Western Goals (UK)

Organisation, History and Politics

In the early years of the Thatcher decade, the radical or ‘new’ right was generally treated as though it was a united palace guard for libertarian Conservatism. More recently it has become clearer that the radical right in Britain was, at best, an ‘anti wet’ alliance between authoritarian/ nationalist and libertarian/radical traditions within the Conservative Party, (1) united by their opposition to the dominant, mainstream tradition within the Conservative Party. Once Thatcher’s position as party leader and then as Prime Minister, had been consolidated, it was inevitable that cracks would begin to show in this alliance.

The formation of the distinctly authoritarian Western Goals (UK), in May 1985, was one of the first symptoms of the growing public divisions among the radical right. By 1988 it had virtually become open sectarian warfare in places, of a kind usually encountered on the fringes of the revolutionary left. A note from Marc Gordon (of the International Freedom Foundation [IFF]) to his fellow libertarian David Hart (of the Committee for a Free Britain [CFB]) reflected the problems that Western Goals were causing them:
‘It is not often that I believe we should act against ‘our own’, but Western Goals have now gone too far — and are positively attempting to smear those who do not adhere to their rigid authoritarianism. They are clearly very dangerous people with little to lose.’

In the accompanying report, Gordon identified the differences between the two factions and reviewed the options available to them.

‘The problem has arisen because of fundamental ideological differences between CFB/IFF/ISHR [International Society for Human Rights] and Western Goals. Whilst the former generally takes a very libertarian line on most issues, Western Goals seems increasingly obsessed with the ideas of racial superiority, a strong state and Jewish conspiracies. The questions is therefore whether we should respond and, if so, how far do we go?
The following options are available:

1. completely ignore Western Goals in the hope that this activity will subside. This seems unlikely.
2. Monitor its activities and even infiltrate an activist into the organisation. This is ready to start.
3. Respond directly through CFB. Challenge A. V. R. Smith to face CFB directly rather than engage in puerile pranks.
4. Respond indirectly by stepping up the covert campaign against Western Goals. The possibilities are limitless.
5. Approach A. V. R. Smith to deny any involvement in anti-Western activities while starting a proxy war by encouraging those already engaging Western Goals to step up their activities.’ (2)

In the end they seem to have adopted a version of option five, though it is not clear whether they ever bothered to approach Smith.

Marc Gordon’s accusations about Western Goals (UK) feeding stories about the libertarians to the press were correct, (3) but at the time both Western Goals (UK) and the open warfare within the radical right fringe largely escaped serious media attention. In part this was the inability of journalists to see Western Goals (UK) and IFF as serious, and in part the tendency of journalists to judge Conservative Party radicals by the standards that are applied to left-wing groups. Groups operating within, or on the fringes of, the Conservative Party are not in the business of building mass movements, but are power-brokers; their target groups are the opinion formers and decision makers, their objective to set and influence the policy agenda. The CFB and Western Goals (UK) are not intellectual heavyweights, nor do they seriously pretend to be ‘think tanks’. They are ideologically-motivated PR agencies. The close connection with Thatcher and members of her ‘kitchen cabinet’ of the CFB’s David Hart made him newsworthy, and apparently influential, in a way that the dull, grey boys that headed Western Goals (UK) were not. (4)

While libertarians like Hart and the CFB had a more or less direct line to some of the policy makers in the Conservative Party, Western Goals (UK) have been building up a steady support within the Monday Club and its rank and file supporters. In an interview with me in 1990, A. V. R. Smith claimed that Western Goals (UK) had control of the Club, and subsequent events seem to have confirmed this. (5)

It is difficult to assess the probable outcome of the current conflict in the radical right. The domination of the Monday Club by Western Goals (UK) has meant the defection of some influential Thatcherite members like George Gardiner MP and the more maverick Julian Amery MP. Gardiner’s defection, to the Conservative Way Forward Group (a Thatcherism-after-Thatcher group) hints that, out of office, Thatcher herself may become more libertarian than she was in office. (6) This would certainly boost the flagging fortunes of libertarians like Hart and the CFB, who have recently seen a decline in their support within the party.

