by Lynne Olson
“our passionate love”: Weitz, Sisters in the Resistance, 93.
“In our war”: Jonathan H. King, “Emmanuel d’Astier and the Nature of the French Resistance,” Journal of Contemporary History, Oct. 1973.
“The proportion of Jews”: Ronald C. Rosbottom, When Paris Went Dark: The City of Light Under German Occupation, 1940–1944 (New York: Little, Brown, 2014), 311.
“the lifeblood of the Resistance”: Herman Bodson, Downed Allied Airmen and Evasion of Capture: The Role of Local Resistance Networks in World War II (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2005), 4.
“Women have such”: Ibid., 154–55.
“ninety-nine percent”: Anthony Cave Brown, “C”: The Secret Life of Sir Stewart Graham Menzies (New York: Macmillan, 1987), 500.
“We knew that men”: Douglas Porch, The French Secret Services: From the Dreyfus Affair to the Gulf War (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1995), 185.
“The general appeared”: M.R.D. Foot, SOE in France: An Account of the Work of the British Special Operations Executive in France, 1940–1944 (London: HMSO, 1966), 181.
“the sort of natural authority”: Jackson, France: The Dark Years, 409.
“the main organizations”: Foot, SOE in France, 180.
“There is a rising tide”: Michael Stenton, Radio London and Resistance in Occupied Europe: British Political Warfare, 1939–1943 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 176.
“For my part”: Lacouture, De Gaulle, 349.
“The British in 1940”: Eric Sevareid, Not So Wild a Dream (New York: Atheneum, 1976), 222.
“has produced violent reactions”: Kersaudy, Churchill and de Gaulle, 225.
“their uncontested leader”: Jackson, France: The Dark Years, 428.
“Between Giraud and de Gaulle”: Harold Nicolson, The War Years, Diaries & Letters, 1939–1945, ed. Nigel Nicolson (New York: Atheneum, 1967), 294.
“The people of France”: Lacouture, De Gaulle, 479.
CHAPTER 14: “THE UGLY REALITY”
“could afford to irritate”: Edward Raczyński, In Allied London (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1963), 155.
“little short of genocide”: George F. Kennan and John Lukacs, George F. Kennan and the Origins of Containment, 1944–1946: The Kennan-Lukacs Correspondence (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1997), 28.
“with the precision”: Sir Owen O’Malley, “Disappearance of Polish Officers in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,” FO 371/34577, National Archives, London.
“Whether you wish”: Allen Paul, Katyn: The Untold Story of Stalin’s Polish Massacre (New York: Scribner’s, 1991), 159.
“one of the greatest”: John Keegan, Six Armies in Normandy: From D-Day to the Liberation of Paris (New York: Viking, 1982), 262.
“neither sought nor cared”: Raczyński, In Allied London, 100.
“To survive is an obsession”: “Czechoslovakia: The Art of Survival,” Time, March 27, 1944.
“The Poles are not troublesome”: John Darnton, “The Polish Awakening,” New York Times, June 14, 1981.
“The Czechs seem”: A. J. Liebling, The Road Back to Paris (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1944), 149.
“lost all realistic perspective”: František Moravec, Master of Spies: The Memoirs of General František Moravec (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1975), 184.
“those who kept”: Madeleine Albright, Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937–1948 (New York: HarperCollins, 2012), 294.
“It was futile”: Moravec, Master of Spies, 196.
“our whole situation”: Vojtech Mastny, The Czechs Under Nazi Rule: The Failure of National Resistance, 1939–1942 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1971), 177.
“a blond god”: Callum MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, May 27, 1942 (London: Macmillan, 1989), 4.
“a predatory animal”: Walter Schellenberg, The Labyrinth: Memoirs of Walter Schellenberg (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1956), 13.
“This man is”: Laurent Binet, HHhH (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012), 39.
“had an ice-cold intellect”: Schellenberg, The Labyrinth, 13.
“orgy of massacre”: Martin Gilbert, The Second World War: A Complete History (New York: Henry Holt, 1987), 5.
“any infringement whatsoever”: H. J. Giskes, London Calling North Pole (London: William Kimber, 1953), 25.
“The epidemic of assassination”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 163.
“obviously large-scale resistance movement”: Mastny, The Czechs Under Nazi Rule, 186.
“the Czechs at the moment”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 162.
