
Operation Mincemeat: How a dead tramp fooled Hitler (2010) - chha
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-11887115
======
hga
For the overall story of strategic deception in WWII, _The Deceivers: Allied
Military Deception in the Second World War_ by Thaddeus Holt
([https://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-
Deception-S...](https://www.amazon.com/Deceivers-Allied-Military-Deception-
Second/dp/1616080795/)) is _highly_ recommended.

ADDED: see my other comment, sometimes it gets bogged down in detail for non-
specialists, or discusses intrinsically boring theaters, but much of it is
riveting, and you sort of need to read the whole account, e.g. the story of
Juan Pujol García AKA GARBO
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Pujol_Garc%C3%ADa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Pujol_Garc%C3%ADa))
starts very early in the war, when in Spain, on his very own after his offers
to help were rejected by the British and Americans, he started running his own
deception operation and got accepted as a German agent. Per Wikipedia:

 _He was instructed to travel to Britain and recruit additional agents;
instead he moved to Lisbon and created bogus reports from a variety of public
sources, including a tourist guide to England, train timetables, cinema
newsreels, and magazine advertisements. Although the information would not
have withstood close examination, Pujol soon established himself as a
trustworthy agent. He began inventing fictional sub-agents who could be blamed
for false information and mistakes.

The Allies finally accepted Pujol when the Germans spent considerable
resources attempting to hunt down a fictional convoy. After the initial
interviews carried out by Desmond Bristow of Section V MI6 Iberian Section,
Juan Pujol was taken on. The family was moved to Britain and Pujol was given
the code name "Garbo". Pujol and his handler Tomás (Tommy) Harris spent the
rest of the war expanding the fictional network, communicating at first by
letter, to the German handlers and later by radio. Eventually the Germans were
funding a network of twenty-seven fictional agents._

Only guy to get high decorations from both sides; in _The Deceivers_ you'll
find out how the British realized something was awry from mistakes made in the
info he was sending the Germans, and as noted above, brought in from the cold.
He later played an important role in fooling Hitler about D-Daym wrote him a
magnificent letter about how important it was to not get the response to the
invasion wrong.

------
stigi
Also very good on that topic by the always glorious Stuff You Should Know:
[http://www.stuffyoushouldknow.com/podcasts/operation-
minceme...](http://www.stuffyoushouldknow.com/podcasts/operation-mincemeat-
how-a-corpse-fooled-the-nazis.htm)

------
thesehands
If this sort of thing interests you, I can recommend [Max Hastings: The Secret
War] ([https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secret-War-Max-
Hastings/dp/00075039...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secret-War-Max-
Hastings/dp/0007503903))

~~~
ErrantX
Hastings is okay, although sometimes his views aren't well balanced
([https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/04/secret-war-
spi...](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/04/secret-war-spied-codes-
guerrillas-max-hastings-entertaining)).

There is also a very detailed (and difficult to read, but interesting) book by
Thaddeus Holt called "The Decievers" and various books by Ben McIntyre are
very good pop-history.

~~~
hga
I found the difficultly of reading _The Deceivers_ to depend on what's being
discussed. Sometimes it's either _very_ detailed to the point of being boring
for the non-specialist, or intrinsically boring, e.g. the Japanese didn't
respect any non-combat arm, so intelligence neither got good officers nor was
much listened to, so only the most gross deception efforts would even get a
nibble and those wouldn't tend to go anywhere. And Italian counter-
intelligence was generally too good to fool.

But I found e.g. the account of Operation Bodyguard
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Bodyguard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Bodyguard)),
the "Bodyguard of Lies" that shielded D-Day, to be riveting, as you'd expect
from what might be the greatest strategic deception in history.

~~~
ErrantX
Yes Holt focuses mostly on Bodyguard; which is a shame because some of the
other theatres are also interesting.

(btw the Operation Bodyguard article isn't in the best of shape, although I've
been working on it on and off. The sub-plans [Copperhead, D-Day naval
deceptions, Ferdinand, Fortitude, Graffham, Ironside, Titanic, Quicksilver &
Zeppelin] are in better shape. My favourite is Copperhead.

~~~
hga
If by "mostly focuses mostly on Bodyguard" you mean spills the most ink on,
agreed, but as I noted and he explicitly points out, it _was_ the greatest
strategic deception in history.

Not sure about his not giving enough attention to other theaters, besides the
Pacific for the mentioned reason, but my copy of the book is packed away in
preparation for a move. I don't remember him ignoring any of them, except
maybe attempted actions against the Italians.

------
jpm_sd
This scenario was enjoyably re-imagined in Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon.
Perhaps in tribute to the original codename, the dead "volunteer" was re-
written as a deceased butcher by the name of PFC Gerald Hott (see Chapter 15:
Meat).

------
chha
There's also a quite good and extensive book on the issue by Ben Macintyre.

~~~
hga
Also note the original book on the subject, _The Man Who Never Was_ by Ewen
Montagu, I read it in the '70s and remember it to be a solid, basic account.
Per Wikipedia:

 _Duff Cooper was a diplomat who had held several top level posts during the
war. In 1950, he published a spy novel, Operation Heartbreak. The key plot
device was floating a corpse into Spain with false documents to deceive the
Germans. Cooper had come up with the idea on his own, but naturally, many of
those concerned with Mincemeat (including Germans and Spaniards) became
concerned and started talking. The 'flap' attracted the attention of the
British press and wild rumours began to circulate. At this point, the British
security services decided that the best response was to publish the story of
Mincemeat, which would not compromise any other secrets. Ewen Montagu took a
weekend off from his busy legal practice and wrote the book The Man Who Never
Was. It was an immediate best-seller and was made into a movie of the same
name two years later. The movie added some fictitious elements for drama, such
as a German agent in London verifying the background of "Major Martin", with
Montagu and his colleagues one step ahead of him.

In 1977, Montagu published a second book, Beyond Top Secret ULTRA, in which he
recounted his secret war work. It could not be revealed earlier, as it
involved both Ultra and the Double Cross System. In chapter 13, he gives a
short version of the Mincemeat story, including some details not in The Man
Who Never Was._

As noted/implied above, _anything_ written about WWII prior to that point in
the '70s when Ultra could be talked about has to be taken with a grain of
salt/suitable adjustments.

