Operation Pastorius

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Operation Pastorius
Part of the American Theater of World War II
The trial of the captured Germans, July 1942.
ObjectiveSabotage American economic infrastructure
DateJune 1942
Executed byNazi Germany
OutcomeFailed

Operation Pastorius was a failed German intelligence plan for sabotage inside the United States during World War II. The operation was staged in June 1942 and was to be directed against strategic American economic targets. The operation was named by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of the German Abwehr, for Francis Daniel Pastorius, the organizer of the first organized settlement of Germans in America. The plan involved eight German saboteurs who had previously spent time in the United States.

The plan quickly failed after two of the agents, George John Dasch and Ernest Peter Burger, defected to the Federal Bureau of Investigation shortly after being deployed, betraying the other six. A military tribunal – whose constitutionality was challenged to the Supreme Court in Ex parte Quirin – sentenced all eight to death later that year. President Franklin D. Roosevelt commuted the sentences of Dasch and Burger, while the other six were executed. In 1948, Dasch and Burger were granted executive clemency, conditional on their permanent deportation to the American occupation zone in Germany by President Harry S. Truman.

Sixteen other people were charged with aiding those in charge of the operation.[1]

Background

After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, followed by Germany's declaration of war on the United States four days later,[2] and the United States' declaration of war on Germany in response, Hitler authorized a mission to sabotage the American war effort and attack civilian targets to demoralize the American civilian population inside the United States.[3] The mission was given to Abwehr chief Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the head of German military intelligence. During World War I he had organized the sabotage of French installations in Morocco, and other German agents entered the United States to attack New York arms factories, including the destruction of munitions supplies at Black Tom Island, in 1916. He hoped that Operation Pastorius would have the same kind of success.[4]

Agents

Recruited for Operation Pastorius were eight Germans who had lived in the United States. Two of them, Ernst Burger and Herbert Haupt, were American citizens. The others, George John Dasch, Edward John Kerling, Richard Quirin, Heinrich Harm Heinck, Hermann Otto Neubauer and Werner Thiel, had worked at various jobs in the United States. With the exception of Dasch, all of the men were members of the German American Bund and/or Nazi Party. Neubauer had served in the German Army on the Eastern Front.[5]

All eight were recruited into the Abwehr and were given three weeks of intensive sabotage training in the German High Command school on an estate at Quenzsee, near Berlin, Germany. The agents were instructed in the manufacture and use of explosives, incendiaries, primers, and various forms of mechanical, chemical and electrical delayed-timing devices. Considerable time was spent developing complete background "histories" they were to use in the United States. They were encouraged to converse in English and to read American newspapers and magazines to improve their English and familiarity with current American events and culture.[6]

The team

Mission

Their mission was to sabotage American economic targets: hydroelectric plants at Niagara Falls; the Aluminum Company of America's plants in Illinois, Tennessee, and New York; locks on the Ohio River, near Louisville, Kentucky; Pennsalt Chemicals (then the Pennsylvania Salt Manufacturing Company) in Cornwells Heights (Bensalem), Pennsylvania;[7] the Pennsylvania Railroad's Horseshoe Curve, a crucial railroad pass near Altoona, Pennsylvania, as well as their repair shops at Altoona;[8] the Pennsalt cryolite (a raw material in the production of fluorine and aluminum) plant in Philadelphia; Hell Gate Bridge in New York; and Pennsylvania Station in Newark, New Jersey. The agents were also instructed to spread a wave of terror by planting explosives on bridges, railroad stations, water facilities, public places, and Jewish-owned shops.[9] They were given counterfeit birth certificates, Social Security cards, draft deferment cards, nearly $175,000 in American money, and driver's licenses, and put aboard two U-boats to land on the east coast of the U.S.[6]

Even before the mission began, it was in danger of being compromised, as George Dasch, commander of the team, left confidential documents on a train, and one of the agents, while drunk, announced to patrons in a Paris tavern that he was a secret agent.[10]