“our trained paratroop commandos”: Moravec, Master of Spies, 196.
“necessary for the good”: Ibid., 197.
“spectacular assassination”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 118.
“For everyone politically active”: Ibid., 140.
“had no intention”: Ibid., 141.
“This assassination”: Ibid., 156.
“Why should my Czechs”: Binet, HHhH, 216.
“[The Führer] foresees”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 176.
“It is our holy duty”: Ibid., 3.
“They’re completely mad”: Ibid., 177.
“seemed almost insane”: M.R.D. Foot and J. L. Langley, MI9: Escape and Evasion, 1939–1945 (London: Biteback Publishing, 2011), 166.
“If future generations”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 200.
“I was in the U.S.”: Ibid.
“In the delicate matter”: Ibid., 209.
“the Czechs and all”: Ibid., 200.
“In view of the trials”: Ibid.
“Somebody else”: Roderick Bailey, Forgotten Voices in the Secret War: An Inside History of Special Operations During the Second World War (London: Ebury Press, 2008), Kindle edition, loc. 1938.
“By his death”: Mastny, The Czechs Under Nazi Rule, 221.
“a complete fabrication”: MacDonald, The Killing of Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, 206.
CHAPTER 15: “THE ENGLAND GAME”
“In London”: Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 4: The Hinge of Fate (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1950), 780.
“No matter which”: Leo Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker’s War, 1941–45 (Stroud, UK: The History Press, 2013), 28.
“the most valuable link”: M.R.D. Foot, SOE in France: An Account of the Work of the British Special Operations Executive in France, 1940–1944 (London: HMSO, 1966), 102.
“so familiar”: “Leo Marks” (obituary), Guardian, Feb. 2, 2001.
“Every code”: “The Masterspy of Acton Town,” Evening Standard, Jan. 8, 1999.
“If some shit-scared”: Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide, 8.
“performing with the precision”: Ibid., 23.
“The whole thing”: Ibid., 16.
“no one will blame you”: “Rivalry in London Led to Deaths of Agents,” SOE and the Resistance: As Told in The Times Obituaries, ed. Michael Tillotson (London: Bloomsbury, 2011), Kindle edition, loc. 1583.
“I cursed my stupidity”: H. J. Giskes, London Calling North Pole (London: William Kimber, 1953), 178.
“extremely skilled and dangerous opponents”: M.R.D. Foot, Holland at War Against Hitler: Anglo-Dutch Relations, 1940–1945 (London: Frank Cass, 1990), 147.
“a deep love”: Giskes, London Calling North Pole, 176.
“no agent”: Foot, Holland at War, 133.
“this continuous negligence”: Giskes, London Calling North Pole, 200.
“famous for its long experience”: Ibid., 10.
“amateurs, despite their training”: Ibid., 92.
“conveyor-belt”: Ibid., 122.
“open attacks”: Ibid., 113.
“unknown criminal elements”: Ibid., 104.
“I was faced”
: Ibid., 107.
“fairy tales”: Ibid., 99.
“all was not well”: Nicholas Kelso, Errors of Judgement: SOE’s Disaster in the Netherlands, 1941–44 (London: Robert Hale, 1988), 196.
“too bloody perfect”: Roderick Bailey, Forgotten Voices in the Secret War: An Inside History of Speical Operations During the Second World War (London: Ebury Press, 2008), Kindle edition, loc. 3334.
“People seemed to get”: Ibid.
“They had a stock”: Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide, 101.
“Why were the Dutch”: Ibid., 113.
“to be in a prison cell”: Ibid., 132.
“God help these agents”: Ibid., 123.
“despite deaths by drowning”: Ibid., 124.
“certainly could not be ignored”: Ibid., 133.
“SOE will be ready”: Ibid., 148.
“I did my best”: Ibid.
“Only one, sir”: Ibid., 336.
“The attempt of”: Giskes, London Calling North Pole, 136.
“I’d worked too long”: Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide, 593.
“treachery on either”: House of Commons debate, March 2, 1953, Hansard, vol. 512.
“The truth is more mundane”: M.R.D. Foot, “SOE in the Low Countries,” in Mark Seaman, ed., Special Operations Executive: A New Instrument of War (London: Routledge, 2006), 83.
CHAPTER 16: “BE MORE CAREFUL NEXT TIME”
“Rather lacking in dash”: Ray Jenkins, A Pacifist at War (London: Arrow, 2010), 62.
