Joseph stalin, roosevelt and churchill in 1943. [inaudible conversations] well, good evening and thank you so much for coming. Im susan and we are thrilled to have one of our local authors here tonight. Bill yenne is the author of nonfiction books and novels. He has written numerous books on military history and has recently released a book called hit the target which we have over here and that book is relateed to the eighth air force but tonight we are honored to have bill here to discuss his latest book with us operation long jump, bill yenne. Thank you. [applause] well, thanks, thanks to paula who isnt here and john who is for inviting me tonight and thanks to all of you for coming out and and sitting down and listening to my story. Well, you know conspiracy stories are almost as fun to write about as they are to read. Well, its not true, theyre more money to write about. [laughter] but an assassination conspiracy stories seem to have a sort of a special resonance and people get excited and interesting in that stuff. Well, im here to talk about what im maintaining as the largest assassination conspiracy in history. Churchill, roosevelt, stalin in one room with three bullets and, of course, the World History has changed. The lincoln conspiracy was a pretty big deal back in 65 but the war was over by that time and it was directed at the leadership of only one country. This particular exercise was aimed at the threeallied powers in world war ii, the three men and their staffs who who commanded 70 million troops who were raid against the armies of the third, so that made it an specially big conspiracy. This took place in 1943. It was the year of the turning point of world war ii although you wouldnt have known that to look at the situation on the battle fronts. The germans had been defeated but still in control of a huge slice of the western soviet union. 1200mile front, they controlled all of western europe, angloamerican allies had kicked to north africa but invaded italy and were expecting to make steady progress against the germans in that peninsula but by november of 1943 when this take place they had run into a little stone wall in the form of the gustav line and had been hung up in a dangerous position and such was the situation of the war at that time. So the big three allies that were allied against the third rike, the u. S. And soviet union, well, the leaders of the churchill and roosevelt, they met several times, they met in washington a couple of times, quebec, casa blanca but they really wanted to get together with stalin, they wanted to have a strategy for defeating the third rike. I actually had access to some of the diplomatic cables or virtually all that were running back and forth between the three guys and i sort of excerpted them and crafted them into like a conversation, actually more of an argument between the big three. Roosevelt, said, you know, joe, we would like to get together. Why dont you and i meet in alaska. He said no. Well, roosevelt and churchill got together and they asked stalin. We are going to be meeting in cairo, we have a conference in november, why dont you come down and meet with us there and joe said, no. Churchill got biblical and talked about their being about setting up three tents in the desert and iraq and having the big three in a tent and have their meeting there and joe said, no. Joe wanted to wanted to meet in iran because it was close to the soviet union and he wanted close to the soviet union because there were people inside his government that he didnt trust. Well, actually come to think of it there wasnt anybody in his government that he did trust. [laughter] its often not told about stalin and the list of fun facts about the least fun man of the 20th century is that he was afraid of flying. He didnt want to go too far. The hitler trip to tehran was his one and only plane flight ever. He argued and stalin refused and finally decided that meeting stalin was worth it. So november 27th 1943, date set. Meanwhile inside the third rike a guy named walter who was the guy who ran the the Operations Division of the ss. He got this idea that we should try to take him out. One room, three bullets. He took up the scheme to assassinate the big three. In fact, he had started to organize the hit teams. The problem was he didnt know where or when this thing was going to take place. The allies argued about it about six weeks before the conference so nobody knew where it was going to be, he certainly didnt. One day got a phone call from albanian, this guy said, i hate the british and im for sale for the right price. Why should i listen to you, because i have a job in the British Embassy in ancora and thats where all the all the diplomatic cables are coming through and the embassador, well, hes not a light sleeper. In fact, he has insomnia so he takes sleeping pills, not just the kind of sleeping pills that you and i might take, but some of the serious stuff that Michael Jackson used to abuse. When hes asleep, he is out. So how much do you want. Finally he said, why not, we will take a chance so the entail started flowing, he would creep into the embassadors room at night when he was in his bed and take pictures of all of the cables and the documents with his little camera and he was shipping those off in berlin. The ss realized that the intel that he was sending was spectacular. The germans conamed this guy ciserol after the norman orbto. He was able to supply the master key that told the germans where and when. Iran between the wars and going to world war i, the germans and iranians had been very close. They were germany was irans leading trading partner. E e the german germany had incredible work of agents, German Military intelligence had a network of agents. Very, very close. In fact, the in the book youll sigh the first picture in the little photo section its an autographed photo from adolf hitler inscribed to his friend the shaw. They were exchanging pictures and the germans were pretty excited. So in fact, this was such a big deal that the british and soviets in 1941 at a time when german armies were closing in on moscow, they took time out to invade and occupy iran because of the German Networks inside this country. Thats how big a deal this was and so all during the war and before the war