Juan Pujol Garcia SSDouble Agent Garbo: The Ordinary Person Who Played a Major Role in Defeating Nazi.pdf
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Can ordinary people play a major role in making the world a better place? How did Juan Pujol Garcia, codename Garbo, a most ordinary man, become a spy that played a leading role in defeating Nazi Germany in World War II? Should we be discouraged when we are ignored? In life sometimes the only solution is to do the best job you can, month after month, year after year, in the hope that one day your efforts will be valued, that you can make an impact. For more interesting videos, please click to subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ReflectionsMPH/?sub_confirmation=1 Shortcut: https://www.youtube.com/@ReflectionsMPH YouTube video using this script: https://youtu.be/-ccnaGxrAWA © Copyright 2023 This blog includes footnotes and Amazon book links: https://seekingvirtueandwisdom.com/double-agent-garbo-the-ordinary-person-who-played-a-major-role-in-defeating-nazi/ We also reflect on: • How Pujol’s experience in the Spanish Civil War, on both the Nationalist and Republican sides, influenced his decision to become a spy. • How the Germans gave him the codename Alaric. • How he fooled the Germans into thinking he was reporting from London, when his dispatches were from Lisbon, Portugal. • His role in World War II, including Operation Torch, the Invasion of North Africa, and the Invasion of Normandy on D-Day, when he convinced the Germans that the invasion would be on the Pas de Calais in Operation Fortitude. • The intersection with the British efforts to compromise the German Enigma Code, broken by Alan Turing. • How He was awarded both the Iron Cross by Hitler, and the MBE, or Most Excellent Order of the British Empire by King George VI in 1944. • How after the war he lived anonymously in Caracas, Venezuela.
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Juan Pujol Garcia SSDouble Agent Garbo: The Ordinary Person Who Played a Major Role in Defeating Nazi.pdf
- 2. Can ordinary people play a major role in making the world a better place? How did Juan Pujol Garcia, a most ordinary man, become a spy that played a leading role in defeating Nazi Germany in World War II? Should we be discouraged when we are ignored? In life sometimes the only solution is to do the best job you can, month after month, year after year, in the hope that one day your efforts will be valued, that you can make an impact.
- 3. Please, we welcome interesting questions in the comments. Let us learn and reflect together! We will discuss our sources at the end of our video. Please feel free to follow along in the PowerPoint script we uploaded to SlideShare, which includes illustrations. Our sister blog includes footnotes, both include our Amazon book links.
- 4. © Copyright 2023 Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/seekingvirtueandwisdom YouTube Channel, Reflections on Morality, Philosophy, and History: https://www.youtube.com/@Ref;lectionsMPH Books on Christians Surviving Under Fascism https://youtu.be/-ccnaGxrAWA https://amzn.to/3kfSkJ5 https://amzn.to/37JkV3w https://amzn.to/3bcnd0K https://amzn.to/3828kJ0 https://amzn.to/386XB06 https://amzn.to/3m5cRCT https://amzn.to/3xSWX0u
- 5. SlideShare contains scripts for my YouTube videos. Link is in the YouTube description. © Copyright 2023
- 6. To find the source of any direct quotes in this blog, please type in the phrase to the search box in my blog to see the referenced footnote. YouTube Description has links for: • Script PDF file • Blog • Amazon Bookstore © Copyright 2023 Blog and YouTube Description include links for Amazon books and lectures mentioned, please support our channel with these affiliate commissions. Blog: https://wp.me/pachSU-UP
- 7. Who was Juan Pujol Garcia, the ordinary man whose imagination played a major role in defeating Nazi Germany? How did his background prepare him for his remarkable role in history? His father owned a cotton factory, and he was educated at a Catholic boarding school, where he learned animal husbandry, and after he graduated he managed a poultry farm, among other jobs. But his family lost everything when, at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, his father’s factory was taken over by the workers.
- 9. The Spanish Civil War was fought between the Nationalists, headed by the fascist general Juan Peron, and the Republicans. At the beginning of the war, the Republicans were an alliance of Socialists and Communists, but early in the conflict there was a war within the war, as the Communists seized control of the Republican movement. Both sides were guilty of mass executions, the Catholic Church supported the traditionalist Nationalists because the Republicans slaughtered priests, monks, and nuns. But the fascist Nationalists instead massacred public school teachers, which meant that each side slaughtered civilians by the thousands. Pujol was compelled to serve in the Republican forces, whom he opposed because of how they treated his family. He was able to defect and join the Nationalist forces, who also mistreated him. Like George Orwell, his Spanish Civil War experiences caused him to detest equally both fascists and communists.
