Epilogue
For months and months after our successful defection we were kept under lock and key. We lived in a non-descript small office building in Munich under constant watch of bodyguards. The building was wired with cameras, motion sensors and an electrified roof . If we wanted to go anywhere we had give detailed plans to the bodyguards who coincidentally had a small room right at the entrance door to our apartment. And while these security measures were understandable on some level, I was a 17 year old kid who was going bonkers in this environment. Each time we went out as a group, it required 6 bodyguards and 3 to 4 cars.
These measures were entirely appropriate. Unbeknownst to us, the STASI had taken the unprecedented step of offering a bounty on our heads. I imagine more so on the capture or execution of Werner Stiller, but we were in danger nonetheless. Many years later I was told that the STASI in 1980 had been mistakenly under the impression that a family in Bavaria was us. They've sent a hit team of three agents across the border. In order to verify the discovery, individual team members visited this unsuspecting family on two seperate occasions. The first came disguised as a delivery driver, the second visit came as a gas meter reader. After that the team was pretty sure they had found us and connverged on the house. All three of them with guns drawn entered the home of their suspects. I don't know the exact details, but somehow the wife of the poor fellow under attack had enough presence of mind to call from the kitchen to the entrance way "Honey I've called the cops - they will be here in 2 minutes." And that was apperantly enough to spook the hit team into abandoning their plan.
Based on the success statistics mentioned in the Intro, there was a good chance if the STASI wants to find you, they will. For many years after our defection I had nightmares about this subject. These dreams stopped after the wall came down and East-Germany ceased to exist. As the case of Georgi Markov in 1978 illustrates, Eastern intelligence services were rather resourceful. From a technology standpoint the STASI was more advanced than the KGB.
In order to defuse my stress of being locked up, the BND resolved to help. Our handlers called a meeting and explained to me that the BND completley sympathized with our situation and offered to relocate me. (They could not relocate all of us together.) "We have good relations with two countries were we think you will be safe. The choice you have to make is which country you'd like to live in - South Africa or the United States".
After some thought and research I decided on the US - even though from a European point of view the country seemed dangerous and full of crime. In June of 1979 I arrived in Washington DC for a scheduled stay of only two years. I was to attend a culinary school located right along McArthur Blvd. My local contact and all around helper was Adalbert Dannegger, a member of the BND attached to the German Embassy.
The relationship between Werner Stiller and my mother ended in the Summer of 1981. After having lived under lock and key for a year and half, constantly being watched and constantly being monitored, Werner convinced the BND to allow him a windsurfing vacation at lake "Garda" in Italy, only him and a bodyguard. He promptly managed to fall in love with a 19 year old girl vacationing there, and confessed his entire story to her. Mom was furious. His actions put everything they had worked for in danger. At some point shortly thereafter the break up was complete and mother joined me in the United States. We were resettled by CIA and given new identities. I actually got to pick my own name!
Were are we now?
We've been living in the US for the past 30 years, which probably makes me more American than German at this point. Mom is married to a wonderful American gentleman and both live in what has to be the absolutely most beatiful small town in the entire United States. Located right along the Pacific Ocean, this city with spanish-mediterranian architecture has become my hometown. Home is were the heart is after all.
What happened to Stiller?
He studied Business at Washington University in St. Louis and obtained an MBA in 1983-84. During his stint at school he discovered the stock market and almost lost his entire life savings while, true to form, making high-risk speculative investments. After graduation, on the recomendation of a professor, he was able to obtain a stockbroker position with Goldman Sachs in New York City where he worked his way up the ranks to be stationed in London somewhere in the late 80's. He continued to make money in high risk deals. After becoming the branch manager for a newly opened Goldman branch in Frankfurt he quit to pursue his own entreprenurial goals. With deals all over the world and houses in several beautiful European spots ( like Cannes ) he managed to get married and divorced 5 times along the way. The most noteworthy marriage being to a pretty mafia princess in NYC. The divorce from this daughter of a "made man" in NYC, cost him over $1 million (or a ride with his father-in-law). Having been riding the greatest bull market in the history of modern economies, Stiller is either completely broke or extremely wealthy at this point. I don't think there is any middle ground possible for this man. According to a newspaper quote in 2001/02 his latest ventured has seen him taking up residence in Budapest Hungary in order to work as a middleman between the business interests of the European Union countrys and Kasachstan. Again a risky but potentially very lucrative position.
As an interesting side note, the BND established a cover story that was both completely false, self serving to the BND's purposes and at the same time intended to scare the STASI. Through numeous articles planted in the West German media,as well as Stiller's own book "In the Center of Espionage", the BND in Pullach attempted to paint a picture of Stiller as a double-agent who had been passing messages back and forth since the early 70's. This cover story painted Stiller as being a BND employee for many years. The cover story does sound nice and Stiller continues to propagate it - even as late as 1992 when he was interviewed by the German newsmagazine "Spiegel" and bragged about secret meetings with the BND in cities like Budapest, Zagreb and even the Stasi safe house in East Berlin. Nothing could be further from the truth. I was there. My uncle was his only contact to the BND.
