Amy Elizabeth Thorpe–The Booty Spy Who Could

By Jay Holmes

In our last post, The Spy Who Loved–Booty Spy Amy Elizabeth Thorpe, we looked at the early espionage escapades of Booty Spy Amy Elizabeth Thorpe. Renowned for conquering hearts and libidos, she was just getting warmed up at a time in her career when other booty spies would be moving on to desk jobs.

After the Nazis completed their conquest of France in June of 1940, the US remained neutral. Along with a few other Americans, Amy Elizabeth Thorpe did not remain neutral.

Mrs. Amy Elizabeth Thorpe Pack Brousse
image from madamebrousse.com

The Nazi-controlled Vichy French government, led by Marshal Philippe Pétain, was strongly anti-British while trying to maintain commerce with the US and other neutral nations. Most of the French military and government officials who were serving in French colonial positions and French embassies around the world remained in their positions and formed the collaborationist Vichy government. However, Pétain’s new government could not effectively realign the personal allegiances of all of its civil servants and military personnel overseas.  While officially those individuals remained loyal to the French government, many of them felt that they could best remain loyal to France by overtly or covertly opposing the Vichy administration. This created a sudden windfall of opportunities for the UK intelligence services and their sympathizers in the US. Amy Elizabeth Thorpe-Pack had the perfect set of talents to identify anti-Vichy French patriots and exploit their predicaments.

Amy, or “Cynthia” as she was now known to MI-6, didn’t waste any opportunities. Agent Cynthia took on the cover of an American journalist and directly contacted the Vichy embassy in Washington, D.C.  In May of 1941, she met the French Press Attaché Charles Brousse and quickly guessed that he was not an enthusiastic servant of the Vichy government. The fact that the forty-nine year old Brousse was married to his third wife and that he was a sophisticated “Don Juan” type did nothing to dissuade Cynthia. Brousse had met his match.

How long it took Brousse to realize that he was the pigeon rather than the hawk in his latest conquest is anyone’s guess. It didn’t matter. He was in love with Amy and not in love with the collaborationists that ran what was left of France. Brousse quickly began cooperating directly with Amy in her intelligence work against the Vichy government.

While outmaneuvering the Vichy government when it was so riddled with anti-Vichy French patriots might have been easy, Amy faced a more serious foe in Washington, D.C.—the FBI. FBI Director J Edgar Hoover took his orders from President Roosevelt, but on matters of foreign policy, Roosevelt and his cabinet members never trusted Hoover. Hoover was a staunch isolationist. He was aware that the US was operating a privately-funded, fast-growing intelligence war against Nazi Germany that was, at the time, without congressional approval, and he didn’t like it one bit. In particular, he didn’t like it that he wasn’t running the operations. Hoover considered the “new breed” of intelligence operatives to be a threat to his power in Washington, and he used the FBI to try to foil them.

Amy was bold in action. She simply moved into the same hotel where Charles Brousse and his wife lived and used good ‘field craft” to overcome FBI wire taps and surveillance without running afoul of Brousse’s spouse. By July of 1941, Amy was confident enough in her relationship with Brousse to request his help in obtaining the French naval cipher system without alerting the Vichy government. Brousse explained to Amy that the code system was tightly guarded, and that only two people had access to it. He explained that he was not in the confidence of the cipher clerk or his assistant, and that they were staunch Vichy loyalists. When Amy suggested a nighttime burglary to access and copy the ciphers, Brousse explained that it would be impossible because they were locked in a heavy safe each night, and the area was patrolled by an armed guard accompanied by a guard dog.

At this point, it became evident that President Roosevelt was aware of MI-6’s scheme to get the French codes. Bill Donovan, Roosevelt’s head of the fledgling US Office of Strategic Services provided Amy with a skilled safe cracker. Brousse informed the security guard that he would be using his office at night to have an extra-marital affair, and he gave the guard a small bribe to keep quiet. Amy and Charles started using the embassy for regular love making, and the guard got comfortable with the arrangement.

One night, they gave the watchman some spiked champagne, and the safe cracker went to work. After much effort, the OSS safe cracker eventually opened the safe, but there was not enough time to safely remove, copy, and replace the books. They had to suspend their attempt.

