Who is the real super spy 007?

James Bond has many real-life models, the number one of which is probably William Stephenson. Winston Churchill himself sent his super spy to New York in 1940 to force the United States into World War II at all costs.

William Stephenson

... was stunned. His telegraph team had just cracked a message from a secret Nazi radio station in New York. A British sailor had sold the Germans the routes of the Allied arms convoy from America to England. In the Atlantic, German submarines would have no difficulty destroying the convoy.

Stephenson thought for a moment and then left his office at the British Security Coordination (BSC) in Rockefeller Center, which was the covert address of the British Secret Intelligence Service in New York.

As night fell, Stephenson returned. An FBI agent, also assigned to the case, waited impatiently for him to discuss a plan of cooperation. “That son of a bitch deserves a hammer,” he said irritably. “It’s done,” Stephenson replied curtly. The American collaborator did not appreciate the British joke; that is, until the newspaper reported that a British sailor had been found dead in an abandoned basement.

In 1953 Ian Fleming published the first James Bond novel and used William Stephenson as one of his main models.

The above anecdote about an event that took place sometime between July 1940 and December 1941 was told by Ian Fleming, who at that time had not yet become the father of the legendary Der James Bond character, more familiar with the code number 007. Fleming had only heard the story from FBI Director Edgar Hoover. The future writer Fleming was impressed by Stephenson's talent, as he told the Sunday Times in 1962, adding that James Bond was a "romanticized version" of a spy, while Stephenson was "the real deal."

Fleming met his hero during World War II while serving as a liaison officer for British naval intelligence. Along with other role models such as the Englishman Edward Yeo-Thomas and the Yugoslav double agent Dusko Popov - who tried to warn the US before the attack on Pearl Harbor but was ignored - Stephenson was primarily the sharp, intelligent type for Fleming to create 007.

Stephenson's biography

... started out like the fictional and screen hero 007: he was born in Canada in 1896. During World War I he fought in the French ranks against the Germans, first as an infantryman, then as a fighter pilot. Due to a fatal mistake, he was shot down by his comrades and became a prisoner of war of the Germans. When he escaped from prison in October 1918, he stole a can opener, which he, of course, did not expect to patent after his discharge and become rich from.

In 1924, on his way to Berlin, Stephenson won the lottery again. In a shop, he came across an Enigma machine, a German-made encryption tool. He bought it and turned it in to British intelligence. The agency sensed Stephenson's sensitivity, took him in, and later gave him a unique mission during World War II.

On June 21, 1940, Stephenson, now codenamed Intrepid, arrived in New York. He was personally selected by the then British Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill, to be sent to America. Britain was the only country in Europe that was opposed to Hitler’s Germany. And Stephenson was ordered to convince America to enter the war as an ally of Britain at all costs. A task that was almost impossible, since 80% of Americans opposed America’s entry into the war.

William Stephenson was also the inventor of the electromagnetic wave camera.

On the BSC office door

... Stephenson's office had a sign that read "Passport Office." By the end of the war, Stephenson had a total of 3,000 employees. They were not only operating in the United States but were also deployed to Canada and the Caribbean. US President Franklin D. Roosevelt was not only informed about Stephenson's activities, but also ordered maximum support. Hoover, the FBI director, was ordered to secretly support British intelligence.

Stephenson did not spare any action that could harm the Germans. In 1941, BSC opened two counterfeiting factories in Canada, Camp X and Station M. From there, countless German uniforms, cards and passports were manufactured with great sophistication. At the end of 1941, Stephenson destroyed the Italian airline LATI, which connected Italy to Rio De Janeiro - Unterhielt. He forged a letter from LATI headquarters in Rome to Vicenzo Coppola, the director of the Rio branch. The letter insulted Brazilian President Getulio Vargas as “a pudgy man in the hands of the Americans.”

During that time, Italy supported a fascist party in Brazil that attempted a coup against Vargas. BSC agents managed to get the letter… on Vargas’ desk. As a result, not only was LATI shut down and Coppola imprisoned, but Brazil also officially declared war on Mussolini and Hitler in 1942. Britain also bought natural rubber from Brazil, which was essential for military supplies.

Stephenson's main duties

... but it did influence American public opinion. First, he planted a spy in the Gallup Polling Institute, and this person skewed all the results of Gallup's research. Stephenson also reached into the newspapers. Paul Patterson, publisher of the Baltimore Sun, was enchanted by Stephenson's spy Alice. J. Edgar Hoover also had his staff terrorize editors at several small newspapers over the phone, in order to get them to report in a favorable light.

BSC even set up its own radio station, World Radio University Listeners, to incite war. American listeners believed it was an American radio station. “Stubborn” politicians were smeared, such as Governor Gerald Nye. Thousands of leaflets and many newspaper articles called him a “Nazi sympathizer.” Republican Hamilton Fish, an opponent of the war, was photographed with his American fascist friends - of course, the photos were edited by BSC...

On December 7, 1941, William Stephenson finally achieved his goal with the help of Japan. The Japanese navy suddenly attacked Pearl Harbor, and four days later the United States declared war, becoming an ally alongside the British.

Stephenson remained in New York to help build the OSS, later the CIA, until retiring to Bermuda.

According to TTVH