Infiltration of agents to Ireland
The first agent recruited for the mission was Christian Nissen, aka Hein Mueck. In June 1940 he had been called to the Sabotage School at Brandenburg and asked to find a boat suitable for transporting three agents to Ireland. Nissen had served in World War I aboard the Imperial German Navy full-rigged ship Melpomene. Melpomene had been captured by the Royal Navy 100 miles (160 km) west of the port of Queenstown, now Cobh, in County Cork. He was interned first at Templemore, then in Oldcastle, County Meath, and finally on the Isle of Man, so Nissen was familiar with the area.
Nissen selected Soizic, a luxurious 36-foot (11 m) yacht from the harbour in Brest Bay for the voyage. The boat was fitted out like a French fishing vessel and had previously belonged to the French military attaché in Bern. Soizic was missing its propeller, but Nissen decided that the vessel could make it to Ireland under sail alone.
The three men selected for the mission were two South African Germans, Herbert Tributh and Dieter Gärtner, and Indian national Henry Obéd. Their mission was to make their way to England to engage in espionage activity. Tributh and Gärtner were both students, and neither spoke English well. Obéd was to act as their guide and interpreter. Obéd passionately hated the British and had worked for the Abwehr before the invasion of Belgium after being recruited by Kurt Haller. He had not performed as expected in an aborted mission to sabotage Royal Navy ships stationed in Belgium. A late addition to the crew was made on the day of departure when a Breton fisherman appeared to aid Nissen in navigation.
Soizic departed on 3 July 1940, bound for Fastnet Rock, Baltimore Bay, County Cork. The vessel flew the French tricolor. On the third day out, 45 miles (72 km) west of Fastnet Rock, two Royal Navy Town class cruisers, were spotted on the horizon. A British seaplane patrolling the area buzzed the yacht, but Soizic continued unmolested to Baltimore Bay where Nissen awaited nightfall.
Capture of agents
The three agents boarded a dinghy and landed on the shore on 7 July 1940 without being challenged. The landing took place in the area of Traspaleen Sound, Castletownshend. They were carrying suitcases filled with Abwehr-supplied equipment, and were expected to split up immediately and attempt infiltration to Britain. They received no orders to contact the resident German liaison to the IRA – Captain Hermann Görtz – or the German Legation in Dublin.
Later that day, the three men, still travelling together, asked some locals for the fastest way to get to Dublin. On being directed to Skibbereen, the three men took a bus there and then hitched a lift to Drimoleague. They were then apprehended by the Garda Síochána (Irish police) trying to take a bus to Cork. They were asked to allow their luggage to be inspected and who they were. The agents claimed they were sight-seeing students, but were unable to verify their statements further. They were arrested, and the arresting officers called Dublin for assistance. Special Branch officers, dispatched to interview the men, quickly established they were foreign agents. They did this, most likely, by searching their luggage which was found to contain:
- Eight incendiary bombs: each eight ounces in weight, made of cylindrical paper tubes filled with thermite.
- Four tins of gun cotton (nitrocellulose) to a total of 102 ounces. Each tin was labelled 'Carres French Peas'.
- Six No. 8 detonators, concealed in wooden containers disguised as fishing reels.
- Six lengths of safety fuse, two reels of insulating tape, and two cutting pliers.
- Currency totalling £829.
Each of the men was sentenced to seven years hard labour.
The Abwehr II diary entry for 18 July 1940 recorded:
Message received from Dr. Hempel [head of the German Legation in Dublin, Eduard Hempel] that agents landed in operation Lobster I have been arrested. Equipment provided incriminating evidence. By director's decision further sabotage acts against England are not to be made via Ireland but direct against England.
Hempel bitterly complained to his seniors about the botched operation. Firstly, he had been entirely unaware of it. Secondly, he was concerned about how it might affect fragile German-Irish relations. Hempel was right to be concerned; the operation had increased the fears of Irish Military Intelligence G2 Branch and saw the beginning of co-operation between them and MI5 throughout the rest of the war.
Upon his return to France, Nissen informed the Brest Amt (regional Abwehr office) that he had successfully completed his mission. He then went to north-western Brittany, where he would wait until called on for his next mission to Ireland, Operation Lobster II.
Plan Kathleen, sometimes referred to as the Artus Plan, was a military plan for the invasion of Northern Ireland by Nazi Germany, sanctioned in 1940 by Stephen Hayes, Acting Irish Republican Army (IRA) Chief of Staff.
Operation Green often also referred to as Case Green or Plan Green, was a full-scale operations plan for a Nazi German invasion of Ireland planned by an unknown German officer known by the alias "Hadel" in support of Operation Sea Lion, the invasion of the United Kingdom, during World War II. Despite its detailed nature, Operation Green is thought to have been designed only as a credible threat, a feint, not an actual operation. Plan W, a planned occupation of all of the Free State by the British Armed Forces, was drafted by the British military in secret liaison with the Irish government to counteract any German invasion.
