Agent in Berlin, page 25
Nobody’s luck lasts for ever.
Chapter 25
Switzerland and London
May 1940
Harald Mettler was the kind of person others didn’t take too much notice of. They tended to underestimate this obedient and mild-mannered young Swiss German from Fribourg who’d moved to Bern when he was eighteen and three years later had found a job as a very junior clerk at the Federal Political Department, which was the name the Swiss gave to their foreign ministry.
As time went on Harald Mettler began to be recognised as being particularly competent and able – discreet and trustworthy, and while reserved by nature, he was capable of being quite personable. Without ever actually applying for promotion he began to move up the organisation, though there was never any question of him becoming a diplomat.
He’d been at the ministry for nearly ten years – so he was thirty years old – when he met the Englishman.
In the spring of 1936 Harald Mettler had spent a week’s holiday in Germany. He wasn’t an especially political person but was appalled at what he saw – and heard – in Germany. People seemed to assume he shared their views and accordingly were open with him about what they hoped the Nazis would do with all the undesirables, as they put it, in their country. Everything he experienced on that horrendous holiday left him in no doubt how dangerous the Nazis were.
Soon after returning to Switzerland he read in the Tribune de Genève of an anti-fascist meeting in Geneva the following weekend and he travelled to it. He returned a month later for another meeting but left doubting he’d return because the meeting seemed more to do with left-wing organisations arguing amongst themselves than with doing anything about the Nazis.
On the train back to Bern he fell into conversation with a very pleasant older man, smartly dressed and speaking very good German though with an accent he couldn’t place. The man asked what he did and he saw no reason to lie to a stranger so he told him and the man said he had dealings with the Federal Political Department and Harald asked him how come?
‘I work for the British embassy.’
‘On Thunstrasse?’
‘You know it?’
‘I sometimes have to deliver important documents there. My name is Harald Mettler: may I ask yours?’
‘Basil,’ the man replied, ‘Basil Remington-Barber.’
* * *
They met frequently after that. Towards the end of 1936 Basil admitted he knew full well Harald had been attending anti-fascist meetings in Geneva and Harald begged him not to tell anyone and Basil said he wouldn’t dream of it and then raised the subject of Harald working for the British. It was much more subtle than that, something which emerged over a series of meetings, and Basil said by working for the British that didn’t mean against the Swiss – far from it. It would be a way of combatting the Nazis – he’d be doing his bit: it would be an act of patriotism.
Basil encouraged him to apply for a posting abroad and to put Berlin down as his first preference and then be patient, it could take months.
It was early in 1938 when he heard he was to be posted to the Swiss embassy in Berlin. He’d start in April as a senior clerk in the consular department on Corneliusstrasse and would share an apartment nearby on Luther Strasse with two other embassy clerks.
Before he left Bern the Englishman gave him a series of very thorough briefings of what he expected of him in Berlin. ‘Every morning you’ll pass a news kiosk on Budapester Strasse. Every morning you will stop there to buy a newspaper. The man at the kiosk is someone you can trust: he’s a war veteran with one arm, called Reinhard. If you are ever in trouble, tell him you’ve run out of matches and are desperate – so don’t buy matches there in ordinary circumstances. Sometimes Reinhard may have instructions or a package for you. If so, he’ll tell you he has the magazine you requested: the magazine will contain instructions. You say part of your duties will be as a courier, is that right?
‘Apparently a courier carries the diplomatic bag from Berlin to Bern every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The courier returns with a diplomatic bag the following day, apart from the Friday, when you return on the Monday. We get to do the round trip once a fortnight.’
* * *
Berlin worked out very well for Harald Mettler. He enjoyed the work, though it did feel increasingly desperate as people clamoured for visas into Switzerland, especially Jews. Berlin was horrific in many ways, but unquestionably more interesting than Bern. Every morning he bought a newspaper or cigarettes from the kiosk on Budapester Strasse. If he was the only customer and no one was within earshot Reinhard would mutter something encouraging as he chewed on a cigarette, something like ‘victory’ or ‘the bastards’. Occasionally he’d hand Harald a magazine and inside he’d find instructions.
