Death at Nuremberg Read online

  III

  [ONE]

  The International Tribunal Compound

  Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

  1305 21 February 1946

  There were six Kasernen—three-story-plus-attic tiled-roof buildings—three on each side of a cobblestone street. What had been the parade ground between them under German control was now essentially a motor pool, filled with Army trucks, most of which bore 1st Infantry Division insignia and bumper markings.

  Concertina barbed wire laid on the ground separated one of the Kasernen from the others. Two signs read XXIST CIC RESTRICTED AREA AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

  There was space for four vehicles in front of the CIC Kaserne. A Ford staff car and a jeep were in two of them. Cronley pulled the Horch into one of the empty spaces and only then saw another sign: FIELD-GRADE OFFICERS ONLY.

  He debated for about two seconds and then decided, Fuck it. As a DCI agent, I’m an assimilated lieutenant colonel, whatever the hell “assimilated” means.

  He got out of the Horch and walked to the door of the Kaserne. It wouldn’t open.

  Then he saw a “Double Eight” field telephone mounted beside the door and one more sign: USE TELEPHONE FOR ADMITTANCE.

  He picked up the handset and cranked the telephone.

  “State your business,” a voice commanded.

  “CIC Special Agent Cronley to see Colonel Cohen.”

  “Wait one.”

  The door opened.

  A man in his early twenties in triangled ODs and wearing a .45 pistol suspended from a web belt appeared.

  “Credentials?”

  Cronley produced his CIC credentials.

  The man examined them carefully and then said, “First door on the left.”

  Cronley walked to the door, opened it, and stepped inside.

  A master sergeant in his late twenties sat behind a desk.

  “I’d like to see Colonel Cohen, please. My name is Cronley.”

  “Send him in,” a high-pitched voice ordered from an outer office.

  Cronley walked through the open door.

  A very slight man in his forties sat behind a desk on which sat a small sign:

  COLONEL MORTIMER S. COHEN, MI. COMMANDING OFFICER.

  “Good morning, Colonel. I’m Jim Cronley. I command the Thirty-fourth CIC Detachment, which has just been assigned here, and I’m here to make my manners with you.”

  “You’re off to a bad start. For one thing, since we both know you’re in the Army, you should have saluted. And for another, you’re obviously too young to be a field-grade officer, so you shouldn’t have parked where you just did.”

  Oh, shit!

  What do I do now?

  Salute this arrogant little sonofabitch and apologize?

  Fuck that!

  That would put me in his pocket, and I can’t let that happen.

  The best defense is a good offense!

  “For one thing, Colonel, I’m wearing triangles, and civilians don’t salute. And so far as being a field-grade officer, that comes with this.”

  He took out his DCI credentials and laid them on Cohen’s desk.

  “I’m actually commanding officer of Detachment ‘A’ of DCI-Europe, which has been charged with protecting Justice Jackson. The Thirty-fourth CIC Detachment is my cover.”

  “I’ve been charged with protecting everyone connected with the Tribunal.”

  “You have just been relieved of that responsibility for Justice Jackson.”

  “Presumably you have orders giving you the authority to do that? I find that hard to believe.”

  “I don’t need orders. I have that authority. May I suggest you ask General Greene?”

  Colonel Cohen stared coldly at him for a full twenty seconds.

  “General Greene telephoned me to tell me you were coming. He said I was to cooperate with you. He didn’t say anything about you assuming responsibility for Justice Jackson.”

  “Well, he knows that’s one of the things I was sent here to do. Why don’t you call him?”

  “You wouldn’t want me to call him if you didn’t know what he was going to say, so I’ll give you a pass on that, Captain Cronley.”

  Cronley didn’t reply. They looked at one another for thirty seconds.

  “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Cohen asked finally. “How I’m supposed to cooperate with you? You implied just now—‘one of the things I was sent here to do’—that you have more than protecting Justice Jackson on your plate.”

  “Let’s start with Justice Jackson. When the President heard that Colonel Mattingly had been kidnapped, he became concerned with Justice Jackson’s security.”

  “‘Kidnapped’? There was a story in Stars and Stripes that he’d been arrested for drunk driving in East Germany.”

  “You can’t always believe what you read in the newspapers, Colonel.”

  “Very true. There was another story in Stars and Stripes reporting that my friend, the CIC inspector general, Lieutenant Colonel Tony Schumann, and his wife were killed when his hot water heater blew up. I didn’t believe that, either.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I had an interesting chat with him shortly before that happened. He told me that he was looking into Operation Ost and that when he tried to see what was going on at the former monastery, Kloster Grünau, ostensibly a CIC installation, he was denied entrance by a young captain named Cronley.”

  “I remember the incident.”

  “And that you shot the engine out of his car when he tried to drive in.”

  “One of my men put one round from a .50 caliber machine gun into his engine.”

  “And that when he reported this incident to General Greene, he was told not to investigate what was going on at Kloster Grünau or with Operation Ost.”

  “I understand that’s what happened. Except that General Greene had told Colonel Schumann that Operation Ost and Kloster Grünau were off-limits to him before he showed up at the monastery.”

