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ABSTRACT
The 1920s marked the first decade in which the Labour Party and the British intelligence community had to work closely together. Their relations during this period, which were often strained, have come to be defined by the Zinoviev letter affair. Allegations that intelligence officials leaked the Zinoviev letter to bring down the Labour government in 1924 have persisted for the last century. Using documents that have been largely unexplored, this article argues that the Zinoviev affair was not an isolated incident. It uses two specific case studies to show that a small number of intelligence officials also leaked sensitive information, in the years before and after 1924, in an attempt to undermine and discredit prominent Labour Party figures. By analysing events in the years before and after the Zinoviev affair, the article illustrates how relations between the British state and the Labour Party fluctuated providing a fresh understanding of Labour Party-intelligence relations during the interwar years.
Disclosure statement
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Notes
1. Andrew, The Secret World, 582; Jeffery, MI6, 219.
2. Phillips, Secret Twenties, 184–86; Jeffery, MI6, 217.
3. Andrew, Secret World, 581.
4. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 139; Gerwarth, The Vanquished, 96–8. See also Madeira, Britannia and the Bear.
5. The National Archives (hereafter TNA), CAB 24/96/62, “Survey of Revolutionary Feeling during the Year 1919,” 18.
6. MacFarlane, The British Communist Party, 277–79; Worley, Labour inside the Gate, 103; TNA, CAB 24/140/2, Report on Revolution Organisations in the UK, 9 November 1922.
7. Worley, Labour Inside the Gate, 67; Beers, Your Britain, 52–7.
8. Beckett, Enemy Within, 22–23; Worley, Labour inside the Gate, 103–4.
9. Carlton, Churchill and the Soviet Union, 35.
10. Beers, Your Britain, 53–59.
11. TNA, CAB 24/132/86, Report on Revolution Organisations in the UK, 2 February 1922.
12. Madeira, Britannia and the Bear, 9.
13. The work on the Zinoviev letter affair is best covered by Gill Bennett in her report for the Foreign Office “A Most Extraordinary and Mysterious Business”: The Zinoviev Letter of 1924 and subsequent book, The Zinoviev Letter: The Conspiracy that Never Dies. The major histories of the Labour Party, most notably Andrew Thorpe’s A History of the British Labour Party and Martin Pugh’s Speak for Britain: A New History of the Labour Party, do not tend to place much focus on intelligence matters. The two major biographies of James Ramsay MacDonald, Labour Party leader and Prime Minister during the 1920s, by David Marquand and Austen Morgan, barely touch on his relations with intelligence at all. Labour Party-intelligence relations are covered by Christopher Andrew in his authorised history of MI5, The Defence of the Realm, but are only a very small part of a much wider piece of work. Similarly, Richard Aldrich and Rory Cormac include a discussion on MacDonald’s dealings with the intelligence community in The Black Door - their extensive analysis of the relationship between British Prime Ministers and the intelligence community.
14. One of the few studies which focuses solely on the relationship between the Labour Party and the intelligence community during the twentieth century is Daniel W.B. Lomas’ Intelligence, security and the Attlee governments which focuses on the relations during the 1945–51 Clement Attlee government.
15. Benn, Keir Hardie, 236.
16. Popplewell, Intelligence and Imperial Defence, 75.
17. TNA, HO 144/1163/213549, “Disturbances: Seditious language and Incitement to mutiny,” 8.8.12.
18. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 101.
19. Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 183–85; Pugh, Speak for Britain, 103.
20. Thurlow, Secret State, 60–61. For more on perceptions of pacifists and those opposed to the war in 1914 and 1915 see, Andrew, Secret Service, 192–95.
21. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, p.146; TNA, HO 45/10741/263275, DPP to Under Secretary of State, 11 September 1914.
