Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's me Josh, and for this week's Select,
Speaker 1: I've decided it's time for a rousing bout of goofy
Speaker 1: history with our twenty fifteen episode on the Nazis who
Speaker 1: invaded the United States during World War Two. I won't
Speaker 1: give anything away, but suffice to say it's the kind
Speaker 1: of topic that records itself. So relax. Let me give
Speaker 1: you a quick shoulder up there, very nice and enjoy
Speaker 1: this classic stuff you should know at Welcome to Stuff
Speaker 1: you should know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome
Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles w Chuck Bryant,
Speaker 1: Jerry's over there. This is stuff you should no. Okay,
Speaker 1: ready for this. I'm ready. We're gonna channel our stuff
Speaker 1: you missed in history class. Yeah. I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: they've done this or not. Have you are you? I
Speaker 1: don't know, So, Chuck, I don't know if you know
Speaker 1: this one because it didn't come up in this article.
Speaker 1: But back in World War Two, did you know that
Speaker 1: the Japanese actually carried out bombing campaigns, two of them
Speaker 1: in Oregon? I didn't know that, Oh you did. I'm
Speaker 1: a bit of a buff and that insane. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: mean there's a lot of forgotten history or a little
Speaker 1: known history that you read it in. Thank God for
Speaker 1: like the Internet, because someone will post an article and say,
Speaker 1: I bet you never knew this, yeah, and then you're like, what, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's pretty much the function of the Internet what you
Speaker 1: just describe, you know. Sure, So this one, I think
Speaker 1: I've learned about this from unsurprisingly Uncle John's Bathroom Reader
Speaker 1: years and years and years ago. Oh yeah, but definitely
Speaker 1: not in this kind of detail. It turns out that
Speaker 1: in World War Two, in nineteen forty two, I believe
Speaker 1: in Armagansett, New York, which is on Long Island, and
Speaker 1: ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, which is just south of Jacksonville. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: Nazi saboteurs landed, they invaded America. Yeah, pretty remarkable, it
Speaker 1: really is. What's even more remarkable is how badly their
Speaker 1: operations went. Yeah. What's remarkable is well, not remarkable, what's uh.
Speaker 1: Thankfully they chose a bunch of dopes, um, half hearted dope,
Speaker 1: half hearted dopes who I don't know if they didn't
Speaker 1: do their research. We'll get into how they picked these
Speaker 1: these schmows. Yeah, but um, it didn't go so well,
Speaker 1: I really did. But if they had to pick them
Speaker 1: like the right guys, it might have been a whole
Speaker 1: different story. Oh yeah, totally in this war and the FBI,
Speaker 1: especially Jager Hoover, really lucked out that these guys were
Speaker 1: half hearted dope. Well not if you ask him. No,
Speaker 1: it was just you might as well have worn a
Speaker 1: cape around the office. Yeah, you know, well he may
Speaker 1: have a little else. So back in World War two,
Speaker 1: even before World War Tour, before the US centered the
Speaker 1: Second World War, Hitler had this great fantasy of sending
Speaker 1: New York City up in flames, like he really wanted
Speaker 1: to just destroy New York. And Werner von Braun, the
Speaker 1: guy who helped get America to the Moon, was working
Speaker 1: on a rocket program that could strike the United States
Speaker 1: from Europe. That was one thing never fully realized because
Speaker 1: the war came to an end before they could develop
Speaker 1: the right kind of missile. But they were working on it, yea.
Speaker 1: And they were also working on long range bombers they
Speaker 1: could fly out of Europe all the way to America's
Speaker 1: east coast and bomb. Yeah. Apparently Hitler used to literally
Speaker 1: sit around and watch like film footage of cities burning
Speaker 1: and like fantasizes about New York City. Crazy. Yeah, well
Speaker 1: he was pretty crazy, sure, but he finally realized that, like,
Speaker 1: if he was going to get New York, the best,
Speaker 1: most efficient, most at hand way to do that was
Speaker 1: to send saboteurs into the United States to infiltrate and
Speaker 1: do New York themselves. That's right, you know, terrorists essentially. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: the only thing that kept him from being considered full
Speaker 1: fledge just straight up terrorists is because we were formally
Speaker 1: at war with this country. So yeah, they were. They
Speaker 1: were considered officially spies and unofficially saboteurs. Yes. Uh, should
Speaker 1: we shout out the articles here? Yes, let's right off
Speaker 1: the bat. I read, well, I read a few. I
Speaker 1: read one on Damned Interesting, which was good. There was
Speaker 1: one you sent called World War two German saboteurs invade
Speaker 1: America in nineteen forty two. Yeah, that was on history Net.
Speaker 1: History Net, and I feel like there was one more.
Speaker 1: There was a Der Spiegel article. Oh yeah, that's one
Speaker 1: of um called Operation from Pastorious Hitler's unfulfilled dream of
Speaker 1: the New York in flames. Yeah, poor Hitler, I know
Speaker 1: his dreams failed. So uh, World War two hadn't been
Speaker 1: raging for long for the US when this happened. It
Speaker 1: was right after Pearl Harbor was bombed, and Hitler said,
Speaker 1: you know what, they think they're over there, They're a
Speaker 1: long way from us, so they probably feel pretty pretty safe.
Speaker 1: So let me undermine that and let me devise this plan.
Speaker 1: And it was originally going to be a wave of
Speaker 1: saboteurs like every you know, four to six weeks. They
Speaker 1: were going to be sending in small teams of terrorists
Speaker 1: slash spies to wreak havoc on the US, and thankfully
Speaker 1: it didn't work out that way, so it was kind
Speaker 1: of scrapped. Yeah, the the ob fair, I think that's
Speaker 1: how you pronounce it. You're the one who knows German
Speaker 1: up fair, Is that right? Yeah? So that was the
Speaker 1: UM the basically the sabotage unit of the German Military
Speaker 1: Intelligence Corps. And these guys had kind of perfected their
Speaker 1: craft with explosives and terrorism and all that jazz, yeah,
Speaker 1: in European theaters already in the war. And so they
Speaker 1: set up a school, a terrorist school, which supposedly these
Speaker 1: guys were trained in like jiu jitsu as well as explosives,
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. Yeah, and I'll bet it looked
Speaker 1: a lot like um enter the dragon in there, but
Speaker 1: with Germans, you know. Yeah. I wonder if they were
Speaker 1: training kung fu school on an island somewhere, but this
Speaker 1: is in the woods. I wonder if they in the
Speaker 1: Black forest perhaps, Yeah, I wonder if they were trained
Speaker 1: in pinuckle and movie watching and car buying. I think
Speaker 1: that just came naturally and rolling over and singing like
Speaker 1: a canary. So the ab there selected a man. His
Speaker 1: name was Walter Kapp or is that Cappy? Walter Kopp
Speaker 1: what Walter Kapp, who was a pudgy, bull necked man
Speaker 1: has described in the history article and the reason that
Speaker 1: they selected him to head up this operation, which Cap
Speaker 1: came to nickname his Operation Pastorius, which is named after
Speaker 1: Francis Daniel Pastorius, one of the early German immigrants to
Speaker 1: the United States who arrived in Philadelphia in sixteen eighty three.
