The Hitler–Hess Deception

by Martin Allen

  ‘Supposing that Göring took his [Hitler’s] place tomorrow,’ Hohenlohe conjectured. ‘Göring’s rivals would make him even more intransigent than Hitler. Hitler was the only man who counted in Germany and if Hitler declared for peace, he would carry the country with him. With Göring or anyone else it would be different.’ At this point Hohenlohe became very critical about Ribbentrop, who he said ‘had lost influence with Hitler, presumably from having told him that England would never fight’.

  Towards the end of the conversation Hohenlohe commented on the Russian situation that ‘Sooner or later, and in his view the sooner the better, Germany would have to absorb the Ukraine and Russian oilfields. He expressed the greatest contempt for the Russian army and implied that they would get what they wanted without having to fight for it.’ This was very important information, more than justifying Hoare’s secret meeting with Prince Hohenlohe. For months Hoare had been battling with an intransigent Hugh Dalton, who as Minister of Economic Warfare had been pressing hard for a naval blockade of Spain. It was a well-kept secret that throughout the war, supposedly neutral Spain acted as a very effective conduit for iron, mercury, rubber, oil and a plethora of other essential supplies which were shipped via the Canary Islands to Spain, before going on to aid the Reich.

  Sam Hoare knew that a neutral Spain, albeit supplying Germany, was infinitely more valuable to Britain in its present state than it would be under a blockade, which might well push it into the Axis fold, setting up a potential chain reaction. An Axis-allied Spain would almost certainly see Gibraltar fall to German control. With that, Britain’s access to the Mediterranean would end, leading to British defeat in North Africa, and the loss of Egypt and the Middle East.

  Now Samuel Hoare had learned, direct from the horse’s mouth, that Hitler was greedily eyeing the Ukraine and the Caucasus. This was another small but highly significant pointer that German economic need, tied to the Nazis’ political ideology of Lebensraum, and almost certainly helped along by SO1’s deception campaign, was slowly but inexorably steering the German Führer in the desired direction.

  Shortly after this important statement, Hoare and Hohenlohe’s meeting concluded, but Hoare later heard from Brigadier Torr that after he had left, Hohenlohe had remained behind, becoming more relaxed now that he was not speaking officially to the Ambassador. Hoare reported that to Torr the Prince ‘lowered the German claims in Europe, saying that of course he had to put them very high to me’.

  The fact that Prince Hohenlohe was allowed to travel to Spain indicates that his peace approach was semi-official. It was, as Albrecht Haushofer would say, ‘significant’ that he could travel to a neutral state. It was known that Hohenlohe had been busy during the winter of 1940 attempting to mediate though the British Ambassador in Berne, David Kelly, on behalf of Himmler and Ribbentrop. Despite this, he was now trying to open another line of communication to the British government.

  SO1’s main criteria was to stall, but as Hitler’s peaceable offer had been a good deal to start with, it would not be long before the Germans demanded some sign of intent from the fictitious Halifax faction. This, allied to Britain’s precarious strategic position, was making it a tense spring for all concerned with Messrs HHHH.

  There had been increasing problems in the Middle East since the beginning of the year when, unbeknownst to the British, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Husayni al Haj Amin, had written personally to Hitler from Baghdad requesting German assistance in overthrowing the British in Iraq, declaring with a dramatic flourish: ‘Excellency. England, that relentless and crafty enemy of true liberty of peoples, has never tired of forging chains to enslave and subjugate the Arab peoples …’5

  In an attempt to further his aim of ousting the British, the Grand Mufti had then sent his private secretary to Berlin to request financial assistance and ‘a subsidy in the form of credits for arms deliveries’. The emissary had assured Ernst Woermann, the Director of the Political Division of the Auswärtiges Amt, that ‘apart from small contingents of the English Air Force there were no English troops on Iraq territory’, and that his country would resume diplomatic relations with Germany ‘if Iraq received the desired political declaration from us and if the question of supporting Iraq in case of war with England was clarified’.6

  In the late spring of 1941 Winston Churchill received a clear-cut military assessment of the Middle Eastern situation that stated:

  If the Germans should launch an attack on Syria or Iraq by air borne troops:-

  (a) Syria: they might succeed in establishing a hold on a part of Syria and perhaps raise the country against the French, unless we can send military aid to General Dentz [the High Commissioner and commander-in-chief for the Vichy government in Syria].

