Though he let his displeasure show, Donovan didn’t back down. “I would say that Jim Whittaker has done his fair share of being valuable to us,” Donovan said.
“At the very least, if he has to be-what shall I say?-restrained, then we can do that as well at Summer Place as Fort Knox.”
“You may have a point,” the President said. “There’s one more thing,” Donovan said.
“Jim Whittaker’s name has come up in connection with the North African invasion, in connection with a man named Eric Fulmar. “Who’s he?”
“Another valuable-to-our-cause German, Franklin,” Donovan said. When Roosevelt glared at him, Donovan went on: “We used him to help us get the mining engineer out of Morocco. He’s close to the pasha of Ksar es Souk, who, Holds worth Martin suggests, might just be able to arrange for a rebellion when we invade.”
“What’s his connection with Jimmy?
“He, Jimmy, and Canidy were in boarding school together. St. Mark’s,” Donovan said.
“We used Canidy to get to him in the Grunier operation, but that burned Canidy out for Fulmar after we decided to leave Fulmar in Morocco although we’d promised to take him out. If we go ahead with the idea of stirring up the Berbers, we’ll need another contact. Among the names that the researchers came up with, absolutely independently, was James M. B. Whittaker.” Roosevelt didn’t reply for a moment. Finally he asked, “Again, Bill, exactly what is it you want me to do? ” “Turn Jimmy over to me,” Donovan said.
“I’ll guarantee his silence. “I’ll discuss it with George,” Roosevelt said. “We both know what he’ll say,” Donovan protested. “As I’ve told you, George doesn’t always get what George wants,” the President said.
“But under the circumstances, I think I should ask him what he thinks.”
Donovan just looked at him.
“And under the circumstances, I think you should relay my gratitude to Barbara for her hospitality to the admiral. You may tell her that I said I have every hope that she will soon be able to see Jimmy.”
I V [ ONE I San Francisco, California June 15, 1942
Lieutenant Commander Edwin H. Bitter returned to the United States aboard the Swedish passenger liner Kungsholm. The Kungsholm was then engaged in returning diplomatic and civilian personnel of the various belligerent powers to their homelands. Its last voyage in this capacity had been to Japan, carrying among others a hundred Japanese of American citizenship who preferred Japan to detention in the camps established for them in Arizona and elsewhere.
The Swedish ambassador to the Empire of Japan then received Japanese permission to charter the vessel to the United States for service as a hospital ship. On instructions from Berlin, the German ambassador supported the Swedish request. The German Foreign Ministry believed that Germany might require similar services at some time in the future.
The German request overcame reluctance from some quarters in the Japanese Foreign Ministry.
The Kungsholm-floodlights illuminating the huge red crosses painted on its white hull-steamed under the Golden Gate Bridge and docked at the Treasure Island Naval Base in San Francisco Bay. Most of the Navy and Marine Corps personnel aboard were transferred immediately to a hospital train for transportation to the Navy hospital in San Diego.
But since Lieutenant Commander Bitter was ambulatory he required a cane-he was driven to the Alameda Naval Air Station in a Navy station wagon. After a complete physical examination he was given an interim classification of “convalescent” and a partial pay, then ordered to report to the Great Lakes Naval Station. He was told he would be given a fourteen-day convalescent leave to his home of record, and that a reservation priority had been authorized for a roomette aboard a train to Chicago the next day. Bitter arrived in the United States wearing Army-issue khakis with an Army major’s golden oak leaf on each collar point. There had been no Navy-size (smaller) rank insignia available in Calcutta. As soon as he could, he went to the officers’ sales store and outfitted himself with uniforms off the rack. These would do for the time being.
When he left for the Orient a year before, he had sent most of his Navy uniforms from Pensacola Naval Air Station, where he had been stationed with Dick Canidy, to his parents’ home in Chicago. He bought two sets of khaki tunics, trousers, and shirts; two sets of khaki shoulder boards (two white, two blue); and the appropriate metal insignia of rank. He purchased golden Naval Aviator’s wings to replace the set he had taken to China. They had been either misplaced or stolen. The clerk had never heard of the Order of the Cloud Banner, so he could not buy a ribbon to represent that. And he was further disappointed when he realized that since he’d gotten his wound while he was in Chinese service, it did not qualify him for the Purple Heart medal. The clerk told him, however, that anybody with ninety days’ service in the Pacific was entitled to a Pacific Theater ribbon, but Bitter decided he wasn’t entitled to that either, since he did not have ninety days’ U.S. Navy service in the Far East. He also did not choose to wear the single ribbon everyone in the service was entitled to, the American Defense Service Medal. Finally, he pinned his American Volunteer Group wings above the right breast pocket and his Navy wings above the left, where regulations prescribed they should be worn. When he examined himself in the mirror, he was pleased with what he saw. It was good to be back in a Navy uniform, and he thought that the AVG wings would more than make up to anyone who knew what they were-and he didn’t really care about anyone who didn’t-for the lack of campaign ribbons on his left breast.