"Face to Face" by Yulian Semyonov, summary

This documentary novel was written in 1983 after two years of work as a correspondent for Literaturnaya Gazeta in Western Europe. This book is a documentary investigation based on the author’s personal diaries, letters from readers, interviews with Nazi criminals, and archival research into Soviet cultural treasures stolen during World War II. The main subject of the search is the lost Amber Room of the Catherine Palace, as well as the Pskov Archive and museum collections in Lviv, Kyiv, Smolensk, and Poltava.

In 1986, director Anatoly Bobrovsky produced the two-part feature film "Face to Face," based on a screenplay by Yulian Semyonov, which was based on this story and the novel "Auction." The work is part of the writer’s series of documentary and journalistic investigations.

Letters from readers and the Sicilian trace

The story was inspired by numerous letters from Soviet citizens. War veteran M.E. Afanasyev reports on the looting of an art gallery and ancient archives in Pskov by Nazi tank crews on July 10, 1941. Writer A. Veresov shares his memories of May 1945 in Königsberg, where Professor Bryusov showed him a door hinge from a lock that matched the opening in Pushkin’s destroyed Catherine Palace.

Former prisoner O. S. Knyazeva tells of secret tunnels in Thuringia at the foot of a mountain near the Neuhaus-Schirschnitz camp. Leningrad resident A. N. Andrianov mentions Hitler’s secret telegram ordering the evacuation of the Amber Room a week before the fall of Königsberg.

The author travels to Sicily to study the links between fascism and the mafia. In Catania, a retired history professor chronicles dictator Benito Mussolini’s relationship with the Cosa Nostra. In 1924, Prefect Cesare Mori arrested rank-and-file mafiosi in Piana dei Greci, but was dismissed as soon as the investigation traced back to the Fascist elite — Don Calò and Don Vito.

American mafia boss Vito Genovese gave Mussolini $300,000 for the construction of a party building and shot and killed anti-fascist Carlo Tresca in New York. Another boss, Charles "Lucky" Luciano, began collaborating with the US OSS in 1942 and, after the war, settled in Capri and Naples, organizing heroin trafficking.

The Sicilian and American mafias are structured on a family principle: a capo leads the organization, with lieutenants and soldiers reporting to him. In Palermo in the 1950s, a young group led by Genco Russo waged war against the old bosses. The mafia later eliminated Enrico Mattei, head of the state-owned oil company ENI, who was organizing oil exploration against the interests of Texas corporations. Lawyer Vito Guarrassi handed over plant plans to the Sicilian bosses, leading to Mattei’s death in a plane crash.

Mafia connections are also evident in far-right conspiracies. In Dallas, the author examines the circumstances of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The Warren Commission declared Lee Harvey Oswald a lone gunman, but evidence points to a conspiracy involving the mafia and the far-right. Nightclub owner Jack Ruby, who shot Oswald, was involved in drug trafficking with Chicago gangster Paul Jones. In 1968, before the new elections in Los Angeles, Robert Kennedy, who had promised sanctions against the Syndicate, was shot by Sirhan Sirhan.

Meeting with Georg Stein and Colmberg Castle

In the town of Stelle near Hamburg, the author meets farmer Georg Stein. A former Wehrmacht soldier, he lost his father and sister, executed by the Gestapo in 1944 for their ties to the Stauffenberg conspirators. Stein vowed to return valuables stolen by the Nazis to their rightful owners. Using his own savings, he collected 50,000 microfilms from the archives of the "Einsatzstab Rosenberg," a team of 350 experts led by General Gerhard Utikal. Thanks to Stein, valuables from the Pskov-Pechersky Monastery and the Smolensk Regional Archives have already been returned to the USSR.

Stein retraces the Amber Room’s steps. In November 1942, the masterpiece was brought to Königsberg Castle. After an air raid on August 30, 1944, the treasure was moved to the basement of the Neurossgarten church. Later, crates containing the amber from Königsberg University ended up in the Wittekind salt mine near Volprihausen in Lower Saxony. A document dated January 15, 1945, states: "Object deposited in V.S."

Stein overlooks Colmberg Castle in Franconia. The former property of German Ambassador Foredge was passed on to Gestapo officer Unbehaven, who opened a museum of oriental culture there. The former owner’s uncle, theology professor Adalbert Foredge, personally compiled inventories of paintings stolen from the USSR. During the war, paintings by Bryullov, Repin, Tropinin, Ge, Vasnetsov, and Aivazovsky were brought to Colmberg.

The author visits Lord Mayor von Mosch in Ansbach, who confirms the facts but admits the authorities’ impotence: Unbehaven invested 15,000,000 marks in the castle’s restoration. Visiting Colmberg disguised as a tourist, the author sees vast collections guarded by German shepherds. Local residents recall that in 1945, Rosenberg’s employee, Baer, died under mysterious circumstances after arriving at the castle with a convoy of trucks. The author’s attempts to speak with Earl Forage in Munich and Adalbert Forage in Erlangen are met with obscenities and refusals. At the German Ministry of the Interior, Advisor Gasner demands proof, despite mentioning the ship Brandenburg, which carried one of the train cars from Königsberg.

Dr. Kohler’s version and the Peter Menten case

In Berlin, East German scientist Dr. Paul Kohler presents his own version. He points to Hitler’s order of November 18, 1940, on the "Führer’s prerogative." All the best works of art in Europe were selected by Professor Posse, director of the Dresden Gallery, for the "Führer Museum" in Linz. East Prussian Gauleiter Erik Koch established a secret facility in Thuringia, centered in Ohrdruf.

