46 replies to this topic

[spynovelfan]

In YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE, M notes in his obituary of Bond:

'By now it was 1941 and, by claiming an age of nineteen and with the help of an old Vickers colleague of his father, he entered a branch of what was subsequently to become the Ministry of Defence. To serve the confidential nature of his duties, he was accorded the rank of lieutenant in the Special Branch of the R.N.V.R., and it is a measure of the satisfaction his services gave to his superiors that he ended the war with the rank of Commander.'

Note that this does not say that Bond saw action in the RNVR, but that his rank was cover. The most likely intelligence outfits to need this would be those connected to and arising from the Special Boat Section.

Or Naval Intelligence, of course - but then, they didn't go around assassinating people.

Bond could also have been seconded to the British Security Coordination in the early part of the war: after all, they were based in the Rockefeller Centre in New York, and did have a Japanese cipher clerk working below them (something Fleming saw for himself when he visited).

Fleming said in his interview with Playboy that Bond was 'a sort of amalgam of romantic tough guys, dressed up in 20th Century clothes, using 20th Century language. I think he's slightly more true to the type of modern hero, to the commandos of the last War, and so on, and to some of the secret-service men I've met, than to any of the rather cardboardy heroes of the ancient thrillers.' (My emphasis.)

WW2 commandos Fleming was friends with include Patrick Leigh Fermor, Anthony Terry... and David Niven.

[marktmurphy]

Yes, no one is pretending that literary James Bond and film James Bond match exactly. 1st at Cambridge? Bah!

I actually really like the fact that he's still got his first in Oriental Languages from Cambridge in the new dossier on the CR site!

[JCRendle]

Though it is impossible, for he also studied at Oxford - I don't believe you can do both (they don't allow it)

[spynovelfan]

I think you can study at both Oxford and Cambridge, but I can't remember Bond having gone to Oxford - where did you read or see that?

[JCRendle]

Danish in TND

[spynovelfan]

He's just screwing an Oxford professor - he's in his 50s! Even if you were to count it as 'studying at Oxford', I'm pretty sure you can do undergraduate degrees at one and post-grad at the other.

Are we just looking for holes now, or what?

[ianfleming1]

Prior to the creation of the fictional British secret service by Fleming as an adjunct to the Ministry of Defence, Fleming's Bond activities were SOE bound based on documented references with corresponding footnotes in 'Ian Fleming's James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies for Ian Fleming's Bond Stories'.

[spynovelfan]

Prior to the creation of the fictional British secret service by Fleming as an adjunct to the Ministry of Defence, Fleming's Bond activities were SOE bound based on documented references with corresponding footnotes in 'Ian Fleming's James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies for Ian Fleming's Bond Stories'.

Hi there.

I don't really get the bit about the secret service being fictional. I'm pretty sure there were brances of British intelligence that were later incorporated into the Ministry of Defence, and even if there weren't, I don't see why that detail means the whole thing is a creation of Fleming: the organisation Bond works for throughout Fleming's novels is quite obviously MI6/SIS.

Whren you say you have documented references proving Bond was in SOE (or SOE bound, whatever that means), do you mean documents of Fleming's, or just your own reading of the text? If the former, I'm fascinated; if the latter, I'd love to hear your explanation for how SOE agent Bond was at the Battle of The Bulge - as far as I can tell, they weren't there. SAS were, but not SOE. Unless you know different!

[Red Barchetta]

Interesting theory.

But I don't buy "possible he meant it to be so."

The SAS started in 1941. While books from their members weren't the cottage industry they are today - Fleming had to be aware of the group's exploits.

He had 12 novels and numerous short stories where he had every opportunity to mention those three letters, and he never did.

The SAS was and is a raid unit, a commando unit. Bond was in intelligence - maybe he helped plan the raids, gather info so they would be successful. Or he helped mop up after the raids were over, gathering the documents and cypher equipment etc.