“a plodder who”: Leo Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide: A Codemaker’s War, 1941–45 (Stroud, UK: The History Press, 2013), 199.
“wasn’t plodding at all”: Ibid., 200.
“tested the logic of it all”: Ibid.
“feeling very sorry”: Ibid., 201.
“I never believed”: Jenkins, A Pacifist at War, 52.
“I can tell you”: Marks, Between Silk and Cyanide, 387.
“during the year 1942”: M.R.D. Foot, SOE in France: An Account of the Work of the British Special Operations Executive in France, 1940–1944 (London: HMSO, 1966), 224.
“brought the optimism”: Jenkins, A Pacifist at War, 51.
“there was nobody else”: Sarah Helm, A Life in Secrets: Vera Atkins and the Missing Agents of WWII (New York: Anchor, 2007), 485.
“fears and excitements”: Philippe de Vomécourt, An Army of Amateurs (New York: Doubleday, 1961), 185.
“He was not firm”: Ibid.
“one of the most exceptional”: Ibid., 10.
“those whose French accents”: Ibid., 185.
“the all-important details”: Ibid., 175.
“If there had been”: Ibid., 126.
“almost to a man”: Ibid., 108.
“There appeared to be”: Jenkins, A Pacifist at War, 4.
“five or six young men”: Ibid., 57.
“That kind of stupidity”: Ibid., 74.
“From the moment”: Ibid., 75.
“Without any”: Ibid., 98.
“What has continuously”: Ibid., 124.
“The resistance in France”: Vomécourt, An Army of Amateurs, 18.
“The French people”: Ibid., 36.
“I was very much awake”: Roderick Bailey, Forgotten Voices in the Secret War: An Inside History of Special Operations During the Second World War (London: Ebury Press, 2008), Kindle edition, loc. 3069.
“You couldn’t go ten meters”: Douglas Porch, The French Secret Services: From the Dreyfus Affair to the Gulf War (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1995), 236.
“At the start”: de Vomécourt, An Army of Amateurs, 85.
“the Prosper folks”: Jenkins, A Pacifist at War, 218.
“The entire Prosper organization”: Helm, A Life in Secrets, 44.
“You have forgotten”: Ibid., 37.
“never wanted to believe”: Ibid., 38.
“Strategically France is”: Ibid., 50.
“No one has”: Ibid., 54.
“not overburdened with brains”: Ibid., 13–14.
“The Germans seem”: Robert Marshall, All the King’s Men: The Truth Behind SOE’s Greatest Wartime Disaster (London: Collins, 1988), 181.
“Déricourt’s operation”: Jenkins, A Pacifist at War, 102.
“Aren’t you the organizer”: Ibid., 221–22.
“You’re not supposed to be”: Bailey, Forgotten, Kindle edition, loc. 3221.
“since the armistice”: Marshall, All the King’s Men, 153.
“typical French backbiting”: Ibid., 154.
“[Déricourt’s] efficiency”: Ibid., 272.
“formed the impression”: Anthony Cave Brown, “C”: The Secret Life of Sir Stewart Graham Menzies (New York: Macmillan, 1987), 508–9.
“Make no mistake”: Marshall, All the King’s Men, 121.
“could be suppressed”: Brown, “C,” 508.
“A lot of nonsense”: W. Somerset Maugham, Ashenden: Or the British Agent (London: Heinemann, 1928), 52.
“With delight”: Brown, “C,” 512.
“resistance groups”: Ibid., 552.
“the blood of the martyrs”: Ibid., 553.
“the most ridiculous”: Marie-Madeleine Fourcade, Noah’s Ark: A Memoir of Struggle and Resistance (New York: Dutton, 1972), 70.
“operating admirably”: Ibid., 86.
“It’s incredible, incredible!”: Ibid., 121.
“one of Dansey’s”: Anthony Read and David Fisher, Colonel Z: The Secret Life of a Master of Spies (New York: Viking, 1985), 297.
“did not dim”: Fourcade, Noah’s Ark, 10.
“Since September 16”: Ibid., 272.
“while the Gestapo”: Ibid., 278.
“Everyone I speak to”: Jonathan H. King, “Emmanuel d’Astier and the Nature of the French Resistance,” Journal of Contemporary History, Oct. 1973.
