Agent 110 by Scott Miller

Author:Scott Miller
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

CHAPTER

29

Light Had Gone Out

The unsupervised isolation Dulles had so enjoyed came to an abrupt end with the American invasion of the South of France in August 1944. He had never liked taking orders. In March 1944, for instance, he had refused to cooperate with the War Refugee Board and its plan to use Switzerland as a safe haven for Jews trapped in Germany. “Zealous individuals who are ignorant of conditions and do not have the necessary technical training can do the refugees the greatest amount of harm,” he wrote. “There is a tremendous need for work now neglected, among refugees already here, especially Jews and Italians, without bringing in a new avalanche of refugees.”

New logistical headaches emerged. The handful of staffers whom he managed mushroomed, and new duties were piled on. Suddenly he was tripping over code clerks, secretaries, and experts on various subjects. New posts were added in Geneva, Zurich, and Basel. There were even new cars to manage, a Packard and a front-wheel-drive Citroen.

Mundane chores now began to consume more of his time. The Sixth Army was hungry for information on changing levels of the Rhine River, which flowed into Germany, and an early reading could be obtained in Switzerland. To supply the information, an OSS representative was dispatched early in the morning to stroll across a bridge, note the water level, and phone in his report to the army.

To Clover, Dulles complained, “There is vastly more to do than when the frontiers were closed. . . . Meanwhile, they are flooding me with cables from all directions and asking generally that we do the impossible.”

Those who knew Dulles best saw a sad transformation. Reminders of the July 20 debacle haunted him. In late January, he wrote Washington to say he had heard that Moltke, in prison for half a year, had been sentenced to death. Was there anything the OSS could do to delay his execution, such as finding a way to convince the Nazis that Moltke was more valuable to them alive than dead?

The plea came too late. Moltke was executed at Plötzensee Prison on January 23.

“Much of the sparkle and charm went out of Allen’s personality,” Bancroft observed. “It was rather like the way an exuberant young person behaves when his parents suddenly show up.”

But Dulles had not been completely tamed. He was still running dozens of promising agents. Before Dulles left for Washington, for instance, Schulze-Gaevernitz had brought in a young former German soldier with impeccable credentials. A member of anti-Nazi groups in Vienna before the war, Fritz Molden had served in a punishment unit on the eastern front before somehow managing a transfer to Italy. There he had promptly gone AWOL and fought for a time with the Italian resistance. Finally, in 1944, he had sneaked across the border into Switzerland, where, with the help of Swiss intelligence, he sought out representatives of the Allies. Arriving at the Herrengasse late one evening, Molden entranced Dulles for three hours with his personal story and promises of how the Austrian resistance could help the Allies.

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