(This entry is a summary of a talk given on July 12, 2010 by Nigel West on board Queen Mary 2, headed from New York to Southhampton, UK. Disclaimer: Any errors or omissions in the following are totally my own and should not be attributed to Nigel West.)
What is the real story of the Maclean and Burgess escape?
On May 25, 1951, Maclean and Burgess defected, leaving the U.K.
Maclean’s phones were bugged, and his telephone made permanently live so anything said in the house would be heard. MI5 felt he was bottle up. On his 44th birthday he received a surprise call. An old friend happened by for dinner. Twice during dinner both men went outside to get cool. At the end of the dinner Maclean said that he and “Roger Stiles” were going out. They went to a ferry, departed at midnight, and were last seen in Cherbourg. Immigration spotted Maclean and alerted MI5.
There was panic in MI5 since he was supposed to be picked up on Monday (they left on Sunday). The agent who was to follow Maclean had an expired passport and could not get out of France (Dick White). Maclean’s wife didn’t know they were fleeing and MI5 pretended they knew nothing.
Why did Burgess pretend he was Stiles? Linda was also a Soviet spy. It was not known until Petrov that all of these were spies.
[According to other sources, Linda, Maclean’s wife, decided to be a full-time wife to Maclean. Although never a spy herself, she did not reveal what she did know about her husband’s activities.]
This had an enormous impact on British intelligence. To this day we do not know how they got from Cherbourg to Moscow. Nobody had suspected Burgess, although he was a “bad boy” and was about to be sacked for his antics. It was unthinkable that significant people in the Secret Service could be traitors. Traitors were supposed to be foreigners.
Obviously the Cambridge spies were not quite what they seemed to be. Their careers had been positive in the service. Burgess got promotions in spite of his bouts of drunkenness and his flamboyant life style. Maclean had access to materials that he passed on. Burgess’ brother was an MI5 officer, thus from position and relations Burgess had access to many politicians (also because of his on-and-off again stints at BBC.) He was “plugged ion.” He was even used to operate a secret radio station to broadcast anti-Nazi propaganda. He also worked for MI5. He was not just a middle-level officer.
Anthony Blunt was a friend of Burgess. He was a talent spotter. He studied languages at Cambridge and was fluent in French. He joined MI5 in June 1940. He was very bright, and attracted the attention of the B division of MI5. He was asked to examine the efficiency of the Watcher Service. Blunt reassured the Soviets that the British had no permanent surveillance of the Soviet Embassy in London. Among the things he passed to the Soviets was the closely held operation XXX (“Triplex” This operation is detailed in the book by Nigel West and Oleg Tsarev, Triplex). Blunt was the MI5 officer tasked with retrieving documents from neutral diplomatic pouches.
When it was known that Burgess had disappeared it was Blunt who gave access to Burgess’ flat, and he helped with the search. The search turned up a letter from Philby that nobody had seen. It was under Burgess’ bed in a suitcase full of documents. It was clear some of the material had come from the Foreign Office as early as 1939. A woman in MI5 recognized the handwriting of John Cairncross, who now also became contaminated by Burgess.
Cairncross was cool, denying passing knowingly anything. While at Bletchley Park, however, he stole literally thousands of Enigma transcripts. He actually helped the Soviets to win the Battle of Kursk. Cairncross also was sent to SIS to work for Philby. At that time, Cairncross did not know Philby was a spy, or any other spies as such.
After the war Cairncross worked for the Ministry of Supply to the branch planning Britain’s nuclear power stations. This was highly important to the Soviets. In May, 1951, when the defections occurred he resigned from the Civil Service. He went to the U.S. to teach at Northwestern University. Later he was expelled from the U.S.
The book, Spycatcher (Wright, Peter. Spycatcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer. New York: Viking, 1987) is an accurate book. It is notorious in British circles, since it was a direct challenge to Britain’s Official Secrets Act. The government tried its best to suppress printing of the book.
Mrs. Thatcher, as Prime Minister, was horrified at the lurid details. She stripped Blunt of his honors (knighthood) and his position in 1979.
MI5 tried to find who tipped off Burgess and Maclean. Philby was brought back and questioned. He was sacked in 1951. Blunt was interviewed 13 times. MI5 could not break these people. Blunt lost his KGB protection. He finally admitted passing classified material. He was a long-term spy recruited in Cambridge.
The FBI thought it could help MI5, because they had a source in Washington who said Blunt was recrui8ted at Cambridge. This was Michael Whitney Straight. Straight was a contemporary of Blunt Cambridge and admitted that he had joined the Communist Party while there. He was also a lover of Blunt.
Straight’s background was not fully known by the FBI. He volunteered to the U.S. State Department. He was nominated by President Kennedy to be head of the National Endowment for the Arts. Fearing he would face a security test after the defections in 1951 he went to the FBI, confessed, and fingered Blunt.
In Britain, agent Arthur Martin convinced Blunt to confess. He gave immunity to Blunt to get information on recruitment at Cambridge. He let Blunt know that if he cooperated he would not be prosecuted. Blunt gave a tailored confession in April, 1964.
Philby died in 1988 in Moscow. Burgess died in 1963. He lived a miserable life after going to Moscow where he was badly treated. Soon after arrival he was beaten up by a group of thugs who knocked out half his teeth. He always wore his Eton tie and longed for England. Maclean became part of an East-West think tank and was highly regarded by the Soviets. He was given full military honors after his death in 1983. Blunt also died in 1983.
In 1990 the Soviet defector Oleg Gordievsky claimed that Cairncross was the “Fifth Man.” Cairncross was never charged with any offence. Cairncross worked as a translator for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome. When he retired he went to live in South France. He died in 1995.
In interviews on BBC not long before he died, he claimed it was youthful indiscretion and that he was never a traitor to his country.MI5 wrote a set of total lies about Burgess and Maclean for public consumption.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
29. Defectors
(This entry is a summary of a talk given on July 11, 2010 by Nigel West on board Queen Mary 2, headed from New York to Southhampton, UK. Disclaimer: Any errors or omissions in the following are totally my own and should not be attributed to Nigel West.)
Defectors are individuals who physically switch sides in a conflict and change their allegiance to an adversary. [See West, Nigel (2002). Historical Dictionary of International Intelligence. Lantham, MD: The Scarecrow Press, p. 81] Defectors are usually self-selected.
Firstly, defectors do not usually have the motivation claimed: the sudden declared interest in democratic values is suspect. Second, agencies to which a person defects typically do not believe the defector’s claims, regardless of the “forensic evidence” the agency may claim about the motivation. Third, really good agents recruit themselves. We will sometimes turn them away
Sometimes we are overwhelmed with defectors. They are the best sources of information, and the only really good Humint comes from defectors. Most realize that going back to Russia, or their home countries, would be a disaster. Still, they may have a hard time selling themselves in the West.
Agencies frequently give serious consideration to giving defectors back, as was the case for the first defector from the USSR in December, 1945 in Ottawa. Igor Gouzenko was a cipher clerk for the Soviets. He knew the Rezident, Pavlov and he had good knowledge of the GRU. He brought with him 109 documents including a diary, telegrams, and the names of 23 Soviet spies.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) recognized a gold mine, but didn’t know how to use it. One of the spies named by Gouzenko was set to go to London (code name ERIC). The Brits were interested but couldn’t move. Washington recognized ALECK was a hot case.