On the night of 12/13 June 1942, the first submarine to arrive in the U.S., U-202 commanded by Captain Hans-Heinz Lindner,[11] landed at Amagansett, New York, about 100 miles east of New York City on Long Island, at what is now Atlantic Avenue beach. It was carrying Dasch and three other saboteurs (Burger, Quirin, and Heinck). The team was launched in inflatable rafts (in which Dasch nearly drowned) and came ashore wearing German Navy uniforms so that, if they were captured, they would be classified as prisoners of war rather than spies.[12][13][14] They also brought their explosives, primers and incendiaries, and buried them along with their uniforms, and put on civilian clothes to begin an expected two-year campaign in the sabotage of American defense-related production.[15]

Immediately upon reaching the beach, at around 30 minutes past midnight the saboteurs were discovered amidst the dunes by unarmed Coast Guardsman John C. Cullen, who was accosted by Dasch and offered a bribe of $300. (Cullen had been shortchanged, the money only amounted to $260.)[16] Cullen feigned cooperation but reported the encounter. An armed patrol returned to the site, finding "four crates of explosives and some German uniforms that had been hastily buried in the wet sand", as well as fuses and pre-made bombs;[17] but the Germans were gone, having taken the Long Island Rail Road from the Amagansett station into Manhattan, where they checked into a hotel. The FBI, informed of the operation by the Coast Guard, initiated a manhunt for the saboteurs.[12]

U-202 itself remained stuck in the sand merely 200 metres (660 ft) offshore until daybreak; only when the tide came in was the submarine able to free itself and return to the depths of the ocean.[12] Later that month, U-202 would sink two civilian ships: the Argentine steamer Rio Tercero and the American passenger liner City of Birmingham, before returning to Europe.[18]

The other four-member German team commanded by Kerling landed without incident at Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, south of Jacksonville on 16 June 1942. They came on U-584.[19] This group came ashore wearing bathing suits, but wore German Navy hats. After landing ashore, they threw away their hats, put on civilian clothes, and started their mission by boarding trains to Chicago, Illinois and Cincinnati, Ohio.[14] Additional breaches of secrecy occurred; Kerling had boasted to a colleague about their mission, and in Chicago, Herbert Haupt had asked his father to buy him a sports car claiming he needed it while traveling on business for the German government.[12]

The two teams were to meet on 4 July in a hotel in Cincinnati to coordinate their sabotage operations.[20]

Betrayal

While in the Manhattan hotel, Dasch — clearly unnerved by the encounter with the Coast Guard — called Burger into their upper-story hotel room and opened a window, saying they would talk, and if they disagreed, "only one of us will walk out that door—the other will fly out this window." Dasch told him he had no intention of going through with the mission, hated Nazism, and planned to report the plot to the FBI. Burger agreed to defect to the United States immediately.[16][21][18]

On 15 June, Dasch phoned the New York office of the FBI, gave his name as "Franz Pastorius" (the namesake of the operation), and explained the plot, but ended the call when the agent answering doubted his story and thought he was a crackpot.[22] Four days later, he took a train to Washington, DC and walked into FBI headquarters, where he gained the attention of Assistant Director D.M. Ladd by showing him the operation's budget of $84,000 cash.[18][22] None of the other six German agents were aware of the betrayal. During the next two weeks, Burger and the other six were arrested. Dasch hoped that he would be hailed as a hero for exposing the plot, but the FBI had other plans; J. Edgar Hoover made no mention of him and claimed credit for the FBI for capturing the saboteurs.[17]

Trial and executions

Since they were caught before they could do anything, officials were initially unsure on how to proceed against the saboteurs. Attorney General Francis Biddle estimated that at best, the German saboteurs could be convicted of conspiracy and face up to three years in prison, while Burger and Haupt could be tried for treason. His alternative proposal was imprisoning them as POWs for the remainder of the war. However, Roosevelt deemed these proposals unacceptable. He said the Americans were guilty of treason and thus liable to courts-martial. As for the Germans, he said they'd forfeited their right to civilian trials since they were "waging battle within our country." Roosevelt then said he wanted all of the saboteurs to be immediately executed. To accomplish this, he told Biddle that he would use his presidential powers to convene a military tribunal to prosecute the saboteurs, something not done on American soil since the end of the American Civil War. He sent another memo to Biddle, reaffirming his expectations.[23]

"I want one thing clearly understood, Francis. I won't hand them over to any United States marshal armed with a writ of habeas corpus. Understand?"