Speaker 1: The reason they selected Cap for this operation was because
Speaker 1: he had lived in America for twelve years already, so
Speaker 1: he was was he understood America, how it functioned, what
Speaker 1: targets should be struck, that kind of stuff, And they said,
Speaker 1: select your teams yeah, and so he put a donkey
Speaker 1: on the wall and got a tale with a little
Speaker 1: pin on it. Right. Now, what he did was he
Speaker 1: did some research and he went through the records of
Speaker 1: something called the Auslin Institute. Yea, and they were big
Speaker 1: on getting Germans back to Germany, right, ones that had
Speaker 1: emigrated to the United States work out. Yeah, okay, So
Speaker 1: specifically the ones who were looking he was looking for
Speaker 1: ones who had been in the United States, yeah, in
Speaker 1: this case, and a lot of these people had been
Speaker 1: in what was called the boond or is it the
Speaker 1: bund I would say, it's a booned, the American boond,
Speaker 1: which is like the basically the Nazi sympathizers in the
Speaker 1: United States, right, And they would set up little shops
Speaker 1: all over the country. Yeah, and they would speak out
Speaker 1: against m. Franklin Roosevelt or speak in favor of fascism.
Speaker 1: And apparently they managed to get twenty thousand people at
Speaker 1: a rally at Madison Square Garden once by holding a
Speaker 1: Knicks game. Pretty much, I don't think the Knicks could
Speaker 1: even get twenty thousand people that come out in Madison Square.
Speaker 1: But they were so unpredictable and radical here in the
Speaker 1: United states that even the Nazi Party officially distanced itself
Speaker 1: from these guys. Yeah, officially. Unofficially they recruited from their
Speaker 1: ranks specifically for Operation Pestorious. Yeah, so what he found
Speaker 1: some some blue collar dudes. All but two of them
Speaker 1: had been Nazi Party members, which was a good start.
Speaker 1: Ford dropped off right off the bat, and that left
Speaker 1: him with what would be eight dudes, which they divided
Speaker 1: up into two teams of four, one leader on each
Speaker 1: side and the three dopes below them, with Cap at
Speaker 1: the head of the whole thing. Yeah, even though he
Speaker 1: didn't come over to the United States for the operation,
Speaker 1: he was just sort of running the training initially. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he was watching him do jiu jitsu, I guess.
Speaker 1: So so here in the hilarious Germans doing jiu jitsu
Speaker 1: in that really I don't think so. It just seems
Speaker 1: a little like, you know, neighborhood ninja camp kind of stuff.
Speaker 1: You know, Well, they had to train in some sort
Speaker 1: of hand to hand combat. Now they're saboteurs. They're not.
Speaker 1: They don't need to know that they're not. They're supposed
Speaker 1: to know how to blow up a bridge. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: what if like it caught in the middle, they got
Speaker 1: to like turn and run away jiu jitsu somebody down. Now,
Speaker 1: you just run if you're a saboteur. Well that's some
Speaker 1: foreshadowing right there. So I hear the players on one
Speaker 1: on Team one, we'll call it Team US. How about that?
Speaker 1: Is that one? Sure? Okay? On Team eints, you had
Speaker 1: the leader, George John Dash and he was thirty nine.
Speaker 1: He was the oldest guy and he I know, thirty nine,
Speaker 1: and he was picked because he was he was a
Speaker 1: smooth talker, and he was apparently just seemed very American,
Speaker 1: which was if you're gonna stick some Germans over there
Speaker 1: to to be saboteurs, it's probably good if they can
Speaker 1: pass themselves off as just regular good German Americans. Right.
Speaker 1: Plus also you have the added benefit of not having
Speaker 1: to teach them to speak colloquial English. Sure, um, and
Speaker 1: they already know the terrain, they know the culture. Where's
Speaker 1: Coney Island? Right? Ivanta hotdog? Exactly? Yeah? So they were
Speaker 1: all good, right? Yeah? Was that Count Dracula? Oh no,
Speaker 1: that was that was my German sabatur. So that's why
Speaker 1: they went with the guys who had already spent time
Speaker 1: in America. Plus they it also showed, um, a pretty
Speaker 1: significant loyalty to your homeland, the fatherland in this case. Yeah,
Speaker 1: where when war breaks out, you go back to where
Speaker 1: the war is being fought. Sure supported, Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. Yeah, so they're like selecting from the
Speaker 1: Ostlands Institute roles of emigrants who were also boond members.
Speaker 1: It seemed like a a just a knock it out
Speaker 1: of the park group of guys. Yeah. So, um, josh,
Speaker 1: he was. He actually did, like you said, served in
Speaker 1: the German Army in World War One, came to America,
Speaker 1: worked as a waiter, and then in nineteen thirty nine said,
Speaker 1: you know what duty calls, I'm going back home. The
Speaker 1: second guy on the first team, Ernest peter Berger. He
Speaker 1: was supposedly a smart guy, and he had an interesting
Speaker 1: story because he was he had long been a Nazi,
Speaker 1: since they said, as you know, as long as Hitler
Speaker 1: himself had been a Nazi. Yeah, he was part of
Speaker 1: the beer hall push. Yeah, he was a what you
Speaker 1: call as early adopter. He was a Nazism. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: really was. And he actually had fled Germany for the
Speaker 1: United States because he was afraid he was gonna get
Speaker 1: brought up on brawling charges. That's right. He liked to fight. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And he stayed there for about six years and then
Speaker 1: worked as a machinist in the Midwest, even joined the
Speaker 1: National Guard, the US National Guard, yeah, and became an
Speaker 1: American citizen yep. And then he went back after Hitler
Speaker 1: game power. Right. Well, he went back mainly because of
Speaker 1: the Great Depression, because oh is that right? Yeah, but
Speaker 1: I mean it coincided. But he was like, yeah, this
Speaker 1: place stinks now, yeah, and Hitler's in power, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go become a brown Shirt and rough up people on
Speaker 1: the street, which is what he did pretty much because
Speaker 1: he really did love to fight. And the brown Shirts
Speaker 1: were purged in the Night of the Long Knives by
Speaker 1: Hitler and his cronies. Yeah, and um Burger was it
Speaker 1: was Burger right. Yeah. He managed to not be killed
Speaker 1: during that purge. Yeah. So he was working with his
Speaker 1: buddy um Ernst room of the Stormtroopers like serious business. Right.
Speaker 1: Rome was actually killed during the purge. Oh yeah, they
Speaker 1: put apparently they put a pistol in his cell with
Speaker 1: him and gave him ten minutes to kill himself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he said, if if you want me dead, Adolph's
Speaker 1: gonna have to do it himself. And they came back
Speaker 1: and he was staying there, right, and Hitler's like, what
Speaker 1: is going on here? Um? And the guy was standing
Speaker 1: there with the shirt off, with his chest beard to him.
Speaker 1: Yeah supposedly, and they just shot him in the chess
Speaker 1: point blank. Yeah. And the head of the brown shoots
Speaker 1: went down. So that didn't work out for him, No,
Speaker 1: But Burger did survive this. Yeah, he did survive and
Speaker 1: went off to college. But then he wrote a a
Speaker 1: paper about the Gestapo that was not too favorable and
Speaker 1: he got sent to a concentration camp for his efforts
Speaker 1: for seventeen months. Right, And then when he was released,
Speaker 1: they said you can come out, but you have to
Speaker 1: go off with the army. Yeah, they harassed his wife.
