Bloodhound (intelligence service)
Bloodhound (dt .: Bloodhound ) was the name of an operation of the US intelligence service Office of Strategic Services (OSS) from the summer of 1946 in post-war Germany , and especially in the three occupation zones of the Western Allies .
Aim of the action
The original aim of the operation was that the former intelligence service personnel of the German Reich was recorded and registered. In particular, they were interested in the former employees and spies of the Foreign Army East Department (FHO), the security service and the Gestapo who had survived the war , in order to check whether they would continue to pose a threat to the security of the USA .
An important informant of this operation was the former Upper Government Councilor and former SS-Sturmbannführer and head of Group E ( police counterintelligence) in the RSHA Walter Huppenkothen . As a result of this operation and the pooling of the surviving agents , many of them were arrested and interned at Camp King . From here, many of these former secret service employees were recruited again by the former major general and last head of the FHO Reinhard Gehlen and integrated into the Gehlen organization (Org).
Use of former employees
Many of these German espionage specialists , due to their exact working methods, which even the OSS and its successor organization CIA recognized, later formed the basis of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND) founded in 1956 and thus made another notable career in the German civil service , despite a dubious past . These included Gehlen's successors at the FHO, Lieutenant Colonel Gerhard Wessel and Lieutenant Colonel Heinz Herre , both of whom later became presidents of the BND. These specialists also included the former lieutenant colonel of the Wehrmacht and from 1944 head of the organization department in the Wehrmacht High Command (OKW) and later Brigadier General and Major General of the Bundeswehr Horst Wendland (* 1912 - † October 8, 1968, by suicide ). Others became employees of the Military Counter-Intelligence Service (MAD) of the Bundeswehr founded in 1955, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) founded in 1950, or a state authority for the protection of the constitution .
literature
- Helmut Roewer , Stefan Schäfer, Matthias Uhl : Lexicon of the secret services in the 20th century . Herbig, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-7766-2317-9 .
- Wilhelm Ritter von Schramm : Secret Services in the Second World War ; Book publishers Langen Müller Herbig, Munich (2003); ISBN 3-7766-2241-5 .
- Michael Wildt: Generation of the Unconditional. The leadership corps of the Reich Security Main Office ; Hamburger Edition (2002); ISBN 3-930908-75-1 .
- Hans-Jürgen Lange: State, Democracy and Internal Security in Germany ; Leske + Budrich Verlag, 1st edition (2000); ISBN 3-8100-2267-5 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Death at noon . In: Der Spiegel . No. 42 , 1968, pp. 73-75 ( online ).