‘Have A Go’: British Army/MI5 Agent-running Operations in Northern Ireland, 1970–72

Abstract

Early in the Northern Ireland conflict the army took the lead in intelligence operations, including Humint. This article examines the case of ‘Observer B’, an agent run jointly with MI5. Using testimony and documents provided to the Bloody Sunday Inquiry as well as original archival sources, it offers a unique Humint case study that discusses the agent's recruitment, motivation, reliability, handling, product, and utility. This represents the most complete account that we have of this case, but gaps remain. It illustrates some of the limitations of clandestine Humint collection in situations where information may be time-sensitive. The article challenges the conventional wisdom about army/MI5 relations and shows how the two improvised and cooperated in agent-running.

Notes

¹John Le Carré, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (London: Pan Books 1974); Myron J. Aronoff, The Spy Novels of John Le Carré: Balancing Ethics and Politics (New York: St Martin's Press 1999) pp.45–46, 125, 187, 252, n.18–19; Christopher Andrew, The Defence of the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5 (Toronto: Viking Canada 2009) pp.168–73, 426–41.

²See, for example, Chapman Pincher, Their Trade is Treachery (London: Sidgwick and Jackson 1981). See also Andrew, pp. 432, 434–5, 438–41, 502–21, 563–4, 754, 759–61, 763; Christopher Andrew and Oleg Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story of its Foreign Operations from Lenin to Gorbachev (London: Frank Cass 1991) pp.155–80, 244–6, 328–32, 362; and Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the West (London: Penguin, 1999) pp.520–1, 528–9.

³Matt Born, ‘What is the Truth Behind the Story of Stakeknife?,’ The Telegraph, 16 May 2003, <www.telegraph.co.uk> (accessed 11 December 2011); ‘Stakeknife is in British Safe House’, The Guardian, 14 May 2003, <www.guardian.co.uk> (accessed 2 January 2012); Matthew Teague, ‘Double Blind’, The Atlantic Monthly, April 2006, pp.53–62, <www.theatlantic.com> (accessed 2 January 2012).

⁴David A. Charters, ‘Intelligence and Psychological Warfare Operations in Northern Ireland’, RUSI Journal 122/3 (1977) pp.22–7; Keith Maguire, ‘The Intelligence War in Northern Ireland’, International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence 4/2 (1990) pp.145–65; Mark Urban, Big Boys' Rules: The Secret Struggle Against the IRA (London: Faber and Faber 1992); Tony Geraghty, The Irish War: The Hidden Conflict Between the IRA and British Intelligence (Baltimore, MD and London: Johns Hopkins University Press 1998).

⁵J.C. Masterman, The Double Cross System in the War of 1939–45 (New Haven: Yale University Press 1972); Michael Howard, British Intelligence in the Second World War: Volume Five Strategic Deception (London: HMSO 1990), pp.3–5, 9, 12–3, 15, 18, 20–1.

⁶David French, The British Way in Counter-Insurgency, 1945–1967 (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press 2011) pp.23–5, 27–8, 31–2.

⁷Teague, ‘Double Blind’, op. cit.

⁸French, The British Way in Counter-Insurgency, pp.16–19, 21–6, 28–9; Frank Kitson, Low Intensity Operations: Subversion, Insurgency, Peacekeeping (London: Faber 1971), pp.73–4, 76–7, 96, 99–100.

⁹Desmond Hamill, Pig in the Middle: The Army in Northern Ireland (London: Methuen 1985), p.69; Bradley W. C. Bamford, ‘The Role and Effectiveness of Intelligence in Northern Ireland’, Intelligence and National Security 20/4 (2005) pp.586, 593.