While the radical right portrays this schism as being simply a conflict of two contrasting, radical, right-wing ideologies, one ‘authoritarian’ and the other ‘libertarian’, it is also about ‘nationalism’ and ‘internationalism’, and at an altogether more seedy level, it is about personal prejudices, ambitions and grudges. The personality clashes between Goalies and libertarians date back to their days in the Federation of Conservative Students and, while they spice up the political clashes, they don’t deserve a great deal of attention. More interesting is the conflict between the libertarians’ individualism and Western Goals (UK) nationalism and support for what it describes as a ‘pan-European order based on the values of European civilisation’. (7) It is a source of conflict understandably played down by the libertarians who are only too aware that their own anti-statist line is not as consistent as it might be. Although their classical liberal, individualist ideology is applied rigorously in the field of social and industrial policy — and also in respect of European unity — it is suppressed when it comes to the civil and military authorities which underpin the British nation state. For Western Goals (UK), however, their cherished ‘Western’, ‘European’ or ‘Christian’ values are threatened not only by Marxism but by liberalism — the classic liberalism of the libertarians, the liberalism of social democrats and democratic socialists, and what they argue is the unprincipled liberalism of the multi-nationals and ‘the connivance of parastatal financial institutions with Communism’. (8)

However it is dressed up as a right-wing, traditional ‘conservative’ outfit, it is impossible to conceive of this illiberal bestiary as anything but fundamentally authoritarian, if not actually fascist. As will be seen, there is good reason to believe that Western Goals (UK) has achieved exactly the sort of fusion of conservatism and authoritarian nationalism that George Kennedy Young had aimed for in the early 1970s. (9)

Early Days

Western Goals (UK) was founded in 1985 as the British wing of the American Western Goals Foundation, which had been established in 1979 by, amongst others, the ultra right-wing Georgia Congressman, Larry McDonald. Its early supporters included General John Singlaub, with Carl ‘Spitz’ Channell as president and Linda Guell as chair. In 1983 McDonald was killed when the airliner in which he was travelling, KAL 007, was shot down by the Soviet Union. His widow subsequently formed the Larry McDonald Memorial Foundation to fund and encourage right-wing organisations.

By 1985 the Western Goals Foundation was a well established member of the American radical right, and it is also said to have established a West German subsiduary. (10) It was an important independent fund-raising mechanism for the Contras in Nicaragua and had produced a number of pro-Contra TV ads. From the start it had particularly strong ties (through McDonald and Singlaub) with the Conservative Action Group and also (through Singlaub) with the World Anti-Communist League and its numerous affiliates. (11)

In May 1985 Linda Guell came over to Britain to organise and launch Western Goals (UK). Paul Masson, then a leading Young Conservative, was appointed its first Director and it initially had a Parliamentary Advisory Board which included MPs the Rev. Martin Smyth, Patrick Wall, Nicholas Winterton, Neil Hamilton, Bill Walker and former MP Stefan Terlezki. (12) Like its parent organisation, Western Goals (UK) from the beginning was intimately linked with WACL and its circle. At the time of foundation Wall was President of the British Anti Communist Council (BACC), then the British ‘Chapter’ of WACL. Also present at the launch was Peter Dally, responsible for running BACC. The former Conservative MP, Terlezki, was a key figure in the British section of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations (ABN). Western Goals (UK)’s early links with WACL were further confirmed when in March 1986 Searchlight reported that Paul Masson had been appointed to the International Youth Committee of the ABN and that the Young Monday Club had sent a delegation to the ABN conference, consisting of Masson, David Neil-Smith, A. V. R. Smith and Adrian Lee.

‘Split’ with the Foundation

At the beginning of the investigation into the Irangate scandal, the U.S. parent body ran into serious trouble. Although its role as a lobbyist and fund-raiser for the Contras was well known, the report of the Tower Commission confirmed that the Western Goals Foundation, and Linda Guell, had been an important part of Oliver North’s covert machinery for passing money to the Contras. More damaging to the Foundation, as a result of the investigation, the Foundation’s president, ‘Spitz’ Channell, was accused of, and admitted, tax fraud. Guell immediately left the Foundation to become Director of the Larry McDonald Trust. When Western Goals (UK) was challenged about its links with Channell, through the Foundation, a spokesman for Western Goals (UK) told Time Out that it had split from the Western Goals Foundation ‘in late 1986’ — after being told by ‘American sources’ that Channell was ‘not a reliable individual’ — and was now affiliated with the Larry McDonald Trust. The Foundation had been wound up; or, perhaps more correctly, had been absorbed by the Larry McDonald Trust. (13)

By 1987 Western Goals (UK) had established its place in the anti-left battle order. It played a prominent role in the campaign against alleged ‘left wing’ charities like Oxfam, Cafod and War on Want. They were not the only group involved in this campaign — in 1986, for example, the Economic League’s manual Companies under Attack, had already targetted a number of these charities for criticism — but they were, nevertheless, the group most publicly associated with it. In June 1987 they published a report on Christian Aid (researched by David Neil- Smith) which was well received by conservative newspapers; and at the Tory Party conference in October that year the charities were the main target of the Goalies fringe meeting, ‘Alms for the Poor or Arms for Communism?’ This campaign continued in 1989, concentating on the charities involved in ‘Central America week’. A ‘special’ Western Goals (UK) report, written by Michael McCrone and Gideon Sherman (son of Alfred Sherman) was sent to the Charities Commission. (14)