Speaker 1: It was I don't know that he was the best
Speaker 1: pick right now that I think we've antagonized, yea, put
Speaker 1: thrown in prison and then forced into the army. Sure
Speaker 1: we also killed his boss, Yeah, harassed his wife. We'll
Speaker 1: trust him as a sabbitude as a team of one
Speaker 1: of eight, right, so Burger is the right hand man
Speaker 1: to dash his team on team team mites e I
Speaker 1: n z e I n z okay, and then there
Speaker 1: were other There were two other dudes, Heinrich heink right,
Speaker 1: it's a great name, and Richard queerin Yes, And they
Speaker 1: were a couple of machinists who, um, were a couple
Speaker 1: of machinists. They've been in America for a while, came
Speaker 1: back and and we're selected for this team. Yeah. Basically
Speaker 1: they went back to Germany started working at Volkswagen and um,
Speaker 1: you know, I guess we're probably eager to leap on
Speaker 1: a top secret job like this. It's probably appealing to
Speaker 1: these guys, you know. So that was Team ICE. We'll
Speaker 1: talk about Team It's yeah, right after this, you know,
Speaker 1: so Chuck tell us about the smiling faces on TEAMSVI, well, Josh.
Speaker 1: Teams FY was led by a man named Edward Curling
Speaker 1: or Edward. I guess who is I take it as
Speaker 1: the only competent person in this entire mission. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: seemed like it, right, kind of a little more than
Speaker 1: the rest. Yeah, comparatively speaking, he seemed like a criminal genius. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good point. So he was also one of
Speaker 1: had gone to America in nineteen twenty nine to work,
Speaker 1: married a German woman there and then they worked together
Speaker 1: as butler butler and cook for a little while, and
Speaker 1: then he said, you know what, I don't like you anymore.
Speaker 1: I think I wanted an American woman. So he did that,
Speaker 1: and then when the war broke out, he tried to
Speaker 1: sail to Germany. Right, So I'm not sure if he
Speaker 1: was a mastermind either, now that they think about it. Well,
Speaker 1: he showed a lot of initiative. Well, good point, and
Speaker 1: he was turned back by the coast Guard. But he
Speaker 1: finally made it to Germany in nineteen forty and he
Speaker 1: ended up working at the Ministry of Propaganda. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: guess with Girdels huh. Yeah, sure. And when he tried
Speaker 1: to sail to Germany that one time, he actually had
Speaker 1: a guy with him named um, was it Hermbert new Bauer.
Speaker 1: I believe I was a new Bauer on his boat. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he was on that crew, and so he would have
Speaker 1: been turned back as well. So he was a natural fit, right,
Speaker 1: and he knew each other and Curling actually recommended Herman
Speaker 1: Neubauer to be part of the team. He's like, he
Speaker 1: can hoist a sail. Yeah, what else do you need
Speaker 1: to know? He was in the boond who Cares that
Speaker 1: was the youngest member of his crew at twenty two
Speaker 1: was Herbert helped and he moved to the US when
Speaker 1: he was just five years old. And so I don't
Speaker 1: know that he was a great choice because he was
Speaker 1: practically American. Yeah, and you know he was also not
Speaker 1: so smart, or put it this way, experienced. He was
Speaker 1: not experienced, right, A little, a little green, a little
Speaker 1: wept behind the ears. And then the last guy, Werner Thiele,
Speaker 1: he surprised surprise as a member of the boond and
Speaker 1: he was working in a war plant. So just this
Speaker 1: weird hodgepodge rag tag group of guys were selected. Only
Speaker 1: two people well out of the whole original twelve or
Speaker 1: had been in the military. Yeah, this sounds like a
Speaker 1: movie in the making. Oh yeah, but it just if
Speaker 1: it would have had a great third act, it probably
Speaker 1: would already be a movie. Oh yeah, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. Yeah, it is lacking a third act. I
Speaker 1: imagine like when if someone had tried to develop this
Speaker 1: or like, this sounds great so far, it's going great,
Speaker 1: and then oh that's how it ends. Yeah, shelf it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so these guys are put together, they're sent to the
Speaker 1: obver school, Yeah, to learn jiu jitsu, and the oldest guy,
Speaker 1: George Dash is like low kick, low kick, oh my hip,
Speaker 1: yeah you know. Yeah. They were also studying like explosive
Speaker 1: techniques and right wiring, not just explosive jiu jitsu technique, right,
Speaker 1: but real explosive right yeah, wiring, detonation timers, all of
Speaker 1: this stuff. They got to go on field trips to
Speaker 1: power plants and bridges and canals and see like where
Speaker 1: the weak points were. And all of this took place
Speaker 1: over an intensive eighteen days of training. That's it. They
Speaker 1: got eighteen days of training. Yeah, and apparently Josh, the
Speaker 1: leader of Team EZ, wasn't even I read one account
Speaker 1: this said he basically kind of snoozed through most of it,
Speaker 1: which would go on to explain a few things later.
Speaker 1: It's hilarious. Yeah, eighteen days and you can't even stay
Speaker 1: awake to learn how to blow something up. Seriously, all right.
Speaker 1: On May twenty third, they were given their assignment and
Speaker 1: these were I mean, this was pretty smart. The assignments were.
Speaker 1: They had a good they had a good plan in place,
Speaker 1: small teams of dudes. Josh's team was assigned to destroy
Speaker 1: quite a few things hydroelectric plants at Niagara Falls makes sense.
Speaker 1: The Aluminum Company of America, the factory in Illinois, Tennessee,
Speaker 1: New York. Yeah, three plants, and the Philadelphia Sault Company's
Speaker 1: crylite plant, which apparently supplies raw materials for aluminum. Right.
Speaker 1: And the reason they wanted to go after aluminum was
Speaker 1: because aluminum production in the United States, that output was
Speaker 1: greater than all of Europe's both sides access hands or no,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. All of the axis is aluminum production put together.
Speaker 1: And aluminium is a very very valuable thing. During war.
Speaker 1: You used to make aircraft frames. You use it to
Speaker 1: make the interiors of ships. Apparently you use it for
Speaker 1: everything from like MRIs like the field ration, tin hands
Speaker 1: or well not tin cans, aluminum can. Yeah, but all
Speaker 1: of the stuff comes in handy and wheels. If you
Speaker 1: can sure pinwheels like the good ones. Yeah, if you
Speaker 1: put those, man, you can cut your finger off with
Speaker 1: one of those things. Yeah. If you can cripple aluminum production,
Speaker 1: you can put a serious thing in the wartime effort. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. It was a smart play. And then they
Speaker 1: are also told to bomb locks on the Ohio River
Speaker 1: between Louisville Kentucky and Pittsburgh. Yes, so disrupting transportation, sure,
Speaker 1: that would have been a huge deal. They would just
Speaker 1: strap a bomb a pack mule that was supposed to
Speaker 1: be pulling a boat along the canal and kaboom. So
Speaker 1: that's team mines. Yeah, team spy curling steam. They said,
Speaker 1: all right, you guys, we want you to concentrate on
Speaker 1: railroads because we saw during the American Civil War destroying
Speaker 1: railroads is a great way to crippling army. Sure, they blew.
Speaker 1: And I don't think that's where they got the idea.
Speaker 1: You know, it's long been a wartime thing to destroy railroads.
