Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion

Book cover
Lobster Issue 36 (Winter 1998/9)

[…] drug and other criminal activities the Nicaraguan bishops had complained back in 1978. Equally disastrous was the initial decision to leave oversight of the Contras to Argentine intelligence officers, for whom the drug-financing of operations was a way of life. On March 16, 1998, in response to Webb’s allegations, the CIA Inspector-General admitted that […]

Understanding others

Lobster Issue 50 (Winter 2005/6)

[…] and error in Northern Ireland, involves the following: A comprehensive plan to alleviate the political conditions behind the insurgency; civil-military cooperation; the application of minimum force; deep intelligence; and an acceptance of the protracted nature of the conflict. Deep cultural knowledge of the adversary is inherent to the British approach.’ In his interesting short […]

A ‘great venture’: overthrowing the government of Iran

Lobster Issue 30 (December 1995)

[…] had gained in popular strength, although its steady infiltration of the Iranian government and other institutions continued’.(69) As for the Tudeh’s attempting a coup, a State Department intelligence report of January 1953 noted that ‘an open Tudeh move for power……would probably unite independents and non-communists of all political leanings and would result……in energetic efforts […]

John Maynard Keynes and the Anglo-American Special Relationship: a Reinterpretation

Lobster Issue 36 (Winter 1998/9)

[…] have been characterised by a special Anglo-American relationship, running in parallel with the strategic one based on collaboration in NATO and the UN, as well as in intelligence sharing and nuclear weapons policy. The ideological rationale for all this has been the defence of liberal capitalism (equated with freedom of speech and national self-determination) […]

When David met Stella

Lobster Issue 42 (Winter 2001/2)

Dr David Turner went to former MI5 Director-General Stella Rimington’s book-signing at Hatchard’s, Piccadilly, on 18 September 2001, where the following exchange took place.   Turner (presenting book for signing after queuing briefly behind several people, including a woman wearing an Anarchist badge) ‘Hello. Do you mind a lengthy inscription?’ Rimington (smiling, flanked by several […]

Systemic Corruption, Systemic Solutions

Lobster Issue 38 (Winter 1999)

[…] would announce the creation of a new housing inspectorate. Lucas passed this on to his affected clients. He gave me other examples of what he called ‘… intelligence which in market terms would be worth a lot of money.’ The firm of GJW obtained advance word on the moratorium on gas-fired power stations which […]

Spook-wise: MI6 and Clare Short

Lobster Issue 40 (Winter 2000/1)

[…] Africa. The spooks must love having Labour in office, terrified to oppose anything they ask for. Hitherto secret Whitehall committee trying to deal with unauthorised exposure of intelligence material was itself exposed in the Sunday Times 21 May 2000. A page of the Guardian (tabloid section) 24 September 1999 was devoted to the Ken […]

Justice Delayed

Lobster Issue 36 (Winter 1998/9)

[…] majority of MKULTRA documents in 1973 during the Watergate scramble to plug leaks and obliterate history. Helping Gottlieb destroy these documents was the then Director of Central Intelligence, Richard Helms. But due to one family’s own diligent search for truth, in a strange case of Justice Delayed, the truth about MKULTRA may finally come […]

PR, espionage and language

Lobster Issue 50 (Winter 2005/6)

[…] pride: if the British are doing it, so should we. This meant that a welfare issue could be prioritised. At times, it could also mean that the intelligence services could pass a coded message, via Hansard, to, for example, a senior health professional who was a source in another country, without being seen to […]

Smearing Wallace and Holroyd

Lobster Issue 15 (1988)

[…] These included the Miami Showband killings of July 1975. Besides this forensic evidence Holroyd had knowledge of the history of these guns. He knew, through his own intelligence work, two of those involved in the massacre and that they were ‘used’ by a RUC Special Branch officer, who he has named. That officer Holroyd […]

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