A subject that has long intrigued historians is the flight of Rudolf Hess, the second man in the Third Reich, to England in 1941. His motives for the flight, his treatment in England and his death are subjects of great interest. The Gestapo conducted a thorough investigation into the Hess flight, but British files on what happened to Hess once in England and on his death are not available to researchers, nor are they ever likely to be.
Q Your people conducted an investigation into the Hess matter, didn’t they?
M A very thorough investigation, believe me. Hitler was in a terrible rage about this and he demanded that he be given the truth of the matter as quickly as possible. He had Hess’s aides put under arrest and wanted everyone, including the wife, interrogated without delay.
Q I think the question we all would like to know the answer to is whether Hitler had sent Hess to England to seek a negotiated peace so that Hitler could attack Russia. Is there any truth to that?
M No, none at all. Hitler had no knowledge of the flight in advance; neither did he instigate it or even approve it. He was stunned by it and realized the propaganda value it would have for the English.
Q Did Hess know about the attack on Russia?
M Yes, but Hess was not in the military picture, and there I think, lies the real reason for the flight. Hess is a mystic, like your Wallace, and was personally very loyal to Hitler. He was not a practical man at all and made no real efforts to maintain his position with regards to Hitler. As long as there was peace in Germany, Hess had no problems that he was aware of, although these existed for certain. I, of course, refer to his chief deputy, Bormann. This one was always seeking to climb up to the sun and he certainly had his connection with Hitler. But, as long as Hess was there, Bormann found his path to power blocked. You see, neither Hess nor Hitler enjoyed the detail work of the bureaucrat. I, on the other hand, am used to it and realize that it is the bureaucrat who works six days a week that can accomplish more than the brilliant politician who only works when he feels like it.
Bormann was very efficient and made life easier for Hitler and Hess, by tending to all the small details. Of course, as both of these men depended on his activities more and more, Bormann achieved a good deal of power. But not the kind of power he wanted. Bormann wanted to have immediate and direct access to Hitler at all times. As a functionary of Hess, he did not have this, so he began to scheme to remove Hess. He could not kill him because if Hitler found out, Bormann would have had a fatal heart attack within a week or died in a car crash. No, Bormann had to find another way.
The outbreak of the war gave him his opportunity. Hitler decided to run the war himself and began to spend most of his time at his headquarters with his generals. High Party leaders were not invited to headquarters except for occasional ceremonial functions, and so Hess found himself more and more out of the picture. With him, it was not a question of power but one of personal feeling. He deeply admired Hitler and felt rejected when he was no longer able to communicate with him on a regular basis.
Q Do you think Hess was in love with Hitler?
M A good point. It had occurred to me at one time, but I think it was a mental attitude, not a physical one. Hitler had the ability to attract people to him and many of these people worshipped him, almost literally. I was immune to this personality business, but I could see the effect Hitler had on most people. He never tried to mesmerize me, and in my case, I think he felt that an appeal to my professionalism was important and in this way, he was successful. But Hess was a Hitler worshipper and was suddenly cut off from his idol by the war. Now, Bormann saw a chance to get Hess to commit some kind of an act that would close the door between himself and Hitler.
Q Bormann was the force behind the flight?
M Yes, in a sense he was. You know that I detested Bormann, but I must admit that he was very patient and he could be very subtle when he wished to be. The prize was worth the wait to him. He began to work on Hess, who was a very untidy and emotional man, and finally convinced him that he could make a great coup by persuading the British to negotiate a peace settlement with Hitler.
You must be aware, of course, that Hitler was initially pro-British and actually wanted to make peace with them. That was before the bombing, of course. With Churchill in power, there was no chance to achieve this end, as you must realize. Churchill was not a sane man and was determined to eradicate Germany forever by any means he could find and at whatever cost to his country in capital and manpower. We undertook private conversations with the British in neutral countries like Sweden and Switzerland with Hitler’s consent, and actually, by his order. Their Foreign Office people were receptive. After all, Hitler was willing to make a peace treaty that took nothing away from England at all. Certainly, more reasonable than the peace treaty that Bismarck prepared for the French in the 1870 war and that was certainly more than reasonable. No, Churchill forbade any contact with us on the matter and it should have been evident to everyone in the Reich leadership that England under Churchill would never make any kind of a peace.
Bormann insinuated to Hess that Hitler had mentioned often in his presence that the man who could make peace with England would be worth twenty new divisions. I don’t know if Hitler actually said this, but it did reflect his thinking at that time.
Q Could Hitler have used Bormann to influence Hess?
M No. It would not have been necessary. All Hitler would have had to do to send Hess off to England would have been to ask him. Hitler was not that devious, but Bormann certainly was. And Hess saw this as a chance to bring a precious gift to Hitler and regain his personal position once again. I told you that Hess was not a practical man. Hitler did not reject Hess at all, but Hess saw it that way. I reviewed all the reports afterwards and it became very clear to me what had happened. But, there was no proof that Bormann had pushed Hess into this and after Hess left, he got the position and quickly consolidated it. Bormann now stood right behind Hitler and at this point, it was not a good idea to challenge him.
If I had had proof of a positive nature, I could have seen to it that Hitler knew but I did not. Afterwards, Bormann wanted to arrest everyone connected with Hess, including his wife, and put them away where they wouldn’t talk but Hitler wouldn’t hear of it and nothing happened. Bormann made initial problems for everyone connected with this but finally gave up and trusted to fear to keep people quiet.
