Talk:Juan Pujol García/Archive 1

Place of death?
Venezuela: I don't believe Pujol died in Choroni, I am checking with my sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.28.62.97 (talk) 19:30, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
 * This has been established. K8 fan (talk) 22:09, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

very awkward table formatting
As of this date, the table of Garbo's 'agents' is poorly formatted and essentially unreadable for those without extremely wide displays.

Someone who understands the ocmpliczions of table design here, should take a look at it. ww (talk) 17:02, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, I decided to learn the Family Tree format and this one looked like it really needed it. The coloring might need to be tweaked a bit.K8 fan (talk) 03:38, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Why is there no German version of the article? Since he seems important for German history this is surprising. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 147.156.52.93 (talk) 14:44, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed, but he was even more important to English history, in the sense that, without his efforts, there may have not been any further English history. K8 fan (talk) 20:59, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

I have three books on GARBO arriving soon, and will be able to substantially expand and revise the section on GARBO's agents and sub-agents. Appendix B of Thaddeus Holt's "The Deceivers: Allied Military Deception in the Second World War" is an excellent source. I also have Pujol's book and Harris's book coming. I intend to take this article to Good, or hopefully Featured status. K8 fan (talk) 03:28, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Dubious assertions require citations
"Operating initially in Lisbon, he pretended to the Germans that he was in Britain." How is this even possible? Needs explanation and citation. "...he did not understand the pre-decimal system of currency used in Britain, expressed in pounds, shillings and pence. He was unable to make sense of the British monetary system, and was unable to total his expenses. Instead he simply itemised them, and said he would send the total later." I find this almost impossible to believe. Again, requires explanation and support. GS3 (talk) 21:52, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
 * This is a year old, but I think enough reliable citations have been added to answer this. K8 fan (talk) 21:47, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Let's get this to Featured Article status for his 100th birthday, February 14th
Pujol's 100th birthday is February 14th, 2012, and I think his accomplishments deserve to be honored. K8 fan (talk) 15:44, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Or at least GA status. You might want to put it up at Peer review. Allens (talk) 16:48, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * I've asked that the Military History WikiProject assess it for C/B class - I'd call it B-class myself overall, although there are a few places where it should have citations that it doesn't. I don't know what they're looking for in terms of coverage. Allens (talk) 22:17, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I've purchased Pujol's autobiography as well as Thomas Harris' and plan to spend some time adding citations. The Catalan language article on Pujol looks to be very good, and a native speaker could be very helpful in bringing that information over to this one. K8 fan (talk) 23:19, 28 January 2012 (UTC)


