More recently, Major James Roosevelt, United States Marine Corps, had been a Marine Raider on the Makin Island raid in the Pacific and awarded the Navy Cross for his heroism in that battle.
“Still successfully dodging enemy bullets,” Roosevelt said proudly.
“We’re very lucky,” Donovan said softly.
“Yes, we are, Bill.”
After a moment, Donovan went on: “Dave is helping plan for Operation Husky.”
Roosevelt saw that after the mention of the code name for the Allied invasion of Sicily, Donovan had paused and his face had changed expression.
“And I’m afraid,” the director of the OSS finally said, “that that’s what I’m here for.”
“Sicily?” the President said. He took a long puff from his cigarette in its holder, exhaled, then added, “I know you’re not asking to keep David from the fight for Sicily—I’m sure he’s hoping to get in the thick of it. So what about it?”
“Mr. President,” Donovan said, his deep voice formal and somewhat stiff, “I’m here to report that there is nerve gas on Sicily.”
The President, his face stoic, took two puffs on his cigarette, turned his chair to look out at the South Lawn, then exhaled the smoke toward the glass.
After a moment, Roosevelt said unemotionally, “Tell that to me again.”
“Frank, it’s true,” Donovan said reasonably.
FDR, still looking out the window, ignored the informality.
“General Donovan,” the President said, his patrician voice an even tone, “indulge me.”
“The Germans have nerve gas on Sicily, Mr. President,” the director of the Office of Strategic Services repeated formally.
FDR turned in his chair and snubbed out the cigarette in a round crystal ashtray with far more force than was necessary.
Donovan now saw anger in FDR’s face.
Roosevelt quietly reached across his desk, opened a silver box that held a dozen or more loose Camel cigarettes, took out one and worked it into his holder, lit it, then inhaled deeply before slowly exhaling a significant cloud of gray-blue smoke.
He remained silent, lost in his thoughts as he absently fingered the stamps in the open envelope on the desk.
Then Roosevelt suddenly banged on the desk with his fist. Stamps went flying. The scissors hit the floor.
“Goddamn it all to hell!” the President exploded.
It was an uncharacteristic act. In all their years, Donovan had known Roosevelt to project calm, particularly at moments of bad news.
The tension or pain—or both—is worse than I feared, Donovan thought.
“Yes, Mr. President,” Donovan, whose temper bordered on the legendary, responded. “My thoughts exactly.”
After a moment, when the President seemed somewhat sure of his anger not getting away from him, he said, “How did we come about this information? And why is this the first I have heard of it?”
“Canidy,” Donovan said. “And I just had it confirmed through radio traffic with the OSS station in Algiers.”
“Canidy?”
Donovan nodded.
“Dick Canidy,” he explained, “two days ago blew up a cargo ship that had the nerve gas onboard. I personally sent him on a mission in Sicily to bring out a professor, a metallurgist, we wanted for the Manhattan Project.”
Roosevelt nodded.
The Manhattan Project—TOP SECRET PRESIDENTIAL—was FDR’s race to build the atomic bomb before Nazi Germany built its own. Albert Einstein and a number of other distinguished scientists who had fled Europe for the freedom of America had convinced Roosevelt that it was only a matter of time before scientists learned how to harness the power of a nuclear reaction and create the world’s most powerful weapon—one producing the explosive equivalent of twenty thousand tons of TNT. FDR understood that whoever won the race for such a weapon also won the war.
Quietly supplying the Manhattan Project with whatever it needed—men, matériel, smuggled scientists, whatever—had become the OSS’s number one priority. Number two concerned the enemy’s development of jet aircraft, and the OSS hotly sought in any way it could to steal, delay, and destroy the Germans’ plans for superiority in the air war. Thus, this wasn’t the first scientist whom Canidy had helped nab, and so neither was this the first time he had come to the attention of the President.
“The evidence of nerve gas, is it conclusive?” the President asked, measuring his words.
“As yet, there is no hard evidence. But there appears to be no reason to doubt the professor. He said that there was nerve gas. Canidy believes him.”
