The Defence of the Realm

Summary

---

The Defence of the Realm: A History of MI5

LSE Public Lecture, October 15, 2009
Speaker: Professor Christopher Andrew
Host/Chair: LSE Film and Audio Team (Arne Westad and colleagues)

---

Overview

This episode features Professor Christopher Andrew discussing his landmark authorized history of MI5, "The Defence of the Realm." In a lively, anecdote-rich lecture followed by a probing Q&A, Andrew journeys through MI5’s 100-year history—from its creation in 1909 to its modern focus on counterterrorism—unpacking what really happens inside Britain's storied domestic intelligence service. He explores MI5’s role in the World Wars, the Cold War, its surprising history regarding gender and recruitment, and its evolving response to new threats like Islamist terrorism. Throughout, Andrew offers frank reflections on the myths, successes, and failures of MI5, and the ongoing importance of understanding intelligence in British—and international—history.

---

Main Themes

• The origins, functions, and evolution of MI5
• Wartime espionage, double agents, and the roots of British deception operations
• Myths and realities around MI5’s reputation (e.g., the "Reds under the bed" era and James Bond culture)
• Gender history within MI5 and early breakthroughs for women
• MI5’s changing priorities, especially the shift to counterterrorism
• The enduring value—and underappreciation—of intelligence history in broader historical analysis

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. MI5 Recruitment, Myths, and Identity

[02:43-08:30]

• Recruitment Cultures: Cambridge’s quirky history of recruiting both spies for Britain and, infamously, Soviet agents; contrast with LSE's "conventional" approach.
• The “Cambridge Five”: The KGB’s top recruits all crossed paths at University College London, debunking dominant Cambridge-only myths.
• James Bond Fiction vs. Reality: MI5 is more bureaucratic than glamorous, but featured some daring real-life agents—like Christopher Draper (the “Mad Major”) who wowed both British and Nazi audiences flying under London bridges.

Quotes:

“Anyone who writes about intelligence is acutely aware that it’s the only profession in which a fictional character is at least 100 times better known than anyone who actually worked for that profession at any time in the past or present.”
—Christopher Andrew, [06:11]

---

2. Double Agents, Deception, and the Art of Espionage

[09:00-19:10]

• The Origins of British Espionage Success: In WWI, MI5's early triumphs included rounding up German spies, which may have saved France from a six-week defeat.
• Key figures such as William Hinchley Cook, whose bilingual skills enabled elaborate undercover work.
• Double-Cross System: The legendary deception campaign against the Nazis in WWII traced roots back to unlikely beginnings (e.g., a pilot’s publicity stunt).

Quotes:

“It is through following Draper’s contacts with German intelligence... that MI5 learns which addresses in Germany to monitor... It is able to turn the best of them around into the so-called double cross system, which I think few nowadays challenge as the most successful deception in the entire history of warfare.”
—Christopher Andrew, [04:53]

---

3. MI5’s Self-Image, Bureaucracy, and Gender Dynamics

[19:11-28:00]

• The Christmas Card Analogy: MI5’s own illustrated holiday card reveals its 1920s self-image—vigilant, patriotic, but reactionary in its view of “subversion”.
• Breaking the Gender ‘Glass Ceiling’: MI5 was pioneering for employing women in responsible roles from WWI (e.g., chief financial planning), long before other government bodies or companies.
• Playfully highlighting mixture of innovation and dated gender attitudes in early MI5, including flirtatious office culture and secretarial advancement.

Quotes:

“The very first place in Britain in which the glass ceiling was broken by women was actually in MI5...”
—Christopher Andrew, [23:29]

---

4. Eccentricity, Creativity, and Influence

[28:01-35:00]

• Colorful Characters: Maxwell Knight, MI5’s “agent runner” moonlighted as a BBC naturalist, kept a parrot, and recruited agents from across the ideological spectrum, exemplifying the eccentric but effective agent-manager stereotype.
• The Power of Ridicule and Creativity: Deceptive communications to German intelligence during WWII often used humor to creative effect.

Quotes:

“You do not embark on a period of deception like [the double cross system] unless you have learned from a previous track record.”
—Christopher Andrew, [06:55]

---

5. Postwar Shifts: The Cold War, Subversion Fears & Modern Terrorism

[35:01-45:00]

• Cold War Myths and Realities:
  • Contradicts popular belief that MI5 was obsessed with Red subversion—actually, government ministers drove much of the paranoia.
  • MI5 sometimes found Communist Party plots more bumbling than formidable, providing reassurance rather than stoking panic.
• Counterterrorism:
  • After WWII, MI5’s main focus shifted through the decades: Jewish militant groups (Irgun), later the IRA, and eventually Islamist terrorism.
  • MI5’s delay in grasping the full dimension of Islamist-inspired threats (e.g., deferred recognition of the seriousness of al-Qaeda cells pre-9/11).

Quotes:

“The idea that weapons of mass destruction will be the only invention in the entire history of the human race not to spread around the world is a proposition so improbable that I really find difficulty in taking it in.”
—Christopher Andrew, [55:46]

---

6. Failures, Learning, and The Importance of Historical Perspective

[45:01-57:00]

• Failures and Oversight: Examples include slow adaptation to the IRA threat in the UK due to unclear division of lead agency roles; later, similar issues in responding to Islamist terrorism.
• Role of Historical Hindsight: Defends the use of “historian’s benefit of hindsight” as vital, not a flaw.
• Critiques policymakers and intelligence agencies for neglecting history, advocating long-term perspective as the essential key to agility and effective strategy.

Quotes:

“Any historian who does not use historical hindsight should be sacked immediately.”
—Christopher Andrew, [54:41]
“The secret of long-term planning is to accept the inevitability of surprise... Take the long-term view—and expect to be surprised.”
—Christopher Andrew, [76:09]

---

7. Q&A Highlights

[47:04–end]

Notable Audience Questions:

• Surprises in the Archive:
  • Biggest surprise was the frequency with which MI5 found the Communist Party more incompetent than threatening ([48:06]).
• On Constraints of Authorized History:
  • Andrew insists he maintained independence, and since MI5 never anticipated these files going public, attempts at sanitization were rare ([54:21], [71:08]).
• The Harold Wilson "Plot":
  • There is no credible evidence MI5 plotted against Labour PM Harold Wilson; conspiracy theories about this are unfounded ([58:52]).
• Response to Islamist Terrorism:
  • MI5 was late in recognizing the seriousness, but “so far as we can see... it’s done pretty well.” Points to Operation Overt as a prevented "British 9/11" ([67:00]).
• Archive Completeness and Doctoring:
  • Extensive records, little evidence of revisionism; archives can’t be easily “doctored” due to process controls ([72:00]).
• Agility vs. Long-Term Planning:
  • Effective intelligence work balances the long view with readiness to improvise in a shifting world ([76:09]).
• On Weapons of Mass Destruction and the Iraq War:
  • MI5 was not responsible for the Iraq WMD intelligence failure, as it is a domestic agency dealing with internal threats ([75:41]).