His biggest challenge came in February 1940 when he stopped at the kiosk and noticed Reinhard make a gesture that he should wait until the customer he was serving had left. He stepped forward and asked for some cigarettes but Reinhard spoke over him.
‘Do you have space in that bag?’
He nodded.
‘I’m to ask you if your bag gets searched when you enter your embassy – or leave it?’
‘Never.’
‘And it stays with you all the time?’
‘I’ll make sure it does.’
‘Good. Here are the magazines you ordered. It’s quite bulky, put it straight in your bag. Good luck.’
He had to wait until he was back in his room that evening before he dared open the package inside the magazines. The main item was a large, stiff, thick envelope bound by tape. There was a smaller envelope and inside it a message.
Bring this to me in Bern on your next trip.
He’d only just returned from a bag trip, as they called them, so would have to wait another fortnight. But he had an idea. His flatmate Erich was due to do the trip the following Monday and Harald’s next trip was going to be the most popular one, a Friday. Would Erich mind swapping? No, there’s no catch, but I need to collect some new spectacles and I’d rather not wait any longer – yes, Erich, you’ll owe me a drink!
He arrived at the Swiss embassy on Corneliusstrasse at five o’clock on the Monday morning and collected the diplomatic bag from the duty officer. In the taxi on the way to Tempelhof he unlocked the bag and placed the package among the documents. He was at the airport in good time for the seven o’clock Swissair flight to Zurich and after brief stops in Leipzig and Stuttgart landed at Zurich just before a quarter past eleven.
That gave him two hours for his connecting flight to Bern, enough time to find a telephone box and call a Bern number. The flight to the Swiss capital was just forty minutes. By four o’clock he was outside the small terminal building and had spotted the car.
A black Citroën Traction Avant, the driver’s called Jean and will be looking out for you.
A few blocks from their destination the driver pulled into a side street and then turned into a courtyard. The rear door opened and Basil Remington-Barber climbed in.
‘Well done, Harald: any problems?’
‘None at all: here you are.’
The Englishman took the package and held it as if it were a valuable piece of art. ‘You’d better get back to work, Harald, and I’d better get this to London, eh?’
* * *
‘It took how long to get to London, Barney?’
‘Rather too long, I’m afraid, Piers. I say any chance of slowing down a bit? You walk so fast.’
‘That’s because you spend too much time on bloody horses: they make you lazy. What on earth was Basil playing at?’
‘I’m not altogether sure, Piers: seemed he got it in his head that putting it in the regular diplomatic bag from Bern was too risky, though I’ve no idea why. Then he took his instructions that it was to be handed to me personally and to no one else rather too literally. He was going to bring it himself through France then got cold feet in case the Germans invaded France while he was travelling through it…’
‘Christ Almighty, they weren’t even in Belgium then!’
‘I know, Piers, I know… eventually I said bring the bloody thing here through France pronto or I’ll come and get it myself and that seemed to do the trick. Arrived a bit later than I’d have liked but at least it’s here and one thing I will say about Basil is that he was able to organise getting the package out of Berlin. Jack took it to Basil’s go-between and he passed it on to Basil’s courier chap.’
‘Do we know who he is?’
‘No.’
‘Of course. Sorry we’re not meeting at our place but as you know the director didn’t want those RAF types sniffing round Broadway. The room in the War Office is very secure though. Do you know Frank Hamilton?’
‘I don’t believe so.’
‘Air vice-marshal, runs the RAF Intelligence Branch – he’ll bring a couple of his chaps with him, the ones who’ve spent the last couple of months studying the file. Hopefully they’ll have formed a reasonably coherent view as to its veracity. Here we are, need to show our passes.’
