Pope Pius XII and the Attitude of the Catholic Church During World War II
PART 3
This is the continuation of the interview with Fr. Peter Gumpel, S.J., the relator of the cause of Pope Pius XII. This part of the interview focuses on more of the little-known history of World War II. It will be concluded in the next issue of The Angelus.
We’ve learned through a Jewish journalist, Mr. Dan Kurzman, a very competent journalist who had interviewed General Karl Wolf, the Commandant to Italy and assistant and deputy to Heinrich Himmler, about the plot to kidnap Pope Pius XII. The plan–this was an actual plan that Hitler had put into place—was to arrest him and bring him to Liechtenstein or some place for his “safety,” then kill him and seize the Vatican and the assets of the Vatican. I’d like you to comment on this and give your knowledge.
Yes, these facts are, to my knowledge, absolutely true. I’ve been in touch with Mr. Kurzman; he very graciously sent me his book. I’ve read it. I agree with his conclusions—maybe not every single expression–but with his general tendency, definitely yes. The highest commander of the SS police forces in Italy, General Karl Wolf, indeed was heard when we made a canonical inquiry. The secretary of state knew he had once been received by the Pope, in all secrecy, and wanted to know more about that and his further activities. He was approached through an intermediary and agreed to make a statement under oath, which is in the acts of the cause of Pius XII’s beatification. I have known these acts. He later even published certain parts of it, and I believe him. The personality of Wolf is not entirely unknown to me, because I already mentioned at the beginning that my mother was arrested and in serious danger of death and that somebody was sent to me when I thought at first I was going to be arrested myself. This was Karl Wolf.
Was he a general?
No, he was not yet a general, but he was the personal aide-de-camp of Heinrich Himmler himself. Therefore, at that moment, and ever since that happened to me, I felt that this man was not totally evil to say the least, that he was still human, that he was not bound to come to see me and to tell me, “I understand what a boy of your age has gone through, that’s why I’m telling you this. But don’t mention it to anybody.” It’s the same Karl Wolf. I had never met him in Italy because I came here in 1947, two years after the end of World War II.
He was in prison, wasn’t he?
He was not condemned by the Americans or by the English. He had gone to see Allen Dulles, the brother of Foster Dulles, the former secretary of state, who was heading the counter-espionage in Geneva, Switzerland. He communicated that he was planning to surrender the German army in Italy and Yugoslavia, which he did. As a quid pro quo, Dulles promised him that he would not be persecuted by tribunals in England, and, in fact, he was never taken to court by the Americans or the English. He was later condemned—it is true—by a German tribunal for certain papers he had signed with regard to the transport of Jews from Germany and France to Auschwitz. And for this he was condemned–and to a rather long period of imprisonment. But it was shortened on account of his health.
We contacted him after he had already been released from prison. So substantially I think the facts can be confirmed, which we also know from German sources. We are not only relying on Karl Wolf. But certainly when Mussolini fell on July 25, 1943, Hitler immediately gave orders to dislocate eight motorized divisions to all the aggressors between the German-occupied countries and Italy: France, Austria, etc. And then he said, “I’m going to arrest the King of Italy, Badoglio, who was the successor to Mussolini, and the Pope.” And on that occasion he said in the presence of witnesses, “I’m going to invade the Vatican and arrest all the foreign diplomats who are sitting in there,” which was true, “and I’m going to take care of the Pope.” He was dissuaded at the moment by Göbbels and Bormann–Nazi leaders–not to do that because of the international reaction to a step like this. But he never gave up.
By “take care of the Pope” you mean arrest the Pope?
Arrest him, yes. Meaning at least to deport him, to arrest him, yes. On the other hand, in the Vatican–I know this for certain by oral testimony–people believed that the Pope would be abducted. The Pope himself was convinced of it. He got the advice from the Spanish government and from the Portuguese government to leave the Vatican and take refuge in their countries. And this was planned rather in detail about how it should be done. The Pope said, “No, I’m not going to leave my diocese. If they want to arrest me, they will have to carry me out by force.” And then he added, and he told this to Cardinal Canali, Sister Pasqualina, Fr. Leiber and other people, “Whomever would leave the Vatican at that moment would no longer be Pope Pius XII, but Cardinal Pacelli.” In other words, provisions had been taken that somebody else, another cardinal, would temporarily govern the Church because Pius XII would be impeded from doing so. These testimonies are clear. We also know that a number of high-ranking people were ordered to prepare their suitcases to follow the Pope. We also know that a number of foreign ambassadors had declared, “We are going to accompany him,” out of loyalty to the Pope: the Finnish ambassador and others. So this story is not just an invention; it is true. And I think Mr. Kurzman has pointed out that this thing cannot just be simply dismissed as a fable as if some people had invented it.