 * According to the Military history review, what it's primarily needing are, first, various citations (noted now thanks to the reviewer), and, second, material on his early life. Allens (talk) 14:13, 6 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, most of the citations are now filled in, as is a bit of material on his early life. (Should he be called Pujol or Garcia in the article, BTW?) Perhaps we can get it to GA (or even FA) by the anniversary of his death in October? Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 03:16, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Pujol. Garcia was his mother's name and he only used "Pujol Garcia" in England. His autobiography is credited to "Juan Pujol". K8 fan (talk) 06:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks, corrected. Hmm... according to the Javier Juarez biography section that I accessed via http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fweb.archive.org%2Fweb%2F20110720141212%2Fhttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.elcorteingles.es%2Flibros%2Fsecciones%2Fcapitulos%2Fcapitulo_libro.asp%3Fccodcapi%3D1%26codiisbn%3D8484603725%26volver%3DS&act=url (Google Translate of archive.org copy - whew!), he was actually born on 28 February 1912. Hopefully we can manage something by the 28th. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 14:25, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * BTW, the same source has a few other interesting things that I haven't put in yet:
 * That he and Mills (and a few others) were reunited in 1984, not 1982, and in a club, not Mills' house.
 * That his mother may not have been married at the time of his birth - this depends on the Spanish, though ("hijo natural")
 * Pujol describes his maternal grandparents as "strict Catholics", so that's unlikely. K8 fan (talk) 17:27, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The other explanation of "hijo natural" that I've seen is a child of parents who were not married originally in the Catholic church, but by a civil wedding. This may fit with his family's more liberal political viewpoint. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 14:17, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The names of two of his siblings/half-siblings/stepsiblings, a sister and his older brother.
 * Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 23:15, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I just added a reference from his autobiography. K8 fan (talk) 06:49, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Siblings: Older brother Joaquin, two year younger sister Buenaventura, Joan two years later and a younger sister Elena (age not specified). (page 11 Operation Garbo). The children did use "Pujol Garcia" growing up.K8 fan (talk) 06:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Do you happen to have the book by Harris? I've seen a recommendation to read it along with the autobiography - it helps pick up inaccuracies in both accounts. (One thing influencing matters is that Pujol had divorced from his first wife by the time he wrote his autobiography, and it was most definitely not an amicable divorce. Admittedly, while she helped considerably, she was also a threat to the operation at various times, from what I've been able to gather via Google Books from reasonably impartial sources (MI5).) Wikipedia policies also discourage relying too much on autobiographies without other supporting sources, IIRC. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 14:09, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I have the Pujol/West book and the Seaman book, which includes Harris' case summary. As I understand it, the latter was the closest we'll ever get to a book by Harris. In the Pujol book, Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 6 and 11 were written by Pujol and all the latter material was by West. I'll add a section about West's discovery of Pujol's identity by West, which is worth telling.K8 fan (talk) 17:24, 23 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I'm confused. What about Garbo: the spy who saved D-Day from 2000? I would not describe 410 pages as a summary... Yes, it was apparently contributed to by Seaman, but the Google Books record claims it's mostly by Harris. Or is this the previous edition of Seaman's book? Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 19:06, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I'd say it's an early example of "shovelware". Seaman took something in the public record, wrote a 30 page introduction and published a book. Yes, the vast majority is by Harris. The "summary" in this case was a report to Harris' superiors intending to be a historical record of a successful operation. All the parts by Harris are printed in a monospace, typewriter font, as if they were directly reproducing his original report.K8 fan (talk) 20:02, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The book I have is "Garbo: The Spy Who Saved D-Day with an introduction by Mark Seaman" is credited to "The Public Records Office" and has an ISBN of 1-873162-81-2, Crown Copyright 2000, with a banner at the top that says "Public Records Office - Secret History Files". The copy on Google Books is the Canadian reprint. K8 fan (talk) 20:07, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I will try to put on some material from the Google Books copy's preview access. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 14:17, 24 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I have a few books (Holt's and Latimer's being the best) about the various deception operations that involved him - they include some biographical detail.--Errant (chat!) 14:17, 23 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Excellent! Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 19:06, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, we missed his centenary, but perhaps we can achieve Featured Article status for D-Day, June 6th?K8 fan (talk)

