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F R,ED HOLROY D W ITH A''CK BURBR' DG E

WarWithoutHonour

Fred Holroyd& Nick Burbridge

Medium

COI\TTEI{TS

Early YearsSpecial trainingActive ServiceMilitary IntelligenceDirty TricksThe Intelligence WebPolitical PsychiatryAnother CampaignRhodesian SojournBattle LinesPostscript - The Full Circle

GlossaryAppendices

92230397A

89106113L20I29148

155159

Copyright Fred HolroYd 1989

Published in Great Britain by The Medium Publishing Co',

1a Clumber Street,FIULL HU5 3RH

Set in Century Roman 9 PointPrinted by Joseph Ward, DewsburY

ISBN 1 872398 00 6

Preface

Fred Holroyd is a very unusual person. Hardly anyone has the stamina to go onfighting the British state offand on for 14 years, losing family, house and careeren route. Yet this is what Fred has done. This is remarkable enough, but moreremarkable yet, he has remained relatively cheerful - and sane.

I frrst met Fred and his wife, Marie-Claire, just after Christmas in 1987, inColin Wallace's unheated living room. Wallace had just come out of prison afterserving six years for a murder he didn't commit, and he and his wife, Eileen,couldn't afford to heat the place during the day. Fred and I should have met inApril 1986. Fred was going to speak at the House of Commons launch of anissue of the magazine "Lobster" devoted to Colin Wallace's allegations but,completely skint, had taken what turned out to be a non--existent security jobabroad. (The powers-that-be just wanted to ensure that he didn't appear at thelaunch.)

A great many bad roads had come together with Fred and Colin: the state'suse of counter-terror in Northern Ireland, the spooks' assault on democracy inthe 1970's, Kincora, covert operations on a massive scale, and a murderousinternecine intelligence war in Northern lreland. The fact that Fred and Colinhad had their lives wrecked, had everything to do with it. Of all the stones theBritish state doesn't want lifting, the assault on democracy in the 1970's andthe war in Northern Ireland come top of the heap.

I taped an interview with Fred and Colin that day which appeared in"Tribune" under the headline 'Loyalty is what they stab you in the back with'-something Fred said. Loyalty is important to Fred, loyalty to the Queen,country, the services. Fred doesn't shrug or smile cynically at the corruption ofthe institutions meant to embody the concepts he holds dear. He hates it.Because Fred - Iike Colin Wallace - was a true believer, the discovery that theBritish state behaves as brutally (and stupidly) as most when it is threatened,was a shock. Cynics on the left don't feel that outrage anymore. But outrage isappropriate. What has been going on in this country - and Northern Ireland isthis country, it is closer to me than Glasgow- is outrageous.

Though some of Fred's account of his Northern Ireland experiences havebeen published already in newspapers and magazines, most ofthis book is new.Almost as asides to his major narrative, he reveals Masonic influence in theilffiy, a hitherto secret major SAS operation in Thailand during the Wilsonadministration; and covert operations in Rhodesia just before the fall of theSmith regime. But it is lrlorthern Ireland, his experience of the early years ofBritish state counter-terror, his subsequent struggle with the British state -and its operations against him (and Colin Wallace, after they teamed up) -which is the heart of this book.

We need people like Fred, people for whom the principles ofjustice and truthwhich we pay lip service to, really do matter. In 1987 he was offered 9150,000compensation by the Ministry of Defence for his lost career in the army - asettlement after 12 years. He was completely broke at this point, hitching

around the country because he didn't even have a bus fare. Yet he turned theoffer down because, at the last minute, a string was attached: he had to stop

campaigning for Colin Wallace.

Fred thinks of himself as 'just an ordinary guy who was put into extra-ordinary circumstances'. Well, maybe. How many of us would give up 9150,000for a friend's cause? I certainly hope I never have to make that kind of choice.

RobinRamsayDED/CAIION

This book is dedicated to the late WO2 Bernard Dearsley,Royal Regiment of Fusileers, a peerless example of Kipling's

'gentleman in kharki'. 'Bunny'was a fearless, humourous andhumane man who showed concern for friend and foe alike. He made all

who knew him better persons for it. Many stiil serving in HerMajesty's Forces wear the decorations he won for them. I hope

they will join me in wishing good fortune to his widow, Pat, andthose of his family who have chosen to follow in his footsteps.

I would like to thank the following for the assistance and encour-agement given to me during the past years. In an age where self-interest appears paramount, it was heartening to knowio *..ty braveand unselfish people:

My wife, Marie-Claire, and my children, Bridget, Jolyon, Toby andRupert;

Humphrey Berkeley, Duncan Campbell, Liz Curtis, Jim Campbell,s_teve Dorril, Frank Doherty, Liam clarke, John Mulcahy, paul Foot,Howard Foster, Neil Grant, Ken T,ivingstone, chris Hird, RobertHarbinson, Michael Heney, Julian Hendy, Barry penrose, EdMaloney, _Aldy Pollak, Richard Norton-Taylor, Gien Nobal, JoeTiernan, Mike Taylor, clive Ponting, Bob p-arker, Major peter E.,Nluiqt chris c., Maior Peter c., Lt.-colonel George c., Brigadier BobT., Brigadier Colin G., Brigadier Michael H; Robert-Bunyard,Amanda Metcalf, Rosaleen and Alan, Bill and Tim.

EARLYYEARSI was a war baby, born in L942 inAshington, Northumberland, in theSeaton Hurst district on the east side of town. My mother had beenconscripted for factory work, so I spent my first four and half years inmy grandmother's home, with a tin bath hanging on the yard wall, anoutside toilet, and a coalhouse, an archetypal tough environment -softened by the close and kindly relationship Geordies invariablycreate gmgng themselves. I have always had a good memory, andrecall the Victory over Japan celebrations held in the rough pasturenext to Seventh Avenue where I lived. I was presented witli a newKing'.s shilling at the Coop Hall for the wheelbarrow race.

_ Allotments, pigeons, days on the beach at nearby Newbiggin allloom large in my recollections. But my main source of pleasure was apiece of newspaper twirled into a cone, and filled with cocoa and sugar.Armed with this, I would sit and watch Geordie, a sixteen stone *inerwho lived next door, as his tiny wife, Ginnie, washed the filthy coaldust from his back.

My maternal grandmother ruled the house with an iron discipline,andrny uncles rarely raised their voices at home, although as-I layawake at night I could often hear them singing raucously with theiifellow miners on their way back from the puu. rney were all upright,handsome men, popular with the lasses. I used to watch them gettingready t9 so out - wearing highly polished boots and rakish cloth caps,smart three-piece black suits, stiffwhite collars and white silk scarves;jokins with my grandmother as she fussed round them. occasionallyI would walk with them to the North Seaton Hotel where I would bLgiven some bottles of stout to take home. They were happy years.

- I was, nonetheless, a tough little urchin by the time my father wasdischarged from the Army and returned to gather his family together.py contralt, my elder brother stephen had lived with the Holroydfamily in Harrogate, where he had experienced a very different life-style. The Holroyds were well-to-do people with some property in thetown, and his formative years could not have been more different. Iremember his shock on being introduced to me; a mutual antipathy setin, which much to my regret has endured to this day. IC did not,however, ruin the remainder of my childhood. I passed the eleven plusexamination and attended Harrogate Grammar School, where I wasfortunate enough to have an enlightened headmaster, who, while he

1

For legal reasons, and to protect the security of individuals still serving, I haveremoved many names from the text. I have done this also to ensure thaiit is thesubject of the story, and not just the role of particular individuals, whichreceives the greatest attention.

10

was frequently forced to give me good hidings for my behaviour, stilltook a keen interest in me and offered me much sound advice.

Since those early days in Ashington I had always found myself theleader of one gang or another, and now, as a teenager, I would head offevery Saturday night to the 'fourpenny hops'in town, along with allthe other aspiring Teddy Boys. I was a very conventional lad with astrong sense of fair play, fascinated by all things military. I joined theschool cadet corps, and attended all the training and adventurecourses, until I became an NCO. I knew what I wanted to do, and waskeen to leave school. Encouraged by my headmaster I stayed on until Ihad passed my O Levels. But I was no academic, and my urge tojoin theArmy took precedence over everything else.

During my school years my parents' marriage had collapsed. Mymother, an attractive and intelligent woman, had been working at theAir Ministry, where she had met a Squadron Leader and fallen in lovewith him. She conducted a clandestine affair for many months - and Ifound myself at times being used as an alibi, to lend innocence to her'friendship'. I very soon became aware ofthe nature of the relationship,and after a difficult and painful process of decision, I resolved to tell myfather what was happening. I think it was then that I had my firstlesson about honesty. My mother denied everything. My father be-lieved her, and I was soundly thrashed for being wicked. I was tooyoung to understand the subtleties of the situation. My father, in fact,was perfectly aware of what was happening, but he loved my motherkeenly, and was prepared to go to almost any lengths to protect theirmarriage. At the time I could only understand that I had been pun-ished for telling the truth. Eventually, my mother ran away with theSquadron Leader, a divorce ensued, and she remarried. The fact thatmany years later she returned to my father seems ample proof to methat she never found the happiness she was looking for, away from herfamily. My own resilience ensured that I personally did not suffer toomuch damage from what happened, but my brother Stephen wasseriously affected and we will both always regret that events did nottake a different course.

Looking back, I feel this experience may have created in me anintense dislike of deceit and treachery that in the real world has causedme tremendous problems. I am often described as naive by those moreworldly than myself who regard deception as a routine part of life.I donot accept this.

It was now 1959. I stayed briefly with my mother in Plymouth. Shehad insisted that, before I join the Army, I try at least six months ofcivilian work. I found a job with a leather firm. But on one particularlunchtime I sat in a coffee bar listening to a Paratrooper talking abouthis life in the service, and that put paid to all that. I went back toHarrogate as soon as I could and enlisted. There were no vacancies in

11

the Parachute Regiment at that time, so I joined up in the Royal

Artillery as a gunner. My path seemed set.

I worked hard at basic training, stationed at 17 Training Regiment

Royaf Artillery, in Oswestry. So much so, I was considered offrcer

*ut"tiul and internally posted to Mons Troop ( a special group oiyou|gmen with officer potential undergoing basic training), to build up the

necessary qualifrcations. Subsequently, I Passed the Regular Commis-

sion Board and attended Moni Officer Cadet School at Aldershot'

However, in the last week there I got involved in the kind of adolescent

"pitoa" f thould have left behind me in Harrogate. The Cadets had all

g'otr" do*n to the Women's Royal Army Corps Cadet school infti"afr"ua for a party in one of the wooden accomodation huts there.Ihad my eye on a cerbain young \Moman, and at one point in a generally

""*tV eiening, overheard a public schoolboy from the Cadet School

telling her whii a common typ" I was, and how sh9 couldn't consider

goingiout with me. I happened to be friendly with another lad - a

Erigialur's son - and we dbcided to teach him a lesson. We ambushed

him"in the toilets, stripped him naked, kicked open the doors into the

spider hut and threw liim onto the dance floor. It was just our mis-

iottntt" that the WRAC Brigadier should choose that moment to walkin.

I was returned to my unit and received my first insight into- a

particulat kind of torrgit justice that sometimes operates within the

btitirrt Army. There had been a general breakdown of discipline thatevening, u.i -o"" serious offences, such as t!"t of the wine stocks,

and acls of vandalism, including the removal of the WRAC sash of

horroor. But when we were hauled before our own Commandant,Brigadier Pope, these offences were overlooked; we alone were held

resfronsible for the indiscipline, and returned to our units in disgrace' Iwai seventeen at the time, and I took the punishment without comp-

laint. After all, I had behaved badly. My friend, the Brigadier's son,

reacted differently. After arguing angrily with Pope, he went back to

his unit in Aden under protest. He committed suicide with a 9mm

Browning shortly afterwards.Once I was back with my training regiment at Oswestry I realised

what a fool I had been, and resolved to put things right' I was posted to

the lst Regiment Royal Horse Artillery, based at-Hildesheim, West

Germany. buring the four years I spent there,-I still considered myselfofficer niaterial, ind as a yorr.tg Bombardier, forced myself to weather

the understandable cynicism of t ty immediate superiors. I managed to

come first on the Royal Artillery NCO's Cadre, for all the gunner

regiments on the Rhine. After lunch on the passing out day, I re-

m6mber being marched up to the General to be congratulaled - q1dio""d myseH?acing a man who had taken too much alcohol with his

meal, utid *ho hal soup stains on the front of his service dress' The

imagl had quite an effect on me - but I was careful to keep my thoughts

to myself.

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Whatever its faults I knew I belonged to the Army. I took pride in myprofessional performance and sense of discipline. I admired most of myofficers, and was proud to serve in an elite regiment. I had learned toski at Aviemore, while I had been in the Mons troop, and when I got toGermany, I was selected for the regimental team. We used to train inNorway and Austria and compete on the German slopes. Our cross-country team came second out of all the teams in the Army - and inthose days the Army was, effectively, the British Team. Those fouryears at Hildesheim were fruitful and positive - I matured quickly,still nurturing my ambition to be as good an o{ficer as those I servedunder, and determined, when my chance came again, to make no moremistakes.

In 1964, I was sent back to Mons. The new climate there suited mewell. Instead of Cavalry and Guards officers wandering around withsilver topped canes - all pose and no soldiering - the instruction camemainly from Para and Infantry offrcers. We actually went out and didthe stuff, and weren't forced to spend endless hours cieaning brassesand webbing. I passed out that year - originally as a Lieutenant,posted to 1 Company Air Portable, RASC at Colchester. Then I wenttoBuller Barracks to complete my junior officers'course. We all workedextremely hard, and I came out with a high grade. At last I had earnedmy Regular Commission, and in effect I was back where I would havebeen if the Hindhead incident had never happened. I was frt, and keen,and somewhat disappointed to be posted back to the Depot Regiment -but I learned from my Brigadier that this was only because I was onwhat he called the'golden circle'which meant that I was going to begroomed for high rank.

It was at this time that I met Fiona, my first wife, a pretty red-haired woman who had just qualified as a teacher, and was working inKennigton, at an infant school. We met at a party near Stratford onAvon. We had a military wedding at Gawsworth in Cheshire, andsettled down together in quarters at Fleet. Despite the events which Iwill recall here, I can honestly say that I dearly loved my wife, and thefour children we had together. Rupert, Jolyon, Toby and Bridget, bornover the following years. But I never made any secret ofthe fact that forme the Army was of the utmost importance, and I would never beswayed in my commitment to serve successfully as an officer. Fionaaccepted this at the time, even thought the pressures and burdenswhich ensued led her to change her mind once I had been posted toIreland.

In 1966 I finished my tour of duty with the Depot Regiment andapplied to join the Gurkha Transport Regiment. I had admired theofficers passing through the Depot who, now that the campaign inBorneo was winding down, were leaving for other postings. I expectedthe next two years to be one of the highspots of my Army Service. WhatI found was quite different and coloured my views on colonialism for

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many years. I was posted to Kluang in Malaysia._There was a Resi-*ettiai HQ and two squadrons serving there which virtually ranthemselves. The Nepaleie Queen's Gurkha Oflicers worked long and

tirelessly, and the Gurkha soldiers themselves lived up to every epi-

thet apilied to them: loyal, brave'and strong - even though they,""*"i^to respond best to a kind of discipline which might best b9

described as rather stultifying'and negative. However, the BritishOflicers I met in Kluang badly let the side down. Given too much timeon their hands, they often behaved in a grotesque caricature of theworst type of colonial overseer. An excessive social and drinking l,iferife wi[[ affairs made me ashamed of my uniform at times. I alsobecame aware of the pervasive influence of Freemasonry in such

circles. A senior officerin my command had met my uncle, who at thetime was serving at GCHQ in Hong Kong, where the Regiment's ThirdSquadron was 6ased. Safe in the Lodge in Repulse Bay, they _haddiscussed my future and decided I should join the order. This oflicersubsequeritly put a great deal of pressure on me, in the most tactlessmanner, to accord with their plans and I reacted in a stubbornlynegative way. Fellow officers who were also Masonsjoined in with theotit-twisting. I held out, not because I had anything particularly-against Freemasonry itself, but simply because I resented this kind oftieatment. In the end, I began to feel quite alienated within the Mess.

When I coupled this feeling with my distaste for the 'carpet-bagget'mentality, I realised I would have to apply to leave the unit before myfull tour *as co-pleted. My C.O. reacted badly, regarding my decision

as a slight upon his own qualities of leadership. I was merely happy toget out as soon as I could. Years later, though, when I met him' now as a

iirigadier at the School of Transport on home territory, we both wen!outlf our way to remove any bad blood which may have remainedbetween us.

While serving with the Gurkhas in Malaysia in 1967 I learned forthe first time tliat for political reasons things could not be quite whatthey seemed. I took part in a large brigade sized logistic exercise on theeasi coast of Malaya for ANZAC (Australia, New Zealand and

Commonwealth) forces. This was publicly described as a 'brigademaintenance'exercise - checking that the brigade deployed in the fieldcould be logistically supplied. In fact, it was being used as a cover for a

covert SAS operation.I was a troop commander in the Brigade transport company moving

stores in the biigade area. One of our tasks was supporting the forryardairfield at which the Air Despatchers were parachuting loads fromArgosy aircraft over Thailand to SAS patrols. The SAS had been

dei'loied at the request of the Thai government-to hunt remnants ofYongPing's communist guerillas who had moved into Thailand at theend of the wtalaya'emergency'. These guerillas had become little more

than bandits and were terrorising the Thai population. Because of thenensitivity of the issue this was kept from the British public, and

1

l

1514

possibly, for all I know, from Paliament. It is a measure of the successof this operation that the vast majority of those involved in the exercisehad no idea that a real external covert operation was taking place. Itwas seeing the RCT Air Despatch Squadron in this operation which ledme to eventually join Air Despatch. Here, I thought, was a unit of myown Corps which was seeing some real action, and I wanted to be partof it. When I eventually became an Independent Air Despatch TroopCommander I was disappointed to frnd that although some of myNCO's were involved in covert operations abroad, because of the'needto know' rule, I was not authorised to have information about theiractivities. However, a book has recently been published by one of thoseNCO's describing his role in the secret war in Oman. ("The Secret War:Dhofar 1971- 72" David Arkless, William Kimber, London 1988).

After a short leave in England, I received my next posting toGermany, to a Divisional Transport Regiment - intially as an Adrnin.Offrcer in a Tlansport Squadron, and then as a Regimental TrainingOflicer. I was fortunate to be awarded promotion to substantiveCaptain early on, and this removed any stale taste I might have hadfrom my tour of Malaya. I served two years in Bunde, Westphalia, andhad the satisfaction of captaining the unit's ski teams, which won theCanadian Land Forces Tbophy and the Princess Marina Cup, the twohighest trophies the Army competes for. My second son, Jolyon, wasborn. The family travelled round most of Europe in our VW estate. Bythe tirne I came back to England,I felt once more happy and fulfilled.

There were a further two yars, spent with 47 Air Despatch Squad-ron, working with Hercules aircraft from Lyneham, flying around theworld with my own independent troop, before I was ordered to do myIntermediate Tbansport Course with a crowd of other offrcers who,having had full careers, had managed to avoid it until this time. Basedat the School of Transport, Marchwood, we took a close look at all thelogistical systems in the country. They were a good bunch of indivi-duals, and it was another happy time for me. I frnished the course in1972. I was by now a well qualified young o{ficer, and despite theoccasional misgivings a firm believer in the values I was entrusted todefend.

This is a very brief summary of my frrst thirteen years inthe Army. Icould go on at length, as old soldiers tend to do, but I feel an outline isenough here - since the main purpose of these recollections lies in myexperience in Ireland. That experience began some months before Iactually set foot on Irish soil. At the end of the Marchwood course I wastold I would be posted to Bunde again - not to my own Corps, but as aMotor Transport Oflicer with 2 Division HQ and Sigaals Regiment. Ihappened to know that all the vehicles belonging to this SignalsRegiment were in a parlous state, and it would be'a nightmare tryingto keep the L960's A.E.C. Ten Tonners on the road. It was the last sortofjob I wanted. So I decided to look round for something more fruitful,

TOP: My parents, when courting: John victor Holroyd and Eileen o'Donnell. BELOW:Target practice in the Harrogate Grammar School Combined Cadet Force, 1956.

TOP LEFT: With Lt. Col. Bremner, C.O. of 1st Regiment Royal Horse Artillery, Tofrek

Barracks, Hildesheim. TOP RIGHT: 2nd Lt. Holroyd, 1 Coy. (Airportable) RASC''

Colchester 1964. BELOW: Animal Transport, Aldershot 1965'

TOP: A military wedding, Gawsworbh church, cheshire 1969. BELOW: An inspection'

Oberjoch, Bavaria, 1970.

TOP: 2 Divisional Regiment RCT, Skiing Team 1969. BELOW: Officers of the GurkhaTransport Regiment, Kluang Officers Mess, Malaysia (myself on far right).

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where I could usefully put into practice the skills I had learned. MajorMoss, my Commanding Officer, knew full well my views on the matter,and one morning approached me to tell me that he had seen an orderasking for Military Intelligence Officers and Military IntelligenceLiaison Officers (MIO's and MILO's) to serye in Northern lreland.Rather like the Paras and the SAS, no unit could stop anyone fromvolunteering if they so wished. I didn't know just what I was lettingmyself in for, but I leapt at the chance, and was immediately selectedfor the course.

At this stage my wife and family were living in a married quarter atCompton Bassett, just off the 4303, four miles from the airport atLyneham - a comfortable house in a'married patch'where Fiona hadmany friends. I felt quite happy to leave them there for the three-month training course, driving back every second weekend to see

them. However, some friction had built up in my marriage, and I wouldbe wrong to deny it. Fiona was pregnant once more, and found it hard tocope with my enforced absences abroad. She had begun to compare meunfavourably with my colleagues who, as senior captains, had alreadygiven up an active life and were settling to desk jobs and taking outmortgages - the kind of role I simply didn't associate with my ownArmy work. I could see her point of view, but I had always made myposition clear * and now that at last, I had the chance to see activeservice and put all my training into practice, I was hardly likely to turnmy back on it. In retrospect, perhaps the time I spent training for mywork in Ireland could have been more carefully handled. For Fiona,alone with the children in Compton Bassett, where she was well settledand secure, the prospect of my transfer to Ulster was clearly verydaunting. But I was involved in very specialised and demanding work,and expected a support which simply wasn't forthcoming.

We were already pulling in di{ferent directions, and, later eventsshould not perhaps have seemed so surprising. There was one.eveningin particular, when the warning signs were only too clear. We hadsome friends to stay - fro{n Harrogate - an ex-Arrny man, who had leftthe service at his wife's request. The two women stayed at hometogether, while we went out.

When we got back we found them both crying. I spent a couple ofhours being berated for what a fool I was, volunteering for Ireland, ofall places; how I would go out and get myself killed and leave my familybehind me. No matter what I said about any sense of duty and loyalty,Icouldn't make an impression. I tried to explain how much the army hadgiven us, what it had allowed us to do, how it had offered us a sense ofpurpose and identity, and how I felt an obligation to pay this back inany way I could. I tried to reason that, as a patriot and soldier, it was nomore than was expectedofme to be preparedto frght terroristswho hadopenly declared war on my country. I had the right background andtraining to be prepared to be genuinely useful. Whatever fear I, or

21

rnyone close to me, might have for my safety w-as_ a secondaryconsid-

*rution - if it wasn't I ihould never have joined the Army in the frrstplace . . . Nothing I said had any effect. I wasmet only with mor-e

["u6 and opposition] In retrospect, perhaps sel{ishly, I was unmoved.

[.'or the frrst-time in my career I was going on active service. It was

what I had always wanted to do. There was nothing anyone coud say, or

do to stop me.

223

Since we had been told by Colonel G that there was a 507o fallute rate,this was by no means assured. So began an intensive three months oftraining, much of which turned out to have very little to do with any ofmy *oik in Ireland! Because in Ireland the image people have of thiskind of soldiering is based largely on the exploits of the SAS, and whatwe find in thrillers and TV dramatisations, an insider's account ofwhat it is like will come as something of a surprise. With hindsight, Ithink the training we underwent did not prepare men fully to go into

action, and rnust [ave had a bearing on some of the confused operatingpractices I discovered in Northern Ireland when I got there.

To begin with, there was Colonel G himself. He had never been toUlster, ind was teaching us on a secondhand basis. His endless stories

about his time with the British Military Mission in East Germany -the team of Army officers allowed to cross the Iron Curtain to keep tabs

on troop movements - were entertaining, but seemed to me to have no

relevarice whatsoever. Slides ofthe East Germanteams pursuingthemthrough the forests with special detectors, or examples of mic"ofilThidin[ places (toothpaste tubes, vacuum flasks, torches), all of which<lbvio[siy came out of the Intelligence Corps Museum, were hardlygoing to prepare us for gathering information on the streets of Ulster.in .o"tt"tt, baptain V Clearly knew his stuff, but his advice related tothe area in which he had operated, close to the border, and his answer

to any question about other areas or issues was simply to tell us that we

had io iake personal responsibility for everything over there; all he

could do waiinstil in us iuspicion, alertness, inquisitiveness, and thef'undamental rules to be carried out to ensure our personal safety. We

ull felt we needed more than this, and the course had not been

udequately planned to ensure that we got it.In other respects, our instruction was much more satisfactory'

'l'raining on all kinds of cameras, ranging from the small Minox, to thetarge Japanese models with telescopic lenses,was compulsory; we weregiv6n roils of frlm to take out on exeicise, and have developed at tt-re end

iif tn" day and anyone whose pictures were not up to scratch had to go

out and -complete

the exercise again. We also trained on several

clifferent weapons: AKs, Schmeisers, Btrownings, Lugers. We had to

strip them, .ttd put them back together blindfold; and we learned to

carry out Immediate Action Drills for a number of situations which we

couli find ourselves in. And every day at ten o'clock we would go out on

[he range situated near the original country house, and practise untilwe were all sound marksmen.

We were also trained in manufacturing explosives, petrol bombs

with chemical detonators and so on. It soon became apparent to thestaff that I disliked handling explosives! And as a consequence theyusked me to set and detonate a whole series. I recall one MolotovOocktail I was ordered to prepare, made with petrol and acid. The twohad to be mixed together itt u bottle, sealed and washed in a bucket of

SPECIAL TRAII{INGThe Joint Services Intelligence Training Centre stands on the righthand side of the A20, as you head south towards Ashford, Kent. Youturn right, travel for 200 metres along a road that runs betweenmarried quarters, go over a small hill, and then ahead of you is themain gate with the guardroom on the right. You are stopped by asentry, who makes you get out of the car and go to a sidegate to checkyour credentials while his colleagpe examines your car. If everythingis on order, you drive through. And you enter the secretive world ofMilitary Intelligence.

It was a bright summer af[ernoon in 1973. As I made my way to theOfficers'Mess, I remember thinking that despite tight security in thecamp - the car checked with a mirror, the trees and grounds interlacedby an infra-red beam alarm system - ofall places they had put the carpark directly underneath an extension of the Mess, supported bypillars. It was an ideal target, if anyone should pierce the cordon. It wasmy first Sense of the peculiar marriage of effrciency and negligencewhich marks this particular branch of the Services.

on my first day, I was introduced to colonel G, the offrcer in chargeof the course, a small stout caricature of an English gentleman, andCaptain V, a tall, well-built, but effeminate man, who would be myCadre instructor. The nine other officers on the course were a mixedbunch. T\l9o particularly stand out in rny mind: a Cavalryman, anarchetypal Hooray Henry, and an offrcer from my own Corps, a pale,

thin, delicate-looking chap with sensitive hands. The others werepretty much like myself.

There was another soldier on the course who wasn't in the Oflicers'Mess that night, but who was to play a bigger part in what followedthan anyonJelse. Staff Sergeant P was intended to be my FINCO(Field Intelligence NCO) when we eventually went over to lreland. AsNCO, he spent his leisure time in the Sergeants'Mess and would comeacross each morning for lectures and other training, then meet usagain later in the day for typing, observation and recognitioneiercises. Later, in Ireland, he developed the habit of walking abouttalking in his very loud English accent, while the rest of us learned towhisper. It typifred his approach to the job'

At this stage, however, we befriended one another, and agreed towork closely together, if we both passed the course and were posted.

24

water. Then a buffenvelope had to be attached, containing two otherchemicals - along with gum of arabic inside the bottle to make sure itwas properly adhesive. These chemicals had to be put in in the rightorder, or the whole thing blew up in one's face. I couldn't stop myselfshaking as I glanced round to see everyone else conveniently turnaway; then, with trembling fingers, tried to put it together, in the hopeI wasn't going to become the first casualty of the course! In the event, Igot it right. And there was my homemade bomb, ready to explode themoment it hit the ground. Of course, the advantage of this kind ofMolotov needs little explanation. You don't have to use a burning ragor anything like that - and under the cover of night, no one can tellwhere the missile has come from.

We also learned useful little tricks with explosives, like homemadeshaped charges to blow neat holes in safes. You take a wine bottle witha concave base. Six inches from the base you tie a petrol soaked rag andignited it. The heat expands the glass which is then dropped into abucket of cold water. The sharp contraction breaks the glass cleanlyround the line of the bottom of the burning rag, leaving the last sixinches of the bottle, a perfect container for packing with explosives touse for a shaped charge in a controlled explosion. In our practical testwe used this technique to blow out the dial combination lock on a safe.

The lock-picking training was taught by one Royal Army OrdnanceCaptain 'Chubby' L. Shortly after the course started we were takeninto a building in the barracks, and along a corridor. The end door wasa replica of 10 Downing Street, which Captain L proceeded to openusing his army ID card. Behind it was the lecture room where he wouldinstruct us in all manner of of 'target penetration' - full of the latestdevices manufactured by the top civilian companies to protect everykind of premises. After an introductory lecture on the history of thelock itself, we were taught how to circumnavigate all these systems.Again, this was the type of instruction which would prove valuable intime to come. The most apposite area of instruction was in the practiceof interrogation. Inside the Ashford camp is an inner compound,screened offby high fences and floodlights, which contains a complex ofPortakabin type buildings, some of thern sealed completely. In thesebuildings is a large operational monitoring room and a number of cells,each of which has a video camera and is bugged. I knew that they wereused for genuine interrogation purposes. So, while we trained there,we had a very real sense of what we were doing. And this was anotherarea where I was singled out for special attention.

While I had been stationed in Germany, my ski troop had often beenrequested to provide soldiers for the German Special Forces School inBavaria for NATO deep interrogation exercises. I took thirty men or so

for three days at a time to act as the staff, while NATO pilots weresubjected, to the most rigorous interrogations. The instructors atAshford clearly knew about this and decided to take me down a peg ortwo. On a particular day when we were ordered to go into a cell and

25

interrogate a recalcitrant Irish prisoner, I was chosen to go first, and

rrrppotedly show the others how it should be done. Once inside I was

faced with what seemed to be a huge Belfast man, who immediatelyleaned over the table and threatened me with every kind of retributionimaginable. I began to reason with him quietly, as I should, but themore violent he becarne.

suddenly he stood up and pulled a pistol from his pocket and qt"dpoint blank into my facb. I wai so shocked,I fell backwards offmy-chair

- and the video "d-ur.,

nicely positioned for the purpose, caught my

blanched expression as I tumbled to the floor. I could hear the laughterfrom the corridor, as the door opened and the others were ushered in'And the instructor's voice - 'That'll teach you not to search for a

weapon.'I learned later that my video was used to stop students frombeing overconfident. It taught me a useful lesson.

Some of the practical exercises, designed to test our new skillsresembled scene; from the Keystone Cops. The first such outing was

held in Ashford town, and involved an NCO arriving at a particularcafe, ata certain time. He would be picked up by a syndicate of three orfour students followed until midday, and a record kept of all his

movements and activities. Each syndicate was given its own quarryand time to appear.

There were three of us in my team, armed with overcoats and hatswe could interchange in the str-eet to alter our appearance. We were allcarrying plastic car.ier bags, with other items of disguise inside. I was

chos'en tlo go into the cafe and keep tabs on the NCO inside. I watched as

he walked up to the counter and filled his tray.Not wanting to lose him, I sidled into the queue' two spaces behind,

with a tray I ripidly fitled as well, thinking we'd have a long breakfastbefore *ol ittg iff. but as our quarry reached the till, he immediatelyput down his tray and ran out of the cafe, leaving me stuck in the queue

*ith tnitt", desperately trying to get after him, and signal to-the gtfgrsoutside. Later on, the only real vantage point to keep in touch with himwas in the office of the local building society. The trick was to keep the

staffoccupied while you hung around. I had nearly signed the deeds for*y ,rorr-"*istent house before it was time to move on again. And when,

laier still, my qualTy walked straight through Woolworths, out of the

back, and through the Emergency Exit, setting off the alarmssomeone had to Totlow him, without getting caught and arrested for

burglary!It was all supposed to teach us to have confidence in the unorthodox'

The second ex-ercise was still more fraught with embarrassment' Italso took place in Ashford. The syndicates were meant to position

themselves around the town centre and keep observation on anotherset of quarries. By half past eight in the morning, we were all stationedat various points n"u.i the War Memorial, waiting for the 'e-n-emy'

whom we had been instructed to trail throughout the morning' Mean-

*

26

while, life went on around us, and so it happened that a Securicorbullion truck pulled up outside the bank nearby. Most of the teamswere too busy looking up and down the road waiting for their quarry toemerge, to notice that no one came out of the vehicle. Meanwhile ihecrew inside were contacting the police to tell them there was a crowd ofsuspicious characters lurking round the street. The whole exercise wasinterupted some minutes later, when four police cars arrived andeveryone was summarily arrested. Only the special papers we hadbeen given at the School got us offthe hook. But, ofcourse, the quarriessimply took advantage of the situation to walk calmly through thetown centre and escape us.

There were two other such episodes. On a damp eariy summermorning we were all taken to Canterbury. My group was instructed toleave a dog's name-tag cylinder, with a coded message inside, at aknown place, which would tell a 'spy'where to pick up a dead letterdrop. (This is a procedure that allows agents to pass messages withoutactually having to meet each other and thereby becoming privy toknowledge they don't 'need to know'.) He would then have to be foll-owed and observed. The dead letter wouid tell him to meet anotheragent in the cathedral precincts, and both had to be photographedtogether. To begin with, the dog tag had to be left in the BoroughArchitect's office. We had no choice but to walk brazen faced into themiddle of a County Surveyors'meeting. I said'Excuse me', and simplystrode across to large section ofrnap trays, counted three across andthree down, put in our message, and walked out again, leaving every-one in the room staring at me bemusedly, though not one of themthought to check what I had left there. Back outside, we left another ofthese little cylinders in a wastepaper basket and then returned to thestreet to keep watch, lurking round casually as we had been taught.

Through a window we watched our agent go in, disturbing themeeting for a second time, open the drawer and take out the codedmessage, once more watched in total bewilderment by members att-ending the meeting. We then followed him to the area of the cathedral,where, using anti-tracking methods, he managed to drop us. In somedisarray by now, we hurried to the southern end of the cathedral andensconced ourselves in the memorial garden, hoping to pick him upagain. Sure enough, our man approached through a gap in the wall,and we were able to photograph him, as if we were taking snaps of thethe memorial itself. He then crossed into the main cathedral grounds,and cut across the grass, to go into the cloisters, where the meetingwith the other agent was supposed to take place.

We had a problem now, to get ahead of him. But this was immedi-ately solved by a dog running out of a nearby cleric's house andvigorously attacking our quarry. With great glee, we took the oppor-tunity to race round the cathedral and position ourselves in time tophotograph the two 'spies' together, albeit with one minus half his

27

trouser leg. The ludicrousness of the situation only increased as weretreated - and kept bumping into all the other syndicates, chasingvarious quarries about the cathedral, all trying not to laugh, as theydodged round the pillars. Finally, on adjourning to the nearest pub fora hard earned pint, the first thing we saw was another syndicate at thebar and then another . . . within half an hour, the whole bar wasjammed with Intelligence Corps staffand students, all pretendingtheywere total strangers. In the end, the laughter did break out, and thatwas the end of it.