I would like you to just make a comment on what it was like within the Vatican during the war as far as leaks were concerned–spies and Nazi sympathizers, etc. All communications had to be done by either word of mouth or by code because, as I mentioned, we interviewed Msgr. Ferrofino, who said that the telegrams would come from the apostolic palace doubly encrypted, and he would have to do this all for secrecy. But comment possibly on the leaks that existed within the walls of the Vatican.
Certainly, I think in all governments, and in all major political bodies, there is the danger of leaks. Think, for example, in America, about the Rosenberg couple who leaked top secret elements with regard to nuclear armaments. In England, Dr. Fuchs did the same thing with regard to the Russians, and other people like that. Therefore things like this happen all the time. They should not happen in an ecclesiastical institution, in religion, but they definitely do happen. They happened during the war, and they happen to this very day.
Let me give you a very concrete example. (You see I am very outspoken and honest with you.) When the Communists still occupied Romania, one of our own Jesuit superiors of that region succeeded–I don’t know how he got leave, he didn’t tell me–in going to Rome. He came to see me and said, “I need to see the Pope.” And I said no. He said, “Why are you so determined?” I said, “For the very simple reason that I happen to know that if you go there within an hour, the Romanian embassy for the Italian government will be informed about it. I will not expose you to that kind of danger. So what you’re going to do, my dear Father, is sit down and write a report. I will see to it that the Pope gets it by hand. Without your signature or anything, typed over.” He grumbled a little bit; he didn’t understand. I said, “I won’t expose your life to that. I know what’s going to happen. If word comes to the Romanian embassy here, the next thing is you’ll go back to Romania and, at the border, you’ll be arrested. So don’t push me, I’m not going to do it. That’s it.”
So, to your question, during the war, there were certainly spies, yes, but spies also in the English embassy to the Holy See. The butler there took advantage of the fact that his boss, the minister, every day took a walk in the Vatican garden to move a little; because the area was restricted, after all. And then he photographed all kinds of documents and passed them right on to the Italians and through the Italians, to the Germans.
And in the Vatican there have been people partly–there are many Italians in the Vatican, and certain Germans–for nationalistic reasons. Some people felt it would be their duty to do this. In other cases, some dark spot has been discovered in the life of somebody. And they put him under pressure. They say, “If you don’t do what we want, we are going to reveal what we know.” The third reason: material advantages, promotion, money–these are all dishonest motives. But these things do happen. You must remember that in the Vatican there are not only priests, there are a number of lay people. They may have their own interests, they may have their own agenda, and there are also some priests who did things in the past at least–I hope they don’t do it today–who in fact give out information which they should never give out.
A typical example is two people who spoke to Hochhuth and provided him with information that is first of all not correct; both of them were very much opposed to Pius XII: one, a bishop who had been deposed and exiled from Rome, living outside Rome now; and the other one, a junior member of the secretariat of state who was so convinced of his own capacity, he thought he was due to be promoted. The Pope knew his people and never promoted him to anything. And the man never forgave him.
And these are the two ecclesiastics to whom Hochhuth spoke. Now this is not exactly “spying” as you are referring to, but you see, the motives that some people can have in giving out information can be various and at times very dishonest. Unfortunately, I cannot deny that these things happened. I know for certain that they happened. There is even a book written on this, Nothing Secret, by Dr. Kaltefleiter, one of my collaborators, and the other co-author, Oschwald, with whom I am also in contact, in addition to other spy books. Not spy stories, but ascertained facts…
At the point when the archives are opened, what do you think will actually be found? I mean, based on the fact that all of this is living potential…
Well, to return to your first question, if there would have been anything really damaging, you can well imagine that these spies would have found it and would have already sold it a long time ago. That is point number one: connecting the two questions together. The second point is: I think I know what is in these archives. I’ve never seen anything in there. I’ve been in frequent contact with the head of the secret archives, now Bishop Pagano, and with the head of the archives of the secretariat of state, a dear friend and fellow Jesuit. I didn’t go there all the time, but I said, “Look, I want to see this, that, and the other thing, and, as investigating judge I have a right to do this.” They both recognized this, and they sent me the documentation. And so that’s how I found out. Now, I’m not a betting man. What I’m going to say may sound a little bit cynical, but it’s my sincere conviction. I’m sure once the Vatican archives are entirely open, everybody can go there provided he has a doctorate or something like a journalist’s credentials.
