GEN. GEHLEN'S CAREFUL SHIFT TO THE ALLIES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200510001-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Sequence Number: 1
• Content Type: NEWSPAPER CLIPPING

Approved For Release 2006/(QBIt 350F 000200510001-7
11 JUNE 1972
STATINTL
" _ [[ II ? the Russians have eliminated China as a
it world power.
General Gelilen's book is a work of- self
0 c justification rather than the spy thriller th
r"P-5 CS advance notices promised (will the real Mar-
tin Bormann please stand up?). Put they are
worth reading as a lesson in the very real
problems of intelligence chiefs. STAI
Allen Dulles once said.to me that the publi-
cation of the Gehlen memoirs would com-
THE SERVICE: The Memoirs of General Rein- promise security, but there is nothing in this
hard Gehlen. Translated by David Irving. book that compromises anything except its
World $10 author. And .one of Dulles' British count-
erparts, Major General Sir Kenneth Strong,
told me at the same time that such a publica-
tion would do no harm because most of what
QJ( )J.tn ould_ cll_.us~v town
A week or two before the European. Phase -BUT THESE MEMOIRS do reveal the tin-
of World War If came to its formal close, I already. `
was 1 _ .
at an airhase in Lsch4vege, Germany, as compromising nature of its alltltoT'n anti-
an intelligence of"cer. Watching for a special Communist convictions.
reconnaissance n nission to return to base, I In the same exchanges of correspondence
was surprised to- see a German Junkers and views, Gehlen himself said that ho could
Transport flying i;r low from the east, wheels not publish because what he would say could
down for a landir;7? Our antiaircraft batteries only expose him and his family to rE.al dan-
were surprised, too, or asleep, because none per of venge.ance~t, fPparently his disliko for
fired at the enemy aircraft. th3 "Ostpolltik" of the present German gov-
I'lia plane was permitted to land, tu- errinient of Willy Brandt has Prompted 1-111-a to
'harmed, but armed soldiers surrounded the take this risic, If risk it is.
occupants as the. dismounted from the craft In his intn duction, George Bailey calls the
and took their] into custody. We learned on General "a specialist In the salvaging laid
Interrogation that they were high-ranking safeguarding of institutions." 1He certainly
German officers from the Russian front and salvaged and safeguarded the ono Institution
had come to volunteer their services to us In he created. it is unfortunate that too much of
what they were convinced would be our ap- Gehlen'a own book, unlike the others on the
preaching war with the Russians. same subject, is devoted less to that institti-
Just about that same time, General Rein- tion, the Gehlen "Org," than to the currently
hard Gehlen, who had been in charge of Ger- unfashionable ideas behind its creation.
man intelligence in the east, was busy trans-
prorting two.truckloads of his files and his K. S. Giniger is president of Consolidated
staff to 'a hideout on the Austrian border 13001 2,
about 300 miles to the south. IIis, idea was
exactly the same. And his extensive files on
the Soviets gave him a bit more bargaining
.power than his fellow officers to the north.
HIS MEMOIRS tell the story of how he par-
layed his convictions about the inevitability of
Allied-Soviet conflict and his small staff and
collection of file cabinets into an intelligence
empire which first operated as a' European
branch of the CIA and then became the oUlclal
foreign intelligence service of the new Feder-
al Republic of Germany. And, although 77
years have passed since that armed conflict
with the Soviets was a matter of days, lie has
not changed his opinion about "the ultimate MOR~ICDF
clash with the United States of America." But
now, he writes, it won't cone until l980, after
Approved For Release 2006/06/19: CIA-RDP88-0135OR000200510001-7