{"product_id":"double-cross-isbn-9780307888778","title":"Double Cross","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNEW YORK TIMES \u003c\/i\u003eBESTSELLER • The “superb [and] intensely readable” (\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e) untold story of one of the greatest deceptions of World War II and the extraordinary spies who achieved it—from the bestselling author of \u003ci\u003ePrisoners of the Castle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“Not since Ian Fleming and John le Carré has a spy writer so captivated readers.”—\u003ci\u003eThe Hollywood Reporter\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn June 6, 1944, 150,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy and suffered an astonishingly low rate of casualties. A stunning military achievement, it was also a masterpiece of trickery. Operation Fortitude, which protected and enabled the invasion, and the Double Cross system, which specialized in turning German spies into double agents, tricked the Nazis into believing that the Allied attacks would come in Calais and Norway rather than Normandy. It was the most sophisticated and successful deception operation ever carried out, ensuring Allied victory at the most pivotal moment in the war. \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThis epic event has never before been told from the perspective of the key individuals in the Double Cross system, until now. These include its director (a brilliant, urbane intelligence officer), a colorful assortment of MI5 handlers (as well as their counterparts in Nazi intelligence), and the five spies who formed Double Cross’s nucleus: a dashing Serbian playboy, a Polish fighter-pilot, a bisexual Peruvian party girl, a deeply eccentric Spaniard, and a volatile Frenchwoman. Together they made up one of the oddest and most brilliant military units ever assembled. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith the same depth of research, eye for the absurd, and masterful storytelling that have made Ben Macintyre an international bestseller, \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross \u003c\/i\u003eis a captivating narrative of the spies who wove a web so intricate it ensnared Hitler’s army and carried thousands of D-Day troops across the Channel in safety.“Gripping stories from the perspective of a remarkable ragtag group of spies who tricked the Nazis in an astounding D-Day deception.  Puts other spy tales to shame.” \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003ePeople\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“It should be said loud and clear that Macintyre is a supremely gifted storyteller. He spins quite a yarn. His books are absurdly entertaining. I would kill for his keen wit. He takes us into a world of bounders, spivs, roués, and men (and women) on the make….\u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e is a blast.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eBoston Globe\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e“Forget fiction when you are buying beach reading this summer. Ben Macintyre’s factual account is more gripping than what you will find anywhere else. It is a story unsurpassed in the long history of intelligence.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eWashington Times\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Macintyre at once exalts and subverts the myths of spycraft, and has a keen eye for absurdity.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eNew Yorker\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[A] complex, absorbing final installment in his trilogy about World War II espionage….Macintyre is a master storyteller.  Employing a wry wit and a keen eye for detail, he delivers an ultimately winning tale fraught with European intrigue and subtle wartime heroics.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eSan Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Superb….the story comes alive again in all its stupendous, unimaginable duplicity.…intensely readable” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eWashington Post\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“A wonderfully entertaining story of deception and trickery that is told with verve and wit….Macintyre’s early books about espionage in World War II have been bestsellers, and this will be no exception.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eChristian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Macintyre revels in the surreal aspects of his story, writing with a breezy, almost tongue-in-cheek style. But the author is also adept at communicating the seriousness and the stakes of the underlying game….Nail-biting and chuckle-inducing reading.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eColumbus Dispatch\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Another captivating, improbably fresh story of World War II….\u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e is ennobling, invigorating and, above all, entertaining. Macintyre's research is impressive, as is his ability to shape disparate facts into a breathless page-turner….Throw in nail-biting suspense and the occasional decadent Nazi (fickle mistress optional) and, with Macintyre in charge, you're virtually guaranteed a history book that reads like a spy novel.