‘I think,’ said Wingco, ‘the library will be best. My fellow members are not great readers, but they can manage a drinks menu.’ The room was empty and the curtains drawn. Wingco pointed to an armchair next to a writing desk. When they had sat down, Wingco took a large brown envelope out of his coat pocket and laid it on the desk with solemnity. ‘It wasn’t easy to get that.’
‘But you did.’
‘I hope, old chap, you don’t think I’m poaching on your territory.’
‘It doesn’t matter, Peter. I trust you. Trust and loyalty are more important than job description.’
Wingco tapped the envelope. ‘This is serious stuff.’
‘Go on.’
‘I had some home leave just after the missile business settled down. Coincided with a retirement bash here in the club for a former colleague, name of Gerry, who told me a very interesting story.’
Catesby finished his gin and tonic.
‘Like another drink?’
‘Later.’
‘In any case, in the late 50s Gerry was flying Avro Shackletons out of the Bahamas. What a cushy assignment. There wasn’t much excitement until one day they were scrambled to intercept a hijacked civilian airliner flying from the USA to Cuba. All available aircrew were beside themselves with joy and everyone wanted to come along – but priority went to an RAF intelligence officer equipped with a camera with a telephoto lens. Gerry did a jolly good job and got right up alongside the hijacked airliner and the intel officer snapped away.’ Wingco paused ‘The photos are probably ones you already know about.’
Catesby shook his head.
Wingco brightened up. ‘Isn’t it odd that none of us were told about the snapshots – considering it was our role to be the UK’s eyes and ears in Havana?’
‘Very odd.’ Catesby vaguely recalled reading about the hijack in one of the daily news digests that SIS officers were given, but had forgotten about it. But why, wondered Catesby, hadn’t he heard about the photographs?
‘I decided,’ said Wingco, ‘to pursue the matter further because it tied in with rumours about el loco.’
‘The crazy one.’
‘El loco is a bit of a dipso who props up O’Reilly’s Bar in old Havana. Rumour has it that el loco is an ex-American pilot who washed up in Cuba in mysterious circumstances. So when I heard about the hijack photos…’
An erratic line of dots in Catesby’s mind was being spot welded together. ‘You assumed that the Avro Shackleton’s photos might solve the mystery of el loco?’
‘And they did.’ Wingco pushed the envelope across the desk.
Catesby slid out the photos. As soon as he saw who it was, he jerked upright as if the photo was a live cable. ‘Good god…’
‘You recognise el loco.’
‘No, the other one.’
‘You mean Jeffers Cauldwell?’
Catesby stared at Wingco with sheer wonder. ‘How on earth did you find out his name?’
‘El loco told me.’ Wingco smiled. ‘Loco is easy to pump – he trades one secret for each mojito.’
‘I’m a bit confused. Did Cauldwell actually reveal his identity to el loco?’
‘No. A Cuban intelligence officer – who also likes mojitos – told el loco after Cauldwell left the country. It seems that the Cuban authorities weren’t sad to see the back of Cauldwell. They either didn’t trust him or didn’t like his politics.’
‘When did Cauldwell leave Cuba?’
‘In early 1961.’
Catesby’s head was churning with new scenarios. But there was another unanswered question. He touched the photos. ‘How did you get these?’
‘When Gerry hung up his flying boots he found himself in command of a large wooden desk in the Air Ministry. When I told him that none of us in Cuba had known about the photos, he assumed there must have been a cock-up. He did the first bit above ground and traced the photos from the Bahamas to the Air Ministry to the Chief of Defence Intelligence, to PUS at the MoD. So if you chaps didn’t see them, they must have got stalled at MoD. You’re smiling, Mr Catesby, like a very satisfied tomcat who has just caught a very juicy mouse.’
‘We’ll see.’
‘But I know you can’t tell me more.’
‘How,’ Catesby asked, ‘did you get copies of the photos if they went AWOL at MoD?’