22. See, TNA, HO 45/10814/312987.
23. See, TNA, HO 144/1459/316786.
24. TNA, KV 2/1917, “MEMO,” V.F., 31/12/16.
25. Andrew, Secret Service, 193–4; Pugh, Speak for Britain, 112–13.
26. White, “Soviets in Britain,” 166–68.
27. TNA, CAB 23/2/65, Cabinet Conclusion, No. 11, 25 May 1917.
28. TNA, CAB 23/16/49, “Report on the Russian Revolution Conference at Leeds,” 12 June 1917.
29. White, “Soviets in Britain,” 173–74; Andrew, Secret Service, 198.
30. TNA, CAB 23/16/49, “Report on the Russian Revolution Conference at Leeds,” 12 June 1917.
31. White, “Soviets in Britain,” 192.
32. Andrew, Secret Service, 225.
33. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 108–9; Thorpe, A History of the British Labour Party, 42–3; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 66.
34. Lomas, “Party politics and intelligence,” 412; Jeffery, MI6, 215.
35. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 116.
36. TNA, CAB 24/81/63, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, 12 June 1919; TNA, CAB 24/83/71, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, 10 July 1919.
37. TNA, CAB 24/93/26, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, 13 November 1919. Thomson’s report quotes from a “recent letter” from MacDonald.
38. TNA, CAB 24/87/37, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, 21 August 1919.
39. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 123–27; Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 234–6.
40. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 123–27.
41. Shepherd, George Lansbury, 175.
Despite his prominence at the time, Lansbury was “out of favour” with the Labour leadership. He declined to attend three consecutive party conferences in 1914, 1916 and 1917.
42. Ibid., 175–7, 179.
43. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 132. In 1928, Lansbury described the Bolshevik Revolution as “the greatest and best thing that has ever happened in the history of the world”.
44. Davenport-Hines, Enemies Within, 88–9.
45. ”Mr Lansbury on Russia,” The Times, 22 March 1920.
46. TNA, KV 2/566, “M. PHILIPS PRICE,” List of Philips PRICE’s associates mentioned in the following precis.
47. TNA, CAB 24/101/2, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, Report No. 46, 18 March 1920.
48. ”Mr Lansbury on Russia,” The Times, 22 March 1920.
49. Jeffery, MI6, 211–12; TNA, CAB 24/109/76, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, Report No. 64, 22 July 1920; Andrew, Secret Service, 263–4.
50. TNA, CAB 24/110/72, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, Report No. 67, 12 August 1920.
51. ”Daily Herald: Bolshevist Help Sought,” The Times, 19 August 1920; Andrew, Secret World, 578.
52. TNA CAB 24/111/88, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the UK, 23 September 1920; Shepherd, George Lansbury, 187–88.
53. TNA, WO 32/5719, “Note on Interviews with three retuned British officers from Moscow”.
54. TNA, WO 32/5719, memo by Major Joseph Ball, MI5 B, 23 August 1920.
55. Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 77–8, Chapter XI, XII; Hyman, The Rise and Fall, 160. Shortly before war broke out, John Bull had opposed Britain’s involvement. (Hyman, The Rise and Fall, 144–5, 155–6; Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 160–62).
56. Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 218.
57. Hyman, The Rise and Fall, 131–3.
58. ”George Lansbury Exposed,” John Bull, 4 September 1920, 10–11.
59. ”Roger Casement Lansbury,” John Bull, 11 September 1920, 10–11.
60. ”Lansbury the Liar,” John Bull, 25 September 1920, 1; “Lansbury and British soldiers,” John Bull, 23 October 1920, 1.
61. HC Hansard Deb, 28 October 1920, vol 133, c1924. See also, FO 371/5445, “Allegation that Mr. G. Lansbury endeavoured to suborn British soldiers from their allegiance to the King”.
62. HC Hansard Deb, 2 December 1920, vol 135, cc1425–6.
63. Shepherd, George Lansbury, 210–11.
64. Shepherd, George Lansbury, 210; TNA, PRO 30/69/1753/1, Diary Entry 22 Jan 1924. In the speech, Lansbury, referring to rumours that the King may prevent the formation of a Labour government, stated “a few centuries ago one King who stood up against the common people of that day lost his head—lost it really … Since that day kings and queens … never interfered with ordinary politics and George V would be well advised to keep his finger out of the pie now”.
