[…] Littlejohn episode in 1973. Although Bloch and Fitzgerald (in their British Intelligence and Covert Action) give a more exhaustive account of the affair, their description of the MI6 informer inside the C3 subversion branch of the Garda as “Sergeant Patrick Crinnion” belittles his significance as an MI6 source. Kelly records that Crinnion was in […]
[…] views of senior British intelligence figures in a ‘pre-emptive strike against Tony Blair ahead of the publication of the Hutton report’ (2) The Herald said this of MI6: ‘The key points it wants on the record are: Many had been openly sceptical about the presence of WMD in Iraq for years. The intelligence community […]
[…] this account of MI5’s adjustment to the post Cold War world is one of the best books on the UK’s intelligence services, up there with Stephen Dorril’s MI6 book, Paul Lashmar and James Oliver’s book on IRD and Richard Aldrich’s The Hidden Hand. Rereading it, I was struck by the following. Although we now […]
[…] Kelly’s body and thus ‘helped to bring closure for the family.’(6) Unofficial histories and authorised versions Described by its publisher as ‘the definitive history of MI5 and MI6’, Gordon Thomas’s Inside British intelligence: 100 years of MI5 and MI6 (London: JR Books), hit the shelves in May, despite the best efforts of the government […]
[…] away from truth. We know the secret world has biases towards certain personality traits and it is not always the case that stability is preeminent. (18) (Did MI6 make Richard Tomlinson what he is or was MI6 attracted to Tomlinson in the first place in part because of those attributes which were later to […]
[…] us…. Tatler (June 1984) Robert Harris reports on the spy recruitment procedures. There was some talk of prosecutions under the Official Secrets Act for naming MI5 and MI6 premises. They are: MI5 recruitment (positive vetting) – 140 Gower St., London WC1 and 14-17 Great Marlborough St., London WC1 MI6 recruitment – 3 Carlton Gardens, […]
[…] acquitted and died in 1962 as a result of an air accident in South-East Asia. Faulks, in reporting this tale, suggested that Bodington may have been an MI6 agent before the war (he had been a journalist) and that the connection between him and Dericourt involved more than friendship. Curiously, Faulks left it there. […]
[…] it would become illegal to claim that any individual is an officer or agent of either the Security Service (MI5) or of the Secret Intelligence Service ( MI6). It was also made known that the publication of British Intelligence and Covert Action last year was considered provocative in this respect. The book contains an […]
[…] MI5 botch a surveillance of an IRA operation and £300 million’s worth of damage is done to the City of London; and nothing happens, no heads roll. MI6 gets involved in trying to use Muslim fundamentalists to assassinate Colonel Gadaffi; and nothing happens; nothing, that is, other than then Foreign Secretary Robin Cook standing […]
[…] of surprise Last, but by no means least: nobble the opposition. No messy fiddling with the votes – go straight to the voters themselves. Hats off to MI6, who proved themselves the masters of this tactic in 1924, when the UK’s first-ever Labour government was seeking to be returned to power. With the Russian […]
