by Roland Perry
Roosevelt was succeeded by Harry S. Truman, 60, a failed haberdasher but good political manager and decision-maker. Truman was no ideologue, and if anything, anti-intellectual. Liberals left him cold, and he was not open to left-wing influence. (The Cold War would see him take a strong stance against the Soviet Union under Stalin, whom he didn’t trust.)
In April 1945 Hitler committed suicide in his bunker, and Germany capitulated. The United States’ total focus was now on the war against Japan in the Pacific. Straight’s once-somnolent outpost was alive with change. The B-17 he had trained on was usurped by the more sophisticated B-29—“Superfortress Bomber”—the biggest plane built by the United States. It was the single most complicated and expensive weapon produced during the war. Nearly 4,000 B-29s were built for combat in the Pacific Theater. The plane had been assembled in a rush by a vast manufacturing program employing about 300,000 workers from Seattle, Washington, to Marietta, Georgia, and from Wichita, Kansas, to Woodridge, New Jersey. The B-29 was more evidence for Straight that the system in the United States could produce something special under pressure, despite capitalist imperfections. The point would be driven home to him when he was transferred to San Antonio, Texas, to train in the product itself.
In July 1945 it seemed as if he were to see active duty after all when he and his crew were ordered to Colorado Springs to prepare for a mission to fly Four-Star General James Doolittle to the U.S. base on Guam in the mid-Pacific. The colonel who had sent for them discovered they had little experience flying over water. That led to a grilling of Straight and his crew by the Standardization Board about their knowledge of the B-17, which was to be Doolittle’s carrier. Their exacting examination found him wanting. The combined lack of experience within the crew also influenced the board interrogators. It was a case of from “Doolittle to do nothing.” They were dismissed and sent back to their base by rail.
Straight had mixed emotions about the end of hostilities in the Pacific brought about by two atomic bombs dropped by B-29s on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Yet he expressed no concern at all about these new weapons of mass destruction. He saw them as important for the Allied victory and the 500,000 American lives that were spared because of Truman’s momentous decision to use atomic weapons. In his autobiography he bemoaned the lost opportunities to see combat in not joining the marines, in having the capacity to speak French, and in not going as a copilot to fly B-17s. Straight regretted three wasted years that had interrupted his career as a writer and a member of the progressive movement in the United States. Yet, as he mentally worked through those lost years, he was thankful for the passion he had developed for flying.
He was beginning to consider his future. Sitting on a bunk in his quarters in San Antonio in between flying B-29s in eight-hour shifts, he reflected more and more on the lost chances to serve in combat. A stronger service record would have given him the momentum for a political career, first as a congressman, and later even a shot at the presidency, which was a family expectation for one of its sons going back to his great-grandfather Henry B. Payne. Yet when Straight returned to civilian life, he would not be so concerned with a lack of combat. Politics was still very much on his agenda.
At the Potsdam Conference in Berlin on July 24, 1945, President Truman turned to Stalin and said through an interpreter, “Our scientists have developed a new weapon. We tested it fully. It has a terrific destructive force.”
The president searched Stalin’s face for a flicker, some hint of concern from the Soviet Union’s leader. His expression remained implacable, even benign.
“I’m glad to hear of it,” Stalin responded. “I hope you can make good use of it against the Japanese.”
It was Truman who received the surprise. Stalin’s reaction meant only one thing. He already knew. In fact, the biggest espionage operation in history had been running for nearly eighteen months in an attempt by the Soviet Union to catch up to the U.S.-controlled development of the atomic bomb, known as the Manhattan Project.
Days later the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were all but obliterated. The atomic age of destruction was not merely a complex diagram on a blackboard; it was reality. Despite the stolen and home-produced knowledge the Russians already had, the shock was palpable in the Kremlin. There was a not-unwarranted fear that the United States could now turn its attention to Moscow and finish the job left incomplete by Hitler. Some hawks in the Pentagon were advocating a move on the citadel of communism while the United States and its allies in Western Europe were on a roll.
Stalin responded by increasing the huge espionage effort to gain the capacity to produce his own bomb. Yet the United States, it was learned, was moving on to even bigger and more powerful weapons, a hundred, perhaps a thousand times the force of the one dropped on Hiroshima. The KGB was ordered to hold back that progress as much as possible. A “peace movement” was mobilized to retard U.S. development of new weapons. The aim was to put pressure on the vulnerable key scientists involved in the Manhattan Project, who were concerned about one country—the United States—having a monopoly over the use of atomic weapons. The aim was to contact them through “friends” to obtain vital documentation on the technology. In effect, the KGB wanted to make de facto espionage agents out of them, and to also gain their support in the Soviet-inspired peace movement.
The three top targets were physicists: J. Robert Oppenheimer, an American at the University of California, a communist sympathizer with a strong conscience about his part in the bomb’s creation; Hungarian-born Leo Szilard, who petitioned Roosevelt to develop weapons using atomic energy, and when the bomb was made, tried to stop it being used against Japan; and Italian-born Enrico Fermi, who had won the Nobel prize in 1938 for his work on radioactivity.
