Hitler, Nazis, concentration camps, and Jews; these are the most known topics when it comes to World War 2. But the whole point of covert operations is that no one should know about them. The definition of a covert operation is “An operation that is so planned and executed as to conceal the identity of a permit plausible denial by the sponsor.” These operations were pulled off by government agents, army officials, and in the first of the following examples, James Fleming, the author of the James Bond story, wrote fake papers. There were many covert operations surrounding World War 2. Three well known are Operation Mincemeat, Operation Grief, and Operation Paperclip.
Operation Mincemeat was “one of the most successful war deceptions ever achieved”…show more content… Otto Skorzeny was someone who was known to “get things done.” Scorzeny was already famous for many operations, and “he is basically the father of all modern commando operatives.” (Operation Grief) By 1944, Germany’s army was falling apart, and Hitler knew he had to take serious action. In calling in Scorzeny, Hitler was hoping he could somehow pull out a victory. In his meeting, Scorzeny was told his order; to go behind enemy lines and cause discord. Hitler based his plan off a successful attack that an American commando unit performed against the German lines. The only problem with Hitler’s plan was that he gave Scorzeny very little time and resources to fully go through with the operation. Scorzeny tried his best, getting as many Allied tanks and weapons as he could, but unable to get a substantial amount he had to try to disguise German equipment as American. Scorzeny also had to try to find fluent English speaking German soldiers. In over one hundred volunteers, only around ten spoke fluent English. Scorzeny had to just hope that the rest of the volunteers could get by with the fake identification papers and with hardly any speaking having to be involved. Scorzeny had another problem with getting uniforms. He had American overcoats, but not the actual, necessary uniforms in order to not be discovered. Scorzeny was able to gain uniforms from German prison-of-war camps, which he gave to…show more content… At the end of the war, Americans could see that the USSR (Soviet Union) would not keep their alliance once the war was over. In order to try to get the upper hand, Americans decided to get German rocket scientists, chemical warfare engineers, chemical reaction technology specialists, and scientists in the field of medicine and bring them to work for the US in rocket study and construction. The Americans found a document called Osenberg list, found in a toilet at Bonn University, contained the names of scientists and engineers. The then newly founded Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA) took care of getting the scientists and their families, taking them to a safe house, and then in secrecy to the states. Most scientists practically came to the Americans, not wanting the Red Army (Soviet Union) to take hold of their projects. So the JIOA took the scientists to a safe house in Landshut, Bavaria with the operation under the name “Operation Overcast.” Unfortunately, this name became well known to the natives there, so the name was changed to “Operation Paperclip.” At the time of this operation, President Harry Truman gave the law, saying that the scientists couldn’t be brought to the states if they had helped the Nazis in any way, but JIOA found a way around that law. They “whitewashed,” or erased, any evidence of possible war crimes. The officials thought the
