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In 1942, Lieutenant-Commander Ian Fleming
RNVR was personal assistant to the Director of Naval Intelligence
- the dynamic figure behind James Bond’s fictional
chief, ‘M’. In the Admiralty, Fleming had a
brilliant idea: why not set up a unit of authorised looters,
men who would go in with front-line troops to steal enemy
intelligence?
Known as ‘30 Assault Unit’, they took part
in the landings in North Africa, Sicily and Normandy and
helped liberate Paris. But 30AU really came into their
own in Germany in 1945 and their final amazing coup was
to seize the entire archives of the German Navy - over
300 tons of documents. Ian Fleming flew out in person to
bring the loot back to Britain, where it was combed for
evidence to use in the Nuremberg trials.
In this gripping and highly enjoyable
book, Nicholas Rankin, author of the bestselling Churchill’s
Wizards, puts 30 Assault Unit’s fascinating story
in a strategic and intelligence context. He also argues
that Ian Fleming’s Second World War service was one
of the most significant periods of his life - without this,
the most popular spy fiction of the twentieth century would
not have been written.
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