by Nigel West
Finally, at the end of this historic ‘longest day’, GARBO transmitted one last signal to Madrid, to say that BENEDICT had sent a message from Glasgow stating that local troops had not embarked, and the ships moored in the Clyde were still at anchor. This apparently casual observation held considerable significance, for the Germans had expressed great interest in the 52nd (Lowland) Infantry Division, which BENEDICT had reported the previous month as having moved from the east coast to the Firth of Clyde to participate in a training exercise around Loch Fyne. On 22 May Madrid had asked:
I am particularly interested to know urgently whether the 52nd Division is still in the camps in the Glasgow area after finishing the manoeuvres on the 11th in accordance with the message of BENEDICT. I should be grateful to have your reply as soon as possible. Please take every measure to ensure that you are notified of every movement of that division by the quickest possible means. I should be grateful if you would tell me how much time will be lost from the moment the invasion starts to its embarkation operations until the news reaches you for the transmission to us by message.
In the light of BENEDICT’s news, GARBO announced that he had called his agents to attend an urgent conference in London the very next day, and closed his message to Madrid with his own opinion:
For the present I can only state a definite argument, based on the studies and appreciations which my work in the Ministry has facilitated and it is that the enemy are hiding their intentions behind this first action.
Fortunately the first action was robbed of the surprise which they wished to create through the information from CHAMILLUS as, from the hour at which the assault is said to have started, I am able to prove, with satisfaction, that my message arrived in time to prevent the action coming as a surprise to our High Command. There is no doubt that CHAMILLUS has accomplished through his action a service which, though it will make it impossible to use his collaboration in the future, has justified a sacrifice by his last report. CHAMILLUS left this morning accompanied by DAGOBERT who will arrange for him to be hidden in a safe place. For myself, and counting on your approval, I intend to take care of this friend and give him every consideration in order to make him aware of our recognition.
Thus GARBO claimed to have alerted CENTRO to the invasion, and then packed CHAMILLUS off to South Wales to hide as a fugitive with DAGOBERT, the seaman from Swansea. From the Abwehr’s perspective, CHAMILLUS had been the only agent in Britain to have performed, as was conceded by BRUTUS and TATE, who acknowledged their failure. In the early evening of D-Day, BRUTUS admitted as much in a signal to Paris:
Unfortunately, by remaining without contact with 21 Army Group and through awaiting a state of alert at FUSAG was not able to give you details of the first landings.
This expression of regret also contained the significant news, which did not escape the Abwehr, that FUSAG had played no part in the Normandy attack, the implication being that the formation was being held back for a second assault. Similarly, TATE told Hamburg on the evening of D+1 that he had not observed any troop departures in his area of Kent, but that he had noticed plenty of new arrivals, thereby suggesting a further concentration of forces on the coast opposite the Pas-de-Calais. On the evening of D+2 he transmitted a longer message to Hamburg, which he repeated early the following morning:
The Special Trains Section of Southern Railway has opened an advance control office at Ashford Junction. This section is part of the London East Division of Southern Railway … and all-important troop movements are dealt with by it. A friendly clerk in the Ashford office billeted here tells me that that advance control office has been opened to cope with increased troop movements in the area.
GARBO assembled his principal sources on D+2: DONNY, a former seaman and Welsh nationalist named David, originally from Swansea, and leader of an extremist political movement, the Aryan World Order, based in Dover; DICK, an Indian nationalist fanatic and poet, also from Swansea, living in Brighton; and DORICK, alleged to be the treasurer of the Aryan World Order, and previously based in Swansea. Now located in the Ipswich and Harwich area, he reported on the (notional) US Fourteenth Army. Having garnered their views, GARBO was back in touch with Madrid. First, he reported the latest information from his deputy, BENEDICT:
I found BENEDICT awaiting me after a short interview he had had with DICK. Urgent points communicated; he learnt that the 3rd British Division landed in the first assault and has identified it as the one with the insignia of the inverted triangle. The Guards Armoured Division will enter in action three days afar initiating the first attack. The division has left the area.
Thus DICK, the Indian in Brighton, was credited with having correctly identified the 3rd (Iron) Division, which had led British troops ashore on SWORD Beach, and predicting the imminent deployment on D+3 of the Guards Armoured Division, which would actually land in Normandy a week later. The purpose of this purely tactical deception scheme was to relieve the pressure on the hard-hit American beaches by attracting the defenders towards the JUNO and SWORD sectors.
