Operation Paperclip

by Annie Jacobsen

  since foreign governments: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 101. This memo was read aloud in the hearing.

  safe house called Haus Waldorf: Koch and Wech, 115–16; the CIA called Camp King ECIC, or European Command Intelligence Center, DOJ Klaus Barbie investigation, iii, List of Abbreviations.

  “Between 4 June 1952 and 18 June 1952”: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 68; Koch and Wech, 113.

  make them forget: CIA Memorandum for Director of Central Intelligence, Subject: Artichoke, June 1952.

  Beecher was paid by the CIA: Interview with Egmont Koch, August 6, 2012, in Germany; Koch and Wech, 102–5.

  “He had a tough time after Germany”: The documentary Codename Artichoke (2001), by Egmont Koch and Michael Wech, minute 16:00.

  expanding its Artichoke program: the CIA assigns code cryptonyms to each of its projects. One vein of its drug-induced interrogation program at Detrick was called MKDETRIC until agents decided that that was too obvious and changed it to MKNAOMI, after Abramson’s secretary, Naomi Busner.

  “the most frightening experience”: Marks, 84.

  “Dr. Olson was in serious trouble”: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 77.

  LSD tolerance experiments: Regis, 158. He was also working on a book about LSD, which would be published in 1959.

  Frank Olson’s problems were all in his mind: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 75–78; Abramson gave Frank Olson a bottle of bourbon and the sedative Nembutal to sleep.

  “the delivery of various materials”: Marks, 84.

  Olson became suspicious: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 75–76.

  room 1018A: Marks notes that room 1018 was actually thirteen floors up.

  empty his pockets: A curious detail from the Regis account—Lashbrook carried a slip of paper with thirty letters in a row, which Lashbrook said was the coded combination to a safe.

  from aircraft and crop dusters: home movie film footage from Frank Olson’s camera, found by his son Eric, can be seen in Codename Artichoke, minute 11:00.

  as Senate hearings later revealed: “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 3, 23, 68–78.

  “We used a spore,” Cournoyer explained: Codename Artichoke, minute 16:00.

  Chapter Twenty: In the Dark Shadows

  violated NATO regulations: Hunt, 182.

  fearing it would draw the ire: NARA 59 General Records of the Department of State, HICOG Cable from John McCloy to Secretary of State, February 21, 1952.

  the CIA continued to do: NARA 59 General Records of the Department of State, HICOG Memo from Karl Weber to P. G. Strong, March 18, 1952. It is worth noting that the CIA had its own photostatted copies of the Osenberg files, thanks to the JIOA, which included the names, biographical records, and addresses of nearly eighteen thousand German scientists from the Reich Research Council years—which the CIA used as a recruiting list.

  twenty-man team to Frankfurt: Dornberger files, “Calendar 1952,” Deutsches Museum, Munich.

  When McCloy learned of the trip: Hunt, 182, 304n.

  A compromise was reached: Ibid., 182–83.

  target list: RG 330 U.S. High Commissioner for Germany, “Project 63 (Index 1948-52).”

  JIOA renamed Paperclip: Ibid.

  During his year-long tenure: Hunt, 2–3.

  FBI learned that Whalen: Hunt, 202–3.

  Whalen was a spy: Hunt, 2; RG 319, Records of the Army Staff, Subject: Technical Assesment Re: Former Retired LTC Willian Henry Whalen, 8 April, 1967; “Damage Assessment of Classified Documents,” January 18, 1965.

  a grand jury was presented: “Indicted in Espionage,” Associated Press, July 13, 1966.

  “truly revolutionary military offspring”: Neufeld, The Rocket and the Reich, 274.

  “Developing Technology”: http://www.acq.osd.mil.

  “the acquisition of unwarranted influence”: York, 144.

  “Scientists and technologists had acquired”: Ibid., 145.

  “Eisenhower’s warnings”: Ibid., 148.

  In 1950, military intelligence: RG 319 Walter Schieber, Agent Report, January 10, 1950.

  “first class business deal”: Ibid.

  Special Agent Maxwell worried: Ibid.

  even worse news: RG 319 Walter Schieber, Agent Report, March 22, 1950; Agent Report, May 1, 1950. Schieber was also collecting a regular paycheck of 880 deutschmarks from the Office of the Land Commission for Baden-Württemberg in Stuttgart, in their Scientific Research Division. This meant that he was working for three governments at the same time.

  Operation Paperclip payroll until 1956: RG 263 Walter Schieber, “Official Dispatch, Chief of Mission, Frankfurt,” November 18, 1963.