Birthdate
I'm inclined to accept the date in Operation Garbo given that it was written by Pujol himself and regard the alternate date in the Juárez Camacho book as an error. K8 fan (talk) 04:11, 27 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia generally discourages treating autobiographical material as more authoritative, as far as I know. I would not recommend removing the 14 February 2012 date - even Juarez says that it's the date most frequently found in official records - but it does need to be noted that there has been an alternative date put forward. Juarez is pretty specific about it being based on the actual birth certificate (and given that Juarez claims the birth certificate in question indicates Pujol as being a "hijo natural", there is a reason for Pujol to ignore it even if it is factual). Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 12:06, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I read that translation, but I'm not sure I understand it. I copied the original text and ran it through Babelfish and had no better luck. Any chance of getting a manual translation of that paragraph by a native speaker? K8 fan (talk) 01:16, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * A good question; I'll try to take a look around tomorrow afternoon/evening for someone who might be able to do it (as well as Wikipedians who normally do translation, perhaps someone on the Spanish military history task force?). Such a person could also be helpful for bringing in some info from the equivalent pages (Catalan and Spanish) on other Wikipedias (for that matter, I may try running the Spanish version of the Joan Pujol Garcia page through Google and see if it has any additional sources...)Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 02:41, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Looks like running the Catalan version of the page through Google Translate (set on Spanish) actually does yield some new references, even if the text of the article is not particularly comprehensible. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 12:56, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I could understand some confusion about his birth date and his parents marital status if he was their oldest child, but Pujol had two older siblings. Did Juárez say anything about the two older children being "hijo natural" as well? K8 fan (talk) 02:01, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * That's an excellent question. All I have access to is a summary of the book, by the author; this might be explained in the full book. Anyone have access to it and know enough Spanish (or, even better, Catalan with the Catalan version) to understand it? Without that, perhaps this should be moved to a footnote, explaining about the possible birth certificate but mentioning the unanswered question you pointed out? Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 02:34, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Both Seaman/Harris on page 8 and Pujol/West on page 9 have the February 14 date. This is further supported by the documentary Garbo the Spy. I'm inclined to disregard the Juarez book. K8 fan (talk) 00:36, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Who else won awards from both sides?
Currently, the article says that Pujol was one of the few who won awards from both sides. Who else did? K8 fan (talk) 22:11, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * There are no other people who are members of both of the categories "Members of the Order of the British Empire" and "Recipients of the Iron Cross", according to CatScan. There are a number (121) of people who got awards from both the UK and Germany at some point in their mutual history - mainly monarchs of various nations. I'm currently working on narrowing this down to only people involved in WWII. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 23:05, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
 * It looks like no others are recorded in Wikipedia. I went through the 29 others that CatScan came up with, and none of them were awarded by both sides during the war. For that matter, even among those awarded at other times after the 1800s, Pujol's the only "commoner" civilian with awards from both. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 18:06, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Neat bit of research. Is it possible to add it, or would it violate NOR? Or would we need a 3rd party reference making the claim? K8 fan (talk) 19:52, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Hrm. Good question. For that matter, one can't prove a negative. We would unfortunately probably need a reference, and even then, all that could be stated for certain would be "there are no known instances". Ah! I suppose a link to CatScan could be put in in the See also or External links section (not sure which). Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:19, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I just checked the Pujol/West book and found this choice bit send by GARBO's contact in Madrid on July 29, 1944. From page 159: "With great happiness and satisfaction I am able to advice you today that the Fuhrer has conceded the Iron Cross to you for your extraordinary merits, a decoration which, without exception, is granted only to first-line combatants. For this reason we send you our most sincere and cordial congratulations." This would seem to indicate that his Iron Cross was at Hitler's direction. His MBE was awarded shortly before Christmas 1944 by Sir Howard Petrie (page 162). K8 fan (talk) 20:13, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure about that it was at Hitler's direction, or simply with Hitler's permission; admittedly, "conceded" may be a bad translation... "Hitler's concurrence" might be a good way to describe it. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:19, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Garbo answered "I cannot at this moment, when emotion overcomes me, express in words my gratitude for the decoration conceded to my by our Fuhrer...". "Conceded" seems to be the term they used, much like recipients of the US Medal of Honor do not like the term "won", preferring the term "received". K8 fan (talk) 22:13, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * According to the Harris/Seaman book (page 286 in Google's version), you are indeed correct. It was that, not only did the German military not want to grant it to a non-combatant, but they didn't want to grant it to a non-German. It took Hitler's personal authorization to override them. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 00:19, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I just checked, and the Pujol/West book is in error. The Director General of the MI5 at the time was Sir David Petrie. K8 fan (talk) 20:18, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * To correct myself. The book had it right. Director General David Petrie recommended the award, and Howard Petrie presented it. Teach me to read closer. K8 fan (talk) 22:31, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

To clarify, GARBO was awarded the Iron Cross, Second Class. There was some resistance from the German military to awarding a non-combatant, so GARBO was retroactively drafted into the Spanish volunteer Blue Division, which was fighting on the Russian front.K8 fan (talk) 22:31, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Style question: Garbo or GARBO?
The Pujol/Web book and the Harris/Seaman book both consistently spell Pujol's British code name GARBO, all in capital letters. His German code name ARABEL was also always capitalized. Should we adopt the same style, or would that violate Wikipedia style guidelines? K8 fan (talk) 20:21, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Not sure about the style guidelines. Perhaps the smallcaps template would be useful, as in or ? Consult with Military History people and/or see what FA-class Military History articles use for operation names? Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:30, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * That would probably be a good compromise between the limitations of the typewriter era, and modern usage. K8 fan (talk) 22:16, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I've done it for . The BBC quote for Arabel isn't in capital letters, so I didn't do that one. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 19:48, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
 * ARABEL is upper case in the Harris/Seaman book on page 8. K8 fan (talk) 20:24, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Just to add (somewhat late); most of the pile of books I have on the topic capitalise agent names as well as operation names - I ummed and ah'd over how to handle this, and in the end just capitalised the first letter and left it. Standard army documentation will have capitalised those names - but the army use caps for everything, it's not essential IMO. Although I like the look of smallcaps. --Errant (chat!) 21:05, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Other images of Pujol
Here is an image of Pujol that appears to date from his time during the Spanish Civil War. If it was a government photograph, would it be public domain and could we use it? K8 fan (talk) 20:28, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
 * According to, if the author is not identifiable or is collective, and it's from Spain, it's public-domain and is usable (it's at least 73 years ago). If it's by a specific author, it goes out of copyright 70 years after the death of the author. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 14:57, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I wonder if any military experts know the uniform? That would help in setting a date for the photograph and it's province. K8 fan (talk) 19:39, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I checked on a message board and the 7L on his cap would indicate the 7th Regiment of Light Artillery on the Republican side. If so, it is likely to be an official photograph, thus usable.K8 fan (talk) 20:23, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