They don’t have to have a “library card” to go in?
You need permission. It’s a serious, important archive. I needed one when I was a student and, later, as a professor going into the archives. You need to have documentation that you are capable of doing research. Now, we hope that many of these people who are now claiming that there are secret documents hidden in the archives will go there. They are not going to find what they are looking for. But I’ll bet you anything they will say, “Oh well, of course it was there, but it has been destroyed.” This is cynical, but I think it’s realistic.
I want to get back to the Pope’s apprehension of speaking out because there is a specific point. There were many, many thousands of Jews that were being protected under Vatican state territories, whether ecclesiastical facilities or otherwise. What is your impression of what the Pope was probably thinking in terms of the safety of these people? Had he spoken out or had he forced the hand to be actually arrested? Had he been arrested by Hitler?
Some people have said–and I think, first of all, it is not demonstrated, and is even, in a certain sense, objectively malicious: “Oh, he didn’t speak out because he was afraid for his personal safety!”Other people go beyond this a little bit and say that he was afraid the Vatican would suffer. That is not the decisive reason. The Pope personally was a very brave man. When he was Apostolic Nuncio in Bavaria, after the end of the First World War, the Communists broke into the Nunciature, even though it was a diplomatic building. They broke in there and threatened him with a pistol pointed at him. He didn’t back up one single step. He said, “Out with you! Out!” Therefore, he was not afraid, and he said so later.
He referred to this incident and other incidents when he was on the point of being attacked by the Communists in Munich during the Communist party’s uprising in Munich during the uprising in 1919. Therefore, it’s not that. The reason is simply and purely that if he had spoken out, the reaction of Hitler was foreseeable. And it would have seriously aggravated the situation. For example, during the occupation of Rome, imagine he would have come out with a public statement: “This is outrageous, this must stop.” Hitler’s reaction would have been to order the SS to invade all the convents, maybe even the Vatican, and to look for the Jews in there and kill them. And he was aware of that, and he didn’t want to take that risk.
People say, “Why didn’t he speak out?” What they forget is that he was advised by the Polish bishops–not by some Polish bishop who had taken refuge and left Poland at the moment of the danger, but by the Polish bishops who stayed in Poland—who said, “For heaven’s sake, don’t speak out, you are only causing damage.” He once sent over a military man–a chaplain, the military chaplain for the Maltese Order, which was neutral–and sent hospital trains to take back people who were severely wounded to be taken to a hospital here in Italy, etc. He sent over things, pamphlets, to be distributed to the Polish clergy because in Poland there was very bad propaganda from the Nazis saying, “The Pope is with us; the Pope is against you,” which was, of course, a lie. But people, if you continue to repeat something, become very dubious. He sent huge cases labeled “macaroni pasta,” “bottles,” etc., but they were all filled with these writings. And they were taken there by this military chaplain and accompanied by a German officer so as to make it safer.
They went to the Archbishop of Cracow, one of the predecessors of the future John Paul II. He opened them and said, “For heaven’s sake, what are you doing? If I distribute these things, even if they are not tied to me, there are not enough heads in Poland to be chopped off!” And in the presence of these two people who were flabbergasted, he threw everything into the fire. Therefore the Polish warned the Pope: don’t say anything.
In the German concentration camps, where there were many priests and also many Protestant clergymen, if the SS treated them particularly badly, the Protestants would say to their Catholic confrères: “Did your big Pope perhaps open his mouth or your bishops say something to annoy Hitler?” and so on. The German Resistance asked him not to do anything because it would hinder the Resistance since they continued underground to act against Hitler, finally bringing about this attempt on his life on July 20, 1944. But there were about twenty total attempts on the life of Hitler, and, nearly miraculously, he escaped. He had a sixth sense.