These three and several other scientists, such as the amenable Danish physicist Niels Bohr, were assigned code names by the KGB without their knowledge, such as STAR, EDITOR, and PERSEUS, which covered one or sometimes all of them at one time. The KGB’s best agent recruiters were told to focus their skills on gaining the confidence of the scientists and their wives. Elizabeth Zarubin, the wife of the Washington KGB resident, was used to cultivate Oppenheimer’s wife, Katherine, a communist supporter. The attractive, sociable Elizabeth established her own illegal network of Jewish refugees from Poland and recruited one of Szilard’s secretaries, who provided technical data.33
The KGB’s resident in San Francisco, Gregory Kheifetz, met the susceptible Oppenheimer himself at a 1938 party to raise money for the Spanish Civil War and worked on the relationship for the next seven years. In 1943, Kheifetz and Zarubin managed a major coup by influencing Manhattan Project leader Oppenheimer to allow Klaus Fuchs, a KGB agent and German refugee from Nazi Germany, to join the team of British scientists at the project research center in Los Alamos, New Mexico. He misrepresented himself to Oppenheimer as having “escaped from a German prison camp,” which gained the project leader’s respect and confidence. Fuchs proved to be one of the best Soviet intelligence plants of the mission to steal the bomb secrets.34
During 1945, the KGB’s special task force on atomic espionage (Department S), led by Pavel Sudoplatov, presented Lavrenty Beria, the head of the Soviet Security Service, with updated summaries on the U.S. progress in atomic testing, the results of the bombs dropped, and research into new nuclear weapons. The data came from agents at Los Alamos and the main plants servicing it, especially Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Information also came from companies doing the actual manufacturing work, such as Kellex Corp. (a subsidiary of M. W. Kellog), E. I. Du Pont de Nemours, and Union Carbide.35
With successful detonation and then use of the bomb in Japan, Sudoplatov ordered all his agents to push the idea that technology should be shared worldwide and that atomic energy should only be harnessed for peaceful means. Pressure was put on developing a peace campaign for nuclear disarmament.
“Disarmament and the inability to impose nuclear blackmail would deprive the U.S. of its advantage,” Sudoplatov said. �
�We began a worldwide campaign against U.S. nuclear superiority.”36
Straight would be useful. However, he would have a much wider role as one of the key agents seconded to garner as much intelligence as possible for the Russians about nuclear weapons and the huge industry that was developing around them.
House Tensions: Michael Straight, showing the strain under intense questioning by the Select Committee of the House of Representatives investigating tax-exempt foundations that supported communist-front organizations. Wide World Photo
Family Trust Showdown: Dorothy Elmhirst, husband Leonard (center) and Michael Straight at Dartington in early 1950 before the legal battle with Whitney Straight over misuse of family Trust funds. Courtesy of William Elmhirst.
Air-ace with the Aces: Whitney Straight, businessman, highly decorated war-time fighter pilot and part-time British spy, in uniform during World War II. Whitney had the upper hand in the battle over the family Trust. He wanted “out” in early 1950 when he learned his brother Michael was a KGB spy. Courtesy of William Elmhirst.
The First Man: British agent Donald Maclean. Evidence from KGB-defector Walter Krivitsky eventually led to Maclean being the first of the core Cambridge University spy ring to defect to Russia in 1951. Burgess went with him. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Second Man in Exile: British KGB spy Guy Burgess in Russia in 1957, six years after his defection, with London Daily Express photographer, Terry Lancaster. Burgess master-minded Straight’s recruitment to Soviet Intelligence in early 1937. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Third Man in Denial: Kim Philby at his London flat in 1955 denying he was the so-called Third Man. He defected to Russia in 1963. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
The Fourth Man: Anthony Blunt, the keeper of espionage secrets and the Queen’s pictures. Blunt carried out Burgess’s plan to recruit Straight to the Cambridge spy ring in early 1937. Hulton Archive/Getty Images
The Fifth Man: Victor Rothschild, who used his close friend Blunt as the middle-man to pass on intelligence, especially on weapons development, to the KGB. (John Cairncross, who never met any other members of the ring, but was another major spy, is also nominated by some observers as The Fifth Man.) Corbis
Modin, KGB’s Cambridge Control: The author (left) with KGB masterspy, Yuri Ivanovitch Modin in Moscow. He took up his decade-long role as Control of the key Cambridge Ring in London in 1947, making a mockery of claims by ring members, including Straight, that they did not spy in the Cold War (1946–1990). Author photo.
Meyer, CIA Masterspy: The author (left) with CIA man Cord Meyer, in Washington, D.C. Meyer claimed Straight spied for the KGB in the Cold War years. Author photo.
