Operation Bodyguard- the spies and lies that saved D-Day
NIgel Jones

‘Truth’ Winston Churchill told Stalin at a wartime meeting, ‘is so precious that it must be protected by a bodyguard of lies’. The Prime Minister practiced what he preached , presiding over an elaborate deception programme, codenamed ‘Operation Bodyguard’ designed to persuade the Nazis that the coming D-Day  invasion of occupied Europe would come anywhere but its true target: Normandy.

An entire fake army group was created in Kent, commanded by US General George ‘blood and guts ‘ Patton and equipped with dummy tanks and balsa wood planes to prepare for landings around Calais that never happened. An imaginary network of fictitious Spies  fed false reports to their German handlers, and a lookalike actor impersonating General Montgomery toured Gibraltar and North Africa to put the enemy off the scent.

Now the full story of Bodyguard - based on top secret documents held in the National Archives at Kew - is told by historian Nigel Jones. An astonishing tale of double dealing , deception and  successful disinformation - this is the real story of the fake news that saved D-day and helped win the Second World War.