Dickie Metcalfe was not your typical secret agent, but he was larger than life in more ways than one. Unlike many other agents who were part of the Double Cross System during the Second World War, he did not defect; nor was he blackmailed into becoming a spy. Instead, using his father’s connection with Sir Vernon Kell, the first Director of MI5, Metcalfe volunteered his services.

Recently cashiered from his infantry regiment, he had an ulterior motive – by supplying MI5 with tidbits of information about weapons and arms deals in his newfound profession as an arms dealer, he hoped they would be able to help him get his commission reinstated. Metcalfe became BALLOON, a sub-agent of double agent TRICYCLE’s Yugoslav spy ring.

Concurrent with his spying activities, he collaborated with the co-inventor of the Bren gun to develop a new submachine gun for British forces. After the war, he was also a celebrated motor racing driver and continued to compete until shortly before his death. His success as a double-cross agent in the eyes of both his masters – British and German – is examined in this book, using official documents as a primary source.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Author’s Note
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Dramatis Personae
• Foreword, by Nigel West
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Arms and the Man
• Chapter 2 ‘The man’s keen!’
• Chapter 3 Going Dutch
• Chapter 4 BALLOON’s Report on Holland
• Chapter 5 The Air Ministry Leaks
• Chapter 6 ‘A man of intelligence and resource’
• Chapter 7 A Network Evolves
• Chapter 8 Plan MIDAS
• Chapter 9 BALLOON’s Reports
• Chapter 10 Plan STENCH
• Chapter 11 The ‘mythical Christmas card’
• Chapter 12 ‘Gardiner is all right’
• Chapter 13 The Scandinavian Connection
• Chapter 14 ‘A sub-machine gun of outstanding design’
• Chapter 15 A thorn in BALLOON’s side
• Chapter 16 The Grand, Cliveley and Postnikow Affair
• Chapter 17 ‘It is clear that B is in debt’
• Chapter 18 Correspondence
• Chapter 19 The BALLOON Traffic (Part 1)
• Chapter 20 The TRIBAGE Organisation
• Chapter 21 The BALLOON Traffic (Part 2)
• Chapter 22 ‘Plan A’
• Chapter 23 ‘I regard this as very naughty of BALLOON’
• Chapter 24 Cover Addresses
• Chapter 25 Going nowhere
• Chapter 26 ‘He continues to provide such information …’
• Chapter 27 ‘A man of intelligence and resource’
• Epilogue
• Afterword
• Bibliography
• Notes
• Plates Section