Ian Lancaster Fleming was born in 1908, in Mayfair, London. He studied French and German extensively in Austria and Switzerland, but found his first employment with Reuters, the international news service, which included a stint reporting from Moscow in 1933. Fleming's introduction to intelligence work came in 1939 when he was involved in the planning and execution of various espionage and intelligence operations, and also formed a group called 30AU (for "Assault Unit"), specializing in espionage and intelligence gathering in enemy-controlled territory.
In 1952, Fleming turned his experience and fascination with espionage and into a vehicle for fiction, and the result was the first James Bond novel, Casino Royale. In that book, Fleming introduced his dangerous-yet-debonair intelligence agent, code-named 007, in a mission to destroy a Soviet operative named Le Chiffre. The James Bond introduced in that novel was cool, cruel, and shockingly efficient in his work, as well as something of a hedonist in his interests in women and gambling.
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