Holts 'The Deceivers' describes the Allied deception operations aimed at Norway/Scandinavia. These played on actual fears of German leaders the Allies would do exactly this. Deceptions ops, of which FORTITUDE NORTH was the largest, were run to convince Hitler & Co. a Allied army was ready to descend on Norway. By mid 1944 Germany field army of 100,000 men, and another 200,000 naval & air force personnel occupied Norway, mostly on defense missions there. This included some 300 aircraft at a time the Germans were desperately short of operational machines. In that sense this fake offensive was successful, diverting yet more strength from the future battle of France.