First, it appeared that ERIC was a nuclear physicist from Cambridge, and above suspicion. He had worked at Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago. It turned out it could only be Allan Nunn May. He was put under surveillance in London. An MI5 agent, Klop Ustinov (father of the actor Peter Ustinov) was used to meet May. May was tipped off and didn’t show. By February, however, all 23 spies in Canada were arrested. Most of the 23 were convicted, but all but 2 got got their convictions quashed.
Gouzenko alerted the West to huge Soviet espionage efforts. Up till then, nobody had a clue about what the USSR was doing covertly.
In September, 1945 Konstantin Volkov tried to defect in Istanbul. He revealed that Russia was reading the British signals to London. Even better, he offered what was a bombshell. He was a career NKVD officer and knew all NKVD in Turkey, and in virtually all the world. He said there were 9 Soviet spies in London, 3 in the Foreign Office. One, he said, was filling the role as head of the department of British counterintelligence. It was not clear whether he meant SIS or MI5. Volkov would be expensive to take care of but the information he offered was quite valuable.
The British called in Kim Philby to find who the mole could be. He determined to handle it himself. Bu the time Volkov was to meet Philby, there was no sign of Volkov. Apparently he was kidnapped and taken back to Russia. Philby blamed lax security on the British consulate in Istanbul. It is known that Volkov returned to the Soviet Consulate, from whence he quickly disappeared. The last seen of him was a heavily bandaged figure being hustled aboard a Soviet transport plane bound for Moscow.
Volkov’s revelation haunted MI5 and SIS for years. The hunt went on. In 1947 a GRU defector, and by 1954 the flood gates opened. This provided the information for the first time to really understand soviet Intelligence network. After Stalin died, Beria’s coup attempt failed. Those in NKVD who were close allies of Stalin became worried they would be purged and sought asylum.
Yuri Rastvorov defected to the British but opted to go the U.S. to the CIA. He had learned British intelligence had been penetrated. He provided a wealth of information. Then Nicolai Khokhlov, a hit man for the KGB, and a Ukranian who killed with an ingenious gas gun containing prussic acid defected. Prussic acid left no trace within 15 minutes. Khokhlov could identify people in SMERSH. He had a German girlfriend, very devout, who convinced him to quit.
Another defector, Peter S. Deriabin, described by the Central Intelligence Agency as the highest ranking Soviet intelligence officer to have defected to the West up until 1954, provided huge information. He had been a bodyguard for Stalin. He provided information on decision making in the Kremlin. He was the only defector to become a CIA officer. The so-called Penkovsky Papers were actually the material obtained from Deriabin.
There were two more crucially important defectors in Australia, this being the Petrov case. The Petrovs – Vladimir and Evodokia – came to Australia in February 1951 to work in the Soviet Embassy in Canberra. Vladimir was rezident and Evodokia was a cipher clerk. Vladimir wanted to defect and told everyone. He was concern he was about to be recalled. His dentist was glad to help him out since he was a full-time Australian agent. All Petrov really wanted, he said, was a chicken farm. Of course when he defected all hell broke loose. His wife was taken by Soviet thugs and frog-marched onto a plane bound for Moscow.
An Australian agent arranged for her to get a phone call a Darwin when the plane landed for refueling. She was separated from the thugs in the airport. She was able to talk to her husband. As a result she too defected.
The two of them supplied terrific information. Everyone concerned with the affair seems to have written a book. They were resettled on a chicken farm and never left Australia again.
MI5 interviewed them in Australia in 1954. There was concern about moles in SIS, and also the possibility of fabrication of agents to keep interest up. The Soviet defector in Canada, Igor Gouzenko, had said MI5 knew all the time about moles. MI5 had heard that there was a mole, ELLI, a leading Soviet spy that Sonia aka Ursula Hamburger, Beurton, and Ruth Kuczynski were running in Oxford until 1943. After the British defections it was clear there had been spy penetration. What would Petrov have to say? After the defections in 1951 no one knew where Burgess and Maclean were. Petrov said he knew they were in Moscow. He said they were recruited at university and that there were plenty others.
Suspicion to this point was only on Philby, Burgess, and Maclean, assuming it could never be at the top, only mid-level people of little interest. Now that it was apparent there was much more to be said was truly troubling.
Defectors are individuals who physically switch sides in a conflict and change their allegiance to an adversary. [See West, Nigel (2002). Historical Dictionary of International Intelligence. Lantham, MD: The Scarecrow Press, p. 81] Defectors are usually self-selected.
Firstly, defectors do not usually have the motivation claimed: the sudden declared interest in democratic values is suspect. Second, agencies to which a person defects typically do not believe the defector’s claims, regardless of the “forensic evidence” the agency may claim about the motivation. Third, really good agents recruit themselves. We will sometimes turn them away
Sometimes we are overwhelmed with defectors. They are the best sources of information, and the only really good Humint comes from defectors. Most realize that going back to Russia, or their home countries, would be a disaster. Still, they may have a hard time selling themselves in the West.
Agencies frequently give serious consideration to giving defectors back, as was the case for the first defector from the USSR in December, 1945 in Ottawa. Igor Gouzenko was a cipher clerk for the Soviets. He knew the Rezident, Pavlov and he had good knowledge of the GRU. He brought with him 109 documents including a diary, telegrams, and the names of 23 Soviet spies.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) recognized a gold mine, but didn’t know how to use it. One of the spies named by Gouzenko was set to go to London (code name ERIC). The Brits were interested but couldn’t move. Washington recognized ALECK was a hot case.
First, it appeared that ERIC was a nuclear physicist from Cambridge, and above suspicion. He had worked at Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago. It turned out it could only be Allan Nunn May. He was put under surveillance in London. An MI5 agent, Klop Ustinov (father of the actor Peter Ustinov) was used to meet May. May was tipped off and didn’t show. By February, however, all 23 spies in Canada were arrested. Most of the 23 were convicted, but all but 2 got got their convictions quashed.
Gouzenko alerted the West to huge Soviet espionage efforts. Up till then, nobody had a clue about what the USSR was doing covertly.
In September, 1945 Konstantin Volkov tried to defect in Istanbul. He revealed that Russia was reading the British signals to London. Even better, he offered what was a bombshell. He was a career NKVD officer and knew all NKVD in Turkey, and in virtually all the world. He said there were 9 Soviet spies in London, 3 in the Foreign Office. One, he said, was filling the role as head of the department of British counterintelligence. It was not clear whether he meant SIS or MI5. Volkov would be expensive to take care of but the information he offered was quite valuable.
The British called in Kim Philby to find who the mole could be. He determined to handle it himself. Bu the time Volkov was to meet Philby, there was no sign of Volkov. Apparently he was kidnapped and taken back to Russia. Philby blamed lax security on the British consulate in Istanbul. It is known that Volkov returned to the Soviet Consulate, from whence he quickly disappeared. The last seen of him was a heavily bandaged figure being hustled aboard a Soviet transport plane bound for Moscow.
Volkov’s revelation haunted MI5 and SIS for years. The hunt went on. In 1947 a GRU defector, and by 1954 the flood gates opened. This provided the information for the first time to really understand soviet Intelligence network. After Stalin died, Beria’s coup attempt failed. Those in NKVD who were close allies of Stalin became worried they would be purged and sought asylum.
