AMAZING SPY RING

Evening Star, Issue 22990, 22 June 1938, Page 9

AMAZING SPY RING

REVELATIONS IN AMERICA HIGHLY-PLACED OFFICIALS CHARGED " MORAL INDICTMENT OF GERMAN NATION " Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright NEW YORK, Juno 21. The ‘ New York Times ’ devotes two pages to indictments of 18 individuals, most of whom are highly placed German officials, charged with wholesale theft of military, aviation, and industrial secrets. The story of the unravelling of the spy ring outrivals Oppenheim’s melodramatic imaginings. It reveals that there existed an indirect line of intrigue by which information obtained in the United States was communicated to Tokio. This was a sort of backdoor circuit between the headquarters of the spy corps in Berlin and the Japanese army, and was used for mutual exchange of military data in the interests of an anti-Communist alliance. Although the ring never “ cracked ” a vital secret, what concerns the authorities is the broad scope of the conspiracy and its potentialities for subversive action in the future if unscotched. United States military observers summed up the spy ring as the arm of an aggressive espionage organisation that Germany has been building up on a bureaucratic scale. Its programme is to develop progressively, following Nazi blood claims on all Germans abroad, the growth of the German army and navy. Extending down from tho key men in Berlin was a line of agents searching for information concerning all divisions of America’s defence

THIRTEEN IN GERMANY. The names of the 13 who are resident in Germany, and cannot be extradited, are: Captain Udo von Bonin. Chief of the Naval Intelligence Service; Dr Gricbl; Captain Herman Menzl, von Bonin’s assistant; William Lonkowski, a civilian official at the Ministry of War, Berlin; Captain Erich Pfeiffer, Chief of the Naval Intelligence at Port Bremen; Captain Ernest Muller, Chief of the Naval Intelligence at Hamburg; Werner Gudenberg; Herr Sanders, assistant to Captain Pfeiffer’s office in Bremen; Herr Schmidt, ' assistant in Captain Muller’s office in Hamburg; Karl Schulter, political officer of the liner Bremen: Theodore Sclxuetz, political officer of the liner New York; and Karl Eitel and Herbert Jaenichen. former and present stewards on the liner Bremen. One of those indicted, Jessie Jordan, is already serving four years in Scotland for espionage. One charge is concerned with the theft of plans for the army’s pursuit plane made by the Seversky Airplane Corporation, one of the world’s fastest fighters. Another charge is brought against three men and a woman of stealing and sending to Germany an army and navy radio telephone procedure book containing a confidential code. START MADE IN 1935. The cream of the lot consisted of Lonkowski, a political and mechanical genius, and Eitel, who masked his operations behind a menial job on the liner Europa. The activities of the ring started in 1935, when Lonkowski fled the country one step ahead of the United States Naval Intelligence Service agents. Now Lonkowski holds a high position on the Reich Air Ministry. He worked with Gudenberg, a mechanic skilled in air design, in the Buffalo Air Factory. Gudenberg was employed on the Curtiss Scout bomber, then in the experimental stage. He removed a blue print from the factory one night, and Lonkowski photographed it, making several negatives covering the whole design. Gudenberg returned the plan to the file next day. Nothing was known of this until Lonkowski took a violin case containing the incriminating documents to a spy courier on a German ship. Lonkowski was stopped by Customs guards, and the violin case confiscated. The nature of the negatives was not recognised immediately, but they were subsequently pieced together, and it was then learnt that Lonkowski chartered a plane and made a good getaway, his wife following by the ship. Gudenberg, who was still not a suspect, got a job with the Hall Aluminium Company at Bristol, Pennsylvania, which was manufacturing a torpedo bomber for the navy. In the meantime he filed an application for a post in the naval aircraft factory at Philadelphia, but before starting he took fright at Griebl’s revelations as an apparently willing witness, and fledl while the going was good. GERMANY INDICTED. The New York * Times ’ says the Grand Jury’s action appears to be mainly a moral indictment of the German nation. ” Usually untraceable or not mentioned in such cases for diplomatic reasons, the reputed master minds, who included officers of the German War Ministry, were not only named, but indicted. Furthermore, for the first time since the investigation began Germany was officially named as the Power responsible for the under-cover force that aggressively sought to pry out the best technical military defence secrets of the United States.”

The ‘ Herald-Tribune ’ points out that the indictments make a charge that the espionage activities were started on January 2, 1935 a few hours after Herr Hitler, at a New Year reception in Berlin, called for honest co-operation between the nations. The man chiefly responsible for the uncovering of the spy ring is a Federal

Bureau of Investigation agent, Leon G. Turrou, who was responsible for the detection of the Lindbergh baby kidnapper. He has been commended by the Grand Jury for an extraordinary piece of detection. He worked 16 hours a day for nearly four mouths. INFLUENCE OF GESTAPO SUSPECTED. Both Lonkowski and Gudenberg had been questioned before the Grand Jury but neither was guarded, the Government relying on their apparent willingness to testify. It became evident after their departure, however, that a powerful and sinister influence had forced them to go. One Government department believed that agents of the Gestapo had established themselves here for the purpose. This belief gained support to-day when an official disclosed that Carl Herman, held as a material witness, had been identified as a member of the Gestapo. These revelations were made possible by a Dundee (Scotland) clue to a fantastic plot to abduct Colonel Eglin, concocted by Guenther Rumrich (who is under arrest here).

Rumrich planned to rob Eglin of mobilisation plans for an anti-aircraft regiment. Information reached Washington in time to prepare a trap, but the plan was dropped. Rumrich worked with Dr Griebl, who was regarded as head of the New York centre of the fraternity.

Rumrich became the most active secret agent since the war, audaciously attempting to bribe young naval officers to betray secrets. He was able to send to Germany information concerning the strength of troops stationed at Panama Canal and at Fort Hamilton, Brooklyn. He was born in Chicago 37 years ago, and was the son of an Austrian. ADDRESS IN DUNDEE. It was part of the conspiracy for Jessie Jordan and Otto Sanders to maintain an address at Dundee for receiving documents from llumrich in the United States and forwarding them to Pfeiffer in Germany. The indictment charge cites meetings of conspirators on specific dates at such far-removed places as the Hotei Eden, Berlin, the Astoria Club, Bremen, the Astor Hotel, New York, the Hotel Taft, New York, and the Hotel Buffalo, New York. A GERMAN DENIAL BERLIN, June 21. (Received June 22, at 11.30 a.m.) With reference to the United States espionage case it is serai-officially denied that any officers of the German defence force are involved.