Thematics of counterterrorism: comparing 24 and MI-5/Spooks

Introduction

This paper examines themes raised by counterterrorism and terrorism in the popular culture of the USA and the UK, focusing on two contemporary televisual works. I examine the 24 and MI-5/Spooks television series (Fox Broadcasting Company (FBC) Citation2007, Sky One Citation2007, A&E Television Citation2007, BBC Citation2008a) based on in the former, a wholly fictional Counter Terrorist Unit (CTU) of the US federal government set in Los Angeles, and in the latter a fictionalised UK Security Service (MI-5) agents in the counterterrorist ‘Section D’ set in London. I argue that these works are useful cases for exploring the cultural problematics created by the ‘counterterrorist’ mobilisation of the security apparatus. I compare representations of the security apparatus, specifically, agents (individuals) and agencies (organisations) involved in counterterrorism and how such representations impact upon these two democratic polities. I also argue that these shows are exemplars of an emerging counterterror genre that borrows heavily, but is also separate and distinct from, previous ‘spy’ or espionage/counterespionage genres.

These series are distinct in their focus on terrorism as opposed to the games of great powers, but they do not entirely leave those concerns behind. In both 24 and MI-5/Spooks, there are the traces of the conventional concerns found in the espionage/counterespionage genres and both spend a good deal of time revealing the geopolitical back-story to the on-going action. The threats featured in these series run the gamut from conventional state-on-state espionage, through terrorists acting as proxies or suspected proxies of states, to non-state terrorists and criminal entities. Both shows focus on the domestic activities of the apparatus but do not leave out the international dimension. These works are similar to previous works of the espionage/counterespionage genres in the development of antiheroes as central characters, and in their fetishism of technology as a panacea for counterterrorist activities. In this paper, I explore these works through three dominant themes: legitimisation, normalisation, and subversion.

Case selection and theoretical orientation

24 and MI-5/Spooks are useful cases for understanding the post-9/11 and 7/7 zeitgeist created by seven years of ‘global war(s) on terrorism’, a zeitgeist defined by increasing paranoia and suspicion about: (1) the prospect of another spectacular terrorist attack; and (2) excessive security apparatus activities in response to attacks in both the ‘homelands’ and throughout the world. These works span the time period immediately before and after the attacks of 9/11 and 7/7: 24 first aired on the Fox Network in the US in November 2001 and MI-5/Spooks first broadcast on BBC One in the UK in May 2002. Both 24 and MI-5/Spooks are broadcast in the US and the UK – 24 on Fox in the US and Sky One in the UK, and MI-5/Spooks on BBC One in the UK and in the US for two seasons on A&E Television and also on BBC America.

These two works have just concluded, are in the midst of, or are about to begin new seasons. Therefore, it is uncertain where the series will be in their production and broadcast schedules at the time of publication of this paper. In addition, production of 24's 2008 season was delayed due to the Writers' Guild of America strike in late 2007 and early 2008, which has pushed back the airdate for the next season of 24 to January 2009 (Adalian and Schneider Citation2008). MI-5/Spooks' seventh season begins Fall 2008. These series' runs have been of sufficient length to provide a strong basis for analysis and comparison and to determine if the series' approach to representing agents and agencies is significantly different from previous representations, or perhaps draws upon themes with deeper historical and cultural roots extending back into the past to the early Cold War, and perhaps beyond.

24 has attracted more scholarly attention than MI-5/Spooks, including two recent multi-author edited volumes (Peacock Citation2007, Weed et al. Citation2008). This may be due to its innovative aesthetics in the context of US television (such as the programme's real-time format, rapid pacing, and use of split screens to tell multiple strands of story lines). In these two volumes, 24 is treated as a complex object of inquiry with far-ranging political, cultural, and philosophical implications. Interestingly, however, none of the chapters compares 24 with MI-5/Spooks.

My use of the term ‘security apparatus’ is designed to capture the apparatus or dispositive, as discussed by Foucault (Citation2007). However, my conceptualisation of the ‘security apparatus’ goes beyond Foucault's to describe the explicit fusion of military, police, and intelligence functions that have come to define the early 21st century ‘counterterrorist’ policing in the US, UK, and indeed in other great powers and regional entities such as EUROPOL. Additionally, I have selected the cases of the US and UK to build consciously upon other comparisons of the impact of war mobilisation (Regan Citation1994a, Citation1994b) and counterterrorist mobilisation (Donohue Citation2001a, Citation2001b, Citation2008) upon these two major global and/or imperial powers which have similar though very distinct democratic forms of governance. While not the primary focus of this paper, the transatlantic dimension must be addressed, given that both programmes are aired in both states. Much of the commentary I have encountered has emphasised similarities in these works rather than differences, especially following the events of 7/7 (Sweeting Citation2006).