¹⁰ Report of the Bloody Sunday Inquiry (United Kingdom, The National Archives, 2010) (hereafter cited as Saville Inquiry Report), vol.9, ch.193, paras.4, 7. See also: ‘Formal Government Decisions (i.e., those taken by the Cabinet or Cabinet Committees) in relation to the use and deployment of (a) the R.U.C., (B) the U.S.C., and (c) the Army, including (where available) the information and evidence placed before Ministers’, 14 August 1969, Public Record Office Northern Ireland (PRONI), HA 32/ 2/55, at Conflict Archive on the Internet, <www.cain.ulst.ac.uk> (accessed 6 October 2011).

¹¹The National Archives of the United Kingdom (TNA), CAB 164/577, no. 10. Signal, Ministry of Defence (MOD) to Headquarters Northern Ireland (HQNI), ‘For General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland from Acting Chief of Defence Staff’, 22 August 1969 (copy amended as of 24 October 1969). At the request of the head of the RUC the amended version limited the GOC's authority over the RUC only to co-ordination of their tasking for ‘security operations’.

¹²PRONI, HA 32/3/2, Government of Northern Ireland, ‘Instruction From the Prime Minister’, 15 August 1969. The JSC comprised senior representatives of the Northern Ireland government, the police, the army, Special Branch, and the Security Liaison Officer.

¹³David A. Charters, ‘From Palestine to Northern Ireland: British Adaptation to Low-Intensity Operations’ in David A. Charters and Maurice Tugwell (eds.) Armies in Low-Intensity Conflict (London: Brassey's 1989) p.197. French, The British Way in Counter-Insurgency, pp.94–103 points out why the committee system worked better in some campaigns than others.

¹⁴M.L.R. Smith, Fighting for Ireland: The Military Strategy of the Irish Republican Movement (London and New York: Routledge 1995, 1997) pp.83–7, 91–102; Richard English, Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2003) pp.81–2, 88–9, 92–3, 94, 96–8, 102–8, 120–5, 129, 137–8, 144, 146.

¹⁵John Newsinger, British Counterinsurgency From Palestine to Northern Ireland (London: Palgrave 2002) pp.156–58. See also: United Kingdom, Ministry of Defence, Operation Banner: An Analysis of Military Operations in Northern Ireland Army Code 71842 (London: MOD 2006) paras.212–3 and 408, found at <www.vilaweb.cat/media/attach/vwedts/docs/op_banner_analysis_released.pdf> (accessed 9 March 2010). See also: Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8, paras.56, 58, and ‘Future Military Policy for Londonderry: An Appreciation of the Situation by CLF,’ 14 December 1971, document G 41, paras.3–4; ‘Commander 8 Brigade's Brief for CGS on Derry’, 17 December 1971, document G44A; ‘CGS Report on Visit to Northern Ireland 15–17 December 1971’, 20 December 1971, document G44, p.3, para.8, all in Saville Inquiry Report.

¹⁶TNA, CAB 130/560, minutes, GEN 79(72) 32nd meeting, ‘Cabinet: Northern Ireland’, 10 August 1972, p.1. Chief of the General Staff, General Carver, felt intelligence was still poor owing to weaknesses in the RUC. See Michael Carver, Out of Step: The Memoirs of Field Marshal Lord Carver (London: Hutchinson 1989) p.429. But Ed Moloney, A Secret History of the IRA (Toronto: Penguin 2002) pp.117, 128 notes that after ‘Motorman’ British intelligence on the PIRA ‘improved markedly’, reflected in the scale of arrests of PIRA members over the following months.

¹⁷Andrew, Defence of the Realm, pp.602–4. See also Eunan O'Halpin, ‘“A Poor Thing but Our Own”, The Joint Intelligence Committee and Ireland, 1965–1972’, Intelligence and National Security 23/5 (2008) pp.664–6, 668; TNA, CAB 130/422, minutes of a meeting, Cabinet Miscellaneous Committee 244, 2nd meeting, 25 April 1969; and written testimony of the former head of GS Intelligence at HQ Northern Ireland, document 2241, Saville Inquiry Report. He says the JIC's Current Intelligence Group succeeded an earlier Ulster Working Group in autumn 1969. The CIG was responsible for producing an assessment on intelligence from all sources.

