CCHQ Edward Ruff reviews Mark Riebling "Church of Spies"

Contemporary Church History Quarterly

Volume 21, Number 4 (December 2015)

Review of Mark Riebling, Church of Spies: The Vatican’s Secret War against Hitler (New York: Basic Books, 2015), 375 Pp. ISBN 9780465022298.

By Mark Edward Ruff, St. Louis University

That Pope Pius XII was involved in several failed plots to kill Hitler has been publicly known since the 1960s, if not since the close of the Second World War. But there have been few investigations into the actual cloak and dagger. Mark Riebling’s methodically-researched detective story, cast in the genre of a thriller, deserves widespread attention for the light that it sheds on this clandestine world of intrigue and terror in which the pontiff played a central role.

In the detail given to the spy rings operating out of the Vatican, Riebling’s account goes far beyond earlier accounts like those of the American scholar, Harold Deutsch. It adduces evidence from published documentary collections, state, church and intelligence archives in Britain, Germany, Poland and the United States as well as the extensive interview transcripts found in Harold Deutsch’s papers in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. In light of the fragmentary nature of the evidence and the sheer volumes of conspirators, adversaries and agendas, this research is one that only a historian of intelligence could have pulled off so compellingly. Shaping the contours of this book is Riebling’s broad range of experiences as an editor for Random House, security expert and terrorist analysis. This is simply the finest work on the subject in print.

At the heart of Riebling’s sleuthing are three plots in which Pius XII served as an intermediary between German plotters and British diplomats with whom he held midnight meetings. The Vatican, he makes clear, was one of the world’s oldest spy services. He tells how Pius XII had Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of the radio, secretly install a secret audio recording system. Such technical expertise notwithstanding, all three plots were unsuccessful or aborted. In late 1939 and 1940, German generals were supposed to assassinate Hitler, but both they and the British got cold feet. In 1943, two bottles of cognac filled with explosives failed to detonate on board Hitler’s airplane. In 1944, Stauffenberg’s bombs only wounded Hitler. Riebling describes the unraveling of these plots and their aftermath, a gruesome litany of interrogation, torture and execution.

In many ways, however, the star of the show is not the pontiff but a Bavarian lawyer and future co-founder of the CSU, Josef Müller. Pius himself features in less than half of the chapters; it is the world of the plotters, and most notably Müller, that takes center stage. From his home in Munich, Müller was one of the masterminds, a courier bringing reports of Nazi persecution of the churches to Robert Leiber, SJ and Monsignor Ludwig Kaas, an influential German Jesuit and the former Center Party leader residing in the Vatican. At the same time, Müller, though his base in the Abwehr, the military intelligence branch of the Wehrmacht, developed strong ties to well-known plotters like Wilhelm Canaris, Alfred Delp, SJ and Hans Oster, all of whom perished following the failure of the assassination plot of July 20, 1944. True to its genre as a historical thriller, this book closes with a final revelation, how Müller, languishing in concentration camps, was given a last-minute reprieve from the gallows.

Riebling makes it clear that this is largely a Catholic story, the Protestant theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer serving as the lone exception. The Catholic plotters quickly discovered that they could not persuade Lutherans in the highest ranks of the army and church to go against centuries-old traditions of obedience to state authority, those anchored in Romans 13 and Luther’s doctrine of the two kingdoms. Riebling somewhat mistakenly attributes these same understandings to Calvinists, claiming that Calvin too deferred to state authority. In reality, Calvinists had historically proven to be far more inclined to resist unjust political authority under the maxim from Acts 5:29 that “we ought to obey God rather than man.” But even so, the resistance front was gradually become ecumenical, a part of cooperation that would infuse the founding of the interconfessional CDU in 1945.