The last of these incidents was perhaps the most absurd of all. Mytask was straightforward enough - to shake off any surveillance_ Icame under. Tlie exercise started at nine o'clock. After I'd been walk-ing twenty minutes or so, keeping my eyes open and losing lnyonelsuipected of being assigned to watch me, I becarne aware of this lad,

about fifteen or sfuteen, who was clearly following me . . . 'Aha!'saidthe aspiring Intelligence Officer to hirnself, 'they're not using NCOsnow, they ,rslng family' . . . . This was obviously the son of one of theinstructors. So I went into full gear to get rid of him. I rushed into ahotel, took offmy coat,hung it on a peg, picked up someone else's andwent out of the kitchen entrance. I came round the hotel, back throughthe front door again, and then emerged in the mack I'd been carryinginthe obligatory bag. I hurried down to the railway station, dropped th-e

bag, and went off again. I couldn't believe it when I saw the lad stillbeiind me. Whenever I stopped to look round, so did he. Whenever Ihurried on, he did likewise. Worried now that I wasn't doing too well, Irushed into a school, entered the staff room through the Frenchwindows, saying 'Good morning' to the bewildered teachers, wentdown a corridorind out onto the playing fields beyond. I threw myselfover a fence. I could still see the boy sprinting across the grass behindme. There was a public convenience nearby. I rushed in and lockedmyself,in a cubicle. By standing on the toilet seat, I managed to get outof a small frosted glass window overhead at great risk to my privateparts. I dangled over an iron fence, dropped down, and ran off: only toiee the boy hot on my trail. By now, it was half an hour after theexercise was Supposed to have ended, so when I reached the streetsagain, tr gave up trying to lose him. If I'd failed the exercise, s0 be it.

As I came down the high street acar pulled in beside me. captain vleaned out and asked me rvhere on earth I'd been- I told him about theboy - who was still doggedly behind me. Capt. V went across and askedhim what he was doing. The boy simply replied that he had seen me

acting suspiciously early that morning, and in true Enid Blyton style,had been fbllowing me ever since, in the vain hope of finding a police-

man to take over. Capt. V came back to see me' his face wreathed insmiles.

,'You bloody fool', he said, 'He's nothing to do with us!'I got into the car and we drove back to camp.

28

The moral of this tale was, as I learned on frequent occasions inNorthern Ireland, that intelligence work contains a high proportion offarce and it is extremely easy to make a complete fool of yourself. Asense of the ridiculous is undoubtedly an asset in the intelligenceworld.

The last week came, and judgement with it. Not everyone had stayedthe course. The Hooray Henry had gone long since. My friend with thesensitive hands had lasted out, however. And I shall always be gatefulto him - since I was hopeless at typing, and relied on him to type upmyreports at the end ofthe day -just as I would later rely on my FINCO todo the same in Ireland. Tony P too, had survived. Now it was a questionof how many of us would be selected for duty.

Colonel G had us in, one by one, and let us know the results. I was

second from last, and had seen just who had been successful and whohad not. I was feeling confident. They told me that, initially, I'd been

considered too straightlaced a soldier to be able to adapt to the,uncon-ventional role of a Military Intelligence Offrcer. The need to behave ina civilian way, to dress suitably for whatever area one might have. towork in, to use informal methods . . . all this had seemed to be outsidemy rather blinkered capability and obvious military bearing. Bu! Ihad learned well, I was told, and I was to be posted to Ireland in thenear future, to work in the city of Armargh. I was delighted, and leftthe camp, saying goodbye to Tony P who had also passed, knowing thatwe would meet again before long, in very different circumstances.

As I drove back to Compton Bassett I fett exhilarated.I forgot aboqtthe more ludicrous side of things, and thought instead of the workahead. Many years later, as I watched with millions of others on

television the mobilisation for the Falklands War, and saw the extra-ordinary lengths to which some oflicers and menhad gonetomake sure

that they gofto their mobilisation points so they would not miss'theirwaf" I firund myself identifring with them closely, and recalling justhow i felt as I leh Ashford that day. I experienced no fear or misgiving,simply a glow of satisfaction, and the urge to get on with the job.

Regarding Ireland itself, I knew little more than I had been told on

the c6urse, -and what I had picked up, like any other member of the

public, through the media, and by word of mouth. The official Armybverview of tle situation was straightforward. On the one side therewas the IRA, split into two groups by ideological 4ifferences, fightingthe forces of tle Crown, supported by parts of the Republican com-

munity, who may or may not (depending on who you listened to) have

had a iaw deal during the previous three decades. On the other side,

there were the lawless elements in the Loyalist population, who were

either genuine terrorists, or criminals using the political situation as a

screen for their personal gain. As a soldier it was one's duty to act

impartially in support of law and order, fighting any form of illegalityone might-encounter. I felt confident I could carry out that duty.

29

What I didn't know then about the war I was about to enter was howthe'rule of law and order was not wha! it seemed, and I would en-counter illegalities on my own side which would severely dent myBense of purpose. I understood there was a certain mood of ruthlessnesspervading our thinking on Counter Terrorism. Shortly before the endof the training, Brigadier (as he was then) Frank Kitson had come toaddress us on the subject. He was taking time off from the inter-national conference then being held at Blackdown, the Army Ord-nance Depot near Aldershot - and his lecture at Ashford was attendedby a number of American, German and French officers. He was rightlygonsidered the top man in his field. Kitson spoke very clearly and veryelowly, almost as if he was addressing a crowd of schoolchildren; and Irealised that the tactical philosophy he was expounding was ratherdifferent from that normally associated with the British Army. Thelogic of the use of infiltration, pseudo-gangs, and deep interrogation,to defeat terrorist opposition, was nonetheless compelling. I was yet toBee how it worked in practice - and just how it could involve breakingthe law and imitating terrorism itself to achieve its ends.

On the evening of Kitson's lecture there was a party in the Officers'Mess. An American approached me dressed like a U.S. CavalryOfficer, with purple water-silk facings and yellow rank bars on hisjacket shoulders. He quietly proceeded to try to recruit me, along withtwo other Captains from the course, into the CIA. At first I thought thiswas just another ofour initiative tests, but when I spoke to my Colonel,he assured me that the approach was genuine. At that moment, Irealised just how different my work would be from anything I onceexpected.

3

31

My posting did not have an auspicious beginning' There,were only a

f;i;t; [E reiore t was due to 1""'"" foi Ireland, but-I had heard

;id;;?"; ttt" ""t"u""t

u"thorities' Eventuallv M":g tq- !:l=lfartaog6d u *arrant for me, and a ferry ticket,andproTit"dq"::9^T,{iamili over when I had sorted things out' So, nulslng-q tew,days

*"*ttt of beard, and the scruffy civilian clothes I had bought ror

fr;;ii. il;il;a trr" t"ui" for Liverpool. I saw this as a physically

#;;hill;b to i-rt"a u""" traininghard over the precedingveeks'

lost half i.to"" in weight, and feliprepared for what lay ahead' Iarrived early for the Belfast ferry, hoping to preserve my cover'€lnce

tt "

MIO', "6le

*u" apparently so seciet iven he himself didn't know

when he was travelling'

I was duly issued with a special boarding qass'lo I managed to get

i"to'th" i""ry "."tV

and install myself in a calin. Evenutally thetoat

ilii"d;; i";tie quav. Suddenlv, a voice came over the ship's

tannoy:--.wiit-cuptain Fred Holroyd please rgggr! to_the purser's offrce as he

h; L;;;;f,o,"n to be tfre lvtititary fa."iiies' oflicer for the journey . . .'

So much for undercover work!We docked at the other side, very early in the morning' I waited on

tfte Uo.t ""til all the ptt*ttg"tt fria disemUarked and then made my

;;;J";;"tothe dock, stilihalf expecting someone to meet me there'

i;H;;;lll, i;;t-e;;, the white lights shinine bleaklv on thg

iffi"]f ;;A;i,';"y across to a caravan parked on.the quay -"andimmediately recognised the NCO manning-tfe post.P,one ol n1I

ACTIVE SERVICEIn Northern Ireland the activity ofthe various Intelligence agencieshas increased dramatically during the last fifteen years. In 1973, whenI was first posted, the system was still relatively primitive. The chiefcivilian agency at work was the Secret Intelligence Service, or MI6 (Iknew little at all about it then, though I was soon to frnd out). In thesphere in which I was expected to work, Army Intelligence cooperatedwith the RUC Special Branch to gather as much information as it couldon the terrorist groups at large and to recruit as many informers aspossible. To each RUC Division was attached a SMIU Cell (SpecialMilitary Intelligence Unit) which could consist ofMilitary IntelligenceOfficers, Field Intelligence NCOs, and the Military Liaison Officers.these were intended to form the spearhead of regular intelligencework, trying to ensure that all information received by the Army andpolice was effectively collated, warnings given and taken, and sur-veillance successfully carried out.

Basically, we had been taught that we should deal with gatheringinformation on what was called the Intelligence Cycle - a continuousoperation, dividing into six parts:

(a) Determination of the Intelligence ProblemO) ThelntelligenceAppreciation/Estimate(c) CollectionPlanning(d) The Intelligence Process(e) Dissemination(0 Re-appreciation

I must admit, I found the thought of the paperwork pretty*daunting,involving as it would the latest personality indexes, current IRAactivities (in other words the ORBAT (Order of Battle) of the area),social breakdown and topography. My job would be to concentrate onthe liaison between the police and the Army which, at that time, wasconsidered to be well below par. In a sense, then, I would have threeseparate masters: the commanding o{Iicer of the Special Military Int-elligence Unit, the head of the Special Branch and the Brigadier inelnqge of the resident Brigade. My role would indeed be un-conv\tional, and clearly require some diplomacy, as well as anunusua\degree of flexibility and independence. I was well aware thatthe situation in the province had seriously deteriorated: sectarianmurder was rife, our soldiers regularly killed.

l;;;;;;1ei""" i tira rtit" the form, and asked ifhe could phone Armv

ii-d-.fi,i"u"rnto findoutwhatl should be doing. ThirSsdid, srl{ tobe

toli that no one there had even heard of my unit, and that the Desr r

;;d-d";;"to tut "

thu bo, up to Lisburn and sort it out there. The

Staffsergeant then went offabout his business'

As I sat in the caravan waiting, a furtive face appeared suddenly at

the window - with a huge beard and long hair''Psst!'he whispered. 'Over here! Come on!'

A"a ftit head dropped out ofsight' I went to the door ofthe caravan

""d-;;;;;i;;t i;; t'i* au'tiie b"tY-"q two cars' Again the head

".["i "olF."t! over here!'The dis=hevelled stranger tried to convince

fi;;;;t;;A;tbfr;t. I became genuinelv alarmed' wondering iftol"fto* I ftad been set up when I had barely arrived in the province'

I rushed offinto the Departure/Arrival lounge and found the.Royal

Coros of Transport NCO and borrowed his Browning 9mm prstol r

iltttiU"r.-t"Tn" .u.-p"* and found the stranger lurking-in.the;it-;e;;;ld;""i"g tti*'*ittt the Browning I asked him'Who the hell

"t" V""."a *ft.t's-your game-?' Hi*and rnoved to his pocket and I told

il;;-;;u" slowly andZarefully. He produced an out of date identity

""ti, ift" pt

"fograih on wtrich bore no resemblance to him whatsoever'

32

I told him to leave - and do it slowly and carefully. I was convinced thatmy cover had been blown before I'd even starbed. To say the least, I wasin a state of some agitation.

I caught the bue to Lieburn and asked round for my unit, but still,apparently, no one had heard of it. Eventually I was directed to 12Intelligence and Security Company, about 100 metres from the HQbuilding at Lisburn. I went in and introduced myself ta the 2 ilcCaptain G and his CO, Major H. They told me they would do their bestto find out exactly where I had to report. In the meantime I should tryto get accommodation inthe Mess.

I could scarcely believe what was happening. At the Mess they toldme there was no accommodation, but I could use one of the littlecaravans parked outside. No sooner had I started to unpack my things,than a knock came at the door, and when I opened it, standing in frontof me was the bearded man from the docks.

'You stupid bastard! I drove all the way from Armagh to meet you,'he cried.

Once again, he produced the out of issue ID card. This time I lookedat it properly. His name was Major C and he was the current MIOworking at Armagh - the one I was sent to replace. It seemed in-credible. But I didn't argue with him now. He had a Q car outside, andtoldmehewouldtake medownto seemyCO, ColonelD atKnock,the RUC HQ. At last I had made some kind of contact. And I keptthinking to myself, if this was some kind of test, what an absurd wasteoftime!

Yet if I expected things to run smoothly from then on, it certainlywasn't the case. Colonel D was installed on an upper floor at KnockHQ: he remained distant and aloof throughout my first int€rview withhim and gave me the impression that he was more an academic than aleader of men. He made a point of telling me that I should advise theresident Army Brigade only on information that might help themcooperate with the police on specific matters. Any other Intelligence Ireceived was to go straight to him. I listened to his briefrng, then leftwith Major C to go down to Armagh, guarding my first impressions ofthe inter-service rivalry that would dominate my work for so long. Iwas dropped offat Gough Barracks, where again I tried to find somesuitable accommodation. This time, however, I was reduced to a camp-bed in a lecture room, draping my clothes over a chair, and keeping mysuitcase beside me. I settled down for the night, feeling none toopleased.

Mqjor C picked me up the next morning, and we drove to Armaghpolice station to meet the man I was meant to be working with. Theabiding image I have of the RUC man in Armagh, is of a squat littleUlsterman, slightly flushed, with receding white hair, opening a filingcabinet, taking out a folder, holding it close to his chest as he glancedthrough it, then putting it back and locking the cabinet again. It soon

33

became clear to me (and this was backed up Mqjor C) that they were soeecretive and unwilling to delegate an5rthing that working with themwould be an extremely frustrating experience! The impression wasonly strengthened when later that evening, after I had been drivenround the area and taken for a drink in a village pub in Moira, theSergeant with his two constables amazed me by getting drunk, climb-ing back into their car without the least sense ofpersonal security, anddriving off along the roads of South Armagh as if the conflict was afigment of someone's imagination and there was nothing whatever tofear.

During the week I spent learning the ropes from Major C, I began tosee how inadequate the Ashford training was. Major C seemed to haveno idea of what he was doing, or why he was doing it. He had no office,no records, nothing. His main line of duty appeared to be visiting hisgirlfriend in Dungannon - a married woman who lived alone in herEnglish husband's plush house while he worked across the water. Hetook me to meet her and implied that I should take her over when heleft. But I had no taste for infrdelity, and certainly wasn't prepared toinvolve myself in anything that could be used against me. He struckme as a genuinely disillusioned man, with no loyalty to the systemwhatever; the disguise as a freelance artist of high temperamentbefrtted him better than he might have thought.

In spite of my circumbtances, I prepared to take over trying to set upmy own frling system, so that at least when Major C left, I could get onwith the job. Since he had no names or sour@s to give me I learnedwhat I could from the police, and tried to add this information to what Ihad put together at Ashford. A week later, I was just beginning tothink I had a basic familiarity with J Division area when the call camethrough from Knock HQ to t€ll me I wouldn't be working there afterall! Everything I'd done so far was wasted.

Major C took me straight up to Colonel D again, and his 2 i/c M4jor J,a tall slender officer who later went on to serve in the Sultan of Oman'sforces, in their equivalent of MI5. I went into the little office - next tothe Special Branch Commanders - and was immediately told thatanother MIO, Captain A, based at Portadown in K Division, hadbecome a victim of the kind of inter-service rivalry I had alreadyglimpsed for myself. Failing to obey D's dictum that MIOs workedprincipally for the RUC Special Branch and had only a secondary dutyto HQ 3 Brigade, Captain A had been caught trying to pilfer infor-mation from police files. He had gone as far as to have obtained sparekeys to the Special Branch oflices and frling cabinets at Portadownpolice station and had broken in after hours. Caught with police frleshe was immediately escorted from the station andbanned from return-ing. Someone had to be brought in to take his place, and try to repairthe damage caused to the already bad relations between Army andpolice. Since I had onlyjust arrived, and had yet to begin any seriouswork of my own, I was the obvious choice.

34

I drove my newly acquired Q car, a 1300cc Ford Escort, toPortadown. Major C had aCtually taken me to meet the Special Eranchoffrcers there aiouple ofdays after I arrived in the Province, so I knewwhat to expect. Sut of course Captain A's actions on behalf of theBrigade meant a frosty welcome awaited me- I went into the brickbuil"ding, and up some rickety stairs to the Special Branch off:ces'

There iwas introduced again to Sergeant R, a smooth man, sittingbehind his desk in a light grey suit smoking a cigarette througlr a

holder. He smiled at me cyniially and said something to the effect thathe thought they had got rid of MIOs for good.

Then he proceeded to tell me that I should come to the station twice aday: at fO.3O and 4.00. I should sit on a chair in the corridor and waiturrtit ne was ready to brief me. Then I should report back to the Army'And that would be that. He was prepared to put up with me, onlybecause those were his orders. For the first time since I had arrived Igave ventto some ofmyfeelings aboutthe set-up. I saidtlatfromwhatih.d

"u"tt so far, I wai not impressed by the Army's performance and

that unlike Captain A I had no doubts that my first loyalty lay with theSpecial Branci since that was stated in my written charter. I agree{ topass no information back to Brigade that S-pecial Branch vetoed, and tolheck everything with him as a matter of course. Perhaps, I ask-ed inreturn, he mighf show me some confidence in time. By the way I was

dismissed, this seemed a remote possibility'

I now found myself in a situation where I had been ordered'to work ina totally new area, with instructions to try and clear up the mess left by*y predecessor, liaising with a policeman who seemed even less amen-

abl6 tttutt the Special Branch in Armagh. I would also have to look forsomewhere else to live, and work.

My confrdence deteriotated further when I was summoned toBrigide HQ to meet the Bfigadier. Whenl arrived at the 3 InfantryBrilade Headquarters in Lurgan, I was told that I should frrst report tothe"Intellige.tcb section otr the seventh floor of the sky_scraper bJildingknown locilly as the Factory. There I met the Brigade Mqjor S, a tallgood lookingbfftc"", who had been in Ireland earlier and, according tofiir o*tr sold=iers, at that time was not too popular. I was introduced toCaptain (later Major) D, the General Staff Oflicer (Grade 3 Intelli-gence) - like the RUC offrcer Sergeant R, smooth as silk and also, likef,itn, a man who did all his work by telephone and rarely if everven[ured into the hostile world. On the single occasion I recall Mqjor Dappearing on the streets of Portadown, at a roadblock to check a

frineral c6tt ge, both police and Army officers were so amazed theyrefused to believe there was a truce on with the IRA at the time' M4iorD was as blunt as Sergeant R had been - only he gave me exactlytheopposite order. According to him, my loyalty should lie. with theB:rigade. I was working in their area, therefore any Intelligence thatcatie .try *ay should go straight to them. I protested that both my CO,

35

Colonel D and Sergeant R had told me this was not the case at all. ButMqjor D said he didn't care what I had been told. These were my termsofreference.

And so to the Brigadier himself. Colonel G at Ashford had been acaricature of an English Offrcer, but he was no rival to the Brigadier. Iwouldn't begin to question the Brigadier's capacity as an offrcer - heknew his stuff. But he came across as a blustering parody ofMontgomery. He unfailingly referred to the Irish, even the RUC, asBogwogs and the frst thing I noticed in his offrce was a plastic lep-rechaun sitting on a rock, set on a finely carved piece ofwood, with asmall plaque bearing the inscription to the effect of:

Lst Bogwog stone thrown at me in the Derry riots.ltris small, fierce man then launched into a staccato address, wel-

coming me to the area, and telling me that Mqjor D would let me knowexactly what to do. 'We're hoping for great things from you,

, Holroyd'. . . . and so on. He confirmed my worst fears about how theArmy was operating in the Province, and my distate was reciprocated,since he always referred to me subsequently as the Tradesman behindmy back, because I didn'tcome from a Cavalryor Guards regiment,butthe Royal Corps ofTransport - and a grammar school boy at that!

Those who worked under him were plainly affected by his attitude.After that first introduction, Major D took me back to his own office:the Brigade Intelligence centre. Sitting in a corner, at separate desks,were two Staff O{ficers, one dealing with Protestant, the other withCatholic Intelligence. There was also a liaison officer for the SAS, anda number of clerks running to and fro. Major D pointed to an emptydesk opposite the others. He told me that it had been Captain W's andthat this was where I would be working from. I went across to look at it.There was nothing in it - no records, no files. It was becoming afamiliar story, and Major D offered no explanation. Once more, I gavevent to my feelings. I made it quite clear that as far as I was concerned,I didn't work from a desk at Brigade HQ nor was I under his command.We had a few terse words there and then.

I assumed my Colonel at Knock would back me in this, and any otherrun-ins I might have with Brigade, since he had warned me to resistany attempt to co--opt me into their establishment. There was noreason to think that this wouldn't be the case. I had no interest in theconJlicts between the various factions at work, each so desperate toclaim what glimmers of success we were having in the war of Intell-igence. They were prepared to compromise the general plan in order toenhance themselves. I had come here to do a particular job, if I wasgiven the chance, and it seemed my terms of reference were quite plain.Simply because 3 Infantry Brigade Headquarbers weren't prepared toaccept that the RUC Special Branch should effectively control the flowof information, and decide when and how it should be acted on, andwere ready to go as far as to rifle their frles to interfere with this, should

36

not make any difference to me. I had yet to learn just t_row cormpt some

;;d; orin" nuc were, and how there may have been good reason

for such interference, as far as tf,.e Protestant terrorist gloups were

"o"""r"La. lt seemed io me to be more a question of simple rivalry.

T\vo events occurred then that at least gave me a base to work from'

and the chance to meet other men activeln the area, in whom I99ul{

"""ftag ."d *tt" deserved respect. Once I had refused Major D's o{er of

;-I;;f; lh" C"igua" Intelligence Cell, I went down to Mahon Road

A;;b;; ut po""g.ao*'', wfrich was being rebuilt. I thought it mightil..i";dlf,"a ifI coutd trarie an offrce there, adjacent to the office ofthe

bo*ir""a", of the resident Infantry Battalion and next to the oper-

"tio"" """t", which would give meimmediate access to their intell-

i;;;;; n"lrt"ti"s. As the offrces were still under construction there was

,i" "Ui"'Ji"".

-dittua solved one of my problems without too much

i;;;i;. N;;.ily, when I went back to tell Mqjor p we fa{ llgth"T

"ot". S;t I *o"fdft be moved by this, and left, promising to briefhim at

least once a day on whatever information came my way'

This left me with one other difficulty' Since I had spurned theg"ig"iit ;ff"; oi a working space-, I co-uld trardly live^in

-the, offigr.s'

*"t" f.""a ut the HQ at Luigan. Here, I had a stroke of luck' I ran into

;-w;;;t -offt"""

I had hJt met whilst serving in Germanv'. with*ft"* i ft.a .f*.is been friendly, and had helped out on a number ofoccasions. He toli me that thd Army had just bought a new-row ol

h;;; 'tr

Becombra, a very pleasant estate, newly b-uilt on the out-

ski"t" or Portadown, and tl.at while most houses had been comman-

d;;;;tth" -*g.d"

staff, there were still two vacant. If I put a bid.in

;Lfti "*un.

he w6dd make sure I got ong, and could move my familyon'"t

"" *i" .s possible. I went out to look at the houses, and they-were

i"ae"a ftutta n'ew, and each as fine as anything a Brigadier *ight F;ff";;a i" G.rrnany. My former friend and colleague was a! good as his

;ft.i;;"crro-" i" r"ghndto tell Fionathat she couldjoin_me withift"

"ttiiat"-". I wasn't si,tptit d, given what she thought lbou! mv

i".ti"i ."a ttte risks involved,that she reacted with little enthusiafln;["tilE""gt t that once she had seen the quarters and we could resume

""r *.*iZa hfe, that things would change' I was wrong, 9s I thall

,froJi' "*pf.in.

But now, foi the first time since I had crossed the IrishSea, I-began to feel I could start making my mark'

It was hard work. I would sit in the corridor outside sergeant R',s

off*" "t

Portadown police station, waiting for the moment he would

d;g" t ""u

*" - then receive a tight-lipped brie{ing,that-I wrote

Joti" i" t"y p.lice notebook .' . so-and--so was seen at such a place''';t;;;;;tt"ck there was an incident ' ' ' and so on' offI would go to

B;tgrd;, ."a r"ua it all back to them: such humdrum material that;#t;; knew it was merely a qgestion of formalities being observed.

M#;hii" f familiariseil myseliwith the new area, just as I had withe-.*.gtt. i moved into the new oflice at Mahon Road, and began-to

L"iia ip "

a"cent data system. No matter how it was being played' I

37

was determined to treat my role seriously. I don't know how successfulI would have been, if I had been left on my own, but again, I had astroke of luck. I found the men I was looking for.

Since I was no longer working from Armagh, Tony P, whom I hadmet at Ashford, would clearly no longer be my FINCO. Instead I hadbeen introduced to Sergeant I, who had moved into the office with me atMahon Road. Sergeant I was a tremendously hard worker, with a flairfor invention, and an undeniable courage, hidden under a self--effacingmanner. He was with me on most of the operations carried out over thenext eighteen months - and I was indebted to him in other ways, notleast for his willingness to type up reports for me. He helped me to suchan extent that we could best be described as partners in the enterprisesthat followed - an oflicer/NCO relationship much frowned upon at 3Infantry Brigade HQ.

Yet, if there is anyone who stands out in my memory as beingrepresentative of the British soldier at his best, it is Warrant Offrcer'Bunny' Dearsley who supported me through my frrst months inIreland, and was central to the success ofmy work. Sergeant B intro-duced us. Seeing how little joy I was getting from the police, and howkeen I was to meet the MILO in Craigavon, with whom he himeelf hadhad contact when he had been working for Captain W, my predecessor.I agreed at once, and so into my offrce came Bunny Dearsley.

Bunny was a Cockney Warrant Officer, near the end of his service. Itook an immediate liking to him. He reminded me of the actor ArthurEnglish, always with a cigarette in his frngers, and ready with a quicksmile. He had served twenty two years, dating back to the war in Korea

- and came from the same East End stock as the Krays and theRichardsons, though unlike them, had not deserted and turned tocrime, but usedhis shrewdness in servinghiscountry. The situationinUlster was perfect for him. He had been out already with his battalionin 197 l-7 2, in Lurgan, and had proved so adept at recruiting low gradesour@s unoffocially that he was assigned to the Lurgan police stationas a Liaison Intelligence NCO, and had lived in a caravan outside,until the station was blownup by acarbomb andthe RUC movedtotheTown Hall. Whenever the police had been interrogating a suspect,Bunny would get hold of him on his way out, and instead of bullying orthreatening the man, would offer him a cup of tea and a chat and gettwice as much out of him. Bunny was then sent back to England, to gothrough the Intelligence course at Ashford, and posted again to Irelandin 1973 - to work ostensibly as the MILO in Craigavon though, in fact,as I soon discovered, his role was a great deal more significant thanthat.

During those first weeks, however, I took him at face value, and wasgrateful for his advice and for the contacts he helped put my way.Slowly things began to assume (some) cohesion and I got a good

knowledge of the area. Portadown was then a major flashpoint in the

38

troubles and there were covert actions by the ulster volunteer Force.

Also there were a number of catholic estates where a series of serious

incidents had taken place. In contrast, Lurgan was notorious for itsRepublican elements - while Craigavon, the new town built between

the two, also had a reputation for IRA activity. Around -these

towns^

was typical Irish countryside, dotted with villages and farms, -all.

ofwhich were categorised according to their sympathies, and listed withany incidents asiociated with them, individuals and their histories,eti. Bunny kept a desk in our office at Mahon Road, and so was q!19 tofill in a loi of detail from his side of things. Meanwhile he lived with hiswife at Craigavon - and she too proved a valuable source of infor-mation, relayld from the patrols for whom she made tea, and other bitsof local gossip she managed to pick up.

Initially, I only handled fairly low grade material' The information Igave to ttie Army from the RUC principally concerned the activities ofJympathisers, criminal acts that could be associated with those in-vbt"la in sectarian violence, and reports of actual terrorist attacksfrom the police angle. In return, I informed the RUC of the Army'sactivity in the area, and any Intelligence on terrorists and sympath-isers tliey had managed to gain through their own means. Beyond this,I began io use *y own initiative, given confidence by my associationwith Bunny and Sergeant I.

So at last I had a base. My wife and family moved into Becombra, butthe enthusiasm I had hoped I could kindle in Fiona never materialised.I was delighted to be with my children again, but I soon realised thetension in my marriage was simply not going to go away. As it turnedout, the new situation ofthe quarters only exacerbated our problems,

since we were surrounded by offrcers from 3 Brigade HQ who worked attheir desks all day in a secure environment and went to and from theirhomes with an Army escort. Once Fiona had settled in and beganmixing socially with these offrcers'wives, her resentment at my enthu-siasm for active service which was now manifested in the dangerousand secretive work of military intelligence only increased. Their life-style was necessarily very different from ours, and I can quite under-stand how she envied them. I tried very hard to compensate for whatshe regarded as selfishness, but so long as I remained dedicated to mywork, it seemed it would prove an endless source of conflict.Nonetheless, from the day she arrived, I still retained the hope that wecould find some means of compromise, but I had little time to listensympathetically to her concerns and I felt resentful when I thought oftle Brigade Officers who were considered to be so clever for collectingNorthein Ireland campaign medals without taking the least risk orever discovering what it was like to go out into the community itself. Itwas community that I had to work in, and learn to understand, if I wasto be successful in gathering Intelligence.

MILITARYINTELLIGENCE

The key element in the work of a MIO is the ability to respond instantlyto information received, and to follow it up without delay' That is not tosay there is no routine. In fact, I soon settled down to regular nattgrngoing into Mahon Road mid-morning, and seeing what the Army had6een getting up to by checking through their logs and spea\ing tovarious peofle; reporting to the police station, and afterwards, drivingdown to Brigade HQ to give them a full briefing. After lunch, I wouldmeet up with Bunny Dearsley and exchange material. Sometimes,after my second visit to the police station, I would brief HQ ag4in. And'once a month, there was a detailed breakdown ofevents to be delivered.Otherwise the early evening period would be spent with Bgnny q1dSgt. I, patrolling seirsitive aieas, then coming back to the office to frlecirds on various individuals, type up reports and so on. I frnished work,generally, after midnight, in order to be able to respond effectively toactivitiei after dark - more often, at about two in the morning' If anyincidents occurred after that which was rare - we would listen to police

messages on the Storno radios we kept beside us. Bunny and I also-used

to work out where the scene of certain bombs had been simply bycontacting one another after hearing the blast, and using basic tri-angulation methods arrive there before anyone else! Unlike Bunny, Iused to turn my radio off. But he drove everyone around him crazy bylistening continually to those disembodied voices, -piercin-g the'squelchl which like a badcase oftinnitus, one learned only to endure.

This, then, was the routine. And I suppose it is one that I would havefollowed or the next three years, slowly trying to gain the confidence ofthe police, and perhaps on the odd occasion managing to come up withsome importanl InteUigence of my own. But, no sooner had I begun togrow used to this rather limited role, than everything changed for me

once agarn.During these frrst few months the sources ot intbrmation that had

come my way were distinctly low-grade' and the most dramatic in-cident -.s a. occasion at Brigade HQ Lurgan, when a RPGT grenade

was launched at the Factory and blerv a hole in the wall. I rememberpeering through the shattered brickwork. with the heat marks radiat-

4

here'. He was a big, rotund man - if Bt

English, then Smellie was the perfect y - dressed in

40

ing round it, at the whole vista of the Catholic estate in the distance,

arirl for the drst time realising just what it meant to be here in Ireland.It redoubled my sense of personal security, so that my checks on- mycar, the drills I followed when I was driving round the area - never let a

molor--cyclist pass you, always use minor roads if possible, and so on -were kept to with the utmost diligence.

I believe this was why I was chosen to work for MI6. One eveningBunny came into the oflice and asked me if I would do him a favour' He

"aia tiui Sgt. I needed someone to drive a car for them and not ask

questions. Ilmmediately pointed out that I was the officer and he theNCO, and that I was hardly going to act as their chauffeur' Bunnysimpiy nodded, and said that any closer working relationship between,t" *onldtt't be possible, if that was my feeling. There was somethingquite unusual in his attitude, so I changed my mind and agreed to do as

he asked. On that occasion, I drove through a night ofpouring rain andparked on the outskirts ofa Republican area oflurgan. Bunny and SgtI went offacross the fields. They were away for twenty minutes or so'

There was no shooting or anything like that' They came back to thecar, andwe drove offagain.

There were two other such occasions. On the latter, they actuallyasked me to drive onto the Kilwilkie esiate - one of the most dangerous

enclaves of all - and wait while they went into some flats there. I felt Icouldn't put my life at risk any longer for something I didn't even

understand, so I asked what was going on. The response surprisedmemore than I could have imagined. Bunny said that he had talked tovarious people and there was no reason why I shouldn't know what itwas all about. Mo"e than that, if I agreed, I could actually take on thework myself since he would soon be coming to the end of his tour. I stilldidn't know what he meant. But then he told me plainly -'We want youto work for MI6. I'll take you to see my boss as soon as possible'.

I realised at once that this would put me in a wholy new position' Iwould have the authority to by-pass many of the obstacles that hadbeen put in my way. I would gain immediate access to top gra$e

*oor"6", since ivII6 only concerned themselves with top grade intelligence; and sitting wai[ing like a schoolboy outside Sergeant R's offrce

ivould become a mere memory. Yet I was also awaril that this wouldmake my position regarding the Brigade even more dilficult. I was

determined I should do everything by the board, so that if there were tobe any trouble no one could accuse me of duplicity.

So it was that when Bunny took me to Northern Ireland HQ to see

'his boss' my attitude was quite uncompromising. We went up theSecurity Corridor at the top ofthe building. A guard opened-the metalgate foi us, and Bunny took me down to a door at the far end' Aiecretary then led us into a large, comfortable offrce. Awaiting us wascraig smellie who introduced himself to me as the 'Political officerheref He was a big, rotund man - if Bunny reminded me of ArthurElnslish thpn Sme-Jlie was the oerfect Robert Morlev - dressed in

41

tweeds with ayellow waistcoat, with a monocle hangingoverhis lapel.His manner was charming, expansive. He began at once to tell me howBunny had been working for him, and how he had been looking roundfor some time for a suitable replacement. Just as Dearsley worked as aMILO to preserve his cover, so I should continue to work as a MIO-butwhatever doubts may have exist€d before about my primary respons-ibility would now be removed. I would be in the freld to gatn lntell-igence for MI6 and both the Army and the police would be required tocooperate. fn a sense, I would be working directly to the top.

I was flattered, but answered at once that I didn't think I could agreeto anything unless I discussed it frrst with my CO, Colonel D. Smelliedemurred, saying he would rather Colonel D was told nothing about it.When I insisted, he told me to go away for a few days and think about it.

I duly went to see Colonel D the next day. He and his eecond incommand were together in the offrce at Knock when I told them howSmellie had approached me. Colonel D was delighted - and I soondiscovered why. He immediately told me I should deliver secret copiesof everything that came my way straight to him. Just as I had pro-tested at Smellie's demands for thie kind of secrecy, I did so now toColonel D. He too, seemed dissatisfied with my attitude. My onlyoption, since I determined to play it all by the book, was to go back toSmellie in turn, tell him what I had done and leave any decision up tohim. This I did, informing him of Colonel D's response. To my surprise,Smellie simply laughed, and without any hesitation picked up thephone to the Colonel and talked things out with him there and then. Itwas quickly agreed that I strould be recruited, but that I should submitduplicates of all my reports to my unit based at Knock. For once, I sawhow there could be genuine cooperation in the best interests of every-one involved.

Over the next few days Bunny Dearsley briefed me on the details ofhis work. It transformed my image of the province, and just what wasgoing on there for I was no longer on the outside looking in, but activelyinvolved. Bunny had been working two vitally important sources, oneither side of the border who were responsible for a substantial part ofthe Intelligence which led to the identification and apprehension ofIRA terrorists.

The frrst had a particular code name which I shall not use here, butinstead refer to as 'Dreamcoat'. He was a senior offrcer in the Pro-visional IRA, who had been recruited, or'turned'as so many Repub-licans have been, as a result ofa personal grievance. This involved aperiod spent in hospital, where the first contact was made.

At that stage, Dreamcoat was a very frightened man, and the frrstthing he asked of Bunny was whether he could arrange protection forhimself and his family for the following week or so; until he was surethat they were safe. Bunny agreed at once to go into his house, (dis-guised as a tramp and hidden in the back ofa van) and stay twenty-

t

42

four hours a day until Dreamcoat could frnd out what was going on'Infact Bunny stayed only frve days - and when he came out, he had awhole mound of IntelHgence on the activities of the IRA in Lurgan,Portadown and all the outlying areas, including the housing estates bythe l-ough Shore, where information until this time had been verylimited: names of individuals involved, sites where weapons were

hidden, who was running them, and where they were coming from: thewhole Lackground to Dreamcoat's Battalion. Dreamcoat had also

supplied him with the names of others, who had similar grievances,

but were less well placed in the organisation.