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eRichmond Times-Dispatch\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“It is the riveting tales of these agents on which Ben Macintyre focuses, to full advantage, in \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e….Macintyre makes good use of the material. He knows how to let the high drama unfold on its own.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eWall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“London Times writer Macintyre (\u003ci\u003eAgent Zigzag\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eOperation Mincemeat\u003c\/i\u003e) concludes his WWII espionage trilogy with the tantalizing tale of an oddball, ‘Dirty Dozen’-like group of double agents who fool the Nazis into believing the Allied D-Day attack would come at Calais, not Normandy.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eNew York Post\u003c\/i\u003e, Required reading\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e“\u003c\/i\u003eA tale of smarts, personal courage and — even knowing what happened on June 6, 1944 — suspense.  Where would we be if these troubled, eccentric and hang-it-all characters hadn't known how to lie, and lie well?” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eSeattle Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“As in his earlier best-sellers about WWII-era spycraft, \u003ci\u003eAgent Zigzag\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eOperation Mincemeat\u003c\/i\u003e, Macintyre writes with novelistic flair.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The story of D-Day – when 150,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy – as it’s never been told before….this amazing story shows how double agents and spies tricked the German army and saved thousands of Allied lives.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eNew York Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Only with author Ben Macintyre’s scintillating account has this complex human drama, with all its tortuous twists and turns, finally received the cinematic treatment it deserves….This is edge-of-the seat stuff.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eWWII Magazine\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Macintyre does a fine job depicting this extraordinary cast and exposing the ambiguous world of espionage....compelling.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eMHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“With the same skill and suspense he displayed in \u003ci\u003eOperation Mincemeat\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eAgent Zigzag\u003c\/i\u003e….Macintyre effortlessly weaves the agents’ deliciously eccentric personalities with larger wartime events to shape a tale that reads like a top-notch spy thriller.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e (starred)\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Macintyre has written a tense, exciting real-life spy story that illuminates a largely obscure aspect of WWII.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eBooklist\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“With his latest book, \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e, Ben Macintyre tells the astonishing true story of a bizarre group of misfit spies who played a critical role in the success of D-Day.  The stories in this book, many of which have never before been told, are nothing short of incredible.  Skillfully woven together, they form one of the most gripping narratives I have ever read.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eCandice Millard, author of \u003ci\u003eThe River of Doubt\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eDestiny of the Republic\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Ben Macintyre and I work in the same period, and I should be reading him because he is such a scrupulous and insightful writer – a master historian. But, with \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e and his other excellent works, I always wind up reading him for pleasure.  \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e may be his best yet, falling somewhere between top-class entertainment and pure addiction.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eAlan Furst, author of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Mission to Paris\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Ben Macintyre’s spellbinding account features an improbable cast of characters who pulled off a counter-intelligence feat that was breathtaking in its audacity. Their deceptions within deceptions—known as the Double Cross—were critical to the success of the D-Day invasion, and continued to mislead the Germans long after Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy. A truly bravura performance, as is Macintyre’s fast-paced tale.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eAndrew Nagorski, author of \u003ci\u003eHitlerland: American Eyewitnesses to the Nazi Rise to Power\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\"How on earth, in 1944, did we dupe Berlin that we would attack the coast of France in completely the wrong place?  It was a deception that saved tens of thousands of Allied lives.  In \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e, Ben Macintyre ingeniously explains exactly how it was done.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eFrederick Forsyth\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\"Never before revealed facts about the workings of the Intelligence Service in the build up to D-Day in the Second World War.  