What is missing from Riebling’s account is a discussion of how credible his sources are. What might the motives of the postwar storytellers have been in recounting their role in these conspiracies and their failures? Almost by definition, writing the history of such conspiracies runs up against two fundamental problems. For obvious reasons, clandestine plotters tend not to leave behind written records such as letters and diaries. They destroy them or better yet, never commit their plans to paper. Interrogation transcripts produced by their captors are typically unreliable, frequently the product of torture and deprivation. Even worse: ex-intelligence agents are often notoriously prone to exaggeration. Some seek to bolster their accomplishments post facto or settle scores with one-time rivals and adversaries. Nearly all are influenced by the political and ideological climate in which they recount their stories.

Josef Müller provides the perfect illustration of these problems. Riebling relies on his postwar memoirs published in 1975 and a series of interviews carried out by Harold Deutsch at points in the 1950s and 1960s. But how reliable this testimony compiled twenty to forty years after the events in question had taken place was remains open to question. Müller’s account has to be read through the lens of his own postwar political career, one punctuated by both triumph and defeat. After co-founding the CSU, Müller found himself under fire from the conservative integralist wing of the party led by Alois Hundhammer. His political opponents, in the grossest of ironies, denounced him as a former Nazi, forcing Müller to undergo a humiliating ordeal of denazification before a tribunal in late 1946. Müller was also forced to step down from his position as Bavarian Minister of Justice in 1952, having been accused of illegally receiving 20,000 DM from a Jewish rabbi, Philipp Auerbach. He also lost a race in 1960 to become the mayor of Munich. The extent to which these subsequent events colored his recollections is unclear. He was obviously driven by the need to exonerate Pope Pius XII from the allegations raised by Rolf Hochhuth, Saul Friedländer and others that the pontiff had refused to actively resist National Socialism. He was also influenced by prevailing currents that as late as the 1970s continued to see the men of the resistance movements as traitors. Most perplexing is that one of his handlers and co-conspirators until his arrest in early 1941, the Bavarian cathedral canon, Johnannes Neuhäusler, maintained a public silence about these plots until his death. To be sure, Riebling’s account, intended in so small measure for a popular audience, cannot delve into these puzzles in all of their complexity. Nonetheless, weaving the story of the ambiguous sources into the larger narrative would have lent the author’s larger conclusions even greater credibility.

For Riebling ultimately shows that under the guise of silence, Pope Pius XII was working to undermine National Socialism. The silence, for which he has been excoriated by many since the premiere of Hochhuth’s play in February, 1963, was in fact necessary for his covert activities. Riebling quotes what Müller told Harold Tittmann, an American diplomat to the Vatican, on June 3, 1945. “His anti-Nazi organization had always been very insistent that the Pope should refrain from making any public statement singling out the Nazis and specifically condemning them and had recommended that the Pope`s remarks should be confined to generalities only” (248). Müller added that “if the Pope had been specific, Germans would have accused him of yielding to the promptings of foreign powers and this would have made the German Catholics even more suspected than they were and would have greatly restricted their freedom of action in their work of resistance to the Nazis.”

Yet Riebling does not let Pius off the hook completely. “Judging Pius by what he did not say,” he writes, “one can only damn him.” (28). He had the duty to speak out – and on the whole did not. “During the world’s greatest moral crisis,” he notes, “its greatest moral leaders seemed at a loss for words” (28). Nor does he exonerate German Catholics. That it was the pontiff who would have to become involved in such plots speaks volumes about the fact that too few Catholics lower in the hierarchy chose a course of opposition.

Riebling’s masterful account will long remain the definitive account of the papal involvement in the conspiracies to topple Hitler. Yet it cannot remain the final work, the Vatican not yet having made fully available the papers from the wartime pontificate of Pius XII.

Review of Church of Spies - Mark Riebling

This review of Church of Spies appeared on H Net.  I am grateful for their policy allowing republishing. I have opted to use Joshua Klemen's review because I found I was in agreement with his comments on the text.

Riebling has attempted to give another side to the complex realities of the papacy of Pope Pius XII during the 1939-1945 war.  It is a book that looks afresh at the "public neutrality, private action" policy of Pius in relation to one of the arms of the German resistance movement that included among its members many priests, religious, Catholic aristocrats and other Christians drawn together by a common faith and belief that Hitler had to be removed, and removed by force if the war was to end.  It is well known that the Pope was more than sympathetic to these brave men and women, many of whom paid with their lives.