Speaker 1: I see Pennsylvania Railroad station at Newark, right, the Horseshoe
Speaker 1: Bend section of railroad track near Altoona, Pennsylvania, Chesapeake and
Speaker 1: Ohio Railroad parts of it, the New York Central Railroads,
Speaker 1: hell Gate Bridge locks and canals, and Saint Louis Cincinnati, Ohio,
Speaker 1: and the water supply system of New York right. And
Speaker 1: they were also told to carry out acts of general
Speaker 1: terrorism to scare people in general. Yeah, bombing Jewish own
Speaker 1: department stores, UM locker rooms at um train stations, just
Speaker 1: basically just foment like real fear and make Americans feel like, wow,
Speaker 1: America is being struck. Yeah, we're vulnerable, right, um. And
Speaker 1: so the guy said, okay, let's do this, and they
Speaker 1: they they shipped out on two different subs from Lorient France.
Speaker 1: U boats baby, this is Germany. Yeah, okayts U boats yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: They left on U five eighty four and U two
Speaker 1: O two and um they had each team had four boxes,
Speaker 1: three of like dynamite and other explosives, and then a
Speaker 1: fourth box of things like timers and um, detonators and
Speaker 1: wiring and all that stuff. Sausages sure, just in case
Speaker 1: they got a little hungry on the trail. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: was Germans after all. They also had a lot of money,
Speaker 1: roughly about a million dollars today um. At the time,
Speaker 1: each group had fifty grand and they needed this to
Speaker 1: travel and to live and to bribe people and pay
Speaker 1: folks off, right in cash. So they had yeah, what's
Speaker 1: equal to about a million dollars today in cash on
Speaker 1: them in nothing greater than a fifty dollar bill. It's
Speaker 1: a lot of money, yeah, like physically a lot of money.
Speaker 1: Each member was given nine thousand and five of which
Speaker 1: which is very funny. Like team leader is going to
Speaker 1: hold on to this and you can keep for yourself
Speaker 1: and your money belt and only carry like four hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty in your pocket, and that should be enough
Speaker 1: dough to carry out this plan, was the idea. Yep.
Speaker 1: And then the team leaders also got handkerchiefs. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: had the names and addresses and things of contacts invisible
Speaker 1: ink written on them. Yeah. So this is like a
Speaker 1: bona fide spy. Yespionage terrorism operation. Again, great movie in
Speaker 1: the making so far. Yep. So the and again I
Speaker 1: think you said before that like Hitler was planning on
Speaker 1: sending several waves or wave after wave. Apparently the schedule
Speaker 1: was every six weeks they were going to send one,
Speaker 1: one or two teams to the United States. Yeah, I got.
Speaker 1: I mean it was a really smart and scary plane
Speaker 1: because catching, you know, a tiny team of four guys
Speaker 1: who can assimilate as Americans or at least good German Americans,
Speaker 1: that's that's tough to catch. Yes, So Chuck, Yes, you
Speaker 1: two O two, which actually left two days after U
Speaker 1: five eighty four showed up off like fifty yards off
Speaker 1: the shoreline of Long Island and just frightening the thing about. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a German U boat fifty yards off of
Speaker 1: the shore of Long Island on June twelfth, nineteen forty two.
Speaker 1: It showed up about eight in the evening and it
Speaker 1: belches out its cargo of box of explode sieves and saboteurs,
Speaker 1: and the dudes um as they're rowing to shore, they
Speaker 1: put they were wearing like German military uniforms. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: didn't fully and this didn't make a ton of sense
Speaker 1: to me. Oh well, if you were caught in playing
Speaker 1: clothes behind enemy lines, the rules of war state that
Speaker 1: you can be shot on site, but if you're caught
Speaker 1: as a German marine, you're a prisoner of war and
Speaker 1: you have to be That was taking a chance. I
Speaker 1: would addressed as an American. No, I mean, like, I
Speaker 1: think that was smart. Yeah, I don't know. I would
Speaker 1: have addressed. I would have tried to assimilate, not been like,
Speaker 1: I'm a German marine. You're supposed to take me hostage, right,
Speaker 1: But I think, yeah, come on, let's go, I'm taking
Speaker 1: you hostage. Whereas if the guy had been like, you're
Speaker 1: a spy, I am allowed to kill you right here
Speaker 1: and now. Yeah, I just I don't know. I don't
Speaker 1: agree with that one, but hey, everyone has their own
Speaker 1: rules when it comes to saboteuring. Okay, so sabotaging, right, yes, sabotaging.
Speaker 1: That was just kidding anyway, And I've learned recently that
Speaker 1: that was of m that's that words of recent providence.
Speaker 1: Did you know that, like it didn't come into use
Speaker 1: until the beginning of like the twentieth century. That makes sense.
Speaker 1: I would have thought it was a fairly old word. Yeah, nope.
Speaker 1: Did we just think of sabotage or did we just
Speaker 1: start calling it that? Like, did they not use to
Speaker 1: sabotage back in the day. Yeah, I think they just
Speaker 1: started calling it that. Okay. So um, so this is
Speaker 1: Dash's team Teams Team mines and they show up on
Speaker 1: the shore and they're wearing again German military uniforms, which
Speaker 1: they took off really quickly, very quickly. Yeah. Once they
Speaker 1: saw that, you know, okay, we made it. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: operation has begun. They changed right, Yeah, they changed clothes
Speaker 1: and they started, uh I guess they put on there
Speaker 1: I love New York shirts and they started digging big
Speaker 1: holes in the beach to bury these munitions so they
Speaker 1: could come back as needed when they wanted to blow
Speaker 1: something new up. Yes, they can't just carry that stuff around, no,
Speaker 1: and they needed to just stash everything and go and
Speaker 1: cool out and make sure that no one was like
Speaker 1: onto him or anything like that, and then come back
Speaker 1: and get it, like you said, as they needed. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The plan was to meet up for the two teams
Speaker 1: to meet up in Cincinnati on July fourth for a
Speaker 1: baseball game, is what I'm imagining. Yeah, yeah, the Reds
Speaker 1: versus the Braves. I don't know where the Braves were then,
Speaker 1: probably Milwaukee, sure, Okay, I don't think they moved to
Speaker 1: Atlanta until the sixties. Yeah, but I was trying to
Speaker 1: think of Boston, but they were that was long before
Speaker 1: so the team in inst was changing. They just landed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they were in the midst of changing when they were
Speaker 1: discovered by a coast guardsman. Yeah. Well one of them
Speaker 1: was that Josh climbed over a dune and while the
Speaker 1: other guys were still bearing and changing their clothes, and
Speaker 1: he walked up and there was a coast guard dude,
Speaker 1: John Cullen, standing right there, and he was like, hey,
Speaker 1: what you're doing right basically, and the guy was like, oh, nothing, yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh he apparently was kind of handling things when
Speaker 1: Burger comes over, and Burger thought that so the team
Speaker 1: inz had been rowed to shore by two German sailors,
Speaker 1: and I guess Burger lost track of the German sailors
Speaker 1: and assume that they were still there, and that for
Speaker 1: some reason it was only Dash four guys plus the
Speaker 1: two right, and that Josh had climbed over the dune
Speaker 1: to talk to one of the sailors. Yeah. So Burger
Speaker 1: comes up and asks a question in Germany, and the
Speaker 1: coast guardsman, John Cullen, is like, why are you speaking German?