From then on, there was barely any movement in the area thatwasn't known about within an hour of its planning: who was tra-velling, where, in what transport, and along which routes.

When I was recuited into MI6, Dreamcoat was still giving us themost valuable information, but was clever enough to maintain hiscover within the Provisionals. I met him, with Bunny, and we grew tolike and respect one another. I think I always remember him for one

incident in p-articular. TVo men had come up from the south and were

hiairrg ott "

Lousing estate in Craigavon. Dreamcoat didn't really know'exactly how to describe the spot on the map, so we dressed him up as a

Britisfi soldier, with helmel and goggles, and set him on top,of asaracen armouredcaffierbehindthe machine gun. we then setoffintocraigavon, and he was able todirect the driver right to the doorof thehous6 where the 'boys'were staying, so that all the soldiers had to do

was run in and grabihem. Ifhewanted revenge forwhathadbeendoneto him, I think that day he got it.

Dreamcoat was responsible for delivering into our hands two RPG

7's, along with countless bombs and explosives-. He personally lut thefi"g"" oi the Heaney bomb team, wJro were all arrested' Mr Heaney

tat6r died in prison, and there was a big fuss about his innocence. But Iwas keenly involved in that operation, and absolutely 9ur9 tlat,theright peopie were picked up. More than this, Dreamcoat had relativesin"thd South, serving in the Eire Army, and he was able to frx up

contacts, particularly between the British and the Irish bomb disposal

teams, *hich l"d to i number of successful operations - though here,

['m afraid, the nature of the'success'needs some qualification'

Bunny had recruited someone of inestimable value in the Intelli-sence war. But this was not his only coup. Through various contacts,

including Dreamcoat himself, Bunny was able to move across theborder, alnd gather substantial Intelligence in Eire. His chief source

there was a detective in County Monaghan, whose codename was theBadger. I first met the Badger shortly after I had been recruited intowfiOlno""y asked me to gJout on another ofhis clandestine expedi-

tions. Onlyihis time he told me we were actually going into thesouth. Iwas shocked at the time, but he said it had all been agreed at thehighest level, and I had nothing to worry about. Knowing the attitude

43

of 3 Brigade HQ, I wasn't so sure. But there was no point in myprotesting. We duly crossed the border (passed through by the Garda,who knew of our visit) and drove on to Monaghan police station. Wearrived at about halfpast nine in the evening. Bunny went into thestation, and some time later returned with the policeman. He intro-duced me by name, thoughheused onlythe Gardaman's codename. Hetold the Badger that I worked with him now, and that when he leftIreland, it would be my job to take over all his sources. We talked for awhile, and then the Badger handed over a file containing intelligencematerial, which we took back north with us.

Such meetings became a frequent part of my work. The Badgerfurnished us with Intelligence on the movements and whereabouts ofcountless Republicans in the south, profiles on IRSP members, pro-jected excursions into the north by wanted terrorists we could neverotherwise have got our hands on. Just as importantly, he arranged'clearance' on a number of occasions when cross-border operationswere due to take place. In other words, he ensured that no undercoverBritish team, or anyone acting on British orders, should come face toface with a Garda patrol of any kind. It is barely conceivable that theBadger - and the others who met us regularly during that period -could have worked with us in such a way, unknown to their superiors.Their motivation never became wholly clear to me, and their involve-ment with us necessarily opens up a much more profound and compli-cated theme than the'turning'of Dreamcoat and other sources in thenorth.

But during those first months in the Spring of 1974 I was notconcerned about such matters. I was gaining genuinely useful sources,with the authority of the'political office' behind me. There were twowho principally engaged me - both female, both living in Republicanstrongholds. Each had a codename which, again, I have altered, alongwith certain details, to protect them.

Forlorn Hope was an attractive woman with various familial co-nnections to the Provisionals, north and south of the border. Herrecruitment came about through the indiscretion of a captain on att-achment from the Royal Engineers to the Infantry stationed in thePortadown/Lurgan area. One morning, he was manning a roadblockon the Catholic estate which came under a torrent of abuse from ayoung woman leaning out of a nearby window. Breaking all the rules,he went into the house to give her a ticking off. Instead they werealmostimmediately infatuated with each other. They agreed to meetsecretly a few nights later and a clandestine affair began.

Folorn Hope was engaged to be married, but her fiance had beenworking over the water for some time, and she was living unhappilywith her parents. The officer decided he was on to a good thing, andarranged with her to obtain a flat in the neighbourhood. She furnisheditwith a bed and an armchairandwhenever itwas possible, he ordered

44

his soldiers to guard the flat, while he had sex with the yourtg woman,telling his soldiers he was using her as an intelligence source.

It was Mrs Dearsley who first heard all about this through her'teastop'grapevine. She told Bunny, and we decided at once to chall-enge the offrcer. He was so frightened his career would be ruined,especially since he was on detachment to another unit, he tried to bluffhis way out with us, using the excuse of some kind of private intelli-gence work. He told us of Folorn Hope's connections. After discussingthe matter, we decided the best course of action would be to call hisbluff. We asked him to get answers to ten questions about theMonaghan area (who was there, what they were doing, etc.) and comeback to us. Ifhe failed, I would report him for abusing his authority.

He returned to us with most of the answers we expected. We thenwent directly to MI6, and asked for authority to recruit Folorn Hope.This offrcer was then instructed from the political offrce to be assignedto work directly for us. This, ofcourse, rekindled all the latent antag-onism within the Brigade. The Colonel of the Battalion was furious,since no one had either consulted him, or indeed even thought of doingso. He was an ex-SAS man, and not the kind to take this sort oftreatment without seeking to redress the balance. However, no onecould have foreseen the consequen@s of his reaction.

Folorn Hope became another valuable sx)uroe, mostly in mattersconcerning cross-border activity, where the Intelligence she gave uscould be double+hecked, through the Badger, and our other contacts,and on the various individuals in the Craigavon area.

It was on similarly sexual grounds that Goldilocks came our way.She as an older woman, living in the Portadown area, divorced and, toput it bluntly, a n;rmphomaniac. Our first contact was when two lettersaddressed to a couple ofSergeants in the local battalion were passedonto the Regimental Sergeant-Mqjor by the post offrce. (Both the postoffice and telephone service worked closely with the Army and thepolice - monitoring private mail, relaying various calls, pre-dominently involving Republicans.)

The letters turned out to be pornographic photographs ofGoldilocksand another woman involved in various lesbian acts, and an invitationto the soldiers to return again for'More of the same'. A couple of weeksbefore this, I has already received a tip-offthat two soldiers had beenseen visiting a house in a particular area, and that their lives were atrisk from the local terrorists. I had tried, without success, to find outwho they were. It seemed that I now had the answer.

I consulted with the CO concerned, and then checked to find out ifthewoman could be of any use to us. It transpired that she had a longreputation for seducing RUC men, that her house was situated in aperfect spot for observation, and she herselfwould be likely to prove auseful low grade source. Armed with all this, I took the two NCOs withme and knocked on her door. They then went upstairs and had sex with

45

her, while I sat in the lounge watching television. When she camedown again, I put it to her that, if she would let us use her house twentyfour hours a day for observation, I would personally ensure thatsoldiers would be made available to her whenever she required. Once Ihad squared this with the various authorities concerned, it all wentahead smoothly: two unmarried senior NCOs were provided fromevery incoming unit, and we used the house to keep tabs on a number ofactivities in the area, which resulted in several arresLs, and a steadyflow of information. When it became necessary, we moved her into adifferent area; but as is the case with most sourceg, through her wemade contact with others. So the network spread, and when one had toleave for safety's sake, another would take over the role.

The whole business with Goldilocks may sound clinical, and sexistbut these were her sexual needs, and the deal we struck was immed-iately attractive to her. In fact, I grew very fond ofher over the months,though I personally had no place in the deal itself, and was constantlyat pains to keep my distance. When I picked her up to debrief her, it wasmy habit to drive out to a secluded spot in the Mourne Mountains, andpark by a small knoll. Meanwhile my FINCO, Sgt.Iwouldgoupseparately covering my rear and then position himself on anotherknoll where he could cover the whole area with a Mark 4 sniper rifle -303 convertedtoT.62 with a scope.

Through the scope he would watch me inching further and furtheraway from Goldilocks, as she pulled up her skirt and leaned furtherover me, until I was nearly half-way out of the window, still trying todebriefher on events in her locality.

She used to buy me cufflinks from Woolworths, and bottles of over-powering aftershave and so on, which I dutifully took home,and triedto explain to my wife. I wasn't so straightlaced as to be unsympatheticto her loneliness, or the pathos ofher needs, but I had to treat herprofessionally. And, in purely professional terms, it was worth it. Shesupplied a constant stream of information on people with weapons,robberies carried out to bolster terrorist funds, bricked-up or desertedhouses used as caches, and on the members of junior paramilitarygroups and their clubhouses.

These frfteen and sixteen year olds would all get recruited, we wouldfind out who they were, arrest them, and break the grcup up. A monthor two later, another one would start.

We would let them get organized - take over some old garage orwhatever, put their posters and flags up and so on, and then simply goin and lift, them again.

Thanks to Goldilocks, more than anyone else, we were always a stepahead.

There is one occasion I will always remember her for. She rang meup,sounding very pleased with herself, to tell me she knew there wereweapons in a certain bricked-up house, not far from hers. She des-

I

46

cribed them to me - and I was quickly able to identifu them as ones thathad been used in a recent incident. As a result of her information, wegot a search team in the next morning, with a dog, and all the usualgear. They turned the place upside down but all they found was a clip of.22 ammunition, which was hidden in a container, fixed behind a lightswitch. Eventually the house was declared clear.

I was very angry with her, and let her know. I'd been dressed allmorning as a UDR oflicer, keeping an eye on things, since it was myintelligence that had sent the team in; and of course, when no weaponswere found, it could only reflect badly on me. However, no sooner had Ifinished receiving some sceptical teasing at Mahon Road, thanGoldilocks came on the phone again to say that the guns were beingmoved at that very moment. Immediately, we all drove down thereagain, and sure enough, we caught two men carrying the weapons: anautomatic submachine gun and a rifle. They were atrested atonce, andsent to prison for trial. Goldilocks had been right all along. Wherethose weapons were hidden, I couldn't say. But she hadn't let me down,after all.

This, then, was the kind of work in which I was involved after myinitial recruitment into M16. Of course, the routine aspects of my MIOduties went on, though once the police knew what I was doing, theirattitude towards me quickly improved. Now, in addition to my brief-ings to Brigade HQ, and my own unit at Knock, I also had monthlymeetings with Smellie at Lisburn, and there were the standardmonthly gatherings of all the SMIUs where information was ex-changed, trends examined and predicted, and an overall picture ofthewarbuilt up.

The SMIU meetings took place at 12 Intelligence and Security Com-pany, in a large lecture room complex at Lisburn Barracks. The MIO,FINCO and one or two LINCOs from each police divisional area -about 50 ofus in all - would sit and be lectured by the Colonel on policeinitiatives and so on. We would adjourn to the bar afterwards. Atprivate discussions, two things became plain to us all. One, it seemed tous that the predominantly Protestant RUC was inveterately biasedand this attitude appeared to be responsible for many miscarriages ofjustice.

This was hardly surprising, as many of the police themselves eitherbelonged to, or had close relations in, the Protestant outlawed groups.Two, as fast as you got the Republicans locked up, and so were able toturn your attention as a unit to the Protestants, and not rely on thempolicing themselves, the British government were responsible forreleasing the Republicans on parole, to put you back to square one.This happened twice, quite blatantly, in my area.

Whatever the case, as soldiers, we were only too aware that we werebeing kept in work, in many senses, artificially, and that if the powers

47

that be were really to grasp the nettle, much of the sting woulddisappear.

Since his assassination one ofthese officers has been held up as anexample of heroism and devotion to duty. I have my own memories ofCaptain Robert Nairac and they are mixed. I liked him and saw him asa younger version of myself. He was keen and brave, if a little rash, buttotally committed to the war against the terrorists. However there wasanother side to Robert that I was to learn about. The unit he wasinvolved with, with the cover title '4 Field Survey Tloop, RoyalEngineers', was involved with the murdering of suspected and knownkey members of the IRA. '4 Field Survey Tloop'was located at CastleDillon with a genuine engineer regiment. It had a second level of coveras 'Northern Ireland Tlaining and Tactics Team'(NITAT). Neithercover fooled the genuine Engineers. The compound housing'4 FieldSurvey Troup'was guarded by Ministry of Defence Police - somethingany ordinary soldier, used to routine guard duties, knows is highlyunusual.

The unit possessd civilian 'Q' cars fitted with sophisticated com-munications linked to an operations room in one of the wooden barackblocks in the compound. The personnel were issued with non-standardweapons as well as Army issued ones. American MACII (Ingram)silenced sub-machine guns, Remington folded-butt light-weightpump-action shotguns, and Sterling MK5 silenced sub-machine gunswere all bonowed from this unit by me for my own operations. Moreominously, in a cupboard in their arrnourJ/ was a tray of 9mmBrowning pistol barrels, extractors and frring pins which had been'cast' - declared unsuitable for uso because of wear and tear andtherefore (olficially) destroyed by the Army. These'cast'parts couldbeplaced in normal issue Brownings, fired, degtroyed, and replaced withthe original'offrcial'parts. This would make it impossible to connectthe weapon with any shooting-there would be no ballistics evidence.

To this day, although acknowledging that such a unit existed in the1960's t,Le Ministry of Defence claims that all records of it have beendestroyed, and they are thus unable to answer any questions about it.More recently the second level ofcover for'4 Field Survey Tloop'that ofNITATT, has been described as a covert intelligence unit, but its titlehas been altered. now, we are told, in the book Ambush (James Adamsand others, Pan 1988) that this unit.was, in fact, a part of a hithertounheard of '14th Intelligence Company'. To my knowledge,'l4thIntelligence'was formed long aft,er the events I described and this bookisjust the latest in a long line ofattempts to conceal the fact that theSAS were operating out of Castledillon in Armagh long before thegovernment of the day was aware of it.

But although like Bunny, I was always armed - with a WaltherPPK, which I carried in a waist holster, or with an Ingram sub-machine gun, borrowed from the SAS for particular operations - Inever shot a single terrorist, nor did I take part in any ofthe SAS's

I

TOP RIGHT: Myself in'mufbi'with daughter Bridget at home in Bocombra, Porladown.TOP LEFT: Christmas visit to family from Rhodesia, in Devon 1980. BELOW: The familyat RAF Married Quarters, Compton Bassett, near Colne 1971'

TOP: The aftermath of an IRA car bomb in Claudy village. BELOW: The IRA burnt down

their accommodation at Long Kesh Internment Centre and were subdued afer a short,

vicious skirmish by the Army.

51

**'

W

TOP: A Protestant victim of the UVF 'Romper Room'- a venue used to administer internaldiscipline within the para-military organisation. BELoW: lst Regiment, Royal HorseArtillery (my original Regiment) suffered casualties during my undercover tour of duty inthe Province.

'' F, *F, .6: 1t* ,{b,,G !l uGu -#. (} tfl '* \-d

,. !.ryf h*$ \,*.J ='..., , . l.'

A typical IRA weapons find by the Army.

TOP: An IRA car bomb attack which claimed two victims. BELOW: The IRA parade inLong Kesh prison, their'military academy'.

TOP: UDA 'bully boys' manning the barricades whilst RUC o{ficers watch helplessly,

lottao.taetty. SdLOW, The scenJ after a failed bomb making attempt: two men had been

priming bombs in a derelict house, when one went off.

5455

more notorious missions. We took the view that it wasn't our brief toget involved in gun battles if we could possibly help it, since what coverwe had would be blown as a consequence, and all our patiently devisedplans put at risk. But there were occasions when we were forced to firerounds in the general area to get rid ofvarious pursuers, and otherswhen the sight of a weapon was enough to secure an arrest.

Not everyone shared our reticence. The SAS Troop with whom I hadclose contact were based at Castledillon, near Armagh, in a secludedcountry house that had once been used as a mental hospital. Quite howthey fitted into the SB/Army/SIS network I wasn't quite sure at first,though I knew the officers had been trained by the political as well asmilitary authorities, and worked with a high degree of independence.

For a year, 1973 through part of 1974,I was able to conceal myidentity as a member of the security forces, and moved unchallenged inhostile areas, by dressing and behaving like the local target popul-ation. But if I went in alone, I was always armed, and I would haveprepared the ground with the local battallion who would ensure that apatrol was in the vicinity. (It was therefore with some concern that Iread the published accounts of Robert Nairac's death claiming that hewas operating on his own, with no back-up. This was not only againstthe rules of procedure, but out of character for Robert.) However, aftera year during which I had personally interrogated some of the leadingterrorists, my cover was blown. I became known locally asthe beardedSAS man', working from Portadown police station, and had to resort toalternative means to pass safely through target areas.

It is a picture that only now I feel I genuinely understand. While Iwas on active service I didn't make fine distinctions. And it is true tosay that no one from the other side of things could be expected to makea distinction between, say, Captain Nairac, and myself. Every month Icould be seen, with him and the others from his unit, on the dunes atBallykinla, practising with all kinds of weapons on the range there,and eating spare ribs over the barbecue when we had frnished. Wewere both working undercover to track down the terrorists, and there-fore were even less acceptable to our opponents than the regular Armysoldiers.

The fact is I was not'the bearded SAS man'the Republicans eventuallytook me to be. My code of behaviour was not the same. It was my role toobtain intelligence, Nairac's to act on it. And the SAS in Ireland at thattime were the spearhead of Kitson's counter-insurgency policy, andthe lever used by more ruthless operators than those who employedme, to implement their policies.

Once Special Branch knew that I was working with Mr Smellie atLisburn, their attitude changed considerably towards me, and, withBunny, I was soon involved in my area with all kinds of covert opera-tions. Often, these would have to be taken up at a moment's notice.

#*

I

\

,\

RPG 7's appeared in the Province and were used by the IRA from the early 1970's.

56

Some days after I had first crossed the border Bunny and I hadjustbeen inside Craigavon police station, when a leen little constablethere we knew as Sputnik came dashing out after us with a note in hishand. The police had received a message from an old man cn ahand. The police received a message from an old man cn aCraigavon estate that the IRA had learned ofa licenced shotgun in hispossession and were going in later that day to take it offhim. The manwas begging the police to go in frrst - but no one, except Sputnik fromthe station, had any inclination to oblige. We asked him if they hadinformed the Army, but he said they hadn't, for then they would almostcertainly have a gun-battle ontheirhands. Bunnythen agreedthathewould go instead. I looked at him anxiously, but said nothing. Wecrossed to his car. He took two sub-machine guns from the boot, wentback into the station, and fetched his own pump action shotgun, alongwith a civilian jacket. We decided to use my car,since it was new to thearea, and drove to the Taignavon estate, about three-quarters ofa mileaway, Sputnik undoing his tie and taking offhis hat in the back seat,while Bunny relayed the plan to us both.

We went into the estate at normal speed, bumping over the 'sleepingpoliceman', watched from various corners and windowe, as we cruiseddown to the end of the road, did a U-turn and came back up: When wereached the culde-sac where the old man lived, we reversed at fulltilt, straight over his garden, knocking down a little sapling tree, andscreeched to a halt. I jumped out at one side, Bunny, the other, with theengine still running, the heindbrake on. I covered Bunny with thesuLmachine gun as he ran to the door, shouted, 'Open up, you bas-tards' and proceeded to kick it in. Sputnik meanwhile covered himfrom the other side of the car, as a couple of the local lads ran offdownthe street, to make sure our visit was known. A crashing noise camefrom inside the house, and Bunny's voice, 'All right, you bastard,where's your shotgun?' Within moments he emerged, carrying theweapon, while we both kept cover on him. We all three climbed backinto the car, shot into gear, down the road, flying over the'sleepingpolicemen' this time, and out of the estate. And as we left, we could see

the 'boys' &ppes, behind us, armed. But we were out of range now. Wehad the shotgun, the old man had preserved his cover. Success.

This was one ofthe first operations ofthe kind I had experienced. ButI wasn't the only one whose hand was shaking round the coffee cupwhen we were back at the station, going through it all, moment bymoment, and chattering like small boys, to get the adrenalin out of thesystem. When we gave the gun to the local RUC Inspector, he simplyraised one eyebrow, and said nothing. He knew that the RUC them-selves had turned half these places into n(Fgo areas in the frrst place;while the regular soldiers, as Sputnik said, either served as targets forthe snipers or represented a severe over-reaction to this kind ofinci-dent.

There were many such episodes following this one,'when we had towork quickly on Intelligence provided by our sources. I used a part-

57

icular foreign gentleman, married to an Irishwoman, for low-gradeinformation on the area in which he lived' The Provisionals werebleeding him dry - he was a successful businessman, and they were

continuilly demanding money from him, using various threats tohimself and his family. One night I actually went and sat at anupstairs window with a weapon, waiting for them to come to pigk up 1payment. An armed man and a woman came sneaking up tle drive. Iipiayed the ground around them with bullets and forced them to lieflat.i then allowed them to escape thoroughly subdued, and my friendhad no further trouble.

The'starsky and Hutch'element to it all perhaps accounted for some

ofthe reputation I gained in the area. Our Storno police radios reg-ularly picked up messages transmitted to Juliet 23 - Bunny - andJuliet 22, myself, as we drove round in our Q cars on patrol, and wewould give instant response.

A typical example came one a{ternoon that summer, when we wer-e

drivin! round Craigavon. Some time before the incident occurred,

Captain D at HQ 3 Brigade had asked me w-hether I would be workingclosely with Dearsley.-When I said I would, he told me that I shouldknowlhat Bunny had been involved in a bank robbery whenhe was on

tour with his company. I asked why he was still in the Army t\n' a9 a

NCO. D replied that rro one had been able to prove anything. But thefacts were lhat Bunny had tipped offt]re Army that there was going tobe a raid on a bank in Portadown: they had acted on his informationand staked out the building. Meanwhile the IRA had robbed anotherbank across town, and got away with f,28,000. According to Capt' D

Bunny had got a cut of this money - it stood to reason, ervgn |i9background in the East End, and so on. This sort ofsmear had offendedme aI the time. And when I later asked Bunny about it, he explainedthat he had passed on the tip--offin good faith, but that his source hadbeen taken ior a ride. He knew about the rumour' but treated it withcontempt pointing out that people who never left HQ 9xc9n! to dlvc1otheir will-fortifred homes at B-ocombra, and gathered all their Intell-igence by map had no right to cast aspersions on anyone who was

actually out there trying to do their job'

On this particular afbernoon, a call came through from the police

that Bunny had to phone one ofhis sources at once' We stopped at aphone-box; the source told him that if he went down to a garage inLutgatt, well-known to us, he would find two Oxyacetyline-cylindersin aTrame, in the workshop. Eight inches from the bottom of each one,

was a thin hairline crack. The cylinders were threaded, so they couldbe unscrewed. In one, he would find a M1 Carbine, and in the other aGaraud rifle, both WW2 Infantry weapons' Immediately, Bunnyjumped back into the car, got through to the police, told them to followup ind order an Army Quick Reaction Squad to attend the scene'

Meanwhile, we shot straight down to the garage ourselves, without

I

58

waiting for the back-up. We leapt out of our cars, kicked the d9o1s

open, and threw everyone against the wall, gripping our Sunq i1 !9thhbnds, like true movie actors! We found the cylinders, the hairlinecrack, and unscrewed them. One was empty. But out of the other fellsome 37,000 in bundles of tenners. The police arrived. The men at thegarage were duly arrested denying all knowledge of the. money, andcertainly of any possible arms to be found on the premises', Since acomplete search r-evealed none, they had to be believed. Both they, andthe banknotes, were taken down to Lurgan police station'

By the time they came to trial, some of the sum found in the cylinderhad-disappeared, presumbly into the pockets of dishonest police-offi'cers based at Lurgan police station. One can imagine my outrage, then,when Captain D subsequently hadthe effronteryto hintthatthe wholeepisode was contrived by Bunny to return some of the money stolen inthe bank raid, as a means of allaying suspicions about himself.

The link between terrorist activity and ordinary crime in thecommunity was one we were always aware of - and we spent much ofour time tiacing it through various means, until it brought substantialrewards. But there were some bizarre blind alleys along the way.

Some weeks after the gatage incident, we received a tip--off thatsome explosives had been hidden in a milk--churn on a Catholicfarmer's land, south of Craigavon. On the journey there, Bunny hadspotted some lads with weapons making their way back towards thetown, and had pursued them into a cornfield, closely followed by Sgt. Iand myself. One of these lads had been left with lan, while we w-ent

after the other, and it wasn't until we came back that we discovered Ianhad no weapon of his own on him, and, again, in true Hollywood style,was holding the lad prisoner, with only his forefinger pressed againsthis neck!

We took the 'boys', who were only teenagers, to Craigavon police

station, saw them charged, and set offagain to find the milk churn'Bunny and I got out ofour cars at a particular intersection ofthe

farmers fields, and followed the hedge away from the road for half amile or so. We came to the large tree, described to us by our source, justbeyond a small brick wall. I had brought with me a grappling hook Ialways used on such occasions. After we had searched gingerly roundthe aiea, we focused on the top of the milk-churn, buried in the earth.It could clearly have been some kind of booby-trap. So we hooked my-grappling iron to the handle, threw the rope attached over the bough ofltre tree, ina retired some twenty metres or so to the low wall, bailingthe rope out as we went.

Slowly, and carefully, we tried to inch the lid offthe churn. As we

pulled, I put my head over the wall, to see what was happening - angih"." *at the whole milk--churn rising from the hole, with the lid stuckfast. We lowered it down again, and talked about what to do.

Eventually, we decided to lift the whole thing out of the ground again,

and drop it, so that if it was a trap the concussion would set theexplosivLs off. We were just setting to work, when we saw two RUC

men creeping through the field towards us. It was too late to stop. Themilk-<hurn iame ou1 of the ground and hung in mid-air. We heard one

shout to the other, 'Take cover!'And we called them over at once to tellthem who we were and what we were doing. It transpired that they,too, had heard of the tig-off, and demanded that whatever was in thechurn should be recorded as their frnd. We refused to agree, but insteadof arguing, simply let the churn fall. Nothing happened. The RUC menthen wenl acrois and finally managed to wrest the lid off, a potentiallydangerous thing to do.

It wasn't piles of banknotes that fell out on this occasion - but a mass

of pornographic magazines. A few minutes later, the farmer himselfarrived,ind hastily began to stuffthem in his pockets. Naturally, thepolice claimed at once that it was all police property. And, of course,

iike the money, some of the magazines disappeared. This was NorthernIreland in a nutshell - Catholic farmer caught redhanded with a

milk--churn full of pornographic magazines, arguing with the forces oflaw and order as to who should have the privilege of reading them inprivate, while two British soldiers, who only a few minutes before had

ihought they were hoisting a booby-trapped bomb into the air, looked

on in bemusement!But it was an even bet that, another time, the milk--churn might

well contain a bomb, and if we slackened our security for a moment, we

would rue the consequences. Nothing could better illustrate this thanwhat happened to Frink Murray, then with the CID in Portadown, butunlike Sirgeant R an active officer who went out personally to trackdown terrorists on his patch.

It was a similar kind of set-up - only this time we were working atnight, and on the fringe of the Kilwilkie estate at Lurgan. We were

ap"proaching the estate from Craigavon Hall, inching through the-longgiiss to getlo the graveyard' We knew there was a weapons cache in6ne of thle graves, and we wanted to check exactly-what-was.there'Frank, Buriny, Sgt I and myself made our way slowly in the edges ofthe street lighl t]iat shone over the hedge, through the field, parallel tothe cemeter:y. I was at the front, and I stopped at once when I saw a thinnylon string, like fishing-line, running tight across the grass abouteight inchei off the ground. It seemed more than likely it was a

trip-wire. So I turned round, and laid my hand flat an inch above it,sigrralling to the others what I had found. Bunny and Sgt' I then

st6pped o-ver it deliberately. But when Frank Murray arrived, he took

one iook at what it was, reached out and pulled it. It is very hard todescribe the sensation you feel, waiting to be blown up. It lasts only a

split second, but in thal time there is no other comparable horror' Butnothing happened. Frank continued to pull at this wire, and on the end

of it wai a Ilite, its tail dragging forlornly through the grass.

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60

'You bloody soldiers!'swore Murray.'You're all the same' In 1978,Inspector Frank Murray was injured with his colleague by a booby-trap that had been deliberately set for him by a source he had beenrunning, who wanted to get out of his situation. Frank was awardedthe MBE for Gallantry. I read about it all in the newspaper, at home,after I had resigrred from the Army and I immediately rang him up.

I felt sure I knew the man who had done it, and I could track himdown. Frank was only too well aware of the bomber, and he knew thathe had fled to Cork. He told me he would be dealt with in good time. Buthe also said he was glad I had contacted him - for he had laughed at methat night in Lurgan, but he knew now how right I was to takeprecautions.

The last thought he had had as he put his hand out to touch the realbooby-trap was how I had held out my hand as a signal to take care,and that if he had heeded my advice then, that awful moment wouldnever have come to him now.

Frank's plight only confirmed what I had learned, working withBunny Dearsley, that duringthe long months of 1974I was in a uniqueposition in the province. The regular Army were denied any realawareness of what was going on around them. And the RUC's attitudewas coloured by their feelings towards the Republican population, andsupported by their own sente of anger and resentment about theirtreatment by the British government. On a number of occasions,Intelligence would come through, concerning booby-traps, ambushesand robberies, that the police o{frcers would simply ignore becausethey were deemed effective ilFgo aneas. In Portadown, on a particularoccasion when a bomb was discovered in the T\rnnel area, and the areawas cordoned offby a unit of Scottish soldiers, RUC man Sergeant Rmarched straight up to one ofthe soldiers told him to get out ofthe wayand tried to walk past him on to the site. Needless to say, the soldierpushed him up against the wall, calling him an Irish bastard and so on

- Sergeant R was in plain clothes, and had refused to identifu himself.The upshot was that the RUC man threatened to withdraw all hispolicemen from Portadown ifhe didn't get a personal apolory. Clearly,the soldier was in the right. But such was the attitude ofthe RUC that,unless the Army obliged, they were quite capable of carrying out thethreat, and ensuring that the town became a haven for whatevercriminals took advantage ofit. Sergeant R got his apology. I deliveredit, after taking much abuse from both the Army and the RUC, in theprocess.

I lost count of the injuries the police sustained through similar reck-lessness and intransigence. A typical instance springs to mind fromthe summsr of 7974. Duringthat periodwe had recruited an extremelyuseful source - one of the Provisionals' top bomb-makers, whoregularly tipped us offon various planned offensives in which he had

61

been asked to play a part. The Intelligence often came through fromhim at the very last minute, so we were forced to rely on the m€ssage

we put out over the radio being taken serioysly and acted on with due

ca"6. Oo this occasion he warned us that a device had been placed in amanhole on the Craigavon estate, and that some kind of decoy would be

used to lure the Secunty forces to the spot. The message was put out'But inevitably, a uniformed RUC man went to the aid of a childsupposedly tripped in the passage - and was blown to pieces for histrouble.

The Army, too, suffered from lapses in discipline whjch resulted inunttecessaty'deaths. There was another incident, involving the same

sour@, where I sent in a search troop to an empty house in Craigavon'In a pure moment of inattention, a soldier went up to the toilet-and, as

he was leaving, opened a cupboard door. The results were-predictablyhorrific. But, is iar as the iquaddies were ooncerned, there was anunderlying posture of bravado and contempt, which would, with one

RUC Iispeclor, compel him to tackle suspicious vehicles parked across

the main road simply by opening the door, letting offthe handbrake,and pushing them to ttre t<erb. The Protestant Establishment felt theyo*trid th" pilace - and this was often reflected in their security work'

It was when military indiscipline and police recklessness met head

on that the worst incidents occurred, and I questioned just what wasgoing on in the Province. The Gilford Castle shootings, for instance,ia"t"a deep division and embarrassment on both sides, and could nothelp but provide encouragement to the terrorists.

All that was known initially, about the incident was that a group ofsoldiers had been shot by the RUC along the border - and the Armywere extremely angry ai the police. I was called in by Captain-D andtold that the Biigade wanted to know just what had gone on, and in myrole as liaison o{ficer it was my duty to find out and report back as soon

as I had done so. I immediately drove down to the Gilford Castle area-and found a badly led and disorganised shower of a cavalry unit, witha young major in charge.

It took me some time to get any sense out of them, but in the end Imanaged to piece the story together.

A band of men had comeback from leave andhadbeenpicked up in aplain mini-van from the docks. Theyhad been driven, quite rightly,a"to"t the country of Portadown, and then driven through Bambridge,to Gilford Castle. They had arrived there late in the afternoon. Thestanding orders procedure should have been that they stayed thereuntil the following morning, and then deployed to their sub-units,which were on the

-border, down towards Newry - driving the long wayround, back up to Portadown and Belfast, and along the Ards penin-

sula, so into Newry from the opposite direction. This was standardprocedure, because there was a ban on all unescorted vehicles usingrttinor roads in that area at night - only armoured vehicles could use

62

them by day. In other words, the border roads were partially out ofbounds.

I had heard some weeks previously that a civilian vehicle had beenoperating in the border area, dropping soldiers offat various points, inBritish uniform. But, no matter how hard I had tried, I hadn't been ableto track downjust who had been using it. I now learned that the vehiclehad been brought across from England withthe CavalryUnit, and wasbeing used, stupidly in a covert manner, and without authoristaion, fordropping off soldiers along the border, just as I had been told. And onthe night of the shooting, instead ofwaiting for the morning and takingthose who had come back from leave round the usual route to theirlocations in Crossmaglen and such places, a covert mini-van had beendriven out of Gilford Castle, under the command of a Corporal, east-ward along the border.

The mini-van broke down after an hour or so, just north of theRepublic, in what is known as 'bandit country'. It had no radio com-munications whatsoever. So the Corporal in charge ordered his men totake up all-round defence, and prepared to wait until someone came tofind them. They were still in civilian clothes, but armed with theirregulation weapons. To add to his problems, instead of keeping themall together, he had despatched four ofthe troop to look for a telephonebox where they could surnmon assistance and perhaps save him fromsome of the inevitable embarfassment. Such was the shambles theyhad got themselves into.

Not long afberwards, along the border road came two RUC vehicles;and of course the moment the police saw the mini van in their head-lights, with civilians deployed around it, they leapt to the wrongconclusion. They stopped their cars along the road, and called upreinforcements, certain that they had come upon an IRA ambush. TWomore cars were summoned, from the opposite direction, and the policebegan moving slowly through the dark towards the soldiers.

They, in turn, were now sure that they were the intended victims ofthe Provisionals, since the unmarked RUC cars had stopped along theroad, and no one had made any attempt at challenging them. So theCorporal decided to open frre, over the heads ofthe police, to try to scarethem away. Fortunately, no one was hit. But it was the biggest mistakehe could have made, for as yet the police had not fired a shot, but aftercoming under fire, they proceeded to fire back. At that point, thesoldiers deployed round the mini van simply panicked and a number ofthem ran away across the fields, and weren't picked up until thefollowing day. Inevitably, the police put through to the oncoming RUCunits that they were under fire from the enemy, and to shoot first ifthey sighted any of them. The enemy turned out to be the four men sentto the telephone box. They had reached the nearest village by now;three were sitting on a wall, while the other tried to contact GilfordCastle - all in civilian clothes, and all armed.

63

Rushing along the road came the second unit of police' The momentthey sighted the soldiers, they swerved offthe road, leaped out oftheirvehicles, and riddled the telephone box with bullets. Inevitably therewere fatalities.

This time, when I made a formal apology on behalf of the Army toCharles Rodgers, Assistant Chief Constable, it was done without theleast reluctance - and I was able to quieten some ofthe outrage felt atMahon Road about what had happened. But, with hindsight, I can see

how the incident represented the worst aspects ofboth forces.

I began to understand just how the IRA, in spite of the formidableodds against them, and their own lack of effective organisation anddiscipline, were managing to build their offensive, to the point whenthe Labour Government was prepared to negotiate a truce with themin January 1975. I had numerous contacts with active Provisionals,through intenogation and through various sources who had'turned',and so, in this respect as well I gained an insight into the situation,denied to most others in the security forces.

My habit in interrogation was never to resort to any kind of bru-tality, since I knew how counter-productive it was. While I had a lot ofdistaste for the Republicans who came my way, I had none of the openantipathy of the RUC - who sometimes used violence when inter-viewing suspects. I am aware ofthe allegations made about some ofthetreatment meted out iri Castlereagh, and it would be unfair to suggestthat the British too have not resorted to certain kinds ofbrutality inthe course ofinterrogation in Northern Ireland, as the InternationalCourt in Geneva confirmed. I can only say that I felt I achieved farmore by persuasion and discussion thanby a clenched fist, orthe threatoftorture.