Poetic Justice
With the benefit of hindsight, there is much poetic justice to be found in the lifes of the people who had tried to catch and kill us.
Erich Mielke:
On 3 December 1989, Mielke was expelled from membership in the SED. On 7 December 1989, he was detained by GDR authorities and placed in "investigative custody" (Untersuchungshaft) as he was charged with "damaging the national economy"(Schädigung der Volkswirtschaft).
After the GDR joined West Germany in October 1990, Mielke was arrested and charged with the 1931 murders of police officers Anlauf and Lenck. Much of the evidence used in the trial was taken from the files of the original investigation, which were found in Mielke's personal safe after the dissolution of the Stasi. Despite attempts by his lawyers to get the charges dropped by claiming the evidence had been extracted under torture, he was convicted of both murders and in October 1993 he was sentenced to six years' imprisonment. He was paroled after less than two, and in 1998 all further legal action against him was ended on the grounds of his poor health. He lived out the remaining 2 years of his life in an apartment building in Berlin under police guard.
Mielke died on 21 May 2000 aged 92 in a Berlin nursing home. His remains are buried in the Zentralfriedhof Friedrichsfelde in Berlin. Mielke's unmarked grave is outside the memorial section established at the entrance in 1951 by East German leaders for communist heroes. A fitting end for one of the most feared characters in East Germany's gallery of thugs.
Ernst Honecker:
After the GDR was dissolved in October 1990, the Honeckers stayed with the family of the Lutheran pastor Uwe Holmer. Honecker then stayed in a Soviet military hospital near Berlin before later fleeing with Margot Honecker to Moscow, to avoid prosecution over charges of Cold War crimes. He was accused by the German government of involvement in the deaths of 192 East Germans who tried to leave the GDR in violation of anti-Republikflucht laws. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991, Honecker took refuge in the Chilean embassy in Moscow, but was extradited by the Yeltsin administration to Germany in 1992. When the trial formally opened in early 1993, Honecker was released due to ill health and on 13 January of that year moved to Chile to live with his daughter Sonja, her Chilean husband Leo Yáñez, and their son Roberto. He died of liver cancer in Santiago.
Markus Wolf:
Out of all of the opposition players, Wolf probably experiences the best possible outcome. Everything considered. East Germany's number one control agent and super spy fled the country shortly before German reunification , and sought political asylum in Russia and Austria. When denied, he returned to Germany where he was arrested by German police. Wolf claimed to have refused an offer of "seven figures", a new identity and a home in California from the Central Intelligence Agency to defect to the United States. In 1993 he was convicted of treason by OberlandesgerichtDüsseldorf and sentenced to six years imprisonment. This was later quashed by the German supreme court, because Wolf was acting from the territory of the then-independent GDR. In 1997 he was convicted of unlawful detention, coercion, and bodily harm, and was given a suspended sentence of two years imprisonment. Everything considered, things could have gone a lot worse for "Karla".
Lieutenant-General Kratsch:
Not much is known about the most diligent of our pursuers. A German TV crew found him as part of a documentary they were filming about us. Living alone and eeking out a meager existence by delivering newspapers, Kratsch looked severely alcoholic in the interview.
Why tell this story?
Mostly for the benefit of my daughter Katelin. This is part of our family history and with the multi-media cababilities of the web I can link to various pages, pictures and notes that bring the story alive. Katelin is fascinated with this whole business - probably because of the movie "Spy Kids". She loves to ask me " Daddy - Oma was a spy? " to which I answer "Yes she was". She then asks " Daddy- you were half a spy? " - to which I answer " That was a long time ago darling, but I guess you could call it that " at which point Katelin has a triumphant smile on her face and with sparkeling eyes declares " Great! That makes me a quarter spy ! "
I hope that the unbelievable force that helped us through this ordeal, allowing us to escape untouched in spite of everything that went wrong, I hope whatever it is - call it God, call it Faith or Luck - I hope it can see Katelin when she triumphantly declares "I'm a quarter spy !" And I hope that our guardian angels can feel just a little bit of the love that I feel for my daughter who would not be in this world if it hadn't been for 15 minutes.
Thomas Wagner (Michael Michnowski)
Los Angeles, California in the Summer of 2003
UPDATE 2010: Many people have stopped by this site and sent their well wishes via email.Thank you ! In the years since we've first posted this information the Internet grew and gained a great deal more data. Between Wikipedia and Youtube I was able to find an amazing amount of usable information,For example, youtube contains all sorts of videos dealing with East German music, the fall of the wall and how some of the places I lived in look today. I have updated the site with some appropriate links.