Suchergebnisse

Abstract
Recently declassified archival materials reveal that the United Kingdom conducted a sustained program of so-called black propaganda at the height of the Cold War. This article examines roughly 350 operations in which the British government spread propaganda through forgeries and front groups. Placing the campaign in its broader global history, the article demonstrates that British black propaganda mainly targeted Soviet activity in Africa and Asia as part of the postcolonial battle for influence. The British government engaged in black propaganda far more often than has previously been kown, including aggressive operations seeking to disrupt, attack, and sow chaos as much as simply to expose lies. Although much of the content was broadly accurate, the fake sources deliberately deceived audiences in order to encourage a reaction, incite violence, or foment racial tensions.

In early 2019, the British government declassified a tranche of Information Research Department files. Among them is a candid and concise overview of British thinking about covert propaganda, complete with a list of examples of British forgery operations. This short piece transcribes the briefing note and provides an introduction. The document sheds new light on UK covert action, but also talks to ongoing scholarly debates in Intelligence Studies and International Relations more broadly. In early 2019, the British government declassified a tranche of Information Research Department (IRD) files. Among them is a candid and concise overview of British thinking about covert propaganda, complete with a list of examples of British forgery operations. 1 It sheds new light on UK covert action, but also talks to ongoing scholarly debates in Intelligence Studies and International Relations more broadly. The IRD was created inside the Foreign Office in early 1948 to counter Soviet propaganda. Established under terms of the so-called Secret Vote, it expanded quickly and confidentially served a range of 'clients' from friendly governments and trade-union leaders, to Radio Free Europe and counter-subversion partners in the Middle East. Throughout much of its existence, and especially during its first two decades, the IRD focused on international communism. After the Suez Canal crisis in 1956, it gained a mandate to counter Arab nationalism, and, by the 1960s its activities extended to other hostile targets, including President Sukarno's Indonesian regime. David Owen, the Labour Foreign Secretary, closed the IRD down in 1977. 2 The IRD engaged in unattributable propaganda. Generally speaking, it distributed material, often based on sanitised intelligence, into foreign media outlets through trusted contacts. The recently declassified files (FCO 168) cover policy and operational detail. In doing so, they provide a more holistic understanding of IRD and British propaganda; the existing files, FO 1110 and FCO 95, declassified in ...

The United Kingdom has long engaged in covert action. It continues to do so today. Owing to the secrecy involved, however, such activity has consistently been excluded from debates about Britain's global role, foreign and security policy and military planning: an important lacuna given the controversy, risk, appeal and frequency of covert action. Examining when, how and why covert action is used, this article argues that contemporary covert action has emerged from, and is shaped by, a specific context. First, a gap exists between Britain's perceived global responsibilities and its actual capabilities; policy elites see covert action as able to resolve, or at least conceal, this. Second, intelligence agencies can shape events proactively, especially at the tactical level, while flexible preventative operations are deemed well suited to the range of fluid threats currently faced. Third, existing Whitehall machinery makes covert action viable. However, current covert action is smaller scale and less provocative today than in the early Cold War; it revolves around 'disruption' operations. Despite being absent from the accompanying debates, this role was recognised in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review, which placed intelligence actors at the heart of British thinking.

The United Kingdom has long engaged in covert action. It continues to do so today. Owing to the secrecy involved, however, such activity has consistently been excluded from debates about Britain's global role, foreign and security policy and military planning: an important lacuna given the controversy, risk, appeal and frequency of covert action. Examining when, how and why covert action is used, this article argues that contemporary covert action has emerged from, and is shaped by, a specific context. First, a gap exists between Britain's perceived global responsibilities and its actual capabilities; policy elites see covert action as able to resolve, or at least conceal, this. Second, intelligence agencies can shape events proactively, especially at the tactical level, while flexible preventative operations are deemed well suited to the range of fluid threats currently faced. Third, existing Whitehall machinery makes covert action viable. However, current covert action is smaller scale and less provocative today than in the early Cold War; it revolves around 'disruption' operations. Despite being absent from the accompanying debates, this role was recognised in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review, which placed intelligence actors at the heart of British thinking.

The United Kingdom has long engaged in covert action. It continues to do so today. Owing to the secrecy involved, however, such activity has consistently been excluded from debates about Britain's global role, foreign and security policy, and military planning: an important lacuna given the controversy, risk, appeal, and frequency of covert action. Examining when, how, and why covert action is used, this article argues that contemporary covert action has emerged from, and is shaped by, a specific context. First, a gap exists between Britain's perceived global responsibilities and its actual capabilities; policy elites see covert action as able to resolve, or at least conceal, this. Second, intelligence agencies can shape events proactively, especially at the tactical level, whilst flexible preventative operations are deemed well-suited to the range of fluid threats currently faced. Third, existing Whitehall machinery makes covert action viable. However, current covert action is smaller scale and less provocative today than in the early Cold War; it revolves around "disruption" operations. Despite being absent from the accompanying debates, this role was recognised in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review, which placed intelligence actors at the heart of British thinking.

This article examines the role of the IRD (Information Research Department) in Northern Ireland during the first half of the 1970s. After discussing British conceptualisations of propaganda, it offers a detailed account of IRD activity, including how a Foreign Office department came to be involved on British soil; how IRD propaganda fitted into the broader apparatus in Northern Ireland; the activity in which the IRD was engaged – both in Northern Ireland and beyond; and some of the challenges faced which limited the campaign's effectiveness. It argues that the IRD's role was driven from the very top of government and came against a context of cuts, a deteriorating security situation in Northern Ireland, and a tradition of domestic propaganda in the UK. IRD activity pressed four key themes: exploiting divisions within the IRA; undermining the IRA's credibility amongst the population; linking the IRA to international terrorism; and portraying the IRA as communist.

This article examines Great Britain's approach to covert action during the formative years of British Cold War intelligence operations, 1950–1951. Rather than shy away from such activity in the wake of the failure in Albania in the late 1940s, the British increased the number of operations they pursued. This was the start of a coherent strategy regarding covert activity that can be conceptualized as the "pinprick" approach. The strategy was overseen by a highly secretive Whitehall body, the Official Committee on Communism, which in effect became the government's covert action committee. This article uses the commission's recently declassified papers for the first time to assess the merits of this approach.

International economic issues have become a foremost government concern since the start of the global financial crisis, leaving economic security increasingly linked to more traditional concepts of national interest and politico-military security. This prioritization has been reflected in the recent requirements of the United Kingdom's intelligence and security actors. Yet, scholarly research has neglected the relationship between intelligence, international economics, and contemporary security policy. Taking current requirements as a catalyst, this article draws on contemporary British history to explore when intelligence can be used to protect economic security and when intelligence actors can best use economic measures to achieve broader politico-military goals. The use of secret intelligence in the economic sphere does, however, have certain limitations and it should therefore only be employed when necessary. Adapted from the source document.