  “Are you going to share with me, in the spirit of cooperation General Greene wants us to have, what was going on at the monastery?”

  “You don’t have the Need to Know, Colonel. And neither did Colonel Schumann.”

  “Tony said he suspected that Generalmajor Reinhard Gehlen and many, perhaps most, of Gehlen’s Abwehr Ost staff were being hidden there to keep them from being brought here to stand trial with the other senior Nazis.”

  “I can’t speak to that, Colonel, but I can tell you that General Gehlen and all of his former staff have appeared before a denazification court and been cleared. At the time of his surrender, the Sicherheitsdienst was looking for him—for them—because of their role in the failed assassination of Hitler at Wolfsschanze.”

  “And shortly after you put a round in his engine, and General Greene told him Operation Ost and your monastery were off-limits, Colonel Schumann’s water heater blew up.”

  “What are you suggesting, Colonel?”

  “I’m suggesting nothing more than it’s an interesting coincidence. But like you, Captain Cronley, I’m an intelligence officer and we’re supposed to be suspicious of everything. I confess I’ve wondered if General Gehlen might have had anything to do with the explosion of Tony Schumann’s water heater.”

  “Generals Greene and Schwarzkopf personally investigated that tragedy and found nothing suspicious about it.”

  “So I’ve heard. I wonder about a lot of things where there are interesting coincidences. For example, I thought it was interesting that Major Tom Derwin, Tony Schumann’s replacement as CIC IG, fell under a train in the Munich Ostbahnhof shortly after visiting the Süd-Deutsche Industrielle Entwicklungsorganisation’s compound in Pullach. Doesn’t former Generalmajor Gehlen run that? Or have I been misinformed?”

&nb
sp; Okay.

  Battle lines drawn.

  Cohen is among those who feel the Schumanns and Derwin were whacked by Gehlen.

  Which I strongly suspect to be the case.

  The Schumanns deserved it. Both of them were NKGB moles.

  I don’t know about Derwin, but it’s entirely possible Gehlen took him out just to cover all the bases.

  So how far is Cohen going to go running down his suspicions?

  I dunno. But it’s pretty clear he’s not going to stop.

  Which predicts lots of trouble for me.

  “It’s no secret that Gehlen runs the South German Industrial Development Organization, Colonel.”

  “In a compound surrounded by three barbed wire fences and a reinforced company of American soldiers. I don’t suppose you’re going to tell what’s really going on in that compound, are you, Captain Cronley?”

  “As far as I know, they’re developing industry in South Germany.”

  “Bullshit!”

  “As I was saying before, as I understand the situation, when the President heard that Colonel Mattingly had been kidnapped, he became concerned for Justice Jackson’s security—”

  “Why Jackson and not Biddle? Biddle is the chief U.S. judge.”

  “Jackson, like Admiral Souers, is an old and close friend of the President. As I understand it, the President told Souers to send me to do that and then called Justice Jackson and told him he was going to be protected whether or not he liked it.”

  “You’re telling me—and expecting me to believe—that President Truman personally picked you, a captain, to protect Jackson?”

  “Yes, I am. Are we back to why don’t you ask General Greene? Or Admiral Souers?”

  “I think we’re back to what else you’re going to do here at the personal order of the commander in chief.”

  “On my own authority, Colonel, I’m going to see what the prisoners will tell me about Odessa.”

  “Odessa is bullshit.”

  “Many believe that Odessa is bullshit.”

  “Not so. We just caught two bad guys—SS-Brigadeführer Ulrich Heimstadter and his deputy, Standartenführer Oskar Müller—Odessa was trying to slip into France. I’m surprised you don’t know that. When I was through with them, I sent them here. They were already indicted for what they did at Peenemünde.”

  “When you were through with them? What the hell does that mean?”

  “You don’t have the Need to Know.”

  “You arrogant sonofabitch!”

  “So what I’m going to need from you, Colonel, is to clear me and my people into the jail whenever we want to visit one of the prisoners. You have a problem with that?”

  “You’re goddamn right I do!” Cohen said. He snatched a telephone from its base and ordered, “Get General Greene at USFET for me.”

  After about a minute, Cohen said: “General, Captain Cronley is in my office. He just told me he wants unrestricted access to my prisoners—

  “Yes, sir, that was an unfortunate choice of words. I fully understand the prisoners are not mine personally. But I am charged with prison security and giving Cronley—

  “Yes, sir. One moment, sir.”

  Cohen extended the telephone to Cronley. “General Greene wants to talk to you.”

  “Yes, sir?” Cronley said into the phone.

  “Jesus Christ, Jim! I thought you were going to bump heads with Colonel Cohen eventually, but you just got there!”

  “I’m sorry, sir. But—”

  “‘But’ my rosy Irish ass. Learn to get along with Cohen.”

  “I’ll try, sir.”

  “And I don’t want a telephone call from Justice Jackson three minutes after you walk into his office.”

  “I’ve already met with Justice Jackson, sir. And Max Ostrowski, his new interpreter, is already on the job.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, sir. And Mr. Justice Jackson has a new press adviser named Cronley.”

