Killing Patton The Strange Death of World War II's Most Audacious General

Chapter 25

1 In addition to camouflaging the villa’s exterior, Stalin added several curious security details to it. He ordered that the drapes be short, so that he could see the feet of anyone trying to hide behind them. There were no rugs, so that Stalin could hear any approaching footsteps. Also, the backs of the sofas were bulletproof, and designed to be high enough so that Stalin’s head was not visible when he was seated.

2 At the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Stalin’s dacha served as a hotel. Rooms rented for seven thousand rubles—approximately two hundred dollars—per night.

3 In 1964, CIA analysis cast suspicion on Sedov’s death. It pointed out that the autopsies did not probe for evidence of poisoning, such as traces of microbes that might have been injected, nor did they include a thorough search of the nervous system and the skin, to make sure that the location of all injection marks was consistent with medical procedures. Sedov’s successor in Trotsky’s Communist movement, a German named Rudolf Klement, was murdered by NKVD agent Alexander Korotkov on June 13, 1938. His headless body was found floating in Paris’s Seine River.

4 Known as the Bloody Dwarf, Yezhov rose to power by arranging the arrest and execution of Yagoda. He then went on an unparalleled terror spree, killing an estimated six hundred thousand men and women in just two years. The killing was systematic, with security officials given murder quotas that, if not met, resulted in their own executions. Beria, Yezhov’s successor, almost became one of Yezhov’s victims. However, he cleverly aligned himself with Stalin, and Yezhov’s influence soon waned. The Bloody Dwarf was arrested on April 10, 1939, and soon confessed to anti-Soviet activities and homosexual behavior. He was executed on February 4, 1940. His nickname then changed to the Vanishing Commissar, because his image was soon removed from all official photographs until it was as if he had never existed at all.

5 Testimony of Semyon Zhukovsky, head of the Twelfth Department of the NKVD. File number 975026 in the archives of the Soviet Senior Military Prosecutor’s Office.


Chapter 26

1 In all, twenty-four political and military leaders of the Third Reich were tried at Nuremberg. Martin Bormann was tried in absentia. Twelve will be sentenced to death by hanging, seven will be given time in prison, three will be acquitted, one will commit suicide four days after the trial begins, and one will be declared medically unfit for trial.

2 The rumor was untrue, and some believe it was generated by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.

3 The forty-eight-year-old head of British intelligence is widely considered to be the model for Ian Fleming’s fictitious spy, James Bond. It was Stephenson who convinced FDR that Donovan should head the OSS.

4 Bazata was held in high esteem by members of the OSS. No less than William Colby, a former OSS agent who went on to become head of the Central Intelligence Agency, made a point of depicting Bazata’s heroism in the 1978 book Honorable Men. Bazata’s obituary in the New York Times on August 22, 1999, was specific in recounting his work behind enemy lines in France. However, for three decades after the general died, Bazata remained silent about his alleged role in Patton’s death. These quotes come from a letter he wrote to a friend on August 2, 1975. He later confirmed these claims in a 1979 article in Spotlight magazine.


Chapter 27

1 In addition to being the location of Patton’s headquarters, Bad Nauheim was also the site of Hitler’s Adlerhorst command post. Also, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s father used to travel there to take the waters for his heart condition. Finally, Bad Nauheim was host to Elvis Presley during his short stint in the army between 1958 and 1960. The gate to the city’s castle is depicted on the cover of Presley’s 1959 No.1 hit record, “A Big Hunk o’ Love.”

2 Thompson will try to cover his tracks regarding the “borrowed” truck by telling investigators that at the time of the accident he was turning into a quartermaster depot to return the vehicle, but in fact the depot was much farther down the road. There was a redbrick building to Patton’s right, with a broad driveway that might have been Thompson’s intended path. He will later change his story to say that he was turning onto a side street. But that is suspicious. The closest street to Thompson’s vehicle was fifteen feet north of the accident. In effect, Thompson did not know where he was going.


Afterword

1 This was reported in the Washington Star.

2 This is the citation for Bazata’s Distinguished Cross: “The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Service Cross to Captain (Infantry) Douglas D. Bazata, United States Army, for extraordinary heroism in connection with military operations against an armed enemy as an organizer and Director of Resistance forces serving with the Office of Strategic Services, in action against enemy forces from 27 August 1944 to 6 October 1944. Captain Bazata, after having been parachuted into the Haute Saone Department of France, organized and armed Resistance Forces, numbering 7,000; planned and executed acts of sabotage against rail and highway markers in order to divert German convoys onto secondary routes, leading them into well prepared ambushes and causing them to lose many men and motor vehicles. All of these tasks were performed in civilian clothing. Captain Bazata’s services reflect great credit upon him and are in keeping with the highest traditions of the armed forces of the United States.”





APPENDIX

Gen. George S. Patton’s Speech to the U.S. Third Army

SOUTHERN ENGLAND

JUNE 5, 1944