Before analysing the three themes of social commentary evident in the works, it is important to locate them in the political dynamics of the George W. Bush and Tony Blair/Gordon Brown administrations' counterterrorist and counterinsurgency policies, as they reflect debates about the extent of the threat and the required response that takes place in the ‘real’. Both 24 and MI-5/Spooks should be understood as fictionalised reflections of the debates about proper counterterrorist and counterinsurgency policies shaped by nearly seven years of the global ‘war(s) on terror’, internal security mobilisation, and the invasion and occupation in Afghanistan and Iraq. These works must also be seen in the context of general debates about the relative trustworthiness of intelligence services – debates that are the legacy of the politicisation of intelligence and internal security under all three administrations. While these series are fictional, there is a blurring of the ‘real’ and the fictional in many discussions of these works. I address this blurring later in this paper.

These works represent the combat between security agents and terrorists as taking place in a universe defined by moral and political ambiguity. It is my contention that these works should not be understood as ‘nationalist’ ‘war(s) on terror’ taking place throughout the planet; in fact, these two series manifest a certain exhaustion of the theme of simple patriotism.

In the sections that follow, I examine what I see as three dominant themes of the series: legitimisation; normalisation; and subversion. I will be making the theoretical argument that both of these works represent the dangers of a slippage between the real and the virtual (or televisual) which has come to define heavily mediated polities such as the US and the UK. Heavily mediated polities are those highly developed states that are saturated with very influential private and public media outlets that play a major role in political debates and in the consumption/circulation of images that defines citizens' perception of their polity (Bennett and Entman Citation2000). Through the repetition of images that simulate the activities of counterterrorist agents and agencies, these works therefore are constructing the parameters for acceptable constitution of these actors in ‘the real’. The conventional analysis of these works is that they only contribute to the legitimacy and normalcy of agents and agencies. However, I will be making the argument that these works also have embedded within them the potential for subversive readings which interrupt the legitimising and normalising functions of the counterterror genre.

The themes of legitimisation and normalisation are primarily informed by the work of Foucault (Citation2003, 2007) and Deleuze and Guattari (Citation1986, Citation1987), but also borrow from the use of the concept by Habermas (McCarthy Citation1981) and Chomsky. Of particular usefulness is the Habermasian concept of ‘legitimisation crisis’, and to me, it remains an open question whether or not these two shows accelerate or decelerate this sense of crisis for mass audiences. Legitimisation and normalisation are processes by which consensus is manufactured discursively for each of these thinkers, and the mass media apparatus is a critical component of the assemblage that produces consensus. Shows like 24 and MI-5/Spooks can be viewed as attempts to produce a consensus on the range and extent of intelligence activities, albeit a fictional consensus, by making these agents and agencies appear to have a legitimate and normal function in a democratic polity. I examine legitimisation and normalisation first because they are the most dominant themes in the series.

When judging the effects of programmes like 24 and MI-5/Spooks, it is important to keep in mind that the audiences that view these series when originally broadcast, or purchase these works for viewing at times of their own choosing, do so with an intensity of viewing (how frequently the series are watched in their recorded form) that is not necessarily captured by any of the audience metering entities, such as Nielsen in the US and Nielsen and Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) in the UK.Footnote ¹ Additionally, there is more than one audience for these series. Therefore, for some audiences a series may have a normalising effect on their view of the war on terror, for others it will have a legitimising effect, and for still others, it may have a subversive effect.

The theme of legitimisation is evident: (1) when these works show the effectiveness of a (nearly ubiquitous) apparatus composed of counterterrorist agents, agencies, and techniques and technologies, including accelerating the ‘virtual’ deployment of techniques and technologies that are in research and development stages as though they have already been perfected for use in the ‘real’; and (2) when the shows themselves are used directly to recruit agents for actual security agencies, or are aesthetically (implicitly or explicitly) mimicked by recruitment campaigns created by the US's Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and US National Security Agency (NSA), and the UK's MI-5/Security Service, MI-6/Secret Intelligence Service, or Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ).

When using the phrase ‘the real’, I am deeply aware of the debates about the increasingly problematic nature of assertions of being able to access let alone understand clinically, certainly not objectively, ‘the real’. However, when I use the term ‘the real’ I am referring to the actually existing agents, agencies, and apparatus in the two states and the ‘enemy’ entities that their techniques and technologies are designed to govern and police. My understanding of the permeability of the boundary between external material reality and virtual forms is informed by the comprehensive corpus of De Landa (Citation1991, Citation2006), Deleuze (Citation2005), Deleuze and Guattari (Citation1986, Citation1987), Der Derian (Citation2000, Citation2001, Citation2002), Shapiro (Citation2007), and others inspired by their work.

‘Normalisation’, as I use the term, refers to taking the unusual and making it appear to be ‘normal’ or expected. I argue that these works buttress the presence of the security apparatus by taking emergency situations and making the activities of the security apparatus, no matter how extreme, appear normal through repetition of exposure to emergency rule or other exceptional circumstances that define the back-story of these two works.

