From Berlin to Paradise
On August 15, 1935, attractive Susie Ruth Kuhns, a young lady at the time, and her family moved to Hawaii. Susie Ruth's family consisted of her middle-aged father Bernard Kuhns, her matronly mother Friedel, and her six-year-old half-brother Hans Joachim. There was nothing unusual about this Berlin family, recently transplanted from Germany to this Pacific paradise.
An Unusual Ordinary Family
There was nothing out of the ordinary about Susie Ruth's father except that Bernard Kuhns, in 1935, had held great influence in the Nazi party. That the elder Kuhns had served as a midshipman in the German Navy during World War I and had become a doctor after his discharge was certainly normal. But perhaps it was just a bit unique that Bernard had become a close friend with Heinrich Himmler who was head of the Gestapo, and later became a minor official, himself, in the organization.
Also, there was nothing unusual about Susie Ruth except that, at age seventeen, she had been the mistress of the clubfooted Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels.
In time, Goebbels tired of his teen-aged mistress and needed a way to get rid of the girl without insulting her father. And then Goebbels Nazi mind hit upon a plan. Japan, of whom the Nazi's had close ties, had asked for the loan of a spy to work at Pearl Harbor, on Oahu, Hawaii.
Japan Rents a Spy
So, in essence, Japan rented the Kuhn family, paying handsomely for them as well as footing all of their expenses. In return, the Kuhn family was to keep tabs for Japan on what the United States military was doing on Oahu.
Settled into the home they bought in Pearl City, and a cottage in Kalama that conveniently overlooked Pearl Harbor, they quietly went about the business they were being well paid to do, that of spying.
New War Industry, Rent a Spy: Before the Pearl Harbor Attack, continues with Bernard Kuhn, A Spy of Many Faces: Susie Ruth Uses Charms for Spying.