The Emergency was a state of emergency in Ireland in the Second World War, throughout which Ireland remained neutral. It was proclaimed by Dáil Éireann on 2 September 1939, allowing the passage of the Emergency Powers Act 1939 by the Oireachtas the following day. This gave sweeping powers to the government, including internment, censorship of the press and correspondence, and control of the economy. The Emergency Powers Act lapsed on 2 September 1946, although the Emergency was not formally ended until 1976.
Stephen Hayes was a member and leader of the Irish Republican Army from April 1939 to June 1941.
Seán Russell was an Irish republican who held senior positions in the IRA until the end of the Irish War of Independence, and was chief of staff from c. 1938 to April 1939. It was under Russell's leadership that the IRA began the Sabotage Campaign, in which the group began bombing civil, economic and military infrastructure in the United Kingdom, primarily England, between 1939 and 1940. Following this, Russell actively collaborated with the Germans, personally spending 3 months training in Germany in the use of explosives. Russell died returning to Ireland aboard a Kriegsmarine U-boat following a sudden stomach illness and was subsequently buried at sea.
In 1940 the Germans decided to send agents and saboteurs to infiltrate Britain from Norway and northern France. This plan was given the codename Operation Lobster. It remained in place despite the collapse of plans for the invasion of Britain in Operation Sea Lion.
Operation Seagull was an Abwehr II/Brandenburger Regiment-sanctioned mission launched in September 1940. The object of the mission was to infiltrate the UK in preparation for Operation Sea Lion.
Operation Seagull I was an Abwehr II sanctioned mission devised in May 1942. The plan was the brainchild of Kurt Haller and an expert from Abwehr I-Wi (economic). The plan envisioned the use of an Abwehr agent to sabotage the North Scottish power station at Fort William.
Operation Seagull II was an Abwehr II. sanctioned mission planned in June 1942 as a refinement of Operation Seagull I. The plan envisioned in Seagull II was to use an Irish Abwehr agent ("V-Manner"), who would parachute into the area of south-east of Ballycastle in Northern Ireland, recruit a sabotage team from any willing IRA personnel in the area, and attack important "targets of opportunity" in the immediate vicinity. Both operations were to be controlled by radio and with each sabotage team in Ireland and Scotland liaising with each other via radio contact.
Operation Dove also sometimes known as Operation Pigeon, was an Abwehr sanctioned mission devised in early 1940. The plan envisioned the transport of IRA Chief of Staff Seán Russell to Ireland, and on the arrival of Frank Ryan in Berlin three days before the launch of the operation, it was also decided to transport him during the operation.
Operation Osprey was a plan conceived by the German Foreign Ministry and Abwehr II. mid-1942. The plan was an enlargement of Operation Whale. Planning took place in the context of American troops landing in Northern Ireland 26 January 1942, and Hitler's immediate fears surrounding this.
Plan W, during World War II, was a plan of joint military operations between the governments of Ireland and the United Kingdom devised between 1940 and 1942, to be executed in the event of an invasion of Ireland by Nazi Germany.
Friesack Camp or Camp Friesack was a special World War II prisoner of war camp where a group of Irishmen serving in the British Army volunteered for recruitment and selection by Abwehr II and the German Army. The camp was designated Stalag XX-A (301) and located in the Friesack area, Brandenburg region. The training and selection by Abwehr II and the German Army occurred during the period 1940–1943.
John Codd was an Irish-born British Army corporal during World War II, who went on to serve in the German Intelligence service (Abwehr) and the Sicherheitsdienst, the foreign intelligence arm of the SS.
The Irish Republican Army (IRA), a paramilitary group seeking to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and unify Ireland, shared intelligence with the Abwehr, the military intelligence service of Nazi Germany, during the Second World War.
Operation Whale was the name of two separate German Intelligence (Abwehr) plans conceived in 1940.
Operation Mainau was a German espionage mission during the Second World War. It was sanctioned and planned by the German secret service (Abwehr) and executed successfully in May 1940. The mission plan involved inserting Abwehr agent Hermann Görtz into Ireland by parachute.
Operation Sea Eagle sometimes referred to as Operation Dove II was a German Foreign Ministry plan conceived in May 1941 after the collapse of planning around Operation Whale.
Günther Schütz was a German citizen who worked for German Intelligence (Abwehr) during World War II, he was deployed to Ireland, however, due to being parachuted into the wrong location he was apprehended by Irish police, and spent much of the rest of the war in prison, bar a brief period on the run after escaping from prison and failed to be evacuated to France.
Christian Nissen aka Hein Mück was a German sailor and yachtsman, who served with Nazi Germany's Abwehr and its special forces, the Brandenburgers in World War II.
