The Wilmington morning star., 1944-05-26
Locating Spy Radios
BY PET R EDISON

Although existence of clandestine Nazi radio
stations in Latin America was known as early
as the spring of 1941, a full year was to elapse
before the Department of State could arrange
matters so that U. S. technicians, trained in
the monitoring of the air waves by the Radio
Intelligence Division of the Federal Communi.
cations Commission could be assigned to work
with other American governments in putting
these espionage centers out Of business.
First step was made at the Rio Conference
Of Foreign Ministers: resolution recommend,
ing elimination of the clandestine stations
But it was March before the State department
was ready to ask FEC to supply and
mobile equipment to conduct the local moni-
toring in Brazil and Chile, the two most ac-
tive centers.
Two young Texas engineers-they would be
Texans-were assigned to the job. They were
Robert D. Link of Dallas, and John F. de
Bardeleben of Houston. De Bardeleben is now
back in the U. S. as assistant supervisor OF
the primary monitoring station in Kingsville
Tex Link has remained in Brazil and is
hailed as the father of Brazilian montoring.
By long distance radio direction finding OF
the Radio Intelligence Division it was known
that one Of the German stations was in the
locate the exact house in which the transnitter
was set up This involved cruising the streets
of Valparaiso with mobile radio detection
equipment and finally, by means OF hand
sized device developed by RID engineers, 10
eating the exact room from which the signals
were sent
De Bardeleben got to Valparaiso on March
10, 1912, on which day the Nazis operating
clandestne station PYL got smart, They be-
gan staggering their schedules and moving
their equipment from place to place within a
1O-mle radius 1t took from May IS to June
10 to determine that on alternate weeks they
transmitted from the house of one Guillermo
Zeller, Avenida Allenana 5508, Cerro Allegro.
On June Is, Chilean police raided the house
but found no radio A telephone tap had been
placed on the house, however, and when the
raid was over Zeller called another suspect
Nazi and said, LUCKILY they didn't search
very good especially in the basement
It took nine hours to get another warrant,
but even then when the Chilean police found
big crate in the basement they didn't open
it, The station was, however, dismantled and
hidden and the operator, one Peter Johannes
Szeraws Disappeared
In October the Chilean police decided to
move anyway. They arrested Hans Blume
manager of Transradio in Valparaiso, hailed
him into court with the crate of apparatus
which De Bardeleben had located in a grocery
1t was disguised as a sewing machine, on a
special cart which made it easy to move De
| Bardeleben, as inspector Technico de los
Servicios Electricos,'' assembled the appara-
tus and put it into operation before the eyes
OF the judge The court convicted
| Robert Link had similar experiences in Bra
I'll. There had been three German stations
opera -.g as LIR, GEL and CIT which were
particularly bothersome in the spring OF l941.
Around each was separate group OF Ger
man spies, co-ordinated with German diplo-
matte offices and business houses.
Link set up a Brazilian Monitoring Service,
trained Brazilian Army, Navy and Air Corps
engineers in the technique of monitorlng and
direction finding, and as result saw scores
of spies rounded up and their big transmltters
seized. Those not caught decamped to Argen-
tina, from which they still operate in the last
safe haven for espionage in the hemisphere.
| u. S. officials concerned can't speak TOO
highly of Latin American officials involved In
these operations for the way they arrested
spies and seized code books which mace pos
sible the DECIDING of the Nazi secret radio
traafesAfswT