¹⁸TNA, DEFE 11/700, no.259, ‘DMO Brief 84/69 Northern Ireland, for Chiefs of Staff Committee Meeting, 29 July 1969’, no.263, ‘Intelligence on Northern Ireland’, attachment to minute, Callaghan to Wilson, 30 July 1969, no.268, note, DCDS (I) to VCDS, 4 August 1969, and minute, Brigadier General Staff (Intelligence), no.323, ‘Current Weaknesses in Northern Ireland Special Branch’, 18 August 1969; TNA, DEFE 13/903, no.29, minute, CGS to Secretary of State for Defence, 19 May 1969, and no.60, letter, Freeland to Baker, 15 July 1969.

¹⁹‘Note of a Meeting Between the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland on Tuesday, 19th August 1969’, document G0, p.5, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.9, ch.193.

²⁰See, for e.g., United Kingdom, War Office, Keeping the Peace (Duties in Aid of the Civil Power) 1957 (London: War Office 1957) pp. 44–6 (author's copy); War Office, Keeping the Peace, Part 1 – Doctrine (London: War Office 1963) pp.59, 62, copy from Ministry of Defence Library; UK MOD, Defence Council, Land Operations Volume III – Counter-Revolutionary Operations (London: MOD, 29 August 1969), Part 1 ‘Principles and General Aspects’, pp.69–71 (copy in Gregg Centre Library, UNB). See also: Kitson, pp.71, 73–4, 95, 99–100. But this was not always achieved in practice: see, French, The British Way in Counter-Insurgency, pp.28–31.

²¹TNA, CAB 130/444, Cabinet Paper 244(70)5, ‘Security Intelligence Organization in Northern Ireland: Memorandum by the Security Service’ to the Official Committee on Northern Ireland, 6 May 1970, pp.1–3.

²²See TNA, CAB 164/877, no.1, Cabinet, Northern Ireland committee, ‘minutes of meeting’, 22 June 1970, p.4; and ‘Directive for the General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland as Director of Operations’, 4 February 1971, document G1AAB, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8. The Director of Intelligence at the time of Bloody Sunday made no mention of the ISC in his testimony to the Saville Inquiry.

²³Imperial War Museum [IWM], Documents and Sound Section: ‘CGS Record of a Discussion with GOC Northern Ireland’, 21 August 1969, p.4, sub-file Letters to and From the Chief of the General Staff, File Exile! Feb-June 1971, Papers of General Sir Ian Freeland, Box 79/34/3, cited with permission of the IWM. Every effort was made to seek permission of the original copyright holder, who could not be located.

²⁴IWM: General Sir Ian Freeland, ‘Talk to Commanders’, 2 September 1969, GOC's Conference 2 September 1969, File 1, p.4, Clutch File Northern Ireland 1969–1971, Freeland Papers.

²⁵TNA, DEFE 11/700, no. 357, note, BGS (INT), 29 August 1969, including directive to the GOC, and Annex A ‘Terms of Reference for the Director of Intelligence Northern Ireland’. See also DEFE 13/921, no.2, note, R.A. Custis, Assistant Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Defence, to Assistant Under Secretary (General Staff), 7 March 1972, ‘GOC's Directives 1971–1973’.

²⁶Written Testimony of former Director of Intelligence for Northern Ireland to the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, document KD2.1, Saville Inquiry Report.

²⁷TNA, PREM 13/2844, no.17, ‘Note of a meeting held at 10 Downing Street’, 19 August 1969; Northern Ireland, Parliament, Cmnd 535, ‘Report of the Advisory Committee on the Police in Northern Ireland’, (October 1969), paras.82, 87, 101, 104, 124, 133, 142, and 171; English, Armed Struggle, pp.100–4; and Smith, Fighting for Ireland, p.83.

