Word: rieth
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Born in Belgium 60 years ago, Dr. Rieth was the son of a German who once did some work for the Standard Oil Co. in Europe. When the German Army rolled into Belgium in 1914, Kurt Rieth fled through the Belgian lines, joined the invaders. became a civilian administrator in occupied territory...
...Germany's Minister to Austria when in 1933 Adolf Hitler climbed into power. Dr. Rieth stayed on in Vienna, was soon knee-deep in Nazi intrigue. After the assassination by Nazi gunmen of Austria's brave little Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, Minister Rieth was recalled to Berlin, replaced by his good friend Franz von Papen...
First thing Agent Rieth did when he arrived in Rio three months ago was to call a meeting of German consuls in South America, set up a commission composed of two Japanese, an Italian, a German, to look after Axis interests in Latin America. A subsidiary, the Inter-American Abstention Committee, was also formed. Purpose: to keep in touch with U.S. isolationists, encourage those who would hinder U.S. aid to Britain...
...Then Dr. Rieth turned up at Brownsville, Tex. aboard a Pan American Airways plane from Mexico City. At the U.S. customs office he said he was "a retired capitalist" on his way to Manhattan on "a personal financial mission." His immediate destination, he said, was the office of Walter Clark Teagle, chairman of Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey...
Actually, as FBI men soon discovered, his business was to direct anti-British activities in the U.S. Like Dr. Gerhardt Alois Westrick, who beat a hasty retreat last summer after his activities were unmasked by the press (TIME, Aug. 12), Dr. Rieth also hoped to persuade U.S. businessmen to feel more friendly toward the Reich. With that in mind, he called on bankers and industrialists, introducing himself as "a very dear friend" of Standard Oil's Teagle. Mr. Teagle denied that he had ever met the Nazi agent or communicated with...