New York – Bumbling Nazi secret agents slipped into the U.S. through Long Island to sabotage the American war effort, declassified British documents revealed Monday.
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The spies were tasked with committing “small acts of terrorism” with “incendiary bombs in suitcases left in luggage depots and in Jewish-owned shops,” the report said.
The not-so-subtle spies stormed the beach near Amagansett in the Hamptons on the morning of June 13, 1942. Each was dressed in German uniforms, the documents say, and disembarked from a Nazi U-boat.
Dubbed the “Franz Daniel Pastorious Undertaking” by British officials – named after an early German settler in the U.S. – a second batch of agents also came ashore in Florida four days later.
“It was not brilliantly planned,” said Edward Hampshire, a historian at Britain’s National Archives, which released the wartime intelligence documents Monday. “The Germans picked the leader for this very, very poorly. He immediately wanted to give himself up.”
The mission was ultimately undermined by its leader, George John Dasch, who surrendered shortly after arriving in the U.S. and gave up his cohorts to authorities.
A quick check of the FBI files says that they published this story in February 2001. I wonder if anyone told the British that the Jews are the majority in Palestine and changed the name in 1948 to Israel??
Huh? This has been common knowledge for decades.
Donald Rumsfeld talks about it in his memoirs.
This “story” has a number of inaccurcies. The Coast Guard sentry who spoted them was not “paid off for $300.00”. In fact, I saw the Coast Guard sentry being interviewed a few years ago. He was lucky he escaped unharmed. He immediately reported the men coming ashore.
Typical “New York Post”: cheap sensationalism.
Baltimore is probably the only city in the world where two members of the rabbinic leadership had fathers who were arrested during WWII for helping the Nazi war effort.
Rav Moshe Heinemann’s father, Dr. Benno Heinemann zt’l, was in England during the early forties. One Shabbos afternoon, he left his apartment to daven mincha and join another family for seuda shlishis. When he returned after Shabbos, the air raid wardens were waiting to arrest him. The city was under a blackout to help frustrate the German bomber pilots. When Dr. Heinemann returned after Shabbos, his window shades were in the up position because he had left home during daylight hours. He had forgotten to close the shades before he left. This violation of the blackout was punishable by arrest and confinement. Dr. Heinemann spent the remaining years of the war exiled to a prison camp with other blackout violators, etc.
that could explain the montauk project and the other weird government things going on in nowhereland long island before and during the cold war
remember operation paperclip?
Rav Yaakov Hopfer recently spoke on the sheloshim of his father, Dr. Fritz Hopfer. He told the following story. The FBI had gotten wind that the Germans had landed saboteurs by U-boat on Long Island. Dr. Hopfer had recently emigrated to the United States, and apparently, his name was similar to that of one of the German agents. The FBI located the then “Mr. Hopfer” living in Pennsylvania and trailed him for a few days. Obviously, they observed nothing incriminating about the behavior of this religious school teacher and undergraduate physics major. They received a “go ahead” from FBI headquarters to arrest this suspect. The agents came to the Hopfer home, identified themselves, and arrested a bewildered Mr. Hopfer. They executed a careful search of the home and found evidence that convinced them that they had their man. In the Hopfer’s bedroom, the agents found a woman’s wig. Obviously, Mr. Hopfer used this as part of his disguise when he went did his spying and sabotage. They took him away. Distinguished rabbis and askanim were contacted and they immediately went into action. They called the FBI and explained that Mr. Hopfer, a devoutly orthodox Jew, had fled
Hitler and would not work for the German war machine. Orthodox Jews do not serve as German saboteurs. The FBI reconsidered the arrest and realized that they had made an error. But what about the ladies’ wig? That day the FBI learned that married orthodox women cover their hair when they appear in front of other men.
There you have it. A city where two prominent rabbis had fathers who were arrested for helping the German war effort.