The team of "Operation Bodyguard", with "Garbo's" situation and the angry flight of "Treasure".. decides that the operation has come under imminent threat.. so they immediately suspend "Popov's" activity.. and begin turning over every stone in London, searching for "Treasure".. who has not returned to her home since the incident.
And at the same time, they take an extremely important decision.. "Garbo".. it was decided that they would not abandon him.
In truth, "Garbo", as soon as he reached Gestapo headquarters, prepared a new story in his head.. and there he used his astonishing talent for acting.. and he began talking with the Nazis and telling improvised stories of extraordinary brilliance.. so they let him out of the office and back to his home while still somewhat suspicious of him.. and they placed him under surveillance without his knowing.
And the Allied intelligence men find "Treasure" sitting in a bar, drinking and weeping over her lost dog.. so they take her to their headquarters.. and she was intensely angry, over the death of her dog.. so they begin to calm her, and they bring her pictures of dozens of dogs.. she may choose whichever she wishes.. and she does calm down after several hours of coaxing and quiet talk.. and after that we enter into another conversation.. for long hours.. until the station chief extracts from her the coded signal she spoke of, and which she was supposedly going to send to the Germans if she fell into English hands.
And here the Allies freeze "Treasure's" activity.
And at the same time, the Allies observe the close Nazi surveillance of "Garbo".. and they decide that he must regain the Germans' trust at any cost.. so they ask him for something extremely strange.
They ask him to inform the Germans of the real location of the landings.
And because a spy doesn't ask questions and chatter and turn people's heads upside down, "Garbo" carried out what was asked of him with the utmost precision.
He informed the Germans that the Allies would carry out a landing in Normandy, and that he had observed the distribution of supplies and vomit bags to the forces of the Third Canadian Division.
And these vomit bags are special bags, which were given to infantry soldiers who were not used to going to sea, unlike the navy men.. so that they could vomit into them if they got seasick while being carried on the decks of ships and landing boats.
And because the Normandy landing appeared to the Germans as a deception, their suspicion of "Garbo" increased.. had it not been that a coded message came back to them, from a spy most beloved to them.. the fifth and last pillar in Operation Bodyguard.
His code name was "Brutus".. and his real name was "Roman Garby-Czerniawski".. a Polish pilot, recruited by the Allies as a double agent like "Popov" and "Garbo".. two years before the Normandy operation.. at almost the same time as "Garbo" himself was recruited.
"Brutus" sends the Germans a dangerous message.. that the American army is about to land at Calais.. and that the Americans and the English are conducting an extremely precise deception, to fool any spy, so that he believes the landings will take place somewhere else.. and that had he not been near the commanders of the forces that were in fact supposed to carry out the landing.. he would never have known the real information at all.
And the Germans regain their trust in "Garbo".. and indeed about 750 tanks, and 10 thousand soldiers and 2000 artillery pieces are massed, in "Kent" in England, near Calais.. to begin the landing.
Anyone following this series will know that all of these were not real soldiers or equipment.. these are mock-ups we spoke about before.. made in the Allied factories with extreme precision.. so that they appeared to be real pieces. These wooden pieces were the "First United States Army Group".. "abbreviated as FUSAG".
And at the same time, the Germans shoot down an English reconnaissance plane, and capture its commander alive near Normandy.. and they take him off to the Nazi intelligence office in Paris.. and they begin their party of torturing and interrogating him.
And the pilot holds out for days, but under the weight of the severe torture, he begins to pour out to the Nazis everything he has of information about the coming landing.. which he declared to them plainly would be in Normandy!
But the Germans rejected this information completely...!
According to the rules of work in intelligence, this pilot should have endured the torture to the utmost degree, and then fed those torturing him an alternative fake plan.. untrue.. to distract them for a while.. in which he could catch his breath. And because the pilot gave up the original plan directly.. the Germans considered that this was the alternative fake plan!
And the Nazis did not continue torturing the captive pilot.. his giving up the "Normandy" information as a first confession was enough for them to be certain that the landings would take place at Calais.
And at the same time "Popov" resumes his activity, and sends the Germans clear photographs of the American First Army in the English "Kent" as they had asked of him.. so the Germans begin to move with all their weight toward Calais.
And the Allied lie holds this time.
