It has been claimed (in Sunday News 20th Feb. and The Phoenix, 19th Feb.1983) that at the heart of the disclosures over the Kincora scandal is an internal row in the intelligence services. A dissident faction is thought to have formed in the Secret Service. The scuffles over revelations concerning Kincora started with the writing of a book by Rupert Allason, pen name Nigel West, son of a leading MI6 officer.
The original fight was about whether the KGB had deeply penetrated every aspect of British Intelligence. Now a lot of dirty linen is being washed in public and the background to the purges in British Intelligence in Northern Ireland and, perhaps, some details of the private life of Sir Maurice Oldfield, the MI6 chief, are likely to emerge.
“Bachelor Oldfield’s dislike of women except his aged mother was so notorious that even the Sunday Times included mention of it in an obituary. It is often wrongly assumed that Oldfield’s links with Ireland date only from his appointment as Ulster Security Coordinator in 1979. But as Director of MI6 throughout the 1970s he was not only closely connected with Irish affairs, including the Kincora operation, but was a regular visitor to Belfast.” (S.N. as above)
One story released, though not included in the Terry Report on Kincora, is the homosexual assault made on the attractive male personal secretary of Oldfield. At least one statement was made about the incident which occurred in Oldfield’s private apartment on the top floor of Stormont Castle. A senior English civil servant found the attractions of Maurice’s assistant too much and attempted to molest him. A scuffle ensued among the exclusively male gathering, as a result of which the civil servant returned to London.
The Counter Intelligence branch of the Secret Service, MI5, is now believed to be running the show in Northern Ireland after the removal of MI6’s top man in Ulster, David Wyatt. Mr Wyatt, a casualty of the internal row in the intelligence services, was replaced by an MI5 officer. Described by one source as being a ‘link with the foreign office’, he was trusted by the Foreign Office mandarins even more than security overlord Sir Maurice Oldfield, appointed by Mrs Thatcher in 1979. The appointment in 1980 of Sir Brooks Richard, an ex-diplomat, as Security Co-ordinator in Northern Ireland, was seen as giving the Foreign Office ‘game set and match in the mandarins’ rivalries over who runs the various bits of British Intelligence.’ (Guardian 23/2/81)
When Wyatt departed his two MI6 assistants went with him, leaving MI5 in sole charge of ‘mainland’ intelligence operations in Northern Ireland.
In recent months some public figures have claimed that a special security squad has been involved in several disputed killings of terrorists. A source of the Sunday News suggested that there might be a link between the new hierarchy and such a squad, which is alleged operates direct to the Home Office. The intelligence masters are widely believed to operate from the old Speaker’s House in the grounds of the Parliament buildings at Stormont.
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The new Kincora inquiry will be chaired by a retired English circuit judge, William Hughes. When asked on ‘The World At One’ (BBC Radio 4, 18th January 1984) if the inquiry would take evidence on the alleged activities of the intelligence agencies, James Prior, Northern Ireland Secretary of State, replied that if there was any evidence, it would. This appears less than likely because the published terms of reference (Times 29th Jan.1984) stated that the enquiry would look at the administration of children’s homes in Northern Ireland, indicating that the Terry Report had already dealt with the ‘wilder allegations’.
Only one week after the announcement of the new inquiry it was revealed (Sunday News 29th Jan. 1984) that the Northern Ireland Eastern Health Board is fighting for a blanket ban on homosexuals in ‘direct caring roles’. The DHSS recommended that information from police records should be sought on suspect applicants for jobs in children’s homes. The department would establish a ‘pre-employment consultancy service’, which boards and voluntary organisations would be obliged to use. It provides for files based on police records and the opinions of past employers to be kept on all those people applying for residential caring posts.
One Board member said “I believe the Board is trying to cover itself after Kincora. They wanted to get this through before the Terry Report so that they could say ‘We have done everything necessary.’
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Still unreleased (as far as I know) are reports on two inquiries. One (Sunday News 29th May 1983), the RUC detectives who probed the Kincora affair, also investigated incidents at another children’s home. Involved in the homosexual assaults at the Craigavon Home was a “military intelligence warrant officer.” The assaults on young boys took place over a two year period. Two, (Times 26th September 1983) alleged homosexual activity within the RUC. Four men were suspended after Sir John Hermon, RUC Chief, received a letter believed to be from a former woman police officer. Investigations centred on alleged activities in West Belfast more than two years ago. I should make it clear at this point that I have nothing against homosexuality per se. The problem being that in Northern Ireland, as Kincora clearly showed, homosexuality is open to blackmail and intimidation – even in these enlightened times – by the intelligence services.
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Lord Avebury, and the Duke of Norfolk
More on Colin Wallace (See Lobster 1). Liberal Peer, Lord Avebury, and the Duke of Norfolk, have joined forces to help prove his innocence. Avebury has written to witnesses who gave evidence at the 1981 trial (‘It’s A Knockout’) of Wallace, who was information officer of the Duke’s local Arin Council in Sussex at the time. The Duke has had discussions with Avebury at the House of Lords, and apparently says that there are mysteries about the case. (Daily Express 7th Feb.1984) Wallace’s wife, Eileen, is secretary to the Duke at Arundel Castle.
Closely involved with Wallace on psyops was Paratroop Colonel Maurice Tugwell, initially head of the Information Policy Unit. Tugwell has previously been an intelligence officer in Palestine, and had also served in Malaya, Cyprus, Arabia and Kenya. He stayed at Lisburn till March 1973, when he transferred to Iran as an instructor at the Imperial Armed Forces College. He was awarded the CBE the same year. In 1975 he went to Nottingham, and in 1976 he took up a defence fellowship at King’s College, London, where he wrote a thesis on ‘The Problems of Dealing with Revolutionary Propaganda’.
Tugwell’s job as Colonel General Staff (Information Policy) was, as described by terrorism ‘expert’ Richard Clutterbuck, ‘not merely to react to the media -or events – but to take a positive initiative in presenting the news to best advantage for the Security Forces’.
In early 1973, Tugwell, in the wake of internment, published an article, ‘Revolutionary Propaganda And The Role of The Information Services in Counter-Insurgency Operations’. In it he stated ‘Interrogation methods used by the Security Forces in 1971 brought in a mass of valuable information. These methods, combined with the internment of known terrorists, threatened to destroy the IRA’s capacity and to destroy it quickly… None of those interrogated by those methods suffered any injury or ill-effects.’
Tugwell later turned up at the University of New Brunswick in Canada. (Ireland and the Propaganda War – Liz Curtis, Pluto Press 1984 pp. 232/3 – reviewed in this issue.)