Lobster Issue 46 (Winter 2003)
[…] 2001 in the presence of Saudi investors like Shafiq Bin Laden, estranged brother of Osama. In the wake of such events and in line with wider neo- Conservative foreign policy objectives, the Carlyle Group has sought to divest itself of its dependency on the querulous House of Saud in favour of the new ‘opportunities’ […]
Lobster Issue 38 (Winter 1999)
[…] Public Prosecutor’s report into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Section D1023 – D4936 One of Al Fayed’s more unlikely supporters has been Charles Wardle, the Conservative MP for Bexhill and Battle. On 22 June 1999. He opened an adjournment debate on the accountability of the Metropolitan Police over the arrest of Al […]
Lobster Issue 43 (Summer 2002)
Crime fighting? There must many candidates for the title ‘The most damaging thing I have read about this government’. My current candidate is a piece by Simon Jenkins, ‘A Keep Police off the Streets Strategy Unit’ (The Times 2 February 2002). After reminding the reader that in the UK the police are a local service, … Read more
Lobster Issue 54 (Winter 2007/8)
[…] July 2007, Charles Glass wrote in The Nation about what he knew well in those heady days during which he composed his diary: ‘Washington’s ideologically charged neo- conservative coterie possessed little or no understanding of the Middle East, allowing it to dismiss the easily predictable consequences of invading and occupying Iraq.’ A defensible charge, […]
Lobster Issue 30 (December 1995)
[…] that they ‘could be flown into a trouble spot rapidly and discreetly, and operate in a remote area without publicity – a capability much valued by the Conservative Government of the day’ (pp. 150-151). There was considerable demand for their services throughout the 1960s and into the 1970s. De la Billiere himself served in […]
Lobster Issue 46 (Winter 2003)
Wayne Cocroft and Roger Thomas, edited by P.S.Barnwell English Heritage, 2003, h/b, £24.99 A very high-quality, well presented book that is considerably more appealing to look at than most of the unlovely structures which are illustrated between its large, hardback covers. It is partly because of the non-photogenic subject matter that the book is … Read more
Lobster Issue 37 (Summer 1999)
[…] and 60s’, and Lashmar and Oliver’s chapter on IRD’s domestic operations takes that contention a good deal further forward. The authors tell us that in 1956 the Conservative MP Douglas Dodds-Parker, a former anti-communist ally of Labour Foreign Secretary Bevin, had been appointed to the Foreign Office as Under-Secretary – and apparently in formal […]
Lobster Issue 54 (Winter 2007/8)
[…] hard-working, middle-of-the-road. They were victims of the Political Class who had been left with no one to speak up for them, and nowhere to go. Neither the Conservative opposition, nor the New Labour government, is speaking for these people…….This estrangement between a tiny governing elite and mainstream British society is one of the overwhelming […]