Hello Allen
Fair point....
In contrary....
The 12 million dollar number is from the efforts of a dedicated saboteur who was stationed in the United States called Captain Franz Dagobert Johannes von Rintelen (19 August 1878 – 30 May 1949) was a German naval intelligence officer working in the United States.von Rintelen operated independently and received his funds and instructions directly from Berlin.He came from a banking family with good connections in American banking, having served with Deutsche bank as well as acting as U.S. representative forDisconto Gesellscaft then Germany's number two bank, He also set up another company, the Austrian-subsidized Transatlantic Trust Company at 57 William Street in Manhattan,where he had deposited a large amount of money on his arrival from Germany.
This guy had serious cash he even tried to buy the massive du pont company During 1915, Also in 1915 he bought ammunition and supplied money to the deposed Mexican dictator Huerta and encouraged him to try to seize back power in Mexico. He negotiated with Victoriano Huerta on a possible deal with Germany paying 12 million dollars as incentive to go to war with the United States. Huerta was still fuming over the invasion by the United States of Veracruz. Their meetings, Were held at the Manhattan Hotel (as well as another New York hotel, "probably the Holland House" at Fifth Avenue and 30th Street) These conversations were intercepted via secret service predecessor to the later Intelligence services. he travailed under an false passport of a Swiss banker by the name of Email V Gasche by the time of Zimmerman affair in 1917 was tricked into returning to Germany where he was captured by the British en route on the ship Adriatic . In war time the trusted currency was gold As no one trusted the value of any countries paper currency.The fate of this 12 million has never been fully accounted for.
If your inclined you can find out more about the mans efforts to drag the Mexico into War with The united states. look up a book by Friedrich Katz
"The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution."
Another key player and paymaster was Heinrich Friedrich Albert (Born 12 February 1874, died– 1 November 1960) was a German lawyer who served as commercial attaché to the imperial German Ambassador to the United States Johann Henrich von Bernstoff who had involved in the Zimmermann transcript. He was also the paymaster for German espionage and sabotage operations in the United States. In addition, he also arranged for forged passports and documents for Germans in America who wanted to return to fight for the German armed forces.
Albert and the Naval Intelligence Captain Franz Von Rinteleen established a cover firm called the "Bridgeport Projectile Company" to purchase and destroy munitions that would otherwise be shipped to the British and French. This operation has become known as the Great Phenol Plot.
He was exposed as a spy because of his association with George Sylvester Viereck, the editor of "The Fatherland", a pro-German publication, who was himself under surveillance. He left his briefcase, which contained sensitive documents, on a tram, and it was picked up by one of BOI Director William Flynn's counter-intelligence officers, who was tailing him. The papers documented Albert's having spent $27 million to build up a spy network in the United States, using German money to fund dock strikes, attacks on shipping, and bombs planted in munitions plants.And the inducement of Mexico to invade the United states.The papers were published in the new york World Newspaper.
More information can be obtained from a book by Mike Dash published in (2009).
The First Family: Terror, Extortion and the Birth of the American Mafia. London: Simon & Schuster.ISBN 978-1-84737-173-7
Clearly one of the problems for the Germans was Mexico ongoing civil war as fortunes of war changed it was not clear for them who to make a deal with? Since Victoriano Huerta was out of picture by April 1915 the Germans had deal with Venustiano Carranza who made Nealy 2 terms before being assassinated in 1920. In may 1917 he has just returned to office for his second term as president of Mexico.
It not beyond reason that this unaccounted 12 million was shipped in Gold to a port in Mexico some time around 1915 in anticipation for a deal that just never happened. By 1918 it was more than clear as Mexico was well and truly neutral. America was at war with Germany anyway. Because of Zimmermann 1917 affair blunder most German operatives had fled United States to Mexico. Who Is of course the big question?
Crow