Examples of the theme of normalisation include: (1) the normalisation of torture through representations that assume the ubiquity of its use by security personnel for interrogation; and (2) the normalisation of a permanent culture of anxiety and existential threat posed by the use of weapons of mass destruction. This normalisation takes place through narratives that assume that chemical, biological, nuclear, and radiological weapons will inevitably be used by terrorists, dissidents, and/or cells within the security services, perhaps working in conjunction with political elites needing to generate a major crisis to rationalise the extension of counterterrorist policing – even into the most intimate microcapillaries of even ostensibly democratic polities.

I use the term ‘subversion’ to denote strategy and tactics, or in this instance, a theme, of resistance to fascism and ‘microfascism’. This use draws on works of Deleuze and Guattari (Citation1986, Citation1987) and Foucault (Citation2007). For purposes of the works discussed in this paper, ‘microfascism’ is clearly the more relevant analytical construct, referring to the articulation of power or fascism within these series which is of the micropolitical variety. What is being subverted in these shows are, in turn, the other two themes, legitimisation and normalisation, as they are reflected in the various characters' and agencies' actions. In neither of these shows are the central characters represented as flawless heroes or flawed executors of a ‘hero leader's will to power’. Rather, the central individuals and organisation face the spectre of seduction by the microfascist impulse in response to the exigencies of the moment in the midst of counterterrorist operations. The Jack Bauer/Keifer Sutherland and Adam Carter/Rupert Penry-Jones central characters could easily be understood as populist ‘antiheroes’.Footnote ² However, this formulation is not without its own ideological problematics, given antiheroes' frequent relationship to genocidal colonisation projects in the US in the Western film genre. In future work, I intend on exploring whether or not characters like Bauer, Carter, Jason Bourne, and James Bond can be more aptly understood as existential (Sartre n.d.) rather than nationalist antiheroes.

Instances of the theme of subversion include: (1) representation of ‘blowback’ in the series as being the inevitable consequence of empire; (2) delegitimising the security apparatus by portraying it as riddled with conflict and the political elites of the US and UK respectively as being governed by internecine conflict that at times turns murderous and threatens democratic norms; and (3) depicting security agents engaged in ambiguous actions vis-à-vis terrorist networks and other enemy entities which undermines the certainty of counterterrorist discourse in the ‘real’. I now turn to a consideration of the evidence regarding each of these themes in the series.

Legitimisation: counterterror techniques and technologies as silver bullet

In these works, a highly intrusive and adept security apparatus is presented as legitimate in its existence and activities, and its use of technology is represented as a critical force multiplier for both the agents and agencies of the security apparatus. Technology can almost be said to be a separate and distinct actor in each of these works, because the presence of advanced technologies of surveillance and weaponry puts each of these works in the realm of near future espionage/science fiction. Technology is critical to the legitimacy of the security services who boast of their ability to master technology to a greater extent than potential foes, and this boasting in the ‘real’ shapes the legitimising function of technology in these series.

Others (Schuchardt Citation2008), including myself (Erickson Citation2007), have commented upon the clearly fictional, almost flawless quality of wireless technologies in 24 and MI-5/Spooks as a prime example of exaggeration of the potential of counterterror techniques and technologies. Security agents and terrorists alike are heavily reliant on technology. The works also privilege technology as a cutting edge tool of forensic investigation and undercover operations. This is a characteristic that both of these works share with the various CSIs and similar programmes which dominate the ratings in the US, and with similar forensic-policing programmes such as Silent Witness in the UK (BBC Citation2008d).

In 24, much of the action is set in the Los Angeles headquarters of the CTU, which is represented as the idealised high-technology workplace of the early 21st century, with a multiplicity of high-power computer workstations and ubiquitous and relatively flawless wireless communication. This ubiquitous and reliable technological infrastructure enables members of CTU to execute elaborate and globe spanning counterterrorist operations that have thus far frustrated the assassination of a Presidential candidate (2001–2002 season), and thwarted two potential mass casualty terrorist events in Los Angeles, including the detonation of a tactical nuclear weapon (2002–2003 season) and the dissemination of a biological warfare agent (2003–2004 season). The 2005 season of 24 was based on an intricately timed sequence of attacks. This sequence of attacks included the kidnapping of the US Secretary of Defense, a cyber-attack aimed at creating the meltdown of nuclear reactors across the US, shooting down Air Force One with a hijacked F-117, and the attempted use of a nuclear tipped missile against Los Angeles. The 2007 season included the successful detonation of a nuclear weapon in a suburb of Los Angeles and an intricately timed series of other attacks.

In MI-5/Spooks as well, much of the action is set at headquarters, which is known as the Grid. The episodes devote a substantial amount of time detailing the intricacies of MI-5's technological capabilities in the service of both counterintelligence and counterterror operations. The importance of technology in the construction of forensically accurate ‘legends’ (false identities) to assist undercover agents is emphasised in this series more than in 24. Terrorist organisations, and of course competitor states, possess advanced technological capabilities that at times supersede those of the US and UK intelligence communities, or at least provide momentary advantages. MI-5/Spooks spends more time investigating the minutiae of these technologies, because they are often viewed as a silver bullet that can provide the necessary edge and supplement a lack of good human intelligence. In MI-5/Spooks technologies perform well quite often and are critical in the rapidly moving global network warfare that is portrayed. MI-5/Spooks tries to stay closer to actual technological capabilities, but again often portrays the utilisation of technologies that are at least 10–15 years away from actually entering into the normal arsenal of intelligence services.

