A historical diamond factory in Amsterdam, seen in August 2025. With very little preparation, British agents secreted vast quantities of diamonds out of Amsterdam to the UK after the Nazi invasion, sometimes only minutes before the Nazis reached them. (Shutterstock/Jacqueline van Kerkhof)

How Three British Secret Agents Saved Amsterdam’s Diamonds from the Nazis

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In May 1940, the UK launched two separate missions to steal Amsterdam’s stockpiles of industrial diamonds out from under the nose of the Nazi war machine.

The German Blitzkrieg campaign in the spring of 1940 utterly overwhelmed the Western Allies. The Wehrmacht’s modern mobile operations paralyzed the defenders, who tried to fight the war as if it were still 1918. The collapse was so complete that the evacuation from Dunkirk was, and still is, viewed as the single salient Allied triumph of the entire campaign. The rescue of hundreds of thousands of British troops from the beaches of northern France can hardly be called a “victory,” particularly as they left much of their equipment behind. 

Still, smaller successes occurred, which combined to impact the war in ways that were not immediately apparent.

Nazi Germany’s forces unexpectedly invaded the Netherlands on May 10. The Dutch had remained neutral during World War I, and intended to remain neutral again; they had a small army and were unprepared for war. Even so, they were able to force a brief stalemate along the New Meuse River at the city of Rotterdam. But the country’s fall to the far stronger invading forces was inevitable—within days, if not hours—and everyone knew it.

German control of the Netherlands was concerning to the Western Allies for several reasons. A successful German invasion would secure Germany’s right flank for an attack on France, as well as provide forward air bases from which to........

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