The Führermuseum, his Holy Grail, had been nothing but bait, the golden ticket the pope had used to lure Hitler into this irreversible endeavor. In the end, it was all a ruse. Hitler was merely a pawn, a marionette in the grand scheme of things. The ‘Thousand-Year Reich’ was just a grandiose tale designed to cloud Hitler’s judgment.
“Really? The pope did all this for gold?” Hitler seethed. The thought of the pope nestled safely behind his Vatican fortress, safe from ever having to answer for his role in masterminding this world war, was too much to handle. “I’ll kill him!”
Their agreement from the beginning had been for the Nazis to ship all the gold seized from the Jews to the Vatican, while Hitler got to keep all the valuable artwork so he could fill his Führermuseum with priceless artwork, statues, and tapestries after war’s end. Gold watches, rings, necklaces, even the fillings in the Jews’ teeth—all went as payment to the pope. What use did Hitler have for a bit of gold when he commanded the mightiest empire the world had ever seen? He’d considered the deal a bargain, almost too good to be true. Besides, the enormous amount of priceless artwork in Nazi possession far exceeded the value of the gold collected from the Jews. Hitler thought Pacelli a fool for granting such a great deal. What’s the catch? he’d wondered in the early days.
Slowly, over many years, he became aware that all the gold he shipped to the Vatican was being rendered untraceable. Melted down into gold bars, its origin wiped from history. On its own, gold left no provenance. The same could not be said of the artwork confiscated from the Jews.
Running out of options, Hitler finally gave in and executed a plan to rid all that evidence from his lands, creating an alibi that he’d never been involved in the strategic plundering of the Jews and their priceless treasures.
Burn it all. He’d learned this lesson in his early meetings with Pacelli. Burn all paper communications, leaving no evidence of our meetings. Hitler would apply the pope’s instruction to his current situation, burning every piece of artwork no matter how priceless it was. He might have been the pope’s puppet, but he refused to be his scapegoat.
Chapter 67
2 June 1945
Munich, Germany
In the shadowy aftermath of World War II, the Vatican ratlines emerged, clandestine escape routes for Nazi war criminals seeking refuge from the ruins of Europe. The process of conversion was a simple one—the Nazi war criminal would confess their heinous sins to a Catholic priest, who would then absolve them of their sins with a blessing. The priest would assign them a new Christian name, a fresh identity, and the newly reborn Christian would then embark on a dangerous journey to South America.
This clandestine operation, repeated in hushed whispers in Catholic churches across Europe was orchestrated by none other than Jesuit priest Robert Leiber.
***
“Ah, you must be the infamous Franz Stangl. We’ve been eagerly awaiting your arrival.” Leiber greeted the notorious Nazi commander with a chilling calmness, guiding him through the Vatican’s clandestine entrance. Stangl, once the commanding officer of the Sobibor and Treblinka extermination camps, was directly responsible for nearly a million Jewish lives extinguished in the gas chambers and furnaces. The Jesuit, with an air of solemnity, led Stangl down a dimly lit corridor to his private quarters where the process of absolution and assigning a new Christian identity would commence. Once the ritual was complete, Leiber orchestrated safe passage for this harbinger of death to the distant shores of Brazil.
“But what about my family?” Stangl’s voice wavered, his mind filled with images of his loved ones caught in the crosshairs of the Allies’ relentless hunt for Nazi collaborators across Europe.
“Rest assured, arrangements for their safe passage to Brazil have already been set in motion.”
“Thank you. I am eternally indebted to you, Father.”
Chapter 68
1 June 1945
The Art of War
Weaknesses and Strengths
#9 Subtle and insubstantial, the expert leaves no trace;
divinely mysterious, he is inaudible.
Thus, he is master of his enemy’s fate.
Robert Leiber has been a phantom, expertly smuggling away the Nazi elite to a haven in Argentina. His mission to safeguard the architects of the Final Solution has been nothing short of extraordinary. I salute his audacity in seizing the reins of this operation.
