William Massie
With Chapman Pincher retired from the Express group of newspapers, somebody had to take up his position as the spooks’ number one outlet. That person appears to be one William Massie. His name has appeared on some interesting material recently: viz:
- 14th February 1988, front page story in the Sunday Express based on leak from MI5 – complete with surveillance photograph – on alleged contact between the then Labour MP John Diamond and two Yugoslav women. The article contained the women’s passport numbers and the flights they came into Vienna on. The point of this was obscure initially: why would MI5 be shadowing a solid right-wing Labour MP like Diamond, a major supporter of Gaitskell? A week later it became clear. This story was merely a warm-up for a second Massie/MI5 special –
- 22nd February 1988, Daily Express, “Labour leader Neil Kinnock is to be offered an MI5 briefing on KGB attempts to infiltrate the Labour Party…. Such a meeting would be on ‘Privy Council terms’ ” – i.e. Kinnock would be unable to discuss its contents with anyone not also a member of the Privy Council. This is one of the classic Whitehall traps. The first Massie piece was supposed to be read as “So serious are the KGB, they even go after solid right-wingers like John Diamond “.
- May 1st 1988, Sunday Express another Massie re-write of a spook briefing which began, “The terrorist who hi-jacked a 24,000 ton passenger ship is to plan and command a massive revenge attack by the PLO on Israel and her allies.”
- May 8th 1988, Sunday Express, Massie tells us that “Mrs Thatcher has given the security services two months to crack down on IRA killer squads on the Continent … Mrs Thatcher, through her Security Coordinator, Sir Colin Figures, has issued unprecedented instructions to MI5 and MI6 in the hunt for the killers.”
The same day Massie produced a piece about a “millionaire businessman said to be a KGB spymaster (who) is to be questioned about a plot to smuggle arms to the IRA. According to MI6, KGB agents posing as staff of the Soviet state airline Aeroflot have brought weapons and electronic equipment into Shannon airport.”
No theme like an old theme, despite the fact that, an far as I can remember, not one Soviet employee has ever been busted for involvement with the IRA. On close examination Massie’s story dribbled away into nothing. All he actually had was “Israeli intelligence believes Shabtal Kalmanovitch may know how the network in organised and financed.”
Gerard Kemp
Another old spook outlet, Gerard Kemp, is still putting his name to British state press releases. It was Kemp who was given access to the tape recordings of Terry Waite apparently speaking derogatively of the Archbishop of Canterbury, part of the government’s campaign against the Archbishop. (Sunday Express 24th April 1988). And it was Kemp who was among the first to spread the Ulster Citizens’ Army smear against Wallace. (See Lobster 14).
Reproduced here is one of Kemp’s from Sunday Express 15th May 1988 – a gem even by the standards of Northern Ireland. Wallace in his heyday would have been proud of this one.
Sunday Express 15th May 1988Ten-year olds mount IRA hoax bomb campaign
by GERARD KEMP
THE IRA is using children, some as young as ten years old, to make hoax bombs in Ulster.
The new tactic is costing the Army hours of soldiers’ time as every suspected bomb has to be checked out. It often means sending in two armour-plated vehicles, carrying up to ten men.
The children often make replicas of one of the IRA’s latest weapons, the Drogue Bomb. The device resembles the German Army’s “stick bomb” and has a parachute attached.
The idea is to float it down from a height on to passing vehicles or patrols.
“The youngsters get empty tins, pack them with stones, add a metal rod and then paint the whole thing black,” said an Army source.
Maurice Tugwell
Thanks to CASIS (see journals section) we now have some information on events in Canada. One or two interesting developments there:
One is the presence of Maurice Tugwell. Tugwell now heads his own organisation, the McKenzie Institute for the Study of Terrorism, Revolution and Propaganda. This arrived in 1986 “to provide Canadians with a source of information” on psychological warfare. (Something the Canadians clearly need…….) The ‘Institute’ publishes papers, holds conferences and so forth. (Psy ops lightly disguised as anti psy ops) The piece describing this ‘Institute’, from the context written by Tugwell himself, says at one point:
“Militant religion, ideology and frustrated nationalism have latched-on to the new warfare which flourishes wherever it is accepted that ends justify means.”
Don’t you just love that conversion of ‘ideology’ into a free-standing noun? And this from a man with a PhD!
