The true story of Jewish Leutnant Edgar Stern, who in 1914 smuggled 14 Muslim prisoners of war disguised as a circus troupe to Constantinople to win the sultan as an ally
For Edgar Stern, the summer of 1914 begins in the placid seaside resort of Coxyde in Belgium. Pleasant temperatures and cloudless skies promise a lovely time. Stern never could have imagined that war would break out in just a few weeks. And most of all, he never would have dreamed that he would be given a key role in a secret mission intended to bring Germany a quick victory.
The German military leadership has come up with a clever gambit: If it can get the Turkish sultan to declare jihad for the allied German Reich and all Muslims – especially those in the colonies – rise up against the British and French enemy, the battle should be decided quickly. To win the sultan’s favor, the plan is to ceremoniously release several Muslim prisoners of war in Constantinople. But, to do so, these prisoners need to be funneled halfway across Europe as inconspicuously as possible. A mission that calls for someone like Edgar Stern. Stern has a propensity for unconventional military solutions, not to mention that he has something most Germans don’t have: chutzpah. Not least when they see him off at Berlin’s central station, the German soldiers are convinced that they’ve made the right choice: Stern has disguised the Muslim prisoners as a circus troupe. But no one knows whether the border officials will see through the masquerade and how the whole jihad plan will unfold… The journey is going to be a big adventure – and not just for Stern.