If there had been no war, Hitler would have kept to his social schedules and these would have included old comrades like Hess. Therefore, Bormann would have had to try and find another way to get into power.
Q Then your analysis is that Hess felt himself out of the picture, was convinced by Bormann that the best way to get back into favor was to perform some spectacular deed?
M Yes. Hess was a pilot and to personally fly to England at some danger to himself and bring about a successful conclusion to a war Hitler did not want, would certainly have achieved his end. We all saw the triumphal return of Prien* to Berlin after he sank the Royal Oak in the Scapa Flow and I think that certainly this must have had an effect on Hess.
Q In what way?
M Hess saw, of course, that Prien received a great deal of attention for his act and Hess is a person who needed recognition from Hitler. It is obvious to me that Bormann made use of Hess’ insecurity to push him into leaving his post. Bormann saw Hess as an obstacle, a man who had been with Hitler since the War and someone on whose loyalty Hitler could depend. Given Hitler’s personality, he would have never gotten rid of Hess because Hitler was consistently loyal to his early adherents.
So, Bormann could only rise so high and no higher with Hess in the way and then the best thing to do, short of having Hess killed, was to get him to leave on his own. Hess was unstable enough to persuade him to do this. You see, these complicated things usually have a very simple foundation.
Q You know that Hess was very brutally treated by the British. He was physically abused and they even broke his leg.
M That doesn’t surprise me at all. You should see all of the papers we captured from the British murder-commandos at Dieppe. Killing unarmed prisoners, killing Frenchmen who might be friendly to us, putting poison in wells, killing children and making it look like we did it. No, nothing can surprise me about British brutality. And they put on such a face about being the saviors of liberty and democracy—and then go out and butcher the Irish or the blacks somewhere. And forcing the Chinese to take all the opium they were raising in India and turning that country into drug addicts. No wonder there were uprisings in China and that the Boxers began to slaughter Westerners in 1900.
If you draw a bill, you have to pay it one time or another. But Hess was absolutely earnest about trying to make peace with England, believe me. I have gone over all of his papers and reviewed the interviews we made with his wife, friends, aides and so on. Hess was motivated only by a desire to make peace and I am sure the British knew that when they broke his leg. Of course it was foolish because with Churchill in power, no kind of settlement could ever be reached. He bombed our cities and hoped we would retaliate, which Hitler did in time. And then he used this to get your country to help him.
But Hess is now in Spandau for the rest of his life which is a miscarriage of justice based on what I know about the affair. Then, of course, revenge was the sole motivation for the Nuremberg business and we both know that. It would have been less complicated if you had simply shot every government leader you caught rather than make up a faked trial. You have set an ugly precedent with that nonsense, believe me, and it will come home to haunt you. Suppose your country got into a war with Mexico and their partisans were all shot when captured. And this would not be a problem unless you lost the war.
Q There has been some debate about that issue and your point is well taken, but we digress from the Hess matter. Did Hess have knowledge of the impending invasion of Russia?
M Yes, he did. That was a primary worry for Hitler at the time: Would Hess tell them?
Q Apparently he did say something at the time. I understand that he was subjected to physical abuse to the point where his leg was broken. The British passed the information to the Russians, but we know that Stalin ignored it.
M What a wonderful commentary on Anglo-Saxon justice! Here is a man who makes a genuine attempt to achieve peace and he is beaten and eventually tried for war crimes and given a life sentence. Hess had nothing at all to do with the war and certainly was not involved in planning any part of it. He had nothing to do with the Jewish problem either, but he was seen as a Nazi and punished just for this. This reminds me of the fate of those Germans who tried to stop Hitler and went to the British for help. Churchill simply turned their names over to my people and they died for their belief in British justice.
The Hess flight is not a mystery to anyone who knew about it. Hess was a harmless eccentric with a desire to do good and look what it cost him. I know that Bormann tricked him into it, but I doubt if Bormann realized what would happen to Hess in the end. I don’t think that would have bothered Bormann, but Hitler would have had Bormann’s head if he had ever found out. We can now expect to see many books about Hess from retired intelligence agents and journalists who like to eat.
Q The date of the Russian invasion was certainly known to both the British and us, you know.
M How could you keep something that enormous a secret? That’s like trying to hide a cow in your bedroom cupboard. The only way we could try to conceal huge troop movements was to try to convince Stalin that this was a show to lull the British into a sense of security. Did you know that we actually printed up thousands of maps, guides and so on for the invasion of Britain? And of course left them around for Hitler haters and various agents to find. It did convince Stalin in the end and we were able to smash him flat in the first year of the campaign there.
Q Mr. Dulles was of the opinion that the Hess flight was a sacrifice to give false information to the British. M You know what I think of the intelligence of your friend Dulles. I should tell you about the time that my Swiss friends and I were having a very nice lunch at a restaurant in Bern when one of my men rushed in to tell us that Dulles and his staff were coming for lunch. We all had to run out the back door and, how amusing, Dulles sat at our table. I kept his seat warm for him. Did you know their housekeeper, by the way?
Q Yes, I did.
M Such an efficient woman. Sold everything to us and the Russians. I think she even tried to sell the dinner plates to the gypsies.
Q There are no gypsies in Switzerland.
M Maybe she sold them to the bears at the Bern zoo.
* Gunther Prien, commander of the U47 that penetrated the heavily-guarded anchorage of the British fleet and sank the battleship Royal Oak.
World History
