Operation Mincemeat was an attempt by British intelligence to deceive the Germans in spring 1943 about the site of the next great Allied amphibious landing. With Operation Husky aiming for the Italian island of Sicily in July, Mincemeat sought to deliver fake documents to the German high command indicating that southern France and Greece were the real targets. Such operations were common in World War II, and indeed we might even call them business as usual for both sides before any major undertaking.

What sets Mincemeat apart from any other similar operation in World War II was the intended means of delivering that fake information: a corpse. The mastermind of the plot, Lieutenant Commander Ewen Montagu, and his small band of planners procured a dead body—not as easy as it sounds, oddly enough, even in the midst of the bloodiest war in human history—dressed it in a Royal Marine uniform, lashed a valise to it filled with fake documents, including letters to Generals Sir Harold Alexander and Dwight D. Eisenhower, and dumped it off the coast of Franco's Spain near the port of Huelva. The Spanish authorities retrieved it, and did just about what you would expect an Axis-leaning neutral to do. They informed the British of the tragedy and handed the apparently important documents over to the German military intelligence service, the Abwehr. Sure it sounds like a movie, and in fact it is a movie, The Man Who Never Was (director Ronald Neame, 1956), starring Clifton Webb as Montagu.

In other words, Smyth is working with some great material here, and by and large the book delivers. What comes through most clearly is the incredible complexity of the undertaking. The planners had to find a suitable corpse, and he had to look like a “staff officer type.” They actually had a lot of discussion over this point. He had to have a convincing backstory. What was he doing on this flight? Why was he carrying these important papers? He had to have a convincing life back in Britain, and it is here that we enter the theater of the absurd. The planners gave “Major Martin” letters from his “father,” warning notes from his bank manager complaining about his tendency to overdraft, expired leave passes, all suitably weathered. They even gave him a sex life, an attractive young fiancée named “Pam,” replete with photograph and love letters. They began talking about him as if he were real. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that they began to believe he was real. It is fascinating stuff, much like a police procedural on television, and more than a little ghoulish. Ever try to put heavy military boots on a frozen corpse? Our operatives had to do just that. They solved the problem by holding the ankles over a flame to thaw them.

Deathly Deception is not without problems. Foremost among them is the relentless cheerleading tone, the “isn't-this-just-amazing?” cast to the rhetoric. All the planners are magnificent. One is an “accomplished pilot, pianist, and painter” (p. 169), and another a “born adventurer” (p. 161). Montagu himself is the real deal, filled with “gusto for the game of the double-cross” and “imaginative flair,” and also “adept at fathoming his antagonist's mindset and manipulating it to his advantage” (p. 26). In fact, much of the text here is of the “Montagu did this and then Montagu did that” variety, detailing one bold act of genius after another.

That is perhaps unavoidable in a book of this nature, but the problems run deeper. There is no real thesis to the book, outside of “Mincemeat was terrific.” The author is prone to exaggerate its impact, referring to the “lives of the tens of thousands of Allied soldiers” depending on it, as well as “the fate of millions of people whom the invasion might help liberate from Nazi tyranny” (p. 46, repeated almost verbatim on p. 279). This is all highly debatable. Hitler had long been concerned about his Balkan flank. Indeed, he had fought a campaign there, prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union, in spring 1941. Victorious in Tunisia in May 1943, the Allies were clearly going to land somewhere in the Mediterranean, either on one of the islands or somewhere on the northern shore. The German deployment, therefore, was a prudent one under the circumstances, covering southern France, Sicily, and Greece. The exact same scenario would have played out with or without Mincemeat. Even the author has to recognize this, admitting at one point that Hitler's own inclination to defend the Balkans “makes it impossible to quantify the effect of Operation Mincemeat” (p. 275).

As to the campaign itself, Operation Husky cannot really be categorized as a kind of “near run thing” won by a clever intelligence stratagem. The Allies came ashore on Sicily against relatively light opposition, and after overcoming a skillfully led German rear guard, overran the island by August. It wasn't all that close. The Italians, who comprised the vast majority of Axis strength on the island and without whom the island would surely be lost in any event, did not fight at all, but Smyth does not discuss the impact of Mincemeat, if any, on them.

In the end, Deathly Deception calls to mind an unusual moment in time. A great war is raging, and some very smart people on the Allied side are sitting around a corpse, contemplating the possibilities.