevertheless unparalleled.48

  At the end of January 1940, Admiral Raeder ordered a plan for the possible occupation of Denmark and Norway, apparently after a warning by Canaris that the British might be thinking of landings in Norway49 under the pretext of British ‘Finland Volunteers’.50 On 24 January ‘Sonderstab Nord’ was set up at OKW, renamed ‘Sonderstab Weserübung’ by Keitel on 5 February. A few days previously Canaris had given Oberstleutnant Pruck the task of reporting on the activities of the enemy powers in Norway, the strength and disposition of Norwegian armed forces and to reconnoitre the port installations at Oslo, Stavanger, Bergen, Kristiansand, Trondheim and Narvik. At the end of February the German ambassador in Stockholm warned of an imminent major British and French action in Scandinavia. On 3 March Hitler decided to proceed with Operation Weserübung – with Korvettenkapitän Liedig as Abwehr representative – well before the Western offensive.51 On 31 March Canaris went personally to Abwehrstelle Oslo to see how things were progressing,52 he and Liedig informing Oster regularly: ‘It is impossible to understand how the British can be so blind. It is obvious that it would be possible to unleash a demonstration of British sea power. I am certain that the whole operation will be called off if it is seen that the Home Fleet is sailing.’53 Two days later Oster told his friend Sas that Denmark and Norway would be invaded ‘in the first half of next week’,54 that is, the first week of April. Sas informed The Hague immediately and requested that the British secret service be informed too.

  When Sas told the Norwegian ambassadorial assistant Ulrich Stang at Hotel Adlon, his advice was rebuffed as nonsense; Sas was not aware that Stang was a supporter of the Fascist leader Vidkung Quisling and welcomed a German invasion. The Danish naval attaché Kolsen reported Sas’s warning to Copenhagen, but no armed resistance was prepared.

  On 7 April 1940 the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper, fourteen destroyers and the battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau sailed for Narvik and Trondheim with a total of 3,700 German troops. The armada was detected by British air reconnaissance covering British naval units mining Norway’s coastal waters and the first minor clashes occurred.55 By 22 May Germany had lost eighteen warships, including three cruisers and the ten destroyers sent into Narvik, while the Luftwaffe lost 242 aircraft, but the strategically important ports and aerodromes in southern and central Norway were in German hands.

  On 1 May Josef Müller was again in Rome and passed a letter authored by Oster, Dohnanyi and himself to Pater Leiber warning of an imminent German attack in the West.56 On 6 May the later Pope Paul VI informed the representatives of Britain and France. Osborne, however, was sceptical and in a cable to London reported: ‘The Vatican expects a German offensive in the West at the beginning of next week – on account of previous similar expectations – however I have no great confidence in the present prediction.’57 Abbot-General Noots visited the Belgian ambassador Nieuwenhuys and asked him to inform Brussels, but after the Venlo incident all information from apparent German Resistance sources was being treated as a possible plot to disseminate disinformation by German intelligence, and Nieuwenhuys also mentioned his doubts.

  Meanwhile, Müller had left Rome, but finding that he had a new attack date to pass on used his friend Hauptmann Wilhem Schmidhuber, consul in Portugal, who was in Rome on 6 May and from then on remained in telephone contact with Müller. Oster was meeting Sas every day in Berlin, often at the latter’s flat. The German conspirators were running a high risk because the constant flow of telegrams, telephone calls and meetings left a trail that the eavesdropping crews of Goering’s Forschungsamt – Research Bureau (FA) – did not overlook. In the run-up to Operation Weserübung they had already recorded the conversations of the Danish military attaché Kjolsen without knowing where his information originated. On 7 May Jodl wrote in his diary: ‘. . . the F very upset about another postponement, as danger of betrayal, esp in Brown Sheets. Conversation of Belgian ambassador at Vatican to Brussels which leads to conclusion of treason by German personality who travelled from Berlin to Rome on 29 April.’58 The FA decrypts were prepared on brown folios, ridiculed in the Abwehr as ‘brown birds’ because of the giant Reich eagle at the head.59 The FA had also intercepted two cables from Nieuwenhuys on 1 and 4 May 1940, while the script of the telephone conversations between Sas and the Dutch war minister in The Hague were shown to Hitler on 9 May.