²⁸Andrew, Defence of the Realm, p.621. Geraghty, The Irish War, p.136 identifies the SIS officer as Craig Smellie and his MI5 successor as Ian Cameron.

²⁹TNA, DEFE 13/921, no.26, ‘Directive for the General Office Commanding Northern Ireland as Director of Operations’, 28 February 1973.

³⁰Document C2241, Saville Inquiry Report.

³¹Ibid.

³²Ibid.

³³IWM: General Sir Ian Freeland, ‘Staff College Lecture, Part II’, p.3, 9 December 1970, Freeland Papers; ‘Directive for the General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland as Director of Operations,’ 4 February 1971, document G1AAB, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8.

³⁴‘Note of a Meeting between the Home Secretary and the GOC and Senior Officers at HQ Northern Ireland’, 14 December 1971, document G40, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8. See also: IWM, Documents and Sound Section, catalogue no. 27190, Oral History interview with Clive Marcus Brennan, 13 August 2004, reel 15. Brennan served as GSO1 on the D/INT staff from mid-1971.

³⁵Brigadier G.L.C. Cooper, ‘Some Aspects of Conflict in Ulster’, British Army Review 43 (1973) p.72; Michael Kirk-Smith and James Dingley, ‘Countering Terrorism in Northern Ireland: The Role of Intelligence’, Small Wars and Insurgency 20/3–4 (2009) pp.552–3; Jon Moran, ‘Evaluating Special Branch and the Use of Informant Intelligence in Northern Ireland’, Intelligence and National Security 25/1 (2010) pp.3–4. See also, TNA: DEFE 13/730, no.2, Note, A.W. Stephens, Assistant Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Defence, 22 June 1970; CAB 164/877, no.62, ‘Note for the record, meeting between Prime Ministers Heath and Chichester-Clark, 13 February 1971’, p.3; and, IWM, catalogue no.27190, Brennan interview, reel 15.

³⁶Moloney, Secret History of the IRA, p.101; and Smith, Fighting for Ireland, p.101.

³⁷IWM: ‘Report’, GOC's Study Day 5 December 1969, File 2, p.35, Clutch File Northern Ireland 1969–1971, Freeland Papers.

³⁸TNA, CAB 134/3011, Minutes, Ministerial Committee on Northern Ireland, 6th meeting, 31 March 1971; Charters, ‘Intelligence and Psychological Warfare Operations in Northern Ireland’, p.23; Geraghty, The Irish War, pp. 158–60; Kirk-Smith and Dingley, ‘Countering Terrorism’, p.561; Operation Banner, paras.505, 507, 520–2 and inset ‘Urban Observation Posts’; Valdis E. Krebs, ‘Mapping Networks of Terrorist Cells’, Connections 24/3 (2002) pp.43–52. On the use of computers for compiling terrorist suspect data see: TNA: DEFE 24/837; and IWM, catalogue no. 27190, Brennan interview, 13 August 2004, reel 15.

³⁹TNA: DEFE 13/730, item 8, ‘Conclusions of Joint Security Committee meeting’, 2 July 1970; IWM: General Sir Ian Freeland, ‘Closing Address’, GOC's Joint Study Day 8 September 1970, unnumbered file, p.5, Clutch File Northern Ireland 1969–1971, Freeland Papers.

⁴⁰HQ 8th Infantry Brigade, ‘OP Directive No 4/71’, 10 November 1971, pp.5–6, document G27, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8.

⁴¹‘CGS Report on Visit to Northern Ireland, 15–17 December 1971’, document G44, Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.8.

⁴²TNA: CJ4/135, ‘Note of a meeting at the Northern Ireland Office’, 7, 14, 21 April, and 19 May 1972.

⁴³TNA: DEFE 13/916, p.2, ‘Record of a meeting, Northern Ireland Policy Group’, 1 May 1972.

