aggravating and soon terminated his services. After his return to Lon-
don in January 1944, he worked with Otto John in preparing gray
propaganda broadcasts to Germany over Soldatensender Calais.
Among his British friends at the time were Guy Burgess and Anthony
Blunt, two fellow homosexuals in the employ of Soviet intelligence.
At the conclusion of the war, the SIS dispatched Putlitz to the British
occupation zone, where he served as an aide to the minister-presi-
dent of Schleswig-Holstein but returned to become a British citizen
in 1948, unhappy with his initial reception in Germany. In the same
year, he testified for the prosecution during the Wilhelmstrasse tri-
als of German diplomats. Following the defection of Burgess to
Moscow, Putlitz took refuge in the German Democratic Republic in
January 1952. His less than forthcoming memoirs—Unterwegs nach
Deutschland: Erinnerungen eines ehemaligen Diplomaten (The Put-
litz Dossier)—were published in East Berlin in 1956. He died on 3
September 1975 in Potsdam.– R –
RABTA AFFAIR. A scandal that surfaced in 1988 involving the
Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), the Rabta Affair had its origins in
the illegal participation of West German firms in the construction of
a chemical weapons factory at Rabta, Libya. Although the BND had
notified top officials in the Helmut Kohl government of this situation
in August 1987, no action was taken until press reports the follow-
ing year forced the issue. The ensuing controversy led not only to an
acrimonious debate in the Bundestag but to severe strains between
the Federal Republic of Germany and the United States, whose intel-
ligence sources had discovered this link as well. Although a parlia-
mentary investigation later exonerated the BND and its president,
Hans-Georg Wieck, their image was considerably tarnished at home
and abroad. In June 1990, a Mannheim court sentenced the principal
contractor, Jürgen Hippenstiel-Imhausen, to a five-year prison term
for tax fraud and export violations.
RAETHJEN, HANS DIETER (1939– ). A former member of the
Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) who helped train Muammar
358 • RABTA AFFAIR