65. Phillips, Secret Twenties, 166–68; Bennett, Churchill’s Man of Mystery, 79.
66. Andrew, Secret Service, 298.
67. Ibid.
68. Andrew, Secret Service, 231–2; Jeffreys-Jones, We Know All About You, 67; Porter, Plots and Paranoia, 150.
69. Andrew, Secret Service, 300; Porter, Plots and Paranoia, 159.
70. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 146; TNA, PRO 30/69/221, Gower to Childs, 30 January 1924; Childs to Gower, 2 February 1924.
71. Northedge and Wells, Britain and Soviet Communism, 38; Andrew Defence of the Realm, 146–7.
72. Andrew, Secret World, 580–81.
73. Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 312–14; Perkins, A Very British Strike, 39–40; Northedge and Wells, Britain and Soviet Communism, 38–9; Rose, King George V, 331–3; Jeffery, MI6, 215.
74. Porter, Plots and Paranoia, 159–60.
See, for example—PRO 30/69/220, Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, Report No. 253, May 1st 1924.
75. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 147.
76. TNA, HO 144/20985, New Scotland Yard to Sir John Anderson, 2 October 1928. Wheatley is described as the “most socialist member” of the MacDonald cabinet in Andrew, Secret Service, 300.
77. Desmarais, “Strikebreaking and the Labour Government of 1924,” 169–70; Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 318–19; Morgan, Conflict and Order, 114.
78. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 147–8.
79. Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 361–64; Andrew, Secret Service, 303.
80. Perkins, A Very British Strike, 45–6; Davenport-Hines, Enemies Within, 98–9; Udy, Labour and the Gulag, 100–104.
81. Wish, “Anglo-Soviet Relations,” 400.
82. Andrew, Secret World, 582; Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 78.
83. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 900, footnote 58; Pugh, Speak for Britain, 183; Madeira, Britannia and the Bear, 127.
84. Bennett, “A Most Extraordinary and Mysterious Business,” 87–8, 91–92.
85. Ibid., 47.
86. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 149–50.
87. Bennett, “A Most Extraordinary and Mysterious Business,” 45.
88. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 150.
89. Bennett, Zinoviev Letter, 52–3.
90. Ferris and Bar-Joseph, “Getting Marlowe to Hold His Tongue,” 126–28.
91. Bennett, Zinoviev Letter, 253.
92. Jeffery, MI6, 221.
93. Marquand, Ramsay MacDonald, 416; Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 133–36; Lomas, Intelligence security and the Attlee governments, 10; Andrew, “The British Secret Service and Anglo-Soviet Relations,” 705.
94. Lomas, Intelligence security and the Attlee governments, 10–11.
95. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 158–9.
96. TNA, HO 532/10, Prime Minister’s Secret Service Committee, Friday 11 March 1927.
97. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 158–9; Jeffery, MI6, 230–31.
98. TNA, HO 144/20985, minute dated 27/9/28.
99. Hyman, The Rise and Fall, 254–5; Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 273–4.
100. Hyman, The Rise and Fall, 232, 286–7; Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 231, 266–7.
101. TNA, CAB 24/80/68 Report on Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom, 28 May 1919.
102. ”The ‘Yard’s’ Secret Report on Ex-Premier,” John Blunt, September 29, 1928, p.6 (Cutting included in TNA, HO 144/20985).
103. TNA, HO 144/20985, minute dated 1st Oct 1928.
104. TNA, HO 144/20985, minute dated 4.10.28.
105. ”Secret Document Disclosed,” Daily Express, 6 October 1928, 1.
106. ‘Secrets of the shadowing of Mr Ramsay MacDonald, Reynolds Illustrated News, 7 October 1928, 3.
107. ”Another Zinovieff Herring?,” Daily Express, 6 October 1928, 10.
108. ”Mr MacDonald’s View,” Reynolds Illustrated News, 7 October 1928, 3.
109. Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 168–9.