So, there were many people who said, “Speaking out doesn’t help anything, so don’t.” And he was right in making this decision because it was a question of saving Jewish lives. Speaking out would not have saved a single life. It was demonstrated in Holland and on other occasions. Helping them in secrecy and not exposing the institutions of the Vatican to invasion saved thousands of lives.
In other countries like Hungary, where there was still an Apostolic Nuncio, Rotta, together with Wallenberg, saved, under formal order of Pope Pius XII, 20,000 Jewish lives by handing out fake certificates of baptism, by handing out letters of protection, etc. And here, it may be useful to say something, because sometimes people quote John XXIII against Pius XII, which is total nonsense. Pope John XXIII had the greatest admiration for Pius XII; I met him several times. But some people do not know; they try to establish an opposition between Pius XII and his immediate successor, John XXIII, who, during the lifetime of Pope Pius XII during the Second World War, was acting as a papal representative, first in Romania and Greece, later in Turkey. He did a lot to save Jewish lives, and he was praised for that by the Jews, thanked understandably and honestly.
But he always said, “Look, I acted only and exclusively under direct order of Pope Pius XII.” When they tried to give the decoration of “Just among the Gentiles” to Msgr. Montini, who was one of the chief helpers of Pope Pius XII, he said, “No, I won’t accept that. I did only what I was ordered to do, and you don’t accept a medal for doing your duty.” When the Bishop of Assisi, Nicolini, got the same decoration with his aide, Fr. Brunazzi, they always claimed, “Well, we did it because Pius XII sent a message.”
You see, Dr. Susan Zuccotti, whom I’ve already mentioned, said, “Well, I know that Msgr. Brunazzi said that Bishop Nicolini of Assisi (where many Jews had taken refuge) had at a certain moment a letter in his hand, a written statement, and he said, ‘This is what I received from the Vatican: help the Jews to the best of your capacity.’” And then they got going and saved several hundred Jewish lives. Not only in Assisi, but they were sending out messages to the people in the surrounding areas, etc.
Now Susan Zuccotti said that Bishop Brunazzi did not see the letter, practically saying that the bishop was lying. But why should a man who got the highest distinction of Israel tell a lie to these people? Isn’t it outrageous that a Jewish personality of today accuses a man of such high merits for the Jewish people of a lie or fraud? This is, to my mind, from a scientific point of view but also from a human point of view, difficult to understand.
I’d like to touch on a very prominent example of something that went on from 1939-45. Every six months the Pope would issue a telegram so that they could use an old ship to transport 800 Jews from Portugal to the Dominican Republic, and on to the US, Mexico, and Cuba. Msgr. Ferrofino said they would have to hand-deliver this telegram to General Trujillo, driving a day and a half from Port-au-Prince to the island. Then the General would say, “In the name of the Pope, we are going to allow this to happen.” And this went on for many years and saved many thousands of lives. This is, as I see it, a very good example of direct intervention on the side of the Pope. Would you comment on any information you have which may be similar to this? In other words, were you aware of this particular situation?
Yes, I was aware of it, and I even wrote to the state archives and ecclesiastical archives, both in Haiti and in Santo Domingo. But it appears that these archives are in a terrible state of disorder–which, given the smallness of the country and the general setup there, doesn’t surprise me. You can’t compare archives in Haiti and Santo Domingo with the huge archives in Paris, London, etc. Therefore, the case mentioned by Ferrofino was not entirely unknown to me, but he gave me a number of details that I did not know. The essential facts that he passed along the orders of Pius XII, that he got in touch with Trujillo, etc., these things are published in a series of documents which so far I haven’t mentioned. I refer to a 12-volume set published in French and Italian: Actes et documents du Saint Siège relatifs à la Seconde Guerre Mondiale. In English, that would be, “Acts and Documents of the Holy See Relating to the Second World War.” There are about 5,000 documents that were published between 1965 and 1982. And in these volumes, you will find several documents dedicated to the helping of persecuted people. And in one of these volumes this incident of Ferrofino and Trujillo is mentioned. Therefore the substance is there, but not all the details that I saw yesterday when you showed me what had been gathered in this very interesting interview with His Excellency, Msgr. Ferrofino.
(To be continued.)
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