Legtimisation: recruitment

Neither 24 nor MI-5/Spooks receive technical advice or support from the public relations departments of the US or UK security apparatus. However, other shows, such as Alias, received not only production support, but became actively involved in recruiting agents for the CIA. In the US, The Agency was invited to film scenes at CIA headquarters and was also offered other forms of production support (Erickson Citation2007). Despite attempts to keep some of the shows at a distance, at the very least, the aesthetics of these works have continued to be utilised in recruitment. A CIA advertisement shown before movies in the fall of 2006 was described as mimicking some of the aesthetics and casting of 24:

This advertisement was part of a new post-9/11 campaign, the same campaign that used Alias star Jennifer Garner to record a recruiting video posted on the CIA website briefly in 2004.

MI-5 and MI-6 have simultaneously borrowed and distanced themselves from works such as MI-5/Spooks. When MI-5/Spooks first aired, the show was credited with raising recruitment (Bamber Citation2002). As part of a major expansion of MI-5 agents (from 2000 to 3000 by the end of 2007) and an attempt to attract more women to serve, ads were placed in magazines such as She and Cosmopolitan (Goodchild and Veevers Citation2006). This recruiting drive was complicated by the content of some episodes of Spooks, including the graphic deaths of female agents, which noticeably suppressed applications:

The use of some of these works for recruitment and legitimisation is a double-edged sword, as can be seen above, and the need for the security apparatus to maintain distance from certain recurrent plot elements clearly complicates the ‘legitimising’ function of these works.

Another very clear example of this can be found on the MI-5 website ‘FAQs’. In response to the question, ‘How realistic is the depiction of MI-5 in the television series “Spooks”?’, MI-5 states:

The irony of the above quote is difficult to miss, given the well-documented history of MI-5, MI-6, and US intelligence and law enforcement services regularly acting ‘outside the law in pursuit of their investigations!’ The CIA also has repeatedly emphasised that there is a disconnect between fictional representations of the security apparatus and the lives of real agents, despite using these same fictional representations as a platform or inspiration for recruitment campaigns: ‘(S)ome movies and books have painted an unreal portrait of the US Central Intelligence Agency. Although much of what you see is entertaining (we find it fun, too!), much of it's not true’ (US CIA Citation2007).

Normalisation: torture as necessity and norm

One of the most pervasive examples of normalisation related to the ‘global war(s) on terror’ is the representation of the dilemmas, or perhaps more disturbingly, the lack thereof, posed by questions about the necessity of torturing suspected terrorists, dissidents, ‘subversives’, or spies. Interrogation and torture are integral to the genre and cinematic and literary classics like The Battle of Algiers (1966) (Yacef and Pontecorvo Citation1966/2004), Franz Kafka's The Penal Colony (1961), and George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) delve into the complexities of the relationship between the interrogator and interrogated (Crowdus Citation2004, Yacef and Pontecorvo Citation1966/2004). It is perhaps understandable that a culture industry based in a democratic polity would find the dramatic elements surrounding questions of the use of torture a compelling subject for investigation.

The parallels between the fictional dilemmas posed by the use of torture and the dilemmas faced by US military, law enforcement, and intelligence personnel in the ‘real’ is a fertile terrain of inquiry. What bears exploration is the possibility that the ways in which the normalisation of torture occurs within the narrative structure of the works examined in this paper (and others), may contribute to the loosening of the restrictions on the use of torture which seem to be occurring in the real (as evidenced by the Abu Ghraib photographs and many other allegations and demonstrated instances of torture). Such a contribution might happen in the following way. By assuming that the pressures of counterterrorist investigations make the use of torture a foregone conclusion, the fictional representations of the normalisation of torture could foreseeably shift the general cultural norm of prohibition, or at the very least, restriction of torture. Comparing the results of public opinion polls that included the US and UK, whether this normalisation is occurring is not clear cut. In October 2006, as part of a larger global poll commissioned by the BBC, citizens from 25 different countries were asked whether or not torture should be allowed or should remain tightly restricted. The US results showed that a strong majority of 58% still wanted restrictions. At 72%, this desire for maintaining strong restrictions is even more pronounced in the UK (World Public Opinion Organization Citation2006). This exact poll has not been repeated however, so we have no sense of temporal trends. A more recent poll of 19 nations including the US but not the UK, indicates that US public opinion remains relatively stable on the issue with 53% stating that torture should be prohibited in all cases (although 31% of those polled did make an exception for the torture of ‘terrorists’ ‘to save innocent lives’) (World Public Opinion Organization Citation2008).