A second attempt with new safe information (and without the safe cracker) failed when Cynthia could not open the safe, even with the supposed combination.

On a subsequent night with the safe cracker in tow, they tried a third time. When Amy sensed that the guard had grown suspicious, and that he was approaching the office where they were supposedly in an act of love rather than an act of burglary, she quickly undressed and told Brousse to play along. Sure enough, the guard entered the office. Fortunately, they appeared to be doing something more natural and common than espionage, so the guard apologized and left. Amy, Brousse and the OSS safe cracker were then able to get the codes copied and properly placed back into the safe. We now know that the US and the UK were simultaneously running other operations to obtain the French naval and diplomatic codes. However, Amy at the very least verified the accuracy of the information.

Fortunately, the same code system was still in use during the US led invasion of Northwest Africa in November of 1942. The US and the UK were thus able to conduct their operations safe in the knowledge that the French Navy in Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria would offer less than full resistance to the invasion. Most of the French in North Africa simply wanted to make enough noise to avoid further Nazi action against the French homeland.

After the US was attacked by Japan in December of 1941, the US declared war against Japan. In turn, Nazi Germany and Mussolini’s Italy declared war on the US. Amy continued to work for both British MI-6 and the US OSS.

During an interview after the war, she was asked if, as a woman from such a respectable background, was she not ashamed of her “libertine” activities in her espionage efforts. Amy laughed and pointed out that both the US OSS and British MI-6 assured her that her efforts had saved the lives of thousands of allied soldiers and sailors and that, “Wars are not won by respectable methods.”

After the war, Amy’s nominal husband, Arthur Pack, committed suicide. Charles Brousse and his wife divorced, and Amy Thorpe married her one time “pigeon.” They lived in a castle in France, and by all accounts, the old spooks were genuinely in love and happily faithful to each other. In 1963, Amy Thorpe Brousse died of cancer. Charles Brousse died ten years later when his electric blanket short circuited and set the castle on fire.

It is rare for an agent employing “honey pot” methodology to last so long in the field after targeting even one high profile pigeon. Amy was not only successful with multiple high profile targets while working in dangerous areas like Poland and Czechoslovakia, she also eluded the FBI while conducting a major operation in Washington, D.C.—at the same time as being emotionally involved with the operation’s target. She was, in short, miraculous.

Much of Amy’s early work with MI-6 still remains hidden in the past. But from what we do know, she was, without doubt, one of the bravest and most productive allied agents of the World War Two era.

The Romance Doctors–Poolside Hussy Defense

By Piper Bayard and Jay Holmes

As a Belly Dancer and a Spook, we represent classic romantic archetypes. Therefore, we are qualified to assist with all of your romance needs.

With the month of romance upon us, Valentine’s Day is looming closer, along with all of its romantic pressures. We here at Bayard & Holmes have set aside a negligible portion of our biting sarcasm to devote ourselves to solving your romantic issues.

What to get for the lady or man for Valentine’s Day? How to pop the big question? How to get your mother off your back about how she didn’t walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death to give birth to you to not see you married? No worries, dear readers, we have answers for each of your questions and dilemmas. Let’s see what’s on your minds this week.

Ellie Ann wants to know what to do about a poolside hussy.

Bennett Sisters, image from Library of Congress

Say I’m at the pool with my hot husband, and a bikini-clad hussy starts staring at him (sure, whatever) but then bends down right in front of him several times (NOT okay). How can I tell her he’s off limits short of a she-bear clawing fight?

Bayard:

Really, Ellie, there’s no need for overt violence, and I’m a bit shocked that you would suggest such a thing. That is illegal, after all. An accidental assault is far more appropriate. While she’s bent over, stand up with your large pool bag and “accidentally” boot her hussy butt into the pool. Remember, plausible deniability is paramount in these situations.

Holmes:

Ellie, assuming he woke up with you this morning, he already answered her. He rejected her in favor of you. Smart man.

But, dear friend, I can’t help myself. Embrace your inner weasel. “Ass Clown” has placed herself in an interesting ethical position. Short of assault, she deserves whatever she gets. Opportunities for fun should not always be ignored.

