[…] apparently perceived by some of those who have studied the case. Not that the idea of a meta-conspiracy isn’t attractive. Faced with a cover-up extending across the intelligence services, the mass media, and the political establishment, many of the JFK researchers made the not unreasonable assumption that it was co-ordinated, and that its purpose […]
[…] before 9/11 and that the production of the WMD Dossier was one of the key components of a broader political strategy designed to achieve that aim.(1) Understanding intelligence Andrew Defty considers the role of Parliament and Parliamentary Committees in allowing parliamentarians to develop expertise in particular policy areas and questions whether the Intelligence and […]
[…] In liberalised free markets, the successful nation or company is the one which has a competitive advantage. In the ‘knowledge-based’ economy, one might reasonably expect to find intelligence agencies playing a leading role in securing that advantage. As with the supermarket shelf, where things can literally be stacked in one manufacturer’s favour, so too […]
Nicola Calipari’s death If the tragic death of ‘Nicola Calipari’, the international oper-ations chief of Italy’s military intelligence service, in March 2005, was, as has been alleged, a deliberate act rather than misadventure, it is one of the most recent examples of extreme PR ‘message management’ I can think of. () ‘Public relations’ is […]
[…] the some of the same characters playing a role in these machinations. David Leigh writes that the Brandt Affair “had involved at least four of the West’s Intelligence agencies, working in partnership with each other — the West Germans, the French, MI5 and the CIA’.(1) A Sunday Times “Insight” article informs us that MI5’s […]
[…] the tip of an iceberg whose full extent would reveal a very considerable network, or networks, of bankers, industrialists, landowners, service officers, members of the security and intelligence establishment, and politicians. Some of these were genuinely pro-Nazi, many more were committed to Anglo-German detente so that the wealth of the country would not be […]
[…] the following: ‘Gordon Winter is an Englishman who was recruited by BOSS. His 1981 book Inside BOSS, was the first (and only) inside account of South Africa’s intelligence agency. We still think this is one of the most important political memoirs. Even if elements of the book were included to disinform, as some believe, […]
Our Secret Servants: the Shayler affair Things had been going rather well for the British security and intelligence services in the 1990s. Under pressure from the Wright-Wallace-Massiter revelations of the 80s, they had conceded a notional form of parliamentary accountability with the creation of the Intelligence and Security Committee. With members who either knew […]
[…] not confer a right of access. This policy is consistent with the policy of not disclosing information about data held on individuals by all the security and intelligence agencies for the purpose of their statutory functions. I would point out that a right of appeal exists under section 28 of the Act. The section […]
Abstract The Tribunal established to investigate complaints about phone-tapping and the activities of the intelligence agencies has, at its first ever public hearing, quashed rules made by the Home Secretary forcing the tribunal to hold all its hearings in secret. However, the Tribunal procedure remains too secret, and its decisions cannot be appealed. Malcolm […]