  “a small clique of senior congressmen”: Tucker, 213.

  Sarin production took off: Ibid., 128; Keogh and Betsy, 10.

  Rocky Mountain Arsenal: Hylton, 59–70.

  Rocky Flats munitions loading plant: Hylton, 60; Tucker, 133.

  Collier’s magazine published: Ryan, 89.

  VX by the thousands of tons: Tucker, 164–69.

  working on VX munitions: Hoffmann personal papers; Tucker, 160.

  “He was our searcher”: Hunt, 159–61.

  He always flew military”: Telephone interviews with Gabriella Hoffmann, October 17, 2012, and March 22, 2013.

  “non discernible microbioinoculator”: “CIA poison arsenal explained,” Associated Press, September 17, 1975.

  The SO Division’s Agent Branch; “Joint Hearing Before the Select Committee on Intelligence,” 9–12, 67–71; Regis, 151.

  favorite drink, a milkshake: Marks, 81.

  “We wish give every”: Regis, 184.

  Gottlieb’s plan: Housen, 1–21; Regis, 182–85.

  botulinum toxin lost its potency: Housen, 8.

  thousands of U.S. soldiers: Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, “Is Military Research Hazardous to Veterans’ Health?” December 8, 1994.

  “the inhalation toxicity”: Weeks and Yevich, 622–29.

  became even more deadly: Weeks, Weir, and Bath, 663. At the laboratory at Edgewood, Maurice Weeks conducted “inhalation exposure” experiments on rodents.

  recalls Gabriella Hoffmann: Telephone interview with Gabriella Hoffmann, October 17, 2012.

  American diplomat Sam Woods: Telephone interview with John Dippel, October 19, 2012.

  “I remember it very clearly”: Telephone interview with Gabriella Hoffmann, October 17, 2012; “Agent Orange” Product Liability Litigation, 1–115.

  Hoffmann Trip Report: “Agent Orange” Product Liability Litigation, 52–53.

  Traub worked on virological research: RG 65 Erich Traub, Special Contract, War Department.

  Traub became friendly: Interview with Dr. Rolf Benzinger, February 19, 2013; the navy was conducting research on explosive decompression techniques in order to create what a Senate hearing later termed “the perfect concussion,” meant to give an enemy combatant amnesia.

  agents and diseases being studied: Moon, 22.

  Congress mandated: Loucks Papers (USAMHI), “Fort Terry Historical Report: 1 January 1951–30 June 1952”; U.S. Army Chemical Corps; Robert Hurt, “Fort Terry Historical Report: 1 April–30 June 1953,” July 31, 1953.

  choice for a director: RG 65 Erich Traub, File A-7183623.

  accepted a position: RG 65 Erich Traub, Special Contract. In German, the institute is called Bundesanstalt für Virusforschung.

  at his new home: RG 65 Traub, Agent Report, neighborhood check, January 28, 1963.

  Razi Institute: RG 65 Erich Traub, November 11, 1965.

  an entire group: Tucker, “Farewell to Germs: The U.S. Renunciation of Biological and Toxin Warfare, 1969, 1970,” International Security 27, no. 1 (Summer 2002): 107–48.

  dumped in the ocean: Not until 1972 was dumping chemicals into the ocean prohibited by the Marine Protection, Research a
nd Sanctuaries Act of 1972.

  not made to ever be dismantled: Tucker, 221–22.

  robotic separation of the chemical agent: Keogh and Betsy, 9.

  “The numbers speak volumes”: U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency, “A Success Story—Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System,” press release, September 21, 2005.

  program cost: Keogh and Betsy, 10.

  Chapter Twenty-One: Limelight

  he kept track of: Dornberger files, Calendars 1949–1959, Deutsches Museum, Munich.

  beneficent science pioneer: Dornberger, V-2: The Nazi Rocket Weapon; McGovern, 46; In Dornberger papers housed at the Deutsches Museum, the unedited manuscript drafts of this book include re-creations of conversations Dornberger said he had with Himmler. In one, on the use of slave labor, Dornberger cites Himmler as having said to him, “[T]he power of Germany [meant] a return to the era of slavery.” To this Dornberger says he wondered aloud if other nations might object, to which Himmler said, “After our victory they will not dare!”

  “It would be nice to know”: Neufeld, Creating a Memory of the German Rocket Program for the Cold War, 78.

  There was “deafening silence”: Heppenheimer, 133.

  “in the role of a double agent”: RG 65 Walter Dornberger, FBI file No. 39-137.

