After that the leaking began. In a rather laddish covert operation conducted presumably by someone in one of the departments which had been consulted, a copy of the draft I had submitted was sent anonymously in a black cab to the Sun newspaper and I woke up in the middle of the night to hear the BBC World Service on my radio, which I had left on when I went to sleep, telling the world that I was wanting to publish my memoirs. Then a version of the record of my meeting with the Cabinet Secretary, which had presumably also been circulated widely, was leaked to a newspaper. Selective briefings were given, including that one department or agency wanted me to be arrested. Everyone had something to say about the issue whether they had read the draft text or not. The story was kept going when the Sun kindly returned the manuscript with much fandango to No. 10 Downing Street. As a result of the premature publicity, I received a torrent of advice from the media, including abuse for even thinking about writing a book and offers to serialise it, sometimes from the same source.
Meanwhile, in a series of friendly meetings over the next year and a half (I was, I can now admit, so shaken I could not bear to look at the text again for some time), while all the leaking and huffing and puffing was going on, I discussed the content with the present Director-General, Sir Stephen Lander. With the best intentions in the world, it is not possible to know, once you are on the outside, exactly what will be regarded as damaging. Some things I wrote appeared to the intelligence community to go too close to the bone. I agreed to accept their judgement and omit them. Any intelligence operations I have referred to are well disguised in various ways.
When we had agreed a final text, which was not difficult, it was submitted for clearance to ministers and eventually, on 6 July 2001, I (and simultaneously the press) duly received the information that I was authorised to publish, though as a matter of principle the government regretted and disapproved of my decision to do so. At the end of it all, it is only a slight exaggeration to say that even I, a seasoned Whitehall insider, was starting to feel the sense of persecution and fear of the main character in a Kafka novel, in the grip of a bureaucracy whose ways and meaning could not be discerned.
As far as I know, I am the first former head of one of the intelligence agencies to ask permission to publish a book since 1955, when Sir Percy Sillitoe published his autobiography, Cloak Without Dagger, and that may account in part for the reaction I received. Intelligence and security services are vital to democracies, and to be effective they must be able to conduct their operational activities in secret. When I first joined MI5 in 1969, that was taken to mean that practically nothing at all could be said in public about the Service, about what it did, where its offices were, the people who worked there. Over the years that has gradually changed. Thinking has moved on, and it will move on further, with developments in the law and in the arrangements for oversight of the secret services. There is already much information publicly available for those who care to seek it out, in print and on the web. But it is clearly still true that revelations about specific operations, details of sources of information, human or technical, or about the precise way in which intelligence is gathered are damaging and risk undermining the effectiveness of the intelligence machinery and eroding the confidence of the human sources of information, who often provide the best intelligence and risk their lives to do so. There are no such revelations here.
The wholly disproportionate fuss stirred up as soon as this book’s existence became known shows in my view that there is still a wish among some parts of the intelligence world to keep too much secret. Excessive secrecy harms the position of our vital security services rather than protecting it. Being more open is a risk that has to be taken in the 21st century, if the support and understanding of the public are to be obtained. Similarly it is neither necessary nor appropriate nowadays to try to hold to total silence people who have worked in the public service, whether as civil servant, diplomat, member of the armed services or intelligence officer. It won’t work and it is better to accept that and focus rather on what it is important to protect. It is clearly essential that what is said or written should be considered and submitted to a clearance procedure and not just uttered off the cuff. But that means establishing a properly run clearance procedure which people are encouraged to use, instead of one that is, as it was in my case, intimidating, conducted in semi-public and confusing to everyone.
INDEX
The page references in this index correspond to the printed edition from which this ebook was created. To find a specific word or phrase from the index, please use the search feature of your ebook reader.
