Operation Mincemeat is one of those stories where the truth is stranger than any fiction. The fact that it happened in real life and it wasn't part of a spy novel is wild.
Its honestly just a simple deception, just on a grand scale. Only took one body. If anything, its like they trolled the Axis at the same time as deceiving them. That's the brilliant part. 😂😂 "Made you look." 😉😂
I love this one about Patton: When Patton received a message instructing him to bypass Trier because it would take four divisions to capture it, Patton replied, “Have taken Trier with two divisions. Do you want me to give it back?”
Simon, why do you always forget about the smaller countries? Canadian soldiers composed 1/3 of the British 8th Army in Italy. I love your stuff but give the smaller countries a shout out.
FYI, Cholmondeley is one of those tricky words with lots of silent letters ( e.g Worcester = Woos-tuh Leicester = Less-tuh, Gloucester= Glosstl-tuh) and is pronounced Chum-lee.
I recommend the movie of this story “The man that never was”. It’s one of the best WW2 spy films, with an all star cast, and they used WD advisors so the film is historically accurate. 👍
Hey Simon, please, please, please do a Casual Criminalist video on James Mitchell "Mike" DeBardeleben. The other day you mentioned that the Secret Service in the US is responsible for investigating money counterfeiting crimes on the Casual Criminalist, which made me think of DeBardeleben. He was a prolific counterfeiter, so much so that the Secret Service gave him a nickname: "the mall passer". When they finally caught and arrested him, the Secret Service agents found a lot more than counterfeit money. Together with the FBI he was charged with a whole litany of crimes (he wasn't even prosecuted for most of them). He was sent to prison for life and the agents who investigated him said that he committed just about every felony on the books.
My uncle was a member of 4 companies of heavy mortars in the invasion of Sicily. The mortars fired a 25 lb projectile of 4.2 inch diameter. They had a heavy base that allowed for accurate firing. I believe they could fire 12 rounds a minute. The Germans thought the Americans had automatic howitzers. The heavy mortars were also called chemical weapons because if the battle devolved into chemical war, they were going to be the primary weapon to use it. They did fire phosphorous rounds. These mortar companies were credited with stopping the Axis counter attack against the landing.
Thank you for covering this. I wonder if the story of my grandfather LTC Arthur F Gotham , commander of the 1/505 PIR would be worthy of a video by itself ? His actions at Pointe Dirillo made Sicilian local history that is celebrated even to this day
Watched the new Netflix movie Operation Mincemeat last night(really good!) When I heard how Cholmondeley pronounced, then spelled his name, I literally nearly did a spit take and went back to make sure I heard that right!
Can you guys please do a video about the battle of the Yser? When the belgiums stood their ground against the Germans in October 1914, helding 5% of belgium for the rest of the Great War. All under command of one of the most badass kings in recent history Albert the First of Belgiium.
some golden red herring there. I never knew about that. I was on Sicily and didn't see any evidence of ww2, but I wasn't looking either. Too excited about being with an active volcano. And all respect to lovely Italy, they know how to hang a dictator to dry. Russia, take note.
I can understand your errors in pronunciation of foreign names, but surely you know the good old English name 'Cholmondeley' is pronounced 'Chumley' ! :
My father fought in Italy in the 10nth Mountain Division yes to many histories forget that while Patton was charging across France the 10nth was fighting a yard at a time up mountains.
Im sorry im such a dumbdumb but Warographics has grown to be my favourite channel in the Whistleverse because I like warstories more than either people, places, exploration, criminals or lists. Good goings
You aren’t a dumb dumb at all. I go through phases of interest with some of the other channels like megaprojects and sideprojects and Biographics but Warographics, Into the Shadows, and Casual Criminalist are totally my favourites. Maybe that makes me a bit morbid lmao
I’m disappointed that more wasn’t mentioned about the Trout Memo. While it was issued in the name of Admiral Godfrey, it’s widely accepted that it was actually written by his assistant, a certain Lieutenant Commander Ian Fleming. Yes… THAT Ian Fleming
Far from his uncaring reputation Patton believed pushing the enemy back relentlessly was the best way to save lives. The allies were in no way prepared to invade France in 1943.
Friendly rivals can be good but rivalry’s if not handled can lead to tragedy’s. Example being Napoleons marshals bickered with each other which led to marshals intentionally watching other marshals fail there objectives without supporting them and intentionally watching them fail
Would you be interested in doing a video on the Dieppe raid? It was the first Canadian army engagement in the war, and was a catastrophic failure. In school in Canada teachers try to look on the bright side--information gained, etc--and I'm curious about whether we're getting a sugar-coated version because the reality is just too depressing.
Actually Axis weren't kicked out of Africa in 1942. If anyone follows the World War 2 series by TimeGhost, in April 1943, the battle of Tunisia is still kicking. But the plans for Sicily were underway.
