Sometimes – even when I’m not reading Sir Basil’s money-draining posts – I stumble across a book that I know I just have to have. Here’s the latest impulse buy: Churchill’s Wizards – The British Genius For Deception 1914-1945 by Nicholas Rankin. It tells the story of the army of Brits – many of them crazed amateurs – who, under the guiding spirit of Winston himself, concocted all kinds of military deception and camoflauge. Here’s a nice review from the Telegraph (the piece that prompted me to nip over to the devil’s website). And here’s a funny little vignette from that review:
Some years ago an old painter from the Slade told me of a deputation of artists sent to work on a false munitions factory, made of wood and canvas, near Dover. The morning the last brushstrokes were applied, everyone gathered to toast their achievement. As hip-flasks and glasses were raised, he said, a German light bomber came out of the eastern sun, flew over the dummy factory, rocked its wings amiably, and dropped in the centre of the structure a single, balsa-wood bomb.
Heh. I will let you know what I think after I’ve read the rest.
**Spot the quote.
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November 20, 2008 at 4:27 pm
Kathy
Oooh. That looks good.
If the subject interests, you should check out “The War Magician.” It’s about Jasper Maskelyne—an English magician whose talents were put to good use in the North African campaign. Among other things, he managed to fool Rommel into moving his tanks in another direction by creating a dummy division, and he also managed to “move” Alexandria’s harbour by creating a fake one. The research is dubious, because it appears that his main source of information was Maskelyne himself, who had something of a reputation for telling tall tales, but even if he managed to achieve half of what he claimed, it’s still a good story.