[…] acclaim. To be fair, this was not the book’s subject, anyway. But reference to Lancaster, which I attended as a mature student from 1969-72, put me in mind of the rumours one heard about the politics department there, the postgrad. students who went off for wargaming at Aberystwyth, and the controversy aroused by proposals […]
[…] the motive was regime change; what happened behind the scenes over the second security council resolution; and the still unexplained reason for Lord Goldsmith’s quick change of mind culminating in his advice that starting the war was legal even without UN backing.’ Berlins speculated: ‘Even more shocking, if true, is the allegation that, many […]
[…] even more in her determination to demonstrate the “persistence of illusions about Britain’s place in the world.” (1) This version of events is attractive to the liberal mind because it looks like an exemplary demonstration of the cockup theory of history, and it is that which passes for political sophistication in most of respectable […]
[…] Ward Boston, senior legal counsel for the Navy’s Court of Inquiry into the incident broke his silence and stated, inter alia: ‘There is no question in my mind that those people tried to kill every one on board. I was the counsel. I put witnesses on. I talked to kids never exposed to combat […]
[…] fired some 400 Soviet experts, on the spurious ground that they were no longer needed. The relevant CIA department, known as Covert Action, ceased to operate. Never mind Crozier forgetting – and The Times subs missing – that it was Gerald Ford who succeeded Nixon, not Jimmy Carter, it was Crozier’s use of the […]
[…] ideology and policy formulation and the techniques used to communicate ideas and mobilise mass action in support of those ideas. Above all, we need get inside the mind of the secret state, to start thinking a bit harder about why it behaves as it does domestically and internationally. What it thinks as a […]
[…] out no operation, investigation, surveillance or action against any individual otherwise than for the purposes laid down in its directive.’ The words ‘lying’ and ‘bastard’ come to mind, as they say. Gill takes a deep breath and contents himself with observing that ‘such an inquiry, to be carried out properly, would have taken many […]
[…] Hanssen was bad! (But no info about his specific badness, and no mention of the tunnel the Americans dug under the Russian embassy, or vice versa). Never mind! Bin Laden bad! The longer articles similarly crash on the rocks of recycled press reports. ‘Peru is a nation not usually associated with spy dramas’ begins […]
[…] as the Nixon people knew that the CIA knew, they (the White House) must have known that it was all going to come out. With this in mind we should perhaps not so readily accept Hougan’s assertion that the Agency couldn’t have foreseen the outcome. Indeed, we need not assume – as Hougan does […]
In an article in the Journal of Popular Culture, (1) one of the editors of the Jonestown Report considers the role that conspiracy theories have played in the unfolding narrative of ‘Jonestown’. It is a worthwhile endeavour to which few scholars could bring better credentials. Rebecca Moore is a professor of religious studies at the […]
