Operation Pastorius

You might not know that German spies landed on the East Coast of the US during World War II. The group of eight men were neither talented as spies nor committed to the Third Reich. All of their actions were either in direct conflict with their orders, or else had nothing to do with their mission. Two men of the group, George John Dasch and Ernst Peter Burger planned to sabotage the mission entirely. The trouble is, when ringleader Dasch visited the FBI, no one would believe the story!

The agents in the building, however, were too busy catching spies to be bothered with every crackpot off the street who happened to know classified details about secret Nazi landings. Dasch was bounced from office to office until finally Assistant Director D.M. Ladd, the agent in charge of the manhunt, agreed to humor him with five minutes of his time. Dasch angrily repeated his story, only to find himself greeted once again with patronizing nods and glances toward the door. Fed up at last, he lifted the briefcase he had been carrying, tore open its straps, and dumped the entire $84,000 of mission funds onto the Assistant Director’s desk. Ladd blinked with astonishment and began to reconsider Dasch’s claims.

The group was rounded up by the FBI. However, the story made public by J. Edgar Hoover had nothing about Dasch turning himself in. Hoover credited “The detective work of the century,” and all eight men were convicted by a military tribunal. Six were swiftly executed, and the two leaders received long sentences. The case served as a precedent for holding terrorists for military tribunals today. Read the entire story at Damn Interesting. Link