they were sending agents in and out. Fact they had long range aircraft flying out of crimea and dropping troops throughout the war, supply drops, thousands of miles, extremely longrange planes. Gu290s, i know we have one aircraft buff in the room. And it was this long jump more inserting agents to iran that was the source of the name, operation long jump. So inside tehran you have a city with international spyies. You have the germans, youve got the british, they were active throughout that region before well, ever since world war i, back to the 19th century. That was an important part of their influence between the suez canal and india so they had a strong presence. Thanks for coming. They had a strong presence there. What about the americans . Well, you probably heard of norman, the familys general, you may have heard of his dad who was the head of the new jersey state patrol who was the guy who cracked the lindberg case. Who does the shaw, the new shaw because the british depotsed deposed shaw. They got him to hire to run. So this was the presence of the british and the americans. What about the soviets, well, they were present too. They sent in the ikvd. These were the same guys who made their reputation back in the 30s, rounding up people and sticking them and when the soviets knew that the big three conference was going to take place, then they flooded tehran with nkvd. Now these guys, you heard in the movies about sometimes youve got the cops and the secret police rounding up the usual suspects, nkvd rounded up sufferable suspects and unusual suspects and in fact, theres a famous quote in 1937 that they picked up every second man and a lot of women. This is their strategy and they brought that to tehran. They brought their jails and dungeons. They were set all over te h, tehran. Ballooning jump was this takes us to a small circumstance circle and there were some couple lebanese and some iranians, there was an iranian french guy and then there was polish refugee girl who actually was the smartest one in the whole bunch but that was another story and how the polish refugees got to iran is another story but, anyway, this existed before the war and passing through iran before the war an coming in contact with these people there was a Young American named peter ferguson. He was kind of a cowboy. He felt for this polish girl. Ferguson and kavalka, one of those boygirl things, the usual tension. Hi wanted it to go somewhere and she didnt, so they got mad and he went home. He has gone home. The war started and his dad who was well connected, he knew somebody who knew somebody got him a job at the office of strategic services. So meanwhile, you know, he got his interview, what have you done in life, well, i hitchhiked in iran. Okay, youre going back to iran. He ends up back in iran. Back in this little thing going on with his would begirlfriend. I dont want to spoil it. Its in the book. Meanwhile ida has befriended another polish refugee girl, somewhat younger and her name is wanda polik. She works for mercer, 1930s became a 1940s. He was a double agent. He was recruited in the 1930s by the German Military intelligence and hired on with them and started supplying them with information because he was he moved between europe and the middle east and with his business dealings and so he was able to supply them with a lot of information. Meanwhile as a young man he had studied in england. He had the same kind of for the british. He didnt mention that in his interview with the advair. He met an english play right. Yeah. And he was he spent time in switzerland and it was while he was in switzerland these two crossed path, well, you might want to take a look at doing some work for mi6 and he jumped at the chance. Thats how mercer became a double agent. He had employed this younger polish girl as a housekeeper at his house and she worked there and she was befriended and became part of this circle of friends, this group of young people who would hang out and go to coffee shops like people do. Part of the social scene. While, one day it was a nice day, a day not unlike today, it was late september, nice fall day, beautiful fall day, decided that they were going to go for a picnic and so this group of fends went to a picnic and they were having a good time, they were probably drinking a Little Something or another and getting a little bit relaxed and they noticed that where is wanda, she said she was going to take a walk. How long ago was that she certainly should have been back by now, but she wasnt, they looked hard and they couldnt find her and finally they found somebody that said, oh, yeah, we saw a girl like that and there were these russian guys pushing her into a car so nkvd which was indescriminate. They were picking people up at random, our friend has been taken by the soviets, what are we going to do . Can you help us . And he said, all right, im going to ill make a call. I know some people who know some people and so he called his contact with mi6 at the British Embassy in tehran and said, well, this thing happened, what do you know, okay, i can find out and he found out. Well, i am i am sorry to say that your friend is in kvd custody at such and such a place. They set up all these jails and dungeons all over town. Yeah, shes in jail at this particular address and its the nkvd and you i hate to say it but you have to kiss this girl goodbye so he came back to this little circle of friends and said, thats the situation, im sorry, nothing we can do. So ferguson, this cowboy says we cant let this stand. He was an oss agent. He had learned his trade. A lot of these oss men did in those days by watching the movies and he knew what you needed to do. We are going to brake her out of jail. [laughter] he was one of those guys that knows everybody in town, so they set up and lured the guards away. They went to the jail, it was lightly guarded, they broke in and found wanda in her cell and they got her out and as they were taking her out of this dungeon, you can picture this in a movie, somebody says, well, you know, if we take just her theyll know that we came for her and shell be in big trouble when she gets out. We have to let everybody go. They went around and opening cells, they let everybody that the nkvd had swept up and thrown in this particular