Defector Politics: or, grooving with Mr G. The six months since the last Lobster have been the most interesting period in defector politics – the attempted political exploitation a Soviet defector – that I can remember. Oleg Gordievsky has really been having himself a time and putting himself about! Even I have a Gordievsky anecdote. … Read more
A Hack’s Progress Phillip Knightley Jonathan Cape, 1997, £17.99 This is a highly enjoyable and very well written memoir by one of our senior investigative journalists. As a young-Aussie-leaves-home-and-sees-the-world tale this is nearly as entertaining as the celebrated Clive James version (and with fewer forced jokes). Any journalist’s memoirs are welcome: it’s always interesting to … Read more
The Spycatcher’s Encyclopedia of Espionage Peter Wright Heinemann, Australia, 1991 The cover-blurb says this is ‘the rest of the story’. It feels more like the out-takes from Spycatcher spiced with a few more fragments of interesting gossip. And I do mean fragments: the interesting bits of 260 pages — largish print and much white space … Read more
Political activist Daniel Ellsberg and Professor Alfred McCoy have something special in common. Based on their actions and accomplishments of nearly thirty years ago, they have achieved the status of icons within the subculture of what passes for the New Left. Icon Ellsberg became a celebrity in 1971 after he leaked The Pentagon Papers, an … Read more
I was a student here (1) from 1971-74 doing a social science degree; but more importantly, between 1976 and 1982 I was on the dole much of the time and spent most of my days in the library here, educating myself in post-war history, American history, what was available then about the intelligence services – … Read more
The conspiracy trail is littered with unresolved leads, but few can be more important than Lee Harvey Oswald’s visit to Mexico shortly before the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. What was the purpose of Oswald’s visit to Mexico City? Was it Oswald or an impostor who visited the Cuban and Soviet embassies? And what … Read more
Introduction In 1967 the CIA sent out to ‘Chiefs, Certain Stations and bases’ a briefing document, Dispatch Document 1035- 960, titled ‘Countering Criticism of the Warren Report’. This unintentionally very revealing and faintly comic document was reproduced in issue 2 of the now defunct newsletter, The Dorff Report in March 1990. In view of the … Read more
Kevin Coogan is the author of the study of the American fascist Francis Parker Yockey, Dreamer of the Day, reviewed in Lobster 39. He sent me an essay primarily about the American far-right group the Defenders of the American Constitution. The essay, while fascinating, is too big (about 20 pages) for these columns. However within … Read more
Peddlars Of Crisis Jerry W. Sanders (Pluto, London 1983) With this book research into clandestinism and Cold War revisionism take another big step towards meeting. It is the story of the Committee on the Present Danger, the Cold War think-tank that prepared the way for the election of Reagan and provided the administration with Jeanne … Read more
Do they talk like this? At < www.lewrockwell.com/cummings/cummings29.html > there is a very interesting piece by Richard Cummings about the CIA and publishing; agents and operations are named. At the top of the article is this quote. ‘We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine, and other great publications whose … Read more
