'MI6' is a history of mainly Cold War spook ops, blow by blow, country by country, acronym by acronym.

The same culprits turn up again and again, same shopworn tactics - recruiting ex Nazi collaborators, war criminals, to get behind the Iron Curtain. Ex SOE types train cloak and dagger private armies, but the infiltrators are often infiltrated, the Soviets using double cross networks. Dorril is keen to play down Philby, stressing internecine émigré politics and tunnel vision by MI6 analysts. Nascent guerrilla groups in post WW2 East Europe did not enjoy popular support, and the Cold War did not turn hot enough to use them. We see the usual gamut of spook tactics including disinformation, Zinoviev style forgeries, rigged elections.

Often their tricks proved inept, like the propaganda leaflets sent by balloon, and blown back in the wrong direction. (Dorril does not seem aware that the RAF did the same thing, with the same result in the early days of WW2) A great deal of their activity was sheer evil; the interference in Greece, the doomed infiltrations into the Baltic states or Albania. Perhaps the worst is the allegation that a Jewish refugee ship was sunk, [p 547 ff] which Dorril does not follow up. Presumably this ship had a name, owners, a passenger list, a date of sinking.

The real problem with this book is that its breadth is a hindrance. Each episode can only be treated at a superficial level, and Dorril's work much depends on earlier material, so to that extent it is really a compilation of secondary literature. His previous book, 'The Silent Conspiracy' suffers in a similar way. This long [Robin] Cook's tour through Acronym Reich looks impressive, but suffers from the necessary lack of real depth imposed by this urgent need to move on. Many of the really interesting matters (the Anglo-French plot to attack the Russian oil fields at Baku eg) are not properly investigated. Important questions are not asked: Why did General Vlasov change sides? Why did Sikorski crash at Gibraltar?

Various myths are accepted uncritically; MI6 manipulated America into WW2 by plotting against the Isolationists, or European unity was originally an MI6 sponsored wheeze against Communism, for example.

It would have been better shorter, and focused.

There is a myth that the spooks secretly control everything, which I think Dorril really believes, what we have here is a glorified history of office politics. The whole world at your fingertips, a card index, this secret history includes everything. (or would like to). Ultimately, this book shows how the rise of the intelligence services mirrors the real decay of the British political establishment. It takes him 600 pages to reach Suez (1956) which leaves him just 200 more for the next four decades. A better writer would have paced himself. The closer to the present, the faster and more superficial it gets. All the opera cape and gaslight fake politics about Intermarium and the Promethean League masks the important point that this is essentially their version, the one they want you to believe. Like their new Vauxhall Cross HQ, it owes a good deal to Busby Berkeley.

In and out, round and twist; the groups and plots create a shape viewed from above. If Dorril is cast as Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers could be the aptly named Mrs Dangerfield. Spin's the thing, but in order to spot the dogs that don't bark, you need to know where the dogs are. The Mull of Kintyre Chinook helicopter crash? The death of Princess Diana? Dorril fights shy of these matters.

This book should be understood in the light of MI6 having to recast itself in the post Cold War NWO era of 'avowal', mafia crime, drugs, super terrorism and Terry Farrell HQs. In all conscience, not to be recommended, this book is one of interest to really committed spook spotters, but not at all for the general reader.

– Steve Booth

Green Anarchist: Front Page Current Articles First 10 Issues See: uk.indymedia.org for more on the university expansion.

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