---

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• On James Bond and Intelligence Myths:

  “Anyone who writes about intelligence is acutely aware that it’s the only profession in which a fictional character is at least 100 times better known than anyone who actually worked for that profession...”
  —Christopher Andrew, [06:11]

• On Eccentric Recruitment and Double Agents:

  “I’d say Cambridge has sent some of its best people into the other side as well. The KGB always regarded [the Cambridge spies] as the ablest group of foreign agents it ever recruited...”
  —Christopher Andrew, [03:03]

• On MI5’s Gender History:

  “The very first place in Britain in which the glass ceiling was broken by women was actually in MI5.”
  —Christopher Andrew, [23:29]

• On Learning from History:

  “Any historian who does not use historical hindsight should be sacked immediately.”
  —Christopher Andrew, [54:41]

• On Facing Islamist Terrorism:

  “The only way to prepare for anything really important is to take a long-term view... There are only two constants in human history over the last 20,000 years. The first one is obviously human nature.”
  —Christopher Andrew, [55:18]

• On Conspiracy Theories about Harold Wilson:

  “There is nothing I can do to help [those who believe there was a plot against Wilson].”
  —Christopher Andrew, [63:10]

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Introduction and Overview [00:00–02:43]
• MI5 Recruitment and the Cambridge Five [02:43–06:11]
• WWI Espionage and Early MI5 Success [06:12–13:20]
• Breaking Gender Barriers [19:10–24:54]
• WWII, Double-Cross System, and Agents like Juan Pujol [24:55–35:00]
• MI5’s Cold War Reputations and Subversion Fear [35:01–45:00]
• Counterterrorism and Rise of Islamist Threat [45:00–47:00]
• Q&A on Surprises, Hindsight, Authorized History, Wilson, and More [47:04–78:10]
• Closing Reflections [78:10–end]

---

Memorable Moments

• Eccentric Employees: Tales of a parrot-owning MI5 officer who doubled as a BBC presenter ([28:01]).
• Ridiculous—but Effective—Deceptions: The “double-cross” operation’s success using agents who sent outlandishly creative (and sometimes hilarious) misinformation ([40:00]).
• Christmas Cards as Self-Image: MI5’s self-concept crystallized in a 1920s Christmas card, complete with “masked Britannia” stabbing “subversion in the back” ([19:11]).
• Historical Insight: The thesis that MI5’s surveillance of the Communist Party mostly reassured governments of their irrelevance, rather than feeding anxiety ([48:03], [51:40]).
• Defending the Role of History: Andrew’s passionate call for more historians (and policymakers) to integrate intelligence into their analyses ([53:01]).

---

Conclusion

Christopher Andrew’s lecture brings MI5’s complex, colorful history to life, exposing the realities behind its public image, celebrating its eccentric and innovative characters, and challenging lingering myths. He underscores how intelligence is inextricably linked to British—and indeed global—history, and why only by shedding the "historical attention span deficit disorder" can one begin to understand the present or prepare for the future.

---

Listen to the episode for the full, spirited recounting and firsthand stories from the “official historian” of MI5.

Transcript

[A]

Good evening everyone. Welcome to this public lecture arranged by LSE Ideas, the LSE's new center for the study of international affairs, diplomacy and strategy. And I'm one of the Ideas directors, together with my dear friend and colleague Professor Michael Cox, who is also in the audience tonight. And it is a particular pleasure for us to introduce Professor Christopher Andrik, who is going to speak to us today on his new book. Chris is professor of Modern and Contemporary History at Cambridge University. He is without any doubt the world's leading scholar of intelligence history. You will know him, many of you will know him as a regular presenter, BBC Radio and from TV documentaries, but he's done several of for myself. His main role of course by far is being President of Corpus Christi College in Cambridge, which is one of my own spiritual homes. Chris has written a number of books on intelligence, on strategic history relating to intelligence in various ways. The Mitrokian Archive, the two volumes that came out some years ago were probably as close as we're ever going to get, at least in my view, to the inner workings of the KGB during the Cold War. And it's also close to done a number of other studies that have had great significance on the use and the abuse of intelligence and secret services in modern history. He has the quite unique distinction of having written the two most important books both on Eastern and Western intelligence during the Cold War. KGB, the Inside Story of Its Foreign Operations From Lenin to Gorbachev, which came out in 1990 with Oleg Gardievsky and for the President's Eyes Only, Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency From Washington to Bush from 1995 and now he has written who Else Could Do It? The official history of the British Security Service, otherwise known as the MI5. The book is entitled the Defense of the Realm, which I take is a reference to the Defense of the Realm act of new 1914, among other things. I'm sure Chris will develop on that further and he takes us through the history of the MI5 from its founding in 1909 through the world wars, through the Cold War and up to today's involvement with counterterrorism and other issues that are plaguing international society at present. It is a great pleasure to introduce you here tonight, Chris. We are very much looking forward to your lecture.

[B]

