Introduction Intelligence officers who blow the whistle get attacked by their erstwhile employers. Agee, Stockwell, Marchetti,Wallace, Holroyd, Jock Kane, Cathy Massiter – they all have variously suffered for their decision to go public. Their allegations and their characters are rubbished; operations are mounted to discredit them and disrupt their lives – and worse. Gordon Winter … Read more
Robert Caro New York and London: Alfred Knopf, 2002, hb $35 (US) £35 (UK) (But in the UK only £22 from Amazon.com) This is the third volume in Caro’s biography of LBJ. The first two volumes are wonderful pieces of work, the best biographies I have read; and in many ways this is their … Read more
The Enemy Within: The Secret War Against the Miners Seumas Milne London: Verso, 2004, p/back, £8 GB84 David Peace London: Faber & Faber, 2004, p/back, £12.99 On the 20th anniversary of the most significant power struggle in post war Britain, two very different books on the miners’ strike of 1984-85, read alongside each other, … Read more
[…] the creative accounting of their bankers, Sindona and Calvi.) The final part of the plan was for Gelli to foment the use of political violence – bombings, murder and kidnappings – and then, when he had created sufficient chaos, make use of propaganda designed to prepare Italians psychologically for the new era of Fascism. […]
[…] Libyans did Lockerbie. Which tells us that the disinformation prepared by the US to show Libya guilty was sufficiently convincing to persuade a professional intelligence officer. See Hollingsworth and Fielding, Defending the Realm (reviewed below), p.147. See Peter Smith’s ‘Is Libya still the prime suspect in the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher?’ in Lobster 32.
Public relations, more usually referred to these days as ‘communications’, is a method used by organisations to explain themselves or issues, or sell a product/message/strategy. To create/manipulate their audiences’ various external environments so that these can prevail, sophisticated organisations firstly recognise competitor or negative PR; secondly, they counter it. The means by which they do … Read more
[…] is the only documentary that includes footage of Oswald being driven into the Dallas PD headquarters after his arrest. The Oswald-Ruby Slaying. Three versions of the Oswald murder appear to have been filmed. These are: KRLD-TV, Dallas: b&w video. KRLD-TV, Dallas: 16min b&w. Cameraman: George Phenix. WBAP-TV, Fort Worth: 16min b&w Cameraman: J. Jamison. […]
Lobster’s writers say farewell (in approximately 250 words or less) In alphabetical order: Richard Alexander: Good riddance. Dan Atkinson: Prediction is a mug’s game, but here is one forecast for the early, troubled years of the next decade: Tony Blair’s ten years in power will be widely seen as a golden age of cheap consumer … Read more
[…] least the last 30 years; yes, that Karl Dallas — seems to be attempting to do just this. He has written and published an 8-page pamphlet, The Murder of Joseph Stalin which seems to me to show little. However, you can decide for yourself, for it is available from Mr Dallas at £1.00 at […]
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