Church of Spies is a refreshing addition to the literature on Pius XII.  However, its strength lies in the orderly assembly of information - primary and secondary - that fills over 100 pages in the notes and bibliography of the book.  The broad outline of the narrative is reasonably well known, but Riebling's attention to detail and notation of almost every fact presented gives the reader assurance they walk on solid ground.

It is also important to note what Church of Spies is not.  It is not a defence of the "papal silence" during the Holocaust.  This was the only major disagreement I had with the text, something I share with Klemen.  

Finally, Riebling introduces an extraordinary man who should be better known in the English-speaking world.  Josef Müller, "Ox Müller" strides through the book larger than life and gives, at least for me, the principle that underpins this whole book.  These men and women did what they did because they believed it was the right, moral and just thing to do.  The "how" to do it came from their deep and nourishing Christian and Catholic faith and the support they received from particular Church leaders, most notably, the leadership given by Pope Pius XII.  

Josef Müller, "Ochsensepp"

1898-1979

As an historian who spends most of his time focussed on the Holocaust I admit that I finished the book with a sense of sadness and indulged, if only for a moment, in a "what if..." moment.

The H-net review follows.

Mark Riebling. Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War against Hitler. New York: Basic Books, 2015. 384 pp. $29.99 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-465-02229-8.

Reviewed by Joshua Klemen (ACSC)

Published on H-War (December, 2015)

Commissioned by Margaret Sankey

In Church of Spies, Mark Riebling attempts to provide a defense for Pope Pius XII and the Catholic Church against charges of inaction and complicity with Nazi Germany in WWII. In Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII (2002), John Cornwell writes that Pius enabled Hitler and had “drawn the Catholic Church into complicity with the darkest forces of the era.”[1] While this argument is not explicitly stated within the book, the summary included in the dust jacket suggests directly that Pius was “Hitler’s Pope.” It is clear throughout that Riebling aims to respond to Pius’s critics by providing the details of his secret wartime actions. He seeks to provide an explanation for why the Vatican showed “public moderation” and neutrality towards Hitler and Nazi atrocities (p. 28). Church of Spies sheds light on the secret actions and covert war waged by Pius, the Vatican, the German Catholic Church, and various German Catholic citizens against Hitler and the Nazis. 

Pope Pius XII’s role in diplomacy with the German resistance as well as his support for the removal of Hitler is a central theme in this book. The pope’s largest contribution to the anti-Hitler elements was to negotiate on their behalf with the Western Allies for a post-assassination peace treaty. Through a variety of examples, the reader is shown the critical role that this diplomacy played in driving German resistance groups’ attempts to overthrow the Nazi regime, as such an agreement was a prerequisite for a successful coup. In addition, Pius provided the moral authorization for the assassination of Hitler by justifying the action under the church doctrine of tyrannicide. Providing this moral justification to the Catholic conspirators was essential to their involvement. Riebling provides evidence that Pius made a conscious decision to directly support the removal of Hitler, who would be replaced by “[a]ny government without Hitler” (p. 63). Although the author attempts to show that Pius took direct action to assist European Jews, only a few examples are given. For instance, the author provides an excerpt of a conversation between Pius and a bishop where Pius claims to have diverted “large amounts of American currency ... to help Jews escape Europe” (p. 168). If true, this claim would certainly add to the stated purpose of the book, but no further evidence is provided, to the overall detriment of his argument.

