Allason,
Rupert. The Branch: A History of the Metropolitan Special Branch, 1883-1983. London: Secker & Warburg, 1983. Allason,
Rupert. The Branch: A History of the Metropolitan Special Branch, 1883-1983. London: Secker & Warburg, 1983.
Clark comment: Rupert Allason is the better-known "Nigel West" writing, in this instance, under his own name.
Wilcox: "Anti-terrorist, anti-subversive police."
Bamberg, J.H. The History of the British Petroleum Company, Vol. 2: The Anglo-Iranian Years, 1928-54. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
According to Ashton, I&NS 11.1, this "account throws up very little evidence concerning contacts between the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and SIS." The absence of linkage between the oil company and the coupists is rejected somewhat petulantly by the reviewer, who essentially argues that some complicity must have been involved.
Berkeley,
Roy. A Spy's London. London: Leo Cooper, 1994.
According to Peake, WIR 14.4, the author "has found 136 London espionage sites, organized them into twenty-one walks, and persuaded his wife to provide a map for each walk indicating the buildings of note, all with commentary about the people involved and operations undertaken."
Foot, I&NS 10.4, comments that the author "writes decent English, and has a sense of humour."
Bower,
Tom. Maxwell: The Outsider. New York: Viking, 1991.
Walker, WPNWE, 11-17 May 1992, finds Maxwell to be a "readable and revealing biography" that "is well-researched." However, "[t]here are unsettling flaws. No footnotes or sources are given for Bower's assertion that Maxwell was induced ... to sign a compromising document promising cooperation with Soviet Intelligence when he worked for the British Military Occupation authorities in Berlin.... Nor is there supportive evidence for Bower's claim that KGB and GRU ... jointly called in that obligation to summon Maxwell to a mysterious meeting with the new KGB chief Yuri Andropov."
Bunyan,
Tony. The Political Police in Britain. London: Quartet, 1977. New
York: St. Martin's, 1976.
Chambers: "Socialist interpretation."
Callaghan, John, and Mark Phythian. "State Surveillance of the CPGB Leadership: 1920s-1950s." Labour History Review 69, no. 1 (Apr. 2004): 19-33.
de la Mare, Arthur
[Sir]. Perverse and Foolish: A Jersey Farmer's Son in the British Diplomatic Service. Jersey: La Haule Books, 1994 [limited edition].
Kerr, I&NS 13.4, notes that the author "had a very distinguished career in the Foreign Office between 1936 and 1973.... [H]e would have been much more informative had he written with the needs and interests of scholars in mind."
Among de la Mare's wartime experiences was a posting "to Washington to work in a branch of the Political Warfare Executive, in Colorado, which broadcast[] propaganda to the Japanese. However he reveals nothing else about this important aspect of Britain's war effort."
Later, in 1953-1956, de la Mare spent three months as Assistant Head of the Permanent-Undersecretaries Department (PUSD) and headed the Foreign Office Security Department for three years.
Dilks,
David, ed. Retreat from Power: Studies in Britain's Foreign Policy of
the Twentieth Century. Vol. 1, 1906-1939. London: Macmillan, 1981.
Fitch,
Herbert Taylor. Traitors Within: The Story of the Special Branch, New Scotland Yard. Garden City, NY: Doubleday-Doran, 1933. [Wilcox]
Gill,
Peter. Policing Politics: Security Intelligence and the Liberal Democratic State. London: Frank Cass, 1994. London: Frank Cass, 1994. [pb]
Robertson, I&NS 10.1, identifies as his "main criticism" the situation that "it is actually quite difficult to tell where the author stands.... This means that we are offered a useful outline of security intelligence practice but no clear thrust to the argument." Nevertheless, Gill does provide "a very scholarly review of the sources ... [and] a great deal of valuable information."
Choice, Jan. 1995, notes that the book is "almost exclusively British-oriented, or deals with topics of British interest." There is "comparatively less ... known regarding the operation and control of security intelligence organizations in the UK" than in the United States. "A final chapter looks to the future need -- pro and con -- of security intelligence."
Hollingsworth,
Mark, and Richard Norton-Taylor. Blacklist: The Inside Story of Political Vetting. London: Hogarth, 1988.
Hannant, I&NS 4.4, notes that the authors examine the operation of Britain's postwar security screening or political vetting system. The two authors are journalists, and their work is "likely to leave the academic audience craving more official documentation and a broader theoretical underpinning." In addition, the authors "repeat the accepted view that vetting is almost entirely a Cold War phenomenon." That notion "is utterly erroneous."
Hughes, Mike. Spies at Work: The Rise and Fall of the Economiv League. 2d ed. London: 1 in 12 Publications, 1995.
Thurlow, I&NS 12.4, comments that much of this book "can be dismissed as conspiracy theory." Nevertheless, there is still "some interesting material on the origins and development of political surveillance" in 20th century Britain.
Lustgarten,
Laurence, and Ian Leigh. In From the Cold: National Security and Parliamentary Democracy. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Gill, I&NS 10.1, calls In From the Cold "a major legal analysis of the relevance of 'recurring themes of constitutionalism to the realm of security and intelligence.' The study is comparative; [however,] Britain is the main focus.... The centrality of human rights in the authors' legal perspective is clear.... [T]he comprehensiveness and skill of the analysis here make this book quite indispensable in understanding the legal issues surrounding developments in the control of security intelligence agencies."
To Rogers, Political Studies 44.4, this "massively detailed study,... principally from a legal perspective," provides a "scholarly yet critical assessment of current issues of accountability and control."
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