  Fort Bliss rocket team moved: Biography of Dr. Wernher von Braun, First Center Director, July 1, 1960–Jan. 27, 1970 (available at www.nasa.gov).

  necessary first step: Neufeld, Von Braun, 246.

  “patriotic writing”: Ibid., 271.

  “taken as a fundamental source”: Neufeld, Creating a Memory of the German Rocket Program for the Cold War, 77.

  The first Disneyland TV broadcast: Wolper, The Race to Space, narrated by Mike Wallace; Brzezinski, 91.

  NASA constructed the Vertical Assembly Building: NASA facts, “Building KSC’S Launch Complex 39” (www.nasa.gov); McGovern, 251.

  designed by Bernhard Tessmann: Wolper, The Race to Space.

  chose not to correct the newsman: Neufeld, Creating a Memory of the German Rocket Program for the Cold War, 76.

  “Human skin, of course?”: Neufeld, Von Braun, 271, 514n.

  the rocket would not hit London: Cornwell, 423.

  The Secret of Huntsville: Neufeld, Creating a Memory of the German Rocket Program for the Cold War, 84.

  The space agency’s three top officials: Neufeld, Von Braun, 405–6.

  success in the Eastern bloc: Ibid., 408.

  “I don’t know much more”: Bundesarchiv Ludwigsburg, Rickhey Files, B-35/66, April 20, 1967.

  Essen-Dora Trial: Bundesarchiv Ludwigsburg, Rickhey Files, B-162/964.

  NASA lawyers suggested New Orleans: Neufeld, Von Braun, 428–29.

  “to broadcast the connection”: Neufeld, Von Braun, 428; Telephone interview with Michael Neufeld, April 3, 2013.

  von Braun said no: Feigin, 330–35.

  von Braun and Dornberger corresponded: Neufeld, Von Braun, 429.

  “Sorry, but I can’t support”: Neufeld, Von Braun, 471.

  first ever U.S. military panel discussion on biology: Mackowski, 125–26.

  Albert was strapped into a harness: Tara Gray, “A Brief History of Animals in Space,” NASA History Office, 1998, http://history.nasa.gov/printFriendly/animals.html.

  decided it was time: Hasdorff, 9.

  “we needed much larger accommodations”: Bullard and Glasgow, 69.

  sell the idea to Congress: Ibid., 70–75.

  “I appointed myself Director”: Ibid., 77.

  he traveled to Germany: RG 330 Hubertus Strughold, November 16, 1945.

  leaked to journalist Drew Pearson: Hunt, 54.

  at SAM, he worked: RG 330 Konrad Schäfer, March 27, 1951.

  make Mississippi River water drinkable: RG 263 Central Intelligence Agency, Hubertus Strughold file, A-1-2062.

  “The experience of this Headquarters”: RG 330 Konrad Schäfer, March 27, 1951.

  that he be sent back to Germany: Ibid.

  He moved to New York City: RG 65 Konrad Schäfer, FBI File No. 105-12396. The FBI paid Schäfer at least one visit in New York, during which they “advised him of the jurisdiction of the FBI concerning espionage, sabotage and subversive activities.” Schäfer promised the FBI that if the Russians were to try and recruit him, he would contact the FBI and let them know.

  in violation of the Nuremberg Code: “Memorandum to Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments,” April 5, 1995; Jacobsen, 302–3, 331.

  aboveground nuclear weapons tests: Jacobsen, xi–xvi, 107–23.

  Top Secret studies: USAF School of Aviation Medicine, Randolph Air Force Base, Randolph Field, Texas, “Trip Report,” August 19, 1952 (FOIA).

  studies involving “flashblindness”: Ibid. In addition to the flashblindness studied, SAM conducted experiments involving “Blasts, Burns, and Psychological” effects.

  “That’s the thing that gave us curiosity”: Welsome, 292.

  members of the SA: Ibid., 293.

  forty miles from ground zero: Welsome, 295.

  porthole-like windows: Harbert and Whittemore, 54.

  Some of the soldier volunteers: Ibid., 55.

  in declassified records as “S.H.”: Ibid., 290.

  “one of the most beautiful images of a fireball”: Harbert and Whittemore, 33.

  Monkey astronaut rocket tests: It would be another ten years before two monkeys, Able and Miss Baker, traveled into space and returned to earth alive. The taxidermied body of Able, strapped into his flight seat, is on display at the National Air and Space Museum.

  personally escort Farrell: Reichhardt, “First Up? Even Before NASA Was Created, Civilian and Military Labs Were in Search of Spacemen,” Air & Space, September 2000.

  Benson singled out Strughold: Thomas, 54.