“Never in my life”: Fourcade, Noah’s Ark, 278.
CHAPTER 17: “HEROISM BEYOND ANYTHING I CAN TELL YOU”
“a girl of radiant integrity”: M.R.D. Foot and J. L. Langley, MI9: Escape and Evasion, 1939–1945 (London: Biteback Publishing, 2011), 80.
“it takes less time”: Herman Bodson, Downed Allied Airmen and Evasion of Capture: The Role of Local Resistance Networks in World War II (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2005), 12.
“Nothing could have expressed”: Airey Neave, Saturday at M.I.9: The Classic Account of the WWII Escape Organisation (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1969), 25.
“admiration of the girls”: Paul Routledge, Public Servant, Secret Agent: The Elusive Life and Violent Death of Airey Neave (London: HarperCollins, 2002), Kindle edition, loc. 1749.
“I’d never seen”: “Airmen Remember Comet Line to Freedom,” BBC News, Oct. 24, 2000.
“the little cyclone”: Airey Neave, Little Cyclone: The Girl Who Started the Comet Line (London: Biteback Publishing, 2013), Kindle edition, loc. 45.
“a cross-section”: Foot and Langley, MI9, 155.
“The last decision”: J. M. Langley, Fight Another Day (Barnsley, UK: Pen & Sword, 2013), 168.
“always a very sore point”: Ibid., 16.
“parcels”: Bodson, Downed Allied Airmen, 52.
“It is not an easy”: Langley, Fight Another Day, 50.
“I loved them”: “Airmen Remember Comet Line to Freedom,” BBC News, Oct. 24, 2000.
“I fell in love”: The Bulletin: The Newsweekly of the Capital of Europe, Oct. 19, 2000.
“I have nothing”: Ibid.
“They were afraid”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 132.
“Belgian, Dutch, or French”: Langley, Fight Another Day, 251.
“kept to her own rules”: Ibid., 136.
“It seemed incredible”: Ibid., 187.
“one of the most colorful”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 183.
“Pour une femme”: Peter Morley, director, “Women of Courage,” television documentary, 1978, Imperial War Museum, London.
“looked much younger”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 188.
&nb
sp; “she was used to”: Ibid.
“fearlessness, independence”: Ibid., 189.
“My godfather died”: Peter Morley, director, “Women of Courage,” television documentary, 1978, Imperial War Museum, London.
“simply loved titled people”: Ibid.
“I found this completely ridiculous”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 190.
“endanger her own life”: Ibid., 192.
“to use a battle-axe”: Langley, Fight Another Day, 189.
“I’ve nothing to say”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 191.
“Spare no effort”: Langley, Fight Another Day, 189.
“I just wanted”: Neave, Saturday at M.I.9, 195.
“We’ve got only one”: Ibid., 201.
“die arrogante Engländerin”: Peter Morley, director, “Women of Courage,” television documentary, 1978, Imperial War Museum, London.
“In four minutes”: Foot and Langley, MI9, 230.
“The airmen who come”: “Airmen Remember Comet Line to Freedom,” BBC News, Oct. 24, 2000.
CHAPTER 18: A GIANT JIGSAW PUZZLE
“were quite unable”: H. J. Giskes, London Calling North Pole (London: William Kimber, 1953), 138.
“As fast as”: Tessa Stirling, Daria Nałęcz, and Tadeusz Dubicki, eds., Intelligence Cooperation Between Poland and Great Britain During World War II (London: Valentine Mitchell, 2005), 558.
“We had no illusions”: Giskes, London Calling North Pole, 139.
“practically all the Allied”: Noel F. Busch, “Ambassador Biddle,” Life, Oct. 4, 1943.
“We can state”: Stirling, Nałęcz, and Dubicki, eds., Intelligence Cooperation Between Poland and Great Britain, 489.
“do for Germany”: Ben Macintyre, Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies (New York: Crown, 2012), 98.
“his loyalty is entirely”: Ibid., 32.
“From their knowledge”: Ibid., 418.
“studied not only by”: Ibid., 620.
“the new weapons”: R. V. Jones, Most Secret War (Ware, UK: Wordsworth Editions, 1998), 352.
“no one could say”: Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6: Triumph and Tragedy (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1953), 43.
“a bit of a tall order”: Stirling, Nałęcz, and Dubicki, eds., Intelligence Cooperation between Poland and Great Britain, 475.