‘Just a reminder, Piers – no one else will know of Scholz’s identity, will they?’
‘Absolutely not: as far as everyone else other than us is concerned he’s Karl, a source inside one of the ministries.’
* * *
It was a convivial start to the meeting, as was the way in Whitehall. A lengthy round of friendly introductions, one or two connections established, inevitable references to shared schooldays. And then it was down to business. Piers took the lead.
‘Thanks to Barney’s first-class work a source we’ve been cultivating in Berlin for quite some time has finally come up with something for us to get our teeth into. Karl is a source inside a ministry in Berlin and according to him in the autumn of 1937 the German Ministry of Aviation started Project Shrike with the aim of exploring the possibility of developing an alternative fighter plane to the Messerschmitt 109. The project is now at an advanced prototype stage. That’s the essence of it. He supplied our agent with a very detailed report, including photographs and designs. You have all been given copies of this report. The purpose of this meeting is two-fold: firstly, for you to give your opinion on the veracity of this report, and secondly, if appropriate, discuss what to do about it. Frank?’
Air Vice-Marshal Frank Hamilton nodded and stubbed out his cigarette. ‘Thank you, Piers, and of course you, Barney: jolly well done for getting hold of this and getting it out of Germany. Glad to hear none of our planes bombed it en route!’
A polite ripple of laughter went round the table as the air vice-marshal opened a file in front of him.
‘If I may summarise, then. The report does indeed show that the aim of Project Shrike is to develop an alternative to the Messerschmitt 109, which I have to say is extremely sensible: it is never ideal to rely on just one type of aircraft – we of course have both the Spitfire and the Hurricane as our principal single-seater fighter aircraft and Fighter Command feel the two aircraft complement each other: always a mistake to put all of one’s eggs in the same basket and if I were them I’d worry in case it was discovered that the Messerschmitt had a fatal flaw that meant it had to be grounded.
‘The principal designer of this new aircraft is Kurt Tank – I don’t think tank has the same meaning in German, in case you were wondering. Tank works for Focke-Wulfe and is particularly well known for designing the Focke-Wulfe FW200, better known as the Condor. It was originally a civilian passenger aircraft and has since been adapted for military use. If you’ll excuse my language, it is a bloody good aircraft, and Tank is a bloody good aircraft designer. The development stage for the Condor was just one year, which is remarkable, and in 1938 – a year after it went into service – it flew non-stop from Berlin to New York, which is even more remarkable.’
‘If Tank is the man in charge of the design, then we do need to take this most seriously. The report also acknowledges that the Messerschmitt 109 is best suited to optimum flying and take-off or landing conditions. In other words, it could struggle when conditions aren’t necessarily in its favour. So they’re going down a very sensible route. As far as we can tell, they’re still very much at the development stage – it would appear they’re on version five of the prototype at the moment. As far as we can gather it’s likely to be at least another year before the aircraft is operational.
‘Nonetheless… we are intrigued by the design. Perhaps, Cromwell, if you’d take us through it, in layman’s terms if possible, please, for the benefit of our friends here? Cromwell’s one of our chaps who actually understands how planes get in the air and stay there!’
There was more polite laughter as Cromwell coughed and nervously shuffled his papers. He was a short man in civilian dress but with the RAF handlebar moustache.
‘The 190 would appear to incorporate some very radical new technology. Kurt Tank’s design is for a far more robust single-seater fighter than the Messerschmitt 109 – there’s a reference within the document to Tank describing the 190 as a cavalry horse rather than a racehorse like the 109, which makes a good deal of sense. For example, I don’t believe the Messerschmitt copes terribly well with uneven airstrips. I come now to a very complex area, one that we’ve taken a good deal of time to analyse: we believe the 190 has a number of very interesting and potentially extremely clever new features, including the wing design and landing gear. The 190 will also carry much heavier armament than the Messerschmitt.