  “Well, maybe you’re not really as incompetent as most people around here think. But keep in mind, Jim, that Morty Cohen—like most intelligence officers—can be really dangerous when crossed, and obviously that’s already happened.”

  “That already occurred to me, General.”

  “Keep in touch, Jim,” Greene said, and hung up.

  Cronley replaced the handset on its base and retrieved his DCI credentials from Cohen’s desk.

  “Thank you for receiving me, Colonel.”

  “My pleasure. And please let me know if there is anything else, anything at all, that I can do for you,” Cohen said.

  That’s the kind of sarcasm that can knock down a brick wall.

  Cronley walked out of Colonel Cohen’s office.

  [TWO]

  Headquarters, 26th Infantry Regiment

  The International Tribunal Compound

  Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

  1355 21 February 1946

  The office of Colonel James T. Rasberry, commander of the 26th Infantry Regiment of the 1st Division, was, like that of Colonel Mortimer Cohen, close to the door of the Kaserne. The reception Cronley received was far more cordial than the one he had just received from Colonel Cohen.

  “Come on in, Mr. Cronley,” Colonel Rasberry welcomed him. “I’m just sitting here watching my soldiers demolish the vehicles in my motor pool.” He put out his hand. “Tell me what I can do for the CIC while we have a cup of coffee.”

  Cronley saw the only thing pinned to the chest of Rasberry’s tunic was the Combat Infantry Badge.

  I think I’m going to like this guy.

  “Colonel, I’m sort of here under false pretenses,” Cronley said, and handed him his DCI credentials. The colonel examined them carefully.

  “Jesus H. Christ! If I read this correctly, your chain of command is straight up to this admiral, and he answers only to President Truman. Right?”

  “Yes, sir. That’s it.”

  “Should I stand to attention and salute?” Colonel Rasberry asked.

  “Please don’t, Colonel.”

  Almost immediately, Rasberry, looking out his office window, said, “Oh, shit! One of my six-by-sixes just ran head-on into one of my ambulances. One of the drivers, if not both, has just flunked, probably for the third or fourth time, How to Drive 101.”

  Cronley laughed and asked, “That bad?”

  “You ever hear what the average age of enlisted men in the Army of Occupation is?”

  “Eighteen point something.”

  “And thirty-point-something percent of them are from New York City and other major metropolitan areas, where they don’t teach their young to drive. And of that thirty point something, the repple depple sends ninety percent to units like the 26th, where they really need to know how. Despite what Napoleon said about armies moving on their stomach, this army moves on trucks. Six-by-sixes, like the one that just moved to the ‘Out of Service for Collision Damage Repair’ column.”

  “That bad?” Cronley asked again.

  “Worse. We are now back to what can the 26th do for you, Mr. Cronley?”

  He walked to a coffee thermos, poured two mugs, and handed one to Cronley.

  “I just got here with a small detachment to provide security for Justice Jackson, and I’m here to make my manners.”

  “I was afraid, when Sergeant Fuller said, ‘The CIC is here,’ that you were bearing more complaints from Colonel Cohen. You know who I mean?”

  “I just came from making my manners to Colonel Cohen.”

  “And?”

  “I got the impression he doesn’t like me.”

  “I don’t think he likes anybody. Or was it something specific?”

  “I told him I was relieving him of the responsibility to protect Justice Jackson. He told me I didn’
t have the authority to do that. I suggested he check with his boss, General Greene. General Greene told him of the authority that goes with the DCI credentials. Things went downhill from there.”

  “I try to give Cohen a pass, both because he’s an intelligence officer and because he lost a lot of relatives in Treblinka or some other hellhole. But sometimes that’s hard. So what can the 26th do for you?”

  “Two things. I’d like you to pass the word, quietly, to your people that the DCI is here, and are authorized to be anywhere. Most of my people are Poles, former officers of the Free Polish Army and Air Force—”

  “—who didn’t want to go home to get shot on arrival by the Russians?”

  “Right.”

  “Done. I’ve been wondering why Cohen worries more about the Nazis, who we have locked up until we can give them a fair trial and hang them, than he does about the goddamn Russians. Half of the Russian delegation here spends ninety percent of their time running around our zone taking pictures of our installations. Yesterday I ran two of them off Soldier’s Field.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The Army airfield.”

  “You’re responsible for the airfield?”

  Rasberry nodded.

  “Is there a hangar on the field where I could park a Storch—that’s a German airplane a little bigger than a puddle jumper—”

  “I know what a Storch is. You’ve got one?”

  “Two. And the Air Corps doesn’t like it.”

  “But you’ve got two of them. Which means . . . Would your feelings be hurt if I told you you don’t look old enough to be a heavy-duty spook who can get away with giving the Air Corps the finger?”

  “You’re putting me on a spot, Colonel.”

  “I’ll make a deal with you, Super Spook—you give me a ride in your Storch, and I will let you hide it in my hangar.”

  “Deal. Thank you.”

  “Can I ask why you need an airplane like a Storch?”

  “To move around. In addition to my duties here, I’m trying to shut down Odessa.”

  “So Odessa must be real. Contrary to popular belief.”

  “It’s real, Colonel.”