Reinberger promptly reported to Luftwaffe headquarters in Berlin through his embassy in Brussels that he had succeeded in burning down the [German plans and maps for the attack in the West] to “insignificant fragments, the size of the palm of his hand.” But in Berlin there was consternation in high quarters. Jodl immediately reported to Hitler “on what the enemy may or may not know.” But he did not know himself. “If enemy is in possession of all the files,” he confided to his diary on
January 12, after seeing the Fuehrer, “the situation is catastrophic.” That evening Ribbentrop sent a “most urgent” wire to the German Embassy in Brussels asking for an immediate report on the “destruction of the courier baggage.”
William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