‘Finally – and this is awfully complex so I’ll summarise it as plainly as I can: Tank’s design uses a radial engine, which in layman’s terms means its cylinders – in this case fourteen of them – are mounted in a circular manner around the crankshaft. It’s a radical technology to use in the manner they’re proposing but our view is that it could well work.’
‘So should we take the 190 seriously, Cromwell?’
‘In a word: yes. It’s not difficult to design a plane to get up in the air, stay there for a while and then land in one piece, but we have to consider how much of a threat is it to us once it’s up there. Our conclusion – on the basis of what my colleagues and I have seen from this report – is that it could pose a considerable threat and thus needs to be taken most seriously. The lengths they’ve gone to, the detail here… the drawings… there’s no question this is genuine. Remember, I’m summarising weeks of our poring over all this – we’ve even tested some aspects of the design in our specialist workshops.’
There was silence in the room, broken only by someone tapping their pencil on the table.
‘And Project Shrike – could that be a clue to anything?’
‘It’s a bird, Frank.’
‘Yes, but could it point to anything about the plane?’
‘I very much doubt it,’ said Piers Devereux. ‘The purpose of code names is not to give too much away. I suggest we don’t spend too much time on ornithology. Frank, you’ve been looking at the locations relevant to the 190?’
‘May I ask Tim to lead on this? Wing Commander Carter here is our expert in this area.’
The young officer stood up and moved to a wall of maps at one end of the room. ‘Bit of a geography lesson: from what we’ve read in Karl’s report and from our own intelligence – including aerial reconnaissance – we believe the plane is being developed here… at the Luftwaffe’s Erprobungsstelle test facility in Rechlin, which is just north of Berlin, as you can see, sixty miles north-west of it, to be precise. There are also indications in the report, again backed up by our own intelligence, that the plane is being built at these two Focke-Wulf factories: the Flugzeugwerke here in Oschersleben, twenty-five miles south-west of Magdeburg and their own factory some one hundred and thirty miles north of it here, in Bremen.’
‘So do you propose we bomb them – wouldn’t that make sense?’ It was the first time Barney Allen had spoken.
‘Yes and no,’ said Frank Hamilton. ‘There’s a school of thought – one to which I have to say I subscribe – that we should hold our fire, rather like a sniper waiting until their target comes closer. As the 190 is a year or so away from flying in combat we should let them carry on putting all their efforts into developing it and building it. It will be more devastating for them if we hit their factories at a later stage of development.’
‘May I make another point, sir?’ It was the young wing commander. ‘We still need better intelligence on the sites at Oschersleben and Bremen – there’s inevitably a limit to the quality of what we can see from the air. Ideally before any bombing mission we’d require ground-level intelligence: photographs, drawings and the like.’
‘Is that something you can help with, Piers?’
‘Barney?’
‘Perhaps we can discuss this later, Piers.’
* * *
‘What did you make of that, Barney?’ They were back at Broadway.
‘Encouraging in that the RAF have no doubt about the veracity of Project Shrike. It would mean Scholz is genuine, which has always been Noel Moore’s view.’
‘Can we get your American to check out these two sites?’
‘Bremen ought to be easier than the other place, which I understand is quite small, not somewhere he’d have a good reason to go.’
‘Needs a German to go there.’
‘Which is what I was thinking too, Piers.’
‘No news on the SS officer’s wife?’
‘Which is also what I was thinking.’
Chapter 26
Berlin and Switzerland
October 1940
Berlin, Monday, 7 October, 1940
My dearest Annemarie!
I pray that this letter reaches you: I hope you’ll remember me, Sophia Schaeffer from the gymnasium in Wedding in Berlin – your penfriend from eighteen years ago!
This weekend I was sorting out some storage boxes and came across my diary from 1922 and at the back of the diary, I found letters from you and I spent a very nostalgic hour reading them. They brought back such happy memories: although our friendship was conducted by post I did feel that I could trust you and I sense from your letters that you felt the same.
