World War II Spy

Helias Doundoulakis — Fri, 07 May 2010 02:18:37 +0000

By the time Helias Doundoulakis arrived in Salonica in March of 1944, most of the Jewish population had been deported to the death camps in Auschwitz and Birkenau. His wireless was hidden and operated in an abandoned Jewish textile factory, where one close encounter with German officers, while installing the wireless antenna, were close enough for Doundoulakis to see their cards:

“All they had to do was look up.
In order to hide, I moved behind a column, and I was standing mostly
on one leg. I said to myself, How long would I be able to stand like this up
here without them noticing me? Since it was so dusty up there, what would
happen if I sneezed or coughed? I was so close to them, right above them in
fact that, since I knew how to play bridge, I was following their game and
judging their plays and mistakes.”
-I Was Trained To Be A Spy-
Helias Doundoulakis, 2008

His OSS training, near-capture experiences, escapes, and messages sent to OSS HQ in Cairo are the focal point of the book. One such message resulted in the bombing of the rail road station in Salonica, and the deaths of 2.500 German soldiers. ( see http://www.iwastrainedtobeaspy.com/ ).

I WAS TRAINED TO BE A SPY

Helias Doundoulakis — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 03:28:30 +0000

When I consider the many times I narrowly escaped from the enemy, I must have been crazy to have volunteered. I lived and worked surrounded by the Germans, and had many close calls, so I had taken many chances, as if I was playing a game! Otherwise, who knows, things might have turned out differently.

Because of my involvement in the Cretan resistance and recommendations by the British SOE, I was chosen by the OSS, schooled and trained as a spy in Cairo. They taught me how to assimilate with others in a strange surrounding, but also learned the Gestapo’s methods of interrogation and if needed, to take my own life with a cyanide capsule. I played the game so well disguised as a Salonica businessman, serenading the neighborhood girls with my accordion, that no one ever suspected that this young man was really a corporal in the US Army and a spy in the OSS.

When I sent telegrams regarding troopships or convoys, I would not see their destruction and so it was not personal. Yet there are times I regret sending the telegram for our planes to bomb the Salonica train station, killing over 2,500 German soldiers, 450 Greek civilians, and the 6 American pilots captured and who knows how many airmen killed, which I personally witnessed. But I cannot help but think how those German soldiers, readying to depart from Greece, might have killed many more thousands of our American soldiers in Italy or France, and for this, I am grateful.

I WAS TRAINED TO BE A SPY | Helias Doundoulakis

World War II Spy

I WAS TRAINED TO BE A SPY