At the same time Western Goals (UK) were now emphasising that it was an authoritarian, not a libertarian, conservative group. In August 1987 the Kilburn Times reported a vitriolic attack by Western Goals (UK) on Ken Livingstone MP (whose constituency includes Kilburn):

‘Livingstone and his friends in London’s Labour councils want to encourage more homosexuals to come out of the closet and spread their perverted filth. The gay rights policy which he is preparing to put before Parliament in the Autumn is typical of someone who is working to destroy the family and traditional family values. It will mean more danger of AIDS and that is just what Britain’s enemies want.’ (15)

The 1987 General Election

The 1987 election strategies of both the Conservative and Liberal parties involved maintaining the image of a Labour Party riddled with crypto-communist extremists. The Liberals and the radical right published their own lists of ‘extremist’ candidates. According to the Goalies A. V. R. Smith, ‘The more accurate details of Communist aligned candidates (both Labour and Liberal) which were widely picked up in the media were contained in a briefing paper produced by Western Goals at the outset of the election campaign and circulated to Conservative MPs and right thinking journalists.’ (16)

In a later interview with the author, Smith claimed that the research for this list had been carried out by Mark Taha, and the Western Goals (UK) list had been the basis of a four-page special which appeared in the Daily Mail under the byline of the right-wing trade unionist, Frank Chappell. Curiously, David Hart has also claimed that the then fledgling Committee for A Free Britain produced the same, or a similar list. Nobody on the right has to look very hard for official or semi-official information on the Labour left. It is the sort of work in which the Conservative Research Department, the Economic League, Common Cause and Industrial Research and Information Services (IRIS) all have expertise. More recently, of course, British Briefing has been revealed to be doing the same thing, part funded by CFB’s David Hart, using the information from Charles Elwell, formerly of MI5’s F branch. (17)

Into Thatcherism’s third term.

Events behind the former Iron Curtain meant that Western Goals (UK) role with WACL continued to dominate its activites. Thus it was hardly surprising to find a Western Goals (UK) meeting in 1988 being addressed by a representative from CAUSA, the Moonie front which provided funds for the U.S. Conservative Action Foundation (CAF) and the Committee to Defend the Constitution (CDC). In January 1989, David Finzer, general secretary of WACL’s youth wing, the World Youth Freedom League, and closely associated with both CAF and CDC, was reported as having been working with Stuart Northolt and A. V. R. Smith to raise money for an ‘International Conference’ in April 1989 on the theme of ‘Self Defence for Eastern Europe’. (18)

Western Goals (UK) also showed a growing interest in South African politics. They claimed to have an ‘African desk’ in 1988, although this is most probably another name for Northolt and/or Smith. Their own contacts with right-wing forces in Namibia, Angola and Mozambique, and with the South African Conservative Party, were drawn into the WACL empire. In July 1988 Western Goals (UK) helped organize a visit to Britain by Joseph Savimbi of the Angolan UNITA, and held a briefing with him in the House of Commons, attended, it was claimed ‘by 20 Western Goals (UK) MPs’. Who these MPs were, and what formal links they had with Western Goals (UK) is another question, especially since it seems that their original sponsoring ‘Parliamentary Advisory Body’ had ceased to function. (There is no evidence of Winterton, Hamilton or Walker’s continued involvement with them, and Terlezki is no longer in the House of Commons.)

In February 1989 Western Goals (UK) issued a press release condemning proposals to ammend the law to permit war crimes trials in Britain. ‘The British Government’, it concluded, ‘would be well advised not to allow British Justice to be perverted as part of a communist disinformation ploy’. (19) The notepaper on which the press release was issued gave the names of Western Goals (UK)’s vice presidents. Among them was the long standing supporter, Unionist MP Martin Smyth, who had been a prominent campaigner for war crimes trials. He immediately resigned.

In June it turned its attentions back to southern Africa, with a lengthy pro-South Africa/UNITA ‘Discussion paper’, Namibia – what kind of Independence?. It was the latest in a series of pamphlets with a robust pro-South African line, including ANC/IRA Partners in Terror and Crisis in South West Africa. This latter pamphlet coincided with a visit to Britain by Andries Treunicht and Clive Derby-Lewis, respectively leader and foreign affairs spokesman of the South African Conservative Party. Although officially hosted by the then recently-formed Anglo-South African Fellowship, the visit was exclusively a Western Goals (UK) show. PR was handled by ‘A. V. R. Smith Associates’. In addition to Smith’s own number, the contact numbers provided on the press release included those of Gregory Lauder-Frost (Chair of the Monday Club’s Foreign Affairs Committee) and Christopher Forster (Chair of the Anglo-South African Fellowship). Both were active Goalies — Lauder-Frost had just become one of its vice presidents, and Forster had been working as a part-time researcher for them.