Although the focus of the author is on Pope Pius XII, many prominent German Catholic citizens’ roles in the attempts on Hitler’s life are highlighted in this book. In particular, the story of Josef Müller and his dominant role in the Vatican’s involvement in the various intrigues is crucial to the story. Acting as an intermediary between German anti-Hitler factions and the Vatican, Müller played a central role in the secret diplomacy between these groups and the Western Allies. Based on the evidence provided, Müller is painted as both a devoutly religious man of high morals as well as a German patriot who views Hitler as a threat to Germany’s ultimate existence. The author also provides compelling evidence to highlight the extent of Catholic influence on various assassination plots. Among others, he highlights the role played by Father Augustinus Rosch in a failed December 1941 plot as well as the religious motivations of Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, a devout Catholic and central figure in the more well-known July 20, 1944, plot to assassinate Hitler inside his East Prussian field headquarters. The detailed and interesting nature of the descriptions of these plots aids in the effectiveness of this work.

Riebling uses a storytelling approach to highlight the various exciting and clandestine aspects of this subject. By weaving together numerous storylines in a chronological fashion from 1939 to 1945, the history of this period reads more like an exciting popular fiction spy novel than an academic work. For example, Riebling’s description of Pope Pius’s first day as pope gives the reader a colourful account of his decision to start a secret archaeological excavation in search of Saint Peter’s crypt. While details such as these parallel recent works of fiction, this exciting style by no means distracts the reader from the factual basis from which the work is derived. 

The author uses many sources to demonstrate the extent of the church’s efforts to counter Hitler in Europe. Perhaps the most compelling are transcripts of secretly recorded conversations between Pope Pius and senior German clergymen as well as numerous personal accounts taken from postwar testimony. Using sources from Germany, the Vatican, and Allied intelligence agencies, the author provides an extremely credible evidentiary basis for his overall argument.

Church of Spies is an extremely readable and interesting work on Catholic influence on German resistance efforts. However, the book does not provide a sufficient level of evidence to counter the perceptions of papal silence towards atrocities committed against Europe’s Jews.  Although Riebling shows how the highest levels of Vatican leadership stoked the fires of the German resistance through acting as diplomats to the Western Allies and through providing the moral justification to assassinate Hitler, he falls short of convincing the reader that any meaningful action to counter the Holocaust was taken directly by the Vatican. Rather, the Vatican and Pius seem to have placed a higher value on official silence in order to minimize reprisals to Catholics in Europe at the expense of Hitler’s Jewish victims. However, the book does convincingly portray the important roles played by numerous Catholic citizens as well as German Catholic clergy. Ultimately, Riebling presents an important counter argument to Cornwell and other critics of the Vatican and Pius’s lack of action in WWII, making this is a valuable work that sheds light on the role of organized religion in modern warfare, politics, and international relations.

Note

[1]. John Cornwell, Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII (New York: Penguin Books, 2002), xi.

Citation: Joshua Klemen. Review of Riebling, Mark, Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War against Hitler. H-War, H-Net Reviews. December, 2015.

URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=45332

Mark Riebling "Church of Spies: the Pope's secret war against Hitler"

The Wikipedia page on Mark Riebling describes him as a "a U.S. historian, essayist, and policy analyst. He has written on national security, the history of ideas, and Vatican foreign policy during Cold War and Second World War. He is the author of two books Wedge: The Secret War between the FBI and CIA and Church of Spies: The Pope’s Secret War Against Hitler."

Mark contacted me some time ago and asked if he could send me an advance copy.  I very happily replied that I would enjoy reading his book.  Unfortunately, teaching commitments and the like have meant that I probably won't get to reading it much before the Christmas holidays in December! 

Reviews have been positive and with only a skim through notes and bibliography it appears that Riebling has done his homework thoroughly.  It matters little if at the end of my reading the work that I agree or disagree.  What does matter is that a conversation about the role of the Pope during the war has been examined from another angle and new insights have been offered.  This is the stuff of history and it is what historians do.

Some of the reviews that have appears on line in recent weeks are these:

Desmond O'Grady in the Australian Financial Review weekend edition.

Mark Oppenheim on History Net.

The Australian publisher's review on Scribe

Review on Kirkus.

And reader comments on Amazon.

There is an extract from the book on Salon.

I look forward to reading what looks likely to be both good history and a stimulating thriller.