BBC Documentary – The Spies Who Fooled Hitler (1999)
Original Air Date – 2 October 1999
Series – Timewatch
Duration – 45:52 minutes
Producer – Tilman Remme
BBC/History Channel Co-Production
Part 1 clip available here – 10 minutes
Part 2 clip available here – 10 minutes
Part 3 clip available here – 10 minutes
Part 4 clip available here – 10 minutes
Part 5 clip available here – 5:52 minutes
Entire video available here – 45:53 minutes
Review
I came across this show by accident on YouTube. Produced in 1999 by BBC and the History Channel, the show gives a fairly good summary of the Double-Cross system. While many of the classified MI5 documents were released after 2000, the show makes up for that by interviewing men and women who served with MI5 during World War 2. Such living testimony is quite rare today and more than makes up for the lack of archival documents. One of the women who was involved in the interrogation of Karel Richter (probably as a transcriptionist) noted that it was all rather like a game, until the morning of an execution day. Then it all became very real. While the show makes no mention of Josef Jakobs, the first two clips (above) provide some insight into the operations of MI5 and Camp 020 during the time when he was in their custody.
N.B. 2021 – I wrote a follow-up blog about the film and the people interviewed therein.
Review Score
4.5 out of 5 – the live interviews with former MI5 officers and staff are fascinating