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Editorial Reviews
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MI6, the foreign section of Great Britain's intelligence service, began life early in the 20th century with the charge of keeping tabs on "Red Russia," and, soon thereafter, on Nazi Germany. Less effective during World War II than its American counterpart, the Office of Strategic Services, MI6 came into its own during the cold war, when Britain's spymasters recruited bright young public-school intellectuals to play a modern version of the Great Game against their Soviet counterparts in the KGB and thwart Communist ambitions around the globe.
MI6, the foreign section of Great Britain's intelligence service, began life early in the 20th century with the charge of keeping tabs on "Red Russia," and, soon thereafter, on Nazi Germany. Less effective during World War II than its American counterpart, the Office of Strategic Services, MI6 came into its own during the cold war, when Britain's spymasters recruited bright young public-school intellectuals to play a modern version of the Great Game against their Soviet counterparts in the KGB and thwart Communist ambitions around the globe.
The Soviets, writes English historian Stephen Dorril, were often a step ahead, helped along by British turncoats like Kim Philby, who provided Stalin with the names of MI6 operatives and later defected. And, like the CIA, the agents of MI6 were obsessed with conjuring elaborate schemes, including plots to assassinate Egyptian leader Gamal Abdul Nasser (with poisoned chocolates) and Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic (by means of a carefully engineered car crash). Busy planning elaborate endings to their enemies' lives, the British spies failed to comprehend important developments as they were happening, from the Belgrade-Moscow split of the late 1940s to the collapse of the Soviet bloc in the late 1980s.
Such failures, lapses, and scandals have led to repeated calls for dismantling the agency, especially now that the cold war has ended. Even so, Dorril writes, MI6 enjoys a privileged position within the British government and is unlikely to see meaningful reform. Readers who know of British spydom only through the surprisingly accurate James Bond novels of Ian Fleming will find Dorril's densely detailed, often scathingly critical book to be an eye-opener. --Gregory McNamee
From Publishers Weekly
Despite the efforts of an outraged British government determined to suppress its publication, this exhaustive study of Her Majesty's secret service appeared in print in the U.K. in March, and was serialized amid great controversy in London's Sunday Times. The fruits of Dorril's 15 years' research into the shadowy MI6 are now presented for the edification of U.S. readers. Dorril (Smear, etc.) goes heavy on revelations and myth busting. In his hands, MI6 is no longer the precision-tuned organization of legend, but appears far more American in its tendency to blunder its way through important missions. In an echo of the CIA's failed efforts in Cuba and elsewhere, MI6 is shown fumbling plans to assassinate troublesome heads of state, including Muammar Khadafy and Slobodan Milosevic. Ever shrewd, however, the British spy agency manages to fund some of its operations with CIA money. Also, Dorril claims, MI6 conducted spy operations for the U.S. in Vietnam as part of a complex, covert deal with Washington to keep British troops out of Southeast Asia. Other assertions are indeed delicious if not entirely persuasive: Nelson Mandela (who denies the charge) is portrayed as a British agent who provided key information on Libyan financing of the IRA. Dense even for an intelligence history, the work is carefully organized to avoid overwhelming the more casual reader, while providing both in-depth research for the serious student and entertainment for the well-informed spy buff. American journalists and readers accustomed to seeing our own country's secrets unmasked via the Freedom of Information Act may wonder what all the fuss is about on the other side of the Atlantic, but will certainly find much to marvel at. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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