⁴⁴TNA: CAB 134/3778, Ministerial Committee on Northern Ireland, ‘Memorandum IRN (74)2 Army Plain Clothes Patrols: Note by the Ministry of Defence’, 28 March 1974, p.4; DEFE 13/730, ‘Northern Ireland Intelligence Reports’, no.55, ‘Northern Ireland Report for period from 6pm 4 September to 9am 7 September 1970’, 7 September 1970.

⁴⁵TNA: CAB 130/560, Cabinet Committee on Northern Ireland (GEN 79), minutes, 35th meeting, 6 October 1972, p.1; and CJ4/135, ‘Note of a meeting at the Northern Ireland Office’, 3 October 1972. See also Bamford, ‘The Role and Effectiveness of Intelligence in Northern Ireland’, pp.587–9; Moloney, The Secret History of the IRA, pp.119–21; and Urban, Big Boys' Rules, pp.35–6.

⁴⁶TNA: DEFE 25/282, no. E4, letter, CGS to Secretary of State for Defence regarding ‘Special Reconnaissance Squadron – Northern Ireland’, 17 November 1972; and CAB 134/3778, ‘Memorandum IRN (74)2 Army Plain Clothes Patrols: Note by the Ministry of Defence’, 28 March 1974, pp.2–3.

⁴⁷Written testimony of MI5 Officer ‘Julian’, 2 February 2000, document KJ4, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁴⁸Witness statement, MI5 Officer A, 12 April 2000, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁴⁹Written testimony of ‘Julian’, document KJ4, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁵⁰Document C2241, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁵¹IWM, catalogue no. 27190, Brennan interview, 13 August 2004, reel 15.

⁵²Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King's College, London [LHCMA]: Major D.A.B. Williams, OC R Company, 3 RGJ, ‘Recruiting Sources and Making Contacts’, 7 September 1974, p.1, Papers of General Sir David Ramsbotham, Box Lecture Notes and Northern Ireland. Citations from this document collection are used with the permission of The Trustees of the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives.

⁵³TNA: DEFE 25/282, letter, CGS to Secretary of State for Defence, 17 November 1972 did not rule out further plain clothes operations by units, under the control of brigade commanders, but felt the need for them would decline once the SRU became operational.

⁵⁴Similar practices had been used in earlier post-1945 counter-insurgency campaigns. The army ran human sources in Palestine and in Malaya. MOD, Land Operations III, vol.1, p.79 places great value on agents and informers ‘controlled by trained handlers’, although it does not specify how they might be recruited.

⁵⁵LHCMA: ‘Recruiting Sources and Making Contacts’, p.1.

⁵⁶Ibid.

⁵⁷Ibid.

⁵⁸Written testimony of Officer M, 6 June 2002, document KM10, and written testimony by Observer B, undated, document KO2, Saville Inquiry Report. B's testimony is heavily redacted.

⁶¹LHCMA: ‘Recruiting Sources and Making Contacts’, pp.1–2.

⁵⁹Ibid.

⁶⁰Stan A. Taylor and Daniel Snow, ‘Cold War Spies: Why They Spied and How They Got Caught’, Intelligence and National Security 12/2 (1997) p.117, no.8, cites former KGB officer Stanislav Levchenko as the source for the MICE model. Taylor and Snow agree with the first two (M and I) but replace C and E with ingratiation and disgruntlement.

⁶²LHCMA: ‘Coy Comds and the Running of Int in Their Coy bdrs’ (undated), Ramsbotham Papers, Box Lecture Notes and Northern Ireland.

⁶³Written testimony by MI5 Officer Julian, 29 June 2001, document KJ4, Saville Inquiry Report. See also his oral testimony, day 325.

⁶⁴Document KJ4.

⁶⁵Written testimony by MI5 Officer Julian, 29 June 2001; Julian's testimony, day 325.