110. ”To Ramsay Macdonald, MP, House of Commons’, John Bull, 20 March 1915, 18; “Ramsay Macdonald—To the Tower!,” John Bull, 19 June 1915, 6–7. On another occasion, Bottomley published MacDonald’s birth certificate in John Bull and revealed that he was ‘the illegitimate son of a Scotch servant girl”. (Symons, Horatio Bottomley, 168; “James McDonald Ramsay,” John Bull, 4 September 1915, 9).
111. ”The Police and Ex-Premier,” John Blunt, 20 October 1928.
112. Holmes, John Bull’s Island, 417, footnote 220.
113. TNA, HO 144/20985, minute dated “5/10,” minute “John Blunt 27 Oct 1928”.
114. ”The Police and the Press,” John Blunt, 27 October 1928.
115. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 74.
116. Blake R, ‘Ball, Sir (George) Joseph (1885–1961)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Accessed at : https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/30564 While working for the Conservative Party, Ball was one of a number of people who briefed the then Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin, ahead of a Commons debate on the Zinoviev letter in 1928. (Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 132–35).
117. PARLIAMENTARY ARCHIVES, DAV/125, Ball to Davidson, 13.XI.21.
In 1921, for example, Ball wrote to Davidson enclosing ‘the note about which I spoke to you over the telephone’.
118. Beichman, “Hugger-Mugger in Old Queen Street,” 679. PARLIAMENTARY ARCHIVES, DAV/170, Davidson to Ball, 18 November 1924.
119. James, Memoirs of a Conservative, 272.
120. Pinto-Duschinsky, British Political Finance 1830–1980, 97. Prior to the formation of the first Labour Government, Davidson does not appear to have been as concerned as many Conservatives were. He did not believe in any of the schemes proposed by colleagues to prevent Labour taking office, opening that such actions would “deprive Labour of their constitutional rights”. (James, Memoirs of a Conservative, 189)
121. James, Memoirs of a Conservative, 272
122. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fol. 94, “Liberal Party Headquarters,” 13.2.29. James, Memoirs of a Conservative, 272, footnote 2. Ball was, by this stage, already receiving information from sources within the Liberal Party. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 19–26, 9.9.1928, ‘Liberal Organisation’.
123. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 45–49, 16 October 1928; fols. 61–65, “Confidential,” 10.11.1928; fols. 68–73, 21.11.28.
124. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 5–7, “Labour Party,” 15 May 1928; fol. 10, “Labour ‘Fighting Fund’”, 22.5.1928; fols. 68–73, 21.11.28; fol. 85, ”Labour Party,” 3 February 1929; fols. 90–93, “Labour Party,” 14.2.1929; fol. 97, “Mr. J.R. MacDonald’s health,” 22.2.1929; fols. 45–49, 16 October 1928.
125. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 34–42, “Socialist Party,” 6.10.1928; fols. 51–56, “Confidential,” 24.10.1928.
126. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 74–79, 17.12.1928.
127. Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, Papers of Sir George Joseph Ball, MS Eng C 6653, fols. 102–108, “Confidential,” 24 June 1929.
128. Bennett, Churchill’s Man of Mystery, 126–7.
129. James, Memoirs of a Conservative, 271–2.
130. Andrew, Secret Service, 342.
131. Ibid., 340.
132. Bennett, Churchill’s Man of Mystery, 132.
133. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 74–6. See, Cockett, ‘Ball, Chamberlain and Truth’, for a fascinating account of Ball’s relationship with Chamberlain.
134. Andrew, Secret Service, 345, 350–51. Fletcher was appointed as MI6’s chief ‘G officer’, responsible for operations in Europe and the Near East. He had previously been a Liberal MP between 1923 and 1924 and was elected as a Labour MP at the 1935 General Election. He appears to have been involved in a somewhat opaque operation in 1931 whereby SIS sought to purchase and retrieve letters, from a woman to whom MacDonald had written ‘compromising’ letters, which revealed an affair.
135. Ferris, Behind the Enigma, 123. For more on the naval conference see, “British SIGINT Decrypts on the London Naval Conference, 1930” in, Hughes, Jackson and Scott (eds.), Exploring Intelligence Archives, 41–55.
