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Spycatcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer

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Reading "Spycatcher", I was continually struck by this thought: how was it possible for Peter Wright to publish a book which exposes so much of the internal operations of Britain's MI5 domestic intelligence/security service? He names names, describes personalities in often unflattering terms, and details what were surely the most sensitive of investigations undertaken by MI5. What may be MI5's loss is the public's gain, as we get a rare glimpse at the very heart of a (by definition) highly secretive agency, charged with ensuring the security and continuance of one of the Western world's greatest democracies.

Wright is undoubtedly a brilliant man, as are his colleagues (Wright describes how one of them does crossword puzzles completely in his head). Although the book opens with his retirement day, in which he shreds his diaries, he is somehow able to reconstruct the minutest details of operations that span his 20-year career with MI5, from the mid-50s to mid-70s, as well as critical pre-World War II events that he investigated for MI5. Wright is a radio engineer by training and original profession, and he joins MI5 as their first scientist in order to bring the benefits of technology to the agency. As MI5's top scientist, he is immediately charged with carrying out their most sensitive bugging and eavesdropping operations, which indoctrinates him into MI5's most secretive activities. Eventually, he leaves scientific advocacy behind to assume a role hunting down suspected Soviet spies within MI5 itself.

Although Wright has many successes, he is never able to fully prove his most shocking assertion, which is that Roger Hollis, the head of MI5 for many years (and Wright's superior), was a Soviet spy. The circumstantial evidence Wright presents, however, is very convincing. Wright's analysis and the logic he applies are impressive because he not only looks at the various events themselves, but he constantly considers how events would have unfolded differently if his thesis were untrue.

"Spycatcher" is a fascinating book, for many reasons. First of all, it takes the reader deeper within an actual government intelligence agency than almost any spy novel, and it has the added benefit of being true. The case against Hollis, and other spies exposed by Wright and his compatriots at MI5, serves as a warning about the fragility of security agencies: a few well-placed enemy spies can destroy massive amounts of work. Many of these top-level spies recruited by the Soviets were left-wing students at Britain's finest universities (Oxford and Cambridge), which shows how ideology expressed in an academic environment can lead to radical behavior and revolutionary actions. However, spying on potential domestic subversives is not a pleasant task, as Wright himself admits. "Spycatcher" also shows the special relationship between the U.S. and the U.K., which is not without its tensions.

Finally, "Spycatcher" illustrates the need to fight back using many of the tactics of the enemy, however despicable they may be. Intelligence work is not pretty: it involves tapping communications, breaking and entering, planting agents, soliciting defectors (using whatever might best appeal to them), and trying to detect and eliminate the enemy's spies before they do the same to yours. And in the end, the intelligence information received may be completely wrong, either because of the motives of the agents who provided it (who may be double agents), or because it is the product of an enemy disinformation campaign. However, if the U.K. and U.S. had not played the spy game against the Soviets, they would have put the countries at serious risk. Winning the intelligence game is not easy, but this was definitely an important front during the Cold War in Wright's day, and the war on terror today. The Soviets had an active disinformation campaign during the Cold War; in fact, one of the more spectacular assertions of Wright's is that the Cuban missile crisis was a Soviet disinformation exercise to distract attention from their long-range missile development programs. As "Spycatcher" proves, the intelligence game is like a hall or mirrors - you're never sure if you're seeing something real or something which is exactly backwards. But, it is still important to attempt to play the game as best as one can.

This is one of those books that I came to late in the game (It all started with the DVD "Cambridge Spies" last fall.), but after perusing the first page of "Spycatcher", I couldn't put it down for three days! One of the reasons that I waited so long was that various espionage writers have criticized the book for its inaccuracies (So he got the date of Philby's interrogation wrong!). I'm beginning to think that they are suffering from an overdose of sour grapes because Mr. Wright made the New York Times Bestseller List and they did not!

I am actually glad that I read other books such as "My Silent War," "The Philby Files," "Anthony Blunt," "Philby: The Long Road to Moscow," "Crown Jewels," etc. first, because by the time I read "Spycatcher," I was thoroughly familiar with the multifarious cast of characters. However, as much as I enjoyed the other espionage books, "Spycatcher" surpasses them in one respect: it gives details of tradecraft that are impossible in an account of Kim Philby or Anthony Blunt who, by necessity, had to keep silent about the finer particulars of their work in intelligence (whether Soviet or British). Peter Wright lets the reader peek over his shoulder as he installs sophisticated bugs behind convincing false doors at midnight. He also gives the reader a good chuckle when such operations go disastrously awry and floors collapse or cables are cut, and the work has to begin all over again.