There are thousands of ways to deal with her without going to jail or answering any civil suits. If your husband agrees, you could simply speak about her derisively as if she wasn’t there. The conversation could include words like “lonely slut” or “desperate whore” or “I wonder how many diseases she has.” If you wanted to be a tad more subtle, he could say, “Wow, if her butt was any bigger she would block out the sun.” Or, depending on the size of her butt, “That’s the ugliest boney butt I’ve ever seen on a human.”

Then you could admonish him with something like, “Sweetie, don’t pick on her. It’s not her fault that she was born like that.”

A water pistol with some nice dye in it might be fun, too. If she’s wearing a dark bikini some white dye would create a charming effect.

We should do no harm to innocents. She’s not innocent so have at it.

We don’t just help happy couples find each other and stay happy, we advise authors about the romances in their books. Texanne is wondering how patient her character should be.

How long does the secondary heroine have to wait after the rotten wife of the tertiary hero leaves him before she makes her move, and what kind of move would be communicative yet leave some room for saving face if it doesn’t work out?

Bayard:

If she’s anything like a college “friend” of mine, approximately 18 minutes, which is how long it took her to drive across town to my newly-ex-boyfriend’s place when I told her I’d split with him.

As for a move? Asking a man about his interests and hobbies, such as his passion for the Civil War, and feigning interest while flaunting a perky, aerobicized butt is a tried and true method. The worst that happens is that he continues to have more interest in General Grant than in her charms.

Holmes:

Her timing needs to be consistent with her character and fit the plot. If not, then you need to explain a new facet of her character and bend your plot.

As far as “how” she gets his attention, I recommend that she put on a skimpy bikini and bend over in front of him three times at the local pool. Just have her watch out for women with water pistols. If you want something more subtle, she could invite him over for lunch, and, depending on how lunch goes, she could progress from there.

image by Sergio Savaman Savarese, wikimedia commons

Good luck, everyone, and keep your water pistols handy!

What are your questions for The Romance Doctors? We are here to serve you. And remember, no question is out of bounds, but our answers might be.

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Piper Bayard is a belly dancer from way back and a recovering attorney with a university degree or two. She currently pens post-apocalyptic sci-fi and spy novels with Holmes when she isn’t shooting, SCUBA diving, or chauffeuring her children. Her debut sci-fi thriller, ARCHER’S RECKONING, will be available this spring from Stonehouse Ink.

 ‘Jay Holmes’, is an intelligence veteran of the Cold War and remains an anonymous member of the intelligence community. Piper is the public face of their partnership.

You may contact them in blog comments, on Twitter at @piperbayard, on Facebook at Piper Bayard, or by email at bayardandholmes@bayardandholmes.com.

©2013 Piper Bayard. All content on this page is protected by copyright. If you would like to use any part of this, please contact us at the above links to request permission.

The Fox Behind the Desert Fox: Hekmet Fahmy

By Jay Holmes*

On June 10, 1940, Italy declared war on Great Britain. At the time, Great Britain lacked the resources to invade Italy, and Italy had no intention of invading Great Britain. However, the two enemies, along with France, had large colonial holdings in North Africa. At the time, the Suez Canal in Egypt was critical for Great Britain to connect the British Isles, Gibraltar, and Egypt to its colonial holdings in India, Ceylon, and Burma. Italian Dictator Benito Mussolini was confident that his forces, along with his German allies, could deal a major blow against the British from their bases in Libya, and perhaps threaten the British Suez Canal.

Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, image from the German Federal Archives

In general, the North African campaign of WWII is remembered as a series of battles. Great Britain dealt a decisive blow against the Italians in Libya. Germany sent reinforcements led by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, aka the Desert Fox, who pushed the British back to the Egyptian border. Newly appointed British commander Field Marshall Montgomery led UK forces in a series of counterattacks. Those attacks were marginally assisted in the final phases by American landings in Morocco and Tunisia.

Conventional analysis of these battles emphasizes the skills of the opposing leaders. More in-depth descriptions also consider the logistical nightmares that both sides faced during the campaign. However, these assessments are based on well-researched analysis that was conducted without the benefit of certain classified information that was not released before 1970. When we consider the newer information, we learn that Erwin Rommel’s tactical genius and Bernard Montgomery’s inspiring leadership were heavily impacted by a variety of intelligence operations conducted by both sides.

