Vanguard: The True Stories of the Reconnaissance and Intelligence Missions behind D-Day

by David Abrutat

Operation OVERLORD the opening up of an Allied second front by the invasion of the Normandy beaches on 6 June 1944 was the largest military invasion of all time but it was preceded by years of industrial-scale intelligence collection and dangerous clandestine reconnaissance missions off the French coast. Vanguard is the untold story of this work the intelligence machine and covert reconnaissance missions that went into the D-Day planning such as the signals intelligence intercepts the agent running operations orchestrated by the 15th Flotilla to the secret work of the X-Craft and COPP (Combined Operations Pilotage Parties) diver teams that scoured the Normandy coast months before the June 1944 deadline.

400 pages, Hardcover

Published May 1, 2019