Venlo Incident The Venlo Incident was a covert German Sicherheitsdienst ( SD - Security Service ) engineered capture of two British SIS ( Secret Intelligence Service ) agents on 9 November 1939 . The incident was used by the presiding National Socialist German Workers ' Party government ( for propaganda purposes ) to link the United Kingdom to Georg Elser ' s failed assassination ( time - bomb ) attempt on German Chancellor Adolf Hitler at the Bürgerbräukeller in Munich ( Germany ) on 8 November 1939 and to justify Germany ' s later invasion of the Netherlands , a neutral country , on 10 May 1940 . History . Two assigned British SIS agents had met supposed discontented German Army officers in the Dutch border town of Venlo . Following a series of covert meetings , these German Army officers communicated that they were plotting a " coup d ' état " against Chancellor Adolf Hitler . The initial meeting had been arranged with the British SIS in early September 1939 by a known German political refugee named Dr . Franz Fischer , who was exiled in the Netherlands , but who unbeknown to the British SIS , was working covertly for the " Gestapo " and then Sturmbannführer ( Major ) Walter Schellenberg of the Foreign Intelligence ( Counter - Espionage ) section of the " Sicherheitsdienst ( SD ) " . This political refugee ' s primary task was to collect and feed false information to the British SIS in general , as part of the German " Sicherheitsdienst " network of intelligence operations . Capture of British agents . Reichsführer - SS Heinrich Himmler , who along with Hitler had only just escaped death in the failed Bürgerbräukeller assassination attempt , seized the opportunity : in an angry telephone conversation he ordered the so - called " Hauptmann Schämmel " to capture the two British SIS agents for interrogation about British involvement into the Bürgerbräukeller assassination attempt . On the night of 8 – 9 November 1939 , German SS - Sonderkommandos ( SS Special Units ) under the operations command of SD man Alfred Naujocks , crossed into the Netherlands at Venlo . They were to meet with the two British SIS agents in a café , Café Backus , situated just metres behind the German - Dutch border crossing post on the Netherlands side . To reinforce credibility , the British SIS agents had been promised that they were to meet a German Army General , who was leading the intended " coup d ' état " , and agents Best and Stevens took with them Dutch intelligence officer Lieutenant Dirk Klop . When Best and the others arrived , the awaiting German agents surrounded their car with machine guns and opened fire , mortally wounding Klop and forcibly dragging the two British agents and the dying Klop over the border into Germany . The Germans blamed the near - simultaneous assassination attempt on Hitler in Munich on British agents such as Stevens and Best . Under interrogation in Berlin , the two captured British SIS agents revealed much to the " Gestapo " , though the extent of useful information pried out of them remains uncertain . In Britain , the capture of these two significant agents had destroyed much of their network operating in the Netherlands , and left London feeling uncertain to the extent of knowledge that had been gained by the German Security Services , fearing their entire espionage network throughout Western Europe may be incapacitated . This incident also subsequently made the British very suspicious of any further approach from any kind of professed German anti - Hitler resistance . Hitler used it as an excuse to claim that The Netherlands was involved with Britain and had violated its own neutrality . Best and Stevens remained imprisoned until the end of the war . The Venlo Incident was described in episode 1 of BBC Radio 4 ' s " MI6 : A Century in the Shadows " , broadcast on Monday , 27 July 2009 . Payne Best recalled : " I know I was standing next to Stevens when four of these men jumped off and rushed towards us . Stevens said ' Our number ' s up . ' Last I heard of him for five - and - a - half years . Then the next moment there were two fellows in front of each of us , one holding a pistol to our heads and the other putting handcuffs on . Then the Germans shouted at us ' March ! ' , and prodding us in the back with their pistols and calling ' Hup ! Hup ! Hup ! ' , they rushed us along toward the German frontier . " Fictional portrayals . The Venlo Incident is the inspiration for the ending of the first episode in the BBC comedy - drama " Private Schulz " . It was also used by William Boyd in his 2006 book , " Restless " . Venlo and Klop are renamed , respectively , Prenslo and Lt . Joos . The two SIS officers are not named . Café Backus is named .