Until July of 1942, Rommel, the Desert Fox, enjoyed a tremendous advantage over the British in the form of timely, detailed, and accurate intelligence about British dispositions, supplies, and intentions. This information came inadvertently from US General Bonner Fellers.

General Fellers was the US liaison with the British in North Africa. Over his objections, he was instructed to use the US diplomatic Black code to transmit messages to the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. Unfortunately, that code was stolen and copied by the Italians from the US Embassy in Italy in September of 1941, prior to the US entry into the war. As a result, Rommel’s staff read every word Fellers sent back to Washington before Washington read it. When Fellers was replaced in July of 1942, his replacement was permitted to switch his communications to US military cyphers. The Germans could no longer decipher the intercepted transmissions.

They turned to an Egyptian belly dancer for help. In the spring of 1942, a team of elite German commandos set out from Libya in US military vehicles captured from the British. Their goal was to infiltrate two Abwher agents, Johannes Eppler and his radio operator Hans Sandstede, into Egypt.

Eppler had a German mother and an Egyptian father and had spent most of his childhood in Alexandria and Cairo. He was well-trained and well-prepared for an operation in Egypt. After a grueling fifteen day trip through the desert, Eppler and Sandstede were dropped near the British Egyptian rail station at Asyut, Egypt.

The German spies made their way to Cairo where they used well forged documents and high quality counterfeit British cash to rent a house boat and set up operations. The crux of Eppler’s plans came down to one roll of the dice. He contacted an ex-girlfriend by the name of Hekmet Fahmy.

Hekmet Fahmy, image from bellydancemuseum.com

In 1942, Fahmy was the most popular belly dancer in Egypt. She had access to the best night clubs and parties attended by the elite of local British and Egyptian society. She was the most alluring female celebrity in that country and enjoyed popularity with dance fans across Europe. She was also trusted in the highest military and social circles. Fahmy recruited other popular belly dancers to assist Eppler, allowing him to operate one of the most successful honey traps of all time.

British officers and government officials mistakenly trusted Fahmy and foolishly revealed critical information. As Fahmy’s guests slept in her arms, Eppler searched their personal effects. By keeping track of which British officers from which regiments frequented the clubs, the Germans determined when particular units were being dispatched to the front.

In some cases, British officers and civilians revealed more detailed classified information that was then transmitted to Rommel’s headquarters. In effect, the Germans replaced an American general with an Egyptian belly dancer.

Thanks to the continued flow of high grade intelligence, the Desert Fox confounded British attacks with timely delaying actions and skillful withdrawals. Rommel’s tanks were outnumbered by now, but he could continually place them and their accompanying 77 millimeter anti-tank guns in ideal locations to deal with British movements.

After a few months of operations in Cairo, the British pushed back the Afrika Korps from El Alamein. Communications with Rommel’s headquarters became difficult. Eppler sought out the Egyptian Free Officer Corps, who were anti-British, to request assistance with passing information to Rommel. The young Egyptian officer who agreed to help was the future president of Egypt, Anwar Sadat.

In his 1957 book Revolt on the Nile, Sadat depicts Eppler and Sandstede as being too lazy and too concerned with their own pursuits of flesh. The depiction may have been unfair, as Eppler needed to appear to be a Scandinavian-American playboy in order to conduct his operations most effectively. If Eppler was in fact lazy, then we have to say that he was also fantastically lucky in his recruitment of Fahmy and his skillful use of her connections in gathering vital intelligence for the Desert Fox.

While Fahmy seduced British officers and Eppler fed their information to the Germans, the British simultaneously read and partially decrypted German military communications. They quickly became suspicious that German spies were succeeding in operations against them in Cairo. Either by managing too many local agents without insulation from themselves, or possibly because an Egyptian messenger was compromised, the British captured Eppler, Sandstede, and Fahmy.

With the defeat of the German intelligence operations in Cairo, combined with an increasing flow of Allied supplies and continued decryption of German military communications, the British were able to roll back Rommel across Africa. When the British captured 130,000 Germans in Tunisia in May of 1943, Rommel was on medical leave in Germany.