On 2 July 1942, President Roosevelt issued Executive Proclamation 2561, creating a military tribunal to prosecute the Germans.[24][25] Placed before a seven-member military commission, the Germans were charged with the following offenses:

  • Violating the law of war;
  • Violating Article 81 of the Articles of War, defining the offense of corresponding with or giving intelligence to the enemy;
  • Violating Article 82 of the Articles of War, defining the offense of spying; and
  • Conspiracy to commit the offenses alleged in the first three charges.

The trial was held in Assembly Hall #1 on the fifth floor of the Department of Justice building in Washington, D.C., on 8 July 1942.[26] Lawyers for the accused, who included Lauson Stone and Kenneth Royall, attempted to have the case tried in a civilian court but were rebuffed by the United States Supreme Court in Ex parte Quirin,[27] a case that was later cited as a precedent for the trial by military commission of any unlawful combatant against the United States.

The trial for the eight defendants ended on 1 August 1942. Two days later, all were found guilty and sentenced to death. Roosevelt commuted Burger's sentence to life in prison and Dasch's to 30 years because they had surrendered themselves and provided information about the others. The others were executed on 8 August 1942 in the electric chair on the third floor of the District of Columbia jail and buried in a potter's field in the Blue Plains neighborhood in the Anacostia area of Washington.

Aftermath

The failure of Operation Pastorius caused Hitler to rebuke Admiral Canaris and no sabotage attempt was ever made again in the United States. During the remaining years of the war, the Germans only once more dispatched agents to the United States by submarine. In November 1944, as part of Operation Elster, the German submarine U-1230 left two SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt (Reich Security Main Office) spies on the coast of Maine to gather intelligence concerning American manufacturing and technical progress. After a month of high living in New York City, but no espionage gathering, one of the men turned himself in to the FBI, which captured both agents soon afterward.[28] Both were convicted and sentenced to death, with their executions stayed throughout the duration of the war, after which their punishment was commuted by President Truman into life sentences in prison.[29]

In 1948, President Harry S. Truman granted executive clemency to Dasch and Burger on the condition that they be deported to the American occupation zone in Germany. In Germany they were regarded as traitors who had caused the death of their comrades.[30] Dasch died in 1991 at the age of 89 in Ludwigshafen, Germany. Burger died in 1975.

Sixteen people, including Herbert Haupt's mother and father, were arrested for aiding the saboteurs. The last person to be arrested was Lutheran Pastor Carl Krepper, a member of the German-American Bund and the German-American Business League, which supported boycotting Jewish businesses. Krepper had helped establish safehouses for the saboteurs. In March 1945, he was found guilty of trading with the enemy and conspiracy to commit sabotage and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Krepper was paroled in 1951, and died in 1972.[31]

For his part in the affair, John Cullen was awarded the coxswain insignia, featured on the front page of the New York Times, and received the Legion of Merit medal. His wedding in 1944 made the newspapers and attracted turnout "well beyond the intended guests".[22] Cullen died in 2011, at the age of 90.[16]

Sometime during the 1960s or 1970s, the National Socialist White People's Party placed an unauthorized monument to the executed spies in a thicket in southwest Washington, D.C., on National Park Service land. It went largely unknown and ignored for several decades; the Park Service removed it in 2010.[17]

