The Amber Room_ The Fate of the World's Greatest Lost Treasure - Cathy Scott-Clark [101]
All informers were marshalled into ranks: the Inoffizieller Mitarbeiter (IM), the lowly tell-tales who lived next door; the high-ranking Hauptamtlicher Inoffizieller Mitarbeiter (HIM), senior snitches who had direct contact with the person under surveillance - your best friend or your wife; the Inoffizieller Mitarbeiter zur politisch-operativen Durchdringung und Sicherung des Verantwortungsbereich (IMS), the verbose rank of boss or a secretary responsible for reviewing the political pedigree of his coworkers. But despite all of this stratification, the Stasi handlers referred to their charges by the derogatory term spitzel, which translates roughly as 'nark'.
By December 1962 Enke's remaining family members had been security-cleared and Hauptmann Schliep, an officer attached to the Stasi's Department of Agitation visited him at home.20 Schliep wrote: 'Enke placed the question on the table, what sort of income he expected to realize... He declared that he could not hope to equal his current income of L,8OO Ostmarks net. The undersigned [Hauptmann Schliep] pointed out that Comrade Enke could count on a net income of approximately L,2OO Ostmarks if he was employed by us.' Paul Enke became a Stasi IM on New Year's Day 1963.21
In the next document we read that on 5 October 1964 Enke joined the Stasi itself as a full-time operative, with the duty grade Oberstleutnant and the duty rank of Referatsleiter (departmental manager) in the Observation and Investigation Directorate (HA VIII, Section 8). So here was proof that several years after beginning his private research, the author of Bernsteinzimer Report had become a Stasi agent.
'Worker OLL-747 Enke' recited the Minister for State Security's personal oath to 'protect our workers and farmers', promising 'eternal loyalty to our fatherland, the GDR', to give his life 'in defence of every enemy' and be forever 'unquestioningly obedient to the military authorities'. He pledged to protect the republic and its Ministry for State Security
'for ever and everywhere in the world'.22 We flick back to the photograph of the purposeful bureaucrat in a tight black suit, wearing heavy-framed glasses. This was the authorized image of a man who would later become faceless.
In 1968, Enke completed his Stasi training and his Service Qualification read: 'Dr Paul Enke, Historian.' In 1970, he became an Offizier im besonderen Einsatz, a Stasi special operations officer.23 He was given a new cover, assuming the name Dr P. Kohler, a senior researcher at the Documentation Centre for the State Archives Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, Potsdam. 'At the same time he continues his usual social activities (participation at all party and other important events connected with his service).' Enke was back in the archives in a much more senior position than before.24
His arc was complete: lathe worker, radar operator, informant, historian, spy. Enke's only concern now was how to make an impression in an organization so vast.
Another binder from the Amber Room study group lands on the white plastic table. It begins with a selection of wartime newspaper cuttings collated by Stasi Oberstleutnant Paul Enke a.k.a. Dr P. Kohler of the Documentation Centre for the State Archives Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, Potsdam.
On 12 April 1942 the chief editor of the Berlin Lokal-Anzeiger reported on the Amber Room's unveiling ceremony at Konigsberg Castle.
It was presided over by Captain Helmut von Wedelstadt, the deputy Gauleiter of East Prussia. There was no mention in this story of Hitler, the Gauleiter of East Prussia, Erich Koch, or Alfred Rosenberg sending their congratulations.25
Enke found the article in Pantheon magazine, an illustrated German art digest, dated October 1942.26 It was written by Castle Museum director Alfred Rohde, but it provided