The plot to subvert wartime New Zealand

by Hugh Price

This is a true story of events in New Zealand at the most desperate time of World War II, when Japanese invasion seemed likely, and the outcome of the terrible world struggle between the Allied and Axis powers could have gone either way. At this perilous moment, early in 1942, a prison inmate by the name of Syd Ross completed his sentence and was released from Waikeria Prison, and at once set about building the biggest hoax that New Zealand has ever seen, involving the Prime Minister, and another senior minister as hapless participants along the way. Syd’s hoax grew and grew, and was about to burst, when he was astonished to find that it had been hijacked by a public figure, with more serious, and worrying, designs in mind. How this extraordinary matter unfolded is the tale at the heart of this book. As the Police Commissioner at the time said: the whole thing was "…beyond comprehension".