Right, thank you very much, Arnie. This is the most self serving photograph you're likely to see at any lecture in lse. This is me. What is the reason for that strange expression on my face? And the answer is I am the first person ever to be photographed entering MI5. Why am I looking a bit apprehensive? Because once I get in there, well, I was told they were going to be 400,000 files, so let's just Technically true. What I didn't realize that those on so many people from Cambridge university would have 50 volumes. So actually it's more like several million. I want to make clear that inside MI5 headquarters there are plenty of LSE as well as Cambridge graduates. But LSE and Cambridge have traditionally recruited in rather different ways. LSE has had a more conventional recruitment policy so far as British intelligence is concerned. In other words, LSE recruits tend to join the intelligence services of our own side. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. This is once again a case where Cambridge could learn from the LSE example. But Cambridge has over the years had a more cosmopolitan approach to intelligence recruitment than LSE the KGB always regard. In other words, we have, I'd say recruited, sent some of our best people into the other side as well. The KGB always regarded as the ablest group of foreign agents that it ever recruited, the so called 5, until the KGB saw the most successful of all westerns. In other words, the Magnificent Seven. It was in 1960 and decided to call the best five Cambridge recruit the magnificent five. What my book shows, however, and I hope this will shock those of us here this evening from London University, is that all the Five were recruited to the KGB by a psychology postgraduate at University College London with one of the most remarkable academic records in, in the history of London University. So it was all London's fault, really. Anyone who writes about intelligence is acutely aware that it's the only profession in which a fictional character is at least 100 times better known than anyone who actually worked for that profession at any time in the past or present. And I'm referring of course to James Bond, whose films have been seen and mostly enjoyed by a majority of the world's population. And though that of course is not what MI5 does for most of the time, there have been a few real bonds in MI5 history and here's something that even Bond never tried. There we are. So this was performed by MI5's most daredevil agent of the period before the Second World War. What you see on the screen, or most of the screen, is a perfectly ordinary and indeed boring old black and white photograph of Westminster Bridge. Until, that is, you cast your eye down almost to river level and you see that a plane is about to fly underneath that plane, underneath Westminster Bridge. That plane is piloted by a First World War fighter Ace Christopher Draper, the so called mad Major. This was because he had begun his first World war career before the Royal Air Force had been founded and before it had set up its own ranks. Now let's move on to the next one. There is Draper on the left, there is the Fuhrer on the right, and there are a couple of really boring German fighter aces between the two. But one of the few ways in which a Brit was able to really impress the Fuhrer between the two world wars was by flying repeatedly under all London Bridges. And this is precisely what happened as an isles. Yes, there is something more than anecdotal significance that happened as a result. So because of the Fuhrer's interest in people who could fly under all London bridges, he was actually invited to the Munich Air show shortly before Adolf Hitler became Fuhrer. And he carried on talking to him much like this for about 40 minutes. The two people in the middle, as I think I said, were German fighter aces. When Draper gets back to England, he is asked by German Intelligence, then the Abwehr, to spy on the Royal Air Force, which he immediately agrees to do, stopping only to ask MI5 if that's okay. And MI5 says that that is okay. So he becomes a double agent. Now, one level, this is a fairly trivial story, but it is through following Draper's contacts with German intelligence in the 1930s that MI5 learns which addresses in Germany to monitor. And it's through monitoring those addresses that it discovers those British subjects really are spying for Hitler's Germany. And it's through identifying those that it is able to turn the best of them around into the so called double cross system, which I think few people nowadays challenge is the most successful deception in the entire history of warfare. So you can never tell where flying under London Bridges will lead you to. But of course you don't begin to embark on a period of deception like that unless you have learned from previous track record. So the British success in deceiving the Germans during the Second World War begins in the First World War. And it begins with this man, William William Hinchley cook, the only 20 years of age, the first World War I recruit of MI5. British father, German mother, educated in Germany, bilingual, but spoke English with a German accent. Now, anyone who spoke English with a German accent at the beginning of the First World War tended to have a fairly short survival rate. I mean, even those in London who had dachshunds had a problem. But so in order to get into the War Office business, It was necessary for the first head of MI5 Vernon Kell to actually put on the bottom of his pass. He is an Englishman. Not everyone believed him, but of course he had two other identities. There we are. He was. His other identity was as a German officer. He posed as a POW during the First World War. So far as we know, there isn't a single German POW who suspected that he might not be working for the German side. And then he also had a third identity. There we are. Notice that it's the same photograph that appears on his pass to get into the War Office. He has a pass as an alien enemy alien resident in London, Wilhelm Edouard Koch. And that again is not suspected by any of the German civilian residents in London during the First World War. So what difference does this make? It's part of The British success MI5 success at the beginning of the First World War in identifying and leading to the arrest of all the German spies in Britain. All German spies in Britain of any significance. Now that again sounds like, you know, little technical detail in intelligence history. But it wasn't. How can I put this sensitively? I can't put it sensitively, so I'll simply explain what actually happened. The French had an unfortunate habit of being beaten by the Germans in six weeks. This happened in 1870, this happened in 1940, and it damn well nearly happens in 1914. And as the French version of history, putting this as sensitively as I can, the French were only not beaten in six weeks by the miracle of the Marne. But supposing that the Germans had known where the British Expeditionary Force was going to land at the beginning of the First World War, supposing they had known when it was going to land, well, it would have taken, I think, more than a miracle for the Germans not to repeat their six week victory. So I think this was of importance. There we are, our first leader. He looks pretty boring. But one of the things that I think is quite difficult for students nowadays is to look at old pictures of old British gents and realize that even if they look boring, they could be really quite interesting. Look at this fellow. Who would guess, looking at the first head of MI5, appointed in 1909, that he was the best linguist ever to head any British intelligence agency, and I would dare to say any British government agency. In 1909, when he joined at the age of 36, he had a translator's qualification in Russian, he had a translator's qualification in Chinese, and he could speak all the more boring European, predictable languages as well. Now, this is the image that MI5 had of itself at the end of the First World War. In those days, in this great country of ours, people took real trouble over their Christmas cards. They didn't just go to the nearest charity shop and produce a picture of a robin with a little bit of mistletoe next to it. So you can't probably see it from where you are. But moving away from the microphone, but I'm going to point to the bottom left hand corner where it says EHW inve. This was a period when using the Latin language was supposed to make your Christmas cards stand out from other people's Christmas cards. So EHW in vein it EHW designed this. Who was EHW? He was the deputy head of MI5 and he carried on doing Christmas cards for another 30 years. And in the bottom right hand corner, it's got by him, Shaw. He was the most expensive illustrator in Britain at the time. Now, what does it show? It shows MI5's self image. It had already caught all the German spies, so it was now concerned with catching those people who were engaged in subversion against the British fighting man. Look at that handsome young woman on the right hand side. She is a masked Britannia. She is MI5. How do we know that she is MI5? I'll move away from the microphone just to point out to you her secret. The secret monogram on the bottom of her trident. If ever you see a trident like that, you'll know that you're dealing with somebody from MI5. This is Miroman V. And what is she doing? She is stabbing in the back the loathsome figure of subversion. How do we know there was subversion? Well, many people in the audience are too young to remember what subversion really consisted of, but broadly until the 1970s, it was people with long hair and excessive facial hair. And if you ever saw somebody with that degree of body hair, crikey, you know, they would be bound to go to the lse. Sorry, shouldn't have said that. And what is this loathsome figure about to do? He. Because subversion is always male. Subversion is about to stab in the back the British fighting man who in order to raise his status, is dressed as a Roman officer. So that is the image which I think has pursued MI5 into the cold War. And as I'll say in a moment, I think it's entirely wrong. It's amazing the images from Christmas cards can persist. MI5 during the First World War was mainly composed of men who had some reason, usually patriotic reason, for not fighting on the Western Front or some other theater. In other words, they had had a bit knocked off them, which made it difficult to continue combat. But these were bright gents. They had to have really good languages to get into MI5. So for the first time in British history, they had the idea of having the most intelligent women in Britain work for them. The idea of having the most intelligent women in Britain work with them would have to wait for a few more generations. So where did they get the secretaries from? Well, MI5 did not have direct contact with the appointments services, the career services at any of the Britain's major universities. But so far as women were concerned, in the First World War, they already recruited direct from Royal Holloway, which was then a women's college. They already recruited direct from two of the Oxford women's colleges and they already recruited direct from women's, from the Cheltenham Ladies College. Now, what did this produce? It produced a moment in gender history which only gender historians so blind that they have not bothered to look at. I mean, all the way through British intelligence history, what you find is extraordinary opportunities for people working in other fields which they would have followed up had the word intelligence not been included. So British intelligence, I believe, is the way forward for gender historians. It will certainly lead to more interesting lives for them, I think. So this is a cartoon that is, well, not really a cartoon, but a drawing that was done during the First World War, which shows a typical interaction between a gent who, as you can see, has had various bits knocked off him and is wearing a monocle and looks seriously bemused, and a bright young 20 something from Royal Holloway College. And the caption is, Ms. Thinks she's right now. So this was the first period in British history in which women were able to explain to men in a lot of jobs in MI5, they haven't really got it right, but they understood it. Now, there were two kinds of men in MI5 during the first World War. Those who were outraged that a woman could understand something that they couldn't, and the others who were only too pleased that they, their secretary can understand the accounts, for example. So the financial controller, future financial planning as well as current accounts in MI5 during the first World War, is a woman the first person female to hold that post in British history. Now, it's a long and winding road which leads from that to the appointment in Britain in 1992. Still Stella Rivington, as the first female head of any of the world's major intelligence agencies, but the world's. The first place in Britain in which the glass ceiling was broken by women was actually in MI5. And some point in this century, or possibly the next, there will be some gender historian who finds that worth further investigation. And here's one example. No, that's not the example I was looking at, but let me talk about it anyway. If you have a lot of really bright 20 something old women and a lot of slightly bemused 40, 50 year old gents, you get sometimes a somewhat flirtatious experience. So this is the invitation card to the victory celebrations in MI5. Now, I am myself, for reasons that I won't seek to explain or even to convince you, I am an Honorary Commodore. And if I were to give my cap or any part of my kit to anybody else, I would be in serious breach of Queen's regulations. Now, this secretary had obviously got to know her boss extremely well because she is wearing his cap, she is wearing his tunic, and she's combining this with the shortest skirt available in London at the time. So gender interaction in MI5 at the end of First World War was more seriously exciting than it had ever been in any part of officialdom in British history. And those of the people interested in gender interaction, once again, I suggest that MI5 is a good place to look. So what MI5 still does. I'm not going to respond to any questions which suggest that I may be part of the annual reviews that take part in MI5. I'm not going to deny it, but I can answer no questions except to not deny that I am. And the next one is in a fortnight's time. But it all begins here. I mean, MI5 is actually the first organization in British history. I will be talking about failures, by the way. I really will be talking about talking about failures to identify that one of the things you should look for in new recruits in any form of officialdom is actually a sense of humor. Why? Because we all know it's easier getting on with people who have a sense of humor. But we also know if you were dealing with really, really desperate stuff like Islamist terrorism, for example, unless you have some sense of the ridiculous, you do not actually have the sense of proportion portion which allows you to deal with it. So enough of that. Now here's one example of what could happen. Jane Archer, who, if you look in Philby's memoirs, he identifies as probably the most intelligent British intelligence officer of his generation. Somebody who, slightly older than him, who he believed was the only British intelligence officer, if she was allowed to investigate his copy case, might have worked out who he was. She was recruited in 1916 as a 16 year old secretary direct from school. Here she is in 1924. What has happened over those eight years? She's qualified as a barrister and in those eight years she's become head of the Soviet section in MI5, which was of course the most important section in MI5 because the Soviet Union was the most important threat. So, so what are the gents? There's some very interesting gents as well. Look at this fellow. Quite so. Some of the COVID that has been adopted by MI5 over the years, I think has been brilliant, broadly speaking. Next time you see somebody walking into the old building with a parrot on his shoulder, it could be one of us. Anyway, this is Maxwell Knight, BBC's first TV and radio naturalist. But what viewers and listeners did not know was that from the 1930s to the 1950s, he was MI5's leading agent runner. Visitors to his house in London, as one of them recalled Warden, I quote, exactly, find him nursing a bush baby, feeding a giant toad, raising young cuckoos, or engaging in masculine repartee with a vowel. Experienced gray parrot, that is the parrot. But again, I mean, just of all the disguises that have been adopted by intelligence services over the ages, I think that Maxwell Knight actually had the most unusual one. But anyway, he was the last buccaneer, I think, in service history, MI5 history that I know about. In other words, if you want to do something interesting, he, he didn't ask permission from the Home Secretary, as everybody has done since, but with the assistance of the parrot. The agents that he was running in the 1930s included the Secretary to the Secretary General, the head of the British Communist Party and a series of senior fascist officials. Now, for the most successful of the British, the MI5 agents between, between the wars only have a look on the right hand side. Since he was not married, the left hand side is relevant. This is Putlitz. He was a diplomat in the German Embassy in London in the 1930s. He was run by Klopp Ustinov, the father of Peter Ustinov. And he persuaded as early as 1934, MI5 to read and take seriously something which, unless there's somebody in the audience who knows better, and there may well be, to read and take seriously mein Kampf. Now, MI5 did not take Mein Kampf seriously in a foolish sense. They didn't suppose that it represented any kind of program for what was going to happen. But what they did suppose, and what they repeatedly told Prime Ministers, is that this was the best guide that we had to Hitler's ultimate ambitions. Trying to get through to Neville Chamberlain, particularly at A point during the munich crisis when MI6SIS was saying exactly the opposite thing was very difficult. Neville Chamberlain wrote really supportive comments on the SIS memorandum. He did not write any supportive comments. He did not write any comments at all on MI5 memoranda. So what do you do.

