Operation Bodyguard - Background

Background

During World War II, and prior to Bodyguard, the Allies made extensive use of deception – developing many new techniques and theories. The main protagonists at this time were 'A' Force, set up in 1940 under Dudley Clarke, and the London Controlling Section, chartered in 1942 under the control of John Bevan.

At this stage of the war, Allied and German intelligence operations were heavily mismatched. Through the signals work at Bletchley Park much of the German lines of communication were compromised – intercepts, code named Ultra, gave the Allies insights into how effectively their deceptions were operating. In Europe the Allies had good intelligence from resistance movements and aerial reconnaissance. By comparison, most of the German spies sent into Britain had been caught (or handed themselves in) and turned into double agents (under the XX System). Some of the compromised agents were so trusted that, by 1944, German intelligence had stopped sending new infiltrators. Within the German command structure internal politics, suspicion and mismanagement meant intelligence gathering had only limited effectiveness.

By 1943 Hitler was defending the entire European western coast, with no clear knowledge of where an Allied invasion might land. His tactic was to defend the entire length and rely on reinforcements to quickly respond to any landings. In France the Germans deployed two Heeresgruppen (army groups). One of these, Heeresgruppe B, was deployed to protect the coastline; the Fifteenth Army covering the Pas de Calais region and the Seventh Army in Normandy.