Five Thousand Spies a Month a Crime

Alfred Frenzel, sixty-one years old, Social Democratic deputy in the Bundestag for Augsburg and a Su- deten German refugee from Czecho- slovakia, with a married daughter still living in Prague, was arrested on October 28 in the Parliament Building. He was charged with treason. Under the West German constitution, parliamentary immunity from arrest does not apply if a deputy is caught red-handed or with- in twenty-four hours of committing Five Thousand Spies a Month a crime. Frenzel was said to have been ar- DANIEL SCHORR rested shortly after turning over secret information to agents of a Czech spy ring, as he allegedly had BONN three or four hundred marks a been doing for years. The Ministry NE LEARNS to live with espionage month for tidbits of confidential in- of Interior stated that he made an O in West Germany, a country formation, perhaps supplemented immediate confession, and later that counts a fifth of its population with the romantic attentions of an Frenzel resigned his seat in the as refugees, repatriates, and expellees agent. Bundestag with a letter to the speak- from German-speaking regions now It is officially estimated that there er in which he called himself "un- under Communist rule; a country are 16,500 Communist agents operat- worthy" of serving in the house. that, as a matter of proud policy, ing in West Germany today—ninety Frenzel was no mere backbencher. still maintains an open door and full per cent of them for East Germany, A zealous and assiduous party worker citizenship rights for political fugi- the rest for networks centered in in his new homeland, he had risen tives from East Germany. Postwar other satellites or the Soviet Union. to deputy chairman of the Social frontiers cut across families and The dropout rate is high among Democratic Party for South Bavaria. friendships; two tangled decades of the amateurs and the halfhearted. He was chairman of the Bundestag's war and its aftermath blur political Two hundred a month are uncov- Restitution Committee, which is con- loyalties. In a country divided by ered, many of them simply through cerned with the restoration of prop- fiat but not by language or tradition, public appeals to come forward and erty to Hitler's victims. And he was a spy needs little disguise. And he unburden their consciences under a member of the Bundestag's De- need not be dropped by para- promises of immunity from prosecu- fense Committee, a function that chute or picked up by submarine tion. Others have to be caught—1,800 gave him access to secret military when he can travel back and forth of them in the past eight years con- information. through Berlin unmolested. victed and sentenced, most to rela- It was not the first time that So it is that West Germany is vul- tively mild terms of two or three espionage had penetrated West Ger- nerable to what western experts call years in prison. many's parliament. In 1954 Chris- the most massive intelligence effort tian Democratic Deputy Karl Franz ever directed against a single coun- Spying Is Routine Schmidt-Wittmack defected to East try. Of the fifteen thousand refugees No court has a more crowded calen- Germany, for which he had been who come from East Germany each dar than the Federal tribunal in spying. The circumstances of the month, it is estimated that as many Karlsruhe, which handles spy cases Frenzel case, however, the magnitude as thirty per cent have been ap- almost as an American court would of the betrayal, and the sensitive proached in advance by the Com- handle traffic violations. domestic situation in a pre-election munist intelligence apparatus to act Occasionally there is a flutter of year combined to make this West as spies. Others are recruited after publicity over an unusually sensa- Germany's most sensational spy case arrival here by threats against the tional case, such as that of a defense to date. It also brought a whole series relatives they left behind. West Ger- ministry secretary accused of system- of grave issues to the surface and mans with relatives in the East are atically turning over her steno- forced the Federal Republic to look blackmailed the same way. graphic pads with military secrets to deeply into itself—an appraisal that Financial inducements are offered, a Communist agent. She had been has so far produced more questions too—preferential treatment for West cleared for confidential work al- than answers. German businessmen who will do though her file showed she had a spying on the side, or money pay- child in Leipzig, East Germany. But HAT is the relation between the ments to underpaid civil servants. A for the most part, the existence of Wgovernment and the parliament? source of amazement to counterin- widespread espionage in the Federal In this eleven-year-old democracy, to- telligence officials is the low wage Republic had taken on a sort of day's precedents will become