Operation Mincemeat

In the spring of 1943 the British Security Service MI5 launched a plan to place false intelligence documents in the hands of the Abwehr. The objective was to convince Hitler that Allied forces intended to invade Greece and Sardinia that summer, rather than their true objective of Sicily, and it succeeded spectacularly. Ben Macintyre wrote a wonderful account of the full operation, but more briefly you can learn about the plan and its execution here:
Operation Mincemeat

Sicily was the obvious target of choice in the western European theater once the campaign in north Africa was concluded and the invasion of Normandy was not yet ready. To improve their chances of success Allied intelligence attempted to divert as much Axis resistance as possible through a systematic campaign to convince the Axis heads of state that Sicily was not going to be the next target, even though strategically that conclusion seemed inevitable. To help, a British Intelligence team lead by Charles Cholmondeley, Ewen Montagu (brother of table tennis enthusiast and Soviet spy Ivor), and Ian Fleming (yes, that Ian Fleming) enlisted the help of the espionage demimonde of neutral Spain, the submarine HMS Seraph, and the body of a Welsh vagrant named Glyndwr Michael, disguised as a Royal Marine officer. Spy folks have come up with some odd ideas over the years, but this stands out even among that crowd.

Michael died, possibly by accident and possibly by suicide, in London in January of 1943 after ingesting a lethal amount of phosphorous-based rat poison. Having no next of kin, no property, and few if any acquaintances, it was easy for the reality of Glyndwr Michael to disappear. MI5 agents crafted an elaborate backstory for a Marine Major named Bill Martin and assigned it, along with a briefcase full of official-looking documents outlining a planned invasion of the islands of the Aegean and Sardinia, to Michael's body. The plan was for the newly-minted officer to be placed just off the coast of Spain, floating face-down in a life jacket, providing a reasonable simulacrum of a drowned plane crash casualty. Hopefully someone would find him shortly thereafter and take him ashore for examination by Spanish and Nazi spies.

Once the plan's form was finalized and the documents made ready, the fabricated Marine was shuttled to the coast of Andalusia by way of the Seraph in an airtight capsule filled with dry ice for preservation. In the early morning hours of April 30, after some brief drama on the surface that involved rigging the seemingly-unsinkable capsule with plastic explosive to facilitate destruction of its evidence, Major Martin was sent on his one-way mission of deception. Later that day he was indeed found by local fishermen, and eventually worked his way to the Spanish authorities.

Mincemeat, as the operation was code-named, was a production that only made sense if you wanted to believe it anyway. Phosphorous poisoning doesn't look much like drowning, and after spending three months in a morgue, Michael's body was in poor condition to pass for a recent plane crash victim. Still, the Germans were eager for any news about Allied plans after their anxious retreat from Africa, and were willing to look past the parts that didn't fit together and see a coherent story behind Major Martin. The record seems to show that Hitler found the plant convincing, and even after the invasion of Sicily began he was convinced that it was nothing more than a diversion from a real, upcoming assault further east in the Mediterranean. Sometimes the most convincing lies come from those who don't speak at all.

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