136. TNA, CAB 24/201/12, The Political Situation in India, Lord Peel, 23 January 1929; TNA, CAB 23/60/3, Cabinet Conclusion, No.1, 30 January 1929.
137. TNA, CAB 23/61/2, Cabinet Conclusion, No. 2, 21 June 1929; Gupta, Imperialism and the British Labour Movement, 203–4. For more on the reaction of the left towards the trial see, Pennybacker, From Scottsboro to Munich, 167–76.
138. TNA, CAB 23/62/17, Cabinet Conclusion, No. 4, 11 December 1929.
139. Gupta, Imperialism and the British Labour Movement, 204.
140. Walton, Empire of Secrets, 20–1; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 137–8.
141. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 213–16.
142. Pugh, Speak for Britain, 246–47; Beckett, Enemy Within, 64–5 Implementing the policy was not without its difficulties, however, as some within Labour sought to pursue a ‘Popular Front’ anyway. See, Pugh, Speak for Britain, 247–58.
143. TNA, KV 2/2509, serial 32a, “Report from I.P.I. re MENON”., 16.12.39.
144. Labour History Archive & Study Centre, Manchester, Labour Party, International Department Papers on India, LP/ID/IND/1/13, NEC Confidential Memorandum of Cancellation of candidature of Krishna Menon for one of the Dundee Seats, 27 November 1940.
145. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 138–9.
146. Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Government, 42–5.
147. Jeffery, MI6, 352–3; Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Government, 37. This was later identified as a crucial moment for the Labour Party by the historian M.R.D. Foot. He stated that placing ‘one secret service [SOE] under a Labour Minister’ laid to rest the ghost of Zinoviev.
148. Dorril, MI6, 35.
149. Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Governments, 55; Aldrich, GCHQ, 66.
150. Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Governments, 55.
151. Vincent, Culture of Secrecy, p.199; Defty, Britain, America and Anti-Communist Propaganda, 34; Hennessy P, Never Again, 245; Aldrich, The Hidden Hand, 130–31.
152. For information on the atomic bomb see, Bew, Citizen Clem, 369, 376–79; Hennessy, Secret State, 50–51; Adonis, Labour’s Churchill, 263–4. For more on their role in the formation of NATO see, Adonis, Labour’s Churchill, 290–92; Bew, Citizen Clem, 461–64.
153. Macintyre, A Spy Amongst Friends, 92–3.
154. Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Governments, 189; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 321.
It has been alleged that Attlee appointed Sillitoe as DG to have his own man in MI5, an organisation he was supposedly suspicious of. This has, however, been proven to be untrue. See, Lomas, Intelligence, Security and the Attlee Governments, 187.
155. TNA, KV 4/196, Guy Liddell Diary, 29 May 1945.
156. TNA, KV 4/468, Guy Liddell Diary, 19 November 1946. Following Attlee’s request for information on MPs, Guy Liddell remarked in his diary, ‘I gathered he felt that he had a responsibility to the House and the country to see that such members did not get into positions where they might constitute a danger to the state. They might either be members as members of the Government, or if they were in the Opposition as members of Royal Commissions or Parliamentary Delegations’.
157. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 322. Sillitoe told Churchill in 1952 that he had regularly informed Attlee about “certain delicate matters which came to the notice of the Security Service from time to time and which concerned the personal affairs of Ministers”. He mentioned that there had been one case where the son of a Minister ‘had become involved with certain people under investigation by the Security Service and who had given information to these people in return for some kind of reward’.
158. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 411; TNA, KV 2/3812, serial 333a, “Extracts from Mins between B.1.a. & the D.G. re passing information to the P.M. re BING,” 21.5.47.
159. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 847. This taking place in practice can be seen in a memo sent to Margaret Thatcher shortly after she became Prime Minister in 1979. See, TNA, PREM 19/2845, John Hunt to Prime Minister, 4 May 1979.
160. The file was known as the “Lost Sheep” file. See, Labour History Archive & Study Centre, Manchester, Labour Party General Secretary’s Papers, LP/GS/LS.