One of the forms of deviance and criminality that is often featured in 24 is the use of interrogation techniques that could conceivably be considered war crimes given their violation of international and US law. This has generated significant controversy. In November 2006, this controversy included a meeting between actual interrogators from the US military, intelligence, and law enforcement communities, and the producers of 24 and Keifer Sutherland, asking them to reconsider, if not eliminate, the show's seeming embrace of war crimes and torture as a necessary expedient in the faltering ‘global war on/of terror’. The meeting was called, because these ‘virtual’ techniques were slipping into the minds of ‘actual’ US security apparatus personnel being trained in the not so subtle arts of interrogation and torture (Buncombe Citation2007). This slippage has also been observed by US interrogators and those who train the leadership cadre of the US Army and Marines, as demonstrated by the unprecedented visit to the studio lot of 24 by the dean of the US Military Academy of West Point, US Army Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, who brought with him three experienced US Army interrogators and an FBI interrogator. Their mission was to try to convince the producers and Mr. Sutherland to rein in some of the representation of torture, or at least to show its negative consequences. General Finnegan's concern was:

Human rights organisations in the US have begun campaigns against representations of torture on the US airways, including campaigns featuring former US interrogators decrying the representation of torture not only in 24 but also other dramas such as Alias, Lost and other network features (Human Rights First Citation2008a, Citation2008b, Citation2008c). This slippage is not speculation, as has been noted above, but is regarded as an actual training problem by US military forces and it would be naïve to assume that some of this same slippage of the virtual/fictional display of torture's ‘effectiveness’ has not permeated the UK and global media-space as well.

This slippage of the fictional/virtual into the real clearly impacts not only agents in the field, or those about to be deployed, but it also impacts upon critical decision-makers who shape the overall juridical framework for ‘wars on terror’. For instance, at an international legal conference in Ottawa, Canada, in June 2007, US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia invoked the character Jack Bauer of 24 in justifying his views on the types of interrogation/torture techniques that are required by and allowed in the global war on terror:

One of the justifications for agents' deviations of torture, assassination, and other techniques and technologies that violate human rights and legal regulations, rests on the demonisation of ‘enemies’ and the framing of ‘the real’ as being haunted by a ubiquitous threat of violence and chaos. The array of enemies, from terrorists to negative elements within the security apparatus and government, portrayed in these works, is quite extensive. In both 24 and MI-5/Spooks, the series stay relatively firmly in a fictionalised ‘present’ and include terrorist and criminal organisations and sole psychopathological ‘super empowered individuals’ as the key threats of disorder in the US and UK. MI-5/Spooks also draws upon the conventional array of rogue nations, placing an emphasis on the threat posed by Islamic fundamentalist terrorists, lone wolves, and the activities of the intelligence and military services of both allied and enemy states occasionally working in conjunction with terrorist organisations.

Normalisation: chemical, biological and nuclear/radiological weaponry

In each of these series, both the forces of order and the dissidents and terrorists are acting based on very particular understandings of the risk of the use of chemical, biological, and nuclear/radiological weaponry. In 24, and to a lesser extent MI-5/Spooks, the threat of terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction mimics the debate in the real world about the dangers posed by terrorist and criminal networks acquiring such weapons (Bell and Dallas Citation2007).

Four of the six seasons of 24 involve terrorist/criminal networks both acquiring and using a nuclear weapon and/or a genetically enhanced biological agent. The effects of the nuclear blast in the second season would have been limited to Los Angeles, and thanks to the efforts of the CTU the nuclear weapon was seized and taken out of Los Angeles via aircraft to detonate in the sparsely populated desert areas to the north-east. But the detonation triggered the escalation of a military confrontation between the US and an unidentified Middle East state that was falsely blamed for carrying out the attack. 24 and MI-5/Spooks are crafted around an international and domestic environment where the forces of order and disorder are engaged in an unending war involving incredibly high stakes. In the third season of 24, the biological agent is given to cells that have dispersed themselves in major urban areas of the US. The potential for mass casualties is presented as a stark option to then-President Palmer (who was, as a presidential candidate, the target of an assassination attempt in the first season, then elected president and faced an attempted coup d'état in the aftermath of the nuclear detonation in the second season). This resonates with the material forms of the apocalypse that drive current homeland security and global war on terror concerns. The threat of weapons of mass destruction in 24 reaches its zenith with the detonation of a nuclear weapon in a suburb of Los Angeles in the opening episodes of the most recent season.

In MI-5/Spooks, weapons of mass destruction and attacks on critical infrastructure appear frequently as plot elements serving to normalise this type of threat to the UK. These portrayals include a plague that menaces the first episodes of the most recent season. The representation of the dangers of the use of biological, chemical, radiological, and nuclear agents is stark in its assumptions of the extent of damage and the ease with which terrorists can acquire and utilise these weapons, helping to perpetuate a political culture of high anxiety around these issues, although it must be said that discussion of these threats in the real is likely to have more of an impact that fictionalised representations.

