During World War 2, a dead tramp from London was shipped to Italy, given an elaborate backstory by Ian Fleming (of James Bond fame), dressed as a British soldier and supplied with fake British invasion plans. What I’m saying is he was a zombie spy. So as it happens, zombies have been du jour since the mid 1940s.

Says the BBC about ‘Operation Mincemeat’:

“Into his pockets went an identity card, ticket stubs and mementos from a fiancee. Chained to his wrist was a briefcase containing a letter marked “PERSONAL AND MOST SECRET”, identifying Greece for invasion by Allied forces. Greece was a dummy target – the real plan was to invade Sicily.

…

After a tense week or so – it took the Germans several attempts to get sight of the briefcase’s contents – photographs of the falsified documents made it to Hitler’s desk. He was fooled, and moved an entire panzer division – 90,000 soldiers – to Greece.”

And I mean yes, respecting the dead blah blah they stole a corpse, but come on! That’s awesome! Almost as awesome as the telegram sent to Churchill once the bluff worked:

“Mincemeat swallowed rod, line and sinker.”

The gentlemen had class.

Thanks, Peter.

[Source : BBC]