GARBO’s second transmission lasted a record 122 minutes, and hammered home his belief that the events of the past forty-eight hours represented a diversionary feint, and a potential trap, citing his mistress ‘Dorothy Thompson’, an unconscious source in the Cabinet Office, who had mentioned a figure of seventy-five divisions in England:
From the reports mentioned it is perfectly clear that the present attack is a large-scale operation but diversionary in character for the purpose of establishing a strong bridgehead in order to draw the maximum of our reserves to the area of operation and to retain them there so as to be able to strike a blow somewhere else with ensured success. I never like to give my opinions unless I have strong reasons to justify my assurances, but the fact that these concentrations which are in the East and South East of the Island are now inactive means that they must be held in reserve to be employed in the other large-scale operations. The constant aerial bombardments which the area of the Pas-de-Calais has suffered and the strategic disposition of these forces give reason to suspect an attack in that region of France which, at the same time, offers the shortest route for the final objective of their illusions, which is to say, Berlin. This advance could be covered by a constant hammering from the air since the bases would be near the field of battle and they would come in behind our forces which are fighting at the present moment with the enemy disembarked in the West of France. From AMY I learned yesterday that there were seventy-five divisions in this country before the present assault commenced. Supposing they should use a maximum of twenty to twenty-five divisions with which to attempt a second blow. I trust you will submit urgently all these reports and studies to our High Command since moments may be decisive in these times and before taking a false step, through lack of knowledge of the necessary facts, they should have in their possession all the present information which I transmit with my opinion which is based on the belief that the whole of the present attack is set as a trap for the enemy to make us move all our reserves in a hurried strategical disposition which we would later regret.
This crucial message, received in Madrid, was slightly edited and then re-encrypted on the KO’s Enigma channel and transmitted to Berlin, closely monitored by the Bletchley Park cryptanalysts:
V-Mann ALARIC network. ARABEL reports on 9 June from England
After personal consultation with 8 June in London with my agents JONNY, DICK, and DORICK, whose reports were sent today, I am of the opinion, in view of the strong troop concentrations in South East and Eastern England, which are not taking part in the present operations, that these operations are a diversionary manoeuvre designed to draw off enemy reserves in order then to make a decisive attack in another place. In view of the continued air attacks on the concentration area mentioned, which is a strategically favourable position for this, it may very probably take place in the Pas-de-Calais area, particularly since in such an attack the proximity of air bases will facilitate the operation by providin
g continued strong air support.
This single message appears, more than any other, to have influenced the OKW to undertake a reversal in policy and persuade Hitler, Keitel and Jodl to cancel an armoured counter-attack in Normandy. While on D+3 the OKW was changing its strategy to cope with a likely second assault, DICK and DORICK submitted their observations from Dover and Harwich respectively:
DICK reports that the following divisions are to be found in his area without indication of embarking at present … Southern Command … 47th Division … DICK reports that the activity in his area has greatly increased, giving the following divisions stationed in the area without indication of embarking for the moment … 47th London Division.
Later the same day, GARBO sent a further message to emphasise the point, that yet more troops and tanks were massing in East Anglia:
Amplification and notes on the messages sent yesterday. Looking over the messages I see that I omitted to include, in the list of troops in the area of DONNY, the units 2nd Canadian Division and 2nd Canadian Corps. DORICK has learned through a well-informed channel that there are more than a hundred tank transport barges capable of transporting about five hundred tanks … which have gradually been concentrating in the ports of Yarmouth, Lowestoft and in the rivers of the Debenham and the Orwell.
On 14 June, TATE, who had been silent for the previous six days, made a calculated contribution to the idea that Kent was the destination for yet more Allied troops:
Railway clerk friend has been very busy working out adjustments to timetables. Was able to see at his place a railway notice called Special Working Arrangements in Connection with Movements of Troops. Unfortunately no dates given. Dates also unknown to friend. On the cover were several instructions. The first page dealt with twenty-three trains to Tilbury from Tenterden on a date described as ‘J minus 11’ … Thirteen of them were for tracked vehicles and the rest were passenger trains, each with about 500 seats for men and thirty or so for officers. There were about six pages in all but had not much time to get much detail of the others. They covered a period from J minus five or six. The places of departure include Heathfield, Ashford, Elham. The destinations were mainly Gravesend, Tilbury and Dover. Every timetable carried a list of trains to carry tracked vehicles … One included eight trains of ten ‘warflats’, which I was told were for tanks and other big vehicles. There were only twelve trains in this timetable. There were frequent references to connections with the LMSR line. On the last page of the timetable there was a list of hospital trains destined for Birmingham but no times for the movements were shown.
Instead of an instant, enthusiastic response from Hamburg, the Abwehr reacted to TATE’s information a week later, with what appeared to be mild disinterest, thus raising doubts about continuing German confidence in him:
Do everything possible to investigate troop formations which pass through your place or are in the district. If there are no troops there try to get information about concentration areas and reserve areas either from your own travels or from a third party. Especially now such messages are of colossal importance.
‡
The task of creating and sustaining the ‘second wave’ threat was made somewhat greater by the prime minister when he addressed the House of Commons at midday on the afternoon of the invasion to announce the Second Front, and accidentally referred to ‘a series of landings’, an assertion that the Germans would be likely to misinterpret, as Liddell remarked:
The Prime Minister in his speech to the House of Commons said that the recent landing in France was only the first of a series of landings which would take place on the continent of Europe. I cannot help feeling that this is a mistake. The Germans should deduce that this is the one and only landing.
