Baldrik Ottke

Decorated for his service with a Jäger battalion during the Great War no one could contest Baldrik Ottke’s bravery. Left unsaid was exactly how he had earned those commendations. True, Ottke was a decisive officer yet he could also be brash, reckless and disposed to taking chances. His comrades suspected it was Ottke’s way of breaking away from the influence of his severely conservative father. Regardless, he had been noticed and was one of the few officers retained in the treaty-hobbled Reichswehr after the war. The next decade saw a procession of blasé army postings that Ottke found stupefying. He was a man who found purpose in being tested and decided the best option available to him was espionage work. By 1932 Ottke had arranged to be transferred to the military’s intelligence branch, the Abwehr, just as the Nazis were vying for power.