tomor- that a spy will work for. A woman grisly normalcy—until the Frenzel row's traditions. Strong-willed Kon- secretary is sometimes satisfied with case. rad Adenauer, the only chancellor 56 THE REPORTER PRODUCED 2004 BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED the Federal Republic has known, has explain that this did not imply an Controls at the East German bor- tended to overshadow the parlia- accusation against the deputy him- der would mean a break with the ment. Now it will become harder self, and there would be partisan basic principle that West Germany than ever for the Bundestag to assert repercussions. does not recognize the division of itself. "No," Strauss concluded, "it is all Germany or of Berlin. To bar those The Frenzel case, says the Frank- a matter of confidence, and that con- with relatives behind the Iron Cur- furter Allgemeine Zeitung, is "bitter fidence has been broken." And so a tain from confidential positions for everybody, but especially for the government that shrinks from inves- would be to brand hundreds of thou- Bundestag." And Die Welt says that tigating members of parliament de- sands with a special mark of shame. the Bundestag's prestige has "suf- cides for itself when it has confidence Many persons who would be consid- fered severely." in parliament. And one more blow ered security risks in the United Only recently, West Berlin's Mayor has been struck against a legislature States or Britain are employed here Willy Brandt, the Social Democratic that already has trouble keeping up because of the labor shortage and candidate for chancellor in next with the Executive. because West Germany simply lacks year's election, was complaining that the huge security apparatus that the government did not give parlia- Tempting Ammunition would be necessary to follow the ment enough information on defense Will the espionage issue envenom twisted trails of personal histories policy. Now, Defense Minister Franz- West Germany's election campaign, through wartime and postwar up- Josef Strauss looks like a hero for which is threatening to become the heaval. Even more basic is the fact having withheld information. bitterest and dirtiest yet? that security is inhibited by West Germany's revulsion against the Ge- Herr Strauss told me that he had On lower levels, the ruling Chris- stapo—a vivid memory—and a general refused to submit to the Defense tion Democratic Party has already distaste for snooping. been suggesting the line that a postwar returnee like Brandt is less reliable than an Adenauer, who re- TT IS SYMBOLIC of the desire for re- mained in Germany during the war. *- spectability that West Germany's It has made much of the role of counterintelligence organization calls Herbert Wehner, a former Commu- itself the Federal Office for the Pro- nist, who is a leader of the Social tection of the Constitution. Under Democratic Party. Hubert Schruebbers, who succeeded If one can forget that the Chris- defector Otto John in 1955, this of- tian Demociats had their traitor in fice has conducted itself with scrupu- Schmidt-Wittmack six years ago, the lous regard for civil rights. Frenzel case is tempting ammunition, Security procedures will undoubt- especially since his trial next year is edly be tightened somewhat. Govern- likely to coincide with the peak of ment departments may be a little the election campaign. more circumspect about whom they It may or may not be an accident employ for confidential jobs. But that Frenzel's arrest was first dis- from all present appearances, this Committee the basic blueprint for closed by Minister of Justice Fritz republic, self-consciously trying to Western European defense, NATO Schaeffer at a Christian Democratic live down its Nazi past, is not ready Document MC-70. "I did explain to rally in Munich. The semi-official to institute the massive security ap- the committee the German require- government organ Politische-soziale paratus that would be needed to ments under the NATO plan, and I Korrespondenz has said that Social cope with the massive Communist gave the details for each year—for Democratic opposition to NATO and infiltration. And if the country re- 1959, for 1960, and, unfortunately, German rearmament in previous mains a happy hunting ground for for 1961. I have always been criti- years "fostered a political climate in spies, so be it! cized for oversecrecy. Now I am ex- the party ranks" that was conducive tremely happy that I have discharged to acts of conscientious treason such my legal obligation without exceed- as Frenzel's. ing the safe limit." West Germany's hothouse democ- Would it be safer to entrust mili- racy is less well prepared than tary information to parliament mem- America's to withstand a campaign bers if they underwent a security in which one party is labeled a check first? The minister rejected the traitor.

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