[A]

If you.

[B]

Wish to tell truth to power to a Prime Minister who does not listen? Well, the one thing which British Prime Ministers, and indeed heads of state, head of government all over the world will always pay attention to is if you tell them that their main opponent is insulting them. So Vernon Kell, we saw his picture a little while ago. He was not somebody with an expansive or, or extrovert personality. The only thing that he ever published was a little article, he was a bird watcher on the life of the lapwing. But in 1939, once Neville Chamberlain had refused to listen to him, he wrote a little memorandum telling the Prime Minister that Adolf Hitler repeatedly referred to him as, and I quote, in the interests of sensitive scholarship, an asshole. And then in order to make sure that the Prime Minister knew the exact language which the Fuhrer was using, he used the German word as well. This was passed on to the Prime Minister through the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, who had never heard anybody of his acquaintance used, referred to in that kind of language. So by the time it reached the Prime Minister, and by the way, this is one of those documents which I didn't get from MI5 Archives, which has lain undisturbed in Kew for quite a number of years. Lord Halifax underlined three times in red the word asshole, which I believe is a unique example of telling truths power. Right. Now, I wouldn't necessarily disagree with Hitler's. Well, I won't go into that now. At the beginning of the Second World War, here was the problem. MI5 is a very small organization. Beginning in 1938, it only had 30 officers and 100 other staffs. At the beginning of the Second World War, it suddenly had to expand incredibly rapidly. Now, there weren't an awful lot of places in which you could suddenly expand tremendously rapidly with the exception of this place. That's it. Those of you who have had troubled experiences with the law will immediately recognize this as Wormwood Scrubs. So that that is where MI5 had to move into at the beginning of the Second World War. The female staff may be looking cheerful, but that is because they had forgotten what happened on day one, which is they moved in to the cell so rapidly that the prisoners had forgotten or decided not to empty their chamber pots. That is what life was like for nine months in MI5 at the beginning of the Second World War, they worked in cells and it worked perfectly well until visitors came to see them and then closed the door on the way out. Because, of course, their only handles are the outside, not on the inside. But anyway, they got used to spending the night inside. And then there was the Blitz and they had to move to Blenheim Palace. And that is why one former member of MI5 who remembers this period has accurately summarized it to me as from prison to palace. But as I hope I've already demonstrated, MI5 women were, always have been, still remain, a pretty lively lot. So when they moved into the backwaters of one of the older British universities, I'm referring to Keble College Oxford, they were a bit too lively for Keble College Oxford. No, that's Vernon Kell, just about before he was about to get sacked after 31 years as head of MI5. Winston was wonderful at sacking people. Kell had lasted 31 years, which is the longest that anybody in the 20th century lasted as head of any British government department or agency. But here is the problem that Keble College Oxford had. Yes, that is the problem. You probably can't read it, but I will read it out. Dinner time in MI5, as I know, is very lively. These are very lively people. But the problem was that the liveliness in 1940, 41 was such that they were breaking far too much of the crockery. So what you probably can't read, but you will find in my book, and you might just be able to make out, is the reply of MI5 when told that MI5 was breaking 10 times as much much crockery per woman as Keble College students were breaking per man. So the third paragraph reads, this is MI5 really taking offense at what the Bursa was saying at Keble College Oxford. It is difficult to envisage that, amongst other things, our staff have broken 28 large coffee pots, 740 plates of all sorts and 140 dishes of all sorts in the dining room. Unless there has been a free fight. I have read the records of MI5. I don't find it difficult to believe at all. Anyway, let's move on. Yes, that's. He's in the wrong place. That is Juan Pujol, the best British double agent of the Second World War, who would not have been able to achieve what he did without the mad Major. And so this is when he was finally recognized 40 years after the Second World War, 40 years after he had been given. I can't tell the difference between an OBA and an mba, but I know it's one of those. When he was invited in by the Duke of Edinburgh to be congratulated on shortening the Second World War. No, I've not left myself time to talk more about that. That's his MI5 case officer, who, despite being a close friend of Thomas Harris, a close friend of. Of Anthony Blunt, was. I mean, they made a brilliantly successful duo. But why did they make a brilliantly successful duo? I don't want to reduce it simply to a sense of the ridiculous, but the messages that they sent to the Abwehr were ridiculous beyond belief, but they were sent by really creative, ridiculous people. So there's just time to point out one message that was sent by Thomas Harris, who was of course doing it with, even though his name was never mentioned by Juan Pujol immediately after Gabo. Juan Pujol had succeeded in persuading Hitler in person and not simply the high command that the D day landings on 6 June 1945 in Normandy are simply distractions from the real attack which is coming, or put another way is never going to come. In the obvious place, the Calais, the region around Calais, Juan Pujol is awarded the Iron Cross. And he on the personal instructions of Fuhrer. And his reply to the affair is at this moment I am so overcome by emotion that I cannot put my emotions into words. Why could he not put his emotions into words? Because he was rolling around on the floor absolutely helpless with laughter and it was two days before he could talk again with any semblance of credibility. So they had quite a good time filling the Fuhrer. Now we will move on with incredible speed because I'm running out of time. No, we won't do that one. That's the. Except for me to say that this is the most important agent network ever run inside the United Kingdom. It was run by the Abwehr. J in the middle is Garbo. They were all figments of Garbo's imagination. Now this is sinister stuff, folks. It has often been alleged that MI5 during the cold War was obsessed with finding Reds under beds and quite often finding them in beds and tempted to explain to supine governments that there were Reds under all kinds of government beds. And this appears to prove it. If you look at the top you will see it says Sir Roger Hollis. Sir Roger Hollis was for nine years the Director General of. And then down the left hand side it appears to say 18 in the bottom left hand corner. But it actually means 16. There are 16 Labour MPs who are believed to be members of the Communist Party. It's got CP on the bottom left hand side and then on the right hand side it's got possibles nine more. But actually having found that document, what I really discovered is it actually reverses the usual explanation. In other words, it was successive governments who from time to time hyperventilated over and sometimes successive oppositions who hyperventilated over the problems of subversion. So this is not an MI5 document. The reason that it has Sir Roger Hollis at the top and the House of Commons on the right is that on the personal instructions of Hugh Gateskill and George Brown, it was brought by Patrick Gordon Walker, shortly to become Labour Foreign Secretary for a short period. So it's the Labour Party who, since from 1945 right up to the point at which Harold Wilson becomes Labour leader, is preoccupied by the belief that there are communist penetration within Labour benches. Look at the bottom, top left hand corner. MI5 refused to get involved because they just thought that this was silly Labour Party politics and it was not wrong. But it also believed that none of these people were of any serious significance whatever. But it made one serious mistake. Top left hand corner. Those who are sitting in the front two or three rows but I think nobody behind it says W O will O N MP for Morpeth. He had been for the past seven years an agent of the Czechoslovak Intelligence Service. And he so remained until he was prosecuted. His reputation was destroyed, but he got away with it. He was one of three Labour Party MPs who was actually a Soviet bloc agent. Now for something I haven't left myself time to talk about H Davis. No, he wasn't. H. Davis was. Oh, it's another H Davis. No, he was just a bit peculiar. He wasn't an agent. The other two were Bob Edwards and John Stonehouse. John Stonehouse of course was a Minister. And very seriously peculiar. I've not let myself talk about Harold Wilson. The extract in the Times has talked about him. But I'll just say one thing. I mean, I think anybody looking back at the career of Harold Wilson now can reasonably