 The failed attempt to kill Bond while at Royale @-@ Les @-@ Eaux was inspired by Fleming 's knowledge of the attempted assassination of Franz von Papen , Vice @-@ Chancellor of Germany and an ambassador under Hitler . Both Papen and Bond survived their assassination attempts , carried out by Bulgarians , because trees protected them from the blasts . The torture scene in which Bond 's genitals are thrashed while he is strapped to a bottomless chair was a version of a French @-@ Moroccan torture technique , passer à la mandolin , in which the steel string of a mandolin was used to slice in half the testicles of British wartime agents . 