Yuri Rastvorov defected to the British but opted to go the U.S. to the CIA. He had learned British intelligence had been penetrated. He provided a wealth of information. Then Nicolai Khokhlov, a hit man for the KGB, and a Ukranian who killed with an ingenious gas gun containing prussic acid defected. Prussic acid left no trace within 15 minutes. Khokhlov could identify people in SMERSH. He had a German girlfriend, very devout, who convinced him to quit.
Another defector, Peter S. Deriabin, described by the Central Intelligence Agency as the highest ranking Soviet intelligence officer to have defected to the West up until 1954, provided huge information. He had been a bodyguard for Stalin. He provided information on decision making in the Kremlin. He was the only defector to become a CIA officer. The so-called Penkovsky Papers were actually the material obtained from Deriabin.
There were two more crucially important defectors in Australia, this being the Petrov case. The Petrovs – Vladimir and Evodokia – came to Australia in February 1951 to work in the Soviet Embassy in Canberra. Vladimir was rezident and Evodokia was a cipher clerk. Vladimir wanted to defect and told everyone. He was concern he was about to be recalled. His dentist was glad to help him out since he was a full-time Australian agent. All Petrov really wanted, he said, was a chicken farm. Of course when he defected all hell broke loose. His wife was taken by Soviet thugs and frog-marched onto a plane bound for Moscow.
An Australian agent arranged for her to get a phone call a Darwin when the plane landed for refueling. She was separated from the thugs in the airport. She was able to talk to her husband. As a result she too defected.
The two of them supplied terrific information. Everyone concerned with the affair seems to have written a book. They were resettled on a chicken farm and never left Australia again.
MI5 interviewed them in Australia in 1954. There was concern about moles in SIS, and also the possibility of fabrication of agents to keep interest up. The Soviet defector in Canada, Igor Gouzenko, had said MI5 knew all the time about moles. MI5 had heard that there was a mole, ELLI, a leading Soviet spy that Sonia aka Ursula Hamburger, Beurton, and Ruth Kuczynski were running in Oxford until 1943. After the British defections it was clear there had been spy penetration. What would Petrov have to say? After the defections in 1951 no one knew where Burgess and Maclean were. Petrov said he knew they were in Moscow. He said they were recruited at university and that there were plenty others.
Suspicion to this point was only on Philby, Burgess, and Maclean, assuming it could never be at the top, only mid-level people of little interest. Now that it was apparent there was much more to be said was truly troubling.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
28. The Ten Best Books Written on Intelligence
The following is a list I obtained from Nigel West. The books are listed in alphabetical order of author.
Bearden, Milton and Risen, Jim (2004). The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA’s Final Showdown with the KGB.. New York: Random House. A fascinating version of the end of the Cold War and the Soviet defeat in Afghanistan, written by a senior CIA officer.
Benson, Robert Louis and Warner, Michael (1996). VENONA: Soviet Espionage and the American Response, 1939-1957. Washington, DC: NSA/CIA. The official history of the VENONA cryptographic project declassified in 1996.
Bentley, Elizabeth, ed. by Peake, Hayden (1988). Out of Bondage. New York: Ballantine. The story of the NKVD defector in New York in 1945 who implicated numerous Communist Party agents.
Burrows, William E. (1996). Deep Black. New York: Random House. Most accurate history of the development of reconnaissance satellites, and an overview of aerial intelligence collection platforms.
Dallin, David (1955). Soviet Espionage. New Haven, CN: Yale University Press. Earliest, most reliable history of early NKVD activities, the first of a genre.
Hinsley, F. H. (1979). British Intelligence in the Second World War. London: HMSO. Comprehensive study of ULTRA and other intelligence sources and their impact on the war, in five volumes, released as an official history series.
Masterman, J. C. (1972). The Double Cross System of the War of 1930 to 1945. New Haven, CN: Yale University Press. Magisterial analysis of the development and exploitation of double agents and the genesis of strategic deception.
Schecter, Jerrold (2002). The Spy Who Saved the World. New York: Charles Scribner’s. Best account of Oleg Penkovsky’s espionage in Moscow during the Cuban missile crisis, based on CIA transcripts.
Sontag, Sherry and Drew, Christopher, with Drew, Annette Lawrence (1998). Blind Man’s Bluff. New York: Public Affairs. Detailed account of the U. S. Navy’s deployment of clandestine submarine operations during the Cold War.
Wise, David (1995). Nightmover. New York: Harper Collins. An accurate account of the investigation in Aldrich Ames’ espionage inside the CIA, with the counterintelligence background.
Bearden, Milton and Risen, Jim (2004). The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA’s Final Showdown with the KGB.. New York: Random House. A fascinating version of the end of the Cold War and the Soviet defeat in Afghanistan, written by a senior CIA officer.
Benson, Robert Louis and Warner, Michael (1996). VENONA: Soviet Espionage and the American Response, 1939-1957. Washington, DC: NSA/CIA. The official history of the VENONA cryptographic project declassified in 1996.
Bentley, Elizabeth, ed. by Peake, Hayden (1988). Out of Bondage. New York: Ballantine. The story of the NKVD defector in New York in 1945 who implicated numerous Communist Party agents.
Burrows, William E. (1996). Deep Black. New York: Random House. Most accurate history of the development of reconnaissance satellites, and an overview of aerial intelligence collection platforms.
Dallin, David (1955). Soviet Espionage. New Haven, CN: Yale University Press. Earliest, most reliable history of early NKVD activities, the first of a genre.
Hinsley, F. H. (1979). British Intelligence in the Second World War. London: HMSO. Comprehensive study of ULTRA and other intelligence sources and their impact on the war, in five volumes, released as an official history series.
Masterman, J. C. (1972). The Double Cross System of the War of 1930 to 1945. New Haven, CN: Yale University Press. Magisterial analysis of the development and exploitation of double agents and the genesis of strategic deception.
Schecter, Jerrold (2002). The Spy Who Saved the World. New York: Charles Scribner’s. Best account of Oleg Penkovsky’s espionage in Moscow during the Cuban missile crisis, based on CIA transcripts.
Sontag, Sherry and Drew, Christopher, with Drew, Annette Lawrence (1998). Blind Man’s Bluff. New York: Public Affairs. Detailed account of the U. S. Navy’s deployment of clandestine submarine operations during the Cold War.
Wise, David (1995). Nightmover. New York: Harper Collins. An accurate account of the investigation in Aldrich Ames’ espionage inside the CIA, with the counterintelligence background.
Monday, August 9, 2010
27. Worst Books Written on Intelligence
The Worst Books Written on Intelligence
The following is a list I obtained from Nigel West. The books are listed with some comments, and are certainly not recommended for reading.
Thomas, Gordon (2009). Secret Wars: One Hundred Years of British Intelligence inside MI5 and MI6. New York: St. Martin’s Press. ISBN-13:978-0-312-37998-8; ISBN-10: 0-312-37998-6. Supposedly a centenary history of dMI5 and MI6, this book is filled with errors, invented quotations, and incidents that simply never happened, such as Allen Dulles and Stewart Menzies meeting at the 1945 Yalta conference. Neither attended it. He names Kim Philby’s father as Sir Harry Philby. St. John Philby never held a knighthood, and never could owing to the British class structure.
Stevenson, William (1976). A Man Called Intrepid. Macmillan. The fabricated biography of Sir William Stevenson by a Canadian journalist. Even the photographs, supposedly recovered from a secret wartime archive, are faked, and are stills from a movie made after the war. And Stephenson was never codenamed INTREPID.