Speaker 1: We're at war with Germany. What's going on? Yeah, And
Speaker 1: at that point Josh tells Burger to get out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he said, you fool, go back to the others, right,
Speaker 1: And the guy was why, like what others? Wait a minute,
Speaker 1: And so Dash's story was that they were fisherman, stranded fisherman. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And before he got really suspicious clan, the guy from
Speaker 1: the coastguard said, well, if you guys are stranded fisherman,
Speaker 1: that's my job. We have a Coastguard like house, party
Speaker 1: house right up the beach. We just ordered some pizza.
Speaker 1: Come with me, you guys can eat some pizza and
Speaker 1: chill out, and Josh is like, well, uh, we don't
Speaker 1: have any idea on us. Yeah, we don't fishing permits either, right,
Speaker 1: we don't want to get in trouble. I was like, well,
Speaker 1: you're telling a guy from the Coastguard that, so you're
Speaker 1: in trouble first of all, but secondly that strikes me
Speaker 1: as weird. About that time, Burger comes up, asks his
Speaker 1: question in German, and Josh sees the riding on the
Speaker 1: wall and tells Um tells Collen, well, he says, do
Speaker 1: you have a mother? And Colin says yes. He goes
Speaker 1: do you have a father? Says yes, and Dash says, well,
Speaker 1: then I wouldn't want to kill you. Yeah, so how
Speaker 1: about I give you some money you can forget that
Speaker 1: this ever happened. And he tries to give him a
Speaker 1: hundred bucks and Colin said nope. Yeah, he says no,
Speaker 1: thank you, and he said He ends up giving him
Speaker 1: two hundred and sixty dollars and Cullin basically realized that
Speaker 1: something was going down and I just need to just
Speaker 1: take this money and act like I'm down with the
Speaker 1: take and get out of here. So he does. So
Speaker 1: he does. He scaddles and then oh, but not before
Speaker 1: this is very key piece. Actually, oh yeah, Josh grabbed
Speaker 1: his flashlight before he left and shined it on his
Speaker 1: own face and said, you will be meeting me in
Speaker 1: East Hampton sometime soon. Do you know who I am?
Speaker 1: And then guy was like, no, I don't know who
Speaker 1: you are. And he said my name is George John Davis,
Speaker 1: which was a lie. Well it was his real alias
Speaker 1: for the mission though, so like he actually gave him
Speaker 1: his real alias, and he said what's your name? And
Speaker 1: Cullin said Frank Collins, which was a lie. Which was
Speaker 1: a lie. Pretty quick thinking and um, basically he scrambled
Speaker 1: back and Josh came back over and was like little
Speaker 1: seeing their guys, I totally took care of it, right,
Speaker 1: should not be a big deal. Don't even worry about
Speaker 1: pay the guy two hundred and sixty bucks. Yeah, we're good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So everybody finished bearing these boxes, which they did, and
Speaker 1: um Colin ran off and went and grabbed some of
Speaker 1: his fellow coastguardsmen. By the time they got back, Team
Speaker 1: Ice had left. Yeah, they wentn't caught a train, but
Speaker 1: apparently and this is another thing, so the U boat
Speaker 1: that dropped off. Team Ice had grounded itself on a
Speaker 1: sand bar and was sitting there like trying to get
Speaker 1: back out to sea because Dawn was just rocked back
Speaker 1: and forth in your chair? Was that that's what it looked,
Speaker 1: was that the method they had all the guys in there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it just moved to the right, right exactly. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: finally the tide came in just enough for them to
Speaker 1: dislodge themselves and go back out to sea, just in time.
Speaker 1: But apparently um Colon and the other coastguardsman who came
Speaker 1: back caught sight of this U boat heading back out
Speaker 1: to sea. Yeah not good, right, Yeah, No German U
Speaker 1: boat off the host to Long Island just ran into
Speaker 1: some guys who are speaking German and tried to pay
Speaker 1: you off. And then now all of a sudden, in
Speaker 1: the moonlight, you can see the ghostly outlines of four
Speaker 1: freshly dug holes in the sand. Yeah, let's see what's
Speaker 1: in there. Yeah. I wonder if um I couldn't find
Speaker 1: I saw that about the boat being stuck, but I
Speaker 1: couldn't find if that was like, if they could have
Speaker 1: gotten away, you know, it could have all changed. They
Speaker 1: might not have been that suspicious I think that Cullen
Speaker 1: was he was on it appropriately suspicious. Yeah, he was
Speaker 1: definitely coming back, but seeing the U boat was just
Speaker 1: icing on the cake exactly. Okay, so the other dudes
Speaker 1: had hopped date. Well, they dug up the holes and
Speaker 1: they found the stuff and said, okay, this is a
Speaker 1: huge deal. Yeah, we just found a trove of explosives
Speaker 1: in German military uniforms buried on the beach like sixty
Speaker 1: miles from New York. Yeah, so toot sweet. By ten
Speaker 1: twenty three that morning, those boxes were in the office
Speaker 1: of New York City Police Captain John Bayliss, who then
Speaker 1: promptly got in touch with the FBI, and by noon
Speaker 1: that day, thirteen hours after they had arrived, the FBI
Speaker 1: had all that stuff in custody, and Jay Edgar Hoover said,
Speaker 1: there's a we need to get a blackout on the
Speaker 1: news so these guys don't get wise to this, and
Speaker 1: we need to get the largest man hunt in FBI
Speaker 1: history underway. And they did, and we will explore that
Speaker 1: and all the ways the FBI got some lucky breaks
Speaker 1: on this. Right after these messages, you know, all right,
Speaker 1: so Team iience, let's recap here. They are in Manhattan. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they go shopping at Macy's. Of course. Yeah, we've got
Speaker 1: a lot of cash. All they had with them was
Speaker 1: the clothes the civilian, the clothes they brought and all
Speaker 1: that cash. Yeah, that was it. Everything else is buried
Speaker 1: back in the beach, but is now an FBI custody
Speaker 1: unbeknownst to these guys. That's right. So they go shopping
Speaker 1: at Macy's. They split into They said, let's split up
Speaker 1: into pairs, because that makes sense. Kieran and Hank checked
Speaker 1: into the hotel Martinique Dash and Burger I went to
Speaker 1: the Governor Clinton hotel Governor Bill Clinton, and I don't
Speaker 1: think so. And unless he was named after the hotel,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, never know. That's why he always wanted to
Speaker 1: be governor. So apparently, um Dosh and Burger met. He
Speaker 1: summoned Burger to his hotel room up on a tall
Speaker 1: floor and opened the window and said, I've got a
Speaker 1: plan and I'm going to tell you about it. And
Speaker 1: if you're on board, you're on board. But if you're not,
Speaker 1: then one of us is leaving through the door. One
Speaker 1: of us is leaving through the window. He basically threw
Speaker 1: down the gauntlet to Burger to Burger, I, oh wow,
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that. Yeah, And so Burger he basically said,
Speaker 1: I would like to turn and sabboteur sabotage the sabotage
Speaker 1: right and go against Germany and because America is kind
Speaker 1: of great. So Dash was going to kill Burger if
Speaker 1: Burger didn't go along with it. That's what he said.
