A Clever Agent’: Notes From ‘Watchers’ Of Spy Kim Philby Made Public For First Time

Vanessa Thorpe at the British newspaper the Guardian reports on a new exhibition at the National Archives in London that reveals the extent of the MI5 operation to expose the British double agent and traitor Kim Philby.

Secret surveillance of Britain’s ­notorious double agent, Kim Philby, made public for the first time in archived documents, reveals how keenly the Security Service wanted to confirm or disprove early suspicions of his high-level treachery. 

In daily bulletins submitted to MI5 in November 1951, undercover operatives describe how Philby, codenamed Peach, moved about London.

They said he gave “no outward sign of being either nervous or on the alert, but your well trained man should not do so; every movement is natural – again as it should be”.

The notes, from official ­“watchers” who were tailing Philby and bugging his phone, raise a key question about how the arch-traitor eventually escaped justice: did the British establishment deliberately protect him, or simply hope to avoid a public scandal? Mark Dunton, of the National Archives, believes the ­documents, which go on display in the ­exhibition, “MI5: Official Secrets,” next week at Kew, west London, shed light on one of the most shady ­periods of British ­espionage. 

You can read the rest of the piece via the link below:

‘A clever agent’: notes from ‘watchers’ of spy Kim Philby made public for first time | Kim Philby | The Guardian

You can also read my Counterterrorism magazine piece on Kim Philby via the link below:

Paul Davis On Crime: A Look Back At The Notorious British Double Agent And Traitor Kim Philby

Spy Vs. Spy: Cold War Heats Up In Prime Time

Bill Neveney at USA Today offers a piece on the new espionage shows on TV this season.

TV viewers are increasingly seeing vintage Red — as in spy dramas that hark back to the bad old days of Cold War espionage between the Soviet Union and The West.

BBC America's The Game (Wednesday, 10 p.m. ET/PT), FX's The Americans (returning for a third season in late January) and NBC's Allegiance (Feb. 5, Thursdays at 10 ET/PT) each play the classic spy vs. spy game from a different angle, with the first two set during the Cold War and the third dealing with its remnants in the present day.

Russians are the protagonists in The Americans, the enemies in The Game and a mix of both in Allegiance, with long-deactivated KGB agent Katya (Hope Davis) trying to protect her American family when Russia comes calling after many years with a new assignment.

The Cold War era brings the kind of high stakes that can make for great drama: opposing philosophies, as represented by the Soviet Union vs. such Western nations as the USA and Great Britain, playing nuclear-armed chess. The Game's Brian Cox, who plays an MI5 team leader known as Daddy, remembers the tension of the era, citing 1962's Cuban missile crisis.

"We thought the whole thing was going to blow up," he says. "It was Kennedy meeting Khrushchev head on. That is the background out of which spy paranoia grew."

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/tv/2014/11/02/cold-war-russian-spies-on-the-game-the-americans-allegiance/18251633/

George Smiley Was My Father, Says John Bingham's Daughter

Neil Tweedie at the British newspaper the Telegraph spoke to former MI5 officer John Bingham's daughter Charlotte.

John Bingham, seventh Baron Clanmorris of Newbrook in the County of Mayo, always drank at the bar holding his glass in his left hand, despite being right-handed. The reason was to be found in his right pocket. “He always had a knuckleduster among the change,” explains his daughter, Charlotte.
 
“As a child, I just thought everybody did.”

There was the sword stick, too. And a revolver. And lock picks, for a little light breaking and entering. “I was about five when I found the revolver,” says Miss Bingham. “It was in a chest and my mother said, 'Go and get me this manuscript.’ And I pulled it out and underneath was hidden this gun, and I picked it up – as children do – and said, 'Ah! Look, a gun. What fun.’
 

“I became aware of what he did for a living when I was 18. He told me about this secret life. He would say to my mother, 'I can’t do such and such tonight.’ She’d say, 'Why not?’, and he’d say, 'I’ve got to do a burglary.’ ”
 

John “Jack” Bingham was one of the most effective intelligence officers produced by the security service, MI5, during the Second World War. 

... Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Smiley’s People are successful on page and screen because of their seeming approximation to reality, presenting the secret world as a cynical layman would imagine it to be: shabby, morally ambiguous, an arena in which cruel and ultimately pointless games of life and death are played out. In le Carré’s world, there are few really good guys.
 