Holzman, Michael (2008). James Jesus Angleton. University of Massachusetts Press. Yet another biography of the legendary CIA counterintelligence chief, but poorly researched and full of supposition masquerading as fact. The content mainly drawn from three other books, none of them any good.
Twigge, Michael (2008). British Intelligence. National Archives. Presented as a guide to declassified documents from the British Intelligence services, this is riddled with very basic mistakes and ahs no value whatever.
Allen, Martin (2005). Himmler’s Secret War. Robson Books. One of three books written by an author with a talent for forgery. Most of his “authentic archival documents” are rather poor modern forgeries.
Bennett, Richard (2002). Espionage: An Encyclopedia of Spies and their Secrets. Virtually every date in this encyclopedia is inaccurate. Most of the entries are a mixture of error and falsification.
Boyd, Colonel Arthur (2007). Operation Broken Reed. DeCapo Books. A delusional account of a clandestine operation in Korea that never happened.
The following is a list I obtained from Nigel West. The books are listed with some comments, and are certainly not recommended for reading.
Thomas, Gordon (2009). Secret Wars: One Hundred Years of British Intelligence inside MI5 and MI6. New York: St. Martin’s Press. ISBN-13:978-0-312-37998-8; ISBN-10: 0-312-37998-6. Supposedly a centenary history of dMI5 and MI6, this book is filled with errors, invented quotations, and incidents that simply never happened, such as Allen Dulles and Stewart Menzies meeting at the 1945 Yalta conference. Neither attended it. He names Kim Philby’s father as Sir Harry Philby. St. John Philby never held a knighthood, and never could owing to the British class structure.
Stevenson, William (1976). A Man Called Intrepid. Macmillan. The fabricated biography of Sir William Stevenson by a Canadian journalist. Even the photographs, supposedly recovered from a secret wartime archive, are faked, and are stills from a movie made after the war. And Stephenson was never codenamed INTREPID.
Holzman, Michael (2008). James Jesus Angleton. University of Massachusetts Press. Yet another biography of the legendary CIA counterintelligence chief, but poorly researched and full of supposition masquerading as fact. The content mainly drawn from three other books, none of them any good.
Twigge, Michael (2008). British Intelligence. National Archives. Presented as a guide to declassified documents from the British Intelligence services, this is riddled with very basic mistakes and ahs no value whatever.
Allen, Martin (2005). Himmler’s Secret War. Robson Books. One of three books written by an author with a talent for forgery. Most of his “authentic archival documents” are rather poor modern forgeries.
Bennett, Richard (2002). Espionage: An Encyclopedia of Spies and their Secrets. Virtually every date in this encyclopedia is inaccurate. Most of the entries are a mixture of error and falsification.
Boyd, Colonel Arthur (2007). Operation Broken Reed. DeCapo Books. A delusional account of a clandestine operation in Korea that never happened.
26. Jack Hewit and the Cambridge Four
Not discussed in many references to the Cambridge spies, Jack "Jacky" Hewit was born May 17, 1917 in England. He tried a career as an English dancer and chorus boy. His relationships were complicated and nearly destructive to him. Over the course of his life Hewit was lovers with Anthony Blunt, Guy Burgess and Christopher Isherwood. It is probably true that he was influenced by the work of the openly gay novelist, and friend of Isherwood, E. M. Forster.
In this context the comment of one of Guy Burgess' lovers, Jack Hewit, about the milieu in which they moved, is telling. 'There was a sort of gay intellectual freemasonry which you know nothing about. It was like the five concentric circles in the Olympic emblem. One person in one circle knew one in another and that's how people met.
Certainly all of the above were gay and openly so at a time that severe social prejudice against homosexuality was prevalent. Isherwood was also Burgess’ sometimes lover.
Hewit served as a civil servant and intelligence agent for Britain during WWII. He lived with Guy Burgess most often, at different periods in his life. According to Isherwood's diaries, Guy introduced Jack to Christopher toward the end of 1938. They went to Brussels with W. H. Auden for Christmas and Hewit is one of the subjects of Auden's poem "Ode to the New Year" (1939).
When Christopher left for America with Auden in January 1939, Jack rode with him in the cab to see him off and gave Christopher a champagne cork from the New Year's party in Brussels at which Auden had read his poem. Christopher later buried the cork in the park yard of his home in Los Angeles.
Hewit’s connection with Anthony Blunt had a significant impact on British intelligence. Blunt reported on the Soviet operation “XXX.” This was a closely-held operation. It involved copying documents inside the British diplomatic pouches.
Pouches were escorted to the receiving country’s home office. Actually most were escorted on trains. Since trains had station stops, an escort might find a “blonde” to “liaison” with. The local constables would offer to put the pouch in a safe. Surely one could trust the British Bobby.
While the escort was “involved” technicians could retrieve the pouches, break the seal, photograph all contents, and return it to the safe, undetectable. Blunt convinced Jacky Hewit tyo be a lure for gay couriers. They nevere complained about delays.
Jacky died December 30, 1997. Whether or not he was also a Soviet agent is to me unknown, but he activities. Interviews with him revealed the Zeitgeist of the late 1930s when the Cambridge group found each other. It sheds some light on just how it could have happened.
The fact that Burgess was homosexual, to a predatory degree, that Blunt was gay, and the involvement of Hewit gave impetus to the discrimination against gays in intelligence. Many outstanding gay men worked in intelligence and at least one, Alan Turing, probably helpd shorten the war by two years through his service at Bletchley Park in breaking the German Enigma cipher. He was treated very badly after the war, to the point of torture, for being a homosexual. Because a handful of men, who happened to be gay, were turncoats to their country does not allow for painting all homosexuals as potential traitors. It was not until Prime Minister Gordon Brown that the British government finally apologized for the way Turing and other gays were treated after WWII.
(http://www.aolnews.com/story/gordon-brown-apologizes-for-treatment-of/666717)
In this context the comment of one of Guy Burgess' lovers, Jack Hewit, about the milieu in which they moved, is telling. 'There was a sort of gay intellectual freemasonry which you know nothing about. It was like the five concentric circles in the Olympic emblem. One person in one circle knew one in another and that's how people met.
Certainly all of the above were gay and openly so at a time that severe social prejudice against homosexuality was prevalent. Isherwood was also Burgess’ sometimes lover.
Hewit served as a civil servant and intelligence agent for Britain during WWII. He lived with Guy Burgess most often, at different periods in his life. According to Isherwood's diaries, Guy introduced Jack to Christopher toward the end of 1938. They went to Brussels with W. H. Auden for Christmas and Hewit is one of the subjects of Auden's poem "Ode to the New Year" (1939).
When Christopher left for America with Auden in January 1939, Jack rode with him in the cab to see him off and gave Christopher a champagne cork from the New Year's party in Brussels at which Auden had read his poem. Christopher later buried the cork in the park yard of his home in Los Angeles.
Hewit’s connection with Anthony Blunt had a significant impact on British intelligence. Blunt reported on the Soviet operation “XXX.” This was a closely-held operation. It involved copying documents inside the British diplomatic pouches.
Pouches were escorted to the receiving country’s home office. Actually most were escorted on trains. Since trains had station stops, an escort might find a “blonde” to “liaison” with. The local constables would offer to put the pouch in a safe. Surely one could trust the British Bobby.