jail, they let them all out and earnest mercer is standing watching all of this and all of a sudden and hes a german speaking and all of a sudden he hears someone behind him thats speaking german. And he turns around and hes greeted in german by walter shellinbergs operation long jump advancement who had parachuted and had gotten into the city and picked up in one of the sweeps. The nkvd had no idea who he was. It was just some guy that spoke german and they had no idea that he was the advanced man for this the thing they were guarding against most. And he gets let out of jail, and this is where the story really gets interesting. This is where it gets really interesting but i dont want to spoil it so im going to [laughter] i will entertain questions. Thank you. [applause] i had a question. Yes, sir. Yeah, he was part of the he was one of the ss he was the well, the label that he enjoyed the most, in fact, he used it for his eventual memoirs was the most dangerous man in europe. He was probably the most the most ruthless and most effective of the of the ss special Operations Team leaders, when the allies invaded italy and the king decided to end the factious government, locked him up in this hill top prison, actually it was a resort hotel out of season but they locked him up there. [laughter] was the guy who led the special operations operation to get him out of there. An amazing story. I wont get into all the details. They used these in landing airplanes and he got within within 24 hours, within 18 hours, they had berlin shaking hands with hitler. That was the kind of stuff that skortzini did. He was one of the people who was likely to have been involved in this thing but its after the the war, there were a lot of denials about this whole operation. In his memoirs largely deny any involvement in it but in later conversations he admitted that, yeah, he had been part of it but he did not actually go to tehran. That would have made a great story. Maybe in the version story it would have. That is a very good question and one that i got into briefly. In the book. Both churchill and stalin did wear uniforms. Stalin did have a military rank so under the rules of war they would have been fair game haag. Do you think is bought third . When hitler signed off on this operation they didnt care. Your description of close german ties with iran how could they have helped in the first place knowing the danger created by that and how could the Russian Secret Service and german spies have listed in that city at the time . Prior to the conference after the invasion it was a very effective occupation, and i got ahold of the memoirs of the guy, probably the lead agent in iran and his story about how they clamped down when the british came in they clamped down hard and fast and so did the soviets so the iranians, you had a lot of pro german iranians and a lot of them were waiting for the german army to get close enough that they could come into iran and liberate it from the soviets and the british. You also had pro ally iranians but mainly, who once the british and the americans, especially the british and the americans were there spending money and doing Infrastructure Projects because the americans ran the railroad through iran to take supplies into the soviet union so once they got in there, a lot of Public Opinion shifted toward the allies. That was the environment and the germans largely went underground at that point. A couple questions, you mentioned the second question is in argentina at actually did he end up in argentina . Two questions there. The first one, admiral cabarrus who was in charge up their, they got along as well as the fbi and the cia. The tension between them was more serious. Interestingly enough, this was one of the few operations where they actually cooperated. There were meetings where cabarrus was present and the interesting footnote about them is they used to go riding. They were both equestrians so they would go riding in the morning and they would go to work and fight against each other. It was a strange deal between those two. What happened . He was picked up by the allies, not on humanitarian war crimes but military war crimes because during the battle of the bulge in his team operated behind american lines and american uniforms which is something that is against the rules of war. He was tried for that and interestingly enough, he got a lawyer who found a group of british operatives who had operated behind german lines in german uniforms, got him to testify so he got out of those charges. He was actually in jail and on other charges serving time, he broke out of jail in 1947 after is the war, in an allied prison he broke out of jail and was never recaptured. There were magazine photos of him drinking at a sidewalk cafes in paris and he later spent time in argentina, mainly went to spain and operated there. He had a private Security Consulting firm that lasted through the 1960s and he was doing work for the spanish the government and the Egyptian Government and was never recaptured. He was never recaptured. Eventually they just washed it away. That the notification courts in germany who ran those types of things just cut him loose for time served. Second husband was a surveyor for the railroad, built north of the caspian sea. An interesting story. It is very much a german project and something the british hated this railroad and they hated it because it went from the persian gulf to the soviet union. They wanted a railroad that went from gaza in iraq, british dont iraq to india. They wanted to go east west and not coast to coast from the persian gulf to the caspian sea but that is the way the shop wanted it and the way they built it. It was it later became an important deal with the supplies that were going from the persian gulf to the soviet union. Yes, sir . Two questions. You started your first chapters sort of describing what the assassination would be like but you in the entire book never told us did you have an idea what the assassination would have been like and you gave us a hint which was that there was a german who was a russian defector and the russian germans would show up acting like russians. That is how it took place. Second question it seemed like there was candy every other page, did you think you were