Very little of the intelligence material collated by the Labour Party appears to have survived. Many of the files were said to have been burned by Ron Hayward when he became General Secretary in the 1970s. See, Mikardo, Back-Bencher, 131.
161. Hopkins, “Herbert Morrison, the Cold War and Anglo-American Relations,” 23; Schneer, Labour’s Conscience, 110–18; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 411–12.
162. TNA, FCO 168/2724, Labour Party Annual Conference 1967, minute JE Tyrer, 22 September 1967. For IRD reports on a number of Labour Party Conferences see, TNA, FCO 168/73, FCO 168/786, FCO 168/787, FCO 168/1190, FCO 168/2724.
It may well have been the case that IRD officials attended in the years following 1967, but from the evidence that is currently available, it is not possible to say so.
163. TNA, FCO 168/426, note JET Egg, 26 October 1961; TNA, FCO 168/1190, Labour Party Conference December 1964.
164. TNA, FCO 168/520, J.E.T. Egg, 29 January 1962; “North Islington Constituency Labour Party,” 31 January 1962. The file shows that the IRD asked the Security Service for information about some members of the North Islington Labour Party, but were only given limited information, described by one IRD official as “a bit stingy”.
165. TNA, FCO 168/426, Labour Party Contacts Receiving IRD Material Regularly or in Personal Contact.
166. TNA, FCO 168/1184, Note, JE Tyrer, 30 June 1964. One IRD official noted that the relationship with Bowden ‘is direct and on a completely informal basis … the etiquette is that, except in exceptional circumstances, we wait until Mr Bowden has something to ask us and do not normally raise matters with him off our own bat’. On one occasion, for example, Bowden asked for information on the former MP, John Platts-Mills, who had applied to be readmitted to the Party. See, TNA, FCO 168/1183, Home Regional Meeting, 111th Meeting, June 18 1964.
167. TNA, FCO 168/1183, Home Regional Meeting, 111th Meeting, June 18 1964
168. A generational change had occurred between Attlee’s defeat in 1951 and Wilson’s victory in 1964, meaning that very few of the new government had experience of the intelligence services. See, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 412–15.
169. In March 1965, Wilson discovered that his Home Secretary, Frank Soskice, had authorised a Home Office Warrant (HOW) on the Labour MP Bob Edwards. The Prime Minister decided that it should be immediately cancelled. Edwards was later revealed to have been a KGB agent, and Christopher Andrew argues, in MI5’s authorised history, that Wilson’s actions “probably delayed Edwards’s discovery by over a decade”. See, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 527.
170. HC Hansard Deb, 17 Nov 1966, vol 736, cc634–41; Defty, Bochel and Kirkpatrick, “Tapping the Telephones of Members of Parliament,” 676.
171. For more on the Wilson Doctrine see, Strickland P, Dawson J and Godec S, The Wilson Doctrine (House of Commons Library Briefing Paper No 4258) 12 June 2017 The custom was most recently reaffirmed by Boris Johnson in October 2019. HC Hansard, Written Question UIN 5440, 25 October 2019.
172. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 528. For the reports provided to Wilson by MI5 on the strike see, TNA, CAB 301/233.
173. HC Hansard Deb, 20 June 1966, vol. 730, c42.
174. TNA, CAB 301/234, note of meeting between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, 21 June 1966. Parts of the speech were drafted by F1A of MI5, who was present in the Commons during the speech, “occupying one of the three seats below the Speaker’s chair reserved for civil servants who may be needed to brief ministers”. See, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 530.
175. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 278.
176. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 534–5. He also mentioned to the Director General that the London Cooperative Society had been taken over by communists and was “misappropriating some of the £80,000 p.a. that the society was supposed to provide the Labour party with for political purposes,” therefore “a body of members … was manoeuvring to unseat the present governing body and take over control”. Callaghan asked if “the Security Service could help with information about this”. Furnival Jones told the Home Secretary he believed this “was getting perilously near the field of politics,” and nothing appears to have resulted from the request. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 960 footnote 81.