While the escort was “involved” technicians could retrieve the pouches, break the seal, photograph all contents, and return it to the safe, undetectable. Blunt convinced Jacky Hewit tyo be a lure for gay couriers. They nevere complained about delays.
Jacky died December 30, 1997. Whether or not he was also a Soviet agent is to me unknown, but he activities. Interviews with him revealed the Zeitgeist of the late 1930s when the Cambridge group found each other. It sheds some light on just how it could have happened.
The fact that Burgess was homosexual, to a predatory degree, that Blunt was gay, and the involvement of Hewit gave impetus to the discrimination against gays in intelligence. Many outstanding gay men worked in intelligence and at least one, Alan Turing, probably helpd shorten the war by two years through his service at Bletchley Park in breaking the German Enigma cipher. He was treated very badly after the war, to the point of torture, for being a homosexual. Because a handful of men, who happened to be gay, were turncoats to their country does not allow for painting all homosexuals as potential traitors. It was not until Prime Minister Gordon Brown that the British government finally apologized for the way Turing and other gays were treated after WWII.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has apologized for the British government’s "horrifying" treatment a half-century ago of Alan Turing, the mathematical genius who played a key role in defeating Nazi Germany but was later convicted of "gross indecency" for having sex with another man.”
British gay activist Peter Tatchell said that Turing was one of an estimated 100,000 British gay men-- including playwright Oscar Wilde in 1895 -- convicted under Britain's "gross indecency" law, which was formally repealed in 2003.
While Turing was dealt with under the law of the time and we can't put the clock back,'' Brown stated, "his treatment was of course utterly unfair and I am pleased to have the chance to say how deeply sorry I and we all are for what happened to him.
Gordon Brown's message is clear," Graham-Cumming told AOL News. "Do not allow prejudice to color our thinking or actions.
(http://www.aolnews.com/story/gordon-brown-apologizes-for-treatment-of/666717)
25. The UK-US Special Relationship
US-UK Special Relationship
(This entry is a summary of a talk given on July 10, 2010by Nigel West on board Queen Mary 2, headed from New York to Southhampton, UK. Disclaimer: Any errors or omissions in the following are totally my own and should not be attributed to Nigel West.)
The term “special relationship” often heard mentioned by the President of the United States and The Prime Minister of Great Britain has a specific, narrow meaning related to intelligence and spills over into the nuclear program.
It really is an extraordinary relationship, particularly between NSA and GCHQ, the FBI and MI5. It began at the end of December 1940. There was considerable doubt, even in Britain, if the UK could survive WWII without the USA.
Two FBI agents, Hugh Clegg and Clarence Hince , went to the UK in December 1940 to determine if the UK had a secret means to survive and win the war with Germany.MI5 had booked only one room for the two of them (thinking they were boyfriend, girlfriend.)They had an extraordinary tour of secret facilities including Bletchley and the Radio Security Service (RSS). They were authorized to share everything in hopes of wooing USA help.
They learned of Group 5 traffic. This was a radio transmitter channel between Long Island and the Abwehr in Germany. The encryption was very crude and easily broken. It became clear the Nazis had a big operation in the US. Revealing this to the FBI would raise the problem of the FBI closing the operations and the Nazis would realize their hand ciphers were broken.
Some traffic was relayed to Enigma channels. This gave an advantage to breaking Enigma by comparing easily broken messages with those encrypted by Enigma.
Arthur Owen, a Welshman, was known to be suspect. He was taking in to custody and tried to make a deal. The Germans gave him a radio. He had been sending weather reports to Germany. RSS recruited amateur radio operators in the UK and were thrilled with Owens because he transmitted. Owens was codenamed SNOW. They were astonished he was transmitting to Hamburg. But triangulation showed the Germans were using a trawler radio ship. They began monitoring this ship and discovered the same message from the spy ship to Hamburg was Enigma encrypted. Thus if you know the message it is possible to work out the key setting for Enigma. This was crucial since knowing the settings was elemental in breaking the Enigma encryption for other messages.
Not just the settings on one machine but for all machines were changed across Europe, making Enigma quite readable. By sending weather reports Owens gave MI5 a huge advantage. But now the question was, could the two US agents be trusted with this information?
When told, the two FBI agents didn’t react at all. This surprised RSS. The agents owned up that they knew all about the Long Island operations since they were sending it. They had blown the ring and took over transmission. They had been tipped off by William Sebold. Frederick Joubert Duquesne [see http://www.paperlessarchives.com/duquesne.html] was a key German agent in the US. The FBI filled every person meeting Duquesne. Thirty-two spies were identified by observation.
MI5 and RSS discovered a huge advantage with cooperating with the US. This began an astonishing exchange between the US and the UK. Among some of the areas of information were (1) degaussing; (2) centimetric radar, and (3) proximity fuse.
Degaussing is the process of decreasing or eliminating an unwanted magnetic field. The term was first used by (then) Cmdr Charles F. Goodeve, RCNVR, during World War II while trying to counter the German magnetic mines that were playing havoc with the British fleet.
Centimetric Radar was developed by the British to determine the altitude and speed of aircraft and was crucial in the Battle of Britain. [See http://www.vectorsite.net/ttwiz_03.html]
The Proximity Fuse concept originated with British researchers (particularly Sir Samuel Curran) and was developed under the direction of physicist Merle A. Tuve at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab (APL).
Sir Marcus Oliphant in the UK worked in nuclear physics. In a television interview he recalled the following [see http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/subjects/oliphant/script.html]
The Frisch-Pierels Report did suggest it might be possible to develop and air-transportable weapon. But this was hardly an option for the UK owing to the enormous resources required. Henry Tizard was impressed with the report and had the connections within the Ministry of Defence to take it to the War Cabinet, who found it should be further considered. [The Frisch-Pierels Report is published in Serber, Robert (1992). The Los Alamos Primer, Appendix I, “The Frisch-Peirels Memorandum,” Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. It isf also found in Clark, Ronald W.(1965) Tizard. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 215-17. Actually there are two memoranda, the first of which was lost until the British historian Ronald W. Clark discovered it among the papers of Henry Tizard, some twenty years after the end of World War II.]
John Cairncross became an aide to Lord Hankey, secretary to the British Cabinet. He typed the final report to the Prime Minister. Cairncross and Donald Maclean were active at that time but knew nothing of each other. Cairncross admitted to spying in 1951 after MI5 found incriminating papers in his possession. Some believe that the information he supplied about the Western atomic weapons programmes kick-started the Soviet nuclear programme.
It became clear that huge resources would be needed to build an atomic weapon. The government decided that it would develop a reactor at Chalk River in Canada. In the US the decision was finally made to go on with the weapon development. Vannevar Bush was the scientific head of the project and General Leslie Grove was the factotum. It was indeed an Anglo-American project. The UK depended on the US but maintained its own development.
The special relationship extended to cooperation with the OSS. The VENONA cooperation on cryptography became the BRUSA-UKUSA. In June, 2010 the NSA-GCHQ declassified and posted on the internet the early papers of this cooperation that extended through the 1950s.[See http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukusa/]
British pilots trained on U2 aircraft to get imaging of the Soviet Union. U2 aircraft flew so high they were immune to Soviet missiles. British planes adapted to deliver nuclear weapons, but standoff targeting was required. That is, delivery of a weapon at a considerable distance from the target so the delivery platform is not seen and never visually acquires the target. This necessity led to cruise missiles. The first British cruise missile was Skybolt (December 1962). However President John Kennedy cancelled the program without warning the UK. Kennedy met MacMillan to deal with this. MacMillan begged for assistance, so Kennedy shared the Polaris missile. Stung by being unwarned and in political difficulty, MacMillan vowed to have the Union Jack on the nose cone of every British Polaris.