regard as a tragedy. I mean, arguably the most intelligent, the most talented person ever to become peacetime Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. But from the moment that he becomes Prime Minister there's already this tendency towards conspiracy theory. And at the beginning what was reasonable to suppose was that the Conservatives were waiting with far worse profumo cases than Jack Profumo himself and the party which contained Tom Dreiberg for example, as party chairman, had good reason to believe that. So here's just one example and then I'll have to Skip the rest. 1964. I have spoken to, indeed interviewed and quoted in my book one of the Garden girls, Ann Kickle. When, as I hope, she appears fairly soon on television, she will make a particular impression because she will be wearing a dog collar. She is now the Reverend Ann Kickle. Now, only Harold, I think, would have chosen George Wick as in effect, his national security advisor in 1964 with an office in number 10. Why did he choose him? Well, because he was convinced that the Conservatives were out to produce more profumers. So in the first week, Ann Kickle, then one of the Garden girls, in other words, the secretaries, in that nice room overlooking the number 10 garden, there was a large envelope which came down just like other large envelopes sent from other people in number 10 to the prime Minister, except this one had on it, for, I believe, the first time in the history of number 10, not to be opened by any female staff. Of course, they opened it immediately. They drew out a large A4 black and white photograph which showed a gent in public life who they immediately recognized but had never previously seen without his trousers, attempting to undo the stays. This was Edwardian pornography of a woman who they did not recognize. Now to a point as your national security advantage, Pfizer, someone who was later done for curb crawling and who was extremely well known to the vice Squad at the Curzon Hotel, begins to let one into the tragedy that was the Wilson era, which does not take away the extraordinary achievements of the first Ministry. Oh, yes, that's. I'm about to say this is how mi5 kept track of people from Trinity College, Cambridge. But no, this was not the main, the main purpose. This is the first photograph ever publicly revealed of an Observation post by MI5. On the left hand side, you can see photographs of the people it was supposed to check on. These would be mainly Soviet bloc officials and agents. And on the right hand side, somewhat obscured, you can see the blackboard on which they wrote their names. What were they looking at? Well, mainly Soviet bloc intelligence agents, but from time to time they were looking at senior Communist Party officials who were in contact with Soviet agents. And this is the fearful Betty Reid, who was the senior member of the Communist Party, who was in charge of identifying people whose ideological positions were less than correct. You can imagine disputing your ideological position with Betty Reed. Oh, yeah, well, that's just another Soviet defector. Oh, yes, and this is the plans that he revealed for an attack on the North Yorkshire coast, but haven't got time to talk about attacks on the North Yorkshire coast. Wouldn't have worked anyway. Oh, yes. And this is in 1971. The only reason, I mean, the point, the first point at which MI5 began to be able to deal with Soviet intelligence was when it persuaded the Heath government to kick 105 of them out, which is the most that anybody had ever persuaded any government to kick out. So we turned absolutely overnight from being a soft target into a hard target. Oh, yes, this is the levels of fitness which are normally required in MI5. But I put them there partly because I forgot what picture I put there. But these are one of the rare occasions in which the MI5 cricket team against a team two secret dimension, for example, but not necessarily MI6 scored an unbroken 100 partnership. And the man in the back with the long hair and looking a little bit subversive, later became the first Cambridge PhD to become director general of MI5. That's Stephen Lander, who had the idea of doing the book that I, I have just written, and Sir Patrick Walker also, who engaged in this unbroken hundred partnership, also became head of MI5. It's difficult now, you know, in a period when cricketing analogies are no longer used and when people who never played baseball and don't understand it, talking about getting first base, to remember how much the English language has been impossible by the absence of phrases like keeping a straight bat. But these are the kind of phrases that we used for better or for worse, I would say better in MI5 right now. I've left myself very little time, so all that I have time to do is to change your views, which I think I can do, hope I can do in only five minutes. But MI5 has dealt with counterterrorism. I mean, there's this absurd idea. It's somehow been preoccupied by the fact that Muslims are subversive. Not all. I mean, the first terrorists that MI5 became obsessed by were Menachem Begin, Irgun and the Stern Gang immediately after the Second World War. What is not generally known is that after blowing up the headquarters in Jerusalem of the British Mandate, in other words, the King David Hotel, and then blowing up, halfway to London, the British Embassy in Rome, this woman, Betty Knut, actually planted a bomb of equal size in Whitehall, but she failed to do the priming mechanism, so it failed to go off. Then another thing which is not realized, MI5, for historical reasons, which I have not let myself talk about, did not actually have the lead role against the Iraq in the mainland of the United Kingdom until 1992. This is why the biggest operation it ever had against the IRA until 1992, not in the British mainland, it's actually in Gibraltar. And this is Siobhan O. Hammond, who was preferring an attack on a very soft target which would undoubtedly have succeeded had she not, as you can see been under surveillance. And she didn't believe in wearing inconspicuous clothing or inconspicuous hairstyle as you can see. So that's the target, the British garrison in Gibraltar. And that is one of the days that she was in Gibraltar. The map that was taken by MI5 surveillance branch A4 where she went, she was respected as someone who believed in the righteousness of her homicidal cause. So on the top left hand side you can see the Roman Catholic cathedral where she went to light a candle and to say a prayer. Now I've just left myself time to move up to the 21st century. MI5 took too long in my judgment to realize that the main threat for the 21st century is going to be holy terror. Why? Because it didn't read Bruce Hoffman who took a long view, which is of course nothing that any banker in the city of London did until about a couple of years ago. So it's not a unique problem. But Bruce worked out by the middle of the 1990s the problem of the 21st century was going to be holy terror, holy Islamist terror. What is not realized is that the first Al Qaeda attempt to create a British bomb factory was actually a year before 9 11. This is the man, Moynoul Abedin, who claimed when he was brought to court that he was just trying to set up a fireworks business, but failed to convince the jury, although God knows some juries would have been convinced by it. This is the first really major attack after 9 11. This is Operation Crevice. On the right hand side is the British Islamist leader Omar Khayyam who couldn't work out the bomb detonator, the electronic bomb detonators. He needed to destroy London clubs and shopping centers. So had to call in the Canadian Mohammed Mohim Khawaja, who was also serving a very long term in prison at the time in the hope that he could get those detonators off him. They are the past, this is the future. This is Diran Barrett who, who as you see is called field study, that was the code name at the time. His ultimate ambition was to explode a radioactive dirty bomb in the center of London. Now without being Too scary about it. There are only two possibilities. One, that nobody will try that again, which is improbable given that Osama Bin Laden, one of the great blasphemers of modern times. Times Declared the religious duty of Islamists. Well, he just said Muslims, but of course he meant Islamists to gain the ability to use weapons of mass destruction against Jews and crusaders with the crusaders. So there are only two possibilities. He will be the last person to do it or he won't be the last person to do it. To do it. Well, he won't be the last person to do it. He is the future. What can we learn about past experience? Well, this is very self serving. In order to persuade colleagues in Cambridge who don't pay any attention to history that they should pay attention to history, I've invented an acronym which I make no excuse for using this evening. It's Hans A.J. s d historical attention Span Deficit Disorder. All those people in the late 20th century who saw the problems of the 21st century most clearly and not a banker amongst them were those who took a long term perspective. Taking a long term perspective about Deir and Barrett gives us an insight, I think into what we will be facing over the next 30 years. Thank you very much.