177. Lashmar and Oliver, Britain’s Secret Propaganda War, 166–7; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 627–32.
178. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 315; Beckett, When the Lights Went Out, 166–9.
179. Porter, Plots and Paranoia, 210–11; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 635–38; Sandbrook, Seasons in the Sun, 66–8.
180. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 277.
181. See, Sandbrook, Seasons in the Sun, 135–41; Moran, “Conspiracy and Contemporary History: Revisiting MI5 and the Wilson Plot[s],” 169–71; Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 325–7. The existence of a plot against Wilson was also alleged by a former army press officer, Colin Wallace. See, Sandbrook, Seasons in the Sun, 71; Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 323–4.
182. Wright, Spycatcher, 369. MI5 actually held a file on Wilson which had been opened in 1945 after they became concerned about his contacts with Soviets. They did not, however, believe him to be a crypto-communist or fellow traveller. See, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 415–17.
183. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, p.642
184. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, p.323
185. Moran, “Conspiracy and Contemporary History,” 172.
186. Correra, MI6, 214; Pearce, Spymaster, 342.
187. Moran, “Conspiracy and Contemporary History,” 166–67; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 642–3. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher revealed the conclusions of the enquiry in a statement to the Commons on May 6 1987.
188. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 660–61, 663–4.
189. Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 205. Some Labour MPs on the left of the Party did speak somewhat conspiratorially of the intelligence and security services in the 1980s and early 1990s. See Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 210–12; Lomas, “Party politics and intelligence,” 420–22.
190. Bennett, The Zinoviev Letter, 216; Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 797.
191. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 797, 809.
192. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 811; “Blair thanks spies for war role,” BBC News, 2 December 2001 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1688449.stm.
193. Baldwin T, “Rogue spies out to get us: Labour,” The Times, 4 June 2003.
194. Ibid.
195. Campbell and Hagerty (eds.), Campbell Diaries, 595–97. Ironically, days before Reid made his comments, Campbell had privately said to the Head of the JIC, John Scarlett, “before long, once the left was bored with WMD they would be on to the idea that we were victims of what security services have always done to Labour governments”. Campbell and Hagerty (eds.), Campbell Diaries, 593. For more information on the whole incident see, Campbell and Hagerty (eds.), Campbell Diaries, 585–605.
196. TNA, PRO 30/69/1753/1, Diary Entry 16 Jan 1930.
197. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 150. There is one key difference between the three prime examples used in the article—whilst the Zinoviev letter was a forgery, the information released about Lansbury and MacDonald came from genuine intelligence documents.
198. Ferris and Bar-Joseph, “Getting Marlowe to Hold His Tongue,” 115–18. For more on specific leaks see, Bar-Joseph, Intelligence Intervention in the Politics of Democratic States, Chapter 8, especially 263–91.
199. Barnes, “Special Branch” 950–51.
200. Jeffery, MI6, 211–2; Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 37–8; Bar-Joseph, Intelligence Intervention in the Politics of Democratic States, 265–67.
201. Victor Madeira addresses this point well in his study of the era and uses statistics which emphasise the similar backgrounds of men within the Establishment at the time. See, Madeira, Britannia and the Bear, 17–18.
202. Lomas, Intelligence, security and the Attlee governments, 189
203. Jeffery and Hennessy, States of Emergency, 229. In doing so, Wilson became the first Prime Minister to quote so directly from intelligence reports in the Commons since Stanley Baldwin during debates over the so-called “ARCOS raid” in 1927. Baldwin did not, however, do so with the express permission of the intelligence services. See, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 155–56.
204. For the bigger picture of the atmosphere at the time see, Andrew, Defence of the Realm, 503–21; Correra, MI6, 192–218.
205. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, 429.
206. Ahead of the 2017 General Election, the former Labour MP, Chris Mullin wrote a piece for The Spectator where he stated, “even moderate Labour governments have traditionally faced attempts to destabilise them by elements in the political and security establishment”. See, Bennett, Zinoviev Letter, 259–61.