The American needed ground stations for NSA and the UK had little islands all over the world, remnants of the empire. NSA shared its product (even raw data.) In 1970 the UK elected an anti-American prime minister (Edward Heath). As a young man he was dismayed by US isolationism before WWII. Further, the US did not help the UK, French, and Israeli attack in Suez. During the 1973 Yom Kippur War Heath refused permission for the US to use any UK bases for resupply.
The US reconnaissance aircraft, the SR71 “Blackbird”, was a great aircraft but burned a huge amount of fuel. British bases were needed for refueling. There was an enormous US antipathy to Heath. The US-UK finally got together after Heath. Nevertheless, the US-UK intelligence cooperation was unaffected.
The Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) in Britain is at the apex of British Intelligence. At its table sits the heads of the secret agencies plus Whitehall representatives and it reaches agreed views, by consensus, which are then circulated to an inner group of ministers and departmental consumers. It prepares and circulates the “Red Book, the classified weekly summary of current events which senior ministers take home and read each weekend.” The US CIA station chief also sits on the JIC.” [West, Nigel (1997). The Secret War for the Falklands. London: Little, Brown and Co., p. 26]
When a new prime minister is named in Britain, he (or she) makes a call on the Queen. The outgoing minister is quickly and quietly shown the back door of the palace. Upon return to Number 10, Downing Street the new PM is told to write three letters, for the UK nuclear submarine commanders. It is he who must determine what they are to do in the event of a nuclear attack on the UK (and decapitation of the UK command system). The cabinet secretary gives guidance but it is the PM who must write the letters. They have some options which the PM must prioritize
(This entry is a summary of a talk given on July 10, 2010by Nigel West on board Queen Mary 2, headed from New York to Southhampton, UK. Disclaimer: Any errors or omissions in the following are totally my own and should not be attributed to Nigel West.)
The term “special relationship” often heard mentioned by the President of the United States and The Prime Minister of Great Britain has a specific, narrow meaning related to intelligence and spills over into the nuclear program.
It really is an extraordinary relationship, particularly between NSA and GCHQ, the FBI and MI5. It began at the end of December 1940. There was considerable doubt, even in Britain, if the UK could survive WWII without the USA.
Two FBI agents, Hugh Clegg and Clarence Hince , went to the UK in December 1940 to determine if the UK had a secret means to survive and win the war with Germany.MI5 had booked only one room for the two of them (thinking they were boyfriend, girlfriend.)They had an extraordinary tour of secret facilities including Bletchley and the Radio Security Service (RSS). They were authorized to share everything in hopes of wooing USA help.
They learned of Group 5 traffic. This was a radio transmitter channel between Long Island and the Abwehr in Germany. The encryption was very crude and easily broken. It became clear the Nazis had a big operation in the US. Revealing this to the FBI would raise the problem of the FBI closing the operations and the Nazis would realize their hand ciphers were broken.
Some traffic was relayed to Enigma channels. This gave an advantage to breaking Enigma by comparing easily broken messages with those encrypted by Enigma.
Arthur Owen, a Welshman, was known to be suspect. He was taking in to custody and tried to make a deal. The Germans gave him a radio. He had been sending weather reports to Germany. RSS recruited amateur radio operators in the UK and were thrilled with Owens because he transmitted. Owens was codenamed SNOW. They were astonished he was transmitting to Hamburg. But triangulation showed the Germans were using a trawler radio ship. They began monitoring this ship and discovered the same message from the spy ship to Hamburg was Enigma encrypted. Thus if you know the message it is possible to work out the key setting for Enigma. This was crucial since knowing the settings was elemental in breaking the Enigma encryption for other messages.
Not just the settings on one machine but for all machines were changed across Europe, making Enigma quite readable. By sending weather reports Owens gave MI5 a huge advantage. But now the question was, could the two US agents be trusted with this information?
When told, the two FBI agents didn’t react at all. This surprised RSS. The agents owned up that they knew all about the Long Island operations since they were sending it. They had blown the ring and took over transmission. They had been tipped off by William Sebold. Frederick Joubert Duquesne [see http://www.paperlessarchives.com/duquesne.html] was a key German agent in the US. The FBI filled every person meeting Duquesne. Thirty-two spies were identified by observation.
MI5 and RSS discovered a huge advantage with cooperating with the US. This began an astonishing exchange between the US and the UK. Among some of the areas of information were (1) degaussing; (2) centimetric radar, and (3) proximity fuse.
Degaussing is the process of decreasing or eliminating an unwanted magnetic field. The term was first used by (then) Cmdr Charles F. Goodeve, RCNVR, during World War II while trying to counter the German magnetic mines that were playing havoc with the British fleet.
Centimetric Radar was developed by the British to determine the altitude and speed of aircraft and was crucial in the Battle of Britain. [See http://www.vectorsite.net/ttwiz_03.html]
The Proximity Fuse concept originated with British researchers (particularly Sir Samuel Curran) and was developed under the direction of physicist Merle A. Tuve at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab (APL).
Sir Marcus Oliphant in the UK worked in nuclear physics. In a television interview he recalled the following [see http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/subjects/oliphant/script.html]
Now the interesting thing is that working with me in the laboratory at that time were two German refugees, from Hitler's Germany. One was named Piles [sic. His name was Rudolf Peirels] the other one's name Frish [sic. The name is Otto Frisch. He was the nephew of Lise Meitner, and the two of them have priority in the discovery of nuclear fission. Fred Wilson]. These two people together, of course they were enemy aliens, they weren't allowed to know anything about this secret weapon or radar you see. So they had to be kept out of that.
So not being allowed to do that, they set to work to do some calculations about nuclear energy, about the possibility of getting nuclear energy, and, they lo and behold -- they came through with a paper, which they said that if one could separate the uranium then one could make a bomb of enormous power and they calculated the amount of uranium 235 that was required and also the explosive force that might be produced.
And this was absolutely hair-raising. Here were these two chaps not allowed to have anything to do with the secrets of radar, producing this paper on this possibility of making a nuclear weapon. So this paper was sent to the United States to inform them. So I had to dash across to America in connection with the Magnetron, but while I was there, I was asked to see what had happened to our report, the Piles Frish [sic. Frisch-Peirels] report, so I went to the, to Washington, to the Chairman of the American committee, who was the head of their department that was responsible for standards, their standards laboratory. And he was a real stick in the mud and he'd taken this report, thought it was a bit interesting, but had stuck it in his safe and hadn't circulated it to the other members of the committee.
So I went straight away to see[Vannevar] Bush and [James] Connant, who were the President's scientific and technical advisers and both of them took the point of view, well this is very interesting but this if for the next war, not for this war.
So still dissatisfied, I got on an aeroplane and went to see [Ernest O.] Lawrence whom I'd worked with you see and knew to be a live wire and a member of the committee. So I told him about this, and he was so upset that he got on the plane with me and we went back to Washington. Within a few days the man had the project well on its way. And we moved to America, whole of the British team moved to America.