Jack Bingham did not concur. Until his death in 1988 he retained an iron belief in the rightness of his cause, the defence of the British way of life. Imperfect it may have been, but it was better than all the rest. The agents Bingham ran in war and peace, fighting firstly fascism and then communism, were to him people of courage and honour, often humble and unselfish, acting for the best of intentions.

Le Carré, believed Bingham, ignored this noble aspect of secret work, seeking to establish moral equivalence between East and West. Jack, who enjoyed a successful subsidiary career as a crime writer, was dismayed by his former colleague’s reworking of history and told him so.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10683288/George-Smiley-was-my-father.html

Note: John Binham is the subject of Michael Jago's book, The Man Who Was George Smiley: The Life of John Bingham.  

Smiley's People: Spy Who Inspired George Smiley Accused John Le Carre Of 'Giving Comfort' To Britain's Enemies

Jasper Copping at the British newspaper the Telelgraph offers another piece on the late MI5 officer John Bingham and his views of spy thriller writer John le Carre.

The man who inspired George Smiley, one of Britain’s most celebrated fictional spies, accused his creator John le Carré of giving “comfort, pleasure and glee” to the country’s Cold War foes in his depiction of the secret service. 
 

John Bingham, who was le Carré’s former mentor in MI5 and model for Smiley, wrote to the author to express himself “puzzled” at what he saw as his disloyalty to the intelligence agencies, in his cynical portrayal of their activities and agents. 
 

Bingham wrote: “You are far from being pro-Soviet or pro-Communist, but I would think the attacks gave comfort and even pleasure and glee in some places.”
 

He added that he had “often been puzzled as to why you have so frequently attacked” the security services, adding “troops don’t normally improve by, in effect, being called a lousy lot of bums, and inefficient or ineffective to boot”. 
 

The letter was written in October 1979, the same month that a television adaptation of le Carré’s Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was broadcast on the BBC, with Alec Guinness starring as Smiley.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10678879/Spy-who-inspired-George-Smiley-accused-John-le-Carre-of-giving-comfort-to-Britains-enemies.html

You can also read an earlier post on Bingham/le Carre via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/03/british-mi5-officer-who-inspired-george.html

Note: John Bingahm is the subject of Michael Jago's book, The Man Who Was George Smiley: The Life of John Bingham.   

John Le Carre On John Bingham And The Inspiration For George Smiley

The British newspaper the Telegraph offers a piece on John le Carre's response to the claim that John Bingham, the MI5 officer le Carre based his character George Smiley on, despised le Carre's portrayal of British spies.

He is one of Britain’s most celebrated of literary characters of the twentieth century - a spymaster who personified the country’s Cold War intelligence battles. 
 

Now, his creator, John le Carré, has shed new light on the inspiration behind George Smiley, and defended himself against accusations that he had "hurt" his former mentor in the secret service, on whom the character was partly based. 
 

The author, who worked for both MI5 and MI6 during the 1950s and 1960s, has written to the Daily Telegraph to respond to accusations in Tuesday's newspaper which claimed that John Bingham, his former boss, had “deplored” the author’s portrayal of the intelligence services. The letter said Bingham had “not been treated as respectfully as he deserved by his protégé”. 
 

That intervention, from Lord Lexden, a Conservative peer and historian had, in turn, been prompted by revelations in last week's Daily Telegraph about Bingham’s achievements during the Second World War.     

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10676670/John-le-Carre-on-the-inspiration-for-George-Smiley.html

You can also read an earlier post on John Bingham via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/03/british-mi5-officer-who-inspired-george.html 

British MI5 Officer Who Inspired George Smiley Character Dispised John Le Carre's Portrayal Of Spies

Kieran Corcoran at the British newspaper the Daily Mail offers a piece on the MI5 officer who reportedly inspired John le Carre's character George Smiley.

A Second World War intelligence agent who inspired fictional spy George Smiley 'hated everything' about how John le Carre portrayed the secret services, it has been claimed. 

John Bingham, an MI5 agent, exposed nazi sympathisers in Britain by convincing them he was a German double agent. After gaining the trust of undercover fascists, he convinced them to reveal secrets which were fed back to the intelligence services. Mr. le Carre, whose works include The Spy Who Came In From The Cold and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, revealed in 1999 that Smiley was inspired by Bingham, who had been his boss at MI5.

