Quick Book Reviews Blog

The silver screen would have us believe that for the most part, being a spy involves car chases, shootouts, bomb defusals, and the occasional document theft. For entertainment purposes it certainly does the trick, but those who are even just a bit acquainted with the topic know things to be very different. Upon even a superficial review, the life of a real-world spy is rather different than what is presented in most works of literature, being centered mostly on acquiring information through any means necessary, with persuasion and manipulation being the favorite ones.

Intelligence is perhaps one of the most important aspects of warfare, whether today or in the past. Yes, having greater numbers, better equipment and superior training can certainly lead one to victory, but knowing what to expect, how to react to it, and how to confuse the enemy is just as important in my eyes. As a matter of fact, it can be argued that much of the Second World War was fought through spies and counter-intelligence officers, with information being one of the, if not the most coveted possession for military leaders.

Though we tend to frown upon crime in society, there is no doubt that we nevertheless glamorize many aspects of the criminal world, with some people even developing an ever-growing fascination with them. Just to support the point, in recent years we have seen countless books and movies where the protagonists are criminals in one capacity or another, from small-time crooks and thieves all the way to megalomaniacal assassins and cold-blooded avatars of destruction.

Virtually anyone who has studied the Second World War is familiar, at least in some capacity, with the events of June 6th, 1944, when the Allies took to the beaches of Normandy in an attempt to start pushing the Nazi war machine at the Western front. Though there were certainly many casualties, on the whole, many consider the operation to have been a resounding success, with the number of lives lost being far less than what was expected.

The Second World War has given rise to countless tales of heroism that will hopefully be carried on for centuries and centuries to come. As a matter of fact, there are so many of them that one would be hard-pressed to discover them all in one lifetime. At this point, those who studied the war know that a huge part of it was not fought with guns, but with information and espionage tactics.