Western Goals (UK) was by now part of attempts to create a euronationalist axis, apparently based round European WACL associates. In time for the 1989 Tory Conference, Western Goals (UK) launched European Dawn. Edited by Northolt and run by Smith, European Dawn seems to have been the successor to the short-lived Young European, and was described as being ‘published by Western Goals (UK) on behalf of YEWF’ (Young Europeans for World Freedom, the WACL youth organisation). (20)

European Dawn was an undisguised euronationalist broadsheet. Its logo superimposed the map of Europe on to the sort of celtic cross used by the British National Party. Northolt’s obsession with this symbol goes back to the late seventies when he used it inDreadnought, the Uxbridge Young Conservatives Newsletter which he edited. The first (and only?) two issues of European Dawn contained substantial articles in support of the Republicans in Germany and the Front National in France. Northolt’s covering letter which went out with the first issue also mentioned ‘a private dinner of the Western Goals (UK) Executive Committee at which the guest of honour was Major Roberto D’Aubuisson of El Salvador’s ruling Arena Party’. It announced that ‘as a result of this meeting a Latin American Directorate has been established’. Northolt also announced that D’Aubuisson, one of the organisers of the El Salvadorean death squads, had agreed to become an honorary patron of Western Goals (UK).

The Goalies fringe meeting at the Tory Conference, on October 12 1989, was jointly sponsored by European Dawn. Derby-Lewis was the main speaker, but the Front National member of the European Parliament, Yvan Blot, also spoke. Western Goals (UK)’s own press release for this meeting neatly summed up their political position: ‘Western Goals (UK), the group sponsoring tonight’s meeting, is a London-based right-wing organisation devoted to the preservation of traditional Western values and European culture, and it opposes communism, liberalism, internationalism and the ‘multi-cultural society’.’

Western Goals (UK) were, in effect, now acting as unofficial ambassadors for the South African Conservative Party, the German Republicans, the French Front National and the Arena Party in El Salvador. It was a role that suited them. Because Western Goals (UK) was small and ‘fringe’, it attracted comparatively little attention; and though this was frustrating for the Goalies’ leadership, it allowed them the freedom to pursue their aims unhindered by any damage limitation exercises by the Conservative Party Central Office or leadership. However, its firm foothold (through the Monday Club) in a ‘respectable’ British party, makes it an important example for other eurofascists attempting to establish themselves as respectable parties.

When Clive Derby-Lewis returned to Britain in July 1990, A. V R. Smith arranged for him to attend the WACL conference in Brussels, and, a few days later, his first meeting with the Front National’s leader Le Pen. Western Goals (UK)’s own publications began to take on a more or less overtly anti-semitic character and, according to two sources, there was at least one meeting between the pan-European fascist League of St. George and Notholt and Smith. One of these sources suggested that this had caused controversy within Western Goals (UK)’s ranks, with Lauder-Frost demanding an end to meetings with the League. (21) When I challenged A. V. R. Smith about these meetings he denied them. Keith Thompson of the League of St. George also denied any such meetings had taken place — but said he admired the Goalies work: ‘I’ve seen their stuff and I think its great.’ Links between Western Goals (UK) and the British National Party (BNP) are easier to establish, and were openly discussed in the BNP magazine Spearhead. The article described how BNP members had turned up at the Western Goals (UK) meeting with Treunicht at the Royal Commonwealth Society and had been stopped from selling Spearhead. The article criticises the Goalies for not having the courage of their nationalist convictions: ‘Their line was the familiar one: ‘Oh yes, I agree with all you say, but keep it quiet’….Their greatest fear is that of being embarassed by their nationalist acquaintances turning up to their gatherings and compromising their ‘respectable’ credentials.’

It is, of course, possible that the BNP, who claimed to know ‘roughly half the Tory types there’, are overstating their acquaintance with the Goalies. However it must be remembered that Stuart Millson, one of the original Western Goals (UK) activists, and at the time a close friend of Smith and Northolt, defected to the BNP in 1986. In Yorkshire a BNP activist, Sean Pearson, was also active in the Monday Club there, in a branch run by Anthony Murphy, an elected member of the Club’s national executive and Western Goals (UK)’s main contact in the region. Murphy was expelled from the Bradford Conservative Association for distributing racist leaflets in the streets. He maintained his party, and therefore, Club membership, by joining the Thurrock Conservative Association. (22)

Another important intermediary appears to be the historian David Irving who appeared during 1990 at meetings organised by both Lauder-Frost and the BNP. Irving’s Focus Policy Group, and the ‘Clarendon Club’ organised by him (and perhaps the similar but almost unknown ‘Riverside Club’) are a natural meeting ground for a variety of nationalist movements. (23)

The Next Step?