The Frisch-Pierels Report did suggest it might be possible to develop and air-transportable weapon. But this was hardly an option for the UK owing to the enormous resources required. Henry Tizard was impressed with the report and had the connections within the Ministry of Defence to take it to the War Cabinet, who found it should be further considered. [The Frisch-Pierels Report is published in Serber, Robert (1992). The Los Alamos Primer, Appendix I, “The Frisch-Peirels Memorandum,” Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. It isf also found in Clark, Ronald W.(1965) Tizard. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 215-17. Actually there are two memoranda, the first of which was lost until the British historian Ronald W. Clark discovered it among the papers of Henry Tizard, some twenty years after the end of World War II.]
John Cairncross became an aide to Lord Hankey, secretary to the British Cabinet. He typed the final report to the Prime Minister. Cairncross and Donald Maclean were active at that time but knew nothing of each other. Cairncross admitted to spying in 1951 after MI5 found incriminating papers in his possession. Some believe that the information he supplied about the Western atomic weapons programmes kick-started the Soviet nuclear programme.
It became clear that huge resources would be needed to build an atomic weapon. The government decided that it would develop a reactor at Chalk River in Canada. In the US the decision was finally made to go on with the weapon development. Vannevar Bush was the scientific head of the project and General Leslie Grove was the factotum. It was indeed an Anglo-American project. The UK depended on the US but maintained its own development.
The special relationship extended to cooperation with the OSS. The VENONA cooperation on cryptography became the BRUSA-UKUSA. In June, 2010 the NSA-GCHQ declassified and posted on the internet the early papers of this cooperation that extended through the 1950s.[See http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukusa/]
British pilots trained on U2 aircraft to get imaging of the Soviet Union. U2 aircraft flew so high they were immune to Soviet missiles. British planes adapted to deliver nuclear weapons, but standoff targeting was required. That is, delivery of a weapon at a considerable distance from the target so the delivery platform is not seen and never visually acquires the target. This necessity led to cruise missiles. The first British cruise missile was Skybolt (December 1962). However President John Kennedy cancelled the program without warning the UK. Kennedy met MacMillan to deal with this. MacMillan begged for assistance, so Kennedy shared the Polaris missile. Stung by being unwarned and in political difficulty, MacMillan vowed to have the Union Jack on the nose cone of every British Polaris.
The American needed ground stations for NSA and the UK had little islands all over the world, remnants of the empire. NSA shared its product (even raw data.) In 1970 the UK elected an anti-American prime minister (Edward Heath). As a young man he was dismayed by US isolationism before WWII. Further, the US did not help the UK, French, and Israeli attack in Suez. During the 1973 Yom Kippur War Heath refused permission for the US to use any UK bases for resupply.
The US reconnaissance aircraft, the SR71 “Blackbird”, was a great aircraft but burned a huge amount of fuel. British bases were needed for refueling. There was an enormous US antipathy to Heath. The US-UK finally got together after Heath. Nevertheless, the US-UK intelligence cooperation was unaffected.
The Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) in Britain is at the apex of British Intelligence. At its table sits the heads of the secret agencies plus Whitehall representatives and it reaches agreed views, by consensus, which are then circulated to an inner group of ministers and departmental consumers. It prepares and circulates the “Red Book, the classified weekly summary of current events which senior ministers take home and read each weekend.” The US CIA station chief also sits on the JIC.” [West, Nigel (1997). The Secret War for the Falklands. London: Little, Brown and Co., p. 26]
When a new prime minister is named in Britain, he (or she) makes a call on the Queen. The outgoing minister is quickly and quietly shown the back door of the palace. Upon return to Number 10, Downing Street the new PM is told to write three letters, for the UK nuclear submarine commanders. It is he who must determine what they are to do in the event of a nuclear attack on the UK (and decapitation of the UK command system). The cabinet secretary gives guidance but it is the PM who must write the letters. They have some options which the PM must prioritize
- Use your own initiative.
- Go to Australia (become part of the retaliation).
- Place yourself under command of the U.S. President.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
24. Did The CIA Get it Wrong about Iran
A recent article in The Wall Street Journal (Edward Jay Epstein, “How the CIA Got It Wrong on Iran’s Nukes,” The Wall Street Journal, (July 20, 2010), p. A13) posits the following:
The NIE to which Epstein refers is not quite so naïve or simplistic. At the outset it clarifies what questions it will address:
(See National Intelligence Estimate (November 2007), “Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities” (http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf, p. 4).
This is the source from which Epstein drew since the full report remains classified.
Further, the assumptions Epstein makes:
is not supported by the NIE, which states:
Another crucially misleading statement Epstein makes is that the CIA got it wrong. Surely he must know the CIA does not write the NIE. The NIE is prepared under the auspices of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence:
The Director of National Intelligence coordinates the reporting of analyzed intelligence, with input from all intelligence sources in the Intelligence Community. To state that the CIA produces the NIE is to show lack of understanding of how national intelligence is produced and reported.
And finally, the NIE does not report what Epstein says it does. The 2007 version was updated in 2009 and the findings are much more complex that he suggests.
Epstein’s suggestions that we know something quite different about Iran today (and perhaps even when the NIE was written) and that the “CIA got it wrong,” is not supported by the facts. Epstein states,
The Obama Administration has made public statements quite different from what Epstein suggests, and those statements are in accord with the 2007 NIE. (See http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/index.php?q=node/9097)
Epstein has been riding a hobbyhorse on Iran for years. In fact the Wall Street Journal article has appeared in several publications, virtually identical to the one referred to here, most of them in June and July of 2007. He is convinced that, “Taken together [his evidence]…these efforts added up an inescapable conclusion: Iran was going nuclear.”
We do have evidence of Iran’s nuclear energy program proceeding. Tehran has made claims, some of them outrageous (such that it will have fusion energy within a few years) but what is the likelihood of a nuclear weapons program being viable.
There has never been any scientific “secret” to the atomic bomb, except the crucial secret, revealed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that such a weapon would work.
The above quote is from Richard Rhodes, “Introduction” (1992).to Robert Serber(1943.) The Los Alamos Primer,Berkeley, CA: The University of California Press, p. xii.
Fareed Zakaria, on his program GPS (“Sanctions”. Fareed Zakaria (August 8, 2010) CNN GPS) argues that
[http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2010/08/08/gps.what.in.the.world.8.08.cnn]
Producing intelligence is not the same as investigative reporting. Many sources are tapped to gather data (not information. They are different.) Professionals with years of pertinent experience, assemble the data and perform analyses for policymakers. Finally the compiled intelligence is disseminated to consumers (the policymakers) who will, undoubtedly cherry-pick conclusions that agree with agendas and current perceptions. I know this is true. It has happened to me.
The costs in resources, facilities, and brainpower to develop nuclear weapons is enormous. Even with a set of plans handed over personally from Pakistan, Iran would find it very difficult to construct a working nuclear weapon. But other resources, also expensive and quite detectable, are required, such as a means of delivery of a weapon. These efforts can be detected far earlier than the detection of a nuclear arsenal.
It is in Israel’s interest that the U.S. policy assumes that Iran is hell-bent on developing a credible nuclear threat. It would follow that the U.S. would be the “deep pockets” of resources to eradicate such a threat. But Israeli policymakers are no less intelligent that American ones. Why would Israel be so concerned about such a program.
No country can afford to ignore a threat of even low credibility. No country can afford to ignore the threat of a threat. At the very least by announcing a nuclear program Iran gets a better chance at a place at the table. Its threats are not totally empty. Should Iran acquire even a very-low efficiency weapon then no city could afford to ignore an Iranian threat. It’s leverage. And in the world of geopolitics leverage may be even more important that possession of a working bomb.
