The Destruction of Convoy PQ17

This book tells the Real History of a naval disaster of World War II. In June 1942, the great Anglo-American convoy PQ.17 laden with cargoes for the Soviet Union headed for North Russia, escorted by a mighty array of British and American warships. All went well until July 4. Then the British Admiralty ordered the convoy to scatter and the escorts to escape. Codebreakers had wrongly put the German battleship Tirpitz at sea. The Germans hunted down and sank each ship, one by one.David Irving tracked down the fate of each of those ships, and spoke with the German bomber and submarine crews. He gained exclusive access to US and British naval records, and to the admirals and politicians behind the scenes. The book was a best seller -- with consequences. A libel action brought by a naval officer in the name, some said, of the Royal Navy led to one of the biggest libel awards ever made. The battle begun in the Barents Sea in 1942 lingered on through two more closely fought actions in the court of appeal and the House of Lords thirty years after - but that is another story.