The resignation of Margaret Thatcher and her replacement by John Major was a significant blow to the ambitions of the radical right. Although Major was generally backed by radical right Tories, he was an unknown quantity to many of them. He had not been a joiner of fringe movements or an ideologue, and although the radical right seem to feel confident about his ‘robust’ approach to fiscal policy, they are thoroughly suspicious of his attitudes on social issues and European unity. (24) Neither the authoritarian/nationalists nor the libertarians will be in a position to influence his policies in the way that the libertarians were under Thatcher. The Western Goals (UK)/Monday Club faction, in particular, must be expecting to be kept firmly on the sidelines by Major, who has a reputation for taking a tough line against old-fashioned Tory white suprematism. The libertarians, on the other hand, must also be aware that Major’s need, and perhaps inclination, to distance himself from his predecessor, spells problems for them. It is hard, therefore, not to envisage both factions playing a largely oppositional role in Conservative Party politics in the immediate future; acting, that is, as a sort of radical, nostalgic, party conscience, rather than as a source of inspiration and ideas, or useful market research on the government’s own partly-baked ideas, as they were under Thatcher.

With little place now for Western Goals (UK) in a Conservative Party trying to establish a ‘more caring’ image, there is not much point in them treating the new leadership with caution. With Western Goals (UK) in control of the Monday Club, and with nothing to lose by upsetting the Party leadership or Central Office, the prospect for the developing eurofascist/ultra right-wing axis could be interesting.

Western Goals (UK): Who’s Who

Thomas J. Bergen — Vice President (listed once, in October 1989). US citizen, Senator Joe McCarthy Foundation, A.B.N.; article in European Dawn.

Sir John Biggs-Davison — Now deceased. Early Western Goals (UK) leaflets claimed his support, though he never became a patron/vice president. His early support, and that of Peter Dally’s points to continuity between Western Goals (UK) and the British Anti Communist Council (BACC) (and thus to WACL).

Peter Dally — Vice President, Chair of British Freedom Council (successor to BACC). Regular writer in Asian Peoples Anti Communist League journal Asian Outlook. Billed at Western Goals (UK) 1988 Tory Conference as ‘former editor of Intelligence Digest‘, Kenneth de Courcy’s newsletter.

Clive Derby-Lewis — Attended the 22nd WACL conference in Brussels (July 1990) as Western Goals Institute delegate. The press release (30 July 1990) described him as a vice president of Western Goals, the first mention of a position in Western Goals (UK). Commandant Derby-Lewis is foreign affairs spokesman of the South African Conservative Party. On the June 1989 Western Goals (UK)-organised visit to the UK he accompanied party leader Andreas Treunicht. That October he addressed the Western Goals (UK) fringe meeting at the Tory Conference. During his 1990 visit Western Goals announced that he had met with a number of Tory celebrities including Lord Hailsham and former NF-supporting tennis player Buster Mottram; that he addressed a House of Lords Monday Club meeting hosted by Lord Sudely, and a South West Essex Monday Club banquet with MPs Teresa Gorman, Teddy Taylor and Tim Janman, at which he was ‘praised for his robust defence of Western Values and Civilization in Southern Africa’. He also attended a ‘select’ dinner in Whitehall for ‘Conservative Parliamentarians, Parliamentary candidates, councillors and party officials’. (The neo-nazi historian David Irving was spotted in the Houses of Parliament just before the Lords meeting, and also that night at a Monday Club Foreign Affairs Committee meeting in Whitehall — organised by Gregory Lauder-Frost — at which Derby-Lewis was speaking.) Derby-Lewis also appeared on the Sky TV programme hosted by Norman Tebbit MP and Austin Mitchell MP.

Roberto D’Aubisson — Ex military commander in El Salvador, a senior position in the Arena Party. According to A. V. R. Smith (interview with author) Western Goals (UK) had been corresponding with him for some time before his 1989 trip to Britain. During this visit Western Goals (UK) hosted a dinner in his honour, and D’Aubuisson agreed to join its list of patrons.

David Finzer — Washington-based, former Anglican deacon responsible for running the Conservative Action Foundation and Committee to Defend the Constitution, both part funded by the Moonies. Was General Secretary of World Youth Freedom League, the youth wing of WACL until 1990. Details on the Finzer/Northolt/Smith connection are in the David Rose piece in the Guardian 9 January 1989 (especially the longer version in the first edition).