In fact, I was lucky that this was my attitude. During 1974, one of anumber of bombs we had been unable to detect had gone off in theT\rnnel area of Portadown. Two men had been lifted, and taken toMahon Road Army camp where they were waiting to be interrogated.One of them, a large man with a beard, I shall simply refer to as T. Ifound him to be an intelligent and engaging man, not the kind I wouldexpect to meet from the pirticular estate he came from, inthe north ofPoitadown. His accomplice was a thin tall man, who said very little.We had had word that ihe two of them had been involved with makinga bomb, and we were pretty sure that this was one that had beenactivated. Only we had no proof- hence, the interrogation.

I arrived at the camp, and went into the oflice. Ordering the othertaciturn character to stand in the corridor, I asked for T to come in totalk to me. The moment he sat down, he asked for a cigarette. I gave

him one, then lit my pipe and started to question him. It soon became

apparent that nothing would make him talk about the bombing in-

wliich I was positive he was implicated. And, to his surprise, instead ofissuing him with threats, I began to probe him about his motivation,

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and t}re impossibility of his side ever winning the war. As I saw it, hdwas bashing tri! head against a brick wall. No matter how manysoldiers were killed the British would simply replace them. So long asthe political will was there, the war would go on indefrnitely. I askedhim why he didn't concentrate his efforts on political activities, andleave aside the more violent means. Of course, he simply replied that,as far as he was concerned, the British could never be trusted, and thatno matter what progress was made peacefully, at the back of it all wasthe iron fist, that would soon hit out again when it didn't get its way. Inthe end, we must have drunk five or six cups of cofTee together and Iquite forgot about the other man waiting outside. We both knew thescore:.Hhadbeen pickedupthat evening, while he was still inthebath,scrylblng his fingernails clean. He reckoned he had been watchingtelevision - Coronation Street, as he said - but he couldn't tell me whJta-ny of the regulars of the Rovers Return had been up to. I took aphilosophical view of the whole business. Our IntelhgLnce networkwas _good, even though this incident had slipped through. T would getinvolved again, and next time we would nab him. After four hours orso, quietly gaining information from him that was certainly ofgeneral,if not specific use, I told him he could go. I let him know I knewivhat hehad done and that I would be sure to see him again soon. T then had thel9rve tq protest that the area around Mahon Road was hardly safe forhim and his friend to be released into - I took his point, and agreed todrive him downto thetown in a Landrover. As we were driving-along, Isaid quite plainly to him, since I knew all about the bearded S1,S min'cited in the local Republic broadsheet and some ofthe actions laid atmy door, that I wanted to read none ofthe usual nonsense about eitherg!_them being worked over while I'd interrogated them - and that, if Idid, my attitude would be very different in future. He told me not to bestupid, nothing of the kind would be printed. He too had appreciatedour session together.

The next issue of the local Republican newspaper camied a photo-gra-ph of his accomplice bruised and beaten, and an article saying thatboth he and T had been beaten up by the'bearded SAS oflicer'in MahonRoad Camp while under interrogation. I was livid. So much so, thataQgt a month later, I too was guilty of a lack of discipline. I waswalking at ttre top end oftown, in civilian clothes and I saw T standingin a particular pub entrance, frequented by the'boys', with a crowd o]his friends. I crossed the road, went straight up to him and grabbed hisshirt. 'You bastard!'I cried. 'Next time, lwill give you a thumping'. Twas so startled he said nothing, and his friends were so take.t aLack bymy temerity^, lhey didn't come near me. As far as I was concerned, bythis stage of_the qqme, my cover was ineffective among these peopll?nyway and I couldn't contain my anger. Nonetheless, I realised h-owfoolhardy I'd been, and resolved to control myselfbetter in future.

As it was, in a very Irish fashion that incident might well have savedmy life. Four months later, I was driving out of Coolstown and had run

65

out oftobacco. I stopped at a pub. There was a fire burning on the lefthand side, and a darts match going on. And there, sitting rJund a tableset in a corner was a gang of men I wouldn't have w"anted to meettogglher-oltsjde Mahon Road, let alone out here in the sticks, *fre"" ipu]{qafelV_{isappeer without trace!It was like a meeting of ine tocaiIRA Lions Club or Round Table. I hesitated. At the sar;e moment Tcaught_sight of me, and without a word got up from the table andushered me out of the door. He looked into my eyes and told me to geithe hell out of it. I did as I was told. It was his way of paying me Urc[.

I had made a point, in my early days, of walking through certainareas.-of Portadown, at a regular time, contrary to all-trainin!, in orderto build up an image of someone who shourd be th"re - """""ttto"g[i]4qltpryg4 +f only qhrase in an lrish accentwas,There you

";;;;;;;which I'd deliver with a canny nod. I changed my appeaiance *.r"".itimes, but I never stopped going out in lhe streets, listeninj, andwatching. I learned how to blend in with my surroundings.

I-t- didn't, however, alyay-s work to my advantage, I recall only toowell another of the bombs that went offin the Tuniel area <furini mytour. A patrol of the GreenHowards was.ghosting'down Obins S#eei,moving-from doolway to dogIwqy, opening andllosing the gaps be_tween them, moving nlst I llock of hats, just under tfre Urijge. Th"lrovisionals were sitting- behind the flats, looking down thJ alley.They _watched the frrst soldier come thrcugh, waitel a few moment"s,then detonated a directional bomb behind 6rire cormgated iron at themoment they expected the second soldier to go past. F-ortunately theirtiming.was-arrry. Nonetheless there *ar a-fi""ce explosion - ind animmediate follow-up from Mahon Road, and the police station.

I heard what had happened and went to the scene at once, scrambl-ing down the railway embankment and round the back of the houses.So I approached the scene from behind. I could see the crowd millinjround under the streetlight, kfpt back by soldiers in uniform. I was, aiusual in civilian clothes._I-wallied quietiy up to the taped<ffarea, andmingled amo{rg

_the $publicans, keeping my ear open fo, "rry

*-oorsp€ to who might have done the bombing, meanwhile straining my neck,like everyone else to see what was hapftning in the co"donedatrarea. '

_ I managed to squeeze towards the front, thanks to the movement ofthe- crowd. And it just happened that a Military police NCO fromY*pl Road Camp was wilking past, who recognised me. Withoutthinkinghe smacked his boot in, gave me atremeri<loue saluteandeaid'Goo-d evening,_sir.' N,o sooner had'he done it, than he realis€d h6;;;;his face crumpled and he quickly marched oit. t i" t"*:"*p"a o""r trrJcordon, rushep last the nolice and the forensic people a"a ais.ppe.""dup-the tlrnnel as fast as my legs could carry me until I reached thesafety of-the police station. It was often the very absurdity ofwhalhappened that made me realise just how close tragedy and farce hajbecome in this war. If any of the scenes I remember"besi epitomises the

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66

pathos and absurdity, and yet the stubbornees ofthe people involved, itis that of the Chalet Bar, in Portadown.

The offrcial name of the Chalet Bar was the Shamrock Club, whichstood on the corner of Mahon Road, the main route from portadown toArmagh, opposite the stock car racing stadium. It was a Catholicfinanced pub in the heart of a Protestant area, and in the whole time Iwas there I think it operated as a business for two two-week periods.Otherwise, it was either standing in ruins or being rebuilt, the pro-testant bombers favourite target.

I had none of the RUC's reticence in dealing with the UVF and UDAboys, and whenever I had reason to believe the Chalet was going to beattacked, I did my best to stop it. But it seemed fate was against me. Onone occ-asion the tip--offI had received was red hot - the bar was goingto be blown up the same night. I went down to Mahon Road to try andar"-ang_e-an ambush. But it was just my luck that the Regiment in-stalled there was the Duke of Edinburgh's Royal Regiment, and theCaptainl hadto deal with, Adam W. wasthe same manwho, as aMIOin his previous tour had tried to break into the RUC SB files inPortadown, which had led me to be interposted to the area. Thesesoldiers were only in Mahon Road to reorganlse before they went home,{nge -they had been iirvolved in a horrific incident at the range aiB_allykinla, when sixteen of their number had been blown up in theNAAFI there. So it was predictable that Adam W. now back wittr trisbattalion would be reluctant to take them out to defend a Catholic bar.Nor-retheless, that was his duty. But when I requested a unit to lay theambush, Adam W. refused. And, sure enough, that night the Ciraletwas blown up - needlessly - and the bombers went free, to strike again.

But I'm happy to say this wasn't always the case. On another occa-gton, I got the tip-off that a Double Diamond keg bomb had beenhidden in a desert€d house in Edgarstown, a staunchly protestantarea, and was determined some effective action should be taken. TheChalet Bar was just nearing completion, yet again, and it seemed theobvious target. I duly got in touch with the Army and asked for anambush party. And again my request was declin-ed since they wereappalently_too busy with other matters. But I was determined to carrytbis through, so I got hold of a Signals officer who worked at BrigadiHQ - a non--combatant who was eager to see some action and whJhadoffered to assist me if ever I was ihort handed. I told him now hischance had come.

We sat in a car parked at the entrance to the stock car stadium forfour nights, slumped in the seats, dozing fitfully and very cold. By thenmy colleague had had enough, and decided to go back to his otherdr'.ties., On the next night I saw a vehicle approach-The Chalet - like anold fashioned green post offrce van - veryilowly, with no lights on. Itwent^through Mahon Road, reversed and parked outside thJbar. I gotout of the car v-ery quietly, carrying my sub-machine gun, and pulltacross the roof. TVo men climbed out of the van, and as I expected,

67

began manhandling the Double Diamond keg across the forecourt.They got to the entrance - one returned to the van, the other lit a matchfor the fuse. I shouted across the road -'If you light that fuse, you're adeai man. If you walk away or pull a weapon, Itll shoot you anyway.'Suddenly the van started up and swerved offdown Mahon Road. Tireman by the kegwas left shrieking afterhis mate,'Don,t leave me, don,tleave me you bastard!'And then he promptly burst into tears. I wentacross and anested him.

So, on-that ocrasion at least the Chalet Bar was saved. The offender,never brought to court, began a new life as an informer. It says a lot forthe determination of the Catholic owners that they continued to re-build, and try to function as a business.

Just before Christmas, 1974, at about five in the afternoon, I waedriving down Mahon Road back into town, and as I neared the junction,immediately to 1nf riSht I saw three figures jump down from a van,leap over the wall to the bar and disappear. ttrl building was just nearto completio! once more. I swerved violently off the road, nearlycausing a multiple pile-up, and parked across the pavement. I leapedout, ready to go in alone. But, as I turned and lookedup the road I saw ao-atrol of soldiers coming towards me - all loaded up with Christmass_hopping, including the odd fir tree - though still with their rifles, asthey were just coming offduty. They should have been more alert totheir own security. I rushed up to them furiously, but there was no timeto give them a bollocking. I simply said'Chalet Bar - three men overthe wall! Come on!'The Corporal turned to his men, ordered them to{rop all the shopping and follow me. But the men protested - ,No, nothat's a present for the wife!' and so on. I lost my tLmper then, cailedthem a shambles and told one man to stay with the stuhwhile the restdeployed to the bar.

We reached the wall, got over quietly, then inched towards thebu']ding._We could hear the sound of voices inside. I gave the signaland we all rushed in through the open doorways. There were the threemen, sitting oq the floor, playing cards. They threw their arms up ato_nce, and stood there quivering. 'Don't shoot! Don't shoot!'I shouted,'Who are you?' and the answer came back -'We're working here -we've come to put the windows in.'And so they had. Apparently, theforeman alone had.the key to the gate, and rather than sit *.iti.tgoutside, theyhad decided to come overthe wall. We checkedtheir storythrough, and mumbling apologies, went back into the snow. The oli'-ended soldiers smiled smugly at me.

It took me some time to live that one down - but the most bizarreincident at the Chalet didn't involve me directly, and at least provedthat the Army weren't totally indifferent to its fate. Though, onceagain, perhaps discretion might have proved the better part . . .

It was a similar scenario. The bar almost complete. But this time, itwas two o'clock in the morning. A particular old man I shall only refer

68

to as Sam (to spare his blushes, rather than to protect-him-from anyviolence) had been out drinking in Portadown, and was heading uptheArmaetr road on his way back-to his smallholditg. e" he allproached

M"ftofr Road, he felt a dlsperate need to empty his bowels' He caught

sight of the dark, empty building on his-right, and reckoned that would

bias good a place aiany, given hissudden need. He would at leagt be

shelteied, and more than likely, frnd a peice of sacking or something to

clean himself up with.What Sam didn't know was that a patrol had gone in a few hours

before, after we had received another tip+ffthat the Protestants were

ioing'to blow the place up. Ttre soldiers had settled in round thef,uiliing, inside the wa[, but had grown so tired and numb withwaitingtiheyhad all fallen asleep. Thismay soundhardto credit, but ithappeied rlguhrly with men who had been on a hard tour, and were

o"d6""a to [eep watch for too long at a stretch. More difficult tounderstand is how sam managed to wend his way into the chalet Barwithout waking any of them. But he did. And there he squatted, in adark corner, rel-ieving himself on the concrete floor. But unfortunately,there was no sign of iry sacking or paper, anddrunk as he was, he hadquite forgotten-to prepar,e himself beforehand. So Sam lit a match tosee what he could find.

Shortly before he did rltl' one of the soldiers stirred, at last, at the-

sound co'ming from the bar. f,Ie woke the man next to him - and ofcourse, they iecided instantly that this must be the bombers. Instead ofwaking up-the rest of the seAion, these two crept forward; and as theygot level withthe door sam struckhismatch. KnowingthatProtestant[ombers use black powder fuses that hpd to be lit, the two soldiersopened frre.

The rest of the squad nearly jumped out of their skins, assumed theywere coming undei fire, and let rip in the direction of the shots. Ttre

Chalet Bar-was riddled with bullets, coming through every door and

window. Each man in the patrol had 4 magazines, with 20 rounds ineach - and they let it all go.

Whenthe frring stopped, the two soldiers toldthe Corporal indrargewhat they had seen. The patrol moved in, expecting to frnd-the dead

terroristi lying in the bar. Instead, they found Sam, still alive, stillsquatting with his trousers round his ankles, begging forgiveness'

They got him on his feet and cleaned him up, took him dowl to.th9police stition and made him give a statement. It was at that point -thati was called in. Sam was still in a very bad state of shock - and all he

had been doing was trespassing when the Army had oPgned fir-e 9ntti*. f he chob to, he could file for a hefty compensation,

-an4 the

reputation of the security forces wouldhardly be enhanced' So I-y3sasked to talk to him to Lxplain what had happened. In fact, all-hewanted to do was to go home and try to forget about it. And, over a tewvery sweet cups of tea, this is what I encouraged him to do' He took his

69

leave of me, still shaking and vowing that he would never have a shit'anywhere but in his own house ever again, safe in his own toilet' withthe door firmly shut.

So the Chalet Bar became a victim once again, though this time moreby accident than design, and the plaiterers moved in to frll the pogk-marks, the windows anddoorswere installed. I believethatlater intheseventies, it did actually open for some time, so the determination of itsowners was justly rewarded.

One of the most farcical of my recollections occurred one afternoon inCraigavon. I was driving through typical Irish weather: pouring rain,visibility down to a few yards. As I came to a large culvert I could see qlot of activity by the side of the road, where a big van was parked, witha gang ofmen acting suspiciously around it. I pulled in at once, and got

out of the car, w'ith my gun at the ready. I approached the men slowlythrough the rain, almost certain that they were involved in some kindofterrorist activity, since there had been 80 much in that area at thattime. When I reached them, I saw I was right to think they were actingsuspiciously - they were loading a steamroller, that had been left idleat some roadworks, into the back of the van, in order to transport itelsewhere and sell it. I had no option but to arregt them. But I couldn'thelp laughing. It took me back to Ashford, and the Securicor vanoutside the high street bank.

I made use of the independence the job offered me in the field, and Iwas aware that my colleagues at Brigade HQ in Lurgan remainedill-disposed towards me, for this very reason. But I was alwayg cgnfr-dent that my CO at SMIU Knock would support me and I would havethe weight of ldr Smellie at Lisbum behind me, I had no idea that Iwould be left open to the kind of treatment that was to befall me in thespring of 1975. But then, I was in no position to understandjust whatwas happening behind the scenes. I knew little.about MI5, or therivalry between it and itg sister service, that was to make Ulster yetanother kind oftesting ground.

b71

access to better Intelligence material. The plan was this. p had re-gruitqd a vgry simple young Republican lad, who had recently beenbrought in for questioning by the Army, and intended to use him as aninfrltrator into the local IRA battalion. If at all possible, he would try tomake sure he went south to a training camp in the Republic, and fiomthere he might pass back all kinds of usefuiinformation to the securityforces. The plan seemed somewhat far-fetched, but not that muchmore so than many others I knew had borne fruit.

In fact, the whole project turned out to be an unmitigated disaster,and provided the frrst example of an occasion when I knew thatthrough the covert actions of the British Army, innocent lives were lostin Northern lreland, and those ultimately responsible were neverbrought tojustice.

- P's recruit barely knew what he was really meant to be doing. The

plan was that the Army should conveniently hnd some ammunitlion ina cigarette packet in his bedroom, and young Columba McVeigh, whowas still just seventeen, would go on the run, and try to make-contactyjth-t_hg nrqvisionals. The first part at least went according to plan.the rycJeigh household was raided at dawn gn a September-morning;the soldiers charged straight up to Columb.t t droo* and found th"eammunition, just where their 'source' had apparently told them itwould be - though of course that source was P liimself.'McVeigh dulyescaped.

_ It had been S/Sgt P's intention that the lad would contact a priestfrom a village nearby, whom he suspected was an important link inthe IRA escape route to the south. But here he met his first problem.The suspected priest refused to have anything to do with him - and hehad to seek shelter with another man of the cloth, who had no politicalcunections whatever. Confused and frightened, McVeigh thenwalked openly into Dungannon police station, where S/Sgt P wasbased, to ask him what he should do next. The police were dumb-founded, since he had made sure the lad had gone onto the wanted list,to help build up appearances. And he had to go to some trouble to makesure he was released again, explaining to the embarrassed officerssomething of what he was doing. A week later, an Army patrol pickedhim up, and he was charged with illegal possession of ammunition.

By all accounts, it would have been obvious to the local'boyos'thatMcVeigh wasn't what he had been set up to appear. But he persistedwith his plan. The lad went to court, and as he had been instructed,refused to recognise its jurisdiction: the standard IRA response. Hewas despatched to Crumlin Road jail. And there, inevitably, he wasbadly beaten up by the Provisionals, who knew he was some kind ofplant. Desperately trying to get himself off the hook, he confessed hisinvolvement with the security forces, and promised to give them a listof names of people he knew had been cooperating with the British.

DIRTYTRICKSThe label 'dirty tricks'has been used so widely over recent years that ithas lost much of its original impact. But to me it remains the bestdescription ofwhat I discovered happening in Ireland during the time Iserved there. The phrase refers to the lengths to which t[e securityag_encies are prepared to go, in order to eliminate Irish terrorists, onwhatever soil they may be found. As far as I am concerned there is avery simple law in this: if the forces of the State allow themselves to actwith the same degree of brutal illegality as those they are commandedto defeat, then in a sense they are shown to be losing the battle. For thesuccess in that battle depends, not on purely military victories, but onthe moral ground that those victories are won. There are always goingto be so--called 'grey areas'; and the operations based upon intelhgencework fall, perhaps, into the greyest ofall. But even here, the securityforceS must be seen to act within the law. I have to admit, however, thaiwhile I was a witness to such operations, on my tour I did not feel at thetime that it as my role or duty to try to intervene. I was very muchf1glting on the 'side of the crown' - I saw soldiers, policernen andcivilians callously murdered by the Provisional IRA, ind to a lesserextent, similar crimes committed by the Protestant terror groups.

^ The dirty tricks I am aware of involved allbranches of the securityforces with whom I worked in tg74-75: the Army, the securityagencies MI5 and MI6, and the RUC. They were carried out on botirsides ofthe border and ranged from the professionally disreputable tomurder. In 1973 when StaffSergeant P arrived in Dungannon, to workas thetr'INCOthere, he encountered many ofthe problemsthatlhad inPortadown - and he was never offered the same chances to overcomethem. He was a well built, serious man, who barely got out of the habitof talking aloud in a strong English accent, let alone of frnding his waysubtly through the cracks in the community where he mighi pick upuseful Intelligence. As a result, he quickly became extremely frustra-ted in his work - I was well aware of this, since he moved onto theestate at Craigavon next to my own FINCO Sgt I and I would meet himand his family at weekends.

^-One dly i" the summer of 1g74, P asked me to drive up to LoughShore with him. It was, predictably, a wet gloomy day. We sat in tLecar, and he began to tell me the plan he had originated, which he hopedwould result in successful operations in his area, enabling him to get

72

The Provisionals sent the list out of the jail in a coded letter. It was,as a matter ofcourse, intercepted and decoded - at 3 Infantry BrigadeHQ where I saw it. The list was an absurd fabrication, including asolicitor from Dungannon and a perfectly respectable SDLP politician.But, more absurdly, and yet as it turned out, more tragically, at thehead of the names of the Protestants supposedly involved in hostileactivities, was the McVeigh's milkman, who came from the same partoftown.

S/Sgt P's plan, then, had already failed miserably. But it was too latenow for him to try to undo it. He had let the police release the lad, hehad made sure the Army processed him, he had put him through thecourts and into prison on remand. Now, to make matters worse, inJanuary 1975, McVeigh was only given a suspended sentence, whicheven had there been no doubts before about his authenticity would nowensure that the Provisionals were aware of a plant in their midst - forno one accused of membership and arrest€d on such a charge had beenreleased in this way. More frightened and confused than ever,Columba McVeigh fled south to Dublinwith hisbrother, knowingthat,in effect, he had openly been branded an informer, despite the fact thathe had had nothing to inform anybody of, and had all along been set upby S/Sgt P. The lad disappeared without trace.

One can only assume that the release, which Father Dennis Faul hascalled 'tantamount to a death sentence' led to his subsequent executionby the IRA. But McVeigh's is not the only life ruined or lost by S/Sgt P'sactions. On the 11th February 1975 a murder was carried out inPomeroy, a village just outside Dungannon. The intended target wasthe milkman on McVeigh's list of names. However, the man concernedwas not on his usual round that day. Another Protestant - ChristopherMein, twenty nine years old, and only recently married - had taken iton, on that particular morning, as relief roundsman. The hovisionalskilled him, thinking he was a member of the UVF. In fact, he had nopolitical connections at all. An innocent man had been murdered.

The whole incident appalled me, as it did the local police - for if myrelations to the RUC hadbeenfrostywhenl firstarrived inPortadwon,as far as the RUC in Dungannon were concerned S/Sgit P might justhave well not existed after Mein was shot. In fact, it was not long beforehe was posted: the police began their own investigation into what hadhappened. However, no charges were ever laid at P's feet - he stillseryes intheArmy.

In fairness to S/Sgt P, the plans he had executed were conceived inheadquarters 3 Brigade's Intelligence Offrce and he was merely a toolof the staffofficers there who had no experience of the situation on theground. So that his career would not suffer, 3 Brigade created a post ofFINCO in their own headquarbers and it was to there that the S/Sgtwas posted after the debacle. He is currently serving in the IntelligenceCorps as a commissionedoffrcer.

It was S/Sgt P back in March 1974 who also gave me my first insightinto some of the crtss-border operations which, far from being simpleexcursions in search of Intelligence, involved both attempted kid-napping, and straightfonn'ard political assassination.

TWo loyalists - ex-boxers - wene being hired by the Army to crossthe border, to kidnap a wanted man living in County Monaghan:Eamonn McGurgan, a known Republican. Some days later, I came intoBrigade HQ to frnd everyone running around like scalded cats, tryingto get 9500 of unattributable funds sent from Lisburn because themoney to pay the boxere had failed to arrive. Eventually, the fundscame through. And the kidnap attempt was echeduled to go ahead, justas Tony Phadtoldme.

In order for this to happen, the area around McGurgan's house had tobe frozen, in other words, someone from the other side of the borderhad to ensure that there would be no police presence for as long as theoperation went on, in that part of County Monaghan. This had beenduly arranged, with a contact in t,Le Garda. The boxere would go over,knock McGurgan unconscious, tie him up with a sack over his head anddump him at a specific spot back across the border. A squad of soldierson patrol would then conveniently find him and he would be arrested.

Like the planwith ColumbaMcVeigh, this one too wentbadly awry.On the particular night in question, a member of Seanad Eireann,Senator Billy Fox, was shot near Castleblayney. The Garda contactcould no longer guarantee that the area would be 'Frozen'. But themessage came through too late to stop the Ioyalists leaving for thesouth. They were halted at a joint Irish Army-Garda checkpoint, setup to catch Senator Fox's murderers and the mission was aborted.

Undeterred, 3 Infantry Brigade HQ persisted with its kidnappingpolicy. On 29 March 1974, just two weeks later, another mission wagset up. And just as before, the Garda were involved. TVo Republicans,Seamus Grew and Patrick Mcloughlin were the intended victims ofthis second kidnap attempt-eightyearsbefore Grew methis death atthe hands of the RUC Special Unit, Echo Four Alpha, the unit JohnStalker was investigatingwhenhe was discr€dited and suspended.

On this occasion, three Ircyalists from Lieburn were to be used. Theirringleader was another ex-boxer, called Jimmy O'Hara. A NCO fromPortadown briefed them on the operation, and provided maps andphotographs of the area around Grew's house near the town ofMonaghan. He also gave them a eketch plan showing where the vic-tims should be dumped acrose the border. The fee, once again, was setat €500.

Again, the operation went wrong. Despite the careful briefrngs atthe Woodlands Hotel in Lisburn, and at a favourite spot for suchaffairs, the Craigavon Hospital car park, the kidnappert were so

clumsy when it came to it, they got themselves anested. Neighbours,

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near Grew's house, saw them actingsuspiciously andcalledthe Garda.TVo of them were taken at once to the local police station. O'Hara,positive that the police knew all about the kidnap and had simplymade a mistake, then walked in as bold as brass to demand the releaseof his colleagues. He too was arrested. And he learned the hard waythat nothing in the Intelligence world is as it seems, and just becauseone's contact had been able to clear their entry to the area, it didn'tmean that he could do anything to prevent their apprehension if theywere stupid enough to get caught. O'Hara, however, was not preparedto take this lying down. And in subsequent interviewe he did nothesitate to refer to the British Army as having set up the wholejob, andthough he refusedto name him, he repeatedlytalkedofanEnglishmanwho had briefed him, and whom he had regularly met in Lisburn. Infact, even if he had named him, it wouldn't have helped, since the NCOhad always used a pseudonym in his dealings with the kidnappers.

As it turned out, the gang were jailed for five years each at theDublin Special Criminal Court in June that year. Ttrey all appealed,and had their sentences increaeed to seven years. The severity ofthesentences showed some degree of concern on the part of the Irishauthorities - but it didn't stretch to any investigation of the Garda'srole at the time. And since, two years later, another Republican, SeanMcKenna was aMucted successfully across the borderfromthe villageof Dentubber, near Dundalk, it was clear that although the trialtemporarily halted this kind of activity, it still went on.

I know for a fact that these kidnaps were originally plotted fromBrigade HQ, Lurgan andthatCaptain D wascentral to theirplanning.That neither of these kidnaps succeeded is not the central iesue. Whatis important is the fact that while the politicians of both countries weretelling their electorates one thing about their security forces'activities, they were colluding in the encouragement of those eamesecurity forces to break their own domestic laws and those of anothercountry.

The involvement of the Army with Protestant terorists has beendenied olfrcially on many occasions. And one of the drief lines ofsupport for these denials lies in the fact that so few hotestants havecome forward, like Jimmy O'Hara, and been prepdred to point thefinger. However, I have spoken to several others, who quite under-standably fear publicity and the wrath of authority, who allowedthemselves to be persuaded it was their duty to 'help' the securityforces, and who committed crimes of which they are now deeplyashamed.

It is not my place to break their confrdence and put them unnecess-arily at risk. However, there are a number of operations which havealready come under public scrutiny and which, therefore, I feel free toshed further light on. A number ofthese operations centred round anSAS troop based at Castledillon- andparticularly CaptainNairac, hisO.C. and his Sgt. Major.

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The stories about Robert Nairac's behaviour are legion - and histemerity in wandering into a pub in Crossmaglen to mingle with thelocals on the night of his death in L977 is now something of a legend.But what, exactly, Robert was doing in Ireland has never been ade-quately explored. Those with whom I have had contact were in nodoubt that it was the same man who was invblved in briefing them onoperations they were to carry out against Republican targets. Ifthis istrue, Robert was at the heart of the'dirty tricks'campaign. He wouldcome into my offrce at Mahon Road quite often, to try to glean whatIntelligence he could from me. The SAS troop were later to workdirectly with the Special Branch - but at this time, he knew it wasquite likely I could tell him things he might not hear elsewhere.Besides, we knew he was keen to take over my MIO's role in the areawhen my tour was finished - and I in turn was not uninterested in theidea of gleaning from him what the requirements for joining the SASwere. So we wene often in conversation.

My personal memory of how quick he might be to shoot at anunidentified target fortunately turned out to be one ofthose incidentswhere there was an element of force, and no life was lost. This is instark contrast to the other vivid recollection I have of him, where if Iwas to believe what he told me, quite the opposite had occured.

On the frrst occasion, I was trying to find someone to drive a car to theedge of a very sensitive Republican area, and stay with it while I wentin with Bunny Dearsldy and Sgt. I to check on an arrns cache. I wasspeaking to Robert in my office, and he told me that his troop had justbeen sent some very good new radios, and he was looking for anopportunity to try them out. He suggested that he, along with B andSergeant Mqior H drive us where he wanted to go, and keep in touchwith us with these new transceivers. I agreed and so the operationwent ahead. I was duly wired up with my own set: an intricate littlesystem with a tinyearphone, and aerial which ran down one armtapedto the wrist, a highly sensitive throat mike and a small box tapedacross the chest. Another wire ran down the other arm to a Presselswitch, which was taped, loose to the palm, like a bell button which oneused when one wanted to transmit. One only had to whisper, so wewere informed and the radio would operate for up to a mile.

There was no visible sign of the apparatus and no squelch; it wasdesigned to function in exactly the kind ofsituation we were going into.Bunny, Sgt. I and I left the car in a small lane behind a wall, and set offtowards a small compact estate, about a quarter of a mile away. Wecrept along a hedgerow and made a dogleg back to the spot we wantedto check. We did what we had to, without any trouble. And then we tooka separate, pre-planned route back to the car.

But we had been there longer than we had meant to be, and Nairachad got worried. He had left the car with their Sergeant Mqjor, andcome to the wall, to peer across the field, to see if they could spot us,since neither ofus had used the radio thus far. I could see them peering

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over the wall as I made my way quietly along the hedgerow, withBunny and Sgt. I some way behind me. [t was clearly time to test outtheir new piece of equipment.

I turned on the radic, using the switch in my palm. The frrst thing Iheard was Nairac's voice -'Watch out! Tony - over there! Can't bethem. Must be the bloody IRA. Get a bead on them, quick!'I whisperedinto the mike -'It's alright Robert, it's Fred. We're coming out.'

There was no answer, Instead I heard Nairac's voice once more,through the tiny earphone. 'Right. Ihere's more than one, you ooverthe hedge.' Once more I pressed the switch and tried to transmit. 'It'salright, Robert, it's us. We're just coming out.'

And still there was no response. I stepped out from the hedgemwalmost certain I was going to be fired at, but still not daring to shout ordraw attention to myself, in such a sensitive area. As I desperatelytried to line the aerial up, since I thought that this must be theproblem, again Iheard Nairac's voice in my ear-'LooklThere's one outin the field! What the hell's he playing at - bloody windmills?' For I wasstanding there now, with arms outstretched, franticaly trying to lineup the aerial on arm and all the while whispering into the highlysensitive mike'Robert! Robert! It's Fred!'

It was only when I actually heard Nairac and B agree to shoot methat I gave up on the radio and shouted across the field -'For Christ'ssake, don't shoot, don't bloody shoot!'And, immediately they realisedwhat had happened. By then, Bunny had caught up with me, and Iexplained to him how I had tried to use the radio andhow ithad nearlycost me my life. We both ripped the wires offin disgust, and rejoinedthe others -knowingthat notonly could we have become easy targetsfor anyone on the estate, but that we could quite easily have died at thehands ofour own people.

But we survived. John Francis Green was not so lucky. In January1975, Robert Nairac came into my office. The conversation hrrned to aparticular killing that had taken place, across the border, in CountyMonaghan. On loth January John Franics Green, the Provisional IRAcommander in North Armagh, had been repeatedly shot at an isolat€dfarmhouse belonging to an IRA sympathiser named Gerry Carville.1he killing had been carefully planned, and whatever Intelligencesouroe was used had been highly reliable, as Green had only visited thefarm at short notice. The initial suspicion was that he had died as aresult of some ihternal feud - though this seemed unlikely, since Greenwas a local hero after his escape from the Maze in 1973. The RUC laterput out the theory that he had been killed by a Protestant from thenorth called Elliot, a deranged man with no political motive, but whobelieved his brother had been killed at Carville's farm, and had come toshoot the old farmer instead. Yet they were later to admit that one ofthe IRA men in Eire who worked as an informer for them, and who hadbeen the last person to see Green before he left for the farm, had been

77

hunriedly 'relocated' once he had fled his home shortly after themurder.

I can only relate that Robert Nairac said quite plainly that he hadbeen involved in the killing. He then produced a photograph of thedead man, lying in his own blood - a colour Polarcid, showing Green'ecorpse, with a black uncurtained window in the background. I took thephotograph from him and asked ifl could keep it. I was a keen collectorof all such memorabilia, so that I could maintain the fullest possiblerecord of what happened in Ireland during my tour. Nairac seemednone too happy with thie. But he did not ask for it back. I put it in mydrawer and asked him to go on with his story.

He told me that he had killed Green, together with two other men,who I assumedwere S/SgtB and theSergeantMajor, astheyworkedasa team. They had crossed the border without interference, and drivendown the country road to Gerry Carville's farm. They knew Carvillewould leave at a specific time. This he did. One man stayed with the carwhile the other made their way stealthily to the house. They could seeGreen through the window. They waited for their moment, kicked inthe door, and then emptied their guns into his body. I had no reaeon todisbelieve what Nairac told me, any more than the Protestant terror-ists who have since admitted they met him, and liaised with him oversuch activities. What made me certain that he knew what he wastalking about was that when the evidence emerged from the Gardainquiry it tallied closely with Nairac's account. Witness€s did indeedreport seeing an unknown car in the area that night, a white Audi orMercedes, with three men in it. Carville stat€d that he always left hisfarm at that particular time of day to tend to a neighbour's cow. Thewindow was uncurtained, the door had been kicked in, and forensicexperts were able to say that two guns were used in the murder -probably a Luger, and a Star automatic pistol.

There have been many twists and turne to this particular story. Ithas been said that Captain Nairac invented his participation in themurder. It has also been suggested that the Polaroid picture was not asI describe it, and that the only picture of Green's corpse in exist€nceshows that the blood from his wounds had congealed, and that therewas no dark window in the background. Finally, it has been claimedthat the rveaporut used were, in fact, not those at frrst identifred ashandguns, and the link that I have traced through one ofthose wea-pons to Captain Nairac is therefore false.

Those people in the Army who have sought to protect Nairac'sreputation, through the odd means of implying that he tried to takecredit for operations in which he wag not involved, would frrgt have todisprove the allegatione made by the four Protestant extremists withwhom I have had contact. As to the Polariod picture, whose exist€ncehas been doubted - I can only say that I saw it, and gave it to the RUCas evidence, on the understanding that it would be returned, when I

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was cooperating with them on their inquiry into my allegations, in1982. It has never been returned to me, despite many l€quests. TheRUC Chief Constablehasrepeatedlyclaimed it isnot intheinterests ofNational Security to do so (which is remarkable when one considersthat a photo alleged to be mine wag offered to journalists by a seniorRUC officer in charge ofthe inquiry into my allegations in 1987, with asmear story attached). Whenever the matter has been raised on otheroccasions, a different picture has been produced, in which the pool ofblood under Green is indeed congealed, and there is no dark window toprove the shot was taken at night. This picture is not the one I gave tolne nUC. Nor can mine be explained away as one of the Garda's'sceneof crime' photos. The Irish police travelled up from Dublin the nextmorning, and used standard black and white film' Both they, .ttd th"-RUC, k-ept well clear of the farmhouse during lhe night, for fear ofbooby traps. So whoever took the photograph given to me by CaptainNairac had to have been at the farmhouse shortly after the killing.Robert told me the picture was his and I still believe that'

As far as the weapons are concerned, I am no forensic expert. But I do

know that during 1975 the RUC were given evidence that linked themurder of John Francis Green conclusively to a number of killings inthat period, carried out by Protestant extremists associated with theIIVF. trtris evidence concerned the Star automatic pistol which wasfound at the Carville farmhouse. With the Garda's cooperation a scien-tist attached to the forensic staffat the RUC called Norman T exam-ined the cartridges left at the ecene of four such murders, committedbetween 19?3 and 1976. And in each case they were identical to thoseleft at the scene ofthe Green assaesination.