The assumption of an attack by weapons of mass destruction has been so normalised that a spin-off of MI-5/Spooks called Spooks: Code 9 is to be based on a near future reconstruction of MI-5 which has had to disperse itself throughout the UK because of a nuclear attack on London (BBC Citation2008f). This series looks to feature a younger cast and the near future setting will lend itself to a more science fiction orientation. It is interesting to note that the MI-5 in this spin-off will no longer be based in London, but will follow the evacuation of the central government north out of the greater London area following the lines of dispersal and decentralisation laid down during the Cold War to deal with nuclear attacks on a strategic dimension (rather than a tactical one as in this series). Needless to say, basing the plotline of a whole new series around a nuclear strike illustrates the deep-seated normalisation of this type of threat.

Subversion: ‘blowback’ as inevitable consequence of empire

Many of the plotlines of either individual episodes (MI-5/Spooks) or entire seasons (24) involve what can be termed ‘blowback’, which initially was developed as a term to characterise the dangers of nuclear fallout and/or chemical and biological weapons attacks from ‘blowing back’ on one's own troop formations even if enemy troop formations are decimated from the attacks, thus causing unintended casualties. In the US, and to a lesser extent the UK, this term has evolved to capture the unintended consequences of covert operations (such as those of al-Qaeda, and thus the attacks of 9/11) as being partially accounted for by the ‘blowback’ from US, UK, Saudi GID, and Pakistani ISI support for the Mujahideen during their resistance to the Soviet invasion and occupation (Johnson Citation2004).

One of the chief forms of blowback is the legacy of covert operations or ‘black ops’ that had previously gone awry, or difficulties with dealing with the consequences of the pragmatic ‘deals with devils’ that were involved in extended deep cover undercover penetration operations of terrorist, espionage, or criminal networks.

Another form of blowback that seems to be an element of these two works, and other similar works such as CBS's The Unit (about a fictional counterterrorist special operations team), entails the consequences of having covert/black ‘operators’ deciding to become mercenaries by establishing their own blackmail or economic/criminal cells or Private Military Corporations (PMCs). When former or even alienated current special operators decide to ‘go rogue’ or become essentially 21st-century mercenary cells, networks, or corporations, their behaviour constitutes a form of ‘blowback’ revenge, which is doubly subversive.

Finally, some of the very techniques and technologies that are represented as ‘silver bullets’ can be understood as a form of ‘blowback’, such as those derived from human experimentation involving serious violations of international and domestic law. Many times, the victims or their families are avenging forces which are the target of policing activities by CTU and MI-5. They are nonetheless generally portrayed in a sympathetic light, and at times eventually assisted in exposing the crimes of allegedly rogue research and development cells. In these cases, the apparatus is generally portrayed as populated by indifferent bureaucrats with patriotic leanings. Not only do these works at times embrace violent resistance to such human experimentation projects, but they also subvert the legitimacy of democratic regimes by referencing the somewhat hidden legacy of real human experimentation for research and development projects conducted by the US, UK, and other democratic regimes (Broderick Citation1999, Britton Citation2004, BBC Citation2005, Citation2006, University of Kent Citation2006).

Subversion: delegitimising policing

An argument could be made that after 9/11 and 7/7, much of US and UK culture turned a blind eye to traditions of anti-statism (Friedberg Citation2002) and suspicion of the forces of order (law enforcement and intelligence services) (Phythian Citation2006), and instead uncritically embraced patriotism in order to bolster internal/homeland security. In both the US and UK, there were momentary spikes in positive public opinion towards the government (King Citation2005, Scheufele et al. Citation2005). However, in these series, the policing apparatus and its agents are portrayed in an unflattering and threatening fashion, as opposed to being paragons of virtue and defenders of justice. This is perhaps one of the most potentially subversive elements in these works.

Organisations and individual agents, from MI-5 to the CTU in 24, are portrayed as having complex motivations, ranging from selfless patriotism to nihilistic pleasure in unleashing planetary chaos. In 24, the fictional CTU is similar to some of the ad-hocracies assembled by the federal state to fuse the activities of the Department for Homeland Security (DHS), FBI, CIA, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), NSA, and state and local law enforcement. The lead character in 24, Jack Bauer, exercises a degree of autonomy that is often technically ‘criminal’ (according to both US and international law). However, CTU, other components of the apparatus, and even the Presidency, are penetrated by various factions who are equally violent and occasionally murderous, so Agent Bauer's actions appear in context to be the lesser of two (or more) evils. Nonetheless, the opportunity for a subversive reading of these works very much exists due to the inclusion of such negative depictions of the apparatus as being wracked by inter- and intra-bureau competition and serving as arenas for inter- and intra-elite conflict. This is evident in both 24 and MI-5/Spooks, including for instance, the targeting of Section D for elimination by the Home Secretary in the penultimate episode of the Fall 2007 season due to a long legacy of tensions between the different factions. While CTU is never disbanded, a review of each season reveals very intense patterns of conflict dividing CTU against itself at critical junctures when carrying out its mission.