New source coming
You fans of this subject might be interested to hear that there's a new book being published in a few months: Agent Garbo by Stephan Talty (Houghton, 2012). (I'm involved in the editorial work.) I'm not sure there's anything actually new in there, but it's well written and worth taking a look at. -- Michael K Smith Talk 19:08, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for letting us know. Would you be open to answering a few questions? K8 fan (talk) 19:49, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
 * By the way, if you have not contributed to this article other than this bit on the Talk page, would you be willing to review the article? We have the goal of raising the quality of the article to Good or even Featured status in time for the anniversary of D-Day. K8 fan (talk) 19:58, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Well, I've contributed to quite a few articles over the years, but I've never reviewed one. I note, by the way (from the book), that the real name of "Federico" was Friedrich Knappe-Ratey, not Gustave Knittel. (The Abwehr often devised a code name that was close to the agent's real name, so he would react automatically to hearing it.) -- Michael K Smith Talk 14:02, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Information added from The Spies Who Never Were By Hervie Haufler. It sounds like your book will prove a useful source, but of course we can't use it as a reference until it is released.
 * As for reviewing, your long record of contributions, work as an book editor and specific knowledge of Garbo would seem to make you an ideal candidate, but I understand if you do not have either the time or inclination. I've looked at reviewing, and it seems a bit daunting to me. I've added references and information as time has permitted, which tends to make the narrative a bit lumpy. I plan to do another pass on the prose soon, but not until I'm sure the basic facts are in order. Either way, thank you very much for your contributions and look forward to seeing this new book. K8 fan (talk) 19:40, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd love to review it, as Pujol is one of my favourites. But I think that having contributed a good portion of the lead I qualify as being too involved. But just to say - I think you have done a stellar job so far! I also just tried to improve my stodgy grammar in the lead --Errant (chat!) 21:00, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * For my part, thank you. I'm willing to do a second pass on the lead if you feel it will free you up to review - which I honestly feel is the greatest contribution anyone can make to the article at this point. I fear I have looked too closely at the leaves to see the whole tree at this point, and a forest-level overview would be immensely helpful. K8 fan (talk) 21:32, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

More use of Harris' work?
K8 fan, you've got a copy of Harris' work. It would be nice to expand the usage of it - making too much use of autobiographies is discouraged. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:10, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I plan to. I've gone through the Pujol/West book making notes and have not yet had to chance to do that with the Harris/Seaman book. But in it's defense, Pujol only wrote six of the chapters - the ones concentrating on his personal history and West wrote the rest. I've worked on expanding his early life as reviewers had mentioned that this area was weak. I've requested a Peer Review on WikiProject Spain, but apparently only one Peer Review can happen at one time. I'm a little disappointed that it has not received any Peer input so far. K8 fan (talk) 21:20, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Good point about Pujol only writing six of the chapters. Thanks for doing the note-taking, etc. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 22:16, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Should we close the Biography Peer Review? Two months and no input. K8 fan (talk) 21:23, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I get the impression that Biography Peer Review is a defunct process. Yes, let's close it. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 22:16, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Done. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 22:22, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Socorro Blanco?
I believe I earlier put in that Pujol escaped detention by the Republicans via a woman who had seduced one of the guards. Who/what is Socorro Blanco? If it was some sort of resistance group, then the two statements (that it was via a woman seducing one of the guards and via the aid of Socorro Blanco) are not incompatible. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 00:27, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I should have clarified that. From page 25 of Pujol's autobiography: Meanwhile my girlfriend got in touch with one of the units of Socorro Blanco, a secret organization which endeavored to assist those who are being persecuted for idealistic or religious reasons. One of their girl helpers posed as a revolutionary and arranged for me to be let out of prison at dead of night. Free, I join the ever-growing number of those leading a clandestine existence. I went into hiding again. K8 fan (talk) 02:38, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Hrm. Would the "girl helper" be the woman in question in a "relationship" with a guard? Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:22, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Archive?
A lot of the issues mentioned on this page have been addressed and many of them go back more than a year. Should this discussion be archived so we have a clean slate upon which to discuss getting it to the next level? K8 fan (talk) 22:12, 10 April 2012 (UTC)


 * The entire talk page, or maybe just threads older than a month or so? There are apparently several bots that can be used to do archiving of this sort. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 22:31, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * At this point, I'd say keep New source coming and More use of Harris' work? and archive the rest. K8 fan (talk) 22:53, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * See here for one example. I'm willing to put together an archive template if desired. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 22:42, 10 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Please do so. I believe you know quite a bit more about the nuts and bolts of Wikipedia than I do. K8 fan (talk) 22:51, 10 April 2012 (UTC)