See also

References

Notes

  1. ^ Spark, Washington Area (1 June 1942), Nazi saboteur Neubauer after his arrest: 1942, retrieved 24 May 2022
  2. ^ "Germany declares war on the United States - Dec 11, 1941 - HISTORY.com". Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  3. ^ Alex Abella, Scott Gordon (January 2003). Shadow Enemies: Hitler's Secret Terrorist Plot Against the United States. The Lyons Press. p. 17. ISBN 1-5857-4722-X.
  4. ^ John Craig (2 February 2004). Peculiar Liaisons in War, Espionage, and Terrorism of the Twentieth Century. Algora Publishing. p. 170. ISBN 0-8758-6331-0.
  5. ^ "Nazi Saboteur Commission, Vol. 3, 293-457". users.soc.umn.edu. Retrieved 20 November 2023.
  6. ^ a b Francis MacDonnell (2 November 1995). Insidious Foes: The Axis Fifth Column and the American Home Front. Oxford University Press. p. 131. ISBN 0-1950-9268-6.
  7. ^ LaVOCorrespondent, Carl. "LaVO: Bensalem factory targeted for destruction in World War II". Bucks County Courier Times. Archived from the original on 25 October 2018. Retrieved 22 November 2020. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  8. ^ Horseshoe Curve, NRHS - Railfan's Guide to the Altoona Area Archived 9 October 1999 at the Wayback Machine(Requires Java 1.6 as of 1 January 2009]
  9. ^ "When the Nazis Invaded the Hamptons". HISTORY. 28 November 2018. Retrieved 19 June 2023.
  10. ^ Dobbs, Michael (February 2004). Saboteurs: The Nazi Raid on America. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-375-41470-1.
  11. ^ "The Type VIIC boat U-202 - German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net". Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  12. ^ a b c d Elke Frenzel, Hitler's Unfulfilled Dream of a New York in Flames Der Spiegel 16 September 2010
  13. ^ Judicial Review for Enemy Fighters: The Court’s Fateful Turn in Ex parte Quirin, the Nazi Saboteur Case Archived 3 December 2013 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ^ a b Noah Feldman (8 November 2010). Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR's Great Supreme Court Justices. Hachette Book Group USA. p. 186. ISBN 978-0-4465-8057-1. Retrieved 25 July 2013.
  15. ^ Federal Bureau of Investigation: George John Dasch and the Nazi Saboteurs, FBI Famous Cases
  16. ^ a b c Goldstein, Richard (2 September 2011). "John Cullen, Coast Guardsman Who Detected Spies, Dies at 90". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 February 2024.
  17. ^ a b c Cox, John Woodrow (23 June 2017). "Six Nazi spies were executed in D.C. White supremacists gave them a memorial – on federal land". The Washington Post. Retrieved 23 June 2017.
  18. ^ a b c Michael Dobbs (18 December 2007). Saboteurs: The Nazi Raid on America. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-307-42755-7.
  19. ^ "The Type VIIC boat U-584 - German U-boats of WWII - uboat.net". Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  20. ^ Page 130, The Florida Historical Quarterly, Volume 49
  21. ^ Joseph T. McCann (2006). Terrorism on American Soil: A Concise History of Plots and Perpetrators from the Famous to the Forgotten. Sentient Publications. pp. 81–. ISBN 978-1-59181-049-0.
  22. ^ a b c Richard Goldstein (13 April 2010). Helluva Town: The Story of New York City During World War II. Free Press. p. 40. ISBN 978-1-4165-8996-9.
  23. ^ Friedman, Max Paul (September 2003), Review of Fisher, Louis, Nazi Saboteurs on Trial: A Military Tribunal and American Law, H-German, H-Review, retrieved 19 June 2023
  24. ^ Jessie-Lynne Kerr (12 July 2010). "A Look Back: Nazi agents picked Ponte Vedra as landing point in 1942". The Florida Times-Union.
  25. ^ "Franklin D. Roosevelt: Proclamation 2561—Denying Certain Enemies Access to the Courts". Archived from the original on 9 August 2016. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  26. ^ Joseph E. Persico (22 October 2002). Roosevelt's Secret War: FDR and World War II Espionage. Random House. p. 204. ISBN 0-3757-6126-8.
  27. ^ Ex parte Quirin 317 U.S. 1 (1942)
  28. ^ Robert A. Miller (27 February 2013). A True Story of An American Nazi Spy: William Curtis Colepaugh. Trafford Publishing. p. 73. ISBN 978-1-4669-8219-2.
  29. ^ Francis MacDonnell (2 November 1995). Insidious Foes: The Axis Fifth Column and the American Home Front. Oxford University Press. p. 133. ISBN 0-1950-9268-6.
  30. ^ "Shoot or hang themselves?". Der Spiegel (in German) (15). 6 April 1998.
  31. ^ "Philadelphia pastor who spied for Nazis subject of new book". The Morning Call. 3 January 2015. Retrieved 5 April 2023.

Bibliography

External videos
video icon Booknotes interview with Michael Dobbs on Saboteurs: The Nazi Raid on America, 28 March 2004, C-SPAN

Further information

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Operation Pastorius.
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