Professor Anthony Flew — Philosopher, ubiquitous figure on the radical right, member of the Monday Club executive. Early Western Goals (UK) leaflets listed him as a supporter and he became a vice president as soon as the group was formally set up.

Chris Forster — Ex-member of the 1970s New Britain Party (most famous member General Sir Walter Walker which, in 1980, absorbed Patrick Moore’s United Country Party. Ran for Treasurer of the Monday Club in 1989 saying that he would ‘work for an end to black immigration and third world aid’. At the time he was working as a part-time researcher for Western Goals (UK) and chairing the Anglo-South African Fellowship, the Western Goals (UK) front responsible for inviting Treunicht in 1989. Removed from his position as a NALGO shop steward at Wandsworth Council, where he was an internal auditor, after his racist politics were exposed (Searchlight, June 1989.)

James Gibb-Stewart — Author of two Western Goals (UK) ‘Viewpoint Papers’ in 1990, The Finance Factor, about the alleged international financial conspiracy, and The Mandela Myth. The latter was reprinted in Candour. Gibbs is the author of three books, Money Bomb, The Mind Benders and Lemming Folk, the last being a pale British imitation of John Birch-type American global conspiracy theorising.

Linda Catoe Guell — Vice President of Western Goals Foundation in the USA. Came to Britain to organise and launch Western Goals (UK). Listed as vice president Western Goals (UK) in 1989 leaflets. Named in Tower Commission investigation into Irangate, left the Foundation to run Larry McDonald Trust.

Mark Haley — Former member Western Goals (UK). Secretary and later chair in 1988. At the time he was secretary of London, Group Two, Young Conservatives.

Neil Hamilton MP — Parliamentary Advisory Committee of Western Goals (UK) in 1987.

Dr. Joseph Labia — Vice President of Western Goals (UK), October 1989.

Gregory Lauder-Frost — Vice president of Western Goals (UK) from October 1989. Chair of Monday Club Foreign Affairs Committee since 1989 and Club Secretary in 1991. Contact for Treunicht visit in 1989. Treasurer of War and Peace Ball, 1989, contributor to European Dawn. Searchlight (January 1990) notes that he works for Riverside Health Authority in London, where he is, or was, a NALGO shop steward.

Paul Masson — First Director of Western Goals (UK) in May 1985. Then a leading Monday Club activist. Still on Western Goals (UK) Board of Directors in 1989.

Michael McCrone — Director of Western Goals (UK) (February 1989), Chair of Young Monday Club and on YEFWF steering committee in 1988. Re-elected treasurer of North West and Central London Freedom Association in August 1987. A barrister, said to work for the Crown Prosecution Service, with Gideon Sherman, he signed the Western Goals (UK) complaints to the Charities Commission in 1988 and 1989.

Tryggvi McDonald — Vice president in February 1989. Son of Larry McDonald, he signed a general appeal for funds in 1988, drawing potential donors’ attention to Western Goals (UK)’s affiliation to WACL and the Singlaub Freedom Foundation.

Stuart Millson — Never seems to have held a formal position in Western Goals (UK) but in 1985 was a Young Monday Clubber, and Conservative student at Exeter University. He helped Smith and Northolt dish the dirt on the libertarians to the press but in 1986 defected to the British National Party. He now claims to have left the BNP and rejoined the Conservative Party.

Patrick More — TV astronomer and eccentric nationalist politician, claimed as a supporter by Western Goals (UK). His own nationalist party was absorbed by the New Britain Party. (See entry for Chris Forster.)

Anthony Murphy — Monday Club executive member, runs Yorkshire Monday Club. Works in sales department of Yorkshire Post. Expelled from his local Conservative Association after distributing racist leaflets in Bradford, but readmitted, apparently in 1991: in April 1991 he was acting as an election agent for the Conservative Party in Bradford. Member of Western Goals (UK) and their main contact in Yorkshire. Enjoyed close links with the BNP until they were exposed in Leeds Other Paper and subsequently in Searchlight and City Limits.

David Neil-Smith — Researched Western Goals (UK) charities report (Sunday Telegraph, 15 May 1987). Former councillor in London, nicknamed ‘the exorcist’ by the libertarians, he was secretary of North West and Central London Freedom Association in 1987 and 88.

Stuart Northolt — Founder member of Western Goals (UK) and now runs it, with A. V. R. Smith and Lauder-Frost. Chairman of YEWF, editor of European Dawn in March 1989. He spoke alongside Slava Stetsko at an ABN symposium on ‘National Fronts and the young generation in the Soviet Russian Empire’, part of his speech being reproduced in the ABN magazine ABN Correspondence.

