It is common to hear references to the "power behind the throne." Of course, the wife, husband, father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, aunt, uncle, mentor had a lot to do with so-and-so's success. But they never get the credit they should!
And sometimes, those people get a biography, but quite often, they get a biography because they accomplished something in their own right. I feel like I'm channeling Tim Allen as Mike Baxter when I point out that there aren't many biographies that read, "And then her parents drove her to school and to work. At night, they helped her with her homework and made meals...and then they did the whole thing again the next day."
Biography: Day, Peter. The Bedbug: Klop Ustinov's: Britain's Most Ingenious Spy. Biteback, 2014, 2015.
In the world of meta writing, The Bedbug is fascinating in part because it is a study of the type of networking referenced above--networking that goes on behind the scenes or "throne." That is, the book is a study of connections rather than notable feats. It mentions Peter Ustinov or the better-known Ustinov, but almost entirely in terms of his view of his father, not in terms of his father's impact on him.
And the book isn't about actors anyway. It is about spying, and I'm not entirely sure it is a biography (which raises the question, What is a biography?). Klop remains the main focus but only in terms of the main issue: his role as a spy. In order to make the impact of his role clear, the book details his connections to other spies and couriers, to MI5/MI6 heads, to certain populations within London, to political heads of state. Many times, the author has to infer Klop's influence since documents of the time, even the ones now available, are deliberately euphemistic.
A few things became clear to me about spying and WWII:
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| Best: Venlo Incident |
If you want cool skills, get a SEAL team.
2. People talk a lot. I don't want to belittle the danger--a number of agents working for Hitler while feeding information to the Brits had to get out quickly when their covers were blown. Some of them ended up dead. And some endured calculated captures and imprisonment operations like at Venlo.
But for many spies, the operations didn't depend all that much on wiggling information out of people. People told them things. People left documents on desks. The difficult part of spying was getting the information out as well as knowing whom to trust.
Nowadays, everyone would just check Twitter.
3. Since all these spies were trying to get information from each other by any means possible, knowing whom to trust, how much, and when was a headache to end all headaches. (And since many of them come across as vaguely sociopathic, even the "good" ones probably couldn't be trusted.)
Klop Ustinov was fairly adept at assessing German agents who supposedly wanted to help Britain. He became a kind of clearing house--agents were often shipped off to spend a weekend with him and his wife. (He was also used to assure said agents of Britain's good intentions.) In one case, he reported:
I firmly believe that having taken the plunge and having soothed his conscience with patriotic and humane formulae, [Wurmann] is playing fair with us and will continue to [play fair], not because fair play is part and parcel of his moral make-up, but because he is much too intelligent and much too disinclined to face discomfort [of] any description. (153)
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| Information was further complicated |
| by someone like Philby selectively |
| downplaying anything harmful to Stalin. |
Someone like Klop was additionally useful since a lot of information and disinformation was coming in from a lot of different sources. One thing that mystery/suspense shows often miss (except Elementary) is the sheer amount of time it takes to sift through documents and texts and reported conversations, digital or not. Klop was good at winnowing out the chaff to focus on salient details.
4. Lots of people warned the Brits about Hitler. Lots and lots and lots of people. German army commanders. German politicians. British military leaders. People like Klop. Churchill. And the warnings weren't coming from a single side or "bench." They were coming from people who philosophically had little in common yet agreed on a single assessment: Hitler was using British political goodwill to further his own ends.
Chamberlain's refusal to act on the obvious was not for lack of good intelligence. It was a psychological mindset. He was actually worse than the way he is portrayed in Darkest Hour.
5. Klop was an interesting guy, a good information gatherer and go-between. By all accounts, he was an excellent conversationalist. It can be inferred that he helped the World War II war effort in Britain.
He was also a not-so-good husband and father.
He would likely not merit a book if he had been a good one.
It is not entirely clear that the book he did get is even about him.
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