Speaker 1: And apparently Burger had the choice too, like or you
Speaker 1: can you can defeat you and throw you out the window,
Speaker 1: or you can triumph and be the living victor. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I think Burger was just on board. And they
Speaker 1: said that in this article that um Dash probably was
Speaker 1: telling the truth that he was. He was really this
Speaker 1: was his idea from the beginning. So here's the here's
Speaker 1: the question. Like, historically speaking, Dash has been seen as
Speaker 1: a genuine betrayer of this mission. Sure, but when he
Speaker 1: became a genuine betrayer of the mission is issues still
Speaker 1: according to this history and that article, either he knew
Speaker 1: it before they even landed, yeah, and that that is
Speaker 1: why he showed his face and gave his real alias
Speaker 1: to right John Colin on the beach, which makes sense,
Speaker 1: or his encounter with John Cullin on the beach rattled
Speaker 1: him enough that he was like, this is never gonna work.
Speaker 1: We're already We're already dead in the water. That's a
Speaker 1: quick turn. So now I'm going to go ahead and
Speaker 1: betray it. Yeah, I say that he was in on
Speaker 1: it from the beginning. That's what that's my feeling, because
Speaker 1: he was snoozing in spy school. Just I don't know,
Speaker 1: it seems like a really quick like they just land
Speaker 1: on the beach. Five minutes later he meets a guy
Speaker 1: and he's like, wait a minute, it's off. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: betray Germany. Right, it just seemed I don't know, a
Speaker 1: little too hasty. Well, maybe he had nerves of spaghetti. Yeah,
Speaker 1: cooked spaghetti. Even so, he says, here's the plan. On Monday,
Speaker 1: dash to burger Yeah, he said, on Monday, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go to the head. They closed the window by now, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think. So they went to dinner and everything was good,
Speaker 1: and he said, I'm gonna go to Uh, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go to Washington meet with j Edgar Hoover. That should
Speaker 1: be pretty easy to get that meeting the man himself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I hear. He wears nothing about a caper on the
Speaker 1: office and he said, you go back to the other
Speaker 1: two guys and just sort of occupy them for a
Speaker 1: little while while I'm going to DC and requesting a
Speaker 1: meeting with the FBI, the head of the FBI. Right,
Speaker 1: So Burger says, let's do this. Josh says, okay, it's Sunday,
Speaker 1: and Josh doesn't make his way to DC until Thursday morning. Yes,
Speaker 1: instead he goes So remember he was a waiter in America. Well,
Speaker 1: he called. He called the FBI first, at least, right,
Speaker 1: And the reason why he called firsts he was a
Speaker 1: little worried because apparently back in a training camp in
Speaker 1: the woods, cop Falter Cop had said, you guys don't
Speaker 1: need to worry, we have a man on the inside
Speaker 1: of the FBI. So Josh was worried that if he called,
Speaker 1: or if he just showed up at FBI headquarters he
Speaker 1: talked to that one guy right out of all the
Speaker 1: FBI guys, he would have that level of bad luck, which,
Speaker 1: from what I understand, that was something that was a
Speaker 1: good concern for her to have. So he called the
Speaker 1: New York Bureau first and said, I'm a German dude,
Speaker 1: I've got information for Jake Er Hoover tell him I'm coming,
Speaker 1: and then he hung up and he went to a
Speaker 1: club four waiters and then played pinuckle for like two
Speaker 1: straight days. Yeah, I get I think he was probably gambling.
Speaker 1: That's what I think too, because if I'm not mistaken
Speaker 1: with the math, he ended up with more money than
Speaker 1: he came with. Really, yeah, so he went and gambled
Speaker 1: with sabotage money. I think so, man, that guy is
Speaker 1: some serious colonies. He's pretty awesome. So eventually he said,
Speaker 1: all right, I gotta go to Washington. This peinuckle game
Speaker 1: has dried up. So he hopped on the Acela Express
Speaker 1: for Washington, Sure, which I highly recommend. By the way, man,
Speaker 1: train travel is awesome. Regional train travel is a delight,
Speaker 1: such a delight, And especially from Boston to New York.
Speaker 1: You just ride along the coastline there and it's just lovely.
Speaker 1: It is lovely. Sailboats and cape cold houses right on points,
Speaker 1: lobster rolls. Yeah, it's nice, good stuff. All right. So
Speaker 1: Josh has arrived by train. Finally by this point, Team
Speaker 1: Spy has landed, right. Yeah. They show up in Florida
Speaker 1: and they're like, let's do this for real. And I
Speaker 1: imagine ponto Vedra Beach in nineteen forty three. It was
Speaker 1: a pretty low key scenario for sure, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: I would think so. So they are twenty five miles
Speaker 1: south of Jacksonville. They bury their crates, no sweat, hop
Speaker 1: on a bus, go to Jacksonville. They split up from
Speaker 1: that point too, went to Cincinnati. Two went to Chicago. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and like I mean, they were no must There wasn't
Speaker 1: like any no one was calling the FBI like they
Speaker 1: were in it to win it basically. Yeah, why they
Speaker 1: should have done Team Ice should have done their recon beforehand.
Speaker 1: The U boat should have not pulled up next to
Speaker 1: a Coastguard station first of all. That would have been
Speaker 1: one thing. Yeah, because that Coastguard station was like half
Speaker 1: a mile away. Yeah it was there, all right, maybe
Speaker 1: that bad intel. So Josh gets to d C, checks
Speaker 1: into the Mayflower Hotel. Yeah, this is the same day
Speaker 1: that Caroling's group lands in Pontevedra. It's a big day,
Speaker 1: huge day, okay. And he in DC said all right,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call the FBI again because you gotta meet
Speaker 1: with Hoover. And he reached out to a Dwayne Trainer,
Speaker 1: and of course Trainer says, you know, this is probably
Speaker 1: not a legitimate call. We get these kind of weird
Speaker 1: calls all the time, but just in case, let's go
Speaker 1: pick him up. Yeah, let's let's see what's going on.
Speaker 1: It's a slow day at headquarters. Yeah exactly. So they
Speaker 1: go and pick up the German and they bring him
Speaker 1: to the Justice Department, and Dash said that he was
Speaker 1: basically bounced from agent to agent, every who's kind of
Speaker 1: a hot potato, nobody wanting to deal with him, And
Speaker 1: finally he convinced these guys enough to end up in
Speaker 1: the office of Mickey Ladd, who was running the man
Speaker 1: hunt for the spies, and the head of the Spies
Speaker 1: was now sitting in his office, Yeah, telling him he's
Speaker 1: the head of the spies, and he still didn't quite
Speaker 1: believe him until Dash said, oh yeah, well here, let
Speaker 1: me show you this and dumped out eighty four thousand
Speaker 1: dollars on Lad's desk, and Lad said, I'm so pleased
Speaker 1: you came in today, right, come with me? Yeah, So, Josh,
Speaker 1: here's here's his idea. Is I want to talk to
Speaker 1: Hoover himself because I'm going to be a hero and
Speaker 1: I might even get like a Medal of Honor out
Speaker 1: of this, right, Like, maybe Jager will have me over
Speaker 1: to his house for dinner. Yeah, who knows what could
Speaker 1: come of this? Take your tape parade, They threw those
Speaker 1: all the time back then. Yeah, so they the FBI
Speaker 1: gets him talking. He does get to meet Hoover briefly, sure,
Speaker 1: but a couple of other agents take his deposition, which
Speaker 1: lasts for thirteen hours. Yeah, before he finished, he had
Speaker 1: told them about Burger and where Burger was, and they
Speaker 1: went and picked up Burger. Yeah, he like, while he
Speaker 1: was still telling him the story, they were already on
Speaker 1: at Burger's hotel staking him out. Yep. So they before
Speaker 1: they picked up Burger, they were staking him out, like
Speaker 1: you said. And they watched Burger go meet Kieran and
Speaker 1: Hink and so they just arrested all three of them
Speaker 1: in all all of a sudden, they had team in
Speaker 1: custody within like a day of um dash walking into
Speaker 1: FBI headquarters. It didn't go so well for Team Ice. No, no,
Speaker 1: so when the team leader betrays you, yeah, like yeah,
Speaker 1: you're you're in trouble, your toast. So on June twenty second,
Speaker 1: Hoover wrote to FDR and said you know what's her.