The author also writes a wry account of brazen Russian agents importuning numerous passers-by in various London parks in an effort to "turn" them into Soviet assets, until the British police, at Wright's instigation, out-brazen the agents by threatening to arrest them for harassing Her Majesty's subjects. He also informs us of MI5's system of Watchers, who were posted all over London and its environs, and whose chief duty was to tail diplomats and cypher clerks from the Soviet embassy. (A memorable moment occurs when 105 Russians are declared PNG and expelled from Britain in 1971--an event I recall seeing on television).

Peter Wright relates a particularly poignant anecdote of Klop Ustinov (actor Peter's father), who had served British Intelligence so faithfully and effectively (at great peril) throughout World War II, and who was living in penury without a pension until Wright brought the matter to the attention of the director (Wright was cheated out of most of his own promised pension at the end of his career, and Desmond Bristow of MI6 also tells of similar ingratitude on the part of the Intelligence Services in "A Game of Moles.").

As for the allegations about Roger Hollis, the director of MI5, being a Soviet agent, the criticism of this theory usually cites the fact that Hollis never confessed, and therefore the charges are groundless. The same could be said of Kim Philby, who never confessed (despite Nicholas Elliot's claims to the contrary--with the window conveniently open so that the recorded "confession" was inaudible because of the Beirut traffic noises). Philby even wrote an article stating that a spy should never confess, because the case against him had to be proved beyond a shadow of a doubt in order to be prosecuted under British law. Whether Hollis was a Soviet agent or not (Desmond Bristow, who believed that the British intelligence agencies were riddled with Soviet penetration agents echoes Wright's suspicions in "A Game of Moles."), Peter Wright builds an intriguing circumstantial case against him, noting that the leaks to the Russians and the ruined operations stopped after Hollis had retired. Wright suggests that the Intelligence services had no interest in pursuing the matter to the end because of the embarrassment caused by the discoveries that Burgess, Maclean, Philby, Blunt, Cairncross, Blake, et al, were Soviet penetration agents. As far as Wright is concerned, the case against Hollis was not proven but the suspicion remains.

From the end of WWII until 1965 when Roger Hollis left as head of MI-5, British counterintelligence was almost completely compromised. The Soviets outmaneuvered them continuously with a flood of diplomatic and illegal agents. This was a constant source of embarrassment as people like Kim Philby, Burgess and McLean defected to the USSR. The agents defecting in the opposite direction were frequently clever disinformants sent as ploys creating a "wilderness of mirrors." As former assistant director of MI5 the author was directly responsible for investigating the infiltration and gives a blow by blow account of how morale suffered as one by one potential moles were grilled and either cleared or ousted. Some committed suicide shortly after questioning. Many interesting and authoritative asides keep interest high throughout this work whose sale has been banned in Britain.

i was fortunate enough to have traded a book for a book when i was in wales last year and i will say that i could not put this book down until it was finished. it took me about 3 days during my trip in great britain. when i was in london i went and visited the churchill's cadinet war rooms from wwII. i the war rooms i saw pictures of philby who defected to the ussr later. it was a great way to be pulled into the book even further.
even today you see the technology that was started and developed by the peter wright and the rest of the true characters
in the book.ie the us signate plane that was brought down in china last year. that technology was started by peter wright and mi5 and mi6.
i will also say that there are times in the book when you feel a little mad at the british higher ups because their system was full of people that got to where they are from their name not their merits, and the fact that they were incompetent at the same time. i loved this book. can't you tell.
i have read it for a second time and loved it even more. you pick up more the second time.
definately get this book.

No wonder this book was banned in the United Kingdom. It sheds a horrible light on MI5 by MI6. It's really no secret that there were spies in the UK in the 40's 50's and the 60's, what ridiculous is how little effort was put into catching them. And of course after reading this book you should get "The Sword and the Shield" and see what the USSR used all this information for, you will be very surprised.