  (b) Iraq: i)they could support the Iraqi Army at Mosul and Baghdad and ultimately threaten our position at Basra, unless we can provide additional Forces. ii) they could capture Ratbah and cut the oil pipe line.

  It was however recorded in the draft handwritten notes that: ‘All our information points to an attack on Crete as the first step, & this is believed to be imminent. On the other hand if the British situation in Iraq seriously deteriorates – it would be possible [for Germany] to launch an expedition from the Dodecanese directly to Iraq.’7

  This was worrying enough in itself, but only weeks before Churchill had received a ‘MOST SECRET’ three-page appreciation on ‘German Relations with the USSR’, prepared by MI14,* which made grim reading. It reported that ‘a suggestion made recently to the Soviet government by the British Ambassador that Great Britain was indifferent to the integrity of the USSR and might be tempted to conclude a peace [with Germany] on the basis of a German withdrawal from occupied countries in return for a free hand in the East got a cold reception’. The trawled bait of implying that Britain might make peace with Germany in exchange for a German withdrawal from her western conquests had not been taken up. The report had pessimistically concluded:

  In the light of the foregoing paragraphs, a German attack on the U.S.S.R. seems most unlikely in the immediate future. The question may be expected, however, to remain open, so that it can be used:-

  (a) as a forceful warning to ensure the continuation by the U.S.S.R. of economic collaboration and to indicate that interference with Germany’s plans will not be tolerated.

  (b) to keep the British government and, in a lesser degree, the Turkish government guessing as to Germany’s future intentions.8

  The implications were clear, particularly to the select few in Whitehall who were familiar with the deception campaign being mounted against the German leadership by SO1. Germany, left to its own devices, was unlikely to move against Russia until, one way or another, Britain ceased to be perceived as a long-term threat. The Messrs HHHH operation had gone some way towards satisfying Hitler that this would soon be the case, that a political clique would soon, by constitutional means, manoeuvre Churchill out of the premiership and form a new government which had, prior to its legal coup, already negotiated the parameters under which an armistice could take place.

  Sixty years after the event, we know that by the winter of 1940 Hitler was already planning Operation Barbarossa. What is not clear, however, is the extent to which his decision to attack Russia and create a second front was influenced by his belief that an Anglo-German peace was being negotiated. The paucity of British Intelligence documents from this period, particularly of those referring to SO1’s political warfare initiatives, makes this difficult to ascertain. Yet it can be said with some certainty that even had Hitler already decided on the invasion of Russia by the winter of 1940–41, SO1’s deception operation helped to bolster that decision.

  However, we do know the importance which Churchill placed upon the setting of Germany against Russia. In a speech to the House of Commons in the spring of 1941, he declared: ‘I beg His Majesty’s government to get some brutal truths into their heads. Without an effective Eastern front, there can be no satisfactory defence of our interests in the W
est, and without Russia there can be no effective Eastern Front.’9

  On Wednesday, 26 March 1941, just at the moment when the peace negotiations seemed to have run out of puff, and a German push towards the Middle East seemed certain, Samuel Hoare was unexpectedly notified that Albrecht Haushofer was back in Madrid, and requesting a meeting. Once again, as so many times before, Hoare found himself in the home of Colonel Juan Beigbeder y Atienza, which seems to have become a wartime Anglo–German place of special neutrality, an in camera environment where the two opposing parties could meet far from public scrutiny and the dangers of press attention. Hoare wrote back to London:

  Dear Alec [Cadogan]

  … I have now had a further meeting with Haushofer at the home of Beigbeder. I understand he is here at his superior’s insistence …

  However, Hoare noted, all was not well, for

  it was evident during our meeting that he and his kin are now becoming most agitated by the lack of progress.

