Undercover Mission

In January 1945, the United States was becoming desperate to find and rescue downed airmen and freed POW, who were wandering in the Polish region. Though no longer in enemy territory, everyone in Poland was suspect by the Soviet Union if they could not present identification--which was the case for most POW (the German's had confiscated papers). These expatriates would end up again in detention camps in Poland or Russia, waiting for the slow bureaucracy to process them, which could take months. And the conditions verified by American fact-finding groups, were no better than the POW camps. So the U. S. needed to act quickly, as those freed were suffering injury, malnutrition, sickness, and hypothermia.

Stalinist Russia was understandably preoccupied --driving the Germans out of  the Soviet Union, then Poland,  in the Great Patriotic War. They had no time or manpower to worry about human collateral. And their cultural and political beliefs did not look kindly on POW, who were seen as cowards at best. So if the U. S. were to help the POW (not just theirs but other countries as well), they would have to go it alone. Stalin made it clear to Roosevelt that the situation was not a high priority, and just as frustrating, that the U. S. would not be allowed to move freely in Soviet-occupied Poland to alleviate the problem.

So America went undercover. And one of the hand-chosen men given the assignment, was pilot Robert Trimble. His cover as an Air Corps officer was perfect, as we were still maintaining the air base at Poltava, and needed to bring home repaired bombers. This was his official assignment, as Assistant Operations Officer. He did not know his covert mission however, till he arrived in early February. He was at first angered by the 'bait-and-switch'; he was a pilot after all, not an agent. But eventually he accepted when he understood the crisis. He later realized, that the ruse protected him from acting suspicious while the Soviets considered his entry visa. Still, he knew nothing about undercover work.

Captain Trimble went alone and on foot into a virtually lawless Polish region, guided by the support of the  Office of Strategic Services (OSS), though he was not an agent of theirs. He carried thousands in U. S. dollars to secure rail passage and freedom for those he found, so that they could get to Odessa, the agreed-upon collection point for POW. The money he carried put him at great risk. One thing he never attempted was to remove a Russian citizen; this would have caused international scandal. But Americans, French, British, and others who were in bad shape, were brought out to safety.