Rommel was tasked with organizing the German defenses on the French Atlantic Coast. However, he was implicated in a plot to kill Hitler. He committed suicide in exchange for his family being spared from persecution. The Nazis kept his betrayal of Hitler secret, announcing the Desert Fox had died of a heart attack. They gave Rommel a hero’s funeral.

Eppler and Sandstede were sentenced to death as spies, but Egyptian King Farouk intervened, and their sentences were commuted. They were released from prison after the war and Eppler became a successful construction engineer.

Fahmy was assumed to be an unwitting accomplice. She was sentenced to two and a half years in jail. She was unable to revive her career after her release, though she managed a few minor movie roles and invested her own money in a failed movie. The Egyptian Fox who did so much to aid the success of Desert Fox Field Marshal Erwin Rommel turned to Christianity for solace and spent long hours praying in church.

The North Africa campaign of WWII will always be remembered as a battle of supplies and opposing wits, and it was. But it was also a campaign greatly affected by the intelligence operations of both opponents, and for a while, the balance of it all was tipped by the weight of a single belly dancer.

Hekmet Fahmy in Rabab

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*‘Jay Holmes’, is an intelligence veteran of the Cold War and remains an anonymous member of the intelligence community. His writing partner, Piper Bayard, is the public face of their partnership.

You may contact them in blog comments, on Twitter at@piperbayard, on Facebook at Piper Bayard, or by email at piperbayard@yahoo.com. 

© 2013 Jay Holmes. All content on this page is protected by copyright. If you would like to use any part of this, please contact us at the above links to request permission.

Gabby’s Hair? What About Those Banana Shoes?

Gabby Douglas, first African-American winner of the Women’s Gymnastics All Around Gold, is confused. Frankly, I’m confused as well.

Gabby Douglas, image from wikimedia by Xxjenesaispasxx

When 16-yr-old Gabby googled herself a few hours after achieving the highest accomplishment in Olympic women’s gymnastics, she found that people weren’t only tweeting about her success, they were tweeting criticisms about her hair!

“Gabby Douglas, you made history w/your impeccable talent and hideous hair.” @BReeMonroe

“We, as a black community, gotta fix Gabby Douglas’s hair.” @Sarocious

“Congrats to Gabby Douglas on her gold metal! Wish I could say the same about that hair! OMG horrible!” @shestaken

Seriously! I never cease to be amazed at people and their priorities.

How can they possibly be criticizing little Gabby Douglas for her hair when there have been far more egregious fashion faux pas from every corner of the Olympic compound?

Take Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce. Who cares that she won a repeat gold in the women’s 100 meter dash when it’s overshadowed by the fact that her tag was sticking up out of her running shorts when she crossed the finish line?

Then there are the Women’s Beach Volleyball bikini bottoms. What difference does all that hustle and jump make when those ladies have more crack than the entire city of Detroit?

Hello? Men’s track stars? You’re really wearing those banana shoes?

And don’t even get me started on those horses in the equestrian events. Some of them made no effort to restrain their free-flowing tails, showing no respect for the fact that they were jumping more obstacles than average Americans do when collecting their own money from their medical flexible spending accounts.

Don’t these athletes realize that no matter what they do, the most important thing when they are on TV is their hair? Where is the Olympic Committee in all of these uniform travesties? Why aren’t they stopping these fashion fails?

Bottom line? This young lady traveled 20 hours from home to live with strangers so that she could train with a great coach. She left her family and friends to follow a dream at only fourteen. She not only went to school but worked what amounted to a full time job in preparing for this event. She could dye her hair purple, wear it in dreadlocks, or even shave her head and it wouldn’t detract one bit from how lovely she is.

I appreciated the sentiment of this “Pulp Fiction” spoof.

WARNING: EXCESSIVE, EXTREMELY OFFENSIVE LANGUAGE, JUST LIKE THE ORIGINAL “PULP FICTION.”

What athletes are impressing you during this Olympic Games?

All the best to all of you for a week of knowing what’s important.

Piper Bayard—The Pale Writer of the Apocalypse