 ... But the spy, who went on to become a celebrated author himself, turned on his former colleague and friend Mr le Carre and grew to detest what he wrote about the British intelligence services, it was claimed today.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2572768/British-spy-duped-Nazi-sympathisers-revealing-secrets-WWII-inspired-John-Le-Carr-s-character-George-Smiley-despised-authors-portrayal-spies.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490

You can also read my column on John le Carre and Ian Fleming, Spy Writer Vs. Spy Writer, via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2010/08/spy-writer-vs-spy-writer-john-le-carre.html 

Note: John Bingham is the subject of Michael Jago's book, The Man Who Was Smiley: The Life of John Bingham (Biteback). 

Letter To The Editor: John Bingham, The Wartime Spy Who Never Wanted To Be John Le Carre's Character George Smiley

In response to a piece in the British newspaper the Telegraph about MI5 officer John Bingahm, a reader sent the below letter to the editor:

SIR – John Bingham was one of our most remarkable Second World War spies. The M15 documents that have just been released (“Spy who turned Hitler’s British supporters into unwitting double agents”, report, February 28) show the scale of his achievement in neutralising the espionage of British fascists, who were more widespread than is supposed.
 

This modest hero, who was also the 7th Baron Clanmorris – an Ulster title without property – was not treated as respectfully as he deserved by his protégé, John le Carré, who immortalised him as George Smiley. He was hurt by the portrayal of his secret world in the novels.
 

The author, Bingham once said, “was my friend, but I deplore and hate everything he has done and said against the intelligence services”. No one cared more about his country and its institutions than John Bingham, to whom we owe so much.
 

Lord Lexden
London SW1

You can read the Telegraph piece on John Bingham via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/02/john-bingham-spy-who-turned-hitlers.html

Note: John Binham is also the subject of Michael Jago's book, The Man Who Was Smiley: The Life of John Bingham (Biteback) .

John Bingham: The Spy Who Turned Hitler’s British Supporters Into Unwitting Double Agents

Hayley Dixon at the British newspaper the Telegraph offers a piece on John Bingham.

A “genius” spy who pretended to be a German agent duped British Nazi sympathisers into revealing their secrets during the Second World War, newly released documents show.

The deception by John Bingham, the MI5 agent who partly inspired John le Carré’s character George Smiley, is disclosed in National Archive files released 25 years after his death. He fed the sympathisers’ secrets back to MI5 so it could prepare for acts of sabotage.
 

The documents also show that MI5 drew up plans to issue the sympathisers with badges of the Union flag to be worn in the event of an invasion; supposedly to identify them as friends to the Germans, but, in fact, to enable them to be swiftly rounded up by the police.
 

Prof Christopher Andrew, the former official historian of the Security Service, said: “This is a revelation that, alongside the extremely well known double cross system in which we actively sent false information to the Germans, there was a small but interesting way of preventing accurate information getting to them.”

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-two/10665482/The-spy-who-turned-Hitlers-British-supporters-into-unwitting-double-agents.html

You can also read an earlier post on the late John Bingham and Michael Jago's book on him via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2013/03/journalist-novelist-patriot-spy-john.html 

'Terrorists Are Rubbing Their Hands With Glee': British Intelligence Chief On Edward Snowden's Leaks

The British newspaper the Telegraph offers a piece on the British intelligence chiefs who testified about the damage done by NSA leaker and traitor Edward Snowden.

Britain’s enemies are “rubbing their hands with glee” over the leaking of tactics used by our security services, the nation’s three leading spy chiefs have warned.

Terrorists around the world are already changing their methods because of the disclosures by the Guardian, MPs were told. Al-Qaeda and other fanatics were “lapping up” the exposing of UK spying techniques, which had put operations at risk and caused damage that would last for years, the leaders said.
 

The GCHQ files were stolen from the US National Security Agency (NSA) by a former CIA contractor, Edward Snowden, and exposed in the Guardian.
 

The warnings were made during a historic parliamentary hearing in which the heads of the three spy agencies, MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, gave evidence in public for the first time.

They used the session to attack the ongoing Guardian and Snowden revelations, adding that their job was now “far, far harder” than it was five months ago.

You can read the rest of the piece and watch a video clip via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/10434196/Terrorists-are-rubbing-their-hands-with-glee-after-Edward-Snowden-leaks.html

Journalist, Novelist, Patriot, Spy: The Life of John Bingham, Role Model For John Le Carre's George Smiley

Stella Rimington, the former director of the British security service MI5, reviewed Michael Jago's biography of John Bingham for the Spectator.

