Operation Mainau - Mission Plan

Mission Plan

The mission was directed against Northern Ireland. He was tasked with using resources gathered in Éire to

  1. Establish a secure communications link between Ireland and Nazi Germany,
  2. Consult with the IRA on the prospect of a reconciliation between the Irish state and the IRA.
  3. Direct the military activities of the IRA towards British military targets (specifically naval installations),
  4. Report any incidental items of military importance.

He was not authorized to interfere in Irish politics or threaten its neutrality.

Görtz was to be unaccompanied on his mission and the attempt to insert him into Ireland was to take place originally in April but it was canceled due to bad weather. In the interval IRA chief of staff Stephen Hayes sent Plan Kathleen to Germany and Görtz was recalled to Berlin to look it over.

Görtz claimed after his capture that the dropzone for the mission was County Tyrone but this is probably a subterfuge concocted to indicate that he meant no mischief in neutral Ireland. He requested a poison capsule to take with him and this had to be cleared via Abwehr chief Wilhelm Canaris. His codename was "Gilka".

He was not equipped with any of the material later spies sent to Ireland would carry, although he was given an Afu transmitter, a 9mm Browning, and some invisible ink ("G-Tinten").

Read more about this topic:  Operation Mainau

Famous quotes containing the words mission and/or plan:

    We can come up with a working definition of life, which is what we did for the Viking mission to Mars. We said we could think in terms of a large molecule made up of carbon compounds that can replicate, or make copies of itself, and metabolize food and energy. So that’s the thought: macrocolecule, metabolism, replication.
    Cyril Ponnamperuma (b. 1923)

    My plan of instruction is extremely simple and limited. They learn, on week-days, such coarse works as may fit them for servants. I allow of no writing for the poor. My object is not to make fanatics, but to train up the lower classes in habits of industry and piety.
    Hannah More (1745–1833)