The most horrific of these outrages became known as the MiamiShowband killings. And the evidence suggests that Captain Nairacwas involved in this episode also. In July 1975, a gang of UVF vol-unteers set up a checkpoint in South Down, dressed as UDR soldiers.The Showband's van was stopped. Two of the UVF men then tried to setup a bomb in the back of the vehicle, and killed themselves, when thedevice exploded prematurely. The others in the gang then opened frreon the Catholic musicians, and killed three of them:

The frrst I knew personally of the atrocity was when my kit wasreturned to me in England after I had been removed from the province.In among my stulf was a letter from Captain V of the Royal Engineers,who took over my work temporarily. He told me that there had beensome 'good news'. At the scene of a sectarian murder a severed arm hadbeen discovered, with the Red Hand of Ulster tattooed upon it - itbelonged to a well known UVF man called Hanis Boyle, and'everyonewas delighted'that he had blown himself up. He never mentioned theMiami Showband incident by name, but I later discovered, this waswhat he was refening to. I also stumbled over fresh evidence, whichmade me suspect that there was a lot more to the murders than theauthorities wanted people to believe.

79

First of all, the same Star automatic pistol turned up again - and thekiiling was therefore indissolubly linked with that of John FrancisGreen. But there were also rifles involved on this occasion. And thesewere traced back to an arms theft from the UDR centre in Portadown,in 1973. I knew a lot about those rifles. I was informed by one of mysources in 1975 that there was a sizeable weapons cache hidden underthe courtyard ofa farm outside Portadown. After failing to get assis-tance from the RUC, and after the SAS had aborted a clandestinereconnaissance mission, I asked for an RAF plane equipped with aspecial reconnaissance system to fly over the area, and take a threemile long linear photo - so that if the weapons were, indeed, hidden onthe farm, I would be able to find exactly where. This system had beenused on several occasions in Ulster very successfully.

The aeroplane's scan on this occasion pinpointed very accuratelywhere the arms were hidden: on the property of a wealthy hotestant. Iwent immediately to consult with Sergeant R. I was asked to leave thematter with him, because of the political implications and I was quitehappy to do so. There were some sixty rifles, and a number of submachine guns, and it was presumed they were being hidden until theday when the province finally plunged into civil war, whenthey wouldbe brought into use by the new Protestant army. The Special Branchwere monitoring the situation, and would take action at the approp-riate time.

Whatever the reasons given, the weapons were never moved fromthe farm outside Portadownby anofficial body. Butsomeofthose rifleswere used at the scene of the Miami killings, and it is barely con-ceivable that they could have left the cache without the RUC beingaware of it. And given Nairac'g close and confrdential operationalassociation with Portadown Special Branch prior to my removal fromthe province a link seems probable.

There are other suspicious aspects ofthe case. The bomb used wascollected from a farmhouse near Glenane - a house which BritishArmy Intelligence men were known to frequent, and on occasions moveexplosives through. All this suggests that the Special Branch and theSAS worked closely with the Protestant terorrists at this time. Fur-thermore, I have evidence in my possession about the deaths ofvariouspersons who were'involved in undercover work, under suspiciouscircumstances, suggesting implication by the Security Forces. Thecarnage of the Miami Showband killings shocked the British public -but if they had thought their own soldiers were involved, I wonder howthey would have reacted? For my own part, I believe quite firmly thatcormption was rife in the RIJC years before John Stalker came upagainst it, and his investigation merely scraped the surface, before hewas deliberately and methodically smeared, and suspended from duty.

The Frotestant terrorist I have referred to frequently inthe course ofthese events is a man by the name of Jackson. He *as at the heart of

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UVF activity in my area, along with three brothers from anotherProtestant family,

-and a close friend of theirs, 'Aberdeen' Knox

-Young, Sergeanl R's personal source within the terrorist grolP' I gangive a detailed example here of a deliberate case of miscarried justice,

ior which the Portadown special Branch must tie required to give anadequate answer.

On a Saturday afteraoon in 1974 I was sitting in a Q car onobservation worli, with Detective Constable A of the Special Branch.As usual, the rain was persistent, but on this oocasion the weather wasno mere Lackdrop to what happened, but an integral part of the-caee'We were specifrcally looking out for a young man called Wilfie Cum-mings. ttiifather trad contacted Sergeant R to tell him that CummingshadTallen in with tenoriets, and that if we could frnd any good reason

to pick himup, thenwe shoulddo so' Wehadtracedthe ladtoahouse inEd-garstown - tE Margaret Street l and hqd made frequent patrolsthr6ugh the area. I had also searched the houseg a{acent a1d- hadfoundln old 38 revolver in one of them which I had pulledout with mygrappling hook and handed in to Special Branch. On these earlierco"iit pat"ols I had noticed a beige Morris Oxford Pa+{ oulsi$enumbei 18 which did not belong in the area. Since I had aleo heard of a

bomb - ready to be used - hidden in Edgarstown, I was fairly certainsomething was going to happen. When a blue Maxi drove paet carryinga number-of UVF men, includiRg Stuart and'Aberdeen'Knox-Young,my certainty increased.

We followed the car to The Golden Hind, the meeting place of theProtestant extremists. I then arranged for the Army to drive a HumberAmoured 1 ton vehicle, known as a'Pigi', down to The Golden Hind,park it nearty and photograph all the people coming oui q-t tfe e-nd ofihe lunchtime drinking session. By half-paet three I had all the photo-graphs in my possession and ran a check on them, telgxryS !o Belfastind going tlir6ugh the Special Branch frles. We soon had a list of themenln the car and the others they had been with at the pub. Some weresuspected bombers from Belfast. I was convinced the good old Chaletbar would be the target that evening.

I stayed up late that Saturday night at Mahon Road Camp - butnothing happened, so I went home to bed. It wasn't until I arrived at thepolice Jtatioir the next morning that I realized it wasn't a bombing we

ihould have expected. A sectarian murder had taken place, involvingthe same car, the same men, and the house in Margaret Street. And we

had missed it.Gerald Creaney and Patrick Duffr were two Catholic lads from

Portadown who had been out to a dance in Lurgan. On their way home

along the main road they had accepted a lift from two men' Theyassumey' the two men were Republicans as they had talked ab-out anacquaihtance of theirs who had earlier go! into a frst-frght with-somehotestants and how it would be a good idea to try and waylay a

81

'Pmddie'that night and beat him up to get revenge. The lads agreedand the two men drove into Edgarstown andparked at adark spot nearthe Golden Hind. Immediately the two Catholics were jumped on andgiven a beating. Creaney managed to get away and alert both his andDuft's family, but Duftwas not so lucky.

When Duffu's parents brought their son's friend to the police station,the police were very sceptical abouthis storyandreactedwith adegreeof sectarian bias. Eventually they agreed to take Creaney back toEdgarstown. They found the blue Maxi he described - but not where heaescriH it. It was parked outside 18 Margaret Street. It had beenpouring with rain all that day but the car was not only sitting onbricks, with the wheels off and the battery removed, there was acompletely dry patch of ground beneath it, indicating to them that ithad not been moved. They concluded that Creaney was a liar, droveback to the station, and sent him home.

As soon as I noted the registration number in the duty book on theSunday moraing, I told the Duty Inspector that this was the car I hadseen drive into Portadownthe previous lunchtime carryingthe Youngbrothers and some known heavy characters from Belfast. I phonedSergeant R and a CID Inspector M to tell them what had happened.Then I drove down to Margaret Street. The flrrst thing that struck mewas that the Blue Maxi was parked on the identical spot to the onewhere, on every day for the previous week, I had seen the MoIrisOxford. I immediately went looking for the other car and found itpushed onto a derelict site nearby. It became apparent to me that oneiar had simply been moved and t,Le other put in its place, so thatwhoever had done it could claim the Maxi had been there all the time.

Creaney's story was then taken seriously. 18 Margaret Street wasraided. A search was mounted for the lad Dufr, and he was almostimmediately found dead in a freld outside the town. I got hold of thephotogaphl taken the day before and Bunny, Sgt. I and myself took-copies

to Aldergrove Airport, Larne and Belfast docks, briefrng thepolice that they should be arrested if they tried to leave the country.Witn ail the relevant information at their disposal I expected to hear,eventually, that the right people had been prosecuted. And, sureenough, in due course I heard that this had happened, and went to see

Sergeant R in his oftice. There I found him with two detectives, D'C. AandD.C. B, and a third I didn't know. They told me a long and involvedstory ofhow, on the night inquestion, there hadbeen somekindoforgyat 18 Margaret Street in which two fifteen-year-old girls were in-volved. (They didn't tell me one was the daughter of an RUC man.)Duffu had been kidnapped, dragged into the house and tied up. He hadbeen stabbed and otherwise abused before being shot dead. When thepolice had been led to the blue Maxi by Creaney, they had, in fact,Lnocked at the door ofthe house. It was opened by none other thanWilfre Cummings, who told them the people in the house were having a

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party and had neither seen nor heard anything unusual. The policehad not gone in.

Sergeant R went further in describing what had happened. Hedepicted Duffu's killing as some kindof ritualistic murder. He gave methe names of those involved (who, it later transpired, were well knownin the community to have committed the crime), and told me theywould all be prosecuted. But he asked me if I would mind not turningup to give evidence at the trial, as the affair was cut and dried as far asthey were concerned and they wouldn't need me. I was quite happy togo along with this. I thought that the RUC wanted to come out as theones who had put it all together and had no reason to want to stealwhatever kudos they might gain - especially since they would be seento be prosecuting Loyalist terrorists. I put the matter out of mind.

It was with utter astonishment that I learned, some years later, thattwo prosecutions had beenbrought one againstWilfre Cummings, andanother against a lad I had only vaguely heard of, called Clarke. Thiswas the first I knew of anyone suggesting Cummings and Clarke hadcarried out the murder. Cummings had certainly been about at thetime - it had happened in the house he was living in - but I knew for afact that he was at best an accessory to the crime. Even more aston-ishing, however, was the conviction given to young Clarke. From hisparents I learned that all he had done was to walk past the car used inthe murder when it returned to Edgarstown. Those inside handed himthe gun used and told him to get rid ofit - or else.

Clarke and Cummings have served fourteen years in prison for themurder of Duft in 1975. Contact has been made with them on anumber ofoccasions and with their parents, to try and encourage themto prove their innocence and have the guilty parties prosecuted, butthey have always declined. Quite why they should do so needs littleexplanation. If they were prepared to go down in the first place, to livethrough the pain and disorientation ofsuch sentences in orderto shieldthe men who carried out the crime, then they are unlikely to comeforward now to clear their names and risk their safety and that of theirfamilies to do so - especially as it must have been obvious to them thatthere was collusion by the RUC.

Neither of these men has approached me on the matter. At the timeof writing this book, Wilfre Cummings had come before the paroleboard with a view to being released. I know that on his medical recordsubmitted to the board, a reference was made to the fact that he mightwell have been innocent of Duffy's murder, and that this ghould betaken into account. This particular reference was immediately deletedby the authorities.

The most unpalatable aspect of this whole case was that the guiltymen subsequently made no secret of their involvement and used toboast openly that they had got away with it. TWo ofthe Youngbrotherswere also implicated in the murder. ('Aberdeen'Knox-Young saw fit

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to e-xtend his evening's pleasures by having intercouree with one of theunder-age girls present at 18 Margaret Street that evening.)

One might ask how this kind of perversion ofjustice can be allowedto lupp"g in asupposedlyjust society. It is a questions that should,perhaps, be addressed to the Chief Constable oftne nUC himself. Hemight be able to encourage those members ofthe force involved to comeforwa$ and e_lplain their actions. They might see things differentlynow. I know Wilfre Cummings does. He was prosecuted as a dire&result of the RUC's policy ofprotecting their info-rmers, and has lost theprime of his life for their sake.

- I could gtve many examples of how the law was made a mockery inthe province during this time. Army Intelligence manufactured boguspress cards for undercover work which directly putjournalists' lives atrisk. The Army also canied out burglaries on privle property undersurveillance. I met Captain 'Chubby' L from the Ash?ord courseseveral times in Ulst€r. The targets ofthe raids he led included a houseon the shores of Lough Neagh where it was suspected IRA arms andwanted men were concealed, and at least a doz6n Orange Lodges, insearch of Ioyalist weapons.

I have freely admitted that when I was serving in Ulster, like somany others I did not question these matters in any profound sense.For instance, I remember an occasion when Craig-Smellie askedBunny-and myselftb go to the Kilwilkie estate in Lurlan to carryout apiece of sabotage. we had been inforrred by one of our reliable sourcesthan an active IRA volunteer in the town was going to use one of theweaponshidden in-a graveyard to murder a. policeman the followingSundqV. Smellie asked us to remove the top tiutlets from the ammuniltion clip and bring them to him so that he could arrange to .give thechap a bit of a surprise'. TVo days later he returned Ihem Io us to:repJ?ce the-m.Ihey had been doctored. Instead of normal cordite, theyhad been frlled with detonator explosive. If the IRA man had used themagainst his target he would have blown his own head off.

I wasn't at all certain about this, so I consulted with the Brigadier.Purely because he resented MI6 arrangingthiskindofoperatioi inhisarea, he forbade us to replant the ammunition. I had no sympathy forhis_motive, but for once I was grateful for his actions. tnsteaa ofreplacilg_the ammunition we interfered with the rifle,s firing mech-anism. When the IRA man stepped out to shoot the policema:n therewas a mere click. The Republican pulled the trigger again, and againthere was no shot. He simply turned and ran, teaving lhe RUC ofircerin a state not dissimilar to old Sam in the Chalet Bar-that night._ It might be argued that the potential murderer deserved what Mrsmellie had in mind for him. But that is easy to argue in the abstract. Ihave- to t4*i1, to my shamc, that I was prepared ii the last analysis to4o what I had been ordered. I don't thini it would have u""" por.ilG t"have done the work I did in Ireland with an entirely clean conscience.

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But at least my role as an intelligence gatherer did not involve me inany fatal or wounding operations, nor did it involve me in pervertingthe course ofjustice. However, it did make me only too aware of whatoccurrd around me. In contrast to the precise act of sabotage MrSmellie requested from Lisburn, anottrer act was car.ried out in Octob-er 1974 which I know resulted in another unnecessary death.

My frrst knowledge of the 'Case of the self-+xploding motor cyclist'carne when I went to Brigade HQ in Lurgan anddiscovered Captain D,Captain M the Brigade's explosive! expert, and others of the lntpll-igence staff sitting round guffawing like a lot of schmlboys in thetuck--shop. The big jar of white mints they kept to celebrate suocessesin the freld was being passed round. The killing of Eugene McQuaid -the event being celebrated - had been well planned and intelligencesources in the south were heavily involved. An arms cache had beendiscovered some time previously across the border. Inetrumental inallowing an ordnance expert to cross into County Monaghan and take alook at it, the Garda had also contacted an Irish Army officer with aview to getting him involved: and he claimed that he been given leavefor this approach from a higher authority in both the Eire Army andthe Garda itself. But the officer reported the matter to GHQ in Dublin.A report was then compiled concerning hig role as an undercover agentfor the British - but to no apparent effect. Instead he was later able toarrange for a 'Covert Felix' team from north of the border to go acrossand, rather than simply inspect the cache, to actually interfere with itscontents. (Felix the cat is the symbol of the British Army's ExplosiveOrdnance Disposal teams and is also used by the Intelligence teams).Such teams consisted of a special Ammunition Technical Officers, andusually a senior NCO who worked primarily with the SAS and mem-bers of the RUC Special Branch, or with their counterparts in theIntelligence Corps, depending upon the task required.

On this occasion it was Captain M himselfwho went on the miesion-and carefully sawd through the safety pins inside the rcckets whichhad been found in the IRA cache. These rockets, or bombards as ttreyare more usually known, had already been used by the IRA to attackarmoured vehicles, and had a range ofup to 800 feet. The discovery ofthese 'mobile mines'was quite a coup. However, by sabotaging them inthis fashion, it was quite impossible to predict when or how they wouldexplode: any rough handling would be enough to set them off.

O{'course when Eugene McQuaid was asked to transport thebombards to ttre north on his motorcycle, he could not have known therisk he w_as_taking - though he must have known what the packagecontained. So he set off towards Newry, as arranged - under closesurveillance fi:om the security forces. McQuaid drove quite some waybefore he encountered the checkpoint set up especially for him on theDundalk-Newry roadjust north of the bordir, with thi Armyteam setwell back from the area for their own safety's sake. Mceuaid brakedand turned back towards the Republic. As he did so one of *te looUy-

85

trappedtombards which he had strapped by the bike's petrol tank,exploded. (The detonator was struck by a pin attached

-to a sliding

weight moving on deceleration.)

_ Eugene McQuaid was blown to pieces a hundred yards or so fromDonnelly's Garage. A witness who heard the explosion and came out tosee what had happened was greeted by the sight of the motorcyclist'ssevered head, still encased in his helmet, lyingit the foot of a tree,withblood runnil_rg gently from the nose. Ttre-remains of Meuaid's bodyand motorbike were scattered across the pavement and a freld nearby,and hanging from the tree itself. The witnees described how the Armyteam anived quickly at the spot and one soldier was seen to approachthe severed head, pick up a handful of the dead man's guts, and say,'That's an end of another of you bastards.'

Had McQuaid been intercepted rather than turned into a live bombon his journey north, it is quite likely that he would have been brokenunder intemogation and might haveyielded useful information aboutthe people he was working for. Far more important ie the fact that themotorbike might have exploded on the streets ofDundalk in the south,or in Newry north of the border, where scnres of innocent people mighihave beelr iqiured or killed. There was no possible gua"attt"", otrce-h"had set off, ttrat this wouldn't have happen-ed. yet back at Brigade Hein Lurgan, the white mints were out and Captain D and hiJ cronieiwere congratulating one another.

During 1974 - 5 I was in contact with a senior NCO in the SAS whoworked from the 4 Field Survey Tloop at Castledillon. 'Ginge'with hissmall frame and {ineboned face under a spnout of ginger hair, hadpreviously been working with an SAS unit based at Ballykelly airfield,disguised as a Signals unit. firie troop was known to have been invol-

"-"d i. the case of Sergeant McCormick, RUC, who was drarged with

the murder of his colleague Campbell (one of the few Cattrolic RUCofficers). McCormick was alleged to have ananged for the IRA toattack police and Army crnvoys. McCormick's sour@ claimed duringthe trialg that McCormick himself had taken him, a known IRA man,to the SAS camp at Ballykelly, where he had been given militarytraining. lhe commanding offrcer of the troop at that time still s€rvesin the Army.

In 1984 I received a statement from a colleague ofhis accusing him ofa particularly horrendous and futile crime. This NCO had been taskedto keep surveillance on an old man who was thought to be givingassistance to the IRA. After a week or so of following the man hebecame bored and one night, as the man was returning home from theprrb on hispush-bike theNCO ranhimover inaland-mver. Removingthe lights from the victim's bike, the NCO reported a fatal 'traffrcaccident'. A Coroner's court, attended by the the NCO wearing anordinary regimental, non-SAS uniform, returned a verdict of accidental death, on the grounds that the man had no lights on his bike in

I

86

poor visibility. The NCO gained some notoriety in his unit and wasthereafter referred to as'Genie and his magic lamp'. I attempted togive this statement to the Essex Police who informed me that as thecrime occurred outside their area, it was not their responsibility. As Iknow from bitter experience that the RUC have engaged irr manycover-ups ofthese events, this case apparently will never be investi-gated, even though the informant identifies himself in the stat€ment.

'Ginge's' career in Ireland provides an interesting contrast withanother 'Ginge', Albert 'Ginger' Baker. A Belfast man, Baker was aRanger (Private) in the Royal Irish Rangers and was recruited to workfor Biitish Intelligence in the early 1970's. He claims that he wasbased with the 'Freds', a group variously called the Mobile Reconn-aissance Force and so on. What is known forcertainisthatthe unithadthe initials 'MRF'. They were based in Army married quarters inHollywood barracks in Belfast. Baker claims that he lived in Holly-woodwith his trandler', anexSAS, Parachute Regimentoffrcer. I knowthat this unit existed because one of my fellow students at AsMord toldme while I was serving in Ireland, that he had worked with this unit.

Much has been written about MRF (most of it inaccurate, much of itjust guesswork). It was a prototype SAS undercover unit set up as aresult of Brigadier Frank Kitson's new counter-insurgency theories.MRF consisted of officers with SAS training, a number of NCOs ofBelfast origin serving in regiments ofthe Army, such as the ParachuteRegiment and the Intelligerice Corps, and eventually'turrred' terror-ists from both sides who had been recruited. This is recogrrisably aKitson--style 'pseudo'or'counter'gang. But, as the first such attemptin Ireland, it began to go wrong. At one point MRF personnel wereregularly appearing in court, some charged with serious offences,including shootings. Around latnL972,MRF was wound up in Belfastand another, more professional unit, consisting of more reliable re-cruiting material, was formed at Ballykelly, disguised as a SignalsTloop, a common cover for SAS. Soon after, a third undercover troopwas set up as 4 Field Survey TYoop Royal Engineers, mentioned else-where in this book. In 1988 the Ministry of Defence propagandamachine tried to explain away all these units as being one hithertosecret unit, '14th Intelligence Company'. 14th Intelligence is said toexist today, but to my knowledge was.created not in 1972 but in theearly 1980s. It is ofcourse possible that'14th Intelligence'is an entire-ly phantom unit, the result of the MOD's disinformation unit.

Baker claims he was tasked to penetrate the UDA and became amember of their No. 1 assassination squad, carrying out some 30murders. When he returned to his Army unit, the Army claimed hewas a deserter who had turned himself in. They courtmarshalled himand he ended up back in England. While with the unit as a regularsoldier he gtit drunk and went into the police station at Warminster,where he confessed everything, including the murders. He was thenescorted back to Ulster to face trial. When he went for trial he found

87

himself escorted by one of the RUC men who he claims gave theassassination squad weapons and collaborated in the murder ofCatholics. He was seen leaving the court in a car after the trial and wastaken to Musgrave Park Hospital military wing. From there he wasflown back to England to serve his prison sentence. Baker claims thathe had been visited by a senior Northern Ireland Minister (who he hasnamed, but who cannot recall the conversation) trefore his trial andoffered a deal: if he didn't reveal the involvement of a number of RUColficers in the sectarian killings by the UDA, and confessed to four ofthe murders, he would serve his sentence in England, would only servefour years, and he would then be returned to Ireland and released atthe first opportunity.

He also claims that the Minister agreed his family would be movedto England and given a house next to the prison where he was servinghis sentence. He claims this deal was reneged upon and has subse-quently spent 16 years in prison, 10 of them in solitary conflrnement.He has maintained this story since his incarceration and has pet-itioned to be returned to Northern Ireland to serve his sentence in aspecial prison unit forreformed terrorists who have servedthe securityservices. His petition was recently turned down, despite questionsbeing asked in the House of Commons by Ken Livingstone. He hasgiven long interviews to Frank I)oherty, the journalist and to KenLivingstone MP. He genuinely believes that his life is still in dangerfrom the British state.

There is, however, a neat twist to this story. I traced Ginger, in 1987,to the same prison as the so--called Birmingham Six, whose tragichistory has been revealed elsewhere. He was actually beingheld in thesame cell block. I managed to arrange for a reputable journalist (to theright of centre and sceptical of Baker's claims) to contact Ginger, sincehe had consulted me on a frlm he was making about these matters, andwanted to meet him. I don't actually know what transpired; but I doknow that when thisjournalist went over to Ireland at the end of 1987to research his project further, he came face to face with exactly thekind of attitude I am familiar with.

The Special Branch grabbed him at the airport, and gave him fourhours ofsearching and questioning in an office there. I gather that eversince he has become as paranoid as I sometimes can be. Quite how thishas affected his system of values I cannot tell. My point is that until onecomes up against these people it is very hard to imagine how they canbehave as they do.

The 'Ginges' have more in common than their nicknames - theyacted in the service of the'British forces supposedly in Ireland tomaintain the rule of law and order. Their actions result-ed in the deathsofseveral ofthe native population. Their separate careers have beenmanipulated by those they served, in the same clandestine manner

88

with which they carried out their operations' And anyone w-ho-

utt"*pf" t" prob6 into such matters is liable to receive the same kind oftreatment.

6

THEINTELLIGENCE

WEBln 7975-76, Northern Ireland became one of the battlegrounds for adamaging feud between MI6, the Secret Intelligence Service, and MI5,the Security Service. The two civilian Intelligence agencies have longhad a history of rivalry, particularly in areas where it is uncertain as towhich should be the predominant service. Tladitionally, MI6 has op-erated on foreign soil, while MI5 has been responsible for domesticsecurity. This is a simplification, for there are countless cross-dealings, and reasons for interplay, but in the case ofNorthern Irelandcooperation reached an all-time low. Given the difficult question ofexactly how to determine the sovereignty of the province, this is,perhaps, not surprising. Since 1972, MI6 had dominated the scene. Butduring the course ofthis feud, it lost ground to its rival organisation;and the result was the SIS chief being posted out of Lisburn, thepoaching ofthe network ofhandles and sources he had been running,and the imposition of an entirely different kind of Intelligence gather-ing, whose lack of scruples made it a perfect foil to the kind of dirtytricks I have already described.

I am not trying to paint MI6 as some kind of welfare organisation.Their reluctance to get involved in the more disreputable activities ofthis'dirty war'was professional rather than ethical. MI6 were certain-ly capable of running some dubious operations. It was MI6 who organ-ised the Littlejohn brothers in their campaign of bank robberies in1972; and I was asked in 1974 by my MI6 controller, Craig Smellie, if Iwould consider robbing a bank. I declined, explaining that this was notpart of the duties of one of Her Majesty's offrcer€ and he never mention-ed it again.The point is that for MI6 the name of the game wasessentially persuasion, penetration, information. MI6 had many yearsexperience of handling agents in hostile territory and they had learnedthat brutality didn't work. Further, MI6 were sophisticated enough toknow that in the end some kihdofpolitical settlement wouldhave tobeworked out; and such a deal would not be facilitated by alienating asection of the community who would have to be included in any settle-ment.

90

In spite of the seamier side of our activities as agents for CraigSmellie, when it came to handling sources, both Bunny Dearsley andmyself were encouraged by Smellie to take a humane attitude. Weunderstood what risks they were taking, and we knew that the mostsensible way to treat our sources then was with an honest and friendlymanner, making sure they were looked after, and only using inform-ation that did not compromise their safety. When Bunny left theprovince, and offrcially handed over souroes like Dreamcoat andFolorn Hope to me, he left, me a tape, describing his dealings withthem, the best way to approach them, and how to make sure theystayed in place, giving us the kind of Intelligence we would make realuse of. I carried on where he left off. And I understood that our parti-cular way of recruiting and maintaining our sources meant that wehad to be trusted friends of theirs. Personally, I actually enjoyeddrinking with Dreamcoat and listening to Goldilocks and her luridtales. But the importance of this attitude was that this was the mosteffective means of eliciting Intelligence.

The agent handlers MI5 sought to bring in, drawn not only from theIntelligence Corps, but the SAS as well, had a very different kind ofunderstanding. Their policy was basic and shortsighted - use what-ever means, legal or illegal, to blackmail the source into acting out offear for his or her safety, then force them to carr;r out operations whichcannot be traced back to the handler, unless the former is prepared torisk his or her life by confesbing what he or she has done. Thig meansthat, instead of running a network full of mutual trust and support,based on the handlers'abilities to exploit dissatisfaction or the desirefor revenge on the part of the sources, there was an embittered andfragmented operation, in which no one could a{ford to turn his back.There was no possible long-term future in such manipulation, and thedanger to those we would need to keep in place was so increased thatany shortterm gains were effectively nullifred. Butsuchwasthepolicythe new masters were determined to introduce in Ulster. The casual-ties were manifold.

In describing how we recruited Folorn Hope, through the indis-cretion of Captain R, I spoke of how his commanding offrcer, Colonel B,was incensed by what we had done, and was unlikely to let us get awaywith it. We could have had no idea, that he would actually arrange tohave us ambushed by British Army soldiers in order to scare us offoursource, so that she could be reclaimed by others. But then, we wereunaware at the time that these were amongst the first blows in ourarea being struck at the behest ofthe Security Service in order to getMl6--oriented officers out of the way. At the time I thought theseconflicts on our side were merely personality clashes.

The ambush happened one night as we were bringing the womanback to her home after a debriefing. We had been driving her round tovarious places, so she could point out certain houses and personalities.

91

It wa! our custom to park at the far side of an estate in Lurgan, whereshe_lved, in a dark lane. Bunny would walk just behind Fo-rlorn Hopeand I would cover his back, with my sub-machine gun hidden undlrn1y jacket, half turning this way and that to make suie everything wasall right. On this particular night, quite plainly, it was not.'SuddJnly IheaxL a whispering from the bushes in fron[ of us, followed by ag"ytfli"g sound. Bunny immediately grabbed Forlorn ilope and bund-led her down. He drew his pistol and waited. Nothing happened. Andthen, again, I heard whispeiing. Bunny was being caled iorwards thebushes. I waited behind, covering him as he mad6 his way forward. Afigure stepped out ofthe bushes. I could see them talking. dther figuresbecame visible - all in civilian clothes, carrXring weapo"r. I wonlered,just what-was going on, but Bunny was talking-to them in such a waythat I had realised that they were not hostile. Now I could see clearlythey were carrying British Army weapons. I assumed they were UDi.mgrll or something of the kind. But then Bunny came back to me - Hesaid 'You'll never believe this. Stay here till I get her home -'He thenhelped our source to her feet and ushered her off down the lane. Iy.uiQd for him, while the frgures in the dark stood around, lookinghighly embarrassed, saying nothing. Bunny was back very quickly. HIbrought one of them over to me andiaid, 'Go on! Tell himt;tirls giitisnsoldier then proceeded to describe how he had received orders to comeout there with a squad ofmen and shoot at us, in order to scare us awayfrom the area so that we wouldn't return. I said I didn't believe him. HLinsisted that it was the truth, and that by challenging us instead andlettin-g usknow that we had been set up, he was disobJying orders andwould no doubt sufferthe consequences, but since hewas aioldierfromlunny's old unit, and had the ulmost respect for him, he felt he had nochoice.

- pha_king mytread angrily, I went back to the car. Bunny, meanwhile,helped the soldier concoct a reasonable story as to why he'had failed tocarry out the ambush. He then joined me in the car. We left the scene,and discussed our plan of action. We knew only that the order for theambush had come from the Battalion Commander. Our only optionyag !o go and,see Craig Smellie in Lisburn and tell him exactly whathad happened, in the hope that he would have the power to do some-thing about it.

This we did. Smellie was suitably outraged. We left his office,without any doubt that some action would be taken. The next day, welearned that the Colonel had been posted immediately and was on hisway to Cyprus to take up a new appointment. I later discovered thatthe_plan, conceived by Brigade Intelligence Staff was designed tofrighten offmyself and Bunny, leaving them free to recruit and run oursource for MI5. What they hdd failed to realise was that, had the shotsbeen fired at us at close range, far from running away, we would haveto retaliate in kind which may have led to Britiih soldiers being killedby British soldiers, and the resultant furore would have mide the

92

Gilford Castle incident I mentioned earlier seem like a tea party. YetBrigade presumably had been willing to sanction this, with all therisks involved. It was a measure ofjust how bitter the inter-servicerivalry had become.

Theie were other signs along the way. On one of our foraging exped-itions round the Republican estate of Kilwilkie, at the back of StColeman's Cemetery, we had used our authority to have an area of onesquare mile sealed off, for as long as we needed it - out of bounds toregular Army personnel. This was to ensure that no Army personnelwould mistake us, armed and in civilian clothes, for terrorists. Al-though Brigade had been annoyed about our activity they were unableto stop us, but they arranged for Land Rovers to be placed with soldiersinside, all around the perimeter, to check our movements so that on thefollowing day a Patrol could comb the area and effectively underminethe clandestine nature of our work for M[6.

We were coming out, our task accomplished - Bunny, myself and twolocal RUC officers - when Bunny suddenly put his hand on my shoul-der and stopped me, 'Can you smell it?'he asked in a whisper. For amoment, I thought he had gone crazy. 'It's gelly'he said. 'Gelly!'Still, Ididn't cotton on, for to me, IRA explosives meant Co-op mix, or Anfo;they smelled of diesel. Gelignite has a completely different smellaltogether - a smell of marzipan - and it wasn't one I was familiarwith.

Bunny then disappeared into the double hedgerow beside us. We hadbeen very careful until now, scanning the area with a nightscope,keeping quiet, dressed in our dark gear. Suddenly, he started shining atorch around him, breaking branches as he laboured to drag somethingout of the hedgerow. And I was left with the two policemen, thinking'Here we go, there's going to be boyos here soon . . . 'But, fortunately,no one heard Bunny but ourselves.

He came out of the hedgerow with a big shopping bag full of ratherold gelignite, wired up with cortex and detonator's, and set it at my feet-He then proceeded to take this bomb apart in front of me, while I gulpednervously, trying to hide my dislike of explosives, recalling the time atAshford when I had been made to manufacture the chemical Molotov.When he had frniehed, he put the stinking explosives back in the bagand handed it to me. 'What do ybu want me to do with it?'I asked.Bunny smiled. 'Just get rid of it, Fred,'he said.

In fact, the bomb was in such a volatile state that it would have hadto have been used within the next twenty four hours, in Lurgan or asimilar location nearby, or it would have been too dangerous to move atall. So we had to take it out. I ended up driving the stuffback to my ownhome, with a foul headache as a result, and keeping it overnight in afield. Early the next morning, I took it down to Mahon Road camp andexplained my dilemma to the 2 i/c there, a Mqjor in the Green HowardsRegiment. I told him how I had come across the bomb in the course of

93

my work for MI6 and that it was on the Brigadier's patch; if he foundout, it would simply prove a further source of conflict. I knew theregiment had some troops at Cookstown and Dungannon, and I askedthe Major if he could arrange for the shopping bag to be taken there, sothat his soldiers could claim the credit for finding it, and could avoidhaving to involve the Brigadier. He duly agreed, and I left the camp.

I then visited the SAS at Castledillon. On my return I had a messageto report to the Brigade Commander, to return a bor:rowed Ingramsub-machine gun. I went straight to Lurgan and into his offrce. I had toendure a tirade of abuse . . . How dare I operate in this manner in hisarea, what the hell did I think I was doing trying to arrange for thebomb to be transported to Dungannon without his knowing . . . and soon. It was an extraordinary display of animosity. And the fact was, hewasn't entitled to know what I had been doing; those were the rules,but he wouldn't accept them.

I left Lurgan, with no doubts as to just how deep this inter-agencyantagonism had become. This was reinforced when a short while later,a StaffSergeant, a Brigade Intelligence Collator, said quite openly tome -'We're going to fix you one day, Fred. Don't worry.'It was offeredin ajokey sort ofway and I responded in kind.

Through all this, however, I remained certain that my own Colonelwould defend me, whatever happened. I had only acted on his orders,and I had kept him fully informed ofthe ill-feeling aroused, and he hadcontinually assured me that I was acting correctly, and that he wouldbatch my back' if Brigade HQ tried to create mischief for me. Ibelieved that I was a good operator,.who had achieved far more thanhad been expected of me and I believed my Colonel would support me.That was my mistake. Colonel D at this time, far from supporting me,as he claimed, wrote a confidential report on me, which stated that Iwas working on my own and showed little respect for my respons-ibilities. I was appalled. I made a point of going to Lisburn and talkingto him about it. I confronted him as he was walking through the campand asked why he had done this. Not surprisingly, he was extremelyembarrassed and refused to discuss the report. I felt disgusted at hislack of loyalty. I went instead to the Assistant Chief Constable of mypolice Division - who contacted the Army authorities in an attempt toput things right. I was later assured that the report had been amended.This did not, however, explain Colonel D's deceit.