  During the course of our conversation H[aushofer] asked why Edward [i.e. Lord Halifax] had not yet made any move, etc. I explained the complexities of the situation, which would make any action a long process. H understood completely, but responded that his superior has insisted on a meeting with a close representative of the man of influence on neutral territory.10

  Haushofer’s question as to why Halifax had made no move revealed that the German leadership was becoming impatient. They wanted an indication, even a small one, that Halifax was preparing to move against Churchill. This could have been a subtle public criticism of the Prime Minister in the neutral United States, or an indication of political disagreement in Britain. Hoare was forced to explain to Haushofer that because of the extreme sensitivity of the situation, any move by the Halifax faction would have to be conducted very carefully.

  Hoare was well aware that Albrecht Haushofer, as an expert on Britain, understood that in British politics the majority of activity takes place behind closed doors, and that a public move by Halifax and his clique – for example the call for a vote of no confidence against Churchill – would only be made when they were absolutely sure of success.

  However, although Haushofer understood the situation, he made it clear to Hoare that ‘his superiors’ – Hess and Hitler – did not. On the whole Nazi politicians were relatively unsophisticated, and found it difficult to fathom the subtleties of British politics. In their anxiety to discover how much support the Halifax faction really possessed, Haushofer’s superiors fell back on their old instincts. They wanted a face-to-face discussion with a trusted emissary who could interpret the signs. Thus they were insisting on a meeting with a ‘close representative of the man of influence’.

  Hoare’s curious phraseology indicates that he was carefully avoiding naming the ‘man of influence’. Throughout the Messrs H – Hitler – Hess – Haushofer – Hoare – Halifax – discussions, SO1 had striven to present as convincing a façade as possible to the German leadership. For this reason it had been necessary to imply that Halifax had significant support.

  Throughout his time as Ambassador in Madrid, Samuel Hoare demonstrated few qualms in his correspondence about casually naming his acquaintances ‘Winston’ Churchill, ‘Anthony’ Eden, ‘Alec’ Cadogan and ‘Edward’ Halifax, even under the constraints of the Messrs HHHH correspondence of 1940–41. The implication is that the ‘man of influence’ to whom he referred was superior to Halifax, and would remain so even once Halifax attained the premiership. Under the British constitution there is only one person of more influence than the Prime Minister, and that is the head of state. Hoare was therefore discreetly referring to a ‘close representative’ of King George VI.

  Any successful ousting of Churchill in 1941 – a political coup d’état, for lack of a better description – would have to receive the support of the head of state. It must have been intimated to the Germans at some point during the course of the negotiations that Lord Halifax had the support of George VI, and that if Churchill lost a vote of confidence, the King would invite Halifax to form a new government. This is the only scenario that Haushofer – an expert on the British constitution – would have believed, and that would have led him to assure Hess and the Führer that the scheme could work. Lord Halifax would form a government and, after a decent interval, announce that the war was untenable and open armistice negotiations, having already secretly agreed terms that would see all the occupied west European states liberated from German control.

  However, Sam Hoare’s letter to London of 26 March 1941 indicated that there was a problem. After months of seemingly satisfactory negotiation on neutral territory, with the tacit understanding that an armistice would shortly be forthcoming, perhaps as soon as that summer, Haushofer had appeared with a demand from the German leadership for a high-level meeting. What had gone wrong?

  It may be that the Germans, disappointed at the lack of progress, smelled a rat. Perhaps they had received a hint from a high-level source that all was not as it seemed. Or it may even be that as the deadline for Barbarossa approached an increasingly paranoid Hitler was becoming anxious to safely tie one source of danger down before embarking on another campaign. Beyond the fact that it is indicative of uncertainty, the reason for the sudden German demand may never be known.

  An evidently concerned Hoare wrote to Cadogan: ‘After I pointed out that this was out of the question, H[aushofer] informed me that it has already been arranged for their Head of AO [Auslandsorganisation] to journey anywhere for a confidential meeting, if it would resolve the impasse.’

