[…] the other hand, maybe he didn’t trust Mr Blair and went to the meetings wired. In Lobster 9, in 1985, Ashdown was named as having been in MI6 by Steve Dorril, in the first batch of what eventually became the Who’s Who of the British Secret State. Though I cannot remember why Dorril thought […]
[…] Times article of 29 October 2000 Labour MP Tam Dalyell wrote: ‘I can now reveal that in 1967, I talked at some length to the head of MI6, the late Sir Maurice Oldfield, who helped to persuade Wilson not to accede to Lyndon Johnson’s request to send a battalion of bagpipers (sic) to Vietnam. […]
[…] reliability was questioned by the Defence: he was known to exaggerate and is well-known for seeking publicity. He has also been a public supporter of MI5 and MI6, and he admitted he was paid a pension of £1,500 a month after he defected. The Defence called an ex-CIA Station Chief, referred to as Mr […]
[…] is just a poor effort on Bethel’s part. One can’t deny that it is useful – after all, it is the first book written solely about an MI6 operation – but one is disappointed by its thinness and its viewpoint. Bethel’s (partly legitimate) excuse is that documentation is unavailable because of Kim Philby’s involvement […]
[…] ban on access to personal files have been signed by Jack Straw, Home Secretary, and Robin Cook, Foreign Secretary, on behalf of the three intelligence agencies, MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, ‘for the purpose of safeguarding national security’. The validity of such a certificate can be challenged, and all three are being challenged; any person […]
[…] times annually by two British eccentrics with a limited distribution to “about 50 like-minded friends.” N.B. It is anti-intelligence, specifically against the Western intelligence services, particularly MI5, MI6 and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The subject matter is apparently varied, eclectic, and highly interesting and informative for intelligence professionals and buffs.’ While good reviews […]
[…] circulation of the document to various departments. The usual suspects are there: SIS, MI5, GCHQ and MOD get between 7 copies for MI5 and 20 copies for MI6. But also listed are 32 (yes 32) copies for the DTI. Why? I wonder. Some kind of export initiative?’ Or the DTI is full of spooks […]
[…] around the KGB defector Oleg Gordiefsky. Gordiefsky’s public role, the quid pro quo for the pension he is now receiving, is to bolster the key myth of MI6, that while we may be the junior partner in the intelligence relationship with the U.S., we’re the best, the most subtle and the most reliable — […]
[…] history use that expression. Knowledge entails disaggregation. Bruce’s index includes a reference to a tiny Scottish Protestant group, the Young Cowdenbeath Volunteers, but no reference to MI5, MI6, the RUC Special Branch or Information Policy. It’s not that the book isn’t interesting — it is. Like Dillon’s and Urban’s it contains many interesting bits […]
[…] in revolutionary politics. 3 Conspicuous by his absence from the author’s list is Arthur Ransome, recently revelealed to have been been working in the Soviet Union for MI6. 4 See Wilde’s Last Stand by Philip Hoare (1997), reviewed in Lobster 38. 5 Yes, seeds. This seems odd but this is what the author says. […]