Aden, 55
Afghanistan, 75–9
Agra, 58
Allen, Alex, 265
Alwyne Place, Islington, 145–6
Alwyne Villas, Islington, 172, 204
Ames, Aldrich, 141
Amin, Idi, 260–1
Amis, (Sir) Kingsley: Lucky Jim, 29
Amritsar massacre (1919), 58
Angleton, James, 100, 205, 207
Ann (London flatmate), 43–4
Apprentice Boys (Northern Ireland), 104
Archer, Mildred, 46
Archer, William George, 46
Armstrong, Robert (later Baron), 169, 188
Asquith, Herbert Henry (later 1st Earl), 83
Attlee, Clement (later 1st Earl), 89, 93
Australia, 205–8
Bakatin, Vadim V., 232, 234–7
Barrow-in-Furness, 4, 6, 9, 11
BBC World Service, 285
Beeching, Richard (later Baron), 42
Belfast: disorder in, 104
Berlin: intelligence activities in, 143
Bettaney, Michael, 175–7, 222
BG plc: SR serves on Board of, 236
Blair, Cherie, 245
Blunt, Anthony, 99, 119
Bombay, 55
Borromeo, Sister, 11
Braithwaite, Sir Rodric, 233
Brenda (archivist), 36
Brewster, Ernie, 44–5
Bridge, Nigel Cyprian, Baron Bridge of Harwich, 167
Brighton: IRA bomb in (1984), 219
Brussels, 127–35, 224
Bulganin, Nikolai, 30–1
Bulgarian Secret Service, 203
Burke, Edmund, 259
Butler, Sir Robin (later Baron), 257
Cabinet Office: SR’s dealings with, 169–70; Intelligence Coordinator, 226; vets SR’s book, 284
Cadbury Committee on Financial Aspects of Corporate Government (1992), 277
Cairncross, John, 119–20
Caledonia, RMS, 53–5
Cambridge University: spy ring, 106–7, 119, 157
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND): communists attempt to influence, 140, 163; counter-subversion against, 151; SR accused of investigating and undermining, 162
Canada, 205–6
Canonbury Grove, Islington, 107, 145
Carew Hunt, R.: The Theory and Practice of
Communism, 98
CAZAB link, 206–7
Cecilia, Sister, 12
Christie, Linford, 250
Churchill, Sir Winston, 88, 206
City of London see London Civil Rights Movement (Northern Ireland), 104
Civil Service Selection Board (CSSB), 183–4
Clarke, Kenneth, 20–1, 259–60
Clarke, Margaret, 35
Cold War, 73, 82, 100, 125–6, 140, 143, 206; ends, 229–32, 238
Comac (company), 81, 107
Committee of Imperial Defence, 83
Commonwealth Security Conferences, 261
Communism: MI5 intelligence on, 87–9, 93; subversive activities, 161, 163; and end of Cold War, 229–30
Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), 88–9, 93–4, 98, 128, 163
Cook, Peter, 44
Costanzo, Sam, 81
Crosslands Convent, Furness Abbey, 11
Cuban missile crisis (1962), 50
Cumming, Captain Mansfield, RN (‘C’), 84
Curzon Street Hous
e, London, 160, 201
D-Day: misinformation on, 87
De La Rue Company, 272
Dench, Dame Judi, 244
Denning Report (on Profumo Affair), 47, 67, 192
Desai, Moraji, 65, 66
Devlin, Bernadette (later McAliskey), 104
Dimbleby Lecture (1994), 257
Directorate of Military Intelligence, 86
Dobson, Frank, 165–6
Docklands (London): IRA bomb, 264, 271
Dominic, Sister, 12
‘Double Cross’ Operation, 87
Downing Street (No.10): mortar bomb attack on, 220
Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan: His Last Bow, 86
Duff, Sir Antony, 178, 180–1, 189, 195, 198, 201–2, 227
Dunkirk evacuation (1940), 1, 4
Dyer, Brigadier-General Reginald Edward Harry, 58
Dzerzhinsky, Felix, 234
eavesdropping, 194–5; see also telephone-tapping
Edinburgh University, 23, 26–9, 31–2
Elizabeth II, H.M. The Queen: SR attends lunch with, 250
Emmanuel College, Cambridge, 270–1
Establishment Club, London, 44
European Convention, 195–7
European Heads of Services, 260