The fate of agents also undermines the legitimising and normalising elements of the series. As previously noted, agents experience torture and near death experiences that suggest mortality rates far beyond the rates for actual field agents. They are also killed off with a frequency that makes for effective television drama, but not necessarily for effective recruitment. As explained above, MI-5 and MI-6 encountered difficulties recruiting new agents, especially female agents, after the death of a popular character (Bamber Citation2002). The workplace, as represented in these series, is extremely hazardous and this may dissuade all but the most dedicated potential recruits from signing up.

Another potential subversive aspect is the portrayal of political elites as being willing to engage in wanton manipulation of their citizenry through covert operations designed to provide the pretext for war or the clamping down on civil liberties within their respective states. Examples abound in both 24 and MI-5/Spooks of this type of cynical manipulation, either on the part of the security apparatus or political elites who are using the security apparatus to accomplish wider goals. One example would be the second season of 24, where an international syndicate uses a foiled nuclear attack on Los Angeles in an attempt to force the President into launching a war against a Middle Eastern state – without attribution for the attack. Indeed, at times the political elites can themselves become the enemy of the security service, due to their manipulative plots. These types of plotlines can only serve to reinforce public cynicism about the security services and political elites, and undermine the themes of legitimisation and normalisation discussed earlier in this paper. At the same time, they serve to bolster general mistrust in the governing apparatus.

Subversive readings of these works reveal a rupture between the intended meaning of some of the series' producers and the meanings that actors and others involved in the production instil in them. For instance, Joel Surnow, one of the main producers of 24, is highly involved in Republican Party politics, yet Keifer Sutherland and some of the other production staff do not directly identify with Republican Party politics and minimise the political dimensions of the show (Mayer Citation2007). It is in these fissures that one can see that 24 is not monolithic in its politics and there is always potential for an embedding of subversive messages through showing the apparatus exceeding any and all parameters for its behaviour, not as glorification but as a warning.

As the prominence of the legitimisation theme makes clear, despite flaws in the apparatus, the external environment is portrayed as even more threatening. It therefore can clearly be read as justifying at least some part of the misconduct of agents and agencies, given the emergency/crisis situations that define these two works. The subversiveness of these shows, given this ultimate apparent sanction for deviating from legal norms, is therefore limited. The subversion I am writing about is a theme that can be read into these works because of their complexity and multilayered nature. Appreciating this complexity requires, for instance, careful attention to back-stories, and it is unlikely that the majority of the audience for these two works is as focused on the back-stories as they are on the main narrative. However, how seriously the theme of subversion is taken by the majority of the audience is unclear and difficult to gauge. Again, in future research I plan on exploring what fans of these two shows reveal about their personal readings of them in, for instance, on-line forums.

Subversion: ambiguity and discourses of certainty

One of the chief ways in which these works can be understood as subversive is the manner in which they portray the uncertainties of the domestic front of the war on terror. This can be seen in the most recent season of 24. In the first few episodes, the rounding up of suspected terrorists and sympathisers from among the Islamic population of Los Angeles results in the arrest of the leader of an Islamic rights organisation and their chief legal counsel, who also happens to be the sister of the US president. The leader of the Islamic organisation is shown as being systematically mistreated by the military and FBI in the detention camp, even after he agrees to wear a wire to help the FBI gather intelligence within the camp. That this is included in the opening episodes of the season illustrates that the domestic front of the war on terror is represented in a multilayered fashion that demonstrates the absence of a clear delineation between enemies and innocent victims of the counterterrorist mobilisation. This ambiguity is extended throughout both series.

The representation of ambiguity in the war on terror is subversive because it cuts to the core of the discourse of certainty that has defined Bush, Blair, and Brown's pronouncements related to the war on terror. In this discourse of certainty, the possibility of mistaken identifications and excessive mobilisation is downplayed to such an extent that all that remains is a clarity of purpose expressed in unwavering faith in the rightness of the actions that have been taken both internally and externally. This stands in contrast to the jaded pragmatics that seemingly govern CTU and Section D.

Ambiguity is also evident in MI-5/Spooks, although this ambiguity extends into the past to include the conflict over Northern Ireland. In numerous episodes, MI-5/Spooks agents are involved in arranging pragmatic alliances with former terrorists, thereby destabilising the boundary between enemy and ally. An example of this can be seen in the first season's final episode. A member of an Irish terrorist splinter cell offers Section D information regarding an Islamist attack on a nuclear power plant, in exchange for not monitoring the Irish terror cell for 30 hours. Pragmatism wins the day and the deal is struck, but not without both sides violating the agreement. Section D does monitor the group and conducts raids on their safe houses, while the Irish cell plants a bomb in a London train station which detonates in an evacuated train station, avoiding any injuries (BBC Citation2008e). Despite the violation of the agreement, the sides are shown as capable of working together in a rational fashion if it serves the self interest of both the apparatus and terrorists or criminals. Such ambiguity can be seen as undermining the foundations of the discourse of certainty that justifies counterterrorist actions in the real.

