Denmark, 15 April 1945

  (Five days before the official start of the Battle of Berlin) 

 The Heinkel HE 111 bomber corkscrewed through the clouds in the early morning hours, lining up perfectly on the radio beacon at the tip of the airstrip outside of Copenhagen. To those watching, it appeared to fall out of the sky and level off just above the waves of Koge Bay. The crew had just one chance before allied air patrols would spot them. They had done this many times before, but it still made them anxious. The RAF would be overhead soon, looking for targets of opportunity.

The HE 111 was serving as the Reich’s VIP flight from Stockholm, and they had less than an hour before the Royal Air Force (RAF) would be overhead. The bomber touched down hard, bouncing. The pilot cut the power to keep the plane from tumbling. With its engines feathered, it coasted to a perfect stop where the ground crew stood.

The Luftwaffe groundcrew rushed around the plane, grabbing it by the landing gear; with their backs extended, they struggled to move it toward the nearby camouflaged netted enclosure in the wood line away from the prying eyes of the Allied fighters. There were no hangers. Instead, there was camouflage netting over clearings in the woods. A line formed behind the plane as it came to a stop as groups of the Reich’s fortunate few waited their turn for the flight to Stockholm and freedom in exile. They followed it to the netted enclosure like sheep. None wore a uniform; many had their wives or mistresses with them.

The entire field was ringed with flak cannons of all calibers. The runway was concrete, with drains running to ditches on both sides. The whole strip was painted in a green camouflage scheme of varying shades to blend in with the pines of the forests on both sides. The field was built originally as an all-weather emergency airstrip with radio beacons. It was never meant as a passenger terminal. There were a few bunkers for the Luftwaffe personnel and a small stand used as a tower, and that was it.

Along the entrance to the field, more camouflage netting was strung about to cover the roadway entrance. Cars and buses sat parked, abandoned, and pushed to the side of the road into the wood line. The evacuations were ending as the Allies and Soviets advanced on all fronts.

A small motorcade of Skoda military staff cars sat waiting for the arriving plane’s number one VIP. The cars were simple black convertibles and had the pennant of an SS Brigadefuhrer (Brigadier General) on their front bumpers. A detail of SS men wore on their arms the “SD” arm patch, the Sicherheitsdienst (Security Service), the Reich’s intelligence service. Unlike VIPs gathered on the field awaiting their turn, it was evident to the intimidated passengers that none of the SD men planned on fleeing. Those fleeing worried this might be a sign of a crackdown. The SD men wore camouflage smocks and were armed with MP40 machine pistols.

SS Hauptsturmfuhrer (Captain) Niklaus Claussen stood with them in field gray of an earlier issue. He was the SD’s money man based in Spain. He was about five foot ten, with dark hair and blue eyes. The captain was a mix of Dane and Ukrainian, with a deep hatred of communism he inherited from his Ukrainian mother. Claussen was shackled to an attaché case that was just a prop. Claussen stood looking about at the fleeing Germans. He shook his head as if tormenting them, all part of the look he wanted to project for his cover.

Claussen’s tan skin was a telltale sign of his posting to Spain; working under the AUSLAND “Section B” for overseas intelligence, he trafficked in counterfeit currency, helped smuggle refugees, and laundered money for the SD’s covert operations. He could be accused of being ruthless by his peers, but he was all business. Niklaus did sympathize with the Jews and other undesirables of the NAZIS regime. Through contacts in his home country of Denmark, he had set up a smuggling ring between Copenhagen and Stockholm for those fleeing Hiler’s persecution. Refugees went out, and very profitable contraband came back. Those who could pay did; those who couldn’t would be smuggled out anyway. He had also made a similar arrangement in Greece. All was done under the guise of an intelligence operation to insert agents into the West.

He started his service to the Reich as an Abwehr officer recruited by the great Hans Oster from the ranks of the Falange in Spain. The Abwehr, the intelligence agency of Germany’s Armed Forces, had been a well-oiled machine that worked with and sometimes against the feared SD. Its personnel were not party members but consisted of a diverse group of cosmopolitan Germans, recruited foreigners, and Prussian officers. They were led by some of the most educated men that could be found within the German military ranks.

