A Special Mission: Hitler's Secret Plot to Seize the Vatican and Kidnap Pope Pius the XII - Hardcover

Kurzman, Dan

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0306814684 ISBN 13: 9780306814686

Publisher: Da Capo Press, 2007

Synopsis

In September, 1943, Adolf Hitler, furious at the ouster of Mussolini, sent German troops into Rome and ordered SS General Karl Wolff, who had been Heinrich Himmler’s chief aide, to occupy the Vatican and kidnap (and, perhaps, kill) Pope Pius XII. At the same time plans were being made to deport Rome’s Jews to Auschwitz, Wolff began playing a dangerous game: stalling Hitler’s plot against the pope, whom he hoped would save him from the noose in case Germany lost the war. To save Pius, Wolff and fellow conspirators blackmailed him into silence when the Jews were rounded up, hoping that Hitler would rescind his order. This tale of intrigue and betrayal is one of the most important untold stories of World War II. Dan Kurzman was the first journalist to have interviewed General Wolff following his release from prison after the war. And this is the only book to tell the full behind-the-scenes story of the plot against the Vatican and its far-reaching consequences.

About this title

About the Author:

Dan Kurzman, former foreign correspondent for the Washington Post, is the award-winning author of sixteen highly acclaimed books, including Fatal Voyage and Bravest Battle. He lives in New Jersey.

From Publishers Weekly:

Veteran popular historian Kurzman (The Bravest Battle) relates how a Hitler-Himmler order in 1943 to kidnap the pope and seize Vatican files and treasures was twice delayed and finally undermined by a group of high German officers and officials in Rome. The foilers were headed by the SS leader in Italy, Gen. Karl Wolff, whom Kurzman interviewed before his death in 1984. Kurzman demonstrates that Hitler wanted the Vatican neutralized because he thought the pope had aided the overthrow of Mussolini in 1943 and feared that the Church's leader would denounce the Final Solution in general and the imminent deportation of Rome's Jews in particular. Wolff and others in Rome, meanwhile, hoped to use the pope as an intermediary for a negotiated peace and an Anglo-American-German campaign against the Soviets. Kurzman also touches upon such related topics as the 1933 Nazi-Vatican Concordat, how Pius's silence on the murder of the Jews was partly rooted in excessive fears of a Soviet takeover of the Vatican, and the curious role of Rome's chief rabbi, Israel Zolli, who ultimately converted to Catholicism. Kurzman does a good job of telling a suspenseful and little-known story of WWII intrigue. (June)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0306814684
• ISBN 13: 9780306814686
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304