- 10. Adolf Hitler and Francisco Franco during the meeting of Hendaye, France, near Spanish border. SPANISH CIVIL WAR Republicans: Government side Socialists and Communists, Communists seized control and massacred Catholic clergy Nationalists: General Franco And rebelling generals Fascists, traditional, pro-Catholic
- 11. Mural of the painting "Guernica" by Picasso made in tiles, depicting the bombing of Guernica
- 13. Juan Pujol Garcia: German Agent Alaric
- 14. After Nazi Germany invaded Poland, then France, Pujol decided the best way he could contribute was to serve as a spy against Nazi Germany. He visited the British embassy in Madrid three times in early 1941 offering his services. He was rebuffed out of hand. How could our Spanish friend burnish his spy resume? By volunteering at the German embassy, playing the role of a fanatic Spanish fascist who could travel to London on official business! The Germans gave him a crash course in espionage, secret writing with invisible ink, a codebook, cash for expenses, giving him the codename ALARIC. His instructions were to move to England and recruit a network of British agents.
- 16. Our independent double agent Alaric surpassed expectations, sending a steady stream of intelligence, and successfully recruiting several other agents. However, these were actually fictional agents, existing only in his imagination, as Alaric himself instead traveled to Lisbon, Portugal! He based his espionage reports on a tourist guide to London and reference books and magazines from the Lisbon Public Library. He submitted expense reimbursements for his travels based on published London railroad schedules. His existence was revealed to the British in the decrypted German Ultra communications intercepted by the Allies. The British MI5 counter-intelligence agency even launched an unsuccessful search for Alaric, the master spy!
- 17. São Jorge Castle and the surrounding neighborhoods in Lisbon, Portugal, which is not London, England
- 18. Juan Pujol: British Double Agent Garbo Network of fictitious double agents. Young Pujol in Spanish Civil War Uniform
- 19. When the Americans entered the war, Pujol contacted the American naval attaché in Lisbon, once again offering his services as a double agent. This time his credibility was enhanced when he sent the Germans on a wild-goose chase for a nonexistent convoy supposedly crossing the Atlantic, per the intercepted German transmissions. The navel attaché convinced the British that Pujol’s services were, indeed, quite valuable. Juan Pujol Garcia was sent to London, the British soon moved his family as well. He was assigned to the Spanish-speaking case officer, Tomas Harris, they both spent their days swamping German intelligence with partly fictional, partially true intelligence reports from an ever-expanding network of dozens of fictional agents. So voluminous was their intelligence that the Germans decided they need not recruit additional agents! His codename was Garbo, named after the famous actress Greta Garbo.
- 20. London during the Nazi bombing blitz, and Big Ben today.
- 21. To convince the Germans of his loyalty, Garbo often supplied accurate intelligence too late for the Germans to act upon. His reports on the Operation Torch landings in North Africa were postmarked well before the operation, but their delivery was delayed by British intelligence. Once when his Liverpool fictional agent failed to report on troop movements, Garbo told the Germans he was deathly ill, later furnishing them his obituary printed in the newspaper. He then convinced the Germans to pay his imaginary widow a pension for his valuable service! His early reports were mailed to a post office box in Lisbon, but the Germans felt this method was too slow. The Germans provided him with the means to communicate by radio, these transmissions were also helpful in breaking the Enigma code the Germans used to encrypt their messages.
- 22. November 1942: The Allies invade French North Africa in Operation Torch. There were multiple landings in French Morocco and Algeria, and the better equipped Allies defeated the German and Italian armies. Operation Torch, Invasion of North Africa
- 23. Network of fictitious double agents.
- 24. Garbo’s Role in Invasion of Normandy Inflatable tanks and fake airplanes and cargo ships to decieve the Germans on where the invasion would occur.