‘The Air Ministry is a belt and braces outfit. They keep spares in case things go missing. It was relatively easy for Gerry to find the relevant filing cabinet – but he was being a bit naughty.’
Catesby put the photos in his jacket pocket – and made a mental note to remember to take them out again before he returned the morning suit to the hire company.
»»»»
Henry Bone did not seem happy to see Wingco’s photos. He pushed them to one side of his desk. ‘I suppose,’ said Bone, ‘it would be more prudent to file them than to burn them.’
‘You seem,’ said Catesby, ‘even more unimpressed than usual.’
‘What should I do? Grab a set of handcuffs, dash over to Horse Guards and kick in the door to Lady Somers’ office? Why are you smiling like that?’
Catesby didn’t answer. The image of Bone, handcuffs and Lady Somers was as piquant as it was ridiculous.
‘In any case, nothing is going to happen, nothing at all, William – no matter how damning the evidence. This government cannot and will not bear another scandal.’
‘But it would be interesting – treason prosecution or not – to see what happened to the hijack photos after they were sent to MoD. Maybe it was a clerical error.’ He paused. ‘Or maybe Lady Somers got rid of the photos in order to protect Cauldwell, who seems to have reinvented himself as Esteban the Cuban Maoist pimp.’
‘How did you work that one out, William?’
‘It’s a guess based on trends. The Sino-Soviet rift seems to have found its way to Havana. Che is pro-Mao and Fidel still prefers Moscow. It also ties in with what Semichastny told me in Moscow about Peking having stolen his spies.’
Bone took off his reading glasses, massaged his eyes and yawned.
‘You’re tired, Henry.’
‘I need a break. I wouldn’t mind a couple of weeks in Italy with my sketchbook and watercolours.’ Bone swept his arm around the office. ‘To get away from this sordid ugliness.’
Catesby didn’t say a thing. It was unusual to hear Bone express such personal emotions. Maybe, he thought, you needed at least an OBE to be privy to them.
Bone put his reading glasses back on and picked up the photos. ‘Yes, we will file them – and I will make a note of what you reported.’
‘And then stash them away under the hundred years rule.’
‘No, William, I don’t think it will be that long.’
Catesby noted a slyness in Bone’s voice and manner.
London: 22 November 1963
The shock still hadn’t drained away, but there was work to be done, no matter how numb the senses. Henry Bone knew that he would be in his office till well after midnight. The cables from Washington were flowing in thick and fast and the cipher clerks were bleary-eyed. The death of a king means no courtier or ambassador can sleep. Bone’s desk lamp at Broadway Buildings would not be the only one burning late into the Whitehall night.
Bone glanced at the wall clock. There wasn’t much time. He had an appointment with the Prime Minister, but there was still one more cable to read and evaluate.
More bad news. It appears that the suspect, Lee Harvey Oswald, defected to the Soviet Union and lived there for nearly three years. The hawks at the Pentagon and elsewhere are rubbing their hands with glee. If they can find or fabricate evidence that Oswald was acting under orders from Moscow it will give them an excuse for war. They wanted to attack last year during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but Kennedy blocked them (just). There are also rumours that Castro may have ordered the assassination. Once again, utter nonsense. It does appear, however, that Oswald was a member of the pro-Castro ‘Fair Play for Cuba Committee’. The mood in
Washington is dangerous and volatile. There are also rumours that Oswald was not the assassin and that what happened in Dallas was a right-wing coup d’état.
My Soviet counterpart is extremely nervous and keeping a low profile. He actually fears for his life. He kept saying, ‘We had nothing to do with this. We are not crazy. Our killing an American President would be suicide for the Soviet Union.’ He did, however, come up with one conspiracy idea that was ‘crazy’. He thinks that China might have staged the assassination in such a way that the Americans would think it was Russia and then attack Russia in revenge. Too much vodka methinks. In any case, if war breaks out America may survive, but the UK would be completely destroyed. Sleep well.