The biographical sketch of Tugwell in this puff notes that “In Northern Ireland in the early 1970s he was responsible for countering the propaganda of violent groups.” This, rather neatly, conveys a vague sense of it without doing the unthinkable, actually acknowledging that he was the CO of Information Policy, the British Army’s deniable (and subsequently denied) psy ops unit in Northern Ireland, colleague and friend of Colin Wallace. (Perhaps ‘friend’ is too strong in view of the fact that Tugwell is one of the many former ‘friends’ who have not come forward to support Wallace.)
The CASIS piece notes that the McKenzie Institute “does not accept funds from any government or government agency”. If they’ve learned anything from the days of ISC/Forum World Features, they’ve learned to launder their money better.
Centre for Conflict Studies
Prior to setting up this ‘institute’, Tugwell was head of the Centre for Conflict Studies at the University of New Brunswick. This sounds like, and probably is, an off-shoot of the Institute for the Study of Conflict.
The current head of CCS is David Charters, about whom I know very little. However, I do remember an hilarious piece he wrote, “Intelligence and Psychological Warfare Operations in Northern Ireland” for the RUSI journal (September 1977) while he, like Tugwell, was doing his PhD at King’s College, London. Charter’s article, despite having Tugwell on tap, as it were, described the 1971 creation of an ‘information policy cell’ – a ‘PR think tank’ – in Northern Ireland. According to Charters, this ‘think tank’ ‘studied trends in reporting and tried to keep one step ahead in the propaganda war’.
Which is not the truth, which is yet another cover story for Inf Pol, but which does at least acknowledge that something called ‘information policy’ did exist in Northern Ireland. As far an I am aware this is the last semi-official reference to the unit.
Paul Wilkinson
The Centre for Conflict Studies produces a journal, Conflict Quarterly. Its editorial advisory board includes Tugwell and Professor Paul Wilkinson the ‘terrorism expert’ from Aberdeen University. And Wilkinson is rather more than the bland rent-a-quote on terrorism he appears.
In 1987 I was briefly employed by Channel 4 News to help research the Wilson-MI5-Wallace story. Like all the other people working on that story we quickly discovered that there was only one person willing to talk on the record – Colin Wallace. In the end, to their credit, Channel 4 News produced the only TV material on Wallace and his story; indeed, produced the only TV material in this country on the entire Wilson-MI5 plots story to date.
We also discovered that there was a sustained attempt by the British state to discredit Wallace, a campaign of whispers and rumours which reached its climax with the full-page attack on Wallace and Holroyd in The Independent. However, while we were researching Wallace, disinformation was run into the Channel 4 News office by
- Andy Tyrie of the UDA
- Wallace’s former colleague at Inf Pol, Gordon Shepperd
- and Paul Wilkinson.
In July 1987 Wilkinson, in his capacity as a consultant to ITN (of which Channel 4 is a part), sent a copy of an anonymous letter about Wallace. The text of this is reproduced below. In his covering letter with this Wilkinson said, inter alia:
the “interesting” letter came from “one of our researchers on the Colin Wallace affair” ….. (it) “certainly raises major question marks about the extent to which one can rely on his version of events in Northern Ireland and elsewhere…. “I have also spoken to the leading journalist mentioned in the letter .. (who) confirmed the main thrust of the letter’s interpretation of events.”
I discuss this “research” below. I should say that I made a bootleg copy of these letters without the knowledge of the Channel 4 journalist I was working for. I was specifically asked not to publish or mention this Wilkinson event and am only now doing so because Wilkinson declined to reply to a letter of mine some months ago in which I pointed out the errors in his “research” and asked him for comments, and then sent the same piece of “research” to the Sunday Times (who, like Channel 4 News, ignored it).
The numbers in the text refer to my comments after the text.
13th July 1987Dear Professor Wilkinson,
You have probably been watching the unfolding revelations of Mr Colin Wallace (ex MI5) concerning the late Airey Neave and Peter Wright’s allegations. To say the least I am surprised that anyone could give Colin Wallace houseroom.
If you are better briefed on this matter than I am, may I apologise for wasting your time. However, you may recall that on one of our first meetings I told you the story of the Ulster Citizens’ Army. Colin Wallace (in 1973) was posing as a journalist (while also an officer in the UDR and working for MI5 and the Army Information Department) and was engaged in some maverick (and I stress maverick and not ‘deniable’) operations.(1)
Wallace was having an affair with a Mrs Horne (2) and was also trying to discredit the UDA. Wallace produced posters and sent anonymous press statements to various journalists about the Ulster Citizens’ Army. The statements were along the lines that socialist and class-conscious elements in the UDA and UVF had formed a new left-wing group to protest at gangsters having taken over the other two groups.