[A]

Thank you very much Chris for that exciting, spirited overview of the history of the MI5. Before I try to needle Chris with the first question of the evening, let me apologize, speaking of attention deficit, to my colleagues in international history, for not mentioning at the outset that this meeting is a co production between LSE Ideas and the Department of International History. The attention deficit comes from chairing far too many meetings in here today, including one in which the Chinese Embassy was very worried about the potential of egg throwing Tibetans. Chris, on the work, enormous amount of work that's gone into this thousand page, almost 1100 page book. When you did get access to the files and you had a pretty free reign of them and you got into writing and you started leafing through all of this, what was it that surprised you most?

[B]

That's a really difficult question. Is this working?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yes, it is working. Because practically every day I would think, oh, I didn't know that. And then the next day or the day after, I would think, oh, I don't know that either. And so my sense of what really surprised me kept being changed. I think that looking at it at strategic level, it was what I hinted at but like everything that I said, didn't leave myself time to develop the fact that those people in official positions who were really exercised by Subversion was not actually MI5, but it was the government. And the second thing that surprised me, because this happens repeatedly year after year after year. In other words, it's not just a single surprise. And that the real effect of listening in to the leadership of the British Communist Party for most of the Cold War is actually to calm people down in government. Why not always? Because the appalling election rigging of the electoral trades unions elections, not simply the those in the 1950s and so on. I mean, this is really serious stuff. But what does one really. What did the government really learn? They just learned how incompetent and irrelevant the British Communist Party was at a political level, not at an industrial level, but at a political level. And then secondly, the other thing that I think I learned is the effect that it had on British decolonization. You know, I think if I left myself time for another conclusion, it would have been, but I hope it was implicit in what I had to say, that the intelligence dimension of British history has an importance which stretches far beyond those who have some kind of specialized interest in intelligence. The mere idea of writing subjects as apparently remote from intelligence as gender history or decolonization without mentioning the role of MI5 doesn't strike me as very sensible. On the other hand, there's a whole generation of graduate students who are only too grateful that their elders, but not necessarily betters, did not do this, because, of course, the gaps of one generation provide the main research opportunities for the next generation. But let me give one example. There is. If he's in the audience, I won't recognize him and therefore he'll forgive me for describing his next book. This is Calder Walton's book on British intelligence and decolonization is absolutely brilliant. That's a relatively restrained description. I can imagine reviewers going some way beyond that. So what happens when the British government is confronted by MI5 with what it's listening to, to, for example, on Jomo Kenyatta. Well, Jomo Kenyatta looked fairly suspicious even before Mama, because he was known to have gone to the Lenin School in Moscow. He was known to have been taught the black arts of various kinds. But what was not known was his response to his experience in Moscow, which was essentially to decide that he didn't want anything to do with it again. So here's a characteristic conversation which I believe to be true. While he was in Moscow in the early 1930s and becoming extremely alienated from life in Moscow, the brilliant young black Secretary General of the South African Communist Party said to him, you're just a Pretty bourgeois. To which Jomo Kenyatta said, not so much of the petty bourgeois. Call me a big bourgeois. Now, when the British government was able to hear the leadership of the British Communist Party saying, after all we have done for Jomo Kenyatta, after all we have done for Kwame Nkrumah, look at what they're saying now. This was deeply reassuring. So if the British government had not had access to what the comrades were saying in King street, they might actually have believed that the British Communist Party represented some kind of threat at anything other than an industrial level. So I think it was the reversal of the normal interpretation of the obsession with subversion. And then secondly, the way that the most frequent intelligence produced by MI5 during the Cold War, listening in to the comrades, actually was deeply reassuring to successive British governments, Labour and Conservative.

[A]

There's one thing that has struck me, Chris, I've been editing for the last few years, Cambridge History of the Cold War, in which Chris has the overall chapter on intelligence. How much that still needs to be done on incorporating intelligence history into general history of international affairs. And Chris and other people working with him have taken the first steps on doing that. But there's still really a lot that must be done. Other questions from the audience. Yes, over in the corner. We start over there.

[B]

Dame Stella's levelled the charge against you. Okay. Dame Stella's leveled the charge against you of what might be called HBHS historians benefit of hindsight so syndrome that she thinks taken slight umbrage. She seems to be slightly riled in her review in the FT about your very mild criticism about MI5 being slow to see the coming men on Islamist terrorism. I mean, did you feel at all. I mean, it's fairly mild, but did you feel at all constrained by the fact that this was an authorized history of MI5? I mean, you had to be vetted, you're recruited in, whether that was in an honorary capacity or whatever. Did you feel constrained not just in what you could write, but in the judgments that you actually made and the conclusions you came to?

[A]

Very good. We'll take one more question over in that corner. Yes, the lady right in front there.

[B]

You say MI5 were not prepared for Islamic terrorism. And if Deir and Barrett is the Future, how are MI5 preparing for that future as a long term strategy?

[A]

Chris? Right.