I have no problem with Bond working with the SAS in various points of his career - and in Gardner it's pretty obvious that he does so on plenty of occasions, both in training and on operations.

My problem lies however, with the fact that the SAS is an Army unit. And once you say Bond was in the army, you take away from the whole Naval Officer elan that is tied to character. Reference a site called Commanderbond.net. Perhaps you've heard of it? LtColonelBond.net doesn't quite have the same ring.

The SAS is the most elite unit of the British army. If Bond has to be in the Army, that is the unit I would choose too. But the army doesn't have the Commander rank. So how are they going to explain that?

Two of Fleming's heroes, his father Major Valentine and Winston Churchill, were in the Army. Had he wanted some sort of army connection for Bond, he very easily could have done so.

But the third person in Fleming's trinity of heroes, is Horatio Lord Nelson. And Fleming's love of things naval is pretty evident - it harkens back to Britain's peak of it's empire and it's strength as a naval power.

And as an aside, elite units don't always equate with intelligence. (IQ I mean, not spying.) For instance, here in America, people argue over who is tougher/more elite/etc. - Army SF (Green Beret's) or Navy SEALS. DOD studies have shown that while the SEALs might be in better shape overall, the Green Berets have higher intelligence - they are selected because of their ability to think, to train others, to use languages, etc. etc. and not just because they can do the most push ups.

And that again follows my objection to Bond being in the SAS - he doesn't just blow stuff up - he isn't just a British Rambo.

I suspect Bond joined the RN, and was attached to SAS as an Intel op- he would still retain his naval rank. It's no different than a US Navy Seal being attached to Special Forces (US Army).

[spynovelfan]

I suspect Bond joined the RN, and was attached to SAS as an Intel op- he would still retain his naval rank. It's no different than a US Navy Seal being attached to Special Forces (US Army).

Are you talking about in Fleming? Because he didn't join the Navy in Fleming - he had a rank in its volunteer service to cover his 'confidential duties'.

[JCRendle]

Bond was in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve before joining the Secret Service, Royal Naval Volunteer Supplementary Reserve was, I believe the cover whilst in the SS

In the film he was in the SBS, not the SAS

[Vauxhall]

Though it is impossible, for he also studied at Oxford - I don't believe you can do both (they don't allow it)

There are no official rules that you're only allowed to study at one or the other. Indeed, I know someone who did their undergraduate degree at Oxford, and then went to Cambridge to study a doctorate. Needless to say - you've gotta be pretty intelligent for that!

[spynovelfan]

Indeed, I know someone who did their undergraduate degree at Oxford, and then went to Cambridge to study a doctorate. Needless to say - you've gotta be pretty intelligent for that!

Only for the first bit, really. Cambridge barely qualifies as a university.

[Lazenby880]

Indeed, I know someone who did their undergraduate degree at Oxford, and then went to Cambridge to study a doctorate. Needless to say - you've gotta be pretty intelligent for that!

Only for the first bit, really. Cambridge barely qualifies as a university.

"I went to Oxford, but I never let that hold me back."

Margaret Thatcher

[spynovelfan]

For anyone still feeling that Bond's background in the SAS is an unFleming-like idea, I give you the man many think Fleming based him on, his Scottish friend and fellow old-Etonian Fitzroy Maclean:

http://www.diacritic...04/maclean.html

[Killmaster]

the novel "casino royale" points out that Bond joined the secret service prior to wwII and earned his "00" during the war.

would it be conceivable to think that he was seconded to the secret service from the british navy when he was a lieutenant and spent time during the war assisting various units, including SAS units?

[30AU]

Casino Royale, does refer to Fleming's 'Red Indians' four times...twice on last page, and this is direct reference to 30AU a special operations unit that Fleming created and headed. Which was attached in small eight man teams to various frontline armies all over Europe.
http://www.30AU.co.uk

Edited by 30AU, 29 December 2006 - 12:09 PM.