Allies: "It's going to be Sicily" Axis: "Definitely Sicily" Allies: "So it'll be Greece instead" Axis: "Hmm, looks like it'll be Greece, even though Sicily is an obvious target" Allies: "Definitely Greece" Axis: "Wait...you invaded Sicily? The twist was there was no twist, but you made us believe there was a twist?" Allies: "Yeah lol"
IMHO, Gen. Patton followed his orders to the best of his ability...when commander of an entire Army group and assault armor division, that's about as "light" as possible for recon to be for him.
Because of the limited range of troop landing ship. Regular ship can reach southern France from north Africa, but cannot land suficient troops to actually occupy the land/coast. You have a similar problem with gliders range. If you start from Corsica you can probably do it. But that means 2 extra steps: Sardigna, Corsica.
Churchill wanted the secure the Med so that British ships could sail safely from the Suez, thus ensuring the links with the Empire weren't cut off. Some might argue it was slightly self serving
Achieving victory through military strenght 🧐 Achieving victory through military stratagems 😎 Achieving bictory through plots and while enemy can't fight back. 🇬🇧 Achieving victory by dealing with criminals and terrorists 🇺🇲 And then you hear them say: "We are the inheritors of Roma!" 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Not mentioned in this video is that Charles "Lucky" Luciano was in Federal prison during WWII but was still running his Mafia family while in stir. His deal with the government was for reasons of patriotism, hatred of Mussolini, and a desire for his own freedom. After the war, the US government released Luciano and deported him to Sicily, on the condition that he never return to America. Lucky Luciano spent the rest of his life in Italy.
Charles Cholmondeley, Ewen Montagu, Bentley Purchase, GLYNDWR MICHAEL??? THAT, is the MOST British group of names I have ever heard! Those names are so British, and so posh, they can only be uttered BY an Englishman! It's like a spell out of the English Book of the Dead! Those aren't real names. Are they? They can't be, it's so cliché it can't be. Steven Toast should be reading that to Clem Fandango. "Simon?" "Can you hear me Simon?" "This is Clem Fandango?" "Yes, I can hear you Clem Fandango!" "Really sell Bentley Purchase, it's Ray's Dad."
When the Allies convince Hitler that Norway was the target of D-Day after convincing him that Sardinia was the target previously: It’s even funnier the second time!
Need to do the battle of Assoro in its history it had never been captured until the Canadians and they did it by climbing a cliff behind enemy lines in the dark without any climbing gear
Forget Taffy 3...it's been done to death And the truth.....the Japanese could have pushed through...SUNK the entire taffy 3 part of the US Navy.....and it would NOT have made any difference to the battle... Our carriers and battle fleet....would have just fought again....
The successful evacuation of kesselring’s army was an unmitigated disaster for the allies. ike never had any plan to prevent it. Fortunately he was able to spin doctor things so as to accentuate the positive. I’m a bit surprised tat this video glosses over that point.
The only branch of the Italian military that really knew what it was doing was their navy. Which, fortunately, was not large enough to challenge the might of the Royal Navy.
@@andrewgause6971 lol...thats a silly joke of a comment... The italian navy.....lol Fun thing...i just got done rereading East of Malta West of Suez The Mediterranean Fleet : Greece to Malta Sea Battles in Close Up vol 1 and 2 (reread the chapters covering the Med. battles) The Italian navy...lol..... put on a PATHETIC showing HOW was it NOT large enough? It did not have to span the globe. It had more battleships, cruisers, destroyers and subs ...in the Med....than Britain did....just no aircraft carriers Or is my memory incorrect? They really needed a better coordination between air force and navy.......Sicily....a huge carrier that couldnt be sunk
@@leeshackelford7517 Aye, they were let down by utterly abysmal shell quality control (there are documented instances of shells fired from the same 15 inch turret landing more than 1,000 meters apart from one another.... which is another reason professionals talk logistics), but their naval forces did have greater success than Kriegsmarine surface units. They also managed to take out multiple Royal Navy capital vessels with nothing more than speedboats. I'm not saying they were a threat to the Royal Navy in overall terms (they could never beat them, it was always a case of "how much damage can they do before they're knocked out of the war?") What I'm saying is that the Italian Navy managed to be the greater danger of the two Axis powers in the Western theater.
true the fighting lasted the entire war but that was actually a good thing. hitler had to spend so many forces defending italy that he didn't have enough left to protect germany from other directions.
Italian Army is the first in Europe. What are you talking about? 🤔 Go look your allies instead, where Germany don't have anymore an army, France is on the brink of collapse and Britain is forced to ask money and help even to our enemies. 🤭 with allies like them, it's even embarassing trying to fight them.
what about the beach jumpers they played a huge role in deception after the operation started especially for the size of 1 the beach jumpers was less than 200 men and 2 the size of the naval craft they was given to use a 62 foot air and sea rescue craft