  This presented a very difficult situation. A meeting on neutral territory was unlikely to be permitted by SO1, for fear of losing control of the situation. However, Hoare concluded: ‘There is undoubtedly an urgency on their part now, and their demands are unrealistic if not dangerous, but … I am also convinced we shall have to facilitate some sort of meeting if the matter is not to fail.’

  There were, as yet, no indications as to who the ‘close representative of the man of influence’ was going to be, and it may well be that Hoare himself did not know. Indeed, since the purpose of all SO1’s subterfuge thus far had been to intimate that a fictitious peace faction within the British government was preparing to launch a coup d’état, it may be that they had not made any provision for such a German demand. That, however, was about to change.

  So far SO1 had successfully managed to suck the German leadership into a fantasy world of peaceable intent by offering them just what they wanted to see: signs of dissent among leading figures in the British government who were prepared to negotiate their country out of the war. Furthermore, the Germans had been led to believe that these politicians were plotting to constitutionally usurp power from Churchill to attain their objectives. The men of Woburn Abbey had put too much effort into this high-risk operation to let it collapse for lack of a credible figurehead to serve up to the Nazis.

  Meanwhile, a report was dispatched to Rome by the Italian Ambassador in Madrid, Francesco Lequio, which hinted that a little information was beginning to spill from SO1’s nest of intrigue. Lequio reported that Samuel Hoare had recently stated to a German emissary that the British government was not secure, and that Churchill could ‘no longer rely on a majority [in the House of Commons]’. Furthermore, Lequio stated that Hoare had declared that sooner or later he expected to be ‘called back to London to take over the government with the precise task of concluding a compromise peace’, and that Hoare had gone on to say that Anthony Eden would have to be removed as Foreign Secretary and replaced by R.A. ‘Rab’ Butler.11

  On the surface, Lequio’s report seems fairly damning evidence of Hoare’s disloyalty to Churchill. But in the context of the Messrs HHHH operation, it can be seen in a very different light. What is less clear is to whom Hoare’s comments were made. Lequio intimated that they were made to Hohenlohe, and it is certainly the case that his report was submitted more than a week prior to the Haushofer–Hoare meeting of 26 March. However, Hoare is unlikely to h
ave made his comments during his 6 March meeting with Hohenlohe, since there is no evidence to indicate that Brigadier Torr, who was present throughout, was involved in SO1’s operation. This therefore suggests that another meeting must have taken place between 6 and 14 March 1941, of which there is no record.

  There is, however, a clue in Sam Hoare’s letter to Cadogan to the chain of events about to occur in late April and early May 1941. This is the demand, as imparted by Haushofer, that the intermediary the German leadership proposed to meet the ‘representative of the man of influence’ was the head of the Auslandsorganisation, Ernst Bohle.

  Despite his senior position and his friendship with Hess, Bohle had not been drawn into the full confidence of the Hitler–Hess–Haushofer inner circle. Yet he was an important figure in Nazi foreign policy, and his Auslandsorganisation played a key role in furthering the Nazis’ foreign aims, maintaining contact with ethnic Germans as far afield as Italy, Spain, the United States, Japan and Argentina. The fact that he had been entrusted with a great deal of Hess’s translation work meant that he was close to the affair, although he did not know the full details. He could thus have been swiftly brought up to speed on the negotiations, should it prove necessary.

  Bohle’s position on the fringe of the peace affair became clearer in 1945, when he was questioned by Allied Intelligence. Under oath, he stated: ‘It was suggested by Professor Haushofer, [the] well-known Munich professor, that I would meet [someone] in neutral territory, possibly Switzerland.’ He caused a flurry of excitement when he went on: ‘I didn’t know he [Hess] was going to England; [I] thought he was going to Switzerland.’12

  In the weeks which followed Sam Hoare’s letter to Cadogan, Germany’s military strategy in the Mediterranean took an ominous turn.