My Name Is Bond. No, Sorry! My Name Is Popov, Dusko Popov
The spy who loved Dubrovnik and who inspired Ian Fleming
Do you remember the scene from the Casino Royale, the first of Bond movies, when James Bond bluffing during the baccarat game, slammed a bag full of money on the table? That particular scene really happened during World War II, in a casino in Lisbon. Mr. Dusan Popov, surrounded by women in shiny dresses, drinking smuggled spirits, winning constantly and easily, bluffed the Lithuanian bragger.
Ian Fleming, the author of novels about James Bond, was there as an escort appointed by MI6 to Dusan “Dusko” Popov, the Serbian triple agent of Yugoslavian VOA, English MI6 and the German Abwehr.
Popov was born in 1912 in a rich Serbian family, spent most of his childhood living in their Dubrovnik summer villa, spending winters in Belgrade. Attending a college in France, studying the law in Belgrade, he got the doctorate in law in Germany. Afterward, he came back to Dubrovnik where he opened his own law firm. In 1940, his German colleague Jonny Jebsen contacted him to inform Popov that he had joined the Abwehr, German’s military intelligence service.
Popov instantly informed Clement Hope at the British legation in Yugoslavia about Jensen. Hope enrolled Popov as a double agent with the codename Scoot (he was later known to his handler as Tricycle), and advised him to cooperate with Jebsen. As a double agent, Popov moved to London. Dusko fed enough MI6-approved information to the Germans to keep them happy and unaware of his actions, well paid for his services.
His most important deception was convincing the Germans that the D-Day landings would be in Calais, 400 km far from Normandy.
The Cosmopolitan spirit of Dubrovnik left its mark on the intriguing double agent
Dusan Popov loved the luxury lifestyle, action, gambling and women. In 1941, the Abwehr dispatched Popov to the United States. They gave him an intelligence questionnaire (a list of intelligence targets) where one entire page was devoted to highly detailed questions about US defenses at Pearl Harbor.
Although he informed the FBI of the impending attack on Pearl Harbor, either the FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover did not report this fact to his superiors, or they, for reasons of their own, took no action.
In 1974, Popov published his autobiography titled Spy/Counterspy, where he revealed his spy role for the first time. He died in France in 1981.
Fleming admitted that Bond was a compound of all the secret agents he met during the war, and among them Dusan Popov as well.
Biography of Dusan Popov
My Name Is Bond. No, Sorry! My Name Is Popov, Dusko Popov
The spy who loved Dubrovnik and who inspired Ian Fleming
Do you remember the scene from the Casino Royale, the first of Bond movies, when James Bond bluffing during the baccarat game, slammed a bag full of money on the table? That particular scene really happened during World War II, in a casino in Lisbon. Mr. Dusan Popov, surrounded by women in shiny dresses, drinking smuggled spirits, winning constantly and easily, bluffed the Lithuanian bragger.
Ian Fleming, the author of novels about James Bond, was there as an escort appointed by MI6 to Dusan “Dusko” Popov, the Serbian triple agent of Yugoslavian VOA, English MI6 and the German Abwehr.
Popov was born in 1912 in a rich Serbian family, spent most of his childhood living in their Dubrovnik summer villa, spending winters in Belgrade. Attending a college in France, studying the law in Belgrade, he got the doctorate in law in Germany. Afterward, he came back to Dubrovnik where he opened his own law firm. In 1940, his German colleague Jonny Jebsen contacted him to inform Popov that he had joined the Abwehr, German’s military intelligence service.
Popov instantly informed Clement Hope at the British legation in Yugoslavia about Jensen. Hope enrolled Popov as a double agent with the codename Scoot (he was later known to his handler as Tricycle), and advised him to cooperate with Jebsen. As a double agent, Popov moved to London. Dusko fed enough MI6-approved information to the Germans to keep them happy and unaware of his actions, well paid for his services.
His most important deception was convincing the Germans that the D-Day landings would be in Calais, 400 km far from Normandy.
The Cosmopolitan spirit of Dubrovnik left its mark on the intriguing double agent
Dusan Popov loved the luxury lifestyle, action, gambling and women. In 1941, the Abwehr dispatched Popov to the United States. They gave him an intelligence questionnaire (a list of intelligence targets) where one entire page was devoted to highly detailed questions about US defenses at Pearl Harbor.
Although he informed the FBI of the impending attack on Pearl Harbor, either the FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover did not report this fact to his superiors, or they, for reasons of their own, took no action.
In 1974, Popov published his autobiography titled Spy/Counterspy, where he revealed his spy role for the first time. He died in France in 1981.
Fleming admitted that Bond was a compound of all the secret agents he met during the war, and among them Dusan Popov as well.
