History's Greatest Lies

Episode 2

1944: Operation Fortitude

6th June 1944. The beaches of Normandy are the scene of the most spectacular military operation of all time: the Normandy Landings, a key moment that will alter the course of the Second World War. They owe their success, though, to a gigantic lie: a phantom army, armed with inflatable tanks and wooden rifles; but also to a whole network of double agents, most of them entirely fictitious. And leading this campaign of disinformation - the most sophisticated ever dreamt up – is one man: Winston Churchill.

Episode 3

1983: The Sniffer Planes

In 1979, in the midst of the second oil crisis, two eccentric inventors proposed to the French industrial oil giant, Elf, a concept for an aircraft able to detect oil deposits underground. Encouraged by « promising demonstrations », the French state administration eagerly backed the « avion renifleurs » …which turned out to be a complete hoax, and a financial swindle that would soon become a national scandal.