Speaker 1: We've we've caught all the members of this group that
Speaker 1: landed on Long Island. Pretty great, huh, and we are awesome. Um.
Speaker 1: He didn't mention that the guy turned himself in and
Speaker 1: told him where everyone was, right, and so FDR was
Speaker 1: just thought that Hoover had done like a bang up job. Basically,
Speaker 1: he's like, wait, way to go, way to do your
Speaker 1: job exactly. He'd lied pretty much. So um, Dash had
Speaker 1: no real leads or anything about teams. Yeah, but he
Speaker 1: did have a handkerchief that had contacts on invisible ink,
Speaker 1: and surprisingly he hadn't blown his nose in it right
Speaker 1: at this point, but he couldn't remember how you were
Speaker 1: supposed to get the invisible ink to become visible. No. Luckily,
Speaker 1: the FBI had a crack team of lab techs on
Speaker 1: this thing, and they figured it out. And now all
Speaker 1: of a sudden they had the names and addresses of
Speaker 1: all of the German contacts for these teams right there
Speaker 1: in their hands, thanks to Dash. Yeah. Right, so they
Speaker 1: were all obviously staked out just waiting on Team HENS
Speaker 1: or I'm sorry, Teams VY to meet up with these people, right,
Speaker 1: which they did. But first teams FI did some other
Speaker 1: weird stuff like Herbert hopped. He was in Chicago, where
Speaker 1: again he'd lived since he was five, and Holpe decided
Speaker 1: that he would buy a Pontiac car. Yeah. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: went to his parents' house, right, I told his dad everything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: had his dad buy him the car? Yep. And he
Speaker 1: proposed to his girlfriend. He remember he had left during
Speaker 1: the war and he was an able bodied man over
Speaker 1: age eighteen. Yeah, And so the local draft board wanted
Speaker 1: to know where he was. So he drops by FBI
Speaker 1: headquarters to clear up his draft problem. Says, I'm back. Sorry,
Speaker 1: I've already registered with my local draft board. No need
Speaker 1: to track me anymore. I'm just an all American boy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And the FBI was like, yeah, sure, thank you for
Speaker 1: coming by, right, and then tailed them on the way out. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then he led them to at least one other
Speaker 1: team member, right. Yeah. And while this was going on,
Speaker 1: Curling and Werner Thiel went to New York and met
Speaker 1: up with a friend named Helmet Lena because they wanted
Speaker 1: to have sex with a lady. And so Lina hooked
Speaker 1: him up with his mistress, said here, have sex with her,
Speaker 1: and he said great, thanks, and he ended up traveling
Speaker 1: with that woman. Curling did, and within a couple of
Speaker 1: days after Dash surrendered. Um, they spotted Curling because they
Speaker 1: were trailing him at a bar where he met with
Speaker 1: Thel and they rested both of those guys. Right, So
Speaker 1: two down on team spy her about helped. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: three down at this point, right, Holped was taken down
Speaker 1: in Chicago. Yeah, the only one left at this point
Speaker 1: was Herman neubaua right, And Neubauer spent his time in
Speaker 1: was it in New York? I think he was in Chicaga. Okay,
Speaker 1: you're probably right. Um, he just went to the movies
Speaker 1: over and over again. Yep, that's what he did. He
Speaker 1: was apparently lonely, so he sought out some friends of
Speaker 1: his wife, whom he hadn't really met before. Yea, he
Speaker 1: told them everything, told him everything. He gave him his
Speaker 1: money for safe keeping, unbelievable, but kept enough to go
Speaker 1: to the movies a bunch. So basically he kept a
Speaker 1: dollar right and dollar fifty. Yeah, and then he was
Speaker 1: I think he'd just come back from the movies when
Speaker 1: the FBI picked him up. Right, yep, So Dash, remember
Speaker 1: is sure that like he's going to be feted as
Speaker 1: a hero that Jay ger Hoover is probably like thinking
Speaker 1: about him right then. Yeah, he's just like basically like
Speaker 1: Ralphie in a Christmas story, just daydreaming about like how
Speaker 1: he's going to be carried around on everyone's shoulders. He
Speaker 1: probably should have been so, I mean, he's the reason
Speaker 1: why this went south, because he said, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm trying, I'm siding with America. Sure, the thing is Hoover.
Speaker 1: He didn't care Jay ger Hoover. Not only did he
Speaker 1: not care, Hoover was taking the credit for all of
Speaker 1: this unraveled. See to bury this right, he couldn't let
Speaker 1: Josh be known as this guy who would come and
Speaker 1: given him this whole thing on a platter, or else
Speaker 1: Hoover would look like an idiot, and Josh might very
Speaker 1: well have been hailed as at least a slimy collaborate
Speaker 1: rather than a criminal. Yeah, after everybody was rounded up,
Speaker 1: the FBI arrested Josh, and Josh must have been quite
Speaker 1: surprised by this. Well, yeah, they arrested him, but they said, hey,
Speaker 1: just go along with us. You'll get a full presidential
Speaker 1: pardon after six months. Just sort of play along with
Speaker 1: the arrest and he was like, oh, okay, I see,
Speaker 1: so put me in the jail with the other guys
Speaker 1: so they don't know, yeah exactly. And it was like, yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: Well because that jibe with Hoover's plan to keep it
Speaker 1: all quiet. Still exact I was working out great for Hoover.
Speaker 1: It didn't work out great for Josh or the others.
Speaker 1: Chuck No. So Fdr wanted to make sure that he
Speaker 1: could get the death penalty and that this could be
Speaker 1: kept quiet. So he formed a military tribunal to try
Speaker 1: these guys. And it was the first one since Lincoln
Speaker 1: had been assassinated. Yeah, it was a big deal. So
Speaker 1: the prosecutor was Attorney General Francis Biddle, chief defense was
Speaker 1: Colonel Kenneth Royal. They defense argued initially for a civilian
Speaker 1: trial that was quickly scrapped and they said, no, we're
Speaker 1: going to move forward with a tribunal and held the
Speaker 1: trial out the Justice Department in Washington during the month
Speaker 1: of July nineteen forty two and basically said, we know
Speaker 1: the whole there's not going to be much of a trial, Fellas,
Speaker 1: we know everything because you told us everything exactly. You
Speaker 1: are coming here to sabotage and blow up our junk
Speaker 1: and you're in big trouble, right, And the prosecutors sought
Speaker 1: the death penalty, as expected, but it was up to
Speaker 1: FDR to decide when and where, and to do that,
Speaker 1: he had to have a transcript of the trial. And
Speaker 1: when he got this transcript of the trial, it became
Speaker 1: obvious that Hoover hadn't really done anything. Yeah. Appinently FDR
Speaker 1: never called him out on it in public, No, which
Speaker 1: was a nice thing to do, I guess, I guess,
Speaker 1: because that would have just been further embarrassment for like
Speaker 1: the whole country, you know. Yeah, So they kept that quiet,
Speaker 1: but at this point it was news all over the country.
