W.E.B.
GRIFFIN
THE
SOLDIER
SPIES
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED UNDER THE PSEUDONYM
ALEX BALDWIN
G. P. PUTNAMS SONS
NEW YORK
THE SOLDIER SPIES
A L S O B Y W. E . B . G R I F F I N
H O N O R B O U N D
H O N O R B O U N D
B L O O D A N D H O N O R
B R O T H E R H O O D O F WA R
B O O K I : T H E L I E U T E NA N T S
B O O K I I : T H E C A P TA I N S
B O O K I I I : T H E M A J O R S
B O O K I V: T H E C O L O N E L S
B O O K V: T H E B E R E T S
B O O K V I : T H E G E N E R A L S
B O O K V I I : T H E N E W B R E E D
B O O K V I I I : T H E AV I ATO R S
T H E C O R P S
B O O K I : S E M P E R F I
B O O K I I : C A L L TO A R M S
B O O K I I I : C O U N T E R AT TAC K
B O O K I V: B AT T L E G RO U N D
B O O K V: L I N E O F F I R E
B O O K V I : C L O S E C O M B AT
B O O K V I I : B E H I N D T H E L I N E S
B O O K V I I I : I N DA N G E R S PAT H
B A D G E O F H O N O R
B O O K I : M E N I N B L U E
B O O K I I : S P E C I A L O P E R AT I O N S
B O O K I I I : T H E V I C T I M
B O O K I V: T H E W I T N E S S
B O O K V: T H E A S S A S S I N
B O O K V I : T H E M U R D E R E R S
B O O K V I I : T H E I N V E S T I G ATO R S
M E N AT WA R
B O O K I : T H E L A S T H E RO E S
B O O K I I : T H E S E C R E T WA R R I O R S
W.E.B.
GRIFFIN
THE
SOLDIER
SPIES
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED UNDER THE PSEUDONYM
ALEX BALDWIN
G. P. PUTNAMS SONS
NEW YORK
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and incidents are either the product of the authors
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual events or
locales or persons, living or dead,
is entirely coincidental.
G. P. Putnams Sons
Publishers Since 1838
a member of
Penguin Putnam Inc.
375 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
Copyright © 1986 by W.E.B. Griffin,
originally published under the pseudonym Alex Baldwin.
First G. P. Putnams Sons edition 1999.
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not
be reproduced in any form without permission.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Griffin, W.E.B.
The soldier spies / by W.E.B. Griffin.
p. cm.
Originally published under the pseudonym Alex Baldwin.
ISBN: 1-4362-1982-5
1. World War, 19391945Secret ServiceUnited States
Fiction. 2. United States. Office of Strategic Services
Fiction. I. Title.
PS3557.R489137S55 1999
98-33260 CIP
813'.54dc21
B O O K D E S I G N B Y J E N N I F E R A N N D A D D I O
For Lieutenant Aaron Bank, Infantry, AUS, detailed OSS
(later, Colonel, Special Forces)
and
Lieutenant William E. Colby, Infantry, AUS, detailed OSS
(later, Ambassador and Director, CIA)
They set the standards, as Jedburgh Team Leaders
operating in German-occupied France and Norway, for
valor, wisdom, patriotism, and personal integrity
that thousands who followed in their steps
in the OSS and CIA tried to emulate.
THE SOLDIER SPIES
I
[ONE]
Marburg an der Lahn, Germany
8 November 1942
On the night of November 7, Obersturmführer-SS-SD Wilhelm Peis, a tall,
pale, blond man of twenty-eight, who was the senior Sicherheitsdienst (SS
Security Service) officer in Marburg an der Lahn, received the following
message by Teletype from Berlin:
YOU WILL PLEASE TAKE ALL NECESSARY STEPS TO ENSURE THE SECU-
RITY OF REICHSMINISTER ALBERT SPEER AND A PERSONAL STAFF OF
FOUR WHO WILL MAKE AN UNPUBLICIZED
VISIT TO THE FULMAR ELEK-
TRISCHES WERK AT MARBURG 8 NOVEMBER. THE REICHSMINISTER WILL
ARRIVE BY PRIVATE TRAIN AT 10:15 AND DEPART IN THE SAME MANNER
AT APPROXIMATELY 15:45.
The message from Berlin seemed more or less routine to Peis, and he at
first treated it as such until early in the morning of the eighth when
Gauleiter Karl-Heinz Schroederin a state somewhere between chagrin
and panicburst into Peiss sleeping quarters (Peis was not in fact asleep)
and pointedly reminded him that not only had Speer taken the place of Dr.
Fritz Todt as head of the Todt Organizationin charge of all industrial pro-
duction, military and civilianwhich made him one of the most powerful
men in Germany, but that he was a personal friend, perhaps the closest per-
sonal friendof the Führer himself.
The intensity of Schroeders concern impelled Peis to double his efforts
on behalf of welcoming the Reichsminister, and he rounded up half a dozen
Mercedes, Horch, and Opel Admiral automobiles to carry Speer from the
railroad station to the Fulmar Electric Plantor wherever else he might
wish to go. He canceled all leave for the police and the SD. And he dressed
in a new uniform.
2
W . E . B . G R I F F I N
By this time Peis was less motivated by the concerns of the Gauleiter
than by more pressing and personal concerns of his own:
The Reichsminister would certainly be accompanied by a senior SS offi-
cerat least an Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant Colonel) and possibly
even an Oberführer (Senior Colonel). If this officer found fault with his se-
curity arrangements for Reichsminister Speer, Peis could start packing his
bags with his warmest clothes. There was always a shortage of Obersturm-