Oster took him under his wing, teaching him about money handling and covert operations. Claussen even found favor with Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the head of Abwehr. The Admiral assigned Claussen to Spain to look out for their interests and those of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, the country’s dictator. Niklaus was Franco’s favorite and was often used as an intermediary between Himmler and Franco. The latter had given him a letter to take to Himmler to provide him with cover for his mission. He needed Claussen’s investments and connections in the post-war world.

Though the Abwehr served Hitler at the beginning of his rise to power, it began to turn on him as it became apparent that his ambitions were dangerous and disastrous for Germany and the world. Unfortunately, after July 20, 1944, the entire Abwehr was swallowed up by the SD, leaving its former leaders and managers imprisoned and awaiting their execution.

The rest of the Abwehr was forcibly absorbed into the SD after most of the leadership had been implicated in the July 20th plot against Hitler.

Claussen’s part of the plot was to reach out to Franco for peace talks with the West if they had been successful. Unfortunately, the plot failed, and Hitler survived. Schellenberg, who ran AUSLAND, saved Niklaus with a plea to Himmler, the head of the SS. He was too valuable to be imprisoned or accused of being part of the plot. The most harrowing part for Claussen was a combined interrogation by Muller, head of the GESTAPO, Himmler, and Ernst Kaltenbrunner, head of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA). He came clean and feigned arrogance, knowing it did not matter then; Oster and Canaris were condemned. Afterward, all three wanted him to understand his place in the SD moving forward and discourage more plots.

The only thing this event had done was to convince Claussen to prepare for after the war. He began to falsify the ledgers and move the funds meant for the Reich from his contraband smuggling into private ventures all over Spain and Switzerland to both launder the funds and feign ventures for the SS. Niklaus became the fifth wealthiest man in Spain. All was going well till Allen Dulles, the American Spymaster in Bern, Switzerland, approached him. Dulles was with the Office of Strategic Studies (OSS). The OSS knew of his embezzlement. He was recruiting former Wehrmacht intelligence assets for the OSS and after the war.

Claussen initially refused and scoffed at Dulles’s attempts to blackmail him into defecting, knowing an accusation by the allies against him would fall on deaf ears. His superiors were profiting from his ventures as well. The American struck him as an amateur that might get him killed. Dulles made a reapproach, this time with a significant cash offer and something more specific. This time, the money was too good to ignore, and the promise of keeping his ill-gotten gains after the war was all he could dream of.

Germany’s top intelligence expert on the Red Army, Major General Reinhard Gehlen, planned to defect to the Americans. Gehlen was the head of FHO (Foreign Armies East), tasked with gathering intelligence on the Red Army and the Soviet Union. He had extensive data on the Soviet Army and supposedly a spy network throughout the Soviet Union that was rumored to have reached into the Kremlin. Hitler dismissed him in late March and his entire staff after a heated argument about the size of the Soviet forces and their intended path into Germany. Gehlen neither protested nor begged but moved his staff from Zossen outside Berlin to the Austrian-Swiss border. During the move, he suffered an intelligence lapse. A microfiche that listed all the contents of the FHO file repository was stolen. Dulles offered Claussen a small fortune and amnesty to find the fiche and retrieve it.

At first, Claussen suggested destroying the microfiche to prevent any further risk, but Dulles explained. Gehlen needed it for an inventory. It was like the card catalog of all of FHO. The actual index cards were destroyed when Gehlen and his staff feared the SS would seize his extensive collection of files after the failed July 20 plot. Now they worried if they had everything.

Claussen suggested that it could be easily copied since it was a microfiche. Dulles advised that it didn’t matter; they needed it. If copied, they would need to move to protect FHO’s resources. Besides, copying it would not be in the thief’s interest. It would lessen their bargaining power. That part perplexed Claussen, who just shrugged at it.

In truth, Gehlen, in establishing his network inside the Soviet Union, had not done proper compartmentalization. There was an assortment of cells interlocked due to successful NKVD radio detection and actual casualties from assets serving in the Red Army. The FHO-turned-Red Army soldiers and officers were often sent behind Soviet lines to verify the whereabouts of an asset who had gone missing, only to be told to stay on station and assume their duties.