There are allocations of a 5th uncaught spy but it would appear that if it were so, they weren't working for the USSR. But then spy catchers are a suspecious lot.

Great read! (way better than the fictional stuff!)

Peter Wright was a former assistant director of MI5 (Britain's secret service or counter-intelligence). This is his story of his career, including his anecdotes about his American allies. He joined MI5 as a scientist who specialized in tools for espionage. He had been promised credit for his years as a civilian scientist. When this promise was broken at retirement, he wrote this book to even out things.

This is an interesting book that can't be summarized in a few paragraphs. It is definitely worth reading for the details on government activities in a "democracy". Watergate was a notable failure of such activities. Do these activities continue? Of course!

Pages 158-9 tell of his proposal for a "Bolshevik model" for former colonial countries: let a political party control the army and secret police so that neither the army or another political party could gain control of the government. He pointed out that only those newly created countries that adopted this principle have escaped military dictatorships and civil war.

Does the above advice seem to cynical and radical? But our Establishment DOES control the army and secret police so that neither the military or a populist political party (one not controlled by corporate interests) can gain control.

Yet the classic solution for democracies, from Aristotle to Machiavelli to our Founding Fathers was well-armed citizens and their militia. It has worked well for over over a century, and the idea still survives today.

Story of British spies ~ MI5 in particular ~ from one who livedthrough it. Wright was the first scientist to join MI5, the domesticspy-catchers, and led the way for others. The bulk of the book is taken up with the search for the Fifth Man ~ Wright's candidate is Roger Hollis, who was head of MI5 during the early Sixties ~ a well-hidden Soviet mole like Philby and his ilk. Reading it, at times, it appears that Wright considers himself responsible for every innovation in spy technology during the '50s and '60s, but if you can get over his view of himself, the book becomes a fascinating read, on a par with anything Le Carré wrote. As far as the Fifth Man goes, my mind is still open, but Wright gives excellent cause to suspect that Hollis probably was at least bent, if not broken.

If you've ever been to Princeton University, NJ and the Cotswold you'll realize how funny this quote from the book is. Besides interesting tid-bits like this, a more serious allegation by Peter Wright was that the Cuban Missile Crisis was a "set-up," a fabulous Russian disinformation effort in which the Russians actually won! Having lived through this incident I'm firmly convinced that he was right. You'll have to read about it to find out why.

Overall, the book is one of the most interesting spy books I've ever read. It's basic, down-to-earth and showed MI-5 to be a disaster mainly as a result of activities by a few elite, upper-crust, rich, idealistic Oxford/Cambridge (Oxbridge)University homosexuals! All this started in the 1930's and moved into the 50's. What a mess!

It also displays the courage of several men, mainly Peter Wright, to find the truth and act on it. Peter's boss, the head of MI-5, was a spy for Russia, but Peter was relentless in his effort to expose this fact.

If you like spy books you have got to get this one.

This book is NOT Ian Flemmings James Bond far from it. This Book does not show the British Inteligence Service as a romantic location where the hero always gets whichever girl he wants, And can live his life how he choses.

This book is a True story about life in MI5, the British (Domestic) Inteligence Service and of the resentment between MI5 and MI6. So true that the British Govenment of the time Banned the book from ever being published in the United Kingdom. For that this book has achived praise world over.

I like the book most for the fact that it is true. And the fact that the author told of the vetting procedure that alowed Guy Brugges and many other famous diffectors to achive such high rank without any problems. He also tells us who he believed was the third diffector. The one that was never caught. I would love to say more but I would not want to spoil the book for you. This book offers a true story that also has a plot, which lacks in some other espionage books.So I would Happily recomend this book to anyone who is intrested in spy stories.

"Spy Catcher" by Peter Wright, I thought, was an excellent book... about the spying that actually went on behind the scenes... during the cold war. It is a must for any student of politics, international, or otherwise. It seems that a war was actually being fought by spies, (MI5, MI6, the K.G.B., the C.I.A., etc), beneath our very noses. (In the latest James Bond film, "Tomorrow Never Dies," there is a reference made to MI5, and MI6). Basically, discussed in the book, was British Internal Security, and the secret state, also a title to a book by Richard Thurlow, entitled "The Secret State: British Internal Security in the Twentieth Century." In a word, "Spy Catcher" should be read as a personal guide to understanding the dynamics of cold war politics.