The Deceivers

Oh dear. I have not abandoned a book in quite a while, but it had to happen sometime- and on one of my favorite subjects, no less. This book is LONG and BORING. Put off by the dizzying alphabet soup of military and spy acronyms, the gigantic cast of every characters (as in EVERY single person who ever concocted a military deception...) and the need to include ALL details, no matter how small or insignificant, I quit after more than 400 pages. (So I am patient with a subject I like.) It is just not worth it. The author clearly needed an editor and better sense of judgment- know when to quit or your reader will do it for you.

This is a very impressive work of archival research, to say the least. Holt has done yeoman's work combing through archives, obtaining declassification where possible, and in general compiling most of the research and historical writing done on the subject in the decades since World War II. However, where this tome falls short is in its lack of a narrative.

Holt is quick to praise general successes and point out failures, but there is a grand thesis missing from his book on strategic deception in war and lessons learned. Much of this is because of the fantastic quantity of detail he has amassed - all of which seems to have been shared here. From the overall success of the FORTITUDE SOUTH deception operation to the series of dalliances show more Dudley Clarke may or may not have had in Cairo, every last scrap of information and every memorandum, no matter how seemingly insignificant, seems to be reflected here. Mere notions of deception plans are studied in full despite never having been approved nor executed.

The reader is left rather overwhelmed and struggling to separate the wheat from the chaff. The important information - and there is much important about it - is here, and Holt deserves accolades for compiling and uncovering it. However, it is buried under a mound of extraneous detail, and much of the book becomes a mere chronological exercise ("X happened and then Y was rejected and then Bevan went back to London"), reminiscent of some of the history papers I wrote as an undergraduate.

Worth reading, but rather suffers under its own weight. show less

Okay, perhaps I was expecting more - a bit of action or more gritty details. The book goes into more personal than operation detail and as such, the title is accurate, but the subtitle is as deceiving as the deceivers themselves.

The Deceivers covers a fascinating topic, the amazing Allied deceptions in World War II. It's a good read; the early chapters in particular are quite instructive and give the reader a background in the history and development of deception as a formal practice, rather than the occasional inspiration of military leaders in the field.

The structure of the book is basically linear, starting with the early British efforts, directed from Egypt, in the Middle East. If the book has a serious flaw, it is that Holt spends perhaps too much time on bureaucratic wrangling and organizational history. I understand this is necessary for following the narrative (why is so-and-so not in charge anymore) but it makes the book longer than necessary, and show more diverts attention from a typical reader's main interest, the actual deception campaigns themselves. show less

Fascinating account of how the Allies deceived the Axis during the Second World War, including policies, inter-service and national rivalries. It was a little long winded in places.