Wallace phoned up the UDA (3) and said that he had met the head of the Ulster Citizens Army, a Mr Horne of such and such address, could they confirm that this was the head of the Ulster Citizens Army?
Considering that the Ulster Citizens Army press statements threatened to kill the UDA leadership along with various capitalists and businessmen, this was tantamount to setting up Mr Horne for killing. So Mrs Horne would have been missing a husband. The UDA leaders and a journalist, David McKittrick (of the Irish Times) managed to pin Wallace down and followed him to Magheralane Barracks Lisburn.
McKittrick met Wallace and put it to him that he was the Ulster Citizens Army and was trying to set up Mr Horne.(4) Wallace was then pulled out of Northern Ireland. (5) Wallace was then jailed for killing the husband of an “Its a Knockout” hostess in England after having an affair with her. (6)
Concerning Wallace’s links with Airey Neave rather than a fantasy about destabilising the Wilson government, it is more likely that Wallace was trying to ingratiate himself with Neave in order to get to Neave’s friend Lt.Col. Brush the head of Down Orange Welfare.
Neave had much better contacts on Communist infiltration in Northern Ireland than Colin Wallace such as his links, that went back to his post-war work, with the security services.
Are the British (mainland) press not aware of Wallace’s past in Northern Ireland? Are they not aware that he was trying to recruit informers left right and centre in Northern Ireland and that the man had James Bond fantasies. He had done skydiving (7) and fancied himself as a womaniser and superspy.
You can check this information on Wallace from the UDA leaders such as Tyrie (8), McMichael (9) or Duddy or from David McKittrick. If you feel this information would be of any use to a reliable journalist to expose that charlatan please feel free to use it. Traitors do not deserve to get away with this kind of behaviour never mind to defame the reputation of a real hero like Airey Neave.
I hope this note is of some use.
Comments
I am not going to rebut the Ron Horn smear again. It was dealt with in issue 14.
- Interesting that the author writes of “one of our first meetings”; and interesting that someone who writes by hand, on lined paper, and appears to have a fairly shaky grasp of punctuation, should emphasise the distinction between ‘maverick’ and ‘deniable’ operations. Also, Wallace wasn’t working for MI5 in 1973 but for MI6.
- Wallace wasn’t having an affair with Mrs Horn (not Horne, either). Of all the versions of the story (see Lobster 14) only one added this final embellishment.
- This is not in the first versions of this story. In those the caller was Keith Hamilton. This particular version was offered to Channel 4 News by the UDA leader, Andy Tyrie.
- If this happened – and Wallace denies it – McKittrick has never reported the event, not even in his smear in The Independent.
- Not true. The UCA events happened in 1973: Wallace didn’t leave Northern Ireland until early 1975.
- ‘Then jailed’ – this was 8 years later! She was not a ‘hostess’ but Wallace’s assistant at Arun District Council.
- Interesting that the author acknowledges ‘skydiving’. In The Independent smear John Ware tried to discredit this.
- See note 3
- McMichael, now dead, was flown to England to tell the Ron Horn saga to Merlyn Rees, former Labour Northern Ireland Secretary.
All in all, this is a very strange piece of work. Bits of it, for example, the sentence “If you are better briefed on this than I am, may I apologise for wasting your time”, especially the use of “briefed”, and the use of “deniable” suggests that the author is both educated and familiar with the language of military/intelligence operations. But other bits of it are in, or are meant to be in, a kind of semi-literate style: for example, the sentence “Wallace phoned up the UDA …. Ulster Citizens Army”. The author who misses out the “and” which should have appeared in that sentence after “address” also uses “tantamount”, “ingratiate” and “charlatan”. Then, in the last paragraph reverts to the semi-literate again, using “to defame” instead of the correct, “defaming”.
In short, this is a not very clever piece of disinformation, coming either from someone in the British state or – my guess – from high up in the UDA. (The reference to Col. Brush certainly suggests a fairly intimate knowledge of Northern Ireland.)
That Paul Wilkinson thought that junk like this would influence the research at Channel 4 News or the Sunday Times says a great deal about his perceptions of journalism! What Wilkinson was up to, and what he really is, I leave to your imagination.