The Pentagon: 25 November 1963
President Johnson was dressed in the solemn suit and black tie that he had worn to the funeral. He still hadn’t moved into the White House because he didn’t want to disturb Jackie Kennedy and her children during a time of grief and mourning. This also meant that he couldn’t use the Oval Office or other White House facilities. The meeting, therefore, had been adjourned in the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. At first, most of the National Security Council had been present, but now only three remained – the President, the Chairman of the JCS and the Director of Central Intelligence – to discuss a matter of extreme secrecy.
The DCI spoke first. ‘This is, Mr President, a policy that I inherited from my predecessor and that was approved by President Kennedy. I can see its merits and logic, but there are strategic risks involved.’
The JCS Chairman, still in full-dress uniform, nodded towards the DCI. ‘It is a daring policy that was devised by John’s predecessor.’
‘You mean,’ said the President, ‘the one who fucked up the Bay of Pigs?’
The DCI smiled bleakly. ‘It wasn’t our brightest moment. But it is a policy that has already been acted upon and there is no turning back.’
‘To be fair,’ said the general, ‘it is based on a principle of solid military strategy that has served leaders through the centuries: the enemy of your enemy is your friend.’
The DCI explained the policy in detail, including what had already been done.
The President’s face turned white.
Catesby wanted out. The war in Vietnam was the final straw. He found it impossible to work with his American intelligence colleagues. But to be fair, some of them secretly agreed with Catesby’s anti-war views.
Catesby’s first act of defiance was to write articles under a pseudonym condemning the US war in Vietnam as a crime against humanity. He was careful not to give away any classified secrets – Catesby didn’t want to go to prison – but he didn’t mind if his bosses found out that he was the author. His anonymous journalism could be construed as gross misconduct – and Catesby wanted to get sacked while he was still young enough to start another career. But instead of sacking him, they promoted him. The message was clear: once a spy, always a spy. Catesby had become a member of a priesthood that protected and tolerated its members – even if you were completely off the rails and outrageous. Guy Burgess had proved that. In fact, Burgess, Maclean and Philby had never been sacked. The only way they managed to get out of the business was by defecting to Moscow. And Catesby wasn’t going to do that.
In the end, Catesby decided to accept his situation because there was nothing he could do to change it. If, say, he turned up at the next JIC meeting wearing a Red Army uniform and shouting anti-capitalist slogans, he wouldn’t be dismissed. It would be assumed that he had had a nervous breakdown owing to pressure of work. He would be given time off to recover. In any case, Catesby also began to realise that his ideas did matter and that he had greater influence as a respected spy than he would as a journalist or lecturer.
10 Downing Street: July, 1967
In the end, Catesby didn’t turn up at JIC wearing a Red Army uniform – just a lounge suit and a tie. The meeting had, in fact, turned into a very awkward one because of the Foreign Secretary and Catesby’s help was needed. The Foreign Secretary was a working-class Londoner who had left school at fifteen to help support his family. He didn’t hide his resentment of those who came from more privileged backgrounds. He also liked a drink. He wasn’t Catesby’s favourite Labour politician, but Catesby was better able to deal with the Foreign Secretary’s aggressive questioning than the other JIC members. The main topic of the JIC was China. The Foreign Secretary was exasperating everyone by asking the same question over and over again. He wanted to know how Washington was likely to react to the growing rift between Moscow and Peking – and he wasn’t satisfied with any of the answers he was getting.
In the end, it was obvious that Catesby was the only person at the JIC meeting who could deal with him. He looked directly at the Foreign Secretary and put a bit of South London into his voice.
‘The Americans don’t even know the difference between a Tankie and a Trot. They only speak their own language and don’t understand that the goons in Moscow Central hate other Communists even more than they hate capitalists. That’s why the Yanks are fucking up in Vietnam – sheer ignorance. I don’t want us to make the same mistakes.’
It seemed at last to be an answer that satisfied the Foreign Secretary. The meeting was able to move on to the next agenda item. The CGS, Chief of the General Staff, coughed assertively and stood up to make his presentation.