Speaker 1: They weren't keeping a quiet with a press, and the
Speaker 1: American public was way in favor of the death penalty.
Speaker 1: In fact, there was an open letter published in one
Speaker 1: newspaper calling for them to be fed to Gargantua, the
Speaker 1: guerrilla at the Ringling Brothers circus, because that's fair to
Speaker 1: Gargantua too, Yeah, eat those Germans. Well. Instead, they electrocuted
Speaker 1: six of them on August eighth of the District Jail
Speaker 1: in Washington, DC. That's right, including Kurbert Hout, who was
Speaker 1: just like, I just wanted Upontiac. Yeah, I just wanted
Speaker 1: to see my parents. Right. Burger and Dash were spared
Speaker 1: the death penalty because they basically had a hard time
Speaker 1: proving in court that they didn't you know, fully intend
Speaker 1: to betray the operation. Yeah, exactly right. So they did
Speaker 1: not get electrocuted. They were sentenced Burger to hard labor
Speaker 1: for the rest of his life and Dash was given
Speaker 1: thirty years. But President Truman commuted their sentence, released them
Speaker 1: and deported them, had them shipped to um West, Germany. Yeah,
Speaker 1: West Berlin said, don't come back, Nope, get out. And
Speaker 1: the other guys were buried in a potter's field by
Speaker 1: the way and outside Washington, Yes, which is now the
Speaker 1: DC Municipal Water Treatment plant. Oh really yeah where they
Speaker 1: were buried. Yeah, just right now. They're part of the system,
Speaker 1: I guess. And so Dash and Burger go back to
Speaker 1: Germany and Burger starts like feeding the media the story
Speaker 1: is basically five years later and blame right and blames
Speaker 1: Josh for the deaths of these other six German patriots
Speaker 1: or who were saboteurs. Right, and dash Um tried to
Speaker 1: publicly clear himself. He first sawt to pardon in America
Speaker 1: so that he could come back. Yeah, he really wanted
Speaker 1: to get out of Germany. Yeah, I can imagine. And
Speaker 1: America said, no, we're not going to do that. We're
Speaker 1: not going to pardon you. We're still mad at you.
Speaker 1: Germany said we're mad at you too, and so he
Speaker 1: just kind of faded out of the public spotlight. Yep.
Speaker 1: He ended up dying in nineteen ninety two at the
Speaker 1: age of eighty nine. And I didn't see any follow
Speaker 1: up for Burger. For Burger, I think he wasn't quite
Speaker 1: as vilified as Josh was, right for sure. But that
Speaker 1: was not the last time the Germans sent saboteurs ashore.
Speaker 1: There was at least one other ill fated attempt in
Speaker 1: nineteen forty four, another German submarine. These are expensive boats, man, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they are really taking a massive risk to drop off
Speaker 1: a couple of saboteurs. But they did it again off
Speaker 1: of Maine, YEP in a snowstorm, and two former American
Speaker 1: residents German Americans were sent off under the main coast
Speaker 1: in a snowstorm. They were seen by a local boy
Speaker 1: scout using a compass during the snowstorm on the side
Speaker 1: of the road, and the boy scout was suspicious, so
Speaker 1: he traced their tracks all the way back to the
Speaker 1: shoreline when they come out of nowhere, and he's like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to call the police. So they scouts actually
Speaker 1: call these guys. Yeah, that's pretty cool. What's ironic is
Speaker 1: one of these German American saboteurs was a boy scout himself,
Speaker 1: so it was like boy scout on boy scout tattling
Speaker 1: wow um, and they got picked up immediately, and as
Speaker 1: far as everybody knows, that's the last time Germany ever
Speaker 1: tried that. Yeah. I think the idea was that Hitler Um.
Speaker 1: It was like this, this is embarrassing. Yeah, let's just
Speaker 1: focus on the rocket program. Yeah, we can't keep sending
Speaker 1: guys to the United States who immediately get there and
Speaker 1: start doing stupid things, right, giving themselves up, Yeah, going
Speaker 1: to see mom and dad, seeing him movies, Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: playing p knuckle. So that's it. That's the story of
Speaker 1: the time the Nazis invaded Florida and New York and Maine.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about that, check out
Speaker 1: history Net, check out damn Interesting, check out all sorts
Speaker 1: of stuff. Yes, just search it. You'll find all sorts
Speaker 1: of cool things on it. I would not look for
Speaker 1: the movie coming soon to a theater near you. No,
Speaker 1: the third act non existent? No, not really, No, it's
Speaker 1: just kind of a letdown. Yeah that an end with
Speaker 1: a bang. No ends with Germany being mad at them
Speaker 1: in America too. Let's see. I think I said Germany's mad.
Speaker 1: It just means it's time for listener mail. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: call this a cute our cutest youngest fan and it
Speaker 1: includes an audio clip. Yeah, hey guys, did you hear this? Yes,
Speaker 1: it's pretty great. Yea. My son, Archer is two and
Speaker 1: a half years old, just two and a half. We
Speaker 1: listen to podcasts together while I rock him to sleep
Speaker 1: at naptime and bedtime. Anytime he's tired, he says, Mommy,
Speaker 1: let's go Archer's room and listen to podcast. I usually
Speaker 1: rotate between Stuff you Should Know and other house stuff
Speaker 1: works a podcast. He's never seemed to have a prefer
Speaker 1: until about two weeks ago when I put another podcast on.
Speaker 1: He said, no, Mommy, not that podcast, just stuff you know,
Speaker 1: the red one. You guys are his favorite, which is
Speaker 1: fine with me, and I have even attached the voice
Speaker 1: recording of him requesting your podcast. It was not rehearsed,
Speaker 1: find you, It's just me asking him before his nap
Speaker 1: time today. That is from Shauna, and Shauna gave us
Speaker 1: permission to hear from Archer. So let's go ahead and
Speaker 1: play that clip right now. Okay, are you ready to
Speaker 1: take a nap? Yeah? I want? Do you want to
Speaker 1: listen to a podcast? Law? Okay? Which podcast? Stuff? Yeah? Okay?
Speaker 1: Ah wow, pretty cute, holy cow kid knows his stuff unbelievable,
Speaker 1: So Archer, if you can understand what's going on here
Speaker 1: about the sound coming out of the speakers. We know
Speaker 1: you don't have four memories, but hopefully this EPISOD so
Speaker 1: we'll be a documentation with it. That's right, Archer, So
Speaker 1: good luck in life. You are off to a great start.
Speaker 1: And now I'll take your nap a little buddy. Nice. Well,
Speaker 1: if you want to share with us how your cute
Speaker 1: kid loves stuff, you should know, we love hearing that, right, Chuckers,
Speaker 1: we do. You can tweet to us at sysk podcast.
Speaker 1: You can join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff.
Speaker 1: You should know. You can send us an email to
Speaker 1: Stuff Podcast at HowStuffWorks dot com and has always joined
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