  On 10 May 1940, 136 German divisions entered Holland, Belgium and France. Holland gave in after five days; the Dutch queen and her government fled to exile in Britain. Belgium held out until the 18th of the month before capitulating, and after less than five weeks German soldiers were in Paris. The new French Government under Marshall Pétain sued for peace, and on 21 June 1940 at Compiègne the armistice was signed in the same railway coach that had been used to stage the German surrender in 1918. Hitler had achieved his great goal; ‘The symbolic liquidation of the old debt was completed.’60

  At the beginning of June Hitler ordered Canaris and Heydrich to find the traitor who had betrayed his attack plan; the task was given to Joachim Rohleder, responsible for counter-espionage at Abwehr headquarters, and to Schellenberg at SS-RSHA. According to SS-Standartenführer Huppenkothen, Canaris and Heydrich agreed to a mutual exchange of information,61 but the relationship between them cooled very quickly because the Abwehr did not keep to its side of the bargain. At Schellenberg’s complaint, Heydrich took over,62 thus putting Canaris in an awkward position, as the investigation could fatally expose the organisation.63 Rohleder was bound quickly to identify Oster, simply by checking the dates of departure of all persons who had gone to Rome at the time in question, and moreover Rohleder had his own source at the Vatican.64 Rohleder discovered everything, and also the connection between Sas and Oster, but put aside the file codenamed ‘Palmenzweig’ – ‘Palm branch’ – when Canaris decided not to proceed with the matter ‘for lack of evidence’. Eventually, however, he requested a copy and said that the relationship between Oster and Müller was being terminated. Rohleder reminded his chief of the danger that the Gestapo might also know everything, but Huppenkothen confirmed later that Gestapo inquiries had fallen on fallow ground: a ‘circle of travellers to Italy’ had been identified, but no significant name was forthcoming.65 Canaris had succeeded once more in saving Oster, Dohnanyi and Müller.

  22

  Operation Felix

  After the triumph in the West, Hitler and his generals had a dilemma, for Britain remained to be defeated and was unwilling to negotiate. Hitler wanted a quick solution to this, for Germany did not want to be forced to the defensive in the near future, and so on 30 June 1940 Generalmajor Jodl presented his memorandum ‘The Continuation of the War against Great Britain’,1 which recommended determination ‘to break the British will to resist’ if ‘political means’ were inadequate.2

  Either England had to be invaded or the war extended peripherally, by which Jodl meant extending towards ‘the lucrative inheritance’ of states that Germany would control once the British Empire gave in. Besides Russia and Japan, it was principally from Italy and Spain that Jodl was hoping for military support to bring about this desired end, by mining the Suez Canal or helping in the capture of Gibraltar.

  On 1 July 1940 Hitler spoke to Italian ambassador Alfieri, and a week later with Foreign Minister Ciano3 about the possibilities of attacking Gibraltar, which the German Staffs were thinking about ‘very seriously’. ‘Special weapons’ would be used, but the actual occupation
would be done by Spanish troops, and the problem lay in obtaining Franco’s agreement; Italy should request air bases in Spain, Spanish Morocco and the Balearics in order to attack Gibraltar.4 It speaks volumes for the confusion on one hand and the readiness to keep all options open on the other that it was not until 12 July that OKW issued the order to prepare the attack operation or, in support of a Spanish coup de main, set up an Intelligence Staff Gibraltar. Four days later ‘Instruction No 16 – Preparation of Landing Operations in England’, also known as Operation Seelöwe, appeared.5 When Hitler announced to his generals at the Berghof on 13 July that he was intending to draw Spain into the war ‘in order to consolidate the front against Britain from the North Cape to Morocco’,6 Canaris was already working on the plans. At the end of June he had made it clear to Franco, the Minister for Air Juan Vigón and Foreign Minister Beigbeder that Germany was not currently interested in having Spain enter the war, but was requesting permission to move German troops across Spanish territory. Franco was cautious – an attack by Spanish troops on Gibraltar would only be possible if Germany supplied aircraft and artillery.7

