You can bet as surely as night follows day that, hard on the heels of any bomb attack in continental Europe, will come criticism from this side of the Channel about a reluctance to share intelligence, lack of coordination among intelligence agencies and – even – infighting among different intelligence agencies of that particular country. The tone tends to the condescending, as though “we” have never suffered such eminently controllable maladies ourselves.
The revelations about a no-holds-barred conflict between MI5 and MI6 about rendition – the evidence being a letter of complaint from the then head of MI5, Eliza Manningham-Buller, to the then prime minister, Tony Blair, about the conduct of MI6 – demonstrates that the UK’s intelligence services are hardly immune to such divisions. But they also demonstrate a whole lot more.
They show, first, at least some of what lay behind the euphemistic references to the “uncomfortable relationship” of MI6 with the government that led to Sir Richard Dearlove’s departure as head of that service in 2004. This, it would appear, was an understatement of the first order: at the height of the Iraq war, the heads of the UK’s two major intelligence agencies were at each other’s throats.
They show, second, that rendition – the clandestine transfer of terrorist suspects from one country to another where they were likely to be subject to methods of interrogation which are outside the law – met opposition at the very top of UK intelligence. At least someone retained her moral compass: a bouquet for Manningham-Buller. Alas, it is not at all clear that her view prevailed.
They show, third, not just the fawning attitude that infests UK intelligence relations with the United States – but also the protectionism exercised by individual services. In the particular case at issue here – the enforced return of exiled Libyan opposition leader Abdul Hakim Belhaj to Tripoli in 2004, where he was detained and as he says repeatedly tortured – MI6 was concerned to take all the “credit”, demonstrating its prowess to the US, but keeping Belhaj to itself.
And, fourth, the revelations show how successful the powers that be have been in keeping the covers on these reprehensible practices to this day. The CPS is still deciding whether there should be prosecutions and Belhaj himself is awaiting a ruling on his case from the supreme court. The Gibson inquiry on rendition was summarily halted, after details of Belhaj’s case emerged, and the questions it raised were left unanswered. Lawsuits brought by those who claim they were subject to rendition have been settled out of court. Individual intelligence agents are thus spared from appearing as witnesses; more important, the agencies themselves are let off the hook.
Yes, the then head of MI6 left office, but what followed for Sir Richard Dearlove was a new career on the consulting and speaking circuit and an honourable semi-retirement as head of a Cambridge college. He has recently re-emerged to champion Brexit, denying that there would be any risk to national security, in part, because the UK remains safe beneath the US umbrella.
Of course, rumblings from, and around, the UK intelligence services emerging now, more than a decade on, may have something to do with the imminent release of the Chilcot report, which is expected to spread its condemnation wide. Whatever Chilcot concludes about the UK intelligence services, however, and about MI6 in particular, it should already be beyond doubt that the UK has little reason to boast of its superior coordination vis a vis its EU partners, and – without more honesty about our own use of extra-legal practices and excesses – still less of a case for national pride.