- 25. The Allies were planning their invasion of Europe, and needed to deceive the Germans on where the invasion would occur. The most logical place to stage the invasion was near the Pas de Calais, the shortest route from England in the Straits of Dover, though the actual invasion would occur on the beaches of Normandy. Garbo played a major role in Operation Fortitude, the effort to deceive the Germans. The Allies could not hide their activities from German airplanes, so they instead decided to amass inflatable tanks and airplanes near Dover, with dummy radio traffic and General Patton making appearances to lead this dummy army. Garbo sent over five hundred radio messages in the months leading up to the invasion, with as many as twenty a day. To deceive the Germans, Garbo sent them accurate information on the morning of the invasion, transmitting it at 3 AM. The Germans were not expecting the invasion at this time due the bad weather, they were chewed out by Garbo when they did not respond until 8 AM, saying “Were it not for my ideals I would abandon the work.”
- 26. D-Day, Invasion of Normandy, June 1944
- 27. The German were so fooled by Garbo’s reporting that they kept two Panzer tank divisions and nineteen infantry divisions in the Pas de Calais area, expecting that this would be where the real invasion would occur, suspecting that the Normandy invasion was a decoy, as Garbo told them. This enabled the Allies to establish a beachhead on Normandy, enabling them to liberate France and invade Germany itself. Ironically, his performance surrounding the Normandy Invasion enhanced his reputation with his German handlers, who spent a total of $340,000 during the war supporting Garbo’s fictional network of agents. He was awarded both the Iron Cross by Hitler, and the MBE, or Most Excellent Order of the British Empire by King George VI in 1944.
- 28. Map of deceptions prior to Allied invasion of Normandy (D-Day) / Insignia for the fictitious regiments.
- 29. D-Day, Invasion of Normandy, June 1944
- 30. After the war, fearful of Nazi retaliation, he traveled to Angola, where MI5 helped him fake his death. He then emigrated to Venezuela, where he lived a quiet life running a bookstore until a persistent politician and journalist tracked him down in the 1980s after considerable detective work. Pujol was coaxed to travel to London, visiting his former colleagues, and was received by Prince Phillip at Buckingham Palace. He passed away in Caracas in 1988.
- 31. Ángel Falls, a top Venezuela top tourist attraction and world's highest waterfall, in the Canaima National Park / Guanaguanare dance, a popular dance in Portuguesa State
- 32. If you are advocating for a cause or trying to better the world around you, and are facing lethargic complacency and discouragement, remember the story of Juan Pujol Garcia, realize that to overcome this you should do the best you can to make the world a better place, and perhaps, after years of effort, you will be recognized for your efforts, or perhaps not, perhaps you will fade into obscurity as did our double agent Garbo for decades after the war.
- 34. Our major sources were the accounts by Dr Wikipedia, which references several books written about Garbo and other spies during World War II, and also the MI5 British Intelligence website.
- 37. Our other videos discuss what it was like to live as a Christian under fascism before and during World War II, in the Spanish Civil War ear, in Vichy France, in Mussolini’s Italy, and in Hitler’s Nazi Germany.
- 40. We would also like to correct a popular misconception of the fascinating story of how the Allies broke the unbreakable Nazi Enigma code during World War II. Although Alan Turing, the brilliant mathematician, played a crucial role in breaking this code, designing a mechanical analog computer that greatly accelerated the needed computations, he was not solely responsible for this effort. Several brilliant Polish cryptographers had obtained an early version of the Enigma machine and deduced its secrets in the years leading up to the war. When Poland’s defeat was imminent, this work was provided to the Allies, providing the British with the foundational knowledge needed to break the Enigma code. Also, many other brilliant team members contributed to this effort.
- 41. The Turing Bombe machine that read German enigma encrypted messages could be seen as an early AI application.
- 42. © Copyright 2023 Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/seekingvirtueandwisdom YouTube Channel, Reflections on Morality, Philosophy, and History: https://www.youtube.com/@Ref;lectionsMPH Books on Christians Surviving Under Fascism https://youtu.be/-ccnaGxrAWA https://amzn.to/3kfSkJ5 https://amzn.to/37JkV3w https://amzn.to/3bcnd0K https://amzn.to/3828kJ0 https://amzn.to/386XB06 https://amzn.to/3m5cRCT https://amzn.to/3xSWX0u
- 43. To find the source of any direct quotes in this blog, please type in the phrase to the search box in my blog to see the referenced footnote. YouTube Description has links for: • Script PDF file • Blog • Amazon Bookstore © Copyright 2023 Blog and YouTube Description include links for Amazon books and lectures mentioned, please support our channel with these affiliate commissions. Blog: https://wp.me/pachSU-UP