Introduction On May 20th this year the San Francisco Examiner ran a story by Kathy Kadane which began, ‘The U.S. government played a significant role in one of the worst massacres of the century by supplying the names of thousands of Communist Party leaders to the Indonesian army, which hunted down the leftists and killed … Read more
Nicola Calipari’s death If the tragic death of ‘Nicola Calipari’, the international oper-ations chief of Italy’s military intelligence service, in March 2005, was, as has been alleged, a deliberate act rather than misadventure, it is one of the most recent examples of extreme PR ‘message management’ I can think of. ([1]) ‘Public relations’ is about … Read more
Why is a Portuguese journalist writing a book about an almost unknown British spy? Recently I had to answer this same question from Igor Prelin, my favourite ex-KGB officer whom I first meet in Cannes, France, during the Television Market Fair of April 1994. After I met Igor Prelin in Cannes, I travelled to Moscow … Read more
Conspiracy, Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Research Robin Ramsay ‘The unexpected and dramatic death of the famous, whether statesmen like John F Kennedy, or media stars like Marilyn Monroe, invariably give rise to conspiracy theories.’ Thus Cambridge historian, Christopher Andrew, during his disgraceful hatchet job on Hugh Thomas’ books about Rudolph Hess for BBC2 ‘s Timewatch … Read more
Kenneth De Courcy Kenneth de Courcy buffs will be pleased to know that they can now visit a website with some interesting further information about this maverick figure. The site can be found at < http:// www.pharo.com/intelligence >, and is run by the team which produced Double Standards, last year’s interesting study of the Hess … Read more
Searchlight At the beginning of the essay on the Blairites above, I discuss the concept of political contamination, the denigration of people on the left by association – real or fictitious – with ideas or people on the right. The most enthusiastic users of the contamination device in Britain today are found in Searchlight magazine. … Read more
Dr. David Kelly The death of Dr David Kelly refuses to go away. Two groups of medical experts have expressed doubts about the suicide verdict. The International Toxicology Advisory Group have queried the conclusion that Kelly swallowed at least 20 co-proxamol tablets, which contributed to his death; (1) and a group of surgeons wrote to … Read more
A small section of this appeared in Lobster 12. Although this is incomplete and under researched, we thought it worth putting out now. The origins of IRD 1947 saw the creation of the Foreign Office’s Information Research Department (IRD). It is generally accepted that IRD was the brain-child of the then Labour M.P. Christopher Mayhew, … Read more
See note(1) Like some Russian high official come to treat with Chechen rebels, CIA Director John Deutch arrived in force — by heavily-armed motorcade, and with helicopter cover. SWAT teams swarmed over the building that was Deutch’s destination. But on November 15, 1996, Deutch’s destination was in fact only the auditorium of Locke High School … Read more
SIS is dead – you read it first in Lobster – but the funeral has not been announced. Established in 1909, it will not make its centenary. SIS once offered a global brand operating in a market that had been previously divided along the lines of accepted cartels (market fixing). Its market-share, however, has been … Read more
