Sir Ronald Evelyn Leslie Wingate, 2nd Baronet, CB, CMG, CIE, OBE (30 September 1889 – 31 August 1978) was a British colonial administrator, soldier and author.

After his second tour in Oman, Wingate held a variety of positions in British India, including service as the Acting Secretary of the Foreign and Political Department of the Indian Government and Commissioner of Baluchistan.

[citation needed] After the war, Wingate served as the British delegate on the Tripartite Commission for the Restitution of Monetary Gold and as a director on the board of the Imperial Continental Gas Association.

[2] From a very young age, he hoped to follow his father into military service, and he began his education at Bradfield College planning to join the Royal Navy.

[3][4] While at Bradfield; however, Wingate discovered that he could not pass the Navy's medical exam because he was severely near-sighted and decided to instead pursue a civil service career.

[14][15] After a honeymoon in the Kangra Valley, Wingate returned to work, becoming an aide de camp and assistant private secretary for the Governor of Punjab,[15] and then the city magistrate of Delhi.

[16] After the entry of the Ottoman Empire into the war, Wingate hoped that his Arabic language skills would result in a posting with the army, but he remained in India until 1917.

[20] Wingate also was responsible for entertaining notable Western guests who passed through Najaf, including Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich of Russia.

[27] Before Feisal departed, Wingate established a Council of Ministers, nominally to advise the Sultan, but actually designed to hold the effective power during his absence.

He began by collecting unpaid customs duties in order to raise more revenue for the Sultan, and sent emissaries to Isa Bin Salih, the Imam's chief deputy.

[30][31] Wingate's initial overtures proved unsuccessful, so he threatened to impose a "punitive tax" on dates, the chief export crop of Oman.

Srinagar was the site of a large club for British military officers and civil servants, and Wingate, finding that he had "a minimum of work", spent much of his time socializing and playing golf.

[11][49] In that capacity, Wingate accompanied the agent on all of his state visits, and encountered for the first time what he considered "real India," rather than the frontier regions in which he had previously served.

[52] While serving in Quetta, Wingate established a new water supply to the city,[52] and frequently became involved in matters relating to security and criminal justice.

In retaliation, members of the tribe kidnapped two British military officers near the town of Chaman and held them for ransom, leading to "considerable criticism" of Wingate by the Army.

[54] In the end, Wingate paid a small portion of the ransom demanded, and threatened to send troops after the kidnappers, leading to the release of both the hostages.

As India was in the middle of reforms aimed at eventual independence, the result of the report of the Simon Commission, Wingate found the period a very interesting time to be in the high levels of the government.

"[65] With the outbreak of the Second World War, Wingate was assigned to the Ministry of Economic Warfare, working in Southeast Asia and Africa and granted the rank of second lieutenant in the Army.

Wingate pressed for a combined strategy for the China-Burma theatre of deception; but the British did not give up throughout the war to resume parity with the United States Joint Staff Planners.

[clarification needed] In September 1942, he was assigned to the London Controlling Section (LCS), an organization devoted to military deception, and part of the joint planning staff of the War Cabinet.

[68] While at LCS, Wingate was cleared for Ultra access to the highest levels of secrecy; he worked closely with Hastings Ismay about whom he later wrote a biography.

[72] Wingate participated in the planning for many deceptions, including Operation Mincemeat's sister, codenamed Brass for which he approved the letters planted on a fake corpse.

Sir Frederick Morgan, the original planner of Operation Overlord, initially believed that no deception plan could successfully disguise Neptune, but Wingate convinced him to at least allow LCS to make an effort.

So Wingate devised a deception to mirror Overlord codenamed Royal Flush, which recommended that they approach three neutral countries: Spain, Sweden and Turkey to ask for their assistance with landings in Southern France.

The plan proved greatly successful; the Spanish passed the information to the Germans and even agreed to provide humanitarian aid for soldiers wounded in the landings.

[75] On his at back from D Division[a][clarification needed] From India he flew into Cairo Rear HQ with Peter Thorne to arrange the last operation of the Middle eastern campaign.

To find out what notional information could be passed onto the Japanese by Peter Fleming in India about German intelligence to assist A Force and SEAC operations.

At the end of the war he teamed up with Jonny Bevan in the Far East, where he was warmly welcomed when he arrived at Manila to work with Goldbranson, the American agent.

The report, which has been described as "urbane, literate and readable" dealt more with the British than the Americans, but provided an excellent reference and was approved by a conference in London in June 1947.

[84] Writing in the Middle East Journal, Muhammad Sabry called the book "a real contribution to African history," applauding Wingate's style and accuracy.