Epstein has published this article in at least 5 different publications . He is an investigative reporter, still riding his hobbyhorse on the Warren commission Report. The article contains a number of misstatements and idiosyncratic presumptions and conclusions.
In a stunning departure from a decade of assessments, the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran declared: "We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program," including "nuclear weapon design and weaponization work" and covert uranium enrichment.
The NIE to which Epstein refers is not quite so naïve or simplistic. At the outset it clarifies what questions it will address:
This Estimate focuses on the following key questions:
- What are Iran’s intentions toward developing nuclear weapons?
- What domestic factors affect Iran’s decisionmaking on whether to develop nuclear weapons?
- What external factors affect Iran’s decisionmaking on whether to develop nuclear weapons?
- What is the range of potential Iranian actions concerning the development of nuclear weapons, and the decisive factors that would lead Iran to choose one course of action over another?
- What is Iran’s current and projected capability to develop nuclear weapons? What are our
key assumptions, and Iran’s key chokepoints/vulnerabilities?
(See National Intelligence Estimate (November 2007), “Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities” (http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/20071203_release.pdf, p. 4).
This is the source from which Epstein drew since the full report remains classified.
Further, the assumptions Epstein makes:
There were high-level people in the newly reorganized U.S. intelligence community who wanted to believe Iran was ending its quest for the bomb, and messages to the CIA from agents inside the country that diplomatic pressure was accomplishing this task fell on receptive ears.
is not supported by the NIE, which states:
This NIE does not assume that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons. Rather, it examines the intelligence to assess Iran’s capability and intent (or lack thereof) to acquire nuclear weapons, taking full account of Iran’s dual-use uranium fuel cycle and those nuclear activities that are at least partly civil in nature.
Another crucially misleading statement Epstein makes is that the CIA got it wrong. Surely he must know the CIA does not write the NIE. The NIE is prepared under the auspices of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence:
The Director of National Intelligence serves as the head of the Intelligence Community (IC), overseeing and directing the implementation of the National Intelligence Program and acting as the principal advisor to the President, the National Security Council, and the Homeland Security Council for intelligence matters.
The Director of National Intelligence coordinates the reporting of analyzed intelligence, with input from all intelligence sources in the Intelligence Community. To state that the CIA produces the NIE is to show lack of understanding of how national intelligence is produced and reported.
And finally, the NIE does not report what Epstein says it does. The 2007 version was updated in 2009 and the findings are much more complex that he suggests.
- The NIE judges, with high confidence, that Iran ended its nuclear weapons program in 2003, but kept its options open for restarting at a later date. In 2007 the program was judged not to have restarted…”but we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.” The NIE judges that in 2007 Iran did not have a nuclear weapon and that its desire to do so had decreased since 2005.
- ”We continue to assess with low confidence that Iran probably has imported at least some weapons-usable fissile material, but still judge with moderate-to-high confidence it
has not obtained enough for a nuclear weapon.” - ”We assess centrifuge enrichment is how Iran probably could first produce enough fissile material for a weapon, if it decides to do so.”
- Iranian entities are continuing to develop a range of technical capabilities that could be applied to producing nuclear weapons, if a decision is made to do so.”
- ”We do not have sufficient intelligence to judge confidently whether Tehran is willing to maintain the halt of its nuclear weapons program indefinitely while it weighs its options, or whether it will or already has set specific deadlines or criteria that will prompt it to restart the program.”
- ”We assess with moderate confidence that Iran probably would use covert facilities - rather than its declared nuclear sites - for the production of highly enriched uranium for a weapon.”
- We judge with high confidence that Iran will not be technically capable of producing and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015.
- We assess with high confidence that Iran has the scientific, technical and industrial,capacity eventually to produce nuclear weapons if it decides to do so.”
Epstein’s suggestions that we know something quite different about Iran today (and perhaps even when the NIE was written) and that the “CIA got it wrong,” is not supported by the facts. Epstein states,
Unfortunately, as the Obama administration has now acknowledged, the NIE's conclusion was dead wrong, costing us precious time in dealing with a serious threat.
The Obama Administration has made public statements quite different from what Epstein suggests, and those statements are in accord with the 2007 NIE. (See http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/index.php?q=node/9097)
Epstein has been riding a hobbyhorse on Iran for years. In fact the Wall Street Journal article has appeared in several publications, virtually identical to the one referred to here, most of them in June and July of 2007. He is convinced that, “Taken together [his evidence]…these efforts added up an inescapable conclusion: Iran was going nuclear.”
We do have evidence of Iran’s nuclear energy program proceeding. Tehran has made claims, some of them outrageous (such that it will have fusion energy within a few years) but what is the likelihood of a nuclear weapons program being viable.
There has never been any scientific “secret” to the atomic bomb, except the crucial secret, revealed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that such a weapon would work.
There were engineering and industrial secrets, of course – how to manufacture filters that would efficiently separate the [uranium isotopes], for example; how to separate plutonium chemically from irradiated uranium; how to compose and shape explosive lenses – and these secrets continue quite properly to be protected.
The above quote is from Richard Rhodes, “Introduction” (1992).to Robert Serber(1943.) The Los Alamos Primer,Berkeley, CA: The University of California Press, p. xii.
Fareed Zakaria, on his program GPS (“Sanctions”. Fareed Zakaria (August 8, 2010) CNN GPS) argues that
Two months ago, the UN security council imposed what President Obama called "the toughest sanctions ever faced by Iran. But are those sanctions working?
Not according to Iranian President Ahmadinejad.
But then why are countries, including some of Iran's trading partners, following America's lead and tightening the screws on Iran? And what effect will that have?
[http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2010/08/08/gps.what.in.the.world.8.08.cnn]
Producing intelligence is not the same as investigative reporting. Many sources are tapped to gather data (not information. They are different.) Professionals with years of pertinent experience, assemble the data and perform analyses for policymakers. Finally the compiled intelligence is disseminated to consumers (the policymakers) who will, undoubtedly cherry-pick conclusions that agree with agendas and current perceptions. I know this is true. It has happened to me.
The costs in resources, facilities, and brainpower to develop nuclear weapons is enormous. Even with a set of plans handed over personally from Pakistan, Iran would find it very difficult to construct a working nuclear weapon. But other resources, also expensive and quite detectable, are required, such as a means of delivery of a weapon. These efforts can be detected far earlier than the detection of a nuclear arsenal.
It is in Israel’s interest that the U.S. policy assumes that Iran is hell-bent on developing a credible nuclear threat. It would follow that the U.S. would be the “deep pockets” of resources to eradicate such a threat. But Israeli policymakers are no less intelligent that American ones. Why would Israel be so concerned about such a program.
No country can afford to ignore a threat of even low credibility. No country can afford to ignore the threat of a threat. At the very least by announcing a nuclear program Iran gets a better chance at a place at the table. Its threats are not totally empty. Should Iran acquire even a very-low efficiency weapon then no city could afford to ignore an Iranian threat. It’s leverage. And in the world of geopolitics leverage may be even more important that possession of a working bomb.
Epstein has published this article in at least 5 different publications . He is an investigative reporter, still riding his hobbyhorse on the Warren commission Report. The article contains a number of misstatements and idiosyncratic presumptions and conclusions.
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