[B]

To respond to those two questions, any historian who does not use historical hindsight should be sacked immediately. That is the first thing that I would say. Otherwise, I think I haven't yet read the review. I haven't had time to read the review. But Stella Remington, in all kinds of ways, I thought, was rather an effective head of Mi5, with the single exception of her failure to use historical hindsight. So far as how MI5 is preparing, I would like to say how I think it is preparing. The only way to prepare for anything really important is to take a long term view. Now let me take a long term view which I've got from colleagues who historical span and whose anthropological and archaeological span go far further back than mine, subject to anything that anyone knows here tonight. I think There are only two constants in human history over the last 20,000 years. The first one is obviously human nature. I mean, there is no credible evidence known to me or known, credible evidence known to archaeologists and prehistorians to whom I've spoken, that human nature has changed at all. So in other words, the idea that 21st century would be the first century without Hitler's, without Pol Pots, without Joseph Stalin's, without Mao Zedongs. Ah, rubbish. The great advance of the 21st century, however, is that they no longer have much chance for the foreseeable future becoming the heads of state. But there is still going to be that minority of fanatics as they've always been every previous century, who believe that the correct response to dealing with people who think differently to them is as much extermination as they can manage. The only other continent I can think of over the last 20,000 years is that all human inventions, without any exception, without any possible exception, have spread around the world. Now the idea that weapons of mass destruction will be the only invention in the entire history of the human race not to spread around the world is a proposition that is so improbable that I really find real difficulty in taking it in. So what should MI5 be doing to recognize the inevitability of these long term trends? I'm talking for myself and slowing them down as far as possible. And then of course, the only ultimate solution, as with global warming, is for a technological breakthrough which will change the balance of power. But you don't deal with any serious problem by denial, which is the way that Neville Chamberlain attempted to deal with Adolf Hitler. You deal with any incredibly intractable problem by recognizing that it exists. And before you find the solution, what can you do? You slow it down. And then you try and slow it down for as long as it's necessary to find a more radical solution. So if I were asked to give MI5 advice, that is the advice I would give. Yes, no, I've answered both questions sort.

[A]

Of yes, other questions. There's one at the back over there. Keep your answer so I can see them. Yes, sir. I'll turn to the people upstairs a little while. Yeah, please.

[B]

David Lee in his Guardian review on Saturday, basically he was of course who wrote the Wilson plot 20 years ago. Well, I'm just saying he says in his review that you kind of imply that there was indeed a MI5 factual plotting against Harold Wilson without actually saying so. So just interesting your, you know, your comments on what you thought David Lee was saying about obviously about you and what you wrote about the Wilson issue.

[A]

Thank you. Another question down here. Yes, over here on the side. Just wait for the microphone please.

[B]

Yeah, just curious as to your view on the Mussolini revelation of earlier this week.

[A]

Sorry, the Mussolini revelation.

[B]

Oh yes, yeah, have a talk about Mussolini. So Harold Wilson and Mussolini are an interestingly diversified pair. Old conspiracy theories never die. The ones about Harold Wilson don't even die away. It is perfectly true that I don't say that there was a Harold Wilson plot. It is actually true to say that there was not a Harold Wilson Wilson plot. On the other hand, those people who've regarded it as an article of faith for about 20 or 30 years do not find that a comfortable message. But you know, if anybody in the audience thinks that there is any credible evidence that there was plot against Harold Wilson a I would be surprised. But please now, now declare it. I mean the only credible source is, or the least incredible source is Peter Wright. Peter Wright, who by the way, I hope the book demonstrates simply fabricated evidence. You know, if one was looking for the most unreliable first hand witness in the entire history of British intelligence intelligence, I don't know why one would look other than at Peter Wright. But you know, when he first produced his book in 1997, it had an extraordinary impact. But what I hope that I have shown is that he fabricated evidence. He was the least popular person in MI5. The mere suggestion that he get anybody else in MI5 took plot with him against anything is so deeply improbable that I'm not even sure that David Lee has suggested that. What does he say? Even in his memoirs he says that during his final few years and he actually resigned from MI5 or rather retired from MI5 at exactly the same time as Harold, poor Harold had finally had enough and retired. He said he was simply going through the motions. Well folks, if you are becoming the first in intelligence officer in British history to plot against a British Prime Minister, you have to do a little bit more than going through the motions. And also you have to have some proven capacity for persuading somebody else to agree with you. So you know, there are still people who believe that aliens have landed in the United States. There are still a huge proportion of Americans who believe that 911 was a plot that was orchestrated by the CIA and Mossad. And there's still people who believe that there was a plot against Harold Wilson. There is nothing I can do to help them. Mussolini. Yes, well, MI5 made a few bad decisions. And who was the person who made the most bad decisions? Yes, it was the future Foreign Secret Secretary who was the head of the MI5, in effect MI6 station in Italy at the end of the First World War. And what my colleague Peter Martland says is in the Guardian and elsewhere is absolutely right and you will find it in smaller detail in the book. The. The idea that Italy might change sides, absurd though it may now seem, was regarded as credible at the time. And he was paid the preposterous amount of £100 a week to try and persuade Italians to do something which they were never going to do, that is to say, start fighting seriously on the side of Germany. But he managed to, after all, over the next 10 years to Fool a lot of Italians. So it's not too surprising that he should have managed to fool the future Lord Templewood. Anyway, what has been published recently about Mussolini as Holy Rite, what has been produced published in the Guardian. I will give just one other example. The most original review of my book that I've seen is the Reduced. The Reduced History. What's it called? The Reduced Something of my book in the Guardian. It was absolutely brilliant. It was complete nonsense. Now I've been having difficult. Of course it's complete nonsense, it's meant to be funny, it's meant to be witty. But there are parts of the Guardian in which a sense of humor disappeared about 30 years ago. And so there is a fine young person in the Guardian. She could be a fine old person for all I know. Who's been asking me for the last two days to comment on readers objections to things, for example, which suggest that but for MI5 they would have been. If MI5 had been listened to, there would have been no Second World War. And anyway, Jack Jones was not a Martian and all this kind of stuff. I have been attempting to say to her that this was meant as a joke, the reduced version of books in the Guardian, these are meant to be witty. And she says, she sends to me emails which say, look, this is what it says and you were the Author of the book, so please correct it. I reply, I didn't write the reduced history. I think it was rather funny, I think it was wholly ludicrous. But. And then she says, no, Guardian readers have been writing in emailing in to say whether it is really true that this, that and the other. So watch this space. I have written an entirely humorless response for tomorrow which says that. Oh, anyway, so Mussolini, absolutely right. Harold Wilson conspiracy theory, ludicrously wrong.

[A]

So in other words, we have to look at the client to get the next version of the story, the authorized version of the story. Questions from upstairs, anyone?

[B]

They are leaving.

[A]

Are there so questions down here? Yes.

[B]

Hi.

[A]

I wanted to know how you would.

[B]

Assess the current government's response to Islamic terrorism.

[A]

How would you do that?

[B]

Yeah, how do I assess the government's response to current Islamist terrorism? Well, it's a bit late. I mean, again, I hope that one of the answers that come across from the book is that Western culture, not simply MI5. But I'm not seeking to let MI5 off the hook where it's got things wrong, it's by not taking the long term view. I will answer the question, but without understanding why it got things so wrong about the ira, I think it's not credible to understand why it got things initially so wrong about Islamist terrorism. Now, in the whole of the MI5 archives I have not found for the 1970s may be there, but I've looked at quite a lot. I've not found a single document which looks at what happened in the previous troubles. In other words, between the Easter Rising and the establishment of the free State in 1922, what did happen? British military intelligence didn't put its act together, didn't particularly put its act together with police intelligence. And nobody worked out whether the metropolitan intelligence agencies, in particular MI5 and MI6 should play a role. What happened in the 1970s? Exactly the same thing. Now, one of the supreme examples of the historical platitude which like most historical platitudes is correct, is that those who do not understand past mistakes are doomed to repeat them. Happens in Ireland in the 1970s. Now in the 1990s, some people got it right, but they were people outside government in the United States and in Britain who took a long term view. Bruce Hoffman, look what he was saying in articles in 1995, let alone in his book Inside Terrorism in 1998, he accurately identified what he called holy terror, which is what he meant. Islamist terror as the problem of the early 21st century. The problem was that people in government and in intelligence agencies dealing with day to day problems didn't have the time to say, look, why don't I take a couple of months off and reproduce Hoffman. But I would say that even though it took longer than it should, that it was, for example, not until 2003 that MI5 grasped that the Islamist terrorist threat in Britain was actually directed against British targets and not simply or mainly at overseas target. Since then, so far as we can see, which is of course not 100%, it's done pretty well. Now let us take what happened last month. Last month was the most important terrorist trial by absolutely none in the whole of British history. What was it? It was the operation Overt trial. It was the plot by a series of Islamist terrorists three years ago which have disturbed travels ever since, to plant bombs with suicide bombers on seven flights which were taking off from Heathrow to North American cities, five of them American, two of them Canadian in a three hour period and with perfectly credible ways of destroying them. Now if that had happened, and I think the prosecution was entirely correct in what it said, that would have been British 9 11. And if some of the explosions had taken place over North American cities, it would have actually been worse than 9 11. It's only in 10 years time that we will know how successful the British government in MI5 has been. Because it's entirely possible that there are other Islamist plots which have not been detected which might turn out to be even worse. Well, the evidence known to us, yeah, the reason why there are only two possible reasons why there's not been a British 9 11, there was alas, a British 7 7. But the only two possible reasons, that is Osama bin Laden and his fellow travelers decided they wouldn't bother to do it. And the other is that they did decide to do it and they failed to do it. And part of the reason, the second is obviously right and part of the reason why they failed to do it is that MI5 was actually working, as far as I can see, fairly well done here.

