“Traveling in the West is a great responsibility. There will be a session tomorrow to discuss your behavior. Captain Ivan Orlov will accompany you as an assistant.”
Igor was not annoyed. He had lived with commissars and NKVD too long.
“One last thing. Your friend, Lotte Böhm.”
Igor started.
“She has relatives in Dresden,” Azov continued. “We have issued travel papers for her to visit them and remain there until you return.”
Lotte would be a hostage. They had decided that he was deeply attached to the girl.
“Fraulein Böhm will be delighted to learn of her trip,” Igor said sadly.
Chapter Sixteen
WHEN SEAN RETURNED FROM his emergency leave he was assigned to escort the Russian inspection group. Later, in Copenhagen, General Hansen would lead the American delegation in the reparations claims conference.
The Russians sent twenty-two officers and civilian experts. American intelligence revealed that the group leader, General Lipski, and half the delegation were from political security and the balance technical experts.
Most of the Russians had been exposed to the Americans in Berlin but nevertheless arrived at Tempelhof Airdrome to board General Hansen’s personal plane filled with suspicion.
The first stop was American Headquarters, I. G. Farben Building, Frankfurt, where they were given a two-day briefing on what to look for in the way of reparations and what to expect in the way of bomb damage.
The Russians, to a man, were impressed, for the Americans briefed them with a depth of technical knowledge and in an open manner of discussion that was unknown to them. Each member of the Russian group was quietly aware of the vast amounts of American motorized and mechanical equipment, the efficiency, the facilities for common soldiers which would be luxurious even for Russian officers and were caught in an over-all spell of the wealth of the great power.
When the briefings were done, General Lipski reckoned Russian suspicions were based on good reason. The Americans told them, in effect, that Western Germany’s industrial complex was all but destroyed. Their own agents did not report such ruination. Obviously the Americans were trying to cheat them out of usable machinery.
They conferred in General Lipski’s quarters after the NKVD members turned the place inside out looking for hidden microphones and were exceedingly nervous when they were unable to locate any.
“The Americans are trying to trick us,” Lipski said. That was the end of his knowledge. He was in NKVD and had no understanding of technical affairs. There was general agreement that the Americans were up to something, but the question was how to prove it
Igor Karlovy confined himself to studying the documents listing the factories, rail centers, refineries. He took no part in the accusations, but suggested that the American liaison, Major O’Sullivan, be contacted and more facts provided.
Sean came later that night to Igor Karlovy’s quarters in the Officers’ Club at the I. G. Farben Building.
“Major O’Sullivan,” Igor said bluntly. “We demand to see a more comprehensive report to back your claims.”
Sean understood it as Russian mistrust. He said he would begin to gather data immediately.
Igor reported this to General Lipski. Knowing his own operation, Lipski said they were in for days of American evasions. He began to draft a sharply worded protest and planned to dispatch it to Marshal Popov the next day.
The protest was never sent. Within twenty-four hours Colonel Karlovy was handed the organizational charts and missions of the Eighth and Fifteenth American Air Forces listing every plane, every installation, every mission, every bomb load, and supporting reports on the results. He promised the same data from the Royal Air Force within forty-eight hours.
Igor Karlovy was chagrined.
“General Hansen believes that if we are to work together in the next weeks, it might be well if you understood America’s global war effort. This document will acquaint you with the nature of our forces and our conflict in every corner of the world.”
Igor eyed the thick record out of the corner of his eye. The cover read: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ARMED FORCES AND SUPPORT IN WORLD WAR II. PRELIMINARY SURVEY. He was most eager to read it but thought better of it. “It has nothing to do with the work of this inspection mission.”
“We believe it has, Colonel Karlovy. Your propaganda that you won the war single-handed is incorrect. Once familiar with the extent of our effort you are apt to approach the work here with a little less suspicion and hostility. I’d like to call your particular attention to pages eighty-four through ninety-nine listing war material shipped from the United States to the Soviet Union.”
He handed the document back to Sean. “It has nothing to do with this mission,” he repeated.
“Nothing you care or dare to see?”
“Major O’Sullivan, I think we had better rule politics out of our discussions,” Igor said. “You deal in theory. We deal in reality. Invasion of your borders, destruction of your homeland changes one’s point of view. We have lived with war inside our country for centuries.”
Igor Karlovy, the most knowledgeable of the group in air matters, studied the reports on the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces with a rising disbelief! If the Americans had what they claimed, then the Red Air Force was a pigmy alongside it.
Igor had seen with his own eyes the bomb damage in Berlin, but that had been attributed mostly to Soviet Artillery. He had seen damage in the Russian Zone of Germany and believed that the West concentrated their air power against East Germany while they preserved the industry and cartels in the Western Zones for a war of revenge.
In the ensuing days they inspected Frankfurt, Munich, and Stuttgart with American Air Force experts and engineers. The precision destruction of transportation centers and manufacturing capability tallied in close detail with the American claims.
A confusion grew within the Soviet group.
And then they came to Rombaden, where the plum was to be the Romstein Machine Works.
They arrived in a convoy of cars late in the afternoon and before receiving billets went to the Rathaus to the offices of the military governor and the Oberburgermeister for the official welcome. At first a few curious people gathered at sight of the Russians. Then the word spread that Major O’Sullivan had returned.
Within minutes hundreds of people had poured from the buildings on the square and the city band was hastily assembled. When they all left the mayor’s office they were greeted by a rendition of “God Bless America”—in waltz time.
Igor and his Russian companions were stunned by what was happening. They knew by now that O’Sullivan disliked Germans intensely and had been a stern master. What a strange welcome for a conqueror!
The spontaneous outpouring continued. School children paraded before him on the Rathaus steps, bowed, and curtsied, and the portico became filled with bouquets of flowers. Everyone wanted to shake Major O’Sullivan’s hand.
Then beer barrels rolled in on horse-drawn brew wagons and an impromptu festival took place right on the spot.
General Lipski allowed his group to mellow a bit. As Igor watched the folk dancing he remembered his dozens of trips to East German cities, where all that ever greeted him was fear. And as the Germans nodded and bowed and smiled to O’Sullivan he remembered the look of hatred in the eyes of the Polish people in Warsaw.
O’Sullivan was intimate with the destruction of the Machine Works. Russian agents had sent back false reports.
The tour went on. Knowing now that the original briefings in Frankfurt would be borne out, the Russians began to relax.
Darmstadt: September 11, 1944. RAF raid. 300 planes dropped multi-thousand incendiaries in 45 minutes gutting 72% of the city and turning it into an inferno. It took a week for the place to cool off.