Leiber is a faithful and reliable sentinel. His work guiding the Nazi hierarchy to sanctuary will in turn prevent the world from ever learning of the Vatican’s involvement.
Chapter 69
March 10, 2000
1:25 p.m.
Roberto’s Mansion
“What are you reading?” Mario asked. The priest had woken late in the morning following his amateur surgery to find Roberto intensely focused on the computer screen. He’d let him be, at least until his curiosity couldn’t take it anymore.
“Check this out,” Roberto replied, his eyes still glued to the screen. He’d been poring over Pope Pius XII’s journal notes all night and had just unearthed secrets about Leiber and his infamous ratlines.
From 1924 to 1929, Robert Leiber served as a key advisor to Eugenio Pacelli during his tenure as Nuncio in Munich and Berlin. Leiber’s advisory role extended through Pacelli’s time as Cardinal Secretary of State. Following Pacelli’s election as Pope Pius XII in 1939, Leiber continued to provide counsel and support until the pope’s death.
Never a Vatican official, Leiber was respected and feared as the “unofficial official.” Hushed whispers within the halls of the Vatican revealed, “I do not fear the pope, but I do fear his secretary.”
“This Leiber character had a deep-rooted connection with the pope. Look at this.” Roberto pointed at the screen.
Mario rubbed his eyes, still groggy from his hangover, slowly rose from the office couch, and walked over to the computer. “Slow down. Who’s Leiber?”
“Robert Leiber, the mastermind behind the Nazi exodus from Germany via the ratlines.”
Leiber breathed new life into Bishop Hudal’s plan, setting up a “ratline”—a secret escape route for Nazis fleeing Europe. Around the time of Operation Barbarossa, Leiber had written to the Austrian bishop, urging him to view the ratline mission as a crusade. As one of Pius XII’s closest confidants, Leiber had the authority to act as the pope’s intermediary and messenger.
Despite his historical training, Leiber destroyed all personal papers before his death, leaving no trace of his actions for future generations to study. Before he died he confessed that he did so out of fear the papers would cast his pope in an unfavorable light.
“Seems like Leiber followed the same playbook as the Nazis, eradicating all traces of his paper trail,” Roberto mused, noticing the parallels between this man’s actions and the orders Pacelli gave Hitler to incinerate all correspondence.
“What exactly is a ratline?” Mario asked, his curiosity piqued.
With a swift click, Roberto opened a new tab and searched for information on the term.
Ratlines were clandestine escape networks for Nazis seeking refuge from the ruins of post-World War II Europe. These covert routes primarily led to safe havens in Latin America, with Argentina, Brazil, and Peru acting as primary destinations. One route snaked its way from Germany to Rome to Genoa before reaching South America. The ratlines were backed by the clergy of the Catholic Church.
“This is incriminating evidence,” Roberto said, leaning back to better absorb the information.
Spain, rather than Rome, acted as the initial hub for the covert ratline operation that aided the Nazi/Fascists’ escape, though the master plan was hatched within the Vatican’s walls. A key orchestrator included Charles Lescat, a Frenchman from the Action Française—a group once suppressed by Pope Pius XI but later reinstated by Pope Pius XII.
By 1946, Spain itself was a safe haven for hundreds of war criminals and thousands of ex-Nazis and Fascists. The Vatican’s cooperation in handing over these fugitives was deemed “negligible” by the United States Secretary of State; Pope Pius XII, however, went on record imploring for Christ’s mercy, stating he would rather see these Fascist war criminals exiled to the New World than languishing in POW camps in Germany.
“Backed by the Vatican, eh? So, these ratlines were essentially endorsed by Pope Pius XII himself. That’s a damning revelation, isn’t it?”
“Unreal,” Mario muttered, limping back to the couch and flipping open his laptop, eager to join his friend in delving deeper into the mystery.
“You know that saying, ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’? In this case, it’s reversed, and it seems those thousand words paints a picture sinister beyond belief. Your ‘Christian’ pope was no saint,” Roberto said, his hands flashing air quotes.
“We need to dig deeper. There’s more to this than meets the eye.”
