[…] Thatcher’s ear that Gorbachev was on the level, and that she could ‘do business with him’. (A station chief as defector-in-place, Gordiefsky was the ultimate pure espionage coup.) In espionage literature this myth is most strikingly displayed by Verrier’s Through the Looking Glass (Cape, London, 1983). Pitched somewhere between the Sunday Express and the […]
[…] seems profoundly unlikely to me. These books, with their massive documentation, constitute proof. On the other hand, this is also the story of the most spectacular intelligence coup of the twentieth century. In the 1930s, largely using CPUSA members or sympathisers, the Soviet Union built networks such that by the war’s beginning it had […]
I was a student here (1) from 1971-74 doing a social science degree; but more importantly, between 1976 and 1982 I was on the dole much of the time and spent most of my days in the library here, educating myself in post-war history, American history, what was available then about the intelligence services – … Read more
[…] completely and use UNSCOM and sanctions to police the country, at the same time covertly encouraging groups which would be in a position to stage a military coup. This was not enough for some: on 26 January 1998 Clinton received a letter calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein because he is a ‘hazard […]
Ben Pimlott Harper Collins, London 1992, £20 At one level, this deserves the plaudits it has received. It is a belting good read, such a good read, in fact, that I had got as far as 1967 before I realized that there was no mention of Lord Cromer, the Governor of the Bank of England … Read more
Peter Taylor has made more TV programmes about Northern Ireland since 1969 than other any British journalist. His most recent was the documentary, Loyalists, earlier this year, a series of interviews with Loyalist paramilitaries and politicians. This was followed by a book, Loyalists (Bloomsbury, 1999), which contained some of the interviews in that programme. Like … Read more
Reflections on the ‘cult of the offensive’: pre-emptive war, the Israel lobby and US military Doctrine In our book, Spies, Lies and the War on Terror,(1) a central theme is the ascendancy of pre-emptive war doctrine in US military strategy and its impact on public perceptions and the construction of political narrative. A parallel and […]
[…] the covert policy.’ In other words Marshall wanted a covert capability outside of his department but still answerable to his guidance. In the aftermath of the Czech coup (the Czechs having been forced to decline Marshall Aid by the USSR the year before), covert operations were further coordinated with the creation of the Office […]
The Shock Doctrine Naomi Klein, (Penguin 2007) X Films: true confessions of a radical filmmaker Alex Cox, London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2008 Managing Britannia: Culture and Management in Modern Britain Robert Protherough and John Pick, imprint-academic.com, ISBN 978-097645539 Guns for Hire Tony Geraghty, Piatkus, 2008 A Peoples History of American Empire: a … Read more
[…] hope to desperate men. Moscow promised not to invade Poland if the Church could dampen the struggle (and, presumably, give the Polish Stalinists time to organise the coup). Some Grey Wolves came to believe that if the infidel Pope would not inflame anti-communist revolt, it would be better if he was assassinated in a […]