In January 1945, the cruiser Emden departed Königsberg for Kiel, carrying relics of the Third Reich and Koch’s boxes. The cargo proceeded to Potsdam, Bernterode, and the Weimar Museum. In early April 1945, a convoy of Swiss Red Cross trucks, under SS protection, transported the valuables from Weimar to unknown mines in Saxony. In December 1944, Dr. Rohde, the curator of the Amber Room, was in Dresden. He was searching for hiding places for the treasures.

In the Netherlands, the author examines the case of millionaire Pieter Menten. In 1941, this SS man shot civilians in Lviv and Pidhorodtsi, executed the family of his rival Pistiner, and plundered the collection of Professor Ostrovsky. Menten smuggled three train cars of paintings from Krakow, Kyiv, and Riga to the Netherlands. After the war, thanks to the intervention of patrons and influential lawyers, Menten served only eight months in prison. In 1976, the executioner attempted to auction off the paintings, but public outcry forced him to flee to Switzerland. After his extradition, the committee of communist Hans Hylense secured his trial.

NATO Secretary General Joseph Luns is revealed to be a former member of Anton Mussert’s Dutch Nazi Party. The scandal exposes European politicians’ ties to the Nazi past.

The Mafia, Lockheed, and Nazi General Wolff

In Darmstadt, the writer meets with SS-Obergruppenführer Karl Wolff. Himmler’s chief of staff, who led separate negotiations with Allen Dulles in 1945, denies Nazi guilt. Wolff claimed to have handed over the Uffizi Gallery to the Americans to avoid destruction, but conceals details about the valuables hidden in Bavarian castles.

In Cologne, former businessman Jakob Schreider and his grandson Michel offer to reveal the address of the Amber Room. According to them, fragments of the amber panels are located in Baden-Baden and Ascona, in the home of the widow of industrialist Wolfgang Erbig. During the war, Erbig supplied varnish to Hermann Göring’s Luftwaffe and used tons of amber. The writer travels to Ascona with a local resident, Bruno. The concierge confirms the presence of vast collections in the blocked apartment, but Schreider himself begins demanding 1,000,000 marks for his testimony in court.

The international mafia launders "heroin money" through the purchase of cultural treasures. German journalist Anthony Terry, a former MI6 agent, confirms the involvement of the mafia and secret services in concealing the stolen goods. In Vaduz, Baron Eduard von Falz-Fein uses his own funds to buy Russian books, icons, and Lanceray sculptures at Sotheby’s and Christie’s auctions, donating them free of charge to Soviet museums.

Corruption is closely intertwined with the military business. The American corporation Lockheed paid millions in bribes to politicians in Japan, Italy, the Netherlands, and West Germany for the purchase of defective Starfighter fighter jets. In Japan, the corporation’s interests were represented by the fascist businessman Yoshio Kodama, in the Netherlands by Prince Bernhard, and in Italy by Mussolini’s former paratrooper, Graziani. Excess profits from these deals were laundered through banks and invested in works of art.

The mystery of the Wittekind mine and Baron von Falz-Fein

The writer receives a letter from Friedrich Axt, a former prisoner of the Moringen camp. Axt recalls seeing an amber ashtray with two eagles — Prussian and Russian — in the possession of SS guards at the Wittekind mine in Volprihausen in the fall of 1944. Hundreds of chests bearing the markings of Nazi agencies were stored at a depth of 800 meters. In August 1945, British officers led by Sir Ettekind descended into the mine and retrieved two boxes of amber, after which a series of strange explosions rocked the tunnels, flooding the underground.

In Kassel, the management of the Kali-Salz concern — Dr. Johnson and von der Eee — confirmed the arrival of 25 train cars from Göttingen and Königsberg in Volprihausen. However, they claim that drilling and pumping out the water will cost 20,000,000 marks and demand a document with the exact numbering of the crates.

In Heidenberg, the author speaks with former Armaments Minister Albert Speer. Speer describes the work of the "Führer Museum" in Linz and the underground storage facilities at Karinhall, created by Göring. According to Speer, Göring sold valuables to the Gauleiters and, before his downfall, hid masterpieces in Alt-Aussee.

On the Côte d’Azur in Vence, Semyonov and Falz-Fein visited Marc Chagall and the collector Petrikovsky. The idea of creating a "Committee for an Honest Treatment of Russian Art Found in the West" was born. Writers Georges Simenon and James Aldridge joined the initiative. Simenon, who was in Switzerland, recalled how in 1933 he heard a recording of a conversation between Hitler, Göring, and Goebbels about the planned Reichstag fire.

In Baden-Baden, archivist Frau Fuss displays documents about the stays of Gogol, Turgenev, and the Annenkovs. The author visits the impoverished Princess Trubetskaya, living in squalor.

The Honesty Committee and the Tragic End of the Search

The security services are trying to block the investigation. The writer receives an anonymous phone call threatening to fabricate a case, revoke his driver’s license for parking violations, or stage an "accident." The police do indeed confiscate the author’s license under the pretext of a traffic violation.

Former Soviet lawyer Boris Umansky passes on information about a businessman named Lakshin (Styller), who is selling 16th-century icons in Germany using a fictitious will from his mother-in-law in Yalta. Shortly after handing over the materials, Umansky suddenly dies of a heart attack in a hospital.

Stein compiles a memorandum systematizing information about Rosenberg’s headquarters, Künsberg, Jordan, and Frank. However, persecution and ruin lead to the researcher’s death. Having lost his wife, Elizabeth, Georg Stein commits suicide, continuing his search until his last moments. Baron von Falz-Fein makes efforts to save Stein’s priceless archive for transfer to the USSR, and also secures the transfer of Feodor Chaliapin’s ashes from Paris to Moscow.