“That’s really not enough to go on, Bill, now is it?” the President said reasonably.
Donovan exhaled audibly.
“Canidy is no dummy,” the director of the OSS replied somewhat defensively. “He’s one of my best men. That’s why he’s basically working directly for me.”
“Is that wise? Is it a good idea to send one who’s a bit of—what did I hear was the phrase?—‘a loose cannon’?”
Donovan frowned as his face flushed.
“Franklin,” he said, his voice beginning to rise, “I’ve heard that crack about Canidy, too. I will tell you that he gets done what has to be done in whatever way necessary, even if—no, especially if—that gets ugly and complicated. Unfortunately, his methods often offend those stiff-shirt types who have been afraid to color outside of the lines ever since they were in diapers.”
Donovan heard what he just said, and how loud he’d said it, and paused.
He threw his hands up, and exhaled audibly.
“Excuse me for that little outburst, Mr. President.”
The President of the United States leaned his head back and laughed out loud.
“That’s the Wild Bill Donovan I know,” the President said fondly. “And you’re absolutely right, Bill. No apology necessary. I should apologize to you. I’ve heard that same loose-cannon phrase attached to you, and felt it was as unfair to you as I believe you feel it is to Canidy.”
He took the two last puffs of his cigarette, then looked intently across the desk. “You’re not done yet, are you?”
After they silently looked at one another a moment, and after Roosevelt snuffed out his cigarette and reached for another, Donovan spoke up.
“I’m afraid Canidy came across more than that,” Donovan said.
“More?”
Donovan explained: “The professor—Rossi—showed Canidy a lab that the SS had set up. They were injecting prisoners with yellow fever.”
The President took the cigarette holder from his mouth.
“My God!” FDR said. “Germ warfare, too? That’s as bad as the damn nerve gas!”
Donovan nodded. “The lab—a makeshift lab, actually, in a villa—was supposed to have blown up, too.”
“Supposed to?”
“They had to leave before they actually saw it go up,” Donovan explained. “But they did see the explosions of the ship that had the gas on board.”
The President looked at Donovan a long moment, mentally measuring it all, before replying.
“Let me see if I have this straight,” Roosevelt said finally. “We know that a ship was destroyed but don’t know conclusively that it had nerve gas. And we know conclusively that a yellow-fever lab existed but don’t know that it was in fact destroyed.”
“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.
Roosevelt shuffled in his seat, sat up a bit, and cleared his throat.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” FDR said earnestly. “I will keep an eye on the Ultra messages”—he gestured at the wire baskets of decrypted enemy message traffic; Ultra was the code name for the Allies’ supersecret breaking of the German cipher machine, Enigma—“for any mention of this. And I will make it known to George Marshall, without mentioning my source, to quietly keep an eye out.”
FDR would not reveal where he got the information because both men knew that Marshall would not be happy with this meeting between them. The way it was supposed to work was that Donovan reported to Marshall and Marshall reported to the President. That was chain of command and how such intel was supposed to reach Roosevelt.
But Donovan knew—and he figured that FDR suspected—that General Marshall, USA, likely would kick it down to General Eisenhower, USA, and get his brethren’s take on it before carrying it to FDR.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower was commander in chief, Allied Forces Headquarters. AFHQ (pronounced “aff-kew”) was in Algiers. Ike’s command included British General Bernard Montgomery and his British Eighth Army.
“With all due respect, you do realize that all answers cannot be found in Ultra,” the director of the Office of Strategic Services said carefully. “Clearly, it’s invaluable. But Ike’s people—both the Americans and the Brits—are putting their blind faith in it. If Ultra says something and they can corroborate it by other means, then they act on it. But if it’s not in Ultra, then it doesn’t exist—which is why, apparently, they’re underwhelmed by Canidy’s discoveries.”
Roosevelt nodded.
“I do realize that,” he said. “So then it’s up to you.”
“You want us to get the evidence?” Donovan said. It was a statement more than a question.
“I damn sure need it before I can”—Roosevelt struggled for the right words—“go forward.”
His face then grew hard.