  Canaris arrived in Spain on 23 July 1940 in order to see for himself the prospects for the operation locally. In his entourage were Piekenbrock, Oberst Mikosch, the commanding officer of 5i.Pionierbatallion, Major Langkau from the Staff of Jüterbog Artillery School, paratrooper Hauptmann Rudolf Witzig and Hauptmann Osterecht. These officers represented the essential technical branches for an attack on the Gibraltar,8 and arrived singly by different routes, in civilian dress and with false passports. On 23 July Canaris and Piekenbrock met in Madrid and visited the head of K-Organisation Spain, Fregattenkapitän Wilhelm Leissner. K-Org was the Abwehr apparatus in neutral countries, usually structured around the German embassy, and its network of agents spread out across the country. The K-Org heads not only kept in touch with the important civilian and military offices of the ‘host’ and collated the available information, but also courted the secret services of the various belligerent states. In this way during the course of the war Stockholm, Berne, Istanbul, Lisbon and Madrid became meeting points for the international intelligence communities and enabled conspiratorial contact across the frontlines. Shortly after seeing Leissner, Canaris and Piekenbrock met Vigón, the new chief of the Spanish General Staff Campos, and Lt-Coronel Pardo, the latter presumably an intelligence officer from the Army Ministry.9 Canaris stated frankly that the purpose of his visit was to discuss a possible operation against Gibraltar and to obtain the fullest information about the Rock, and he requested the help of his Spanish hosts for their maps of the British defence system in order to assess the military conditions for the attack.

  Vigón reacted evasively; he considered a surprise attack out of the question since only one road led there, it would take time to position the artillery, and the Spanish railway gauge differed from the French. Shortly afterwards there was a meeting with Franco, who did not dismiss the German plans out of hand but spoke of his manifold reservations. He feared the British naval strength and thought they might retaliate against the Canary Islands. He pointed to Spain’s economic difficulties, which Canaris had often described himself,10 and was especially concerned at the shortage of oil caused by the American refusal to meet his needs.11 The meeting, though warm, ended without any concrete result, but three houses in Algeciras were placed at the disposal of the Germans, one as a residence while the other two looked across the Bay of Gibraltar and were useful as observation posts.12

  During the next two days Canaris’s commando squad had a closer look at Gibraltar, and did not like what they saw. The steep slopes and unpredictable winds ruled out gliders and paratroop drops. The access over the isthmus that connected Gibraltar to the mainland was apparently mined and the defenders had a good field of fire from all positions. All troop and material transports had to change trains at the French–Spanish border and the Spanish did not have the resources to support the troops in transit with signals technology, supplies and security. An attack would succeed only at the cost of high casualties.13

  On 27 July Canaris held a concluding conference in which the results were discussed. The outlook was not appealing; a surprise attack was out of the question, the Spanish degree of commitment was uncertain and even if an attack were undertaken, the Spanish would need to make immense preparations to support a German Expeditionary Corps. Despite these sobering difficulties, Canaris and his team were not deterred, and on their return to Germany work started immediately on a plan of attack.14

  On 31 July 1940, Brauchitsch, Halder, Jodl, Keitel and Raeder met at the Berghof to discuss the invasion of England with Hitler, but found the Führer preoccupied with his plans to destroy ‘the life force of the Soviet Union’ in the spring of 1941. The increase in size of the Army from 120 to 180 divisions in the middle of August was a signal to those in the know that he did not expect to defeat Britain in 1940 and was calculating for the entry of the United States into the war with the change in the German–Soviet relationship. Operation Seelöwe was not discarded but the Luftwaffe had first to win air supremacy over England, and the subsequent invasion by sea had serious troop transportation problems and problematic weather. That Franco knew this had prompted Canaris to make his fact-finding mission to Spain.