European Union (formerly EEC): British referendum on membership, 129; see also Brussels Falklands War (1982), 156
Farrell, Terence, 228
Faux, Julian, 222
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 263
Fergusson, Sir Ewen, 130
Feydeau, Georges: Hotel Paradiso, 70
‘Fifth Man, the’, 120
Foot, Operation, 139
Foreign Office: attitude to wives, 132–3; and exclusion policy, 140
France: SR studies language in, 223
FSB (Russian intelligence service), 239
Gandhi, Indira, 58, 72
GCHQ (Government Communication Headquarters): role and responsibilities, 88; intelligence leakage, 143; legislation on, 197
General Election (1992), 260
General Election exercise, 167–8
Germany: pre–1914 spying in Britain, 83–5; in World War II, 87–8; Provisional IRA terrorism in, 199, 216
Ghosh, Dr (Bengali poet), 45
Gibraltar: operation in, 207–9
Gigou, Elizabeth, 245
Gillmore, Sir David (later Baron), 257
Goa, 63
Gorbachev, Mikhail, 140, 232
Gordievsky, Oleg, 120, 142, 175
Government Communication Headquarters see GCHQ
Gower Street, London, 160, 201, 224
Griffith, Kenneth, 145
Grosvenor Street, London, 106
Hanley, Sir Michael, 116, 225
Hardy, Jean, 19–20, 30
Hattersley, Roy (later Baron), 260
Heads of Commonwealth Security Services, 260
Heath, (Sir) Edward, 128
Henderson, Miss (Worcestershire archivist), 36
Hollis, Sir Roger, 100, 117, 247
Holstein (of Peacock Hotel, Leith), 85
Home Affairs Select Committee (parliamentary), 258–9
Home Office: security responsibilities, 88; recommends MI5 take responsibility for counter-terrorist intelligence, 220; and MI5’s openness policy, 254–5; and business planning, 275
Home Secretaries: relations with MI5, 166–7, 190–2, 258, 279
Howard, Michael, 191, 255, 264, 266
Hurd, Douglas (later Baron), 162, 191, 232, 266
Hussey, Marmaduke (later Baron), 165, 265
Ilkeston, 14, 26; Grammar School, 15
‘illegals’, 185
Independent (newspaper), 246–7
India: SR and John move to (1965), 50, 51–8; war with Pakistan, 53, 58–9; border conflicts, 58; hippies in, 62; diplomatic protocol in, 64–6; international struggle for influence in, 71; SR and John leave (1969), 80
India Office Library, 41, 44–7, 53
Information Research Department (IRD), India, 74–5
Ingatestone, Essex, 1
Institute of Cancer Research, 165
Intelligence and Security Committee (parliamentary), 259
Intelligence Services Act (1994), 259
Interception of Communications Act (IOCA, 1985), 166–7, 194
IRA (Irish Republican Army): mainland bombing campaign, 128, 261, 263–4, 271; see also Provisional IRA
Iran, 212
Iraq, 212
Islington Gazette, 246
ITN (Independent Television News), 256
James, Elizabeth Margaret, Lady, 66
James, Sir Morrice (later Baron St Brides of Hasguard), 66
Jenkins, Roy, Baron, 191
Jenkins, Simon, 254
Johnson, Lyndon B., 77–8
Joint Intelligence Committee, 178, 217
Jones, Sir John, 168
Justice, James Robertson, 27
Kabul, 75–6, 79–80
Kampala, Uganda, 260
Kashmir, 53, 63
Kazakhstan, 236
Keeler, Christine, 47, 192
Kell, Captain Vernon (‘K’), 83–7, 184–5, 243
Kennedy, John F., 50
Kerala (India), 72
KGB: recruits agents in Britain, 106–7, 120, 126, 143; Peter Wright lectures on, 118; activities abroad, 140; SR visits in Moscow after end of Cold War, 232–9; revives after Bakatin’s retirement, 236–7
Khrushchev, Nikita S., 30–1
Khyber Pass, 75–8
Kipling, Rudyard: Kim, 75
Labour Party: and subversive activities, 161
Lake District, 13–14
Lander, Sir Stephen, 285