Gideon Sherman — Board of Directors of Western Goals (UK) February 1989. Worked on the anti-Charities report. Son of Sir Alfred Sherman, Centre for Policy Studies and speechwriter for Keith Joseph etc.

Major-General John Singlaub — Named as ‘Honorary President’ of Western Goals (UK) in October 1989. Ubiquitous figure on American radical right, key figure in WACL and ABN etc. Chair of Free World Foundation with which Western Goals (UK) have claimed close ties.

A. V. R. Smith — Founder member and Director of Information. Today he more or less runs it with Northolt and Lauder- Frost. Former chair of Young Monday Club, but no longer a member and often gives the impression that he is no longer in the Conservative Party. In fact, like many of his associates, he is a member of the Thurrock Conservative Association in Essex. Secretary General of WACL’s Young Europeans for World Freedom; Secretary to WACL Policy Committee of which Singlaub is Chair. Elected Secretary of North West and Central London Freedom Association in August 1988. According to a letter in anarchist paper Black Flag, he was once a PA to the late Joseph Josten at the Free Czech Press Agency.

Rev. Martin Smyth MP — On Western Goals (UK)’s Parliamentary Advisory Committee in 1987. A Vice President, he resigned following A. V. R. Smith’s press release in 1989 attacking proposals to prosecute Nazi war criminals.

Lord Sudeley — Vice President, Monday Club Executive, he has chaired most of the Western Goals (UK) meetings at Westminster. Appears to be involved (with Lauder-Frost) in Manorial Society, War and Peace Ball and Monarchist Society.

Colonel Barry Turner — Listed as Vice President in October 1989.

Bill Walker MP — Parliamentary Advisory Committee member in 1986/7.

General Sir Walter Walker – Patron of Western Goals (UK), speaker at meetings. A recurring figure on the ultra right, member of Unison and Civil Assistance in 1973-5, founder member of New Britain Party, more recently active in British Israelites.

Sir Patrick Wall MP — ‘the mad major’, now deceased. Patron of Western Goals (UK), long-standing member and supporter of anti- communist organisations in UK.

Harvey Ward — Vice President, regular speaker at their meetings. Former head of Rhodesian TV and radio, now living in Scotland. His paper on terrorism, The Undefined Enemy, was printed and distributed by Western
Goals (UK).

Reverend Basil Watson — Vice President, Council member of the Freedom Association.

Nicholas Winterton MP — Parliamentary Advisory Committee, 1986.

John Wilkes — author of Western Goals (UK) Viewpoint Paper, The Hit Job on Thatcher, April 1990, which alleged that the poll tax riots of 1990 were part of an international ‘liberal conspiracy’ against Thatcher, and that the decision to foment civil unrest had been taken at the Bilderberg Group meeting the previous year.