[A]

Why don't you go first and then we'll take the gentleman on.

[B]

Thank you very much. Just a very quick question. You mentioned MI5 were involved in investigating the IRA campaign in Gibraltar, but what about the IRA campaign campaign in Germany? Were they also involved in investigating that and were they also responsible for the Irish Republic or not? Which leads me to the question, if they were, why were they so weak? They missed the assassination of the British Ambassador, they missed Mountbatten plot. So any sort of explanations for that?

[A]

Yes, I'll turn to you next, Professor.

[B]

You mean, luckily I have to get an assist. Oh, sorry, professor. You've been lucky enough to get access to the archive in a way that probably the majority of us won't ever. And I'm wondering, given that, I'm wondering.

[A]

What your views are on the archive itself in terms of what you think.

[B]

Material stays in, what gets left out in terms of the processes by which those materials actually get filtered and put.

[A]

Into the archive, and how that process that MI5 itself goes through shapes the kinds of responses and histories that you are actually capable of producing in the first place. Very good. Another question down here.

[B]

Yes. Can I just possibly have your views on why the British MI5 and the CIA got it intelligence so fundamentally wrong regarding the weapons of mass destruction that led to the Iraq War and all, obviously, what's happening in Afghanistan now? Yep. Zafi, three challenging and interesting questions. The ira. Well, one of the historical eccentricities in Britain, I mean, the main failure of British counterintelligence policy, it was the government organization of counterterrorism, was, I think, phrase, ludicrously wrong fits. The problem was that the Security Service MI5 during the 1970s and 1980s, had the lead intelligence role against all threats to the United Kingdom, with one exception. Just happened to be the only exception that mattered, that it was IRA within the United Kingdom. So the Special Branch had the lead role until 1992 against IRA terrorist threats in the United Kingdom. Within Northern Ireland, it was the Special Branch of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, which has since changed its name. Until 2007. It wasn't till 2007 that MI5 got the lead role. So, yes, so far as the question about Germany is concerned, MI5 did have the lead lead role against the IRA in Germany, which, whether because of MI5 or not, was ludicrously as opposed to simply, mildly, foolishly unsuccessful it. In the end, it ended up by killing more innocent victims which it hadn't targeted, than those which it did. The Irish Republic is, of course, a foreign country and therefore comes under MI6, the MI5 archives. Well, one of the great things about MI5 archives, as opposed to what stays in, is that it never occurred to anybody in MI5 that the kind of archives that I've seen would be seen by anybody else. They are arranged in such a way that you cannot make a change in any of the MI5 archives without it being recorded in the archives. Furthermore, I've had unlimited ability to talk to former members of the service. The sentence that I always love is, of course, this was not written down. The MI5 archives look pretty much like the ones that you can now see up to about 50 years ago in the in Kew. But even in Kew, everything that is removed is meticulously recorded. There is no such thing as an MI5. And I've introduce these archives twice a year for the last some years in which the fact that something has been removed is not recorded. So these are not doctored archives. And one of the things that I notice from time to time is that people say it would be very embarrassing if this or that was known. Let me give you one example. In the archives of the mid-1970s it said that, yeah, we must make sure that Whitehall, various parts of Whitehall, do not know that we're only spending 7.5% of our resources on counterterrorism. And this includes both the PFLP and the IRA. This is not doctored stuff. In any case, doctoring 3 million files would require about 3 million people. The MI5 as an ever had that number of people. And as I've been able to ask unpredictably for any particular far as to why MI5 failed to realize the problem of weapons of mass destruction and how far it contributed to the appalling intelligence failure of weapons of mass destruction assessment in Iraq, it never made such a. It is a domestic security service. It's foreign intelligence that deals with issues like that. I mean, you'll find in my book plenty of things that MI5 got wrong. But the idea that he got Iraq wrong. Well, first of all, it would have to break the rules and get involved in Iraq in the first place.

[A]

Yes. Abda, the middle.

[B]

Hi. You've spoken quite a lot about long term planning and how important that is for the security service. Do you feel that there's an issue of agility in that? Although long term planning is a key to agility, there's also short term agility needed. And how does MI5 do that? And if you have any anecdotes as well, that would be quite useful. Thank you.

[A]

You bet. This. Yes.

[B]

Okay. Long term planning. Well, I think the secret of long term planning is to accept the inevitability of surprise. That is. Well, that's one of the things one needs to accept. But let's take the beginning of the First World War and the first 80 years of MI5. Largely its priorities are largely determined by what is on going, going on in the two largest European states, in other words, Russia and Germany. Not things were predictable. The idea that in August 1915, 14 there was anybody who could have predicted that at the end of the First World War, Europe's most authoritarian monarchy would become the world's most revolutionary state. Completely impossible. The idea that the Kaiser's Germany Kaiser seemed pretty solidly established on his front would become a shamblingly incompetent Weimar Republic from which Adolf Hitler would emerge at the age of 43. Having spent three years in a doss house. I've been there in Vienna before the first World War as the most aggressive and popular leader in Europe. One needs to realize that in long term planning there are lots of things that one can't foresee. But that is no excuse for not taking a long term view. And I would say that those people who persuaded me two years ago to move my money to the Cambridge Building Society without realizing that Cambridge. Oh well, anyway, no. Were people who were taking a long term view. So there are two secrets. One, take the long term view and secondly, expect to be surprised. I mean that is what he human experience teaches us. And how do you do this? By being exactly what you described, by being agile. But if you expect to be surprised, you are agile. If you don't expect to be surprised, really whatever profession you are in, it is time to retire.

[A]

There are many lessons to be drawn from this masterful work of history. I would encourage all of you to read it. The two, two lessons that I'm left with after tonight is first and foremost intelligence ought to matter to historians much more than what it does today. And of course we are all looking forward to the day when more historians will get access to more materials that are dealing with intelligence history, not just in this country, but in other countries as well. But perhaps even more important than that lesson is the fact that history, history matters and ultimatter for people who make decisions with regard to intelligence. I think perhaps that one lesson, having looked at parts of the book, is the one that really stands out here. And it is a lesson that is of crucial importance, I think for protecting Britain and protecting Europe in the years to come. It has been a true delight to host you here tonight, Chris. We really enjoyed your lecture. We hope that you will be back here soon.

[B]

Thank you very much.

[A]

It.