It wasn't until -some years later that I discovered that at the time he

had actually been running a source for MI5. This was admitted by theMinistry of Defence. In other words, D was MI5's man. Earlier, Idescribed my recruitment into MI6, and how I dutifully consulted withmy CO, who insist€d I pass a secret copy of everything that came myway to him. But D was working for the rival organisation. It ie inevit-able that he passed these opies to MI5. One may safely assume that ithad some bearing on the way in which '5' so easily penetrated the '6'

my

94

network, and later took it over. Officers like my Colonel were acting as

their stooges.HowevJr, in May 1975 D left the province. A new man took over at

sMIU Knock. His name was colonel B. I hoped that he would genuine-

lv back me in mv troubles with Brigade - since he too repeatedly

dss;ea me he would. But again, I was unaware of the connection withMiS at the time. By now, MI5 *et" making sure that all the offrcers

sent to fulfrll Inteliigence roles in Ireland were'their men" B was no

ally. It was only a mJtter of months before I, too, would leave Ulster, on

ihe manufactuted pretext that I had suffered some kind of mentalbreakdown.

During the course of L974-5,both my parents died from cancer' Mymother h"ad been ill for a long time, with various chest complainfs_- she

was a hear.y smoker, with a Jevere bronchial condition. Eventually she

was takeninto a hospital near Knaresborough, Yorkshire^ for cancerprii*t". She had reconciled with my father many years before, a.nd he

,ritit"dh"t ""gularly

now from Harrogate, afewmiles away- Butitwasthen discove.la tftat he had his own medical problem. The doctors

,rt "a

nm to go in for tests, and he, too was diagnosed as having lung

"ut ""t. He deiperately needed an operation, but he knew my mother

was dying, .ttd thut ih" -at determined to come out of hospitel and

live ilihei own home. He was equally determined that he should nurse

her there. And that is what happened. My mother died from a haem'

orrhage four months after shb discharged herself'

I went home at that time' Despite my insisting he go immediatelyinto hospital, my father was determined to supervise my nlotfgrlsfuneral arrangements. within a week of her cremation he had hisoferation in ieeds Hospital. I stayed and saw him through it'Th"d'octors told him it was a complete success, and that he would be frne

from then on. While he was in intensive care, I visited him every day,

and he made it quite clear to me that I should not try to fool him unde-r

any circumstances - if it should be the case that his cancer returned,even if the doctors weren't straight with him about it, I should be' H9was quite unlike my mother in ihis, since she-seemed very frightenedbV thb idea of her own death and we never told her how ill she reallywas.

95

We flew back to England, after I had told him the bad news' Iarranged a wheelchair flight from Luton. And, I am happy to say, Dadmanaged to stay on his feet until Bridget, our little girl, was one yearold, and he actually saw her walk on her birthday, something he wasdetermined to do. Then he took to his bed, and we all knew it was just amatteroftime.

I was extremely busy with my work during this period and oftendidn't get back until the early morning. Then I would stay up and talkwith my father for an hour or two - get him through his worst patch,which was normally about four o'clock then go to bed myself. I wouldrise again at eleven and go back to work until the early hours. Thismeant I saw little ofmy wife andchildren. Butitwasthrough no lackofcommitment on my part. Circumstances simply made it impossible.

While my father was bedridden, Fiona nursed him generously, and Iwas deeply grateful to her. However, the resentment I have alreadytalked of far from diminishing, had come to a point where relationsbetween us were very strained. And the longer we nursed my fatherthe more pressure it put upon us. Rows broke out over trivial matters -and always ended in the same argument, over the nature of my work,which she saw as putting our whole future at risk, but which I saw as auseful contribution to the way of life that made that future at alloossible.' Meanwhile that work went on, providing me with a real means ofescape into which I poured an even gteater amount ofenerry andconcentration. Where the strain did show, however, was on the socialoccasions I was obliged to attend in my role as an MIO. During theperiod when my father was lying in bed at home, I was invited to anumber of police functions in Portadown and elsewhere. After cryingofffor some time I realized I should have to accept some of the invitat-ions at least. After twenty minutes or so at these evenings I hadenough. It made me unhappy to see people eating and drinking andenjoying themselves, when my father was alone in the night, slippingtowards death. I would explain quite openly to people there that thiswas the case, and ttrey all seemed to understand when I left. This kindof painful feeling developed to a point towards the end of my father'sillness where I suffered brief anxiety attacks. I would be so worried hewould die when I wasn't there that I felt guilty about attending suchfunctions. There was no hysteria involved: I would simply go home andsitwith Dad instead.

Eventually I went to see the doctor who was treating him anddescribed these attacks. He prescribed me some low dosage Valium todampen the effects until such time as my father died. I later discoveredthat Fiona had been taking considerable amounts of this drug, gettingit on prescriptions ostensibly for me, an indication that the strainsupon her were more damaging than she wanted to admit. Her owndoctor was my doctor's wife, and they played a central part in whatfollowed - at least according to the Army version of things.

I

I spent all my leave for that year tending t9 my parents' And afterv fither's operation, mv wife Fiona agreed that he should come overoperation, my wife Fiona

toireland to iecuperaie with us. He spent six weeks at Bocombra, andhe seemed to picl up well. However, after only a few-wee\9 back inHanogate, it becamC apparent that he wns not very well at all' Irang aspeciaiist in Leeds, .na ne told me, quite plainly, that despite the

elrher optimisim, my father did indeed have a terminal cancer, due toa secondlry infeciion. He probably had six:nonths to live, no more-' Isat down with Fiona, to discuss what to do. Eventually, we decided the

only thing was to bring him over to Ireland again, so that he could die

with his family.

96

My father died on 13 February 1975. I arranged for his burial and so

on. We took leave to England to clear up all his affairs and to have abreak. While we were there we drove down to stay with Fiona's motherin Budleigh Salterton. She invited the local GP to dinner one evening.Just as in Portadown I experienced a briefbut unpleasant sense ofgriefand worry, even though Dad was gone now. I excused mys€lf and wentupstairs to lie down. The doctor followed me up and asked me if Iwanted him to get me some leave so I shouldn't have to go back toIreland. I told him that going back would be the best thing I could do, tothrow myself once more into my work and let the process of grief go on,as I knew it must, until it was exhausted. I knew, from the experiencesof friends, thatthiswas the best waytohandle it-and Iwaslucky thatmy work was so intensive and rewarding.

lhis is exactly what happened. By the time we got back to Porta-down I was keen to take up ttre reins again. However, the tensionbetween Fiona and myself only reached new heights. Our domestic lifebecame a daily hell - and when, as inevitably happened, our socialarrangements were internrpted by the demands of work, the samebitter rows would flare between us. Yet again I would be called a foolfor taking so many risks andgetting nothing for it. It was all so pettyand destructive, but once this kind of downward spiral had begun, itwas so very hard to stop it.

By February 1975 I had beoome so enraged and dispirited by whatwas happening at home, I arranged for Fiona to go back to England totry and ease the strain upon both ofus. She stayed with her mother fora fortnight, then telephone me to say that she was feeling much betterabout things and wanted to come back and try again. (I did not learnuntil much later that in fact she had been making all kinds of alle-gations against me while she was in England, including brutality andthreats against the children, which I can only put down to the etrainsshe had endured in the months before.) When Sgt. I drove me to theairport I was genuinely looking forward to a reconciliation. Yet fromthe moment Fiona climbed into the car the old quarrels began again. Itseemed hopeless.

Throughout the Spring our marriage deteriorated. But just as it hadbeen with Dad's illness, this made me throw myself into my work withan even greater commitment - and this, of course, simply strengthenedthe downward spiral. By now I was handling the agent known as TheBadger in the South, liaising with the Special Branch, and continuingto provide important information to Mr Smellie at Lisburn. Whateverhappened with Fiona I was determined that my work ehould not beaffected. But it was not to be. I came home one night early in May andrealised that for the frst time ever I had gone off in the morningwithout checking if I was being followed and adopting the usual tech-niques to ensure personal security. My private life had, at last, in-truded where it did not belong. I had been racking my brains to try and

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find some new way through the endless bitterness and recrimination -and only two or three days before had gone to a travel agent inPortadown and arranged a break for thJwhole family in Ct-anada.Afterwards I had visited a jeweller's and bought Fiona a-ring. But anypeace between us was shortlived. Now I saw that my domJstic prob-lems might.actually lead to my getting killed if I did not act decisivelyto do something about them. I went in and told Fiona that I could nLlong-er g-o on as we were: she would have to go home and base herself inEngland for the rest of my tour. This would not interfere with theCanadian trip, lut it would make sure that the long saga of unhapp-iness at Bocombra was finally settled. Inevitably, i roi ensued. Wewere both at our wit's end.

Eventually Fiona went to sleep downstairs and I lay staring angrilyat the bedroom ceiling, wondering what the morning woula Urirrg.When I woke up Fiona had taken the children with lier. I waited a=thome. At 11.30 the Brigade Major rang the doorbell. He told me thatFiona was at his house, very upset, and was making some extraord-inary allegations about me - the same allegations I discovered laterthat she had been making in England. The-worst implied that I hadthreatened her and the children with a gun I was keepinginthe house.F then asked me where the'unattributable weapon'-was. I said therew39 3o_quc!_weapon. I,had had various weapons there, in the past,which I had borrowed from the SAS arrnour5/ for certain operations.But the only gun I had now was my Army issue Walther ppK. Ireasoned with F and tried to explain why I had decided Fiona and Ishould separate temporarily. F told me that it was too late, simply for$onq to go back to England. He had already sent for my Colonel atKnock. It appeared that the family doctors had been in contact withhim and said that if the Army did not remove me to a hospital to haveme examined on the grounds of mental instability, then they wouldhave me committed to a civilian clinic. I found-this impossible tobelieve and demanded to see my wife, to find out exactly what she hadb_een saying to F. He refused. I asked to see my children. He told mephey yer_e with Fiona, and I coulnd't see them either. I drew in a deepbreath: there was no point in trying to change his mind. All I could dowas wait fo1 my Colonel to arrive. I trusted that someone who had myinterest at heart would unravel the mess so that I could get back towork as soon as possible.

_ Colonel B duly arrived and had a talk with Major F. He then told mehe had checked out the whole matter. It was a fact that the doctor hadmade the Tported statement: they had been told I had threatened mywife and children with a gun and believed I was in need of examin-atiol. The Army could, clearly, not take the risk of the threat beingcarried out, so there was no option for me but to submit myself for icomplpte medical investigation. It would all be over by evening andthen, he was sure, I could get back to duty.

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Colonel B told me that as he saw it, it was'a storm in a teacup'' Heknew what a bad time I had had with my father, and then with Fionaherself. The simplest thing to do would be for me to go alon-g with himnow. He had phoned Musgrave Park hospital. Thel'genljl-fit me,in on

the military wing, for an examination' Naturally I would pass it andcould come-back home, where he would make sure the troubles in mymarriage were seriously addressed. Eventually I agreedto go. I reallyhad no-other option. My CO was giving me a direct order. I couldn'tdisobey it but I let him know that I went under protest.

We drove up to Musgrave Park, Colonel B and myself, chattingpleasantly on the journey. We were both armed however, and retainedi suitable sense of security. But as we parked outside the militarywing, B turned to me and said I should leave my weapon behind - thehospital staffwere not keen on guns being taken into the premises. Iobliged, but no sooner had I forsaken my gun than I had a strongpremonition thatl had alreadytakenastep into some kindoftrap. AndI was not sure how I was going to get out ofit.

After all the dull, rainswept days days in lreland, this was a gloriousearly summer morning. We disappeared into the hospital. B told me towait a minute, and went offto consult with one of the doctors. He cameback and told me that I could be seen right away. I followed him into anoffrce, and there, sitting at the desk, was an ordinary general pract-itioner - a man with no specifrc psychiatric skills. He said he hadspoken with B who had told him what was what, and he asked me if Ihad anything to say.

Naturally, I had quite a lot to say. My wife was alleging I hadthreatened her with a gun; the family doctors apparently believed her,and that was why I was there. When, in actual fact, all I had threatenedher with was a trip back to Budleigh Salterbon, and a holiday inCanada.

The doctor looked at me bemusedly, then disappeared and came backfive minutes later. He admitted that frankly, the whole business wasbeyond him, and that I would have to be admitted to the hospitalovernight, until they could get someone from the Army psychiatricinstitution at Netley flown over to examine me' I was astonished, butagreed to see anyone who could help sort the matter out - only it wouldserve no purpose whatsoever to have me admitted, since I wanted to get

home and sort the business out with my wife before it all went too far, ifit hadn't done already. What was more, I wanted to see my children.

Colonel B intervened at that point to tell me that under no circum-stances could I be allowed any of this' I should have to stay in thehospital overnight. I complained this was a domestic matter, and itwas not the business of the Army to interfere in such a way. B then toldme straight: 'I'm not asking you Fred, I'm telling you' You're stayinghere.'I was equally straight in return: 'Sorr5r, sir' But that's an illegalorder. I'm going.'

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. I-g-ot up and walked towards the door. Throughout this time, therehad been a soldier present in the wing, in combalkit and armed with arifle. He was ordered to block my-path, and he did so at once. Ichallenged him. 'Please move out ofmy way. I'm a Captain in the RoyalCorps ofTbansport, and I'm givingyou a direct ordei,

This Corporal in the Light Infantry then replied, ,Sorry sir, I've beenordered: ify_ou_try to leave, I'll have to restrain you by foice., ,Who gavey_ou that order?'I asked. 'The CO of the hospitai, sir.;I was outt.g"d bythis, and steppedtowards the door. The soidier put his weapon icrossfig.body and took up a challenging stance. ,dkay,' I said, ,Okay, Ibelieve yoy.' I turned again to speaklo the Colonel.-,fuhat,s going oin?',I asked_. 'I'm not going to stay here. This isn't Russia. tf mi wiie frasmade this statement she is obviously mentally ill.'The Colonel saidnothing. 'You come with me to see Fiona', I went on, ,sit there andwatch what happens. I'm no threat to her.'The Colonel refused. He saidit was a medical matter and that as a layman he simply could notinterfere. With which he took his leave of me.

- I was g"iven a small room in one ofthe wards there and left to my owndevices. I paced up and down continually, wondering how on earth Iwas going to get out of this mess. Everywhere I went on the ward I wasfollowed. I didn't sleep at all that night. In the dark hours my initialsense of panic and confusion diminished and I had the time to considerjust what was happening to me. I went back over all the events ofrecent months. I was certain, in any ordinary circumstances, my wife'sallegations - if indeed they had been made - would have been thor-oughly checked out with me personally, before this kind of action hadbee-n taken. In effect, I had been put under guard in hospital before Ih-ad g-ry chance to defend myself. It simply wasn't the way thingsshould be done.

The more I thought about it, the more it seemed that somethingstran_ge was going on - something I couldn't, as yet, begin to under-stand. Those half-joking threats from Brigade; the Briladier's ownpersonal distaste for me; the conflict of loyalties between the Army andthe_po_lice, with the Secret Intelligence Service acting independently,and often against their will - it all seemed to point to some kind ofconspiracy. But I realized that if I was going to get through this Iwould have to look at it more rationalll'. I would have to pinpointexactly how I had laid myself open to this treatment, and whyl should!av-e been targetted. What I wasn't aware of, that night in MusgravePark, was just how far an altogether different body might have-beenr-esponsible. I just didn't know how ruthless MIb were prepared to be in!he!r quest to take over the Ulster operation. Certainly, an ambushhad been set up for Bunny and myself out at Kilwilkie. But at the timewe had putit down to Brigade. So I went over all that happened, tryingto work it all out. And the more I thought about it, the more lt seemea torevolve around events that had taken place only ten days or so before.

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First of all, Craig Smellie had left Ireland, for Athens. He had beenreplaced by Ian Cameron of MI5. Within a few days I had been summ-oned to see the new'political officey'. During our interview he told methat he did not want me crossing the border for any reason at thisparticular time as he was supervising an RUC operation in the Repub-lic and did not want to risk any possible interference. I agreed to stayaway until Ihad furtherorders. However, as I lefthisoffrce andwalkeddown the corridor, I was called into another offrce by Mqjor KeithFaraes, an SAS officer, working for the intelligence services at Lis-burn. He asked me what I thought of Cameron. I said, quite honestly,that I hadn't been very taken with him. Farnes told me that I was notthe only one to feel like this: an NCO in the Intelligence Corps who hadbeen running ten different sources in the IRA had seen them allmurdered within a few days of MI5 taking over operations. He hadgone into a bunker and shot himself in the head. In Farnes'words, 'MI5leaks like a sieve!'

I had heard of the man's suicide but could barely believe the reasons.I then told Farnes that Cameron had ordered me not to go south for anyreason until I heard otherwise. Farnes asked me ifl wanted to go. Ireplied that it was quite possible something would come up and then,inihe normal course of things, I would want to go over. He advised me,quite plainly, that if I got the chance, I should cross into the Republicand do whatever was nece"ssary' But instead of telling Cameron, Ishould report back to him personally' 'We've been warned', saidFarnes, 'the Army shouldn't work with these people. So just glve m9anything you get.'I didn't quite understand what was going on, but-Iagi'eed to do ai he said until such time as I could frnd out for myselfw-Lat had been happening since the 'political office' had changed hands

This meant that I left Lisburn with conflicting orders. In fact,although I had agreed to Farnes'request, once I thought about it, I hadno intention of ciossing the border. It seemed altogether to much of arisk. And when Colonel B telephoned me to reiterate Cameron's order,I was sure I had made the right decision. However, I had another callshortly afterwards. Sergeant R told me to get hold of M (the CIDoffrcer who later became the victim of a booby-trap). M had fixed up ameeting in the south with some very senior officials and was veryanxiouJthat I should be able to accompanyhim. I dulycontactedM andhe repeated what Sergeant R had told me' I had to tell him about theconflicting orders I had been given at Lisburn. M grew impatient andexplained why it was so important I came with him. The meetingwasn't simplywith The Badger in some pub in County Monaghan, butwith someone M described as'the top man in the big city down there'.He said that he had stuck his neck out'to set this up', and if the rightpeople did not go down to Dublin, the whole operation would be jeopar-aisea. t thought about this and then agreed to go over - but I could notafford to go as far as Dublin. If the meeting could take place at some

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point just across the border, then I felt that this would be a sensiblecompromise. I might have been disobeying Cameron's order, but Iwoqld be acting in accord with the wishes of the Army and the police -with the least risk to myself.

I then went back to Sgt. I and told him what had happened. We tookmy car down to the border, with M as our passenger. On the journey Ireiterated that I could simply not afford to take the risk ofgoing all theway to Dublin. M seemed happy with this. We drove through Newry,under thB railway bridge and down to the border. At a burnt-outcustoms post we stopped in a lane on the right-hand side - no man'sland - between the province and the Republic. We turned the car toface the road and got out, with our guns. After a few minutes two blackcars came towards us, drove past, then reversed back into the lane. Atall, well-built Garda oflicer got out and walked up to us, grinning.He took it for granted that we were ready to to accompany him toDublin. I demuned. M hurriedly consulted with me, telling me oncemore that I would blow the whole operation if I refused to cooperate.This was the Deputy Commissioner we were going to see, not someminor offrcer from the backwoods of Monaghan. He had importantinformation he wanted to give us and this marked a vital step in thegrowing liaison between the two police forces.

I had to concede - but only on the understanding that I would be backin Ulster that night. So M and I got into one of ihe black limousines,drove out onto the main road, and down into Eire. As soon as we wereacross the border we picked up an Irish Army armoured car escort,which foTlowed us all the way to Dublin. The Garda man took usdirectly to Phoenix Park. At that time the station was being renovated:the square at the front had been ripped up, and a little road channelledin a dog-leg to give access to the main entrance.

We were taken in to see Commissioner Ned Garvey who greeteduswith great effusion. We had a long convergation about securitymatters. I also became embroiled in a discussion with a senior IrishArmy oflicer on the prospect of civil war in the country. I retrospect Ithink I was extremely rude tohim, butthatwas not my intention:lwassimply telling the truth. When asked how I believed such a war wouldbe resolved, I told him that they had saying in the north: they'd be inDublin by Friday night and Cork by Monday morning. And I per-sonally thought that was being pessimistic. The UDR would gothrough the Irish Army like a knife through butter. For Ulstermenwere a martial breed, and while the Irish were highly civilized andattractive people, they could hardly be described as the best soldiers inthe world. To a civilian this would probably have been quite a com-pliment: not, however, to senior oflicer. He wasCommissioner Garvey, on the other hand, couldchuckling.

furious with me.not stop himself

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when we had finished talking we were taken down to the forensic

laboratory in the city - a number of low, single-storey prefabricated-

U"iiai"S"l with windlws all round, painted white inside. On a series of,t

"tu"""u"a unches was a plethora of IRA equipment, all cleaned-up,

with small white labels attached: bombards, mortars, bomb fins,

detonators and so on. It was the yield from the Donalbate arms factory,

the Garda's major coup in recent times.

We were then taken down to the factory itself, some miles from

Dublin, and shown all the machinery involved. I was asked to make a

"ot" of itt" manufacturers so that we could trace it back. It was mostly

English, made in the Midlands. Lastly, we were taken back to PhoenixFari where Assistant Commissioner Garvey gave us some 150 photo-

graphs of individuals involved in the INLA inside the Republic, alongiliit ,r"rn". another details. He also supplied me with a number of

fi"t r.". of the Donalbate machinery, and_other information that had

6elr, specifically requested from the north. The packag-e did-indeed,epresettt u *oit significant gesture of cooperation on behalf of the

Garda, at the higheJt level, and one which might lead one to suppose

ihaffh" Sadgeri claims to have real authority for his dealings with us

in County Monaghan were not exaggerated.

As we were talking in his oflice, Assistant Commissioner Garveyapologised for the esiort of armoured cars which had picked u: ''P

"6"tt"ortn" uorder, but said'we have to make sure this thing's tied u-p'.

rtg aia not mean to imply anf threat from terrorism, but that he had. to

6" *u"y of others on his-own-side, less willingto deal with the securityforces in the north. I told him I thought the whole situation was

ridiculous, and that I suffered, personally, from mistrust and enmity*itt it the British system itself. He replied,'we're more frightened ofour superiors than the terrorists themselves" and went on to point out

thatthere was an understandingbetween all ofus involvedintrying,toaui".t terrorisrn that we could have got on a lot better without theinterference ofsome ofthose above us.

When we left Phoenix Park, our Garda man and another Gardaofn""t ioof us to a guesthouse near one of the many city- Gardastations. After a meal, on my insistence, M and I were driven back to

the border. Sgt. I came down and picked us up. He dropped M offanddrove me horie. When I informed Colonel B of what had happened, the

next day, he appeared to be delighted with my work. This was not the

case, ho-weveriwith the Head of Special Branch, I was told-by M'-Yh"lhe hlatd aboui my involvement h-e became very angry and comp-lained

to Colonel B thati had no right to have been in the south when I knewthat there was a very important operation being set up which t m1g-it!

have fouled up. nxactty wtrat this operation entailed I was never told. Ido recall, how'ever, that on my visit to the Garda forensic laboratories Inoticed an RUC offrcer working undercover - and M warned me to

ignore him. What was apparenlto me-then was that MI5 and Special

Ii'ranch were cooperating,without the full knowledge of the Army - or'

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at least, that part of it which was still MI6 oriented. When I learned ata later date that the material that was handed over to me had beenintended by MI5 to have been given to Captain M (the bomb disposalexpert who was being groomed by them to take over my work), I wascertain that I had got in their way, and this was used as a reason toreplace me.

I appeared to have crossed both Mr Cameron and David Johnson -two of the most powerful figures in the province. But I had done so, atthe behest of M and Sergeant R, on the advice of Major Farnes atLisburn, andwith the belated approvalofmyownCO, Colonel B. Intheevent, I had behaved with the best intereets of national security as mymain concern, and had done another goodjob in the process. I had beenin Ulster for some time now, I had become aware of the internecinestruggles going on between supposed allies in the frght against terror-ism, but I was really no wiser as to whom I could really trust, and who Icould not. And the fact that I was being held against my will inMusgrave park only ten days later implied that I had made the wrongchoice.

This, then, was my preoccupation on the night I spent in that hos-pital. There were other, minor, incidents that paesed through mymind. The Brigadier had been replaced, a couple of months or so before,by a Scotsman from the Highland Light Infantry. He had occasion toask me to his house not long after he had been installed on the oflicer'smarried housing estate at Bacombra. It was early afternoon and'Atkins', having returned from the Mess at Brigade, asked me if Iwanted to join him in a drink, and I said I would prefer a glass of milk.He noted this, I am sure. But he went on, regardless, asking me howthings were going out in the field, I was as blunt with him then as I hadbeen with the Irish Army oflicer in Dublin. It rankled with me that, assoon as he had come over, he had had €1500 worth of oneway glassinstalled, in his own house to protect him from any possible sniperswhen it was already sunounded by bunkers manned by soldiers. Likethe Brigadier before him, he clearly had no intention of ever puttinghimself at risk in the province. Meanwhile, all the StaffSergeants, theFINCO's and theirwives, hadto make do with quarters downthe road,where there was not even a sentry to protect them - and every daythose men went out to face the terrorists in the course of their work. Heasked me about the families welfare and morale and I told him that Ibelieved that his own personal extra security measures had affectedtheir morale adversely. Needless to say, he was none too pleased! Thisdid not surprise me, my relations with Brigade had deteriorated so farthat I didn't believe that anything I said could make matters worse.

But, once I was in Musgrave Park, incidents like this assumed adifferent signifrcance! I worried that I had gone too far, that I hadensured that what might simply have remained idle threats had actu-ally been carried out.

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By the morning I was at least aware that what I was facing wasn'tsimply Fiona and her alleged accusations' I had more of a fight on myhands than that.

About 11.30, Colonel B arrived to see me' I went into the same offrceas I had the previous morning. For the first time I was introduced to apsychiatrist, Captain Cantlay of the RAMC' Throughout thefive min-ute interview, Colonel B remained silent. I put up a spirited defence ofmyself, until the momentwhen the doctor told me that, no matterwhatI iaid, my condition was such that they did not have the facilities todeal with me there, and I would have to be sent back to England, toNetley. The moment I heard the word, it sent a shiver through me. Foras any serving soldier knows, Netley is not an institution where some-

one is sent for some minor problems. It is a mental hospital for serious-ly ill patients. In the Army, if one ever wanted to tease someone' orridicule them, 'Come on, or we'll send you to Netley', was a commonway of doing it. It was where the'nutters'went, as simple as that.

I protested vigorously. I said I would submit myself for an exam-ination anywhere in Ulster, even a civilian clinic if needs be, but Irefused to be transport€d to Netley. For even if it was only a single dayspent there, it would always be on my records, and would be enough toruin my career. I was told that I was being ridiculous - it was a purelymedical matter, and would have no bearing on my career. There couldbe no argument: I was being sent to Netley. I refused to be budged. Iwould no1 go. The Colonel of the hospital was sent for. He spoke brieflywith Colonel B then turned to me.

'Captain Holroyd,'he said,'I am giving you a direct order' You willstay in my custody at this hospital and you will do as you are ordered,or I can assure you, you will be court-martialled.'

I again refused to go to Netley - I had had enough of this now. But Iwas told, quite plainly, that if I did not cooperate, I would be strapped toa stretchei and transported to England under restraint. I simply couldnot believe what I was hearing. And now I became quite frightened. Isat down with my head in my hands. Colonel B then told me he wouldmake sure I had some clothes and personal effects sent to the hospital,and left.

The one part of this whole affair that I remember without bitternessand pain is the journey from Musgrave Park to the airport. In norrnalcircumstances the driver would have been an RCT Driver, to whom Iwould have had nothing to say. I would have been put in the back of thefield ambulance that would have been that. But, owing to a lack ofstaffon the particular evening of my departure Staff Sergeant D, whowas in charge ofthe transport units detail offrce arrived at the hospital,to transport myself and other patients to the aircraft waiting to take usto England.

The moment he saw me, he asked, 'What are you doing here?' I toldhim he was going to take me to the airport with the others, since I was

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about to be casevaced to Netley. Pat refused to believe it. But he soongot his orders. Instead of putting me in the back, he asked me to ridewith him in the cab, and explain just what had happened to me. I hadseen S/Sgt. D only a fortnight or so before, when I had collected a new Qcar. I had told him about Fiona, and how I felt I would have to send herhome. He brought this up again now, and asked me why no one hadmade any real effort to check things out. I told him my suspicions. Drealized he could do nothing for me then. But he promised that, if I everneeded some support, I could contact him without hesitation. In fact, helater wrote a letter, for which I will always be grateful, where he statedthat, as far as he was concerned, I was the same man he had known inGermany for many years, and more recently in Ulster, and any allega-tions of mental instability were unfounded. But of course, S/Sgt. D wasmerely an honest, plain-speaking SNCO. His opinion would nevercount for much in a situation such as this.

We said goodbye, and I took my last look,for the time being, at thebattlefreld of Ulster. On the casualty evacuation aircraft, I took myplace with the six or seven others being sent home. I heard the steward-ess, a female StaffSergeant, say quite audibly that I was dangerous. Imight have to be restrained. I asked her who exactly had told her thisbut she refused to say. I didn't know at the time that, after my firstencounter with the RAMC registrar, Colonel B had gone back to mywife and told her that I was issuing threats against her, and might welltry to attack her ifl was given the chance, so that the best thing shecould do was move out ofour home with the children, and stay with theBrigade-Mqjor and his wife until such time as I was safely out of thecountry. I only knew that I was sitting in an airplane, taking offout ofUlster, with a reputation as a dangerous individual who might have tobe restrained. Ifmy entrance into the province had been arranged withas much skill and care as my exit, one might conclude that the Armyshowed the same interest in its active members as those it needed toget rid of. But such was not the case. The journey to Netley wasperfectly stage managed. The only trouble was, I didn't want the part'It cost me everything I had achieved in my Army career.

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107

him what had been done to me, as far as I understood it, andhe, like so

many others in the hospital, told me there could be no doubt that I hadbeen 'shafbed'. I did not belong there. It was as simple as that.

During those first three days I was never summoned to see a doctor.And no--one in a position of authority would answer 1ny questions. Inthe end I sat down with the StaffSergeant on the ward and forced himto listen to my story. I told him how worried I was about my wife's stateof mind, and the welfare of my children. This seemed to strike a chordin him, and eventually, he, too, came to admit that I was not in any waymentally ill, and in his words, I w4s there for 'political reasons'. Herecalled how the Colonel in charge ofthe Paraswhohadopenedupon acrowd in Londonderry in the incident that became known as BloodySunday, was brought in immediately afterwards, so that if it becamenecessary, a plea of instability could be used to defend him. My situa-tion was clearly very different, but the same methods had been emp-loyed.

Subsequently I was contacted by a former gunner officer who hadbeen tasked to calibrate 25 pounder gunsjust prior to the Suez opera-tion. On the completion of his task he was forcibly incarcerated atNetley in order to isolate him and preserve the secret ofthe forth-coming secret invasion of Egypt. Although, like me, he understandsthe need for strict security and secrecy in some military operations, hisArmy career was ruined by those two weeks he spent in a mentalhospital which were forever recorded on his military record. I can onlywonder how many other innocent offrcers and soldiers have been heldin Netley for political reasons, and how many lives have unnecessarilybeen blighted by the abuse ofpsychiatry in the forces. It is not widelyappreciated that military doctors are not bound by the normal medicalcode of ethics in this country.

I didn't discover until after I had left the hospital that all therelevant members of staff had been ordered to question me closely, toascertain my frame of mind. However, when it came to my first formalinterview with a psychiatrist, I was quite astonished at the course ofevents. I was hauled in to see Colonel D.C.V.Stewart, RAMC, thecommanding officer at Netley at the time. He asked me what I thoughtwas happening to me. I told him I thought my own Colonel had let medown badly, something was seriously wrong, and I could only assumethat I was the victim of some kind of set-up. The very next questionStewart asked me was this: 'What were you doing in Dublin when youwere ordered not to go?'

My mouth hung open like a stunned mullet's. One of the last thingsColonel B had said when I left Ireland was that under no circum-stances, as a Military Intelligence Officer who had been working withsuch highly sensitive material, should I talk to anyone inNetley aboutmy work there. I should cooperate on the medical side, but revealnothing about the various operations I had been involved in. But here

POLITICALPSYCHIATRY

The first thing that struck me about the Army psychiatric hospi+,alatNetley was the peaceful silence hangrng over the buildings and lhegrounds. It is a-large complex set in a country park - the perfect6nvironment for those genuinely sick to rest in, and recuperate' Forme, arriving on that first night late in May 1975, it was pure hell' I wasgiven a bed on an upstairs ward and told to try to get some sleep.

It was a futile instruction. Eventually, I went to the StaffSergeanton duty in desperation, since this was the second night running that Ihad been left-trying to deal with my anger and indignation. TheSergeant offered me d Mogadon. I'took a quarter of a pill, and itknocked me out.

I woke up at about eleven, and went downstairs to the Offrcers' Wing'There I was introduced to the 'senior' patient there, an lrishLieutenant frrom the Royal Navy, who was suffering from manic de-pression. He said simply, 'We're encouraged to run ourselves here. You-do

your own stuff. They call for you if they want to check you. You'renot meant to leave the grounds. Any problems, come and see me.'

I sat rpund for the next three days in a kind ofdaze, drinking endlesscups of tea and coffee, refusing to believe what had happened to me'Eventually the Navy man took me aside, with a knowing smile''There's nothing wrong with you, is there?' he said. I asked him what hemeant. 'You'reiwinging the lead here, you're trying to get a rest, i9that it?'I began to dCny it, hoping he would give me'the chance to tellhim my sto*. He then explained what had made him say this. Therewere tLirty br so armchairs in the Mess; the daily papers rn'ere leftlying on tibles. He had been there eighteen months, and withoute*celtiott, every newcomer had walked in on his first morning, pickedup a paper, and gone to a specifrc chair in the corner, saying nothing toanyohe, but burying himself behind his newspapel. When I had come

in, t trad walked into the middle of the room, said'Good morning'toeveryone, and sat down where I was, with the morning's news on mylap. The Lieutenant had immediately noticed that, and drawn his ownconclusions. As a matter of fact, throughout the month I was in Netley,the newcomers did exactly as he said. During that time, I explained to

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was the Colonel of the hospital questioning me on a top secret missionof which he should have known nothing. I asked him who had informedhim of the Dublin trip, whether he had clearance to listen to what Imight say. He refused to tell me. I then replied that I could say nothingto himunless Colonel B gave mepermission. However, Iwould saythatI did not go illegally. I might have disobeyed one request and one ordernot to go, but I also had authority to make the visit. It was, in a sense, amatter of who gave me the last order.

(Much later on I learned that it was in fact my CO himself who hadgiven Lt Col Stewart this information, as he was the only one privy to itat the time. He also wrote a confrdential report at the time of thisinterview in which he claimed I had disobeyed an order.)

There was nothing I could do, until whoever had wanted me therewas prepared to let me out again. I began to settle, reluctantly, intosome kind of routine. I was allowed to go swimming in Southamptonwhere I lost my contact lenses in the pool, to add to my sense ofdisorientation! I went on walks through the grounds under the hotJune sun that shone almost every day of my stay there. Each day Iwould walk a little further, dressed only in a pair of shorts and flipflops. No one called me back. In the end I walked all the way to nearbyHamble village and back without being challenged - a ten mile roundtrip. So I asked for some running shoes and ran the distance instead,every day, until I was bronzed ahd trim. If they were going to keep mein Netley, I was going to make damned sure I did not waste my timethere. I began keeping a comprehensive diary of everything that happ-ened, on the advice of a RCT Major who befriended me, so that I wouldnot be at a disadvantage when I later pressed my case for redress.Meanwhile, I played croquet with the Naval Officer and visited a localpub with a young Cavalry officer who was a fellow patient. The rulethat I was not allowed out of the grounds was not enforced. And on oneoccasion, in a Hamble bar, I actually caught the eye of Major Brown,the medical officer handling my case, as he sat drinking with his wife,and not a word was said.

I was treated in the most bizarre fashion. I recbived no medicaltreatment of any kind whatsoever. I completed all the tests I wasrequired to do. These fell under the strict Army category known asPULHEEMS, designed as a comprehensive assessment of both phy-sical and mental health. I passed them all without any problem andwas shown the results. And yet, I was refused any weekends away fromNetley despite the fact that many of the serious cases in the hospitalwere offered this facility. I was also refused access to a telephone, andofficially a typewriter, on the occasion I demanded it. This odd mix ofapparently diligent security and utterly lax practices could only re-mind me of Ashford; only now I was not in any mood to see the lighterside ofthings.