While Lobster was being printed the correspondence reproduced below arrived. Please note:
(a) Wilkinson denies sending the disinformation to the Sunday Times.
(b) Wilkinson has omitted the fact that he had sent the disinformation letter to Channel 4 News and that he sent a covering letter with it – in effect doing what he denies, endorsing it. (See letter, C)
(c) Wilkinson’s statement that the content of the disinformation letter is false must leave David McKittrick (and The Independent) in something of a bind.
(d) Wilkinson’s account of the origins of this disinformation here differs from that in the covering letter he sent to Channel 4 News. In that he wrote that it came from “one of our researchers on the Colin Wallace affair.”
Whatever the truth actually is, Mr Wilkinson isn’t telling it.
Robin Ramsay, June 21 1988
A
Cameron Street
Stonehaven9 June 1988Mr. Colin Wallace
14 Dalloway Road
Arundel
West Sussex BN18 9HW
Dear Mr. Wallace,I understand from the University that you have lodged a complaint concerning a letter which made certain allegations concerning your activities in Northern Ireland some years ago. In July 1987 I received a letter from a part-time Northern Ireland researcher making certain claims at variance with other reports that had been contained in the press earlier in the year. The letter referred to a member of the Northern Ireland Press Corps. I at no time endorsed the claims and allegations made in the letter. However, I sought to query the validity of the contents of the information on this matter. It is a copy of this correspondence which has somehow inadvertently, or by other means, come into the hands of a Sunday newspaper.
I should like to make it clear that I was acting wholly in my private capacity as one who has researched on terrorism and security matters concerning Northern Ireland over many years. There was no intention to publish or publicise the letter in the public press. I am happy to say that I am unaware of any instance where the letter has been reproduced by the media.
However, I willingly convey my full apologies for any discomfort or embarrassment that may have been caused to you as a result or this correspondence.
I enclose a copy of a letter of complete retraction sent to all the media organisations as I understand this is your wish.
Yours sincerely,
Paul Wilkinson
Professor of International Relations
B
Cameron Street
Stonehaven9
June 1988
Dear Editor,
MR COLIN WALLACE
In July 1987 I received a letter from a part-time Northern Ireland academic researcher making certain claims about the activities of Mr. Wallace in the early 1970s which were at variance with the account previously given in the media. The letter named a Northern Ireland journalist as a source who could verify some of the contents of the letter. He wrote to me in my capacity as a researcher on terrorism and security matters in Northern Ireland over many years. In my private capacity, therefore, I sent a copy of the letter with a covering note to the journalist concerned.
Inadvertently, or by some other means, a copy of this correspondence has been obtained by a Sunday newspaper.
To my knowledge no newspaper has published the letter that was sent to me. However, I wish to make it perfectly clear that, to the best of my knowledge, the claims made in the letter regarding Mr. Wallace are totally untrue. I therefore offer Mr. Wallace a full apology for any discomfort or embarrassment which my correspondence may have caused and I would be glad if you would give the widest possible circulation to this complete retraction.
Yours sincerely,
Paul Wilkinson
Professor of International Relations
C
UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN
Professor PAUL WILKINSON. M.A.
DEPARTMENT OF POLITICS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
EDWARD WRIGHT BUILDING
OLD ABERDEEN
AB9 2UB
Tel. No. 40241 Ext 5205
S.T.D. Code 0224
21 July 1987
[Name deleted] ITNITN House
48 Wells Street
London WIP 4DE
Dear [Name deleted]
Herewith the interesting letter I received from one of our researchers on the Colin Wallace Affair. I think you and members of your team will find this of interest. It certainly raises major question marks about the extent to which one can rely on his version of events in Northern Ireland and elsewhere.
I have had a word with [Name deleted] who rang me after I spoke to you and I know he would be keen to see a copy.
I have also spoken to the leading journalist mentioned in the letter and although he is not willing to talk about it or write about it publicly at present, he confirmed the main thrust of the letter’s interpretation of events.
As promised, I am having a word with the researcher who wrote the letter and will try to persuade him to talk with you and your colleagues on a confidential basis. I cannot promise anything because his home is in Belfast and he is naturally rather reticent and nervous of possible repercussions. However, I will do my best.
With best wishes.
Yours sincerely,
Paul Wilkinson
Professor of International Relations