Hitler's peace

“No, really, you are. It hardly matters if you kill Roosevelt, I think. After all, he’s a sick man and the vice president would replace him. But Churchill personifies the British war effort, and killing him would be a real body blow for the English. Then again, the British hardly matter, do they? Not next to the Americans and the Russians. No, it’s the Russians that would be affected the most. If Churchill personifies the British war effort, then Stalin personifies the whole Soviet system. To kill all three would be splendid. It would put the Allies in total chaos. But just to kill Stalin would end the war in Europe. There would be another revolution in Russia. You might even get that Russian general of yours to lead it.”

“Vlasov?”

“Yes, Vlasov. The Russians are more terrified of Stalin than they are of Hitler, I think. That’s what makes them fight. That’s what makes them tolerate such enormous losses and still fight on. There are only so many planes and tanks that they can make, but men seem to be in limitless supply. That’s Russian arithmetic. They think they can win because at the end, when every German is dead, they’ll still have lots of Russians left alive. But you kill Stalin and everything changes. He’s shot everyone capable of replacing him, hasn’t he? Who’s left?”

“You,” smiled Schellenberg. “I think you’d make a fine dictator. Especially the way you are now. Magnificent.”

Lina punched him playfully on the shoulder, although it still hurt. She was stronger than she thought. “I’m serious, Walter. You have to make this plan happen. For all our sakes.” She shook her head. “Otherwise, I don’t know what’s going to become of us, really I don’t. I saw Goebbels the other day and he told me that if the Russians ever get to Germany we are facing nothing less than the Bolshevization of the Reich.”

“He always says that. It’s his job to scare us with the idea of what it might be like to live as Communists.”

“That just shows you haven’t been listening, Walter. They won’t be handing out copies of Marx and Engels when they get here. We’re facing nothing less than the liquidation of our entire intelligentsia and the descent of our people into Bolshevist-Jewish slavery. And behind the terror, mass starvation and total anarchy.”

To Schellenberg’s well-informed ears this sounded like a pamphlet from the Propaganda Ministry that had come through his letterbox the previous week, but he didn’t interrupt Lina.

“What do you suppose happened to all those German soldiers who were captured at Stalingrad? They’re in forced labor battalions, of course. Working in the Siberian tundra. And all those Polish officers executed at Katyn. That’s the fate that awaits us all, Walter. My sons are in the Hitler Youth. What do you think will become of them? Or for that matter their two sisters, Silke and Marte?” Lina closed her eyes and pressed her face against Schellenberg’s chest. “I’m so afraid of what might happen.”

He folded her in his arms.

“I’ve been thinking of speaking to Himmler,” she said quietly. “Of asking his permission to get my boys out of the Hitler Youth. I’ve already given a husband to Germany. I wouldn’t want to lose a child as well.”

“Would you like me to speak to him, Lina?”

Lina smiled at him. “You’re so good to me, Walter. But, no, I’ll do it myself. Himmler always feels guilty when he talks to me. He’ll be more likely to give in to me than to you.” She kissed him, and this time she gave herself up to it and they were soon in bed, each striving to please the other and then themselves.

In the early part of the afternoon, Schellenberg left Lina in the Adlon and walked to the Air Ministry. It was housed in a squared-off, functional-looking building, and to prevent it from becoming a target for enemy bombers it displayed no flags.

Schellenberg was shown to a large conference room on the fourth floor, where he was quickly joined by a number of senior officers: General Schmid, General Korten, General Koller, General Student, General Galland, and a lieutenant named Welter who took notes. It was General Schmid, better known to the Luftwaffe as “Beppo,” who spoke first.

“On the basis of what Milch told us, we’ve examined the feasibility of using a squadron of four Focke Wulf 200s. It is, as you have already worked out for yourself, the best aeroplane for the job. It has a service ceiling of almost six thousand meters and, carrying extra fuel, a range of forty-four hundred kilometers. However, to facilitate targeting, we would recommend not carrying a bomb load, but rather two Henschel HS293 radio-controlled missiles. The Henschel acts like a small aircraft, with a motor to boost it to its maximum-level speed, after which a radio controller on the plane guides it to its target.”

“Radio-controlled?” Schellenberg was impressed. “How does that work?”