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I regret that, for the psychological tests run by Mqjor Brown RAMCare quite amusing in retrospect. Quite why, if I decided a certain inkblot resembled a furry caterpillar, which many ink blots do, it shouldhave a bearing on my stability I do not understand, nor that I found theshape of a lighthouse more attractive than a banana. If I had beensubmitting myself for some kind of sexual therapy, then perhaps so.Nevertheless I was relieved when I was told thatin terms of physicalcapacity, Upper Limbs, Iocomotion, Hearing, Eyesight, Mental capac-ity and Emotional Stability, I was in perfect shape. The inevitibleguestions recurred then: what was I doing there, and how long would itbe before I got out? The answers were not long in coming.

During my second week at Netley, I received a visit from Mqjor S of12 Intelligence and Security Coy. - one ofthe first oflicers I had spokento on my arrival in Ireland, and the first offrcer from the province tocome to see me here. It seemed that he wanted to be very helpful. Hepromised to investigate my allegations and come back to me aJ soon ashe could. I never heard from him again. In fact, I later discovered thatMqjor S had tried to prevent me contacting colleagues from Ulster. Iwas desperate at the time to speak to Sgt. I who wae serving as anNCO, Intelligence Corps, at Colchester. I had a short interview withhim. Immediately afterwards, Major S got hold of Set. I and warnedhim to have no more contact with me.

All I received from Major S in Netley, after his visit, was a verbalmessage, through one of the Staff Sergeants, that he was 'awfullysorry', but he had been told he should have nothing more to do with mycase. I was dumbfounded, angrier than ever.

When Colonel B himself arrived a few days later, this anger finallytook shape, and it was then that I really became determined I shouldnot rest until I had found out exactly what had happened to me, andwho had been responsible.

I_t was just after lunch - an orderly came into the Mess and told me myColonel was outside in the garden, and wanted to see me. When I wentout, B led me away from the building and all the other patients, to abench exposed to the strong, hot sun. He had a brown paper bag withhim; in it were two bars of melting chocolate, and a couple of paper-back books. He immediately said how sorry he was for everything thathad happened, and what a disaster it had all been. He asked me whathad happened while I had been at Netley. I told him, adding that Ithought it was scandalous treatment, and I demanded some eiplana-tion. B, like S before him, seemed very reasonable and concerned. Hesaid that he understood now that Fiona was suffering from severestress, and her word could not be trusted; in effect, her allegationsagainst me were false. I sighed with relief. He went on to tell me that Iwould be got out of Netley right away. They wanted to bring Fionaback to England with the children and put her into a quarter at Wilton.She could attend Netley for treatment as a day-patient. Meanwhile,

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the best thing for me was to get right out of it all, a posting to theCa:ribean apparently. I should have a good time for three months, getover everything, and come back to my wife suitably treated, and readyfor reconciliation. I could then return to my own Corps and continuewith my career. I explained to B that this plan was a non-starter. (Theirony did not escape me that, had it not been for his actions, I would atthat very moment have been on a month's leave in Canada, trying torebuild my family). If my wife had behaved as he had described howcould I possibly commit myself again to our marriage? I simplycouldn't trust her any more. There was no telling what she mightallege against me next time the strain proved too much for her. B thenuttered the words I will never forget:

'Fred, you do what we say and you'll be laughing all the way to thebank. The RUC have put you up for a MBE for gallantry. And I'verecommended it to go forward. But ifyou fight us now, we'll crush you.'

That was the moment when I knew what I was up against, when Brevealed his true colours. I reacted furiously. I said I wanted an in-quiry, and as soon as I got out of Netley I was going to the Army Boardto put in an appeal and set the wheels in motion. I could see no optionbut to divorce Fiona. I repeated once more, 'Sir, this isn't Soviet Russia.You don't do this to an.officer in the British Army. If it takes me therest of my life I'll get to the bottom of this.'

For many years I was toldthat my medical downgrading at Netleywas dated on the day following B's visit. This was a lie. After recentquestions asked on the matter in the House of Commons, the Armyhave admitted that I was medically downgraded, in my absence, by aMedical Board consisting of Lt. Col. Stewart, Captain Cantley, RAMCand a Medical Officer from the Navy named Hyles (whose sole contactwith me, was a brief introduction whilst I was using the phone, atNetley). This medical downgrading served as an o{ficial statementthat my transfer to the hospital had not been a mistake, since theregulai Board, ignoring its own rules ofprocedure, declared me to be'occupationally maladjusted' and'environmentally disorientated'.From that point on it was inevitable that I would not return to Ireland.Those who wanted me out for good had got their way'

The day after B's visit, Fiona was brought to Netley. I could barelylook at her after what I had been put through, thanks to her behaviouron the morning after our frnal row at Bacombra. She went into ColonelStewart's o{Iice on her own. After half an hour, I was called in. Fionamade a single false allegation about our domestic life, in my presence. Ilistened in silence, and when she had finished, said to the Colonel that Iwas not prepared to put up with this nonsense any longer. I hadnothing else to add. IfFiona had been brought over to England by theArmy, then she was now the concern of the Army. I intended to do whatI had told Colonel B I believed was the right course ofaction. Fionathen left the hospital, we had acted almost like strangers neitherseeming to know quite how we had come to this extraordinary situa-

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tion, nor when or where we would next meet, only that things had gotwildly out of hand, and it was far too late to try to undo them.

My last visitor at Netley was the Head of Army Psychiatry, GeneralMcGhie, RAMC. I had a halfhour session with him in which I toldhim Ithought the whole business had been setup, andthatmywife hadbeenlrsed by those responsible. He, too, promised to investigate. McGhie, atleast, came back to me. But the news was not good. He simply told me Iwould have 'to put up with it'. He was sorry, he had visited Whitihalland been told I was'a political hot potato'. Nobody would touch mycase. In years to come he would deny he ever said this. But, from mycontacts in relevant positions, I know that he spent a considerable timetrying to get someone to address my grievances in London, withoutsuccess. The reason he gave me I believe was true.

I tendered my resignation from SMIU Northern Ireland, and theArmy proper, while I was still in Netley. The response was very clever.My resignation from SMIU was accepted - but not from Army, since Iwas a resident of an Army mental hospital, and therefore not in aposition to resign. There was no consistency in this answer. But therewas nothing I could do to change it. I was sent to Netley to remove mefrom Ulster. Unwittingly, my resignation from SMIU simply comple-ted this aim.

However, I had only a short time left in the hospital now. Since my wifeand children had kien successfully moved to England, I had givln upmy job and been medically downgraded, there was no reason to keepme there much longer. I only discoverd later that Fiona had been toldby Colonel B that she would be coming back to England with ourchildren before I had even had my initial medical interview at thehospital. One can only ask how he know this at the time.

I made one last gesture of defiance at Netley. I knew I had passed mytests. I asked Major Brown, the officer who had run them, why I couldnot be released immediately. He replied that he wasn't personallyresponsible for my case. It was under Secure classification and there-fore the responsibility of Colonel Stewart. I then demanded an inter-view with the Colonel. This I was granted. I asked Stewart the samequestions. But he said he was not prepared to discuss them with me. Ithen formally requested an independent second opinion, and statedthat it would have to be from a doctor of my own choice, as the rulesdictated. But Stewart ignored the rules. He offered me a list of threedoctors, all with the required security clearance. I refused to chooseone. I told Stewart that they would simply be carrying out whatevermedical orders he gave them - they were not independent in any senseof the word. Again I demanded a doctor of my own choice. And again herefused.

Stewart told me quite plainly that I would never be going back toIreland. Ever since I had come to Netley, I had kept my long hair andbeard, the disguise I had worn in South Armagh, lrusting that sooner

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or later this would all be resolved, and I could get back to the work forwhich I had been trained. But once I had seen Stewart, I immediatelyhad my hair cut and face shaved. I told everyone with whom I assoc-iated that I would not now be going back to my duties - the 'shafting'had been successful. I had no choice but to accept what had been done tome, and try my best to mount a successful appeal which would bringeverything out into the open. By now, of course, so many potentialreasons had occurred to me that I had no idea just how many others anappeal would turn up. It wasn't simply a question of my own position. Ihad realized that: there were all the dirty tricks I had seen, or heard of.There was Robert Nairac. The Badger. The bungled operations. Howmuch did all that have to do with what had happened?

I had no way of knowing the answer. All I was certain of was thatFiona had been manipulated, willingly or not, by the Army, to beinstrumental in my removal. She was not acting rationally at the time,and had been under severe stress. But she aleo had her own familiarreasons for wanting me out. To Brigade, in fact to all those orientatedto M15 the expulsion of an operator who did not recognize any impera-tive more powerful than the duty to carry out his work in the mostcareful and efficient manner was a simple expedient. They wanted adifferent kind of man at work, and so they made sure they got him.What they had calculated on, in making their decision, was an under-lying weakness on my part, combined with a sense of ambition, thatwould ensure I accepted Colonel B's terms when I was offered them atNetley. Here, they made their mistake. I refused their terms, and Ihave refused them ever since. I am still fighting for the inquiry Idemanded 14 years ago.

ANOTHERCAMPAIGN

The period followingmy release from Netley wasthe worstphase ofmylife. Rather than diminish, the confusion and bitterness which resultedfrom my expulsion from Ulster merely increased, as all my efforts tohave the matter satisfactorily addressed were repulsed.

The first thing I did when I was returaed to my Depot Regiment(since my resignation from the Army had not been accepted) was to askfor permission to go and see my wife. The reaction was one of astonish-ment - no one in my Corps knew what had been going on - and I wasgranted my request. I climbed in a vehicle and went at once to seeFiona in her new married quarters at Honiton in Devon. When Iarrived, I found she was visiting her mother in Budleigh Salterbon. Iwent to a phone box and called them. My mother-in-law told me thatFiona would be with me in twenty minutes or so. Foolishly, I left mypolice notebook containing details of my last weeks in Ulster, in thephone box. The Devon police passed it back to the RUC, and theyrefused to return it to me. I am not surprised.

TVo cars arrived some time later-on one ofthem all my possessionshad been stacked. Fiona quickly got out, and into the second car, drivenby one of her friends. They then drove offagain. Furious, I climbed intothe vehicle with all the kit and followed them back to BudleighSalterton. I made Fiona listen to me as I told her just what had beensaid to me by Colonel B. She refused to believe it. She said that she hadbeen told I was seriously unwell, and she did not know why I was out ofhospital at all. But she agreed to let me stay for a couple of days, andspend some time with the children. We talked a good deal - Fiona inconstant tears - and she told me she was sorry for the pain she hadcaused me, she had spoken and acted quite irrationally, but she coulddo nothing now about what had happened as a result. I am not sure Ibelieved her.

Although she seemed to be cooperating now with the Army in theirattempts to enforce some kind of reconciliation, even to the extent ofmoving, subsequently, to Aldershot, to a brand-new quarter that wasmade available to us there, her behaviour was simply beyondunderstanding. It had no element of consistency - nor would

8

myit, I

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suppose, if she were suffering from some genuine mental instability.There were times when I was convinced of this; others, when I firmlybelieved she was part of the wider 'conspiracy' that had ruined mycareer. Whatever the case, no sooner had she moved, than she beganmaking the sarne allegations all over again, to our new neighbours.Eventually I was forced to leave the Married Quarter and take upaccommodation in the Mess at Aldershot. I had thought that by livingwith Fiona again I mightbe able to persuade hertohelp me in my case.But it wasn't to be. Not while I was still in the Army.

It was the most bizarre series of events I can recall. On one occasion,we had the Padre come to the house as some kind of mediator. Fionabroke down and confessed she had told lies about me to the Army. Butshe immediately retracted this. And, when questioned about it, thePadre refused to repeat what she had said. On another occasion, whenshe was still in Honiton, I found her in the bath, rigid, unable to touchherself - it seemed she was in a state of shock. I took her to the doctor.She began seeing a Harley Street specialist called Dr Connell. I barelytalked to the man, but when asked to give written evidence about oursituation, he offered a detailed diagnosis ofwhat he considered to bemy obsessive desire to clear my reputation, without any real appraisalof Fiona's condition which, at times such as these, seemed indeed, tohave the intensity ofa real illness. I later discovered that Connell hadbeen brought into the case by the Army medical authorities. Mean-while, because I was still dow4graded, I had to see a psychiatrist at theMilitary hospital in Aldershot. I was told quite plainly by the Admin-istrative Colonel that my case was wholly irregular, as I suspected. Inthe end, the RAMC refused to treat me, saying there wan no conditionto treat, and I was ordered to attend a Medical Upgrading Board. Irefused, since it was my argument that my downgrading had beenillegal in the frrst place. I was eventually escorted in front of an ArmyMedical Board and not for the first time gave vent to a lot of spleenwhich, if I had been on the other side of the table, would have led me tobelieve that such extreme anger might well have been a symptom ofsome derangement or other! I was declared perfectly normal! A postingto Germany was promulgated the following day. I had to get a civiliansolicitor to stop it, on the grounds that my whole treatment wasinconsistent with natural justice.

All through this time, my chief preoccupation was to prove mysanity, and the underhand behaviour ofthose who had got me out ofIreland. But the more I pushed, the more the system refused me mylegal rights under Military Law. It seemed there was no end to thevelvet worded rebuffs, the neatly cushioned obstacles. I began to doubtthat I should ever see my way through.

Eventually, after three months separated from Fiona, she wrote mea letter offering a last chance ofreconciliation - on one condition, that Ileave the Army. I realized, once and for all, that this was what she hadalways really wanted. And, by this stage, I was so disillusioned the

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thought of saving my family, and trying to start a new lif'e, made mewaver in my determination. Fiona came back to Aldershot. The Messhad champagne sent to our room. I was excused military duties, and Ifinally agreed to quit, without the justice I had been seeking. My letterof resignation, in which I made quite clear my reasons for resigning,was accepted this time without any problem - although I was hurt bythe extraordinary return letter sent to me, informing me that I wouldnot be required to serve with the colours or for any reserve service atall. The Army had shut all doors to me.

My resignation did not mean I was prepared to give up the battle initself, merely that I was at a loss how best to pursue it. I had written tothe Army authorities repeatedly, stating and restating my case,making quite clear that I would settle for nothing less than an inquiry- my right under military law - that would clear me entirely of thestigma of having been allegedly mentally ill, and expose the realreasons for my removal from Ireland.By 26 March 1976, all I hadreceived from the Army Board of the Defence Council, which was theultimate authority I could appeal to, was a statement that I wasremoved from duty under a Non-Adverse report; it was agreed thatany reference to my mental condition could be expunged from it, but itcould not be reconsidered as part ofany wider investigation, since itwas justified at the time. Meanwhile, my medical records would retainevidence of whatever. diagnosis Colonel Stewart had made, and, ofcourse, my enforced hospitalisation. This was of no use to me whateverand it was not even an accurate appraisal ofwhat had happened. Infact I was not removed from my appointment under any Non-Adversereport. That was written later. I was removed before I was medicallydowngraded. These are the facts ofthe case. Once I had received thefinal ruling on my appeal, I decided my only chance was to appeal toThe Sovereign, since this was the only course of action that would keepthe matter within official channels, where it would not involve anyadverse publicity and put the reputation of the Army at risk. Needlessto say, I got no joy here either. It was then that I decided that I wouldhave to take matters up elsewhere.

I made it quite plain to Lieutenant-Colonel Ching, my commandingoffrcer at Aldershot, that since I had exhausted all the proper channelsI felt it was within my rights to approach the Press. He told me that Ishould under no circumstances take this course of action. For the timebeing, I kept it in reserve. But I saw no reason now why I should notapproach the police. I had had long enough to realize that to separatewhat had happened to me personally from the kind of dirty tricks I hadwitnessed in Ulster was a mistake. If I was to get no satisfactoryinvestigation into my own case, taken in isolation, then I decided thatmy only course was to make the connection with other events apparentto authorities outside the Army, since it was their duty to investigatecriminal activities, no matter who carried them out. Her Mqjesty'sForces were no exception to the rule of law. To this end, I went to

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Winchester Police Station on 11 July.1976, and saw the ChiefSu g_ rintendent there. He had known I was coming, since I had inform-ed the lrmy of my intention. His only response wis to tell me that if Iinsisted on making allegations concerning the actions of p andothers in ulster he would have to charge rne under the offrcial secretsAct. I was dumbfounded, realizing thal this would have been an abuseofthe Act. I was familiar with theiricks ofthe RUC, but I still hadfaithin the good old English policeman. I began to wonder just tro*f.r tt

"set-up went.I found out soon afterwards. I took my case to the Metropolitan police

at New scotland Yard, and saw two offrcers from the Anti-TerroristBranch. They listened to what I had to say, but then told me they couldnot process any ofmy complaints. I protested vehemently. The two menwent away for some minutes, then returned, to tell me quite plainlythat they had discussed the matter with their superiors, and tirat theorder not to deal with me came'right from the top-'.

I was now involved in my short lived reconciliation with Fiona _ so,for a brief time, f was more preoccupied on the domestic front. I;ov;!lt: ?*ilY up to Harrogate, my home town, and tried to begin a newlife^. lut it was hopeless. No sooner were we back together aJm"; ;;ewife than I was being accused behind my back of ail f.inds ofinhum;;treatment. The whole marriage was beyond redemption, and we bothrealized there was no point in pretending otherwise. I sent Fiona backto her mother's. I was left alon'b in Harrogate. I could see little future3!"u4 of Te. I applied for several jobs. The interviews seemed prorn-ising but I never had a single offer ofwork. I had a sense that I wasbeing followed-on occasions, but for a long while I could prove nothing. iy.e-"! to the police in Hanogate, but, like the others before them, ttieydidn't warrt to know alout my_case. Ispent too much time.fo"" fo, *1,own good. I knew that I had probably lost my family through thisbusiness, along with my careei. One night, I sat on a liindow tiage aimy parents' home, gazing down to the ground a long way leneaitr. Iknew that only a slight shift of weight would make m]e rati. sut then ipulled myself together. I thought to myself, ,I'm not going to let thembeat me'. I couldn't turn back, and I couldn't give upi fhEre was ontyone way: forward. And so I set out again.

I went to the Samaritans, and my church deacon, who were fright_ened ofthe intelligence connection and were eager to see the baci ofme. I wrote to the local MP, Robert Banks, with att tt e details I had atmy command, including the names of the policeman I had seen andwhat had been said to me. His reply w"s p""ii"t.ble:

'I am afraid that I cannot sincerely advise you to continue in yourprrrsuit of recrimination against the Army. In so saying, may I siressthat I can well understand how you feel, uut t trrint il ir iirit"boi"u"rta'd will prove totally unrewarding for you to continue to iay sucrrcharges. I do not think, quite frankly, thal they will succeed.'

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I received this in october 1922. During the next couple ofweeks, as Iwent about my business in Hanogate, ibecame sure that -y."tiorr.were beingobserved. I took the registration numbers of three-differentcars which had been following me. I went into the police stationanddemanded to speak to someone from the Special Branch. I knew ihat,with Menwith Hill GCHQ Station only a little way up the road, therewould be a heavy special Branch p"esence at the station. But the Deskpergeant-replied that they had oniy had a single constarte o" autl anahe agreed to go and fetch him.

A man in ciwies came downstairs and asked what he could do forme. I said that he probably knew who I was, and that I had reason tobelieve I was under surveillance. If the local special gr.tr"h .tr"t"responsible, for any reason, I wanted to know. I had enough enemiesfrom Ulster to make it yorth my while taking sensible pr"""."tio".,lilhey w91e not. I was told that they knew not*hing aboui me ."aO'g"home. The numbers would be checied and I wouii be contacted in diecourse. I left the station, without believing a word of it.

My old friend and mentor, Bunny Dearsley, comes back into the1tory here. Four or five months before I was moved from Ireland,punny had been warned by Colonel B that he was on an IRA death_list, his life was in dangerand he would have to leave Ireland. As aresult ofthis warning he had left the province, and because his engage-Itent was up, he had retired from the army and was living-ne-arFolkestone surrounded by his former NCO's and his family. Iie hadestablished links with the Folkestone police force and waried me inHarrogate by telephone that he had reaionto believe that I had becomea.victim of a plot bylVII5 and Brigade He. Capt. D of He B Brigade hadvisited him in England while I was stiil irrulster toiell him I hadalready let without handing over my sources to anyone. since thesehad proved so valuable, he isked Bunny if he wouid give him theirnames and addresses. Bunny did so, in good faith. Onl later did hefind out what had happened to me and r6ahsed that Brigade Ha h;;been conspiring to obtain my sources at least three months before i wassent to Netley.

The moment I left Harrogate police station, I got on the phone toBrll.ry in Folkestone. I knew he had been cooperiting with ihe localpolice, part-a,ime, and would be in a position to help ,i" .ro*- (Bu"nyhad spotted an IRA car-stealing operation in the Lydd area). i askei!:q it\u could get someone tn cfreck out the ..".rrrirrbu., I had givenYorkshire police. He agreed, took the number of the pt o"" Uo" i *?. n,and promised to_,get hack as soon as he could. Bunny rang me twentyminutes later. He told me that all the cars belonged t"o trre NortirRiding Constabulary, offrcially registered.

I went back to the station and demanded to see the Special Branchm_an again. Down he came, with his smooth manner, and^ said, ,Ah yes,Mr Holroyd, let's go into the interview room.' He sat-down opporit" -"

,

I absolutely had to. I had talked to them

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and told me, brazen-faced, that one car belonged to a housewife inOtley, another to a farmer at Ilkley, and the third to a woman inKnaresborough. I said, 'You're a liar! Because I've just checked thecentral computer and they all belong to you!'

He disappeared from the interview room, blughing. Within a fewminutes, ttrl Ctrief Superintendent of the Special Branch returned inhis place, and admitted that they had been asked to keep an eye on me,sincl they did not want me to talk to the wrong kind of people! I quicklyfound out whom he was refening to - and it simply made me all themore angry. I had yet to make any contacts with Fleet Street. But theINSIGHT team from The Sunday fimes had heard about me throughthe grapevine, and came to interview me about Robert Nairac' I wasn'tpreparCd to speak about Nairac then. Besides, Robert had orrlyiecently been murdered and I felt I would say nothing about him unlessT ehsolrrfnlv had to. I had talked to them about mv own case instead,my own case instead,though they hadn't been at all interested. They were obsessed withwhatthe SAS had been up to. At that time I did not help them.

Looking back I might as well have told the whole story there andthen. I was now a suitable subject for surveillance. I went straight toRobert Banks MP and told him what had happened. Banks dutifullyinformed Mr Crofton Brown at the Ministry ofDefence, who showednointerest in me, or my allegations. Nor, indeed, as it turned out, wouldBanks himself. He had his own role to play in the Shadow DefenceMinistry. Of course he a{vised me I would get no satisfaction.

But now I had stood up to the Harrogate Special Branch, and madethem take me seriously, they became the first police force to agree toprocess my complaints. On 23 November !977,I made signed state-ments to Detective Sergeant A. Kerr and Detective ConstableDickinson about a number of incidents in Ulster, including the bung-led kidnappings, the illegal planting of ammunition in ColumbaMcVeigh's house, and the forced entry into various private properties.I made it clear that innocent life had been lost as a result of actionsinvolving the British Army and the RUC Special Branch. I was ass-ured, in writing, that North Yorkshire police would take action. ChiefConstable A.B- Connell informed me that a full report had been for-warded to the 'appropriate authority', but that there might be a delaybefore enquiries were begun. I should not doubt in any case that myallegations would be taken very seriously.

I felt at last that I had achieved a genuine success. I had got to knowthe o{frcers at Harrogate police station quite well, and I had begun totrust them, as I felt they had begrrn to trust me. (My credibility withthem had risen when I identified a heroin dealer operating inHarrogate to the Drug Squad). I was prepared to leave the matter intheir liands. Once my allegations were investigated and were found tobe true, I wds sure that all those offrcials in the Army and the Ministryof Defence would be forced to give honest answers to my questions. Iwould get a decent inquiry into the whole matter of what was going on

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in Ulster, between the SMIUs, the Special Branch, Army Intelligenceand the civilian Intelligence services. And, as a result, I would person-ally receive an apology for what was done to me, a genuine adjustmentof my records, and all stigma attached to me for my transfer to Netleycomprehensively removed.

During the course of 1976, I had been offered a job with theRhodesian Army, which I had declined to take up, since I was deter-mined to frnd someone in authority who would pursue my case. Now Ifelt that, in the circumstances, it would be in my best int€rests toaccept thejob. I desperately needed work and, as a soldier, the oppor-tunity seemed too good to pass over, especially since the RhodesianArmy had kept the post open for a year, in the hope that I wouldeventually decide to go out. I was one of many British nationals who,for one reason or another, boarded the plane for Salisbury during thoseyears to see active service in the bush. There was no ideological reasonfor my departure. I simply decided to go and do a job I knew I was good

at. For all I knew, I might even come to view the events of the recentpast in a different light. Late in 1978, I left Britain for a three yearterm as a Mqior in the Rhodesian Army.

I visited the Harrogate Special Branch detectives one last time tomake sure I would not be forgotten. I received the same assuranceg Ihad before.

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was not simply a question of the vehicle I had borrowed from Inkomobarracks.

Within a couple of days I was back in England on leave. Fiona and Ihad finally been divorced. I lost everything I had to her, including myparents'house in Harrogate. The Army's evidence of my alleged men-tal instability weighed heavily against me.

When I returned from leave, I learned that my experience with the'tail' on the road to Salisbury was not the only sign that I was beingchecked up on. A couple of acquaintances of mine, both female, hadbeen visited by men who said they represented the Rhodesian ArmySecurity who asked all sorts ofpersonal questions about me: whether Iwas sexually normal, whether I spent a lot of money or talked at lengthabout nry job. When I learned of this, it was like the recurrence of anightmare. I had become aware that a number of people who had beenmixed up with the Security Services in Ulster had either died shortlyafter leaving the province or become victims of strange accidents. Irang my OC in Rhodesia at once and told him what had happened. Heknew all about my experience in Ireland and told me to try to find outexactly who had been responsible. I then contacted the Special Investi-gation Branch of the Rhodesian Military Police and informed themthat I thought I was under surveillance. They denied they were respon-sible but told me they had a pretty good idea who might be: ArmyCounter Intelligence, a highly undercover group which could not bediscussed over the telephone. But then to my surprise I was given anumber on which to ring them. Clearly, Northern Ireland was not theonly place where schisms between the various Intelligence agencieswere at work.

I rangthe number and put the same questionto the ACI. There was along silence, while whoever answered the phone passed the call tosomebody else. Then a voice came on the line saying'Ah yes, helloFred!' And of course I knew I had got the right people. The voicebelonged to Captain Des Fontaine, the offrcer commanding ACI. Hetold me that I was on the periphery of an investigation into someAmerican officers serving in the Army, suspected of smuggling gunsinto South Africa. 'Nonsense', I said, and asked for the truth. Hisattitude changed immediately, he said I had better come in and seehim; perhaps we should talk things over. I agreed. He suggested wemeet in the lobby of the Monopatapo Hotel in Salisbury.

Afterwards, I rang one of my'call-up'officers, an attorney, and toldhim the story. I asked if he would accompany me to the meeting, and heagreed since his oflices were near the hotel. I picked him up in my carand we drove down, then stood in the lobby, waiting. A huge bear of aman came up to me and flapped his ID card in my face. When he spoke,I realised at once that he was a Yorkshireman - it was a bizarre touch.He refused to let my friend come any further than the lobby, but thentook me to a room in the depths ofthe hotel to see his boss.

RHODESIAN SOJOURN

I had a hard time in Rhodesia, but I do not regret going. The RhodesianMilitary had little affection for the British. The attitude of the indi-genous armed forces and police reminded me of the loyalists in Ulster,and the RUC. My own Commanding Officer, when I first went there,had a reputation for sacking British soldiers once they were servingunder him. But after some time, through sheer hard work and profess-ionalism, I managed to impress him; and he recommended me to takeover a new squadron that was being formed, ahead ofall the Rhodesianoflicers going for the post. I had insisted on enmlment that I would nottake part in any Intelligence activities, and I was accepted with thisproviso.

Yet even here all was not what it seemed. I was about to take a tenday leave for Christmas 1978. I had just begun to feel I had reallysettled down, and been accepted; I was commanding a Logistic Comp-any running various transport convoys through the bush and success-fully defeating ambushes by the guerrillas. It had restored a sense ofpurpose in me not because I had any personal feelings concerning therights and wrongs ofthe war, but simplybecause Iwas doing ajob well.Only someone, somewhere, clearly felt the time had come to remind meof what I had left behind in the U.K.

I had taken my Army Landrover, and was driving down fromInkomo ganison, north of Salisbury, to Darwendale, about thirtymiles to the south, when I became certain I was under surveillance.There could be no doubt about it. The garrison was right in the bush,and there was only a strip road running out to the main Salisbury road.After only a few minutes' driving, a white Peugeot car appearedbehind me, and tailed me all the way down to Darwendale. I asumed, atfrrst, that it was someone checking up on me because I was using theLandrover for a private journey, although this did not worry me since Ihad permission to do so. When I came through Salisbury, and the carwas still with me, I began to grow annoyed and carried out antisurveillance drills. I pulled in and turned a corner, round the back of achurch set off the road. The car did likewise, and stopped when Istopped. I tupned my lights off, so did my pursuer. I drove forward a fewyards, thinking to myself that I might as well play games, if that waswhat he wanted. He too drove forward and stopped again when I did.Then I shot past him and away. He came after me. I felt sure now that it

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When I went into the hotel room, I noticed a tape recorder sitting onthe desk. Behind it was Captain Des Fontaine, smiling at me with thekind of innocent assurance I had become familiar with in such circum-stances. 'Sit down, Fred,' he said, 'and tell me about why you ieftNorthern Ireland.' As often before, I expressed my disbelief at whatwas happening to me. And I told him that the whole business made mevery upset. For this reason I would go through it once, and when I hadfrnished that was it, no more. He had the details already. Before I cameto Rhodesia, I had made sure the Army there knew as much as I didabout what had transpired: I had kept everyone informed.

I simply did not understand why they should start this undercoverinvestigation into my affairs. Des Fontaine simply told me to relax,they just wanted to get things right. So if I wouldn't mind . . . I spent anhour going through what had happened. I was in tears by the end ofit.Again, Des Fontaine told me to calm down, and sent for a cup ofcoffee.He turned off the tape and waited. Then he said, 'I want you to gothrough it one more time.'

I lost all control at that point. I got up and smashed the tape recorder.I swore at the Captain and his senior NCO, and told them I was going tosee the General himself about this. I had performed well in their army,I wasn't going to be treated in the same way as I had been in England.The Yorkshireman tried to restrain me, but I was having none of it. Iwalked out on them, picked up my attorney friend and drove off.

I went straight to Army HQ at King George VI Barracks, andmarched into my CO's ofnce. I told him that I was resigning mycommission, Colonel 'Skin'T\rrner was no Colonel B, I'm glad to say.He asked me to tell him exactly what had been going on, and when Ihad, he got hold of his 2ilc and sent him immediately to see GeneralMacKintyre, the olficer in charge of all Army Manpower andPlanning. Like T\rrner, it transpired that the General knew nothing ofwhat the Army Counter Intelligence Unit had been up to. But hepromised to frnd out. I waited half an hour. A call came through thatthe General had made some headway in his inquiries. I was not to beallowed to resign right away, but should wait a week until he haddiscovered exactly who had authorised the investigation. Then weshould discuss the matter with all the facts at our command.

I did as I was asked. I went up to my front line eub{rnit at Umtali,and waited for three days until I got a call to go back to Army HQ to see'Skin' T\rrner. T\rrner gave me as full an explanation as he could. Hetold me he had to choose his words very carefully, for the matter was adelicate one. Firstly, he could assure me that General MacKintyre hadknown nothing about the investigation. Secondly, the General had toldhim that if I wanted to go to see him he was prepared to say to my facethat I would never be investigated in such a way again, and he,personally thought it was scandalous. Thirdly, the General had askedhim to explain something to me as circumspectly as he could.

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The Rhodesians were still having trouble with the sanctions thathad first been imposed in the sixties when Ian Smith had made theUnilateral Declaration of Independence. The Rhodesian regime wasbeing helped to circumvent sanctions by powerful friends in England,among them MI5. On the 'old boy' network some of the same MI5personnel who had been involved in getting me out oflreland had donea hatchet job on me to Des Fontaine, head of the Rtrodesian ArmyCounter Inteligence. My former OC subsequently told me that Colonel'Skin' T\rner had been told by ACI that I was an MI6 spy in Rhodesia.This was a very serious allegation and could not only have finished mycareer in the Rhodesian Army, but under the Emergency Powers Actthen in force, it could have led to a long term in prison.

Up to this pointl had identified my enemies inlreland asmyColoneland the staffof HQ 3 Brigade. Now I realised things were much moreserious and began re-evaluating the events which had led to mydeparture from Ireland. I recalled that Bunny Dearsley had attended aconference at HQ 3 Brigade some 6 months before my departure whereit had been suggested that an MI5 agent should replace me on cross-border work. Mr Smellie (of MI6) had vigorously resisted this and thematter had been dropped. I also now recalled that 3 Brigade hadrequested me to take Captain M, the Explosives Ordnance Disposalofficer mentioned earlier, over the border to meet my sources. I haddone so in the hope ofstarting co--operation between the bomb disposalunits of the two armies. Such inter-arrny cmperation was being doneclandestinely because at that time the British and Irish Governmentswere virtually not on speaking terms. The diplomatic frost of theperiod was in part the result of some covert operations carried out inthe Republic in the years before, such as the Littlejohn brothers'bankrobberies, and bombings in the Republic in 1974, widely believed to bethe work of Protestant terrorists working with the British Army.

I had taken Captain M across the border to meet various sources inthe Republic, including the most important of them at that time, theBadger. Then an IRA source informed me that the Frovos had arrang-ed to ambush an Army officer in civilian clothes they had identifredrepeatedly crossing the border at the same place. I found that this wasCaptain M. There was extreme danger here because Captain M couldhave led the IRA to my sources in the Republic. I reported this to MrSmellie who ordered Brigade to stop Captain M's operation. (I laterdiscovered that Capt. M, under instruction to pass intelligence to MrSmellie through me, had instead been passing the information toBrigade, and thus to MI5. Captain M had, in effect, been used topenetrate MI6's operations for MI5. It is perhaps not surprising thatthe ollicer who replaced me when I was put in Netley was the sameCaptain M - and after him, a series of MI5 officers.)

But it would be dishonest of me to claim that at this point all thepieces in the jigsaw fell into place. Yes, MI5 had entered the picturewhich before had been almost entirely dominated, in my mind, by

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-#

TOP: A success for the Rhodesian security forces in a contact with ZIPRA. BELOW: trn

Rhodesia,1979.

Rhodesian security forces being briefed before an operation in the bush, 1979

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Brigade HQ. But the appearance of MI5 at this stage just confused mefurther.

This is not the place to recount my experiences of the war inRhodesia. However, there were two incidents which illustrate themachiavellian nature of the intelligence trade.

In 1979, under British and American pressure, a settlement wasbeing organised to end the war. The Rhodesian population - black andwhite - althoughwarweary, did not wantto see a sell--outtowhattheysaw as 'communism' a la Mozambique. (After the withdrawal of thePortugese forces, Mozambique had been taken over by FRELIMINO,led by Samora Machel. An economic collapse followed and it was nosecret in Rhodesia that the people in Mozambique were starving.)While the Prime Minister, Bishop Muzorewa, his cabinet and thearmed forces made a great effort to present the agreement likely toemerge from the Lancaster House talks as acceptable, the big land-owneis were talking ofrazing the country to the ground rather thanhand the country over. After the Lancaster House agreement wassigned, an election was to be held. It had been agreed -that allRfiodesian security forces would be confined to banacks for threemonths, this being overseen by a monitoring force from the Common-wealth, who would set up assembly points in the bush to which allguerrillas, both inside and outside the country would report for this 3month period. This, in theory, would enable the electorate to votewithout intimidation.

It was in this atmosphere that secret meetings were held in militaryestablishments all over the country. Only Majors and above attendedand the venues were guardedby armed soldiers' Bishop Muzorewa andthe senior officers addressed the assembled offrcers and informed themthat they should not worry about the approaching election becat'se asecret deal had been done with the British who were determined thatRhodesia would not go Marxist. The Bishop claimed he had beenassured by Mrs Thatcher that if the guerillas did not conform to thearrangements, the British would rig the election. I heard BishopMuzorewa say this at the meeting held at 4 Brigade HQ at FortVictoria. Muzorewa stood on the platform surrounded by the GeneralStaff and assured the Rhodesians that he had complete faith in MrsThatcher's word. After the meeting was over I tried to convince myfellow officers that under no circumstances should the British be

trusted, and for my efforts was carpeted by the Brigade Mqjor and toldto hold my tongue. I do not know whether the Bishop had been deceivedby the British, and having been part of the conspiracy, was subse-quently in no position to complain; or whether the Bishop and theGeneral Staffwere lying to their offrcers to induce them to take part inthe charade that followed; or whether the Bishop was telling the truth,and that there was an attempt to rig the election which failed' If theBritish lied to the Rhodesians, it might explain why General Walls,Joint Services Commander, felt he had the moral right to attempt to

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organise a coup when the election results - and the victory for MrMugabe's party - became known.

