Former German chancellor Willy Brandt worked as a paid informant for the American military intelligence CIC long before coming to power, Der Spiegel magazine reported on Friday, December 17, citing materials from the American historian Thomas Boghardt. From the publication it follows that Brandt from 1948 to 1952 transferred information about the situation in the GDR to the Americans for a fee.
Among other things, the future Chancellor informed the CIC about the activities of the Socialist Unified Party of Germany (SED) and the youth organization FDJ, which ruled in the GDR, political prisoners in the Saxon city of Bautzen, East German shipyards, factories, railways and telephone equipment of Soviet troops in the GDR.
He received information of interest to the Americans, presumably from the Eastern Bureau of the SPD, which maintained contacts with the Social Democrats in the Soviet occupation zone and later in the GDR. Whether Brandt acted with the knowledge of the leadership of the West German SPD is unknown.
Information for cigarettes and coffee
According to Der Spiegel, the historian Boghardt was able to familiarize himself with the CIC classified materials, in which Brandt is listed under registration number O-35-VIII. The future chancellor met more than two hundred times with CIC contacts, who rated him as “usually a reliable source of information.”
Brandt’s reports to US military intelligence disappeared, but Boghardt found so-called checklists, which say when Brandt met with contacts and what those meetings were discussed. Brandt was initially paid for information in cigarettes, sugar and coffee, which were valued like money on the black market. From 1950 on, he received a monthly fee of DEM 250 from the CIC.
Willy Brandt served as German Chancellor from 1969 to 1974. He resigned after his collaborator Günter Guillaume was exposed as an East German spy. For his policy of detente from the USSR, Brandt was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974.
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