Deathly Deception: The Real Story of Operation Mincemeat

Smyth, a professor of history at the University of Toronto, applies the research and analytic skills of his discipline to a subject primarily addressed by general audience writers. The story of Operation Mincemeat is familiar: it was an elaborate ruse to distract the Germans from a planned invasion of Sicily by leading them to believe Greece was the Allied target. In early 1943, British Intelligence produced a briefcase containing documents alluding to the purported Aegean campaign. They invented an officer’s identity, found a body to fit, and released the corpse and briefcase from a submarine. “The man who never was” washed ashore in Franco’s Spain, and the Nazis eventually swallowed Mincemeat whole. Smyth sacrifices none of the dramatic details of the plan’s construction and implementation, down to reconfirming the identity of the man who became “Major William Martin.” Smyth completes the story in three ways. He presents the complex processes of the false information’s evaluation by German intelligence, the high command, and Hitler himself. Second, he describes the painstaking method by which the British verified Mincemeat’s progress. And third, he relates the vital achievement of Allied intelligence to convince the military commanders to undertake the deception. As a strategic success, Mincemeat has few rivals and no superiors. 8 pages of b&w photos. (Aug.)