Invasion, 1940

In compliance with the Fuhrer's directive on the imminent invasion of Britain in 1940, the Gestapo prepared a secret handbook for the occupation forces, comprised of a detailed analysis of how the Germans thought the country worked. This is a translation of the historic document.

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In compliance with the Fuhrer's directive on the imminent invasion of Britain in 1940, the Gestapo prepared a secret handbook for the occupation forces. The first part, edited by senior Nazi Walter Schellenberg who had been educated in England, is a detailed analysis of how the Germans thought the country worked. The second, equally intriguing section is a list of the men and women the Gestapo had earmarked for immediate arrest. Written in August 1940, the handbook sheds extraordinary light on the British political system, the establishment, the church, industry, the police, trade unions and even the Boy Scouts. The chapter on the British Secret Service was considered so embarrassingly accurate that the few copies captured at the end of the war were retained by the authorities, and it is only now, more than half a century later, that a translation has been made to reveal the full remarkable truth.