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Obi Wan Kenobi Took On the Third Reich and Other Lesser Known World War II Facts

Khalid Elhassan September 14, 2022 38 min

KRT ENTERTAINMENT STORY SLUGGED: OSCARS-COUNTDOWN KRT PHOTOGRAPH VIA ZAP2IT.COM (November 21) Alec Guinness, who played Colonel Nicholson in the 1957 Academy Award-winning war drama "The Bridge on the River Kwai," won the Oscar for Best Actor for his role in the film. (ZP) NC KD 2002 (Horiz B&W Only) (lde)

The WWII Jailbird Who Helped Hitler

WWII - Harold Cole — Harold Cole. Flickr

Eddie Chapman was an English jailbird who nonetheless did some good, helped the Allies, and screwed the Nazis. Not so Harold Cole (1906 – 1946), an English jailbird who did the exact opposite: screwed the Allies and helped the Nazis. Cole served in the British Army at the start of WWII, then in the French Resistance, before he betrayed both and worked as a double agent for the Germans. In his extraordinary wartime career, he lied and conned his way across France, joined the Nazis, and spied and snitched on the Resistance, which resulted in the arrest and execution of many.

Cole was a dirt bag from early on. By the time he reached his teens, he was already an established burglar and check forger. He was no criminal mastermind, however, and frequently got caught. By 1939, he had served multiple stints in prison. When WWII began, he lied about his criminal history to enlist in the British Army, and was sent to France. Promoted to sergeant, he was arrested for stealing money from the Sergeants’ Mess to splurge on prostitutes. As seen below, he did not stay locked up for long.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.