Page 43 - History of War - Issue 01-14

OPERATION MINCEMEAT

At 10.30am on 13 April, the Chiefs of Staff
Committee gathered for its 76th meeting.
Presided over by the Chief of the Imperial
General Staff, the First Sea Lord and the
Chief of the Air Staff, the committee included
eight other senior offi cers from the different
services. Item 10 on the agenda was Operation
Mincemeat. The letters were approved, and
Lt General Sir Hastings “Pug” Ismay was told
to inform Johnnie Bevan of the decision, with
instructions to make an appointment with the
Prime Minister to obtain fi nal approval. Ismay
dropped Churchill a note, advising him that
“the Chiefs of Staff have approved, subject to
your consent, a somewhat startling cover plan
in connection with Husky. May the Controlling
Offi cer see you for fi ve minutes within the
next day or two, to explain what is proposed?”
The note came back with “yes” scrawled in
Churchill’s hand. “10.15 on Thursday.”
Visiting the Prime Minister
Two days later, Bevan found himself sitting
on Winston Churchill’s bed, and explaining
Operation Mincemeat to a Prime Minister
wearing his pyjamas and dressing gown, and
puffi ng on a large cigar. Large wine cellars that
had once served a stately home opposite
St James’s Park had been transformed into a
fortifi ed network of chambers, tunnels, offi ces
and dormitories known as the Cabinet War Mary Evans
Rooms, the operational nerve centre. Above was
the Number Ten Annexe, including the private “Major Martin” received a quick
burial at a cemetery in Huelva
fl at where Churchill usually slept. Britain’s
wartime leader tended to work late, whisky in
hand, and rise at a commensurate hour. Furthermore, that the body might never
Bevan had arrived for the meeting in full get washed up or that, if it did, the Spaniards fi sherman, who turned it over to the British
uniform, at ten o’clock sharp. “To my surprise, might hand it over to the local British authority Attaché in Huelva. No sooner had Major Martin
I was ushered into his bedroom in the annexe, without having taken the crucial papers.” been buried than the Admiralty began sending
where I found him in bed smoking a cigar. He The Prime Minister’s response was typically messages to the Attaché emphasising the
was surrounded with papers, and black and red pithy: “In that case, we shall have to get the importance of retrieving the briefcase, stressing
cabinet boxes.” Churchill loved deception plans body back and give it another swim.” that it must not, under any circumstances,
– the more startling the better – and relished the Churchill was on board, with one stipulation: end up in German hands. As was hoped, the
seamy, glamorous trade of espionage. “In the before the operation could go ahead, agreement Germans’ most senior Abwehr agent in Spain,
higher ranges of Secret Service work, the actual must be obtained from General Eisenhower, Major Karl-Erich Kuhlenthal, got wind of the
facts of many cases were in every respect equal whose invasion of Sicily would be profoundly frantic instruction and persuaded the Spanish
to the most fantastic inventions of romance and affected by its success or failure. Leaving to let him view the contents of the case
melodrama,” he wrote after the war. Churchill to fi nish his cigar in bed, Bevan before they returned it. Reading through the
Bevan handed over a sheet of paper outlining returned to the London Controlling Section documents, they believed they’d struck gold –
the plan, and Churchill read it through. Bevan offi ces and dashed off a Most Secret Cypher the German high command was informed of the
Allied plan to attack Greece and Sardinia, and
BEVAN FOUND HIMSELF SITTING ON WINSTON CHURCHILL’S Hitler moved quickly to stave off the invasion,
deploying some 90,000 troops to the area.
BED AND EXPLAINING OPERATION MINCEMEAT TO A PRIME The coast was now relatively clear for the
Allies to descend on Sicily, and on 9 July 1943,
MINISTER WEARING HIS PYJAMAS AND DRESSING GOWN Operation Husky saw them do exactly that.
Within six weeks, the island had been seized.
Incredibly, considering the number of things
that could’ve gone wrong, Operation Mincemeat
felt he had better say something: “Of course, Telegram, under the codename “Chaucer”, to had been a success. Soon after the operation,
there’s a possibility that the Spaniards might Eisenhower at Advance Headquarters in Algiers. a telegram was sent to Winston Churchill, at the
fi nd out this dead man was not from a crashed The response arrived within hours: “General time paying a visit to the US. It contained just
aircraft, but was a gardener in Wales who’s killed Eisenhower gives full approval MINCEMEAT.” three words: “Mincemeat swallowed whole.” w
himself with weedkiller.” Bevan had left the On 19 April, Operation Mincemeat was set
details to Montagu and Cholmondeley, and now in motion, with HMS Seraph departing for the
found himself trying to explain the pathology of southern Spanish coast. Arriving there 11
chemical poisoning to a Prime Minister in his days later, the submarine surfaced at 4.30am,
nightwear. “Weedkiller goes into the lungs and whereupon carefully briefed offi cers opened
is diffi cult to diagnose,” he bluffed. “Apparently, the steel canister containing Major Martin This feature is an edited
it would take you three weeks to a month just to and dropped his lifejacket-clad body – with extract from the book
fi nd out what it was.” briefcase attached – into the sea. Then, half Operation Mincemeat
Churchill “took much interest” in the scheme, a mile away, a dinghy was dumped to provide by Ben Macintyre,
so much so that Bevan felt obliged to warn further evidence of an air crash (the canister published in the UK by
him that it could go very wrong. “I pointed out was later taken further out to sea and rigged Bloomsbury. It is available
that there was, of course, a chance the plan with plastic explosives to destroy it). The corpse from both high-street
might miscarry and that we would be found out. was found fi ve hours later by a local Spanish and online book stores.
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