From today's featured article
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Operation Hardboiled was a Second World War military deception. Undertaken by the Allies in 1942, it was the first attempt at deception by the London Controlling Section (LCS) and was designed to convince the Axis powers that the Allies would soon invade German-occupied Norway. The LCS had recently been established to plan deception across all theatres, but had struggled for support from the unenthusiastic military establishment. The LCS had little guidance in strategic deception, an activity pioneered by Dudley Clarke the previous year, and was unaware of the extensive double agent system controlled by MI5. Although Clarke preferred the fast and inexpensive approach of spreading false rumours through agents and wireless traffic,
Hardboiled was conducted as a diversionary operation (training pictured). Resistance to the operation by the chosen units interfered with preparations. Hitler ordered the reinforcement of Scandinavia in March and April 1942, before Hardboiled was shelved in May; it is unclear to what extent the operation contributed to his decision. (Full article...)
Recently featured: "The Unnatural" (The X-Files) – Oryzomys – Afonso, Prince Imperial of Brazil
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On this day...
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February 26: Ayyám-i-Há begins (Bahá'í calendar); Liberation Day in Kuwait (1991); Saviours' Day (Nation of Islam)
- 1233 – Mongol–Jin War: The Mongols captured Kaifeng, the capital of the Jin dynasty, after besieging it for months.
- 1815 – Napoleon Bonaparte (pictured) escaped from Elba, an island off the coast of Italy where he had been exiled after the signing of the Treaty of Fontainebleau one year earlier.
- 1935 – With the aid of a radio station in Daventry, England, and two receiving antennas, Scottish engineer and inventor Robert Watson-Watt first demonstrated the use of radar.
- 1952 – Vincent Massey was sworn in as the first Canadian-born Governor General of Canada.
- 1995 – Barings Bank, the oldest merchant bank in London, collapsed after its head derivatives trader in Singapore, Nick Leeson, lost £827 million while making unauthorized speculative trades on futures contracts.
More anniversaries: February 25 – February 26 – February 27
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