PART THREE
COLD WAR CONFLICT
11
BLUNT’S ROYAL MISSION
England’s King George VI called a secret meeting in the library of Windsor Castle in late July 1945. The others present were Sir Owen Morshead, the royal librarian, and Major Anthony Blunt, who apart from his MI5 work acted as an art historian and adviser to the king. George VI wanted the trusted courtiers to travel to Kronberg, where the king’s relatives lived. They had correspondence—“hundreds of letters and photographs”—between the British and German royals dating back to Queen Victoria that the king wanted retrieved.1
At least that would be the cover story, should the mission be noticed by anyone. The real assignment was to find letters and memoranda of conversations by the monarch’s brother, the Duke of Windsor, with Hitler and top Nazis. Blunt and Morshead were to search for transcripts of telephone calls made by the Duke of Windsor (the former King Edward VIII) during his visit to Germany in October 1937. Of particular concern was the October 22, 1937, meeting by the duke and his wife (the American Wallis Simpson) with Hitler in his mountain retreat at Berchtesgaden.
They were sensitive communications, the king informed them. Better that they did not end up in American hands, especially the press. Neither courtier asked questions about the contents of the letters and transcripts.
Suffice to know that their monarch wished them to undertake a mission to secure them all. They realized he was most concerned that they succeed.
In early August 1945, the 38-year-old Blunt, who was in charge of the mission; Morshead, in his mid-50s; and four handpicked British soldiers flew to Frankfurt and then drove an army truck to Kronberg. They found the United States occupying forces using the nineteenth-century palace of Kronberg as a GI rest camp. The British party drove past it two miles to the dark tower of Schloss Friedrichshof, which seemed to hang over the wooded slopes of Taunus Mountains. Blunt left the truck and entered the large entrance hall that featured a wooden-beamed, Scottish baronial style roof. The walls were adorned with English royal coats of arms and portraits of English kings and queens. He was greeted by a U.S. captain, Kathleen Nash, of the U.S. Women’s Army Corps.2 She was in command of the rest camp. Blunt asked where he could find the Hesse family, the king’s German relatives. Captain Nash redirected Blunt to the townhouse, where the family had been shunted in the grounds of the old Kronberg castle.
The Hesse family was a bit taken aback when Blunt produced a letter with the royal seal and signed by George VI. It requested permission to remove the royal letters and “other communications” to England for “safekeeping.”3 The problem for the Hesses was that they were technically headless. The titular head, Prince Philip, was a Nazi leader. He had fallen from favor with Hitler and was in Dachau concentration camp, Philip’s twin brother, Wolfgang, explained.
“Are you not the head of the family in your brother’s absence?” Blunt asked. “We need permission to take the documents.”
The family asked Blunt to wait while they conferred. They emerged after an hour with a letter from the mother of Wolfgang and Philip, the 72year-old Princess Margaret. It gave her permission for the removal of the papers in question.4 There were about a thousand documents, Wolfgang informed Blunt and Morshead, clearly marked in packing cases. “They’re stored in the attic of Schloss Friedrichshof,” he said.
In the evening, the party drove back up the winding road through the Hesse estate to the Schloss. The six-man party entered and were again greeted by Captain Nash. Blunt accompanied her down a passage to an office. He produced the two letters from George VI and Princess Margaret.
Nash showed Blunt a chair, sat behind her desk and read them, frowning. “What papers are you wanting?”
“They are private correspondence between the Windsors and the Hesse family.”
“Windsors?”
“Yes, the royal family. The British royal family.”
Nash shook her head. “I don’t have the authority to relinquish control over papers.”
Blunt nodded at the letters. “That is all the authority you need,” he said.
“What?”
“The king—the head of the U.K., Commonwealth, and the Dominions—has signed that letter.”
“Major, everything here is now the property of the U.S. army.”
“Not royal correspondence.”
“Everything. I have orders.”
Blunt could see that Nash was intractable.5 “I would appreciate you calling U.S. army headquarters in Frankfurt,” he said, remaining his glacial self.
“Why?”
“So that I can speak to your superior.”
“Look, Major, I’m in charge of this camp. I have my orders.”
There was a stalemate. Blunt stood up, excused himself, and moved to the door. “I must consult my colleague,” he said. He hurried along to the entrance hall where the others were waiting.
“She’s refusing to let us take them,” he told Morshead. He glanced at the stairs. “Take the men to the attic, find the papers, and load them on the truck. I’ll stall her.”
Blunt returned to the office. Nash had lit herself a cigarette.
“You’re wasting your time, Major,” she said.
“I really do think it would be in your interest to phone HQ,” Blunt persisted. “Churchill himse
lf supports our mission.”
Nash stared at him. She didn’t know if he were bluffing. She had seen some of the imprisoned Nazi paratrooper commandos at close quarters. She had met the toughest of the American leaders, including George Patton. But this languid, ice-cool British officer with the long face and cutaway mouth was a different animal altogether. He was polite yet remote. He behaved as if he had real, if obscure, authority. She remained firm, yet inside she was a fraction insecure. What if Churchill was behind it? Would she be reprimanded by her commanding officer? The argument continued. Nash relented and phoned Frankfurt, asking Blunt to leave the office. He hastened to the entrance just as Morshead and the soldiers came down the stairs with two packing cases. The party hurried to the truck, loaded it, and climbed in.