In August 1939, Louis P. Lochner contacted the American diplomat Alexander Comstock Kirk and showed him the text, which Kirk was not interested in.[2] Lochner next contacted the British diplomat George Ogilvie-Forbes, who did indeed transmit it back to London on 24 August 1939.[3] The Canadian historian Michael Marrus wrote Lochner almost certainly obtained the text from Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the chief of the Abwehr (German intelligence), who was present at the Obersalzberg conference.[4]