  An offensive in the East and the destruction of the Soviet Union would ‘show Britain the mainland sword’ and, if Russia could be overwhelmed quickly, strengthen Japan sufficiently to deter the United States from entering the war against such an Axis. The conquest of Gibraltar, the support of the Italian adventure in Libya, even the preparations against England, were now little more than diversionary moves to disguise the real direction of the main activity, as Halder wrote in his diary on 31 July 1940.15

  On 2 August Canaris reported on his findings in Spain to Keitel and General Warlimont, chief of the Land Defence Department, Abteilung L, at OKW.16 Building on this knowledge, the Army and Navy Groups of Abteilung L weighed the operational possibilities of an expedition to North Africa consisting of one or two panzer divisions, provided that Operation Seelöwe fell by the wayside permanently and the troops became available. Warlimont was of the opinion that if Gibraltar were captured, the British could probably be driven out of the Mediterranean theatre in the winter.17 Canaris warned against such speculations: Franco would not act against Gibraltar on his own and Spain’s catastrophic economic situation would make it difficult for Hitler to lure Spain into the war.18 Nevertheless Hitler wanted the ‘great solution’ in four steps:

  1. A binding agreement with General Franco that Spain under a fully camouflaged German participation would resist a British attack or landings in the Campo de Gibraltar on the mainland.

  2. A surprise attack by massed German Luftwaffe groups operating from Bordeaux against the British Fleet in Gibraltar harbour, and at the same time the transfer of Stukas and coastal artillery batteries to Spain.

  3. Destruction of the harbour and harassment of British Fleet by Stukas and coastal artillery.

  4. Capture of the Rock by attack from the landward side and possibly also from the sea under Spanish supreme command, although the command of the operation as a whole should remain in German hands through the force of personality of the German commander.19

  Canaris was under strict instructions to undertake no further reconnaissance missions to the Iberian Peninsula20 to ensure that the British remained unaware of the German interest in Gibraltar, and he drove to Paris and Abwehrstellen in Occupied France to collect information before meeting Vigón in Madrid.21 The Spanish air minister had just come from a meeting with the former Legion Condor commander, Luftwaffe-General Wolfram von Richthofen, and was concerned at the progress of the German plan. Franco was very interested in accelerating the operation because of his worsening fuel and food situation, although this would not improve appreciably if he captured Gibraltar. Vigón then voiced Franco’s demands; Spain would only become involved if it were supplied with goods and weapons. These amounted to two hundred he
avy guns, over one hundred flak guns, three squadrons of naval reconnaissance aircraft and many other items.22 Apparently no detailed discussions were held on the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of fuel, wheat, oil and coal that the Caudillo urgently needed.23

  On 24 August, Hitler approved the operational plan Felix. Franco had agreed to participate, provided that his massive material demands were satisfied,24 and Canaris notified Halder of the quantity and types of weapons, the amounts of fuel and food the Spanish leader thought he could make do with.25 Canaris remained pessimistic about the whole endeavour and tried to bring Halder round to his way of thinking. Franco had the generals and the clergy against him, his only supporter being Serrano Suñer, his brother-in-law and the future successor to Foreign Minister Beigbeder, and even he preferred the Italians to the Germans. One assumes that Franco would not have ‘got involved’ until Britain was already on its knees. Ultimately, as Canaris advised, it would need a personal visit of the Führer to ‘work it’; Hitler was keen, as he told Brauchitsch and Halder on 14 September, ‘to promise the Spanish all they want, even if we can’t deliver in full’.26

  On 16 September Ribbentrop met Suñer in Berlin; Suñer was friendly towards the Berlin–Rome Axis, but he was also a Spanish Nationalist, a lawyer and a pious Catholic, and could not stand Ribbentrop. He began by refusing the German request for a naval base on the Canary Islands, and avoided all other suggestions by detailing again all Franco’s material demands. Franco wanted Gibraltar, French Morocco and Oran, but Hitler was only ready to let him have French Morocco if he allowed a German naval base there and mining rights. Franco refused, and so the Ribbentrop–Suñer meeting ended without accord except for Franco’s offer to meet Hitler personally at the Spanish border with France.27