Ben Macintyre's remarkable book is a gripping revelation.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eJack Higgins\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[Macintyre] has excelled himself with a cast of extraordinary characters and in his storytelling abilities....\u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e is an utterly gripping story.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eAntony Beevor, \u003ci\u003eThe Telegraph\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Enthralling....Macintyre is a master at leading the reader down some very tortuous paths while ensuring they never lose their bearings. He’s terrific, too, at animating his characters with the most succinct of touches....gripping.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eLondon Evening Standard\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eBEN MACINTYRE\u003c\/b\u003e is a writer-at-large for The Times of London and the bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eA Spy Among Friends\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eDouble Cross\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eOperation Mincemeat\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eAgent Zigzag\u003c\/i\u003e, among other books. Macintyre has also written and presented BBC documentaries of his work.\u003cb\u003e1. Raw Recruits\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDusko and Johnny were friends. Their friendship was founded on a shared appreciation of money, cars, parties, and women, in no particular order and preferably all at the same time. Their relationship, based almost entirely on frivolity, would have a profound impact on world history.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDusan “Dusko” Popov and Johann “Johnny” Jebsen met in 1936 at the University of Freiburg in southern Germany. Popov, the son of a wealthy Serbian industrialist from Dubrovnik, was twenty-five. Jebsen, the heir to a large shipping company, was two years older. Both were spoiled, charming, and feckless. Popov drove a BMW; Jebsen, a supercharged Mercedes 540K convertible. This inseparable pair of international playboys roistered around Freiburg, behaving badly. Popov was a law student, while Jebsen was taking an economics degree, the better to manage the family firm. Neither did any studying at all. “We both had some intellectual pretensions,” wrote Popov, but “[we were] addicted to sports cars and sporting girls and had enough money to keep them both running.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePopov had a round, open face, with hair brushed back from a high forehead. Opinion was divided on his looks: “He smiles freely showing all his teeth and in repose his face is not unpleasant, though certainly not handsome,” wrote one male contemporary. He had “a well-flattened, typically Slav nose, complexion sallow, broad shoulders, athletic carriage, but rather podgy, white and well-kept hands,” which he waved in wild gesticulation. Women frequently found him irresistible, with his easy manners, “loose, sensual mouth,” and green eyes behind heavy lids. He had what were then known as “bedroom eyes”; indeed, the bedroom was his main focus of interest. Popov was an unstoppable womanizer. Jebsen cut a rather different figure. He was slight and thin, with dark blond hair, high cheekbones, and a turned‑up nose. Where Popov was noisily gregarious, Jebsen was watchful. “His coldness, aloofness, could be forbidding, yet everyone was under his spell,” Popov wrote. “He had much warmth too, and his intelligence was reflected in his face, in the alertness of his steel-blue eyes. He spoke abruptly, in short phrases, hardly ever used an adjective and was, above all, ironic.” Jebsen walked with a limp and hinted that this was from an injury sustained in some wild escapade: in truth it was caused by the pain of varicose veins, to which he was a secret martyr. He loved to spin a story, to “deliberately stir up situations to see what would happen.” But he also liked to broker deals. When Popov was challenged to a sword duel over a girl, it was Jebsen, as his second, who quietly arranged a peaceful solution, to Popov’s relief, “not thinking my looks would be improved by a bright red cicatrix.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJebsen’s parents, both dead by the time he arrived in Freiburg, had been born in Denmark but adopted German citizenship when the shipping firm Jebsen \u0026amp; Jebsen moved to Hamburg. Jebsen was born in that city in 1917 but liked to joke that he was really Danish, his German citizenship being a “flag of convenience” for business purposes: “Some of my love of my country has to do with so much of it actually belonging to me.” A rich, rootless orphan, Jebsen had visited Britain as a teenager and returned a committed Anglophile: he affected English manners, spoke English in preference to German, and dressed, he thought, “like a young Anthony Eden, conservatively elegant.” Popov remarked: “He would no more go without an umbrella than without his trousers.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePreoccupied as they were with having fun, the two student friends could not entirely ignore the menacing political changes taking place around them in the Germany of the 1930s. They made a point of teasing the “pro-Nazi student intelligentsia.” The mockery, however, had a metal strand to it. “Under that mask of a snob and cynic and under his playboy manners,” Jebsen was developing a deep distaste for Nazism. Popov found the posturing Nazi Brownshirts ridiculous and repulsive.