Nazi commandos came 'appallingly close' to assassinating Churchill,
Stalin and Roosevelt as leaders met at secret 1943 summit in Tehran to
plan the liberation of occupied Europe, new book reveals
By Darren Boyle
Daily Mail
May 29, 2020
A group of Nazi-trained commandos almost
managed to kill Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin
who were attending a top-secret conference in Tehran in 1943, a new book
reveals.
The book, Night of the Assassins, uses information from declassified archives in Washington, Moscow and London.
Author
Howard Blum's story outlines how Hitler's favourite commando, Otto
Skorzeny, developed the audacious plan to kill the three leaders using a
crack team of 42 assassins, who would be parachuted to the outskirts of
the Iranian capital in November 1943 before striking.
The Tehran Conference was the first time
Roosevelt and Churchill met Stalin. The leaders wanted to meet
face-to-face to open discussions about defeating Hitler and Japan and
the future of post-war Europe.
Churchill
and Roosevelt wanted to liberate the continent from Nazism. Stalin was
determined to carve out an area to provide a safety buffer for the
Soviet Union.
When German
intelligence agents had discovered details about the proposed meeting,
Hitler ordered a mission to wipe out his opponents.
One
possible attack involved storming the British embassy using underground
water tunnels during a party for Churchill's birthday on November 30,
1943.
Roosevelt had spent two years trying to
arrange a meeting with Stalin, believing he would be able to negotiate
with the tyrant, though the Soviet leader was reluctant to travel,
fearing assassination.
The mission,
Operation Long Jump, saw Skorzeny train a group of renegade Russians -
who were opposed to Stalin - in commando tactics. They were tasked with
parachuting into Iran in two groups ahead of two further groups of
German commandos - including Skorzeny himself.
Skorzeny
was chosen for the mission by Hitler as he had led an audacious mission
to rescue Italian dictator Benito Mussolini who was being held under
guard in a mountain top hotel that was only accessible by cable car.
After conducting aerial surveillance,
Skorzeny decided to use a pair of gliders to storm the mountain top and
rescue the dictator. The plan involved Mussolini then being flown to
safety on a Storch aircraft. The Storch had the ability to land and take
off in a little more than twice its own length.
Tehran
was chosen as the location for the meeting as Stalin was unwilling to
travel far from Russian territory and Iran was nominally neutral during
the conflict.
It was an important
meeting as it was the first time that Stalin had met with the US and
British leaders. He was anxious by the failure in late 1943 of Roosevelt
and Churchill to launch a second front in Europe. Stalin wanted the
Western allies to help relieve pressure on Soviet troops by splitting
German troops.
Ahead of the meeting,
Soviet intelligence claimed to have gathered information that the
Germans, having cracked US naval codes, knew about the meeting and were
planning to strike.
The Soviets also claimed to have agents close to those involved in the plot.
Tehran
had been flooded with 40,000 NKVD (the predecessor of the KGB) ahead of
the conference. The Russians claimed to have intercepted the first
group of parachutists and killed them. The Russians also wiped out the
second group of commandos, but had not been able to track down the last
remaining threats.
They claimed both
Churchill and Roosevelt would be at risk while travelling to the Soviet
embassy from their own compounds during the conference and should
instead stay as guests of the Russian ambassador - in rooms which had
been bugged.
The plot, which is outlined in detail in the book, seemed utterly implausible.
According
to Blum: 'Although the war is undoubtedly lost, the Germans believe
that perhaps a new set of Allied leaders might be willing to make a more
reasonable peace in its aftermath. And so a plan is devised—code name
Operation Long Jump—to assassinate FDR, Churchill, and Stalin.
'Immediately,
a highly trained, hand-picked team of Nazi commandos is assembled,
trained, armed with special weapons, and parachuted into Iran. They have
six days to complete the daring assignment before the statesmen will
return home.'
Blum gathered together details of the plot from documents held in archives in London, Moscow and Washington.
He
outlined how FDR's Secret Service chief, Mike Reilly, who described
himself as 'an Irish cop with more muscle than brains', had to ensure
the safety of the president.
The assassins were working on a plan developed by Otto Skorzeny, who was once described as 'the most dangerous man in Europe'.
The
Russian defectors among the commandos were split into two groups and
would parachute separately into the outskirts of Tehran.
One group planned to meet up with local tribesmen who would act as guides to bring them into the city.
The
men were equipped with Soviet manufactured machine guns and uniforms.
They also planned to use British-made bombs which had been captured by
the Germans to blow up the three leaders.
The two groups of Russians were killed shortly after arriving in Iran.
A
group of six Germans, under the command of Rudolf von Holten-Pflug,
managed to avoid capture after they dropped into the wrong location near
Qom.
They managed to sneak into Tehran undetected ahead of the conference despite the presence of a large NKVD force.
The commandos made the decision to continue with their attack despite the growing evidence that they had been betrayed.
According to Blum: 'Skorzeny, seeing the
element of surprise had been lost, stayed in Germany, not wanting to
risk his life or his reputation.'
The
book claims the commandos had been betrayed by a group of Iranian
wrestlers who had been sheltering them in a gymnasium after they
accepted a $20,000 reward.
Yet the
highly trained German operatives managed to escape and decided first to
make an attempt on Churchill's life during his birthday party which was
being held at the British embassy.
The
commandos had planned to attack using water tunnels under the building.
However, a captured German spy had surrendered details of the plot,
allowing the allies to saturate the area with guards.
In
a final change of plan, the commandos decided on a suicide attack on
the VIP convoy as it approached the airport. Again, the commandos were
betrayed and blew themselves up to avoid capture.
Blum
told The Express: 'There is too much documentary evidence and too many
witness statements proving that the assassination plot was real. But in
espionage you never know the entire truth.
'The
plot would have succeeded if the Russians hadn’t killed most of the
commando force. And if a captured spy hadn’t disclosed the scheme to use
the water tunnel to enter the embassy compound, German commandos would
have burst in on Churchill’s birthday party. It would have changed the
face of the war, and possibly reshaped the world for years to come.'