“You know, I expected this out of those damn ruthless Japs—which was why I reluctantly allowed our nerve gas production to move with such speed and size—but not from that crazed goddamn Austrian corporal. I thought he’d had more than his share of gas when he fought in the First War and that he’d sworn it off.”
Roosevelt looked deeply into Donovan’s eyes.
“Get me that evidence, Bill.”
“Yes, Mr. President. But despite the horror I expect we’ll find, it won’t be easy.”
“Why?”
“Ike has made it clear that he’s controlling all the strings in the MTO. It’s hard to blow your nose anywhere near AFHQ without his explicit permission.”
Sensitive to the accusations that the American troops were unbloodied and undertrained and thus not meshing well with their more-battle-hardened British counterparts, Eisenhower was taking great pains—some said being a great pain—about the British and Americans coming together seamlessly to work under one leader.
And that leader was Ike. And Ike was being all-controlling.
“What exactly was the reaction at AFHQ to Canidy’s findings? You said underwhelmed?”
“More like denial. ‘We’ll take it under advisement,’ they said, not believing our fledgling OSS could possibly know something they don’t. And they’re hiding behind Husky—they’re (a) not going to spend resources checking out what they declare not to be and (b) not going to risk having such an investigation possibly tip off the Germans and Italians that we’re about to invade the islands.”
Roosevelt looked at Donovan and nodded.
“I see,” the President said. “Well, we have to find out the real facts about what is on the island, and quickly. If they have those evil weapons, they must have the plans to them. And, if so, we have to decide if we’re going to respond in kind or not—and, if not, then…”
He let that thought go unspoken.
The OSS director, after a moment, said , “What we can do, Mr. President—”
“You and your loose cannon Canidy do what you have to, Bill,” FDR interrupted. He paused, waiting for the provoked response that didn’t come. Then he went on: “I don’t want to know details, because, if I do, I’m afraid that I won’t be able to deny to Marshall, or whomever, that I do.”
The President puffed thoughtfully on his cigarette holder, bluish gray clouds filing the air immediately over his head. He appeared pleased with himself.
[ONE]
Port of Algiers Algiers, Algeria 1125 30 March 1943
Ensign Zack Lee, U.S. Navy—a wiry, five-foot-seven twenty-one-year-old, fair-skinned, with buzzed white-blond hair and a pair of disproportionately large ears that stuck straight out from his very round head—was not sure exactly what to expect when he had been sent to meet the Free French Forces submarine Casabianca. He’d simply been ordered by the motor pool lieutenant (junior grade) to go down the hill to the docks and bring Commander L’Herminier directly back to AFHQ.
What Ensign Lee was sure of, however, was that he planned to carry out the order without mishap.
The motor pool lieutenant (j.g.) had told him, “Some light bird named Owen on Eisenhower’s staff has a bug up his ass that the sub driver is not to go anywhere but from the boat right to Owen’s office.” Without looking up from the crossword puzzle he’d been working, he added, “Screw it up and you’ll wind up getting reassigned to a DLM in, oh, say, el Golia.”
When Lee had replied, “A DLM in el Golia, sir?” the reply had been, “Ensign, that would be Desk, Large Metal, in the Algerian hellhole called a desert. Now, get the hell down there!”
Ensign Lee, wearing summer whites, his newly issued butter bars shining brightly in the Mediterranean sun, hoped that he was not going to have to wait too long, as he now was beginning to drip with sweat.
Lee had already managed an impressive string of screwups during his short hitch—the biggest being picking the Navy in the first place. He’d joined in large part, he had hoped, to get away from the dreadful dry heat of the sunbaked Texas Panhandle. He’d been born in Amarillo, raised an hour’s drive north in a desolate dirt patch called, appropriately enough, Cactus, Texas. And he’d just graduated from Texas Technological College, there on the high plains in Lubbock.
Now, not at all overjoyed about being assigned as a motor pool driver to ferry AFHQ flag officers and the like, he stood leaning against the front right fender of a 1941 Plymouth P11.
The Double Agents Page 4