Edward Abel Smith, the author of Ian Fleming’s Inspiration: The Truth Behind the Books, tells the British newspaper the Express about Commander Ian Fleming WWII Gibraltar plan.
Mr Fleming’s ‘From A View to a Kill’, James Bond is sent to investigate the mysterious disappearance of a dispatch rider carrying top-secret documents through Versailles, but soon discovers there is a hostile enemy base hidden in the rocks along the road. But, Edward Abel Smith, the author behind 'Ian Fleming's Inspiration,' has revealed this fantastical story was in fact born out of an idea Mr Fleming came up with during the war, when he was a naval intelligence officer.
In his book, set to be released on May 30, Mr Smith casts light on the precarious situation the UK still found itself in, even after the Battle of Britain at the end of 1940.
Nazi Germany’s plan for an invasion of the south coast had been thwarted with the defeat of Hermann Goering’s Luftwaffe at the hands of the RAF – but Britain was very much alone as European states fell like dominoes to the advancing Wehrmacht, the US remained neutral and the Soviet Union sat back watching.
With Operation Sea Lion – Hitler’s codename for Nazi Germany’s planned invasion of Britain – all but abandoned, Berlin investigated alternative ways of waging war against the British, most notably with the Blitz, but also with campaigns in North Africa and the Mediterranean.
The latter is where Mr Fleming came in, as Gibraltar was a hugely significant strategic outpost for the Royal Navy and extremely vulnerable given its close proximity to fascist Spain – a state which, under General Francisco Franco’s rule, was officially neutral but certainly sympathetic to the Axis Powers.
Amid fears that Franco’s sympathies to Hitler and Italy’s Benito Mussolini could be solidified in a formal alliance, the British came up with Operation Tracer – a covert mission created by Mr Fleming to send six Britons to hide in the Rock of Gibraltar for a year.
Mr Smith told Express.co.uk: “Fleming came up with these concepts, one of which was Operation Tracer, and it brings out quite a dark side in him.
“He’s very ruthless because he effectively knows if he puts these six men into the Rock of Gibraltar and cements them in and the Nazis were to invade or Spain were to join the Axis, immediately they would get left there and forgotten about.
“He knew very well that they had 12 months’ supply and the likelihood of being able to take Gibraltar back within 12 months was impossible.
“He was willing to train these men up and they would go in there and perish, but it’s fascinating the detail he went into, the books they should read, the exercises to do each day to survive, which was unheard of at the time.”
In an extract of the book seen by Express.co.uk, Mr Smith reveals how Mr Fleming earmarked the Gibraltar Straight as a key asset to the Allies for resupplying ships in Europe.
You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1287740/world-war-2-james-bond-ian-fleming-rock-gibraltar-adolf-hitler-nazi-germany-spain-spt
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