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAfter graduation, Popov returned to Yugoslavia and set himself up in the import-export business, traveling widely. Jebsen headed to England, announcing that he intended to study at Oxford University and write books on philosophy. He did neither (though he would later claim to have done both). They would not meet again for three years, by which time the world was at war.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn early 1940, Popov was living in Dubrovnik, where he had opened his own law firm, and conducting affairs with at least four women, when he received a telegram from his old friend summoning him to Belgrade: “Need to meet you urgently.” Their reunion was joyful and spectacularly bibulous. They went on a bender through Belgrade’s nightspots, having enlisted “two girls from the chorus of one of the clubs.” At dawn, all four sat down to a breakfast of steak and champagne. Jebsen told Popov that in the intervening years, he had become acquainted with the great English writer P. G. Wodehouse. With his monocle and silk cravat, Jebsen now looked like an oddly Germanic version of Bertie Wooster. Popov studied his old friend. Jebsen wore the same expression of “sharp intelligence, cynicism and dark humour,” but he also seemed tense, as if there was something weighing on his mind. He chain-smoked and “ordered his whiskies double, neat, and frequently. In style, his clothes still rivalled Eden’s, but his blond hair was no longer so closely trimmed and he had a neglected moustache, reddened by tobacco.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA few days later, the friends were alone at the bar of a Belgrade hotel, when Jebsen lowered his voice, looked around in a ludicrously conspiratorial manner, and confided that he had joined the Abwehr, the German military intelligence service, “because it saved him from soldiering, of which he was very much afraid as he is a heavy sufferer from varicose veins.” Jebsen’s recruiter was a family friend, Colonel Hans Oster, deputy to Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the chief of the Abwehr. He now had the formal but vague Abwehr title of “Forscher,” meaning researcher or talent scout, with the technical rank of private, attached to a four-hundred-strong special detachment of the Brandenburg Regiment. This unit was in reality “a wangle by Canaris to keep a number of young men out of the clutches of compulsory service.” Jebsen was a freelance spy on permanent leave from the army, with a personal assurance from Canaris that he would never wear a uniform, never undergo military training, and never be sent to war. He was free to spend his “time travelling throughout Europe on his private business and financial affairs, so long as he held himself available to help the Abwehr when called upon to do so.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Hitler is the undisputed master of Europe,” Jebsen declared. “In a few months’ time, he’ll probably finish off England, and then America and Russia will be glad to come to terms with him.” This was pure Nazi propaganda, but Jebsen’s expression, as usual, was glintingly ironic. “Would you dine with a friend of mine,” Jebsen asked suddenly, “a member of the German embassy?” The friend turned out to be one Major Müntzinger, a corpulent Bavarian and the most senior Abwehr officer in the Balkans. Over brandy and cigars, Müntzinger made his pitch to Popov, as subtle as a sledgehammer. “No country can resist the German army. In a couple of months, England will be invaded. To facilitate the German task and to make an eventual invasion less bloody, you could help.” Müntzinger shifted to flattery. Popov was well connected. His business was the ideal cover for traveling to Britain, where he must know many important and influential people. Why, did he not know the Duke of Kent himself? Popov nodded. (He did not admit that he had visited Britain only once in his life and had met the duke for a matter of minutes at Dubrovnik’s Argosy Yacht Club.) Müntzinger continued: “We have many agents in England, quite a number of them excellent. But your connections would open many doors. You could render us great service. And we could do the same for you. The Reich knows how to show its appreciation.” Jebsen drank his whiskey and said nothing. Müntzinger was somewhat vague about the kind of information Popov might gather: “General. Political.” And then, after a pause: “Military. Johnny will introduce you to the proper people when and if you accept.” Popov asked for time to think the offer over, and in the morning he accepted. Jebsen had recruited his first spy for German intelligence. He would never recruit another.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePopov, meanwhile, had begun to develop what he called “a little idea of my own.”Author of The Spy and the Traitor and Operation Mincemeat","brand":"Crown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304893927653,"sku":"NP9780307888778","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780307888778.jpg?v=1767725562","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/double-cross-isbn-9780307888778","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}