(Prisoner of War: Lived Experiences), appeared several months
later.FORSCHUNGSAMT. The chief agency conducting communica-
tions intelligence for the Third Reich, the Forschungsamt (Research
Office) was authorized by Hermann Göring when he took over the
reins of the Prussian government in 1933. When he became Reich
air minister in 1935, its offices in Berlin were moved to larger
quarters in a converted apartment complex in the Schillerstrasse.
The Forschungsamt obtained its information by monitoring wire-
less communications and radio broadcasts, tapping German for-
eign telephone and telegraph lines, and, in conjunction with the
Abwehr, inspecting mail. The richest source of information proved
to be not the “A” line, or telephone listening stations, but the “B”
line, or wireless receiving stations. The Forschungsamt was divided
into six branches that were later elevated to bureaus: administra-
tion; personnel; distribution of incoming requests and sorting of in-
coming reports; cryptanalysis; evaluation; and technical equipment
development and management. The finished products—known as
the Braune Blätter—were distributed in strictest secrecy to a small
number of select officials. Adolf Hitler relied on these reports quite
heavily in the prewar period, notably during the Czechoslovakian
crisis of 1938.
By 1941, in addition to a network of substations in greater Ger-
many and the occupied territories, the number of employees had
grown from an initial staff of six to more than 6,000. Its three direc-
tors included Hans Schimpf, Prince Christoph of Hesse, and Gott-
fried Schapper. Despite the high degree of personal control exercised
by Göring and the attempt to employ only Nazi loyalists, the Forsc-
hungsamt, dominated by radio engineers and intelligence specialists,
conducted its research with an extraordinary degree of independence
and objectivity. It remained generally aloof from jurisdictional and
political disputes involving other intelligence organs. Yet its wartime
reports, often pessimistic about Germany’s prospects for victory
and forthright in assessing responsibility, were read less and less
frequently. Beginning in 1943, its headquarters had to be moved
from Berlin to Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland), then to Bavaria, and
finally to Schleswig-Holstein.
112 • FORSCHUNGSAMT