 * It's possible, although I'm not someone who can write a new template, say. I'm working on it. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 12:23, 11 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Cool, thank you. K8 fan (talk) 13:56, 11 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Quite welcome. It's set up, and should archive most of the threads when the bot happens across this page. Allens (talk &#124; contribs) 21:20,11 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Done, thanks again. K8 fan (talk) 14:59, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

GAN Nomination
There is an outstanding unreliable source tag on this article that was present when this was nominated. Secret D-Day – US television, 1998 – portrayed by French actor Sam Spiegel. This should be sorted out as soon as possible. AIR corn (talk) 12:10, 9 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Is IMDB an unreliable source?K8 fan (talk) 16:48, 11 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Talk:Juan Pujol García/GA1

Format Issue
The section 'Pujol's network of fictitious agents' does not display correctly in Chrome. It's fine in Firefox. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.153.177.208 (talk) 00:52, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Pujol could not understand the British currency system? Doubtful.
Articles says "He claimed to be travelling around Britain and submitted his travel expenses based on fares listed in a British railway guide. A slight difficulty was that he did not understand the pre-decimal system of currency used in Britain,[28] expressed in pounds, shillings, and pence, and was unable to total his expenses. Instead, he simply itemised them, and said that he would send the total later."

This makes no sense and I find it extremely hard to believe or understand no matter what some source says. Pujol, an extremely intelligent man who was able to fool the German high command, who was able to convince the Allies to take him into their service, who fabricated stories good enough to pass as real, could not understand the British currency system which was used by millions of people in the UK with little or no education and which was well-known to educated people in Europe and around the world and which is similar in many ways to traditional Spanish systems of measuring length, area, weight, etc. It makes no sense and sounds more like a colorful addition to the story. It is an extraordinary claim which would require extraordinary proof. GS3 (talk) 09:37, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

Awards
The statement that the "Nazis never realised they had been fooled, and thus Pujol earned the distinction of being one of the few – if not the only – to receive decorations from both sides during" is simply wrong. The awarding of medals by both sides had nothing to do with whether or not his double-crossing was ever uncovered.Royalcourtier (talk) 07:14, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

Allegiance
His allegiance as a spy was to the UK, NOT the UK and USA. He was never an American agent, or lived in the USA.Royalcourtier (talk) 07:15, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

Use of small caps for Pujol's code names
I would recommend not using small caps for Pujol's code names -- I haven't found any other examples of articles which put spies' code names in small caps as this article does for and. Furthermore, MOS:SMALLCAPS discourages the use of small caps in general, with a few exceptions not relevant in this case. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:53, 2 March 2015 (UTC)


 * The 2011 edition of Pujol and West's book uses small caps throughout. I agree with you about the application of MOS:SMALLCAPS here. —Mark Dominus (talk) 13:35, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

Garcia → García
I have changed the title of this article and corrected the spelling of Pujol García's name as per Manual_of_Style/Proper_names. I relinked all the double redirects. —Mark Dominus (talk) 15:22, 22 June 2016 (UTC)


 * His name is Joan Pujol i Garcia. Garcia without a diacritic. It's a Catalan family name and it's spelt Garcia. García, with a diacritic, is the Spanish version. --46.25.48.186 (talk) 13:47, 31 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks, but do you have particular knowledge that this is the way this specific person's name is spelled? It may be an exception to the usual spelling of Catalan names, and all the reliable sources I could find seem to include the diacritic.  You have also changed the spelling of Juan to Joan.  I understand that the Catalan spelling is normally Joan, but as I noted below, in this particular case the name is Juan, not Joan.  —Mark Dominus (talk) 14:51, 31 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Pujol García writes in his memoir Operation Garbo: The Personal Story of the Most Successful Spy of World War II that his mother, Mercedes García, was not Catalan.  She was from Andalusia.  She and her parents moved to Barcelona when she was eight.  I am going to correct the spelling in the article.  Please do not change the spelling again unless you can produce reliable sources that attest the different spelling.  —Mark Dominus (talk) 12:24, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Suggest Addition to Bibliography
Suggest adding the 2013 book "Overlord, Underhand" - a 2013 novel by American author Robert P. Wells, a fictionalized retelling of the Juan Pujol (Agent Garbo) double-agent story. It's pretty good too. Tony (talk) 16:10, 11 May 2020 (UTC)