The Pond (intelligence organization)

The Pond, led by Grombach, provided the FBI with information on leftist radicals and external influences on the United States. The covert organization's focus developed into the exploitation of communists, especially in America's intelligence institutions.[7]

The Pond was extremely small and unknown to most. The team used codewords and cryptic nicknames in all of the Pond's internal records. Grombach never shared the identities of his sources, totaling over 2,500 field personnel from 32 countries.[8] Although the Pond was an Army operation, its existence was kept from the Office of Naval Intelligence, and it is not clear whether President Truman knew of it. After the end of World War II, Truman decided to shut down the OSS, largely due to Grombach's reports. The extreme secrecy and small size of the Pond are the reasons why it survived after the end of the war. The Pond remained a secret long after its operations ended.[6]

The War Department initially allocated $150,000 to the Pond per year, and this grew to over $300,000 by the end of World War II.[6] The Pond collaborated with foreign businesses to increase their financial resources.[1]

The Pond employed personnel and agent observers from large corporations around the world. The Pond started out as a part of the War Department General Staff but became a private company working under government contract. It changed jurisdictions many times until operations ceased in 1955.[6]

Starting in 1942 as the leader of The Pond, John Grombach worked with a defected Soviet intelligence officer, Alexander Barmine to discover a list of OSS Soviet agents. This was mostly left to the wayside by the United States government because the Soviet Union was now an ally of the United States.[1]

As a study of communist subversion, John Grombach began this project as a comprehensive record of reports eliminated by Alfred McCormack along with identifying two communists that worked for McCormack and several others. The list of supposed communists included:

• Alger Hiss
• Carl Marzani
• John Stewart

The monographs called for research into McCormack to be investigated by superiors, but was later set aside as Grombach was accused of discrediting an officer of the Military Intelligence Service along with inappropriately revealing classified information. Although it seemed the end, this was not so. With the abolishment of the OSS by Harry S. Truman, the branch of Research and Analysis was sent to the State Department along with Alfred McCormack, Secretary of State Byrnes. With McCormack as leader of the Interim Research and Intelligence Service, John Grombach would compile the names of 15 G-2 operatives who had moved to the state department along with McCormack and which were previously suspected of disloyalty. Grombach sent these names to the House Committee of Military Affairs where an investigation would begin. Without revealing his name, the committee made public Grombach's allegations in March 1946, would stir up controversy between McCormack and the Committees chairman, pushing McCormack to resign in April 1946.[1]

As doctor, serial killer, and source for The Pond, Petiot used his occupation as a doctor to gain information from his patients' gossip, and passed that on to John Grombach. Stationed in Paris, Petiot had German Abwehr officers and east Paris refugees as patients. With this information, Petiot identified German Abwehr officers that had been sent to the United States, which were later found by the FBI and some of who were convinced to work for the United States.[1][9]

While investigating a lead that suggested German missiles were being produced in Norway and Sweden, The Pond transported its information via diplomacy from London. Grombach suspected that the pouches that British couriers were transporting were being opened, thus submitted an unopened pouch for FBI investigation, confirming that the pouch had been opened and resealed. Because of this, American couriers transported the pouches from there on out.[10]

The Pond targeted Hungary both during and after World War II. During the war, they focused on gathering intelligence on battle information and Admiral Horthy's attempts to remove Hungary from the war. After the war in 1946, James McCargar became a case officer for the Pond located in Hungary and focused his reporting on an unavoidable communist takeover. His work led to the exfiltration of 75 anti-communist Hungarian political leaders.[1]

Under the sponsorship of the Central Intelligence Agency, The Pond began DAHL as an information assembly in Argentina and Uruguay. John Grombach reported on Uruguayan officials that were communist, but many of the submitted reports were rejected by the CIA as a result of Grombach's unreliable sources and without proof. This may have been the operation that led to the dissolution of The Pond.[1]