Langdon, J. and Sons, Liverpool, 17
le Carré, John, 141; Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, 84
Leconfield House, Curzon Street, 93–4, 105–6
Libya, 212
Lille, 223–4
Lipton, (Sir) Stuart, 228
Liverpool: SR studies archive administration in, 33–4
Lockerbie: air disaster (1988), 216–17
London: SR moves to (1961), 41–3; IRA bombs in, 220, 263–4, 271
Londonderry, 104
Lonsdale, Gordon, 118
Lucknow, 71
‘M’ (intelligence officer), 84
Macdonald, Ian, 156
Maclean, Donald, 32, 99, 106
Macmillan, Harold (later 1st Earl of Stockton), 247
Macmurray, John, 27
mail interception, 167, 194–5
Maitland, Sir Donald, 65
Maitland, Jean Marie, Lady, 133
Major, John, 193, 220, 227, 263–6; Autobiography, 262
Manchester: bombed (1996), 264
Margaretting, Essex, 1–4
Markov, Georgi, 203
Massiter, Cathy, 176
Melville, William (‘M’), 84–5
Members of Parliament: security information on, 167
Metropolitan Police Special Branch (MPSB), 218–19, 261–2
MI5 (The Security Service): SR recruited to in India, 67–71, 73–4; duties in India, 72; interviews and appoints SR in London, 82–3, 90–2; origins and history, 83–7; in Second World War, 87; and communist subversion, 88–9, 161, 163–6; legislation governing, 88, 161–2, 167, 194–8, 200, 258; staff and strength, 88; vetting function, 89, 93; status of women in, 90–1, 94, 96, 101–3, 120–2, 124, 127, 149–50, 156, 185, 199, 251; jargon and code words, 94; organisation and working practices, 94–100; SR’s training and early duties in, 94–8; use of ‘agents’, 94, 102; fear of infiltration, 99–100; personnel and management, 101–2, 179–81, 226, 273; counter-terrorist activities, 106, 159, 197–9, 208–9, 216–19, 253, 261–3; recruitment changes, 120, 182–5, 199; SR resumes career with after Brussels absence, 138–9; co-operation with MI6 in agent-running, 143, 150; SR attends agent-running course, 147–8; runs long-term double agent operations, 154–66; women used for agent-running, 156–8; moves into Thames House, 164, 201–2, 227; denies being subject to political
direction, 165; Home Secretaries’ relations with, 166–7, 190–2, 258, 279; relations with Whitehall, 169–71, 199; crises in, 174–5, 186; Staff Counsellor appointed, 176–7; surveillance officers in, 183; ‘whistleblowers’ in, 186–7; Director-General’s direct access to Prime Minister, 192–3; subject to Tribunal examination and oversight, 200–1; co-operation with US and Commonwealth services, 205–7; relations with Metropolitan Police Special Branch, 219, 261–2; resource management, 225–6, 252; and end of Cold War, 229; SR appointed Director-General, 241–4, 252; institutional changes and openness, 251–2, 254–5; public and media perceptions of, 253; booklet published, 254–6; SR retires from, 267, 269
MI6 (Secret Intelligence Service): in Delhi, 69, 72; origins, 84; role, 88; jointly runs agents with MI5, 143, 150; occupies Century House, 228; and end of Cold War, 229–30
Middlesbrough, 9
Militant Tendency, 161
Milner-Barry, (Sir) Stuart, 66
Miners’ Strike (1984), 128, 161, 163–6
Morning Star (newspaper), 94
Moscow: SR visits (1991), 232–9
Mull of Kintyre: helicopter crash (1994), 180, 266–7
Mullin, Chris, 259
Munich Olympics (1972), 211
Murrell, Hilda, 162
NACODS (union of mining deputies), 164
Nancy (child-minder), 111–13
Nasser, Gamal Abdel, 30
National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), 163–5
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