John Bingham joined MI5 before the war from Fleet Street, recruited by Maxwell Knight, a maverick but brilliant agent runner. Bingham worked on the Double X operations then, when the Service cut its staff after the war, took a post in the Allied Control Council in Hanover, trying to detect Soviet infiltrators among the flood of refugees seeking asylum in the Western zone. It was an experience which convinced him of the fragility of the security of Western Europe.

In 1950, at a time of increased focus on communism and Soviet espionage, following some sensational spy cases, the Service was recruiting again and Bingham rejoined. It was then that he began his parallel career as a crime writer, with the publication in 1952 of his first, partly autobiographical, novel, My Name is Michael Sibley.

When the much younger David Cornwell joined MI5 in 1958, Bingham became his professional mentor and also helped start him on his writing career by introducing him to his literary agent. Bingham’s son Simon records that Cornwell’s pen name, Le Carré, came from the office nickname for his father, ‘The Square’. In a radio interview in 1999 Cornwell revealed that Bingham was a model for Smiley, though in the following year, in an introduction for the re-publication of some of Bingham’s early novels, he says that Bingham was one of two men who went into the making of George Smiley.

But the John Bingham who emerges from the pages of Michael Jago’s book seems, in everything but appearance, to be about as far from Smiley as you could get. Certainly F4, with its nurturing relationship with its agents, many of whom worked for the Service for years and ended with a pension, was a very different place from the nuanced, ethically ambiguous world of Smiley and his colleagues. Le Carré wrote that Bingham felt betrayed by his cynical portrayal of the intelligence services. Bingham himself went on to write a considerable number of successful crime stories, but though he carried on writing until his old age, he never achieved his ambition of producing a spy story to rival the success of Le Carré’s books.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.spectator.co.uk/books/8852241/journalist-novelist-patriot-spy/

World Faces An 'Astonishing' Level Of Cyber Threats, Says British MI5 Chief

 

Megan Neal at the New York Daily News reports on warnings of cyber threats.

The West faces an "astonishing" threat of cyberattack and cyberespionage, the British spy chief said Monday.

Thousands of hackers in underground, organized cybercrime networks are targeting businesses, universities and government data.

And the threat isn't only from criminals. Government-sponsored cyber-spying is widespread is certain countries - China chief among them, ABC News reported.

"The extent of what is going on is astonishing," said Jonathan Evans, director general of Britain's MI5, in a speech to financial executives in London Monday. It was his first public address in two years.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/world-faces-astonishing-level-cyber-threats-spy-chief-article-1.1102597

A Look Back At British Spy Scandals: Britain's Biggest Ever Traitor, Red Sonia, Christine Keeler And The Final, Damning Evidence

Chapman Pincher, the author of Treachery, writes about past British spy scandals involving "Red Sonia," Christine Keeler (seen in the above photo), and his suspicions about MI5 officer Roger Hollis in the British newspaper The Daily Mail.

You can read the newspaper story via the below link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1384646/Red-Sonia-Christine-Keeler-final-damning-evidence-Britains-biggest-traitor.html 

From Russia With Love: Suspected Russian Spy Was Cold, Aloof and Wore Short Skirts

Ekaterina Zatuliveter, the Russian aide to a British member of Parliment that the British Security Service MI5 suspects is a spy and "honey trap," was cold, aloof and wore short skirts, according to a co-worker.

You can read about the British spy scandal in the British newspaper The Telegraph via the below link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/8194373/Russian-spy-was-cold-aloof-and-wore-short-skirts-says-ex-colleague.html

Sex, Blackmail and Bribery: Soviet Spies' Trade is Treachery, MI5's 1960s-Era Booklet Warns

The British newspaper The Daily Mail reports that an MI5 booklet, originally created in the 1960s to warn British citizens traveling behind the Iron Curtain about the techniques Soviet spies use to ensnare them into espionage, is finally being released to the general public.

In Their Trade is Treachery, sex, blackmail and bribery were listed as some of the espionage techniques used by the Soviets. The 59-page booklet was produced by MI5, the British security service, at the time of the "Profumo Affair."

The scandal involved a call girl, Christine Keeler (seen in above photo), who was discovered to be the mistress of both a Soviet spy and John Profumo, the British Secretary of State for War.

You can read the Daily Mail piece via the below link:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1259649/MI5-guide-tricks-Cold-War-59-page-booklet-drawn-1963-published-the-time.html