  “Johnson asked me”: Ibid.

  “Nazi doctors during World War II”: “Himmler the Scientist” by Julian Bach Jr. Letters to the Editor, Saturday Review, August 9, 1958.

  twenty-ninth meeting of the Aero Medical Association: Benford, Doctors in the Sky: The Story of the Aero Medical Association, 56.

  Strughold authored papers and journals: Mackowski, 215–16.

  “Only the janitor”: Thomas, 49–56.

  Simon Wiesenthal: Bundesarchiv Ludwigsburg, Hubertus Strughold Files, 828/73.

  provided Wiesenthal with a copy: Ibid.

  included a list: Charles Allen Jr., “Hubertus Strughold, Nazi in U.S.,” Jewish Currents, September 28, 1974.

  the freezing experiments in detail: Ralph Blumenthal, “Drive on Nazi Suspects a Year Later; No U.S. Legal Steps Have Been Taken,” New York Times, November 23, 1974.

  told interviewer James C. Hasdorff: Hasdorff, 15, 42. Strughold also said he married a “pretty secretary” named Mary Webb Dalehite, in 1971, at the age of seventy-two.

  Hitler’s “so-called enemy list”: Hasdorff, 16. Strughold relayed to Hasdorff an almost certainly invented story involving the Nazi general and the American general George Patton. The scene was allegedly set in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, in the days or weeks after the end of the war. “This [American] General covered in full medals asked Dornberger, ‘Are you the guy who was in charge of development of the V-2 rockets?’ ” Strughold quoted Dornberger as saying. “He [Dornberger] said, ‘Ja wohl, Herr General. Yes, General.’ Then [Patton] gave [Dornberger] three cigars and said, ‘My Congratulations. I could not have done it [myself]!’ Dornberger told me this story himself,” said Strughold (Hasdorff, 19–20).

  distortion of reality: RG 330 Hubertus Strughold, JIOA Form No. 2, Basic Personnel Record.

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Legacy

  large-scale public trial: Pendas, 1–3.

  “The trial was triggered”: Hermann Langbein narrates this story in Verdict on Auschwitz (2007), directed by Rolf Bickel and Dietrich Wagner. The sequence begins at minute 7:00. The film is based on 430 hours of original audio tapes from the trial.

  filed murder charges: Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Ot
to Ambros Files, B 162/3221.

  leading normal lives: This is all told with stunning precision in Verdict on Auschwitz. The details are incredible. For example, Prosecutor Joachim Küger found Rudolph Höss’s right-hand man by a twist of fate. He, Küger, was attending the Olympic Games in Rome when he noticed that an athlete with the last name of Mulka had won a medal for sailing. “Mulka is not a common name,” explained Küger. This is how Küger was able to track down the Auschwitz adjunct Robert Mulka. The Olympic sailor was the son of the war criminal.

  were business colleagues: Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Dr. Otto Ambros Files, B 162.

  “I and my colleagues are the victims of the Third Reich”: Ibid.

  “Former War Criminal”: Ibid. The newspaper is not identified, only referred to in one of Ambros’s letters.

  “The whole affair”: Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Dr. Otto Ambros file, B 162; the letters are both dated April 25, 1964.

  “how I behaved during the Reich”: Ibid.

  W. R. Grace: correspondence with Ambros’s former colleague (from the 1950s) Michael Howard, 2012. Ambros was “always the most intelligent of those with whom he consorted,” recalls Howard. “Ambros was a puppet master, the éminence grise.”

  “Dr. Ambros had contacts”: Memorandum for the president, from James W. Nance, the White House, Washington, D.C., March 23, 1982 (FOIA).

  Even the president: Ibid.; Letter to Congressman Tom Landon from James W. Nance, the White House, Washington, D.C., April 13, 1982 (FOIA).

  “It involved Jews”: Hilberg, 1089.

  “to all the doctors and dentists”: Bundesarchiv Ludwigsburg, Dr. Kurt Blome file, B 162/28667.

  Sonderbehandlung: Ibid.

  alone and estranged: interview with Götz Blome, August 3, 2012, in Germany.

  “I have a very strong conviction”: Bird, 375.

  two sympathetic Dutch Red Cross nurses: Weindling, 309, 315.

  and a reported $350,000: Sereny 646; Van Der Vat, 328.

  “How often I thought of you”: Neufeld, Von Braun, 472.

  Pilot Factors Program: Knemeyer personal papers; telephone interview with Dirk Knemeyer, June 20, 2012.

  “immediately taken to a crematory”: Knemeyer, 70.