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 […]

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 […]

Our Friends in the North West: The Owen Oyston Affair

Lobster Issue 34 (Winter 1997)

[…] Murrin told Sir Peter Blaker, ‘An alternative funding source really needs to be lined up but I can only leave that to you. My own network of intelligence is now building up and I would expect results after the summer.’ 30 July Owen Oyston resigned as chairman of Red Rose Radio. September Oyston bought […]

Malcolm Kennedy: Application to European Court of Human Rights

Lobster Issue 51 (Summer 2006)

[…] Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT), the body set up under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA) to hear complaints relating to conduct by the Security and Intelligence agencies, and complaints about phone-tapping. It also deals with claims under the Human Rights Act 1998, s7(1)(a) that a public authority has acted in a manner […]

The Men with the Guns

Lobster Issue 8 (1985)

The Men with the Guns G.F. Newman (Sphere, London 1984) I’ve got a lot of time for G.F. Newman. He’s written some of the best, sharpest, things about contemporary Britain: the Law and Order series and the Terry Sneed novels are the obvious places to start. But this – perhaps because of the shift to … Read more

Iran on the brink: Rising workers and threats of war

Book cover
Lobster Issue 53 (Summer 2007)

[…] when a reactionary political movement grew out of what were legitimate workers’ struggles, not least because of the input of money and resources by various western pro-capitalist intelligence and ideological agencies. The numbers of those on strike has increased dramatically in the past few years. As the book says: ‘The current unrest signifies the […]

The covert origins of the Biafran War

Lobster Issue 25 (1993)

[…] white sahibs retaliated by calling the white officials of the South, who were forever building schools and dispensaries, “nigger lovers”. ‘In this topsy turvy world of secret intelligence reports, MI5, pimps, prostitutes, rape and murder, presided over by the Colonial Office and Harold Macmillan, it was not surprising that the Nigerian political leader of […]

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 […]

Extracts from the Testimony of Harlan Girard

Lobster Issue 34 (Winter 1997)

Extracts from the Testimony of Harlan Girard Managing Director, International Committee for the Convention Against Offensive Microwave Weapons, before the Human Subjects Subcommittee, National Bioethics Advisory Commission, Washington DC, 19 October 1997. In 1982 an obscure government office called the Congressional Clearinghouse on the Future published a study called ‘Future Agenda’. The obscure chairman of … Read more

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