"MOST SECRET": EXCEPTIONAL MARCH 4, 1945 INTELLIGENCE REPORT ISSUED BY THE SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE, INCLUDING FOUR DETAILED SITUATION MAPS OF GERMANY AND THE WESTERN FRONT, A SUMMARY OF LUFTWAFFE BOMBING AND PROJECTED ENEMY CAPABILITIES

(WORLD WAR II) STRONG, K.W.D. Weekly Intelligence Summary. No. 50. London: Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force, Office of Assistant Chief of Staff, G-2, March 4, 1945. Folio (8-1/2 by 13-1/2 inches), staple-bound as issued, original printed beige paper wrappers. Housed in a pink tabbed folder of the War Office, Deputy Chief of the Imperial General Staff Co-ord. Housed in a custom clamshell box. $6800.

Original March 4, 1945 "Most Secret" intelligence report issued by the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force concerning the Western Front in World War II, with four situation maps offering information primarily about Germany and a detailed analysis of enemy capabilities, Luftwaffe bombing, and assorted concerns like weather essential to military success.

"On February 13, 1944 Headquarters, Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces, known also as SHAEF, replaced and absorbed the planning group called the Chief of Staff Supreme Allied Command, or COSSAC, that had been established in April 1943. COSSAC and SHAEF, as as integrated U.S.-British organizations responsible to the Combined Chiefs of Staff, successively had the task of integrating the British forces and the American forces for operations on the Continent. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was designated as the Supreme Allied Commander, Allied Expeditionary Forces… The staff organization in SHAEF was headed by the Chief of Staff. SHAEF directed the operations of several subordinate interallied headquarters, including separate commands for ground, air, and naval operations. SHAEF was located at London until August 1944; at Versailles, France, August 1944-May 1945; and at Frankfurt, Germany, May-July 1945… During 1944-1945 operated SHAEF Missions that were established in liberated nations to represent the Supreme Allied Commander and to maintain contact with these countries without interfering with military operations. These missions were located in France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Norway. As combined organizations they were disbanded in July 1945 with the termination of SHAEF, but as national missions some of them continued as late as 1947" (National Archives). "Weekly intelligence summaries prior to July 1945 include evaluations of enemy military operations, disposition, capabilities, supply and transportation systems, and related maps. There is also information relating to the economic and political situations in territory held by German forces, information relating to resistance activities, information regarding attacks on the United Kingdom, descriptions of terrain, weather reports, and reports of reconnaissance activity" (Eisenhower Library). This intelligence report includes sections on Enemy Operations, enemy dispositions, enemy defences, enemy capabilities, enemy supplies and transportation, economic notes, miscellaneous (weather), as well as reports on air and sea activities and secret weapons. Perhaps the most interesting part of this report focuses on secret weapons: rockets (faster, less regular firing) and flying bombs (increased firing against the Dutch and a new experimental weapons site). The report reflects the constant accumulation of knowledge about enemy operations throughout the war and the main mode by which analysts were able filter their findings through to command. With laid-in sheets about the distribution and grading of divisions in the West, infantry regiments in the West, and artillery, tank, anti-tank, GHQ assault gun, and GWH engineer units in the West, issued simultaneously with the bound report. Extensive docketing on front wrapper. Colored pencil notation to interior, including the note "Delicious!" in regard to the information, "Other services will be combed and combed again for the infantry, the schools and training establishments will be turned out, and the Volkssturm doled out in dubious lumps in search of leavening."

Wear to folder. Light wear and usual toning to interior, mild toning to extremities, wrappers detached. A very good copy. Rare.