Churchill’s ‘slip-up’, if it had not been noticed already by the Germans, was brought to their attention by GARBO in a message the following evening:
In spite of recommendations made to Churchill that his speech should contain every possible reserve, he based it on the consideration that he was obliged, on account of his political position, to avoid distorting the facts and could not permit that his speeches would not be discredited by coming events.
The FHW assessment of the situation issued on D+1, the day after the start of the invasion, did refer to public statements made by Churchill and Eisenhower, without any adverse comment, as Liddell had feared:
Of the approximately 60 formations now in the south of England it is probable that at the most 10 or 12 divisions are at present taking part in the invasion. The main objective may be regarded as the capture of the Cotentin Peninsula to the south. The following are points worthy of note:-
(a) The employment of the Air Force is limited to a narrow area and has so far, contrary to expectations, not included the important German headquarters in the west.
(b) Sabotage activity has been sporadic.
(c) All divisions so far identified in action have come from the same area.
This evidence indicates that further undertakings are planned and supports statements in this sense by Churchill and Eisenhower. The formations which have so far appeared are from Montgomery’s 21st English Army Group which still has over 20 formations at its disposal so that further air and sea landing attempts appear possible in the region of the Cotentin peninsula, possibly also against the Channel Isles and by way of support, against the west coast of Normandy. With 25 formations available north and south of the Thames a further large scale undertaking in the Channel is conceivable and may be expected to include the employment of the strong portions of the Anglo-Saxon Air Force which have still been held back.
On the next day, 8 June, the FHW issued an assessment referring to up-to-date information from Abwehr agents on the south coast:
A proven Abwehr source reports that the English Guards Armoured Division, at present in the Worthing area, will be embarked from Brighton Harbour. This Armoured Division may therefore be expected to appear shortly. According to a credible Abwehr message the 2 English Army Corps, hitherto reported in the Stirling area (Scottish Command), and the 58 English Infantry Division, stationed west of Edinburgh, were transferred at the beginning of the month to the Dumfries area (Solway Firth). At the same time the 7 English Army Corps, hitherto assumed to be north of Dundee, has been reported on the west coast of Scotland in the Greenock area.
Apart from the very real Guards Armoured Division, these non-existent units had been spotted by BRUTUS during an equally fictitious week-long visit to Scotland in April, and their subsequent move south had been reported by GARBO. This was also the day, D+2, that BRUTUS explained his situation to the Abwehr:
With regard to FUSAG, it is difficult for me to penetrate the Operations Room because my personal relations are still weak and because security restrictions are very severe and in principle the Allied Liaison officers are kept apart. Nevertheless I am obliged to be here every day and each day I improve my relations.
It was at this stage, three days after D-Day, that ISOS revealed the extent to which the deception campaign had not only succeeded, but was continuing to mislead the enemy. A message from Berlin addressed to Gustav Leissner, the Madrid KO chief, from Georg Hansen, asked him to congratulate Kuhlenthal on his recent work in England, which was interpreted to mean the ARABEL network. Additionally, Hansen used the authority of the RSHA chief Heinrich Himmler to demand ‘the object of further reconnaissance must be to ascertain in good time when embarkation began and the destination of the groups of forces in south-east England’.
The OKWs fixation on FUSAG was understandable, and manifested itself on D+2 with a demand for more information on the US 28th Division, a notional FUSAG component, but one that had been characterised as highly trained assault troops. The OKW had deduced that this formation represented a formidable threat, and was likely to be deployed in any future landing. Accordingly, it had been seen last in Ipswich by GARBO’s sub-agent DORICK, an Indian only recruited in February.
A third source offering inform
ation about FUSAG was TATE, the German parachutist supposedly ensconced on a farm in Kent, right in the centre of a prohibited military area. He reported by radio on 8, 9 and 14 June on conversations he had held with a local railwayman based at the village station, on the mainline to Canterbury. According to the indiscreet Southern Railway employee, preparations were under way for FUSAG to embark at Tilbury, Gravesend, Dover, Folkestone and Newhaven. Thus TATE served to underpin FUSAG’s existence, and to support the idea of a further assault to be launched from the south-east.
Over the next three days the evidence mounted to support the hope that the second phase of FORTITUDE was having the desired impact. A Japanese diplomatic decrypt of a signal from Ambassador Oshima in Berlin to the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo dated 7 June was presumed to have been based on a high-level briefing about the invasion:
The forces used by the enemy in landings which he has made to date consist of three airborne and nine ordinary divisions … These, however, constitute only the first wave and it is not yet clear whether the enemy’s main offensive is to be made from here or whether he is going to attempt large-scale landings elsewhere …