Review: Operation Paperclip (Studies in Intelligence)

Intelligence in Public Literature
Operation Paperclip: The Secret Intelligence Program to Bring Nazi Scientists to America
Annie Jacobsen. (Little, Brown & Company, 2014) 575 pp., endnotes, bibliography, index.
Reviewed by Jay Watkins

As World War II ended, the race was on with the
Soviet Union to seize as many German scientists as
possible in anticipation of the Cold War. The full story
has remained elusive until now. Operation Paperclip, by
Annie Jacobsen, provides perhaps the most comprehensive, up-to-date narrative available to the general public.
Her book is a detailed and highly readable account of the
program. Jacobsen compiled extensive primary and secondary sources, duly annotated in over 100 pages of notes
and bibliography. In it are many new sources, among
them US government records (President Clinton’s “Nazi
War Crimes Disclosure Act”), German archival records,
first-person accounts, memoirs, and letters. The book also
contains a useful index and biographies of the principal
players.
Jacobsen offers a detailed chronology of events related
to Operation Paperclip. Because of its scope and the
introduction of so many characters, the narrative could
have been improved if the author had focused on a shorter
list than the 89 individuals profiled and maintained more
topical continuity. Nevertheless, the book is a compelling
work with interesting historical and personal revelations,
for example:
 One of the most notorious cases of WMD proliferation occurred on 15 May 1945, when the German
U-234 submarine, bound for Japan, was captured off
Newfoundland by the USS Sutton. The U-boat carried
Dr. Heinz Schlicke, Director of Naval Test Fields at
Kiel, and the cargo included plans for the Hs293 glider
bomb, V-1 glide bomb (forerunner to cruise missiles),
V-2 rocket (forerunner to the SCUD missile), Me262
fighter aircraft (the first combat jet fighter), low observable submarine designs, and lead-lined boxes filled
with 1,200 lbs. of uranium oxide, a key ingredient of
atomic bombs. Schlicke, who claimed to be an electronic warfare expert, became a prisoner at Ft. Meade,
MD.

 Sarin was produced at Dyhernfurth (Dyhernfurth later
fell into Russian hands). Its name derives from the
initials of its developers: Gerhard Schrader and Otto
Ambros from the infamous IG Farben chemical company—maker of the killing gases used at concentration
camps—and from the names of two German Army
officers.
 Schrader tells the story of inventing “tabun,” a nerve
agent named after the English word “taboo.” The Germans called it 9/91 and, after their defeat at Stalingrad,
seriously considered using it on the Russians.
Henry Wallace, former vice president and secretary
of commerce, believed the scientists’ ideas could launch
new civilian industries and produce jobs. Indeed, German
scientists developed synthetic rubber (used in automobile
tires), non-running hosiery, the ear thermometer, electromagnetic tape, and miniaturized electrical components, to
name a few.
Werner von Braun is well known to those who remember the Apollo moon landing. During the Ford administration, von Braun was almost awarded the Presidential
Medal of Freedom—until one of Ford’s senior advisors,
David Gergen, objected to his Nazi past.
Less well known is that another 120 fellow German
scientists, engineers, and technicians developed the
Saturn V launch vehicle, or that the Launch Operations
Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was headed by Kurt
Debus, an ardent Nazi. The Vertical Assembly Building—
bigger in volume than the Pentagon and almost as tall as
the Washington Monument—was designed by Bernhard
Tessmann, former facilities designer at the German missile launch facility at Peenemuende.
Other prominent Nazis hired under Operation Paperclip included:

All statements of fact, opinion or analysis expressed in this article are those of the author. Nothing in the article should be
construed as asserting or implying US government endorsement of its factual statements and interpretations.

Studies in Intelligence Vol 58, No. 3 (Extracts, September 2014)

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Paperclip

 Dr. Hubertus Strughold, who played an important role
in space medicine by developing space suits and other
life-support systems. In June 1948, he put a rhesus
monkey named Albert in the pressurized nosecone of a
V-2 rocket in a pressurized nose cone, the first step in
the effort to send humans to space.
 General Reinhard Gehlen, former head of Nazi intelligence operations against the Soviets, was hired by the
US Army and later by the CIA to operate 600 ex-Nazi
agents in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany. In
1948, CIA Director Roscoe Hillenkoetter assumed control of the so-called Gehlen Organization.
 German biologist Dr. Kurt Blome was hired to develop
offensive and defensive capabilities to counter Soviet
biological warfare activities.
In 1949, the CIA created the Office of Scientific Intelligence. Its first director, Dr. Willard Machle, traveled
to Germany to set up a special program to interrogate
Soviet spies. The CIA believed the Russians had developed mind-control programs and wanted to know how
US spies would hold up against this capability if caught.
He also aimed to explore the feasibility of creating a
“Manchurian candidate” through behavioral modification.
Thus, Operation Bluebird was born. Bluebird, later called
MKULTRA, was a research activity experimenting in

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behavioral engineering of humans. The Nuremberg Code
prohibits experimentation with humans without their consent. During this program, Dr. Frank Olson, a US Army
biological weapons researcher, was given the drug LSD
without his knowledge, leading to his death by leaping
from a building. DCI Richard Helms ordered much of the
documentation destroyed, and the circumstances of his
demise remain controversial to this day.
Although she understandably questions the morality of
the decision to hire Nazi SS scientists, Jacobsen balances her judgment with an understanding of the perceived
threat of the Soviet Union under Stalin and the communists’ dialectical determination to prepare for total war
with the West. The Soviets similarly captured and used
German scientists for their own defense programs. That
side of the story is not covered in this book.
Jacobsen provides insights on joint intelligence coordination and cooperation among US services and Allies;
operational deconfliction; document and foreign materiel
acquisition and exploitation; interrogation techniques; active tracking; production of foreign intelligence; surveillance and countersurveillance methods; and negotiating
the sometimes conflicting objectives of the judiciary and
the Intelligence Community (i.e., “hang them” vs. “hire
them!”).

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Studies in Intelligence Vol 58, No. 3 (Extracts, September 2014)