Notes

1. The ‘New Right’ and those around Keith Joseph and Thatcher worked hard to portray the Conservative Party before them as devoid of ideology. See, for example, Joseph’s introduction to The Case for Private Enterprise (ed. Cecil Turner, Bachman and Turner, 1979). However, mainstream Conservative Party ideology had been well worked out. Quintin Hogg, for example, in his The Case for Conservatism (Penguin, 1947), widely available second hand, gave it one of its most complete and popular expressions; and Philip W. Buck’s 1975 compilation How Conservatives Think (Pelican), also emphasised the development of a Conservative ideology.
2. Unpublished document in possession of the author.
3. I spoke to one journalist who remembered being given anti- libertarian material by Western Goals (in the form of Smith, Northolt and Stuart Millson) in early 1986.
4. Western Goals (UK), the Campaign For a Free Britain and the International Freedom Foundation are ignored in Maurice Cowling’s interesting history of the British ‘new right’ in Encounter, November 1989.
5. Interview with A. V. R. Smith: – ‘They have all the key positions now — I mean all of them….Although the ‘right wing element’ have acted independently of us it is encouraging to see how many Western Goals members have cropped up as successful in the last [1990] elections.’ See also David Rose, ‘Far right takes over Monday Club’, in The Observer, 24 February 1991, and the denial by Lauder-Frost in the letters column the following Sunday (3 March 1991).
6. News of Gardiner’s departure from the Monday Club and his involvement in the new grouping The Conservative Way Forward broke in January 1991. Conservative Way Forward was not formally launched until March 19. Its aim is to ‘mobilise support in the Conservative Party for the ideas and values of Margaret Thatcher and promote discussion of how they may be developed’. Its first council meeting (on March 20) was chaired by Cecil Parkinson and it was said the have the active support of Norman Tebbit, Keith Joseph, Nicholas Ridley and John Moore. While it looks suspiciously like a Thatcherite rearguard made up of ‘yesterday’s men’, it is not possible yet to dismiss their ability to mobilise and sustain an opposition within the Tory Party to Major’s ‘social market’ policies, which do not yet seem to have any organised support (or to have been thought through very far). The aims of the CWF were quoted in a page-length feature on ‘The Thatcher Factor’ in the Sunday Telegraph, March 17 1991, which also described the personnel and political aims of two other groups in the Tory Party, the No Turning Back Group and The Bruges Group.
7. WG(UK) Discussion paper on Namibia, 1989.
8. WG(UK) recruiting leaflet, 1989.
9. Is Western Goals (UK) a fascist organisation? If fascism is a political ideology, and not merely a collective noun for a number of similar political movements active in the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s, then it is hard not to conclude the WG(UK) is fascist. Among those features supporting this view are:– its nationalism, its authoritarianism and its racial/cultural/religious suprematism; its anti-liberalism, obsessive anti- communism, and support for pan-European nationalist order; and its promotion of the idea of an international financial conspiracy.
10. The German branch is referred to in Lobster 12, p. 37. These days, in addition to their connections with the Republicans in Germany, they describe Conservative Action as their German ‘sister group’.
11. It also seems to have had some sort of link with the US branch of IFF through Congressman Philip Crane (a member of the IFF journal’s advisory board) and Jack Abramoff (head of the IFF main advisory board and a member of the organising committee for the Larry McDonald Memorial Dinner). However, this link does not apply to the IFF group in Britain. Marc Gordon is the Director of IFF in Britain.
12. The ‘Parliamentary Advisory Board’ seems no longer to exist — if, indeed, it ever did anything other than lend its name to the launch of the group.
13. It is not clear how long the Foundation survived Guell’s departure and Channell’s indictment.
14. WG(UK) made formal complaints to the Charities Commission on at least four occasions: 21 May 1987, against Christian Aid, Oxfam and War on Want; 20 November 1987, against Christian Aid; 14 March 1988 against Christian Aid, Oxfam and War on Want; 1 April 1989, against Christian Aid, Oxfam, War on Want, Traidcraft and Cafod.
15. Although the Committee for a Free Britain used anti-gay material during their anti-Labour campaign in 1987, it was restrained by comparison.
16. In a letter to the anarchist magazine Black Flag, 2 March 1990.
17. On Elwell, British Briefing et al, see e.g. David Rose in The Observer, 23 December 1990, and Richard Norton-Taylor in The Guardian, 10 December 1990.
18. The Guardian, 9 January 1989. The conference is presumably the ‘major inaugural conference in April next year’ promised in Young European, October 1988. It is unclear when this fund-raising was happening. The text of the letter from Finzer to Slava Stetsko of the ABN suggested that neither Smith or Northolt were known to her. If this is so then it must have been in early 1988 since, as will be shown, by the time of the Tory conference in October 1988, Madame Stetsko can hardly have failed to have noticed these two rising stars of WACL.
19. The ‘communist disinformation’ line is common to many of the WACL affiliates, some of whom — ABN for example — with collaboration with the Nazis in their history, have pretty pressing reasons not to want that particular bit of the past looked at.
20. European Dawn, widely reported at the time, was predominantly a platform for Le Pen and former Waffen-SS leader of the German Republicans, Franz Schonhuber. See, for example Searchlight, October 1989.
21. This story was given to me unsolicited, and as far as I can establish, inadvertently, by a senior figure in the BNP and confirmed by a leading figure in the Monday Club and WG(UK).
22. Interview with A. V. R. Smith: author — ‘I understand Murphy’s now in Thurrock Conservative Association’.
    Smith — ‘Well everyone’s in Thurrock. I’m in bloody Thurrock — enabling me to claim on the one hand that I’m ‘not politically aligned’, but on the other hand to remember (sic) that I am in fact a member of Thurrock. I think every right winger in the country is a member of Thurrock.’
23. Further evidence of fascist interest in the activities of Western Goals (UK) was shown in July 1990 when the anti-semitic broadsheet, Candour, reprinted in full, and with acknowledgement, the Western Goals (UK) ‘Viewpoint Paper’, The Mandela Myth.
24. It is one of the curiosities of this group that though they believe in the ‘global banking conspiracy’, the first cousin to the ‘Jewish global banking conspiracy’, their hostilty to money-lenders never persuades them to look closely at the City of London, right under their noses. James Gibb-Stewart, for example, in his The Finance Factor lauds Mrs Thatcher as ‘the single most intractable obstacle to banking hegemony that Euromania has yet encountered’, and attributes to non-UK bankers the disastrous high interest rate policies of the Thatcher governments.