Catesby smiled with anticipation. It was fun, like being in a film. The Indian-born field marshal was an upper-class Brit straight out of central casting. He was respected in Whitehall for his implementation of the 1966 Defence White Paper, but even more admired for having played first-class cricket and having been a member of the Egyptian national team as well. He was a fast–medium offspin bowler. Catesby noted the long, strong spin-bowler’s fingers when the CGS uncovered the flip chart for his talk. He also kept an eye on the Foreign Secretary, expecting to see proletarian resentment, but the cabinet minister seemed just as impressed by the field marshal’s cricket credentials as everyone else. Sport is the glue that keeps Britons together.
‘As you know, gentlemen and your ladyship, the People’s Republic of China detonated a hydrogen nuclear bomb on the 17th of June, less than three weeks ago. The remarkable thing about this successful test was the short period of time it took China to advance from fusion to fission. Fusion, of course, is the process that causes an atomic bomb to explode and the far more complex fission process is the way one detonates an H-bomb. A fission device is, as you know, ten to a hundred times more powerful than a fusion device.’ The general flourished a pointer at his chart:
FUSION TO FISSION
France = 105 months
United States = 86 months
Soviet Union = 75 months
United Kingdom = 66 months
People’s Republic of China = 32 months
‘I am sure you realise,’ said the CGS holding his pointer on 32 months, ‘that this is an utterly remarkable technological and scientific achievement.’
Catesby sneaked a glance at Lady Somers. Her face was attentive, but expressionless.
The Foreign Secretary looked at Dick White, as well he might, for the SIS was directly accountable to the Foreign Office. ‘Well, Sir Richard, this is your patch. Can you explain how China managed this?’
Catesby listened with admiration as White spoke intelligently, articulately and informatively for nearly twenty minutes without revealing a single thing. Dick White ended with a master stroke: ‘I am sure this question is also being asked in Washington, Paris and Moscow – and I am also sure that their intelligence services have much more to account for than we do.’
Catesby thought he detected a faint smile on Lady Somers’ face. But he might have been wrong.
Century House, London: July, 1968
The Director looked more tired than Catesby had ever seen him. In fact, everyone looked tired. The move of SIS HQ from Broadway Buildings to Century House, a modern glass tower block in Lambeth, still rankled. It was as if
the intelligence service had been relegated to a lower league and sent across the river. Change and uncertainty were in the air. Catesby had been in his new post, DD-R/Eur – Deputy Director Requirements Europe – for less than a month. It was a big promotion, but Catesby was already missing the dangerous and less well-paid life of a field officer. A number of his colleagues resented his promotion. They thought Catesby was put in the post as a sop to the Labour government.
‘I’ve asked to see you, William, to share with you something personal – and in some ways painful.’
Catesby was startled. The tone of voice was so unlike the usual cool and reserved manner of Sir Dick White.
‘I’ve handed in my resignation and I will be leaving the Intelligence Service in the near future.’ White looked at Catesby and smiled. ‘No, I haven’t done anything disgraceful – at least nothing they know about. It is simply that I feel it is the time to retire. It’s not public yet. You are only the second person I’ve told.’
‘I will, sir, respect that confidence.’
‘But, William, as you probably have guessed, that is not the only reason I asked to see you.’ White laughed. ‘In fact, you might not even be here for my leaving party.’
Catesby smiled. Beneath his mild exterior, White had a wicked sense of humour. ‘Am I being sacked?’
‘Of course not, William, but you are being reassigned on temporary duty to R/FE.’
‘Asia?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Somewhere warm?’
‘Very warm. You’re going to Vietnam.’
It was Catesby’s turn to laugh, but he didn’t. He knew it wasn’t a joke.
‘I suppose I’d better fill you in and give you some background.’ White opened a file on his desk that contained photos and documents. ‘By the way, you’ll need to get fitted with a disguise and a false passport or two. You’re going undercover.’
‘I will, Sir Richard, refuse this assignment if it involves helping the Americans in any way in their ghastly and immoral war.’
The Whitehall Mandarin Page 23
