Under-Cover

Dramas

How British Are Checking Contraband Shipments in Pacific

By John Williams

Honolulu, Feb. 7.

AMERICAN official sources disclose that Britain intends to crack down upon the shipment of contraband car goes from North and South American ports across the Pacific to Japan and Siberia, for re-export to Germany.

These shipments have increased mark edly since war broke out.

Details of the contraband service read like some fictional international drama.

At the outbreak of the war, the American Government appealed to American indus tries t(D conserve their ra w material in “the best interests” of national security.

America, for example, imports the bulk of crude rubber and tin supplies from Malaya and the Dutch East Indies.

German and Russian agents, working under cover in the U.S.A., have been discovered behind the re-export of rub-

On February 29 (three weeks after this article was written) it was semi-officially announced that Brit ain and France, with the co-opera tion of the Australian Navy, pro posed to check the flow of contra band to Germany, via the Pacific and Asiatic Russia, by establishing “con trol stations”, probably at Singapore, Hong Kong, Vancouver, Darwin, Suva and Auckland.

ber, tin and copper, often sent into Mexico, where it is picked up in so called neutral ships, taken through the Panama canal, thence across the Paci fic to Vladivostok, where it is dis charged for shipment to Europe.

This discovery caused the secretaries of the U.S. navy and army, on January 19. to issue joint statements, as co chairmen of the U.S. Munitions Board, severely reprimanding the American offenders and threatening Congressional action if the re-exports did not cease.

Official sources said that the re-ex ports had reached “scandalous propor tions”. This caused reporters to dig deeper into the records, and they found similar conditions in the U.S. petroleum export trade, particularly in sales to Russia to aid her air war upon Finland.

The “New York Times” on January 19 said: — “Russia has obtained from America since the outbreak of the war more than 50,000,000 gallons of aviation gasoline, most of it from California ports ... In the opinion of many observers familiar with the situation this American-pro duced fuel is a major source of supply for Russian aerial, tank and motor driven artillery operations against Fin land . . . The export figures reveal how the exports have increased alarmingly...”

The Congressional sub-committee on oil conservation swung into action on the spot in California. It was shown that Japan has been purchasing at the enormous rate of 4,620,000 gallons daily, and that Russia’s purchases since she invaded Finland have made a big up swing. Obviously, Japan and Russia are re-exporting to Germany.

It is interesting to analyse between the lines of the recent outcry in Amer ica about the allied halting and exami nation of American mails to and from Germany.

Britain has presented evidence in Washington which has revealed the vast ramifications of the German network in America. It appears that, prior to the war, Germany, in collaboration with her nationals and agents in North and South America, designed a system for the circumvention of the British block ade, which involved the use of the U.S. mails for the shipment of contraband to Germany.

Germans in the Americas subscribed to a central agency in New York City called Fortra, the staff of which con sists of employees of German steam ship companies in America specially assigned to Fortra by the German Gov ernment.

Head of this organisation, which has offices at 61 Broadway, is T. E. Kesse meier, who, the American files show, used to be resident manager for the Hapag-Lloyd steamship line at Philadel phia. Prior to the war, he visited Ger many and returned to America in Nov ember with the personal blessing of Hitler.

Fortra guarantees that packages placed in its care in America will reach Germany. For some time, the U.S. mails were used for this contraband ser vice; but, now that Britain has halted this’ by removing the goods from the U.S. mails. Fortra has worked out another scheme.

The Germans in the Americas still subscribe, but now the orders are wire lessed by Fortra from New York to Holland for fulfilment in Holland.

Agents in Holland then deliver the par cels to the German border, where they are distributed to recipients in Germany.

Interrogated by American agents, Herr Kessemeier said that the Fortra service involves millions of dollars annually. It is expected, now, that the Allies’ next move will be pressure upon Holland to halt the contraband service. (It was announced in the newspapers of February 22 that this Dutch-German arrangement has reached such propor tions that Holland is being denuded of essential foodstuffs and materials, and that the Government is taking steps to reduce the traffic—Ed. “P.1.M.”).

The packages assembled in Holland, according to Herr Kessemeier, contain mostly food supplies now. When the U.S. mails were used, the parcels con tained technical equipment, American currency, etc.

Britain already has moved about the North Pacific contraband service. So far, incidentally, she has not established contraband control bases in the Paci fic; but, officially, she has notified Washington that such will be the case if the contraband exports are not halted at American ports.

British agents in the Pacific are not idle. They drew first blood, it can now be reported, when British cruisers took the Russian freighter “Selenga” into Hong Kong, on January 13. The “Sel enga” was carrying a cargo of wolfram ore, essential for munitions, which is produced in South China and exported via Canton. The British intercepted cables between German agents, which revealed that the ore was being deliv ered to German dummies in Siam and Manila for re-export to Siberia, for ship ment by railroad to Germany.