William B. Breuer (1922–2010)

The most destructive war in history and like all wars there were deceptions used by both sides to gain an advantage on the battlefield. Deceptions of World War II by William B. Breuer goes over various incidents of espionage and military trickery before and during the global conflict.

Over the course of roughly 240 pages, Breuer relates stories and anecdotes of incidents of underhand dealings, spying, and military intrigue surrounding World War II from both sides of the conflict. While some of them were interesting and worth reading about, many couldn’t be classified the same. Obviously what one person thinks is a deception could be different from someone else’s but to me when I think of deceptions in the context of a military conflict dropping spies behind enemy lines—while important to a military’s overall strategy—isn’t on the same level as the operations to create a phantom army to mask Operation Overlord or Operation Mincemeat neither of which were even mentioned in this book. And either Breur or his editors left in tiny mistakes that were factually incorrect with one of the most egregious being a line that said the Chief of German military intelligence was working for the British. So, while a nice book to pass the time overall I wasn’t impressed.

Deceptions of World War II is a slender volume of stories and anecdotes about the cloak-and-dagger events of the global conflict, but to me a lot didn’t feel like “deceptions”.… (más)

Nice, readable book about deception in World War II. Mostly about the development and use of camouflage in Europe and North Africa, and the development of radar and radio direction equipment in Europe. Most of the resources describe Allied works, and most of the sources used are in English. The decryption of the Enigma and Ultra systems are given prominence, and how difficult some decisions were to accept loses in order to protect the secret of the decoding successes. Made up of anecdotal stories of different events, it describes clearly the problems encountered and how they were resolved by the use of deception.… (más)

Captivating, fast-paced, diverse and interesting, it is a good entry-level attraction to ww2 for the young/less read public.
For the ww2 maniacs (like myself), it can be often annoying by some basic mistakes (like Wehrmacht paratroopers... really?! they were Luftwaffe personnel, a totally different arm; or ”Zeke, as the kamikaze were known” - no, Zeke was the plane type; or Bulgaria declaring war on Germany in... 1943, and so on) and general half-documentation, most likely willingly done so by the author to make some quite ordinary coincidences into ”wow! mysteries”.
Still a fun read.… (más)

Chapter on Hollandia, West New Guinea, now part of Indonesia and called West Papuia.
Review: Guadalcanal . . . Midway . . . the battle for the Philippines. In each of these critical conflicts, intelligence played a crucial role in bringing about an Allied victory. General MacArthur's brilliant Pacific campaign was designed around espionage and guerrilla warfare. This is the story of his undercover war. Praise for William B. Breuer's Previous Works...

"An exciting narrative presented by a first-rate story teller." --Publishers Weekly on The Great Raid on Cabanatuan

"A first-class historian." --The Wall Street Journal

"Another smasher by Breuer, who specializes in thrilling reports of WWII spycraft and warfare." --Kirkus Reviews on Race to the Moon

"Fast-paced, detailed, and satisfyingly dramatic." --World War II magazine on Devil Boats

"Vivid . . . skillfully written." --Los Angeles Times on Retaking the Philippines

"Brings to life how airborne soldiers survived, how the human will prevails . . . against overwhelming enemies, tactical failures, and even death." --The New York Times on Geronimo: American Paratroopers in World War II

MACARTHUR'S UNDERCOVER WAR

The covert war General Douglas MacArthur waged against Japanese forces in the Pacific arena was the largest undercover operation ever undertaken. Here, for the first time, is the complete story of the legendary exploits and heroism of the thousands of courageous individuals who fought as spies, guerrillas, propagandists, and saboteurs behind enemy lines.

When the Japanese war juggernaut overran the Philippines, it took a near miraculous PT-boat escape for MacArthur to make his way to safety in Australia. He left behind a force of seventy thousand American and Philippine troops marooned on the Bataan Peninsula. To these brave men the general vowed, "I shall return."

Against overwhelming odds, MacArthur succeeded. Crucial to his success was his massive covert war effort. MacArthur created his own undercover warfare agency, the super-secret Allied Intelligence Bureau (AIB), to organize the many far-flung resistance groups. They were the coast watchers--jungle-wise miners, traders and planters, missionaries, and telegraph operators who occupied remote Pacific islands, living in the most primitive conditions while keeping a constant vigil for Japanese movement. They were American soldiers who escaped the Bataan Peninsula and were commanding guerrilla armies in the interior mountain and jungle locations of the Philippines. And they were double agents operating right under the noses of the Japanese in Manila, occupying positions close to the Imperial Army and in the collaborationist Philippine government.

The phenomenal success of MacArthur's island-hopping "hit-'em-where-they-ain't" campaign was built on the accuracy of the intelligence gathered by the AIB. Early in the conflict, the Americans cracked the secret Japanese naval code and established a chain of intelligence radio-monitoring posts circling the Japanese empire from Alaska to Australia. The information garnered from their interceptions of Japanese transmissions and from operatives on the ground allowed MacArthur to pick soft targets--islands the Japanese had left relatively unguarded--for invasion. It was the steel nerves and unbounded resourcefulness of those who fought the secret war that paved the way for MacArthur's "Great Return" to the Philippines and saved the lives of countless American soldiers.

In an action-packed narrative, MacArthur's Undercover War tells of thrilling feats of valor and derring-do--impossible missions to blow up harbors, kidnap heads of state, undermine currency, and arrange prison escapes, all deep within enemy territory. Firsthand interviews with veterans and information from previously unpublished documents reveal a riveting tale of World War II that has never been fully told.… (más)