#38
Post
by red devil » 10 Dec 2004, 16:25
Once the date for the invasion of France/Continent was fixed at 5th June various exercises were put into place, including Exercise Tiger at slapton, Devon, April 1944. On this exercise were 10 officers who each had a fully detailed map of the real beaches, codenames at Normandy. After a monumental cockup in which 917 US servicemen died, Eisenhower ordered every scrap of material be removed from the beaches, they were to be swept clean of everything, as if they had not been there, and if he did not personally see 10 dead officer bodies with 10 maps, the invasion was to be called off, indefinitely.
At the same time General Patton, in disgrace with the british public and his own leaders, was given command of a fictional army based in Kent along with thousands of dummy rubberoid tanks, planes and equipment, heavily defended by AA guns etc. He toured the region giving public appearances and talks to village and town groups, making himself as high profile as he could and the Germans swallowed it. One of the reasons was that it was Patton himself who commanded this "army" - the Germans feared him as an unpredicatable renegade who got the job done. Patton proved this later on with his forced march across the Ardennes to force the German push back. Nobody thought he could do it, except him!
Even after the invasion took place, 24 hours late, the Germans were still sure that this was diversionary and that Patton was coming across to hit Calais and seize the ports.
There were no enemy agents operating in the UK that were not under direct control of British Intelligence. They reported what we wanted them to report. But, however, traitors were another problem altogether. We could not control that element of our society unless they gave themselves away. British Counter Intelligence, under the control of a Col Pinto, was supreme at catching enemy agents and it is thought that not one actually did operate freely the whole war.
German Intelligence (bDienst) had cracked the Brtish Naval code and used it with some success. Even when they cracked a message that contained information they themselves had given out via enigma, they did not realise the significance. Most of the time they put it down to leaks! Doenitz himself questioned the very same thing with his staff, how can the British reroute their ships around a waiting wolfpack if they do not know it is there? He suspected enigma, but was assured time and time again that it was very definitely secure.
American Intelligence was, rightly, concentrated in the Pacific. That, is a whole chapter in awhole volume in itself!!
I have seen it several times because I recorded it long time ago. I think I'll have to watch it once again now when you mentioned it.