Conclusions

After 9/11, the culture industry confronted questions about the reaction of the US, UK, and the global audience to the attacks. Would there be a discontinuous change in the cultural zeitgeist? The Fall 2001 television season had already been labelled the ‘Season of the Spies’ before 9/11 (Britton Citation2004, pp. 252–255). The ‘Season of the Spies’ is now entering its seventh iteration; it shows no signs of a lessening of popularity, or at least potential popularity, of films and television shows touching on themes raised by the dynamics of terrorism and counterterrorism. The durability of these series suggests that they resonate with their viewing audience on a deeper level than the mere aftermath of 9/11 and 7/7, despite the significance of these events.

Immediately after the 9/11 attacks, US networks reconsidered series based on terrorism/counterterrorism or the activities of intelligence services, but went ahead with relatively few alterations in plotlines or deletions of scenes. Following the 7/7 attacks, there were brief discussions concerning the sensitivity of MI-5/Spooks episodes involving terrorist attacks on the London Underground system, but in the end there were no deletions in broadcast or delays in production of these episodes. According to one report, BBC head of drama and BBC One controller, Peter Fincham, ‘agonise[d] over whether to drop the two episode story line but in the end these episodes were used to open the 2005 season of the series which began in September just months after the attacks’ (Gibson Citation2005). Another example of this nexus of the actual and the virtual is criticism of Spooks for supporting a false sense of reality which exaggerates the dangers posed by ‘Islamic fundamentalist’ terror networks (Thorpe Citation2004).

All three of the themes of legitimisation, normalisation, and subversion, are clearly evident. At a deeper level, the works reflect more general themes relating to the policing of the boundaries between the self and the enemy/other that apply not only to the ‘global war on terror’ but the general impact of the era of total war, Cold War, and proliferation of various ‘wars on terror’. Ambivalent representations of both agents of and agencies of the security apparatus reflect a general suspicion of State and Science pervading many polities, including the US and UK. In subsequent research, I will be expanding my domain of inquiry to include the production and distribution of film and television in other nation-states dealing with the dynamics of counterterrorism and terrorism, as well as the difference in audience ‘reception’ of the television shows which I have discussed in this paper in other national audiences.

In these works, security agents are represented as complex beings with a wide range of motivations and a willingness to violate procedures and codes of ethics in pursuit of counterterrorism. The security apparatus is characterised by rampant internecine and inter-bureau competition and directed by networks of elites as violent as any enemy terrorist networks or fascistic enemies within.

Despite efforts to cultivate a positive perception of the US and UK internal security apparatus, these works also cast internal security agencies as subject to abuses by malevolent agents and forces. Such representation includes the critical portrayal of No. 10, the Cabinet, the Home Office, and other services (including MI-6, GCHQ, and the Metropolitan Police) in MI-5/Spooks, and similar portrayals of analogous components of the US policy-making apparatus in 24. This critical representation extends to the (perhaps unintentional) subversive depiction of agents routinely acting outside the law in both series, and the portrayal of violent and nihilistic struggles of occupation and resistance ranging from the periphery to the very heart of their respective empires or ‘spheres of influence’ – to invoke the rhetoric of the Cold War.

These two shows have been critical for establishing a unique counterterror genre separate and distinct from previous spy/espionage genres. The new genre of counterterror has at its core a concern with the domestic effects of a globe-spanning conflict that is distinct from previous conflicts in its concentration on finding soft targets within the ‘homeland’ to attack. Both of these shows also reflect the rapid pace and unpredictability of asymmetric and networked warfare in their core aesthetics, that is, through fast pacing, split screens, and multiple story lines.

The popularity of these shows demonstrates that public attitudes towards the war on terror have never been completely stable or monolithic. If a subversive theme is evident in these works, which I believe I have identified, then producers must sense that audiences are receptive to that theme, although never to the point of completely overwhelming the themes of legitimisation and normalisation. The theme of subversion may become more pronounced however, in step with the increasing unpopularity of the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan and other fronts of the global war on terror. It is possible to envision both of these shows placing subversion at the forefront, especially if producers believe the majority of their audience to be sympathetic to subversive storylines. Additionally, given the debate over the efficacy and moral costs of torture/interrogation currently taking place in both polities, it can be expected that both of these series will sharpen this debate within their respective narratives (although for 24 torture has become such an essential plot element that it is difficult to imagine its producers abandoning such representations of torture altogether).

In the face of the 9/11 and 7/7 attacks, and the constant speculation about near-future eruptions of sleeper cells bearing weapons of mass destruction, these televisual works in both the US and UK are not frozen into an uncritical stance. Indeed, the threatening shadows (and mirages) cast by various security ‘threats’, as they are refracted by visual culture, have at times taken on a subversive hue. The themes that I have detected in these works clearly have deep historical roots in both polities. Yet they are also distinctly contemporary, especially in their attempt to grapple with globe-spanning political and technological change whose velocity and intensity are creating a ‘securitised’ future over whose horizon these works peer, to discover a number of possible near-futures, all of which are, perhaps not coincidentally, dystopian.