The “kluge,” as Gehlen called it, needed the index fiche to ensure its continued operation. Assets had to be contacted and paid if the Americans were going to take them over. Therefore, it was vital for the microfiche to be recovered.

To get it back would require extensive resources in Germany to help locate the microfiche and its thief. The man who could do that undoubtedly was Brigadefuhrer Walter Schellenberg, the head of the SD Ausland (Security Service Foreign Countries), the SS’s intelligence service, and Niklaus’s superior. Claussen also knew Schellenberg needed post-war funds and living arrangements.

Schellenberg now exited the craft at the field by its crew hatch beneath the fuselage, not waiting for it to stop. The SD head had been meeting with a committee of the Red Cross and International Zionist in Stockholm on Himmler’s behalf. This was solely for Himmler and not for the Reich. He was followed by about twenty men spilling out the hatch wearing older versions of Kriegsmarine and Wehrmacht uniforms that were more elaborate than those currently issued. These unfortunates were to attend Hitler’s birthday party in Berlin.

Claussen stepped forward and exchanged party salutes with Schellenberg.

“How are you doing, my favorite Dane?” Schellenberg asked. “I’m running against time, Brigadefuhrer,” Claussen replied. “Would you care for a ride, Claussen?” The SD head offered

as he gestured towards his staff officer.

“Erich, ride with the protection detail, would you?” Schellenberg ordered one of his aides.

Schellenberg grabbed Claussen by the arm, “Nikki, please drive.”

The SD head, Claussen, and his security detail hurriedly entered their cars and sped away. It was early morning; Allied aircraft would soon swarm about the airstrip, roads, and surrounding area. The flat terrain with the various causeways was a prime hunting ground for the RAF patrols.

Schellenberg’s voice was barely audible above the car’s engine and the rush of air with the top down. Claussen desperately tried to keep his nerves in check, knowing he was running out of time; the Red Army was expected to pounce on Berlin at any moment. Not to mention getting his hands on the microfiche before the Soviets. The pitted Danish roads added to his anxiety.

“Muller has it. He’s been trying to prove his worth to the Soviets,” Schellenberg yelled. “It’s either in the Gestapo evidence safe or his private residence in Berlin.”

“We can’t make a formal request for obvious reasons,” Schellenberg continued, wiping sweat from his brow with a handkerchief decorated with an ‘SS’ monogram. “My source in the Chancellery warns that Bormann might already know or suspect Himmler is negotiating for peace. All members of RSHA are probably under surveillance by Borman’s spies in Berlin, and Muller could be playing both sides. Either way, step lightly.”

Claussen gritted his teeth as he swerved to avoid the endless potholes in the road, making their drive more hazardous with each mile. The rising sun cast an orange hue across the horizon, both swallowed and looking about the sky. The Allies would be out at any moment.

Schellenberg patted Claussen’s shoulder and pointed at the horizon, grimacing as he saw two dark dots appear over the trees in the distance. The sun rose to their right, and in response, Schellenberg waved his arm above the car in a fist, signaling attention to the bodyguards and staff behind. Both cars quickly sought cover, pulling off onto each side of the road into the dense woods. His bodyguards emerged from their car, covering both Skodas with netting stored in their trunks.

Schellenberg reached for a cigarette as he often did; he was a chain smoker. He urged Claussen to walk along the wood line so they could observe the field ahead. Beyond was the clear view of a German convoy accelerating to get over a hill and into a wood line across the field. The SD head reached for Claussen, offering up an ironic comment:

“You know things are bad when you take a note from Himmler to the head of worldwide Zionism wishing them a Happy Passover!

They both laughed.

“He thinks Bernadotte will save him. Himmler doesn’t realize he’s Himmler,” Schellenberg chuckled darkly.

The formation of RAF Typhoons rose above the tree line and swooped into a dive. With their long noses and bluish-grey cowling, the fighters roared over the ground, engines screaming at full throttle. They pounced on the convoy.