OPERATION "CORNFLAKES"
A Secret W.W.II Propaganda Operation Of The OSS

"Cornflakes" was one of those elaborate -- and expensive -- operations that are the delight of bureaucracies. The idea was to introduce Allied propaganda into the German mail system to undermine German morale on the home front, create fear of defeat, and destroy confidence in the leadership of Adolf Hitler.


This closely guarded U.S. Government secret came to light by accident when President Franklin Roosevelt's valuable stamp collection was put up for sale a public auction. His untimely death came early in 1945 when World War II was still raging savagely in Europe.


It was discovered that Roosevelt had a secret collection of "Officially" counterfeited German Postal Stamps whose illegal issue was authorized by an Espionage Agency of the United States Government, headed by a personal friend of the President, General "Wild Bill" Donovan. Also discovered at that time was an unknown issue, the grinning "death head" stamp.


The "death head" stamp was not intended for use on envelopes, but was included as a propaganda tool. If you will take note to the bottom line of this stamp which reads "FUTSCHES REICH" instead of DEUTSCHES REICH as is on the regular issues of the 6pf & 12pf stamps, as well as on the forgeries of these. "FUTSCHES" means gone, lost, ruined, broken or done for. These were distributed by the Morale Operation of the OSS in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations during the final weeks of the war.


The OSS report listing the "Hitler-heads" is believed to refer to these death head stamps. Figures show that 1,138,500 were printed, with 329,000 shipped to Bari; 73,500, to Brindisi; 106,650, to North Italy; 519,400, to Algiers; and 18,350, to France. Another 31,000 were given "special" distribution. Some presumably were among the "Cornflakes" fake airdrop mail, along with the OSS- published German-language propaganda newspaper "Das Neue Deutschland" (The New Germany) and anti-Nazi stickers.


The reasoning for using these two denominations, 6pf & 12pf, was that they resembled the then current Hitler-portrait series of 1941. Approximately 15,000 hand addressed envelopes were produced weekly. A fighter group of the U.S. Army Air Forces was detailed for the bombing and mail-dropping runs. Practice quickly revealed that customary air tactics had to be modified considerably for the attacks on mail-carrying trains and the dropping of fake mail sacks.


Efforts to distribute anti-German propaganda inside the Third Reich had been frustrated by lack of a viable underground, and by the close control the government held over communications. My belief is that the forgeries were produced to simply dilute the monetary segment of the German Postal System by the infiltration of more mail into it, then were the actual sales of the genuine issue stamps.


It seems obvious that, even if all of the operational goals of "Cornflakes" had been achieved, it would have made no significant contribution to the war. By the time the first "cornflakes" bags of phony mail fell near Amstetten, Austria, the military outcome was already inevitable. The huge "Operation Cornflakes" effort, including the loss of a pilot and the dedication of precious resources, produced no comparable benefits, except now to the collector.


All of these forgeries have been themselves forged, so it's difficult to tell which are the "genuine" forgeries. A trained eye even has difficulty, but they can be detected. The "genuine" forgeries of the 6pf & 12pf issues were produced in several with several varieties of perforations, which would lead one to conclude that the stamps were produced in several locations. This may also be true for the "death head" stamp as well.


The average market value of the pair of "genuine" forgeries of the 6pf & 12pf stamps ranges frome $80.00 to $100.00 and the "death head" single stamp an average value of $60.00 and upwards. If one is fortunate to find any of these on the handwritten envelopes that were produced, or used, in "Operation Cornflake" the 6pf & 12pf would be valued at $600.00+ and $450.00+ respectively. The "death head " on an envelope has not stated value due to it's rarity, and a guesstimate would be in the several thousands of dollars.

I shall try and post the photographs I have of the forgeries and of the operation itself as soon as possible.

Richard