[…] made public.’ You can’t buy an endorsement better than that, thanks very much. And if ‘the Establishment’ was cross with ‘West’ it didn’t stop him becoming a Conservative MP; and under Margaret Thatcher, who hated dishers of dirt and secrets. So, for me, ‘West’ has always been a puzzle: a conservative (and Conservative) historian […]
[…] The author’s account also shows a Labour Party dimly aware of all this, making the occasional half-hearted stab at reining in ASIO, which the agency and its conservative allies easily outflanked or overturned. Cain’s account has the familiar virtues and the faults of academic writing on these subjects. On the plus side it is […]
[…] saga certainly played its part in creating the impression that Labour could not be trusted to run the economy competently, a view frequently promoted thereafter by the Conservative Party and then, in the 1990s, by ‘new’ Labour. The criticisms from the right were reinforced from the left by arguments that Wilson, his Chancellor Jim […]
[…] Liberation Army (INLA) soon claimed responsibility. The widespread shock which greeted his assassination was probably nowhere more clearly felt than by Mrs Thatcher, then leader of the Conservative opposition. Neave had masterminded Thatcher’s rise to power in the Conservative Party, organising her election as party leader. It was probably him who directed the ‘dirty […]
[…] a functioning military concept for the US, which can be located in the evolution of US strategic doctrine. In the early 1980s, the first period of neo- conservative dominance in US politics, analysts of international relations were struck by similarities between the ‘new cold war’ prosecuted by the Reagan administration and the great power […]
Ex-British intelligence officer Richard Winch said KGB defectors regularly named 7 ‘MPs, trade union leaders and 1 former Conservative Cabinet Minister’ as KGB agents. (Daily Telegraph 24 and 27 September 1984) What, only 7? According to Frederick Forsyth’s ‘sources’ in the British labour movement there are 20. (See Times 31 August 1984). And doesn’t […]
[…] was invited to have lunch with GKY and Eric Lancasterat the Caledonian Club in Halkin Street, SW1. Eric Lancaster was a Justice of the Peace and a Conservative trade unionist. Some time later I found that my name had appeared on Tory Action stationery as a committee member, which was a surprise. My work […]
[…] button once again in the Middle East.() Welcome to Cameronia The final nail in the coffin of UK support for the neo-cons’ adventures was driven in by Conservative Party leader David Cameron. On the 2006 anniversary of 9-11, Cameron spoke to the British American Project (BAP). He produced the expected homilies about the US […]
[…] the great Liberal newspaper. Casement’s appeal was heard – and dismissed – by the same judge who dealt with the Pemberton-Billing/Allen trial, Mr Justice Darling, an ex- Conservative MP. Other parallels? Both Wilde and Casement were Irish, both were gay, both were Protestants. How the English establishment takes its revenge! (And how little good […]
Since issue 45, last June, there has been so much information produced on the events preceding the assault on Iraq it is impossible to keep track of it all. Here is my selection. For the powers-that-be, the war has been traumatic, not least because their various cover stories and deceptions have been exposed so rapidly, … Read more