⁶⁶Witness statement by Officer N, MI5, 18 March 2003, witness statement of Officer Z, undated, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁶⁷Witness statement by MI5 Officer E, 20 March 2002, witness statement by Officer N, Saville Inquiry Report. See also Memorandum, Greg McCartney to Tony Gifford, QC, ‘Notes of a Telephone Call Received at 1 pm 07/04/00, in Material Supplied to the Inquiry by McCartney and Casey on June 21 2002, Including Various Notes and telephone Memoranda Relating to Martin Ingram’, addendum to witness statement by individual identified as ‘Martin Ingram’ (pseudo.), document K12. During the course of the conversation on 7 April 2000, Ingram explained that MI5 used a system of grading documents containing information from sources: a letter grade of A to F for the source and 1–6 for the information.

⁶⁸Document KJ4, Julian's oral testimony, day 326, witness statement no.2, MI5 Officer A, 16 January 2003, all in Saville Inquiry Report.

⁶⁹Witness statement by Officer N.

⁷⁰Document KJ4, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁷¹Ibid.

⁷²See the transcript for 6–7 May 2003, and witness statement 26 July 2002 ‘Martin Ingram’, document K12, both in Saville Inquiry Report. B's existence as an agent was questioned by the witness identified as ‘Martin Ingram’, who said he did not recognize any document referring to Observer B. However, Ingram's qualifications were challenged by army intelligence personnel Y and Z, witness statements, undated, documents KY1 and KZ1. Both had worked with Ingram.

⁷³LHCMA: ‘Recruiting Sources and Making Contacts’, p.2.

⁷⁴LHCMA: ‘Coy Comds and the Running of Int in Their Coy bdrs’.

⁷⁵Julian's written testimony, and oral testimony day 325, and Document KM10, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁷⁶Document KJ4 and document KO2, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁷⁷Document K02, and Julian's verbal testimony, day 325, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁷⁸Verbal testimony by Julian, day 325.

⁷⁹Document KJ4; Observer B statement.

⁸⁰Document KJ4.

⁸¹Julian's testimony, days 325 and 326, and quote from document KJ4.

⁸²Source report from MILO to James (MI5) via D/INT, 23 May 1972, document KJ4.

⁸³Ibid; and document KO2. See Julian's testimony, day 326.

⁸⁴Observer B's witness statement. See also Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.3, paras.11–12, and vol.2, ch.19, paras.169–80.

⁸⁵Julian testimony, day 325. Under questioning Julian pointed out that even if there was contradictory information from other intelligence sources, such as Special Branch, he would not necessarily have seen it.

⁸⁶TNA: CJ4/266, ‘Intelligence in an urban guerrilla warfare context’, note presented by Mr Flanagan, 24 July 1972, p.1.

⁸⁷The plan had been drafted and had been forwarded to HQNI by 0830 on 26 January. Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.9, paras.278, 335, 337–8. There is some uncertainty about what was in the plan since the document has not survived, and details were recalled from memory of participants.

⁸⁸‘Record of D OPS Meeting’, 26 January 1972, item 1, document G75.459, and Saville Inquiry Report, ch.9, para.344. For some reason this paragraph refers to Observer C, not B, as the source.

⁸⁹Document KJ4. Observer C, also operating in Londonderry, had been recruited directly by MI5 in May 1970, was paid regularly, and handled with great care usually through a ‘cut-out’ (Observer D). He was regarded as so reliable that on one occasion his information was passed on to the Prime Minister.

⁹⁰ Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.9, paras.278, 396.

⁹¹Document G83.

⁹²Document G85.

⁹³Document KJ4.

⁹⁴ Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.9, paras.664–5.

⁹⁵Ibid., para.665.

⁹⁶Document G95, Saville Inquiry Report.

⁹⁷ Saville Inquiry Report, vol.1, ch.9, paras.676–8.

⁹⁸Ibid., para.679.

⁹⁹Ibid., para.680.

¹⁰⁰Ibid., para.713.