It holds for nearly two whole months.. until the sixth of June, 1944, when the Allied ships head for Normandy, in the largest military naval operation in history.. to carry out a successful land landing of nearly 200 thousand soldiers on the shores of France.. which history has preserved for us under the name "Normandy landings".
At that time "Hitler" was at his mountain home, spending a pleasant time with his wife, in the German Alps.. he had even invited minister "Goebbels" and his wife "Magda" as well.. to spend several days, and pleasant evenings.. and watch some romantic films.. completely reassured about the strength and massing of his army at Calais.
But even with the weak German presence in Normandy.. the German forces protecting the shore fight ferociously.. and try to hold out.. and ask their command for reinforcements.
And the German commanders are bewildered and seized by extreme anxiety.. for if they inform "Hitler" that the attack took place in Normandy.. he might order their execution.. for their failure to anticipate the real location of the landings.. so they remain in discussions and confusion and decisions and their opposite.. and they ask their men there to hold out.. and the German soldiers do indeed hold out.. until 21 July.. and after that they collapse before the Allied strikes.. which occupy all of Normandy.. and blow up the German radar stations.. which allows the air force to advance and cover the troops.
The news does not reach "Hitler" until the end of June.. so he immediately orders the movement of forces from Calais to Normandy.. to save what can be saved.. but too late.. the Allies had already advanced across French territory.. and were on the outskirts of Paris.. and the forces coming from Calais were forced.. to head for them there.
And fierce battles rage on the outskirts of Paris.. "so much so that "Treasure" abandons her role as a spy, and volunteers as a fighter in the French army against the Nazis.. and this becomes the right moment for the Soviets to move.. so they attack the Germans from the east at the very moment.. in which the Allies attack and advance from the west.. and the Allies and the Soviets close in on the Nazi forces.. and Paris is liberated on 25 August, of the year 1944.
The Allies free their captive pilot, who turns out to be an English intelligence officer, who played this whole game in agreement with his country.. in order to divert the Germans' attention from Normandy. The Nazis tore this man to pieces.. and he was unable to return to service afterward, from the extremity of what was done to him at the hands of the Germans.. but he remained in the English records as a hero who rendered great services to England in wartime.
The advance of the Allies and the Soviets continues for months.. the activity of "Garbo" and "Brutus" and "Popov" and "Bronx" never stopped for a moment in their midst.. especially with the Germans' profound trust in this team, because they had carried out what was asked of them to perfection.. especially "Garbo" in particular.. who became one of the most important spies after the Normandy landings.... because he had in fact pointed to Normandy before the landings took place.
And the Soviets enter the German capital Berlin, on 20 April.. of the year 1945.. on the very day of "Hitler's" 56th birthday.. and ten days later.. "Hitler" commits suicide in his bunker.. and one week after that,, Germany surrenders officially.
With the end of the war.. the spies we spoke about did not even know the important and vital role they had played.. and they began to return to their normal lives.
"Treasure" bought a new dog.. and worked as a translator for the American major "John Barton Collings".. and they fell in love and she married him.. and she moved with her husband to live in the United States.
"Garbo" was found a job by the English at an oil company in Venezuela.. he worked there for a period.. and then turned to teaching English.. and then with the money he had saved, along with the Allied reward.. he opened a small hotel.. on the shores of "Maracaibo" in Venezuela.. he kept running it with his wife in quiet until their last days.
"Popov" moved to the United States, and there he worked officially with the nascent American intelligence agency.. the CIA.. and became the link between them and the European intelligence agencies.. for coordination and follow-up.
"Brutus" opened a photography and printing office.. he spent most of his time there in quiet and contentment in the heart of London.
"Bronx" opened an upscale restaurant.. in the heart of Marseille.. and a clothing store in Paris.. and she went off to enjoy, from their revenue, her noisy social life.
Without doubt this group changed the outcome of the World War and the history of the world as a result.. of course there were dozens of other spies.. but these in particular had a pivotal role.. changing the outcome of the war and consequently the map of the whole world.
There is a group of spies, among them "Popov", who were the reason for the birth of the character "James Bond". Whose author himself was an intelligence man and a spy.. This subject is very fascinating.. but it is a long story.. so we will continue talking about it later.
And the talk will have a sequel.
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