The second event of which I have some knowledge concerned the

attempt to kill Robert Mugabe while he was electioneering in the Fortvictoria area. At this time we had the British Monitoring Force

attached to the HQ. Just after lunch, while sitting in the mess talkingwith one of the British o1ficers, there was an almighty explosion close

to the British HQ which was situated next to the military/civilianairport. Startled, ih" gtitittt officer said 'What on earth was that?'

Joiittgly, I replied 'Oh, just someone trving to blow up rylr Mu-sape'l

Seconis iater as the mesi was vacated confirmation came through thatthis was indeed what had occurred. I immediately mobilised one of myarmoured ambulances and went to the scene. The explosion had occur-

red on the narrow road leading to the airstrip. 1000lbs of Russian

explosives had been planted in aiulvertunderthe road, blowing a hole

the size of two doubie decker buses. There was utter confusion as MrMugabe's bodyguards, suffering from shock, ran around pointing wea-

pon"s and threalening people. Mr Mugabe himself, who had narrowlyavoided death, had Gen rushed to the airstrip and put on a Viscountaircraft which was in the process of taking off. As it left the strip an

army helicopter clung to its tail providing escort.

In the evening whqn I had time to go over the events of the day and

had learned that the explosives had been remotely detonated, I re-

called that a couple ofhours before the event I had seen a uniformedmajor in SAS em6ellishments in the HQ building. (The everyday-we3r

uniform of the Rhodesian SAS was identical to that ofthe British SAS).

He was being briefed in the presence of both Rhodesian and BritishMonitoring force offrcers and I was asked to move away' I also knew

that this SlS oflicer had taken offin a light aircraft and was over the

scene of the explosion at the time of its detonation. The frring wireleading from tG explosives in a ditch terminated some 70 metres from

tne roia and the p"rsott who detonated the explosives lad no line ofsight to the road is his vision was obscured by bushes' (He was never

calptured.) I suspect the SAS M4jor was an aerial observer of the

MiigaUe convoy ginittg the command to fire to the man on the ground'

The"combinatiln of these factors led me to speculate that both Britishand Rhodesians cHperated in this incident. whether this incidentwas intended to kill Mr Mugabe or merely frighten him, I don't know'

Rhodesia was a kind of clearing ground for me, a breathing space'-I

Utea tne white Rhodesians, juJt as I was very fond of the blackRhodesians with whom I had close acquaintance. The former were

proud, stubborn people, but earthy, and coarse in a manner I found

lrrgugirrg. I can certainly say they treated the black African population

far"b6tte-r than most people realise. I can provide an example ofjusthow this worked, in terms of a guerrilla war that was not without itsparallels to the war in Ulster.

)

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I had a black African Sergeant Mqjor called Tosavepe Ghogo. Hecame_to me one day and told me that his father, a village headman, hadbe_en beaten up by Rhodesian soldiers - a troop ofGrey Scouts, based atInkomo garrison. I made enquiries and found out which sub unit wasinvolved. They had gone on a follow-up operation after some terroristshad visite_d the village to get food and rls[. The soldiers had questionedall the villagets, and beaten up Tosavepe's father quite badly in theprocess. I got Tosavepe to write a statement about all this and addedo1e- g,f my own, and took them to my Brigadier, Brigadier Hoskins. Itold him I had come from Northern Ireland where this sort of thingwent on r.eguJarly, and eventually rather than achieve anything posi-tive, it simply damaged the credibility and morale of ihe soldiersordered to carry it out. Hoskins studied my reports, and immediatelvput out an order ofthe day, saying that ifany ofhis soldiers we"e eveifound maltreating the local people, they would have to answer person-ally to him. He then got hold of the two offrcers in charge of tle unitwhich had descended on the village, and severely disciplined them. If Ihad tried anything like that in Ireland, it would have been me whoended up on a charge!

Obviously, I am not saying there were not a number of offensiveracists among the white population and the system they lived underonly served to bolster their prejudices. But I was told time and againwhen I was there that the mqjoritywere willingtochange; butthallanSmith and his government were determined not to lose-power throughany kind of compromise. The peace settlement was forced upon their.For my_own qart I continued to serve under the new regime, andretained my affection for the country itself, with its marvellous iand-scape and wildlife, while prepared to serve the black political author-lty ju.st as I had the white. When I left, I did so with mixed feelings. Ihad done the jo! I had been asked to do, and had done it well. But-myappetite was whetted for my own battle at home. I had heard no *o"iabout any inquiry into my allegations. And Icouldsee no future unlessI took up the fight once more, to clear my name and see justice done.

10

BATTLE LINESI- applied for a number of jobs on my return to England and wasdelighted to be accepted by Group Four (Total Security) as a Cash InTbansit consultant. I moved to Essex and got on with my work. I wroteto the North Yorkshire police to find out exactly what, had happenedabout the complaints they had promised me they would see processed.Eventually, on 11th January L982,I received an evasive letter fromAssistant Chief Constable Burke, telling me that in fact my frle hadbeen sent to the Commissioner of the Metropolitan police, NewScotland Yard. He merely suggested that I write to him to frnd outwhat had been done.

I immediately suspected nothinghad been done at all. When I wroteto Mr McNee at New Scotland Yard, a printed card came back throughthe post telling me that my letter was'receiving attention'. I contacteda Detective Inspector Talbot on 19th March LIBZ tD ask about thedelay, and he told me that, while he was handling my case, he refusedto discuss it except to suggest that I would be wise to drop it. It wasnot something the police could cope with. It was really an Armymatter. I contacted the Army again, and was promptly told that Ishould be dealing with the police. In other words, t o one wanted totouch it. I was back at square one.

I then lost my job at Group Four. I was in the offrce when a call camethlgugh from an oflicer in the Metropolitan Anti-Terrorist Squad,with,a message that was to be passed to my superiors. It was quitesimple: I was a dangerous, disaffected ex-offrcer and could not betrusted. I went to see my boss shortly afterwards. He asked me to leave,saying-they cguli not afford to upset people in the Security Servicessince they relied on the goodwillof the police, especially in London.They offered me ayear's salary,'condcience money'in lieuofnotice, butI refused to accept it.

fp the event I put my trust again in the police themselves, albeit adifferent force. I went into the local police stltion in Southend and toldthem what had happened with Group Four, explained what had led tothis, qnd repeated that the Army had told me it was a police matter. Iasked them to take action on my behalf. I made unothe" long state-ment, reiterationg my allegations, and the details of my own treat-ment, to two members of the Essex Special Branch.

130

About a week later, they contacted me to tell me that Chief Cons-table Bunyard had come under pressure from MIb not to take up mycase. In response, he had asked for someone from the security serviceto come down and talk to me personally. If this was not done,-he wouldpass my material onto the RUC, where it should have gone in the firstplace, since the offences took place in their area.

In fact, no one from MI5 came to see me, and Bunyard could get nopggran_cgjhat anyone would. As a result, he p"ocessed my compfaintsto the RUC. For the first time, and when I least expected it, so'meonewas acting honourably on my behalf. But how far lhe RUC would beprepared to take matters I could only wonder.

What seemed like a strange coincidence happened then. In theprevious year, Sir George Terry ofthe Sussex police had headed aninvestigation into the Kincora Boy's Home, and the scandals surround-ir_ts it. I had known little about it at the time. My only connection withKincora when I was in Ireland was a reference I had made in my policenotebooks about rumours circulating that several leading proiestantpoliticians were using it for homoseiual practices. shortl! after I hadlast spokenwith Essex police I was visited by a Captain in the RoyalMilitary Police Special Investigation Branch. Naturally, I thought hehad come about my case so I invited him in. I began to burlte on"aboutit, when he stopped me and told me it was the KincoraBoys'Home hewanted to talk about - did I have any relevant information? I wastaken aback by this, but I ferreted through my notebooks and showedhim what I had written. Then I returnea to tfre subject of my case.

t Rlayed the Captain the tape Bunny Dearsley had left me when hequit-the province, which made reference to cormption within the RUCwhile speaking about the sources he was haniing over. My vistorrepeated ttlat his brief was on Kincora, but that he was rrery intrigued

accompanied by an Inspector RUC. He too had been involved in

131

investigation could have been stepped up a gear, as it was later -though not by the authorities themselves.

As it was, I continued to feel isolated and frustrated, and began tosuspect that the RUC team were simply milking me for everything Iknew, without doing a thing about my allegations. They would makeremarks like, 'Fred, you don't really want to prove this do you?'or'Hebelieved in what he was doing at the time'. One by one, they weretrying to make me drop the charges I had made. After eighteen monthsofgetting nowhere both the Essex police and I had little confidence lefbin the effectiveness of the RUC inquiry.

Not long after the team had first come to see me, they had taken meover to Ulster, and installed me at RUC HQ Knock for a week, so thatthey could debrief me at leisure. I cooperated fully with them. But onceI had done this they made sure that all the loose ends I had unravelledwere firmly tied up, and all the witnesses told to keep their mouthsshut. Far more sinister than this was the fact uncovered byjournaliststhat MI5 itself stepped in to make sure that anything the inquirymught turn up should be conveniently overlooked. Bernard Sheldon,(referred to in Parliament as Bernard'X') was MI5's'legal advisor'andreported to the Security Service Director General Sir John Jones.Sheldon approached the MOD at this time to ask for their assistance inhaving the RUC investigation blocked, if such beeame necessary. TheMinistry had claimed to set up their own inquiry into the dirty trickscampaign, which if they were telling the truth produced no publicresults whatever. But they were reluctant to cooperate with Sheldonand MI5. Sheldon then went directly to the Northern Ireland Office,which ordered Sir Jack Hermon to make sure that any investigationwas curtailed, in the interests ofthe safety ofagents still at work inUlster, an entirely spurious reason. I also learned that Clive Ponting,as a legal officer from MOD attended a meeting at Whitehall where itwas generally conceded that my allegations were true and steps toprevent the press taking up the case were discussed. The meeting waschaired by Mr Tony Stephens, who had been the Director of the ArmyLegal Services when I tried to frght my case in the Army. Betweenthem, the RUC, the Army, MI5 and its political masters, made surethat none of my allegations was addressed in the normal manner. I hadgot my so--called 'inquiry'- and little good it had done.

There were some of those in the Essex police who saw what washappening, and who shared my view on the whole business. One night,during the course of this charade, a small number came to my house,and told me they thought I was being hoodwinked. They were not ableto approach me officially, but they had come privately to suggest that Igo to see one of two journalists, and have the thing blown wide open.The first was a man called Chris Ryder, and the other DuncanCampbell. They recommended the latter, since, whenever the Essexpolice were sent on certain courses, Campbell was always portrayed asa dangerous left-wingjournalist, who was prepared to uncover corrup-

and would return again with a policeman. When he came back, hJwasaccompanied by an Inspector of the RUC. He too had been involved inthe.Kincora ingrliry the year before. But that was not why he came tovisit me now. I frnd it interesting that whenever Sir George Terry isquestioned on the matter, he says that there *.. ,r"rrei any linkbetween the security forces and ihe homosexual vice ring ceiteredaround Kincora. Yet I was visited by two o{ficers, both of rihom wereinvolved in investigating Kincora, quizzing me what I knew about it,at the same time as they were looking into my allegations of dirtytricks.

The connections between those people who were involved in Kincoraandthose who subsequently dealtwith me became evenmore apparentas the months went on. Once the RUC had offrcially .eceived mycomplaints from Essex police and were forced to address them, theyselected a team to talk to me. What I didn't know at the time was thatthese same three men were visiting Colin Wallace in Lewes prsion toinvestigate a completely different set of allegations which nonethelessdovetailed with mine. Had I known about them, the whole process of

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tion without fear of the @rrsequences' They left me with this advice'

I wrote two letters the following day. I can only be grateful that ChrisRyder was away at the time. For various reagons I don't think anythingw-ould have come from working with him, but Duncan Campbellreplied immediately and ananged for us to meet.

As soon as I got the chance to tell him my story, he told me that.itfittedwith a lot ofthingshe had already learnedfromothersources. Asa result, he was personally prepared to undertake an in-depth investi-gation that would put the sham efforts of the RUC in a real perspective'ican't say that I was happy to have to resort to this kind oftactic, but Ihad exhaust€d all the oflicial channels by now. The only course avail-able to me was to carry out the threat I had made before I went toRhodesia: that unless the authorities dealt with my case, I would havegone to the Press. In Duncan Campbell Ihadfoundsomeonewhowouldhave no qualms about making t,l.at threat effective. It ryas-an uneasyalliance, politically, but it was one of the best I had ever had'

Duncan duly went across to Ulster, and started asking questions'In spite of warnings from the authorities many witnes"el-dlq

"oT"forward. Not only was he able to substantiate what I told him, he

unearthed a large ne*r atea ofevidence on other offences carried out atthe same time.

In February 1984, while working on my allegatione, fhrncan was

knocked offLis Uicycle while riding through central lrcndon. He was

taken to hospital with head wounds. Documents from his nannigrgwere seized under the Offrcial Secrets Act and his home was raidedwhile he lay in his hospital bed. I found this an extraordinary coinci-dence.

The three main articles based on my material were publistred in theNew Stateman in the spring of that year. To coincide with theirpublication, a documentary television progranrme was broadcast bybiu"""" Reports on Channel 4. The propaganda machine went ou!c\']1'into work on this side of the Irish Sea, and once the results of the RUCinquiry werc made known (which concluded there was insufficientevidence to warrant initiation of criminal proceedings against anyperson), I realised that now, more ttran ever,I should have to hold frrmio my conviction that I was doing the right thing, and not lose sight ofmy original motives. The fight went on.

It did so chiefly on two fronts. The first, and ultimately less produc-

tive, concerned the reaction in the Republic oflreland to the DiverseReports programme and the articles themselves. Ttre Irish Ambass-ador to Britaitt, Noel Don, declared 'it is simply not acceptable thatthere should be security forces of any other state operating within ourjurisdiction'. In Dublin itself, an internal Garda inquiry was.set in-motion

into my allegations about cross-border activity in particular.The committee

"o*prised Dan Murphy, Hubert Reynolds, and Jack

Hennessy. I was never called to give evidence before it. Nothing was

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made public. In effect it died a death, but it showed at least that now Ihad resorted to the media, people on both sides of the water would beforced to.make public gestures of concern, even if that was all theywere.. Quite why the Gar{a inquiry of 1g84 met such a fate, I can onlysurmise. But certainly, the Padger was capable of implicatinC verysenior officers. It would hardly hive been in thelr interlsts to b-e seenworking with the British in such an underhand manner.

More importantly, was the effect of the New Statesman articles hadon a particular prisoner serving a ten year jail sentence for man-slaughter in Lewes Prison, Susiex. The-magazine received a letterwhich in the normal course of events would have been treated like somany others that were received at that time and banished to the'nrrtter' file, if Duncan campbell had not chanced to read it to me on oneof my visits to the offices. As soon as I heard what colin wallace had tosay, I realised he knew what he was talking about. He had beenworking for the Army's 'psy-+ps'unit throughout tne time I had beenserving in Ireland, and wrote that he too hadi welter of information onwhat was being done in ulster by the security forces and the Intelli-gence agencies. I decided at once to go to visit him, to hear his story,and frnd.outjust what he was doing serving such a long sentence at HerMajesty's pleasure.

within half an hour ofour meeting, both colin and I realised that thethree RUC men who had been visiting both of us during ttte *or"e oltheir inquiry, without telling either o-f the other's existJnce, traa Ueeninvolved in a cover up. It was not simply the details of my case but thewhole issue of Kincora, and the connections with the Goiernment andthe security forces, the police - uncle Tom cobley and all! tuo"e trt""that, it was how the dirty tricks in ulster connected with the activitiesofthe Far Right in this countr5r-how sections ofMlb were at the centreofan extraordinary abuse ofpower and disregard for the law. IfI hadbeen confused until now about just how I had become a victim of whatygnt o1 1n the province, Colin Wallace cleared my mind. So manythins.s fell into place that I wondered how I had not foen tttem as ttr"!were before. Like Duncan Campbell, he was able to complement whatiknew, and set it in the wider political context.

On that first meeting, Colin Wallace was also able to remindmethatwe had, in fact, come across one another once before. He asked me if Iremembered a man in a UDR uniform who hadcome into MqjorKeithFarnes' office at HQNI, one day when we were holding a rieeting -somewhat younger looking, inevitably, but recognisable-neverthelJss.Once he had mentioned it, I did recall seeing him-, since I had taken thegniform at face value, and clammed up. \Me didn't trust the UDR.Farnes had told me not to worry, Wallace was ,one of us'. Now I wassitting with himin prison, discussing how we had both been ,shafted',and how we could best pool our resouices to continue to fight back.

TOP: Colin Wallace (fifth from right) described by Northern Ireland Secretary Merlyn Reesas a'filing clerk' revealed in a rather difl'erent status. tsELOW: Reunited with my

"hild.".tafter Rhodesia, 1981.

A senior member of IRD (Infbrmation Research Department) attached to HQNI, whoworked closely with MI5.

136

There were countless areas where our information overlapped. Colinhad known a lot about the planning side of operations: he had beenordered to p/oduce various statements for the press to cover things upin public. I was able to tell him what had actually happened on theground. In all, there were three main fields we could cover between us.First, the formation of the killer gangs, and the other ad hoc unitsformed to carry out criminal actions. Second, the homosexual vice ringat Kincora which had for many years been ignored by the RUC, andused by British Intelligence to blackmail certain key figures in Ulsterpolitics. Third, the campaign against Harold Wilson and the LabourParty which included the dissemination of bogus literature. I began tosee that my own piece of the jigsaw was relatively small when I heardwhat Colin had to say. But I realised that once it was connected withthese others, it took on a whole new dimension.

I had a problem, however. Colin Wallace had been convicted ofmanslaughter. I believed him when he protested his innocence, andassured me he had been the victim of a set up. But I had to be absolutelysure this was the case, or I could risk losing all the hard fought ground Ihad won. I went to the New Stateman and spoke to Duncan Campbell.He arranged for the magazine to pay my expenses to go down and lookinto the murder conviction, and find out if it was a miscarriage ofjustice or not. I had the time to do this now. During the @urse of theseevents I had applied for another job, as Security Manager at Marks andSpencer's Oxford Street store, and offered the post. I had told Essexpolice to watch closely to see if I was interfered with. I was careful notto put a foot wrong. But it so happened that the Prime Minister,Margaret Thatcher, was due to visit the store one morning. As SecurityManager, I naturally assumed I would be a central part of the securityplanning. In fact, I was asked into the Personnel Manager's offrce theday before and told I should not come into work at all that morning.Instead, I should go and check the security on premises some milesaway. I asked why I was being got out of the way, but I received nosatisfactory answer. I refused to do exactly what I was asked, andactually turned up an hour or two before Mrs Thatcher appeared, tomake sure my MI5 friends knew that they could not simply push mearound. Perhaps it was a stupid gesture. But I needed to make it. Thefollowing day I was informed that the post I held would no longer exist,and again I was offered a year's salary in lieu ofnotice. I refused themoney, as I had with Group Four, explaining that I knew exactly why Iwas losing the job. No comment was made, I was simply asked to leaveimmediately. Essex police were forced to believe me when I told themwhat was being done to me. Once more, I was out of work, and unlikelyto get any now. At least it made sure I could address Colin Wallace'scase with all my attention.

When I gotto Arundel -where Colinwas supposed to have murderedhis alleged lover's husband, Jonathan Lewis - I set to work. I traced thecourse of the murder, the route Colin was meant to have taken his car,

137

the scene by the river where he was meant to have dumped the victim'sbody, the route to his home, and so on. And I realised the killing simplycould not have happened as the police had described it. I got hold ofallthe evidence produced in court, along with other statements variouswitnesses had made during the course of the case - and I found thatthese had been carefully changed by the time they were submitted tothe judge and jury. They bore all the signs of coaching: four cleaningladies suddenly using language they wouldn't normally use, policeexpressions creeping in where they didn't belong. I could gee where theevidence had been manipulated.

I then checked Colin's story, as he had given it to the court. And it allmade sense. He had left, a dinner engagement on the night of themurder, saying he had stomach trouble, which I can vouchsafe that hesuffers to this day. He did go home for an hour, and he was in the placeshe said he had been. Jonathan Lewis's movements, however, were byno means so straightforward. If the real story was to be believed, thenthese had to be properly traced.

Once I had done enough work to realise that Colin was almostcertainly telling the truth, I decided to test out our mutual 'conspiracytheory'by goingdirectly to the police who had been involved in the caseand seeing what reaction I got. When I walked into Arundel policestation, I spoke to a woman at the desk, and told her I was looking intothe'It's A Knockout'murder, as Colin's case was known locally. Wouldit be at all possible to speak to the investigating officers, Super-intendent Harrison and Detective Constable Kent. She agreed to ringthrough to HQ to see if she could contact them. I heard her say, 'I've gota gentleman here called Mr Hohoyd who . . 'and repeat my request.By this time, I had only been in Arundel a couple ofdays, and made mypresenoe known to as few people as possible. I was utterly convinced,then, when she came back to me that the conspiraey theory wasjustifred. 'Mqjor Holroyd', she said, 'Superintendent Harrison sayshe'll be here in twenty minutes.' I had said nothing to her about myrank in any Army - and I was known publicly only as Captain Holroyd,since I had achieved the rank of M4jor solely in the Rhodesian forces. Itwas quite clear that Harrison had been briefed about me, and knewexactly what I was doing in Arundel, though I had never seen, norheard ofhim before.I spent over twenty minutes with the two policemen. Kent took downeverything that was said. I gave the excuse that I ctid not want to beassociated with Colin Wallace if he was indeed a murderer, and couldthey tell me exactly what had happened in the case. Harrison misledme on a number of iseues. If anything would convince me of Colin'sinnocence, that interview did the trick. I felt quite free to ally my causewith his. I would endeavour to unearth some evidence that would provehe was the victim of a miscarriage ofjustice, the motives forwhich nowseemed no less sinister to me than those involved in the blighting of myown career.

138

It was some months before I found this evidence. In the meantime

c;i" [;J l"ld me that superintendent Harrison had been another ofifr" offr*""i"volved inthe Terry inquiry into Kincora. Hehad actuallyg"""

""* t ulster, with his superior. To him, it was just another piece

8i1ftu:Gtt*. Colin was making very pointed allegations about the

invotverient of the security forces in the boys'home, which concerned

un [i"a" of bribery and corruption. What could be more inevitable

t1|f fi;t ;h" policJ offices who had inquired into the affair, and found

it "t

ttr"r" *rs no evidence to support his allegations, were also resporr-

ritf"lot p"tting him away for ten years, and ruining his reputation?

I am certain colin wallace did not murder Jonathan Lewis. During

"r;;i;; i" Arundel, I traced a key witness, a barmaid who had been

;;rfi;; i., u to"at pub and seen the murder victim at the very time_he

*u. uffZg"afy lying unconscious in the boot of Colin's car. I did this

*itnlt L"rr"ti or;i- campbell, another journalist, and author, who

*., ro"xi"s into colin's case, and devoted a whole chapter to it in abook he pub"lished soon afterwards dealing with prison life (Gatefever).

itt" Uuti".ia told us, without any prompting, that she had defrnitely,"u" i"*i, on the evening in question, drinking with another man,

*t. *", ""t

Colin Walhcd She remarked upon Lewis, because he was

;;;"G smart clothes which was unusual for him, since he alwavg

*"r" l.-"""t.lothes when he came into the pub. She also'remembered

;il;;ili""t.r evening accurately because it was the frrrst night she

had worked with a new barman'I was able to frnd out that Jonathan Lewis had got those clothes out

oflhe dry--cleaners on the day he died, and-was wearing them that;;;;id,:"tt as the barmaid said he was' His wife found the drv-;b";i;d ii.tut, after he went missing. The jackel h35 nsvsl he.en

."""""rEa. Nor'has the man Lewis wai talking to been traced' The

p"ii* i"t"t"iewed this witness before the case came to court, but then

[i.-ir*a t "r

recollection of the date she had seen Lewis, claiming itwas an earlier occasion. The dry-<leaning ticket made no difference, as

far as they were concerned; nor Lewis's wife's recollection ofjust how

the plastic bag had been left lying on the bed, with the hanger on top'

Onecanonlyconcludethattheydidnotwanttoadmitthetruth:coti., w"tta"eis path did not cross that of Jonathan Lewis's at the time

stated on the evening he was murdered.

When l saw how they determinedly ignored crucial evidence, and

no* ift"y ftud been .u "og"t

to make sure ('olin rvas prosecut.d'.then I

*.. a"t""*ined to press-his case as firmly as my own, until such tim,e

uJ" *ur at libertt'to do the sanrt,. lhrough this, I gained access to allhis material. And so I became involved far more deeply than before in

the activities ofthe British Intelligence services, and their links to a

particular brand of Politics.DuringlgSSandlg36Itoutedbulgingbriefcasesof'materialround

I'leet Stieet, trying to reach a wider audience than Channel 4' or the

139

New Statesman had been able to. But, while many people showedinterest, no one appeared to be willing to stick their neck out.Admittedly, this was before Peter Wright's Spycatcher had been pub-lished. Bu[ it is my opinion that the newspapers were simply unwillingto accept my allegations when I was visiting their offrces owing to whatI call '[he Netley factor'. However, I am sure what I had to tell thempaved the way for the kind ofreaction which ensued when Spycatcherdid eventually appear, and supported much ofwhat Colin in particularhad been saying.

Of course, when the Stalker Affair blew up, the jigsaw became moreinvolved than ever. Ijust wish that someone had been prepared to takeon our story before the authorities had been able to muster theirdefences and manage to divert as much public attention as they couldfrom the real issues by mal'.ing it all a matter of injunctions, andpersonalities. What people will remember most about John Stalker isthe fact that he was cruelly'smeared'- not the murders he was sent toUlster to investigate. Spycatcher will always be primarily the bookthey tried to ban, rather than the book which gave a genuine insightinto what the Security Service in this country is capable of. It is thefacts of the case that matter, not the appearance, or the way inwhich it is presented to the public. I know that the British Armyarranged to have Seamus Grew kidnapped in 1974. John Stalker knewthat Seamus Grew was murdered in 1982. It is absurd to even pretendthat there is no connection between the two events. The British publicshould know what it is, and exactly what it is a sympton of, for bothacts were carried out in their name.

While the Press seemed reluctant to help Colin and me, there wereothers who helped us along - some wittingly, some unwittingly - and,during these years, far from disappearing from the scene, we made ourpresence felt. Colin had written a number of letters to his MP withoutgetting any joy, so I added my voice, with its somewhat more raucoustone. The result was that towards the end of 1985, the Tory MP TeddyTaylor got in touch with me, prompted by his rather embarrassedcolleague. I was not actually Taylor's constituent - he representedSouthend East, and I livedjust over the edge ofhis constituencey - buthe seemed concerned to listen to what I had to say. One morning hecame to my door and asked to speak to me, saying he had beenrequested to look into the matter. I replied that Paul Channon was myMP, and I was not sure that it was ethical to speak to him. But heinsisted that in certain circumstances the niceties could be waived,and, anyway he was sure Mr Channon would not object if he reducedhis workload by intervening personally. I then invited him in andasked him if he would like to see my files. He declined, stating that heknew the details of my case already, but he oflered to help me.

Mr Taylor invited me to his surgery every Saturday morning, whenwe would continue to discuss events. I was surprised, but happy tomake full use of his assistance to resolve my legal battle.

140

The Taylor saga is full oftwists and turns. It lasted until June 1987,

when the IVIF ultimately denied to the Press Council the substance ofthe greater part ofour conversations, and withdrew from the affair.Beforethathehadpromisedtobe mosthelpful. He made an issue ofoneparticular detail in my case: did I get an order from Major Keith Farneson the eve of my Dublin trip, to go south?

In other words, did he countermand the CO's order, as I said he didand for the reasons I described? Ifthis could be answered satisfactorily,then it seemed likely that I was telling the truth on everything else.For my part, I outlined frve conditions for reaching a settlement withthe authorities which would satisfy me.

1. A posthumous British Empire Medal for gallantry to be awardedto WO2 Bernard Dearsley for his work in Ulster 1973-5.

2. All interference by MI5/CI3, Scotland Yard, in relation to mycivilian employment to cease. 0 would accept a verbal assurance onthis matter.)

3. Compensation to be paid for all capital and property losses I hadsustained as a result of the actions taken against me. (After discussionwith Mr Taylor during which he was given access to my financialpapers from 1975 on, it was agreed that a sum of€,150,000 was fair andacceptable).

4. The MOD should undertake a proper inquiry on oath into ColinWallace's case and take appropriate remedial action in the event ofhim being found to be a victim of a miscarriage ofjustice'

5. My Army records showing me to have been medically downgradedunder the category S (Emotional Stability), from 52 (completely nor-mal) to SB (medically unable to serve in an active service theatre) as aresult of 'occupational maladjustment' and'environmental disorien-tation' should be destroyed, or, if this was not administrativelypossible, amended, showing that additional information, not known atlhe time of sitting, now negated the findings of the Medical Board.(This condition was deliberately worded on the advice of Mr Taylor, toallow the MOD to 'get off the hook', in the event of any charge of'political psychiatry!)

Mr Taylor obviously tried hard to getjustice for me, I was seeing himevery Saturday morning for approximately one year and I began tohave the feeling that there were others behind the scenes who werequite glad that this was happening, that the MP had been chosen astheir conduit.

Colin Wallace and I now reached the stage when we simply could nottell how high up the web stretched, and who, ultimately, wasresponsible for the various cover-ups that had occurred. So we decidedthe only thing to do was to contact the one person who was finallyaccountable for the Security Service, the Prime Minister herself.

't41

-DqrilS !9Q6, Colin put together a folder of some 100-odd pages,ryhich-! added to,including secret documents and statements inipiica-tfng all those guilty of lrglawful practices in Northern Ireland duringlhe yeals we had served there. I sent this folder to Number 10 Downin!S-treet. Each page was punched, and the holes backed with linen ringslThere was a covering letter inside.

Three weeks later, the folder was returned to me. Mrs Thatcher feltable to s1f iq her letter to Colin that after a complete and thoroughsecurity inquiry no action would be taken on the contents of the file.What she did not say was that the contents ofthe file had been retainedUy !r9r offrce, and only photostats returned to us. Extraordinarily, Icould make out pencilled exclamation marks on various pages *h"r"paticularlysensitive areas werre discussed. I immediatelyto;k the fileto Duncan Campbell, who had seen the original, and asked him towitness that this wae not it. I then wrote to the Government, asking formy original

-copy pack. They told me that they had sent it alreaiy. Iwrote back that what I had was a photocopy. They denied this, sayingthey had retained nothing ofthe oiiginal.

- -

Bu! I believe they had to say so; for, meanwhile, Colin had ivritten toask them why they had not passed this information onto the JusticeHughes committee, which was looking into Kincora on behalf of theGovernment. Ttrey could then tell him they again did not possess any ofthis information. The truth was that they did, and they failed to pass it9n. f_refu3ed to grve up. And after a lengthy correspondence, it *asfinally admitted that the originals mighistill be somewhere in theirpossession, but that this was 'irrelevant'. Nothing could have beenmore relevant to the Hughes inquiry than Colin Wallace,s material!The fact was that Mrs T'lutchei's office had chosen to avoid doinganything whatever about it, even though they were plainly aware of itisignificance. We drew our own conclusions irom this. ,Right from thetop', in this case, meant exactly that.

During this episode Teddy Taylor asked me ifhe could take a look atthe copy of the frle that had been returned to me. He took it away toexamine it. A few weeks later he came back to me to tell me that itiradbeen lost from his offrce at the Commons, and he did not know where itcould be.

. Mr-Taylor apologised profusely, saying there was nothing he coulddo - the file was simply gone.

This-wa-sn't goodenough. Iwent straight to DuncanCampbell again,and told him the story. He then published an article i:" tt"-Ne*Qtatesman saying that Teddy Taylor's offrce in the Norman ShawBuilding at-Westminster had been burgled, asking what action hadbeen taken by thg police, and had therJbeen an iriquiry. How was itthat a secure b_uilding at the Houses ofParliament could-be penetratedby thieves and so on!

142

Mr Taylor contacted me at once, to tell me to say he would dowhatever he could to get the file back.

I went down to see Teddy Taylor in Southend the next week. Would Ibelieve it, he began, the file had turned up in his office, there, in hisconstituency - did I think MIs could possibly have stolen it andreturned it? I didn't tell him what I thought, though it seemed quiteobvious to me. I believe that MI5 had obtained access to the file becausethey wished to remove my evidence that Mrs Thatcher's oflice hadretained the original.

In the end, after meetings with MOD ofhcials and MI5 oIlicers, MrTaylor was given leave to offer me a deal. Once he had satisfied himselfthat his central question concerning Maj. Farnes' counter--order hadbeen answered, he seemed ready to address my conditions. KeithFarnes had been contacted in Oman, and admitted that it was quitepossible the counter--order had been given by him, since the circum-stances at the time were just as I had described them. This was enoughfor Teddy Taylor - though he has since denied Farnes said this. In June1986, he was able to tell me that the Ministry of Defence had agreed toat least some of my conditions. I would be paid the S,150,000 I asked forin compensation. A letter would be produced which would clear myname to my satisfaction, without actually admitting any blame in thematter of my removal from Ulster. Apparently, it was not.possible, atthis stage, to award Bunny Dearsley a BEM. However, it seemed that,at last, the Army were giving in. I received two draft letters of refer-ence from the MOD, and an assurance concerning my futureemployment. There appeared to be a genuine attempt to clear thingsup once and for all, and I was grateful for the time and effort Mr Taylorhad put in on my behalf.

But there was the one condition I had made for a settlement stillunfulfilled and that was that Colin Wallace's case be dealt with in thesame manner. I took a short camping holiday with my wifd to thinkthings over. Taylor had given me five different telephone numberswhere I could reach him. I tried to do so from a small village post--officein the Yorkshire dales. but he was unavailable on any ofthem. I sensedthat perhaps it was not going to be quite as simple as I had begun tothink. When I came back, I was proved right. There was no longer anyprollem concerning my own case. But Taylor told me that nothingcould be settled unless I dropped Colin's. I told him at once that Icouldn't do it. I knew what it felt like to be in his position, albeit not inprison convicted of manslaughter. He needed all the friends he couldget. Taylor informed me, then, that there could be no deal unless Iagreed to this proviso. I refused.

However this story ends, I am sure it will be the media who decide itsfate. Late in 1985 I came across a number of stories about Colin,written by journalists who had believed the misinformation on Colinput out during and after his trial. I contacted two ofthesejournalists,

143

steve Dorril and Liz curtis, telling them that they simply didn,t knowthe.full story. I offered to take thJm to meet colin wrir.* i" p.ir"".Both accepted and, on meeting Colin, immediatefy

"eaiisla;il;ir;;b-een.deceived, and that this wa-s an enormously import."i,t"y. "st"r"Dorril, of Lobsterm agazine,went down to soulhend-;"i "*aiir*"gr,my copio-us files. Lobster then began publishing articles o" mtn oii"cases and allegations.

In December 1986 Co_lin was,rellased on parole from Lewes'prison.By this time some of peter Wright's allegations

"il"t;;-Mfi ;i;iagainst the- wilson government had appJared in the seriou. .rul*.-papgr.s.-4lqlough journalists like Ed

-Moloney, Andy pollack andDavid McKittrick had.been investigating and writing .to't ;t;

Kincora Boys Home affailsince 19g0,;heir;ork had "pdr*a ""fyl"newspapers in the Irish Republic or Northern Ireland, and

"o "o[t"had been taken in Britain. When Wright;s ailegatlo;;pd;;cogple of months before Colin's release Fom prisoln, ,o-u o?ifr"lo"r-nalists in London remembered me, and ttre artictes in robster aboutWallac^e's allegations of IVII5 operations against the Wilson g;;rn_ment. so it was in December tggs that colii wallac" steppea t-n"ou!tthe door of Lewes prison.(with me in the rear, carrying the bagsrr to-bemet by aproximately B0 journalists and B television crews,

^ The most llnportant immediate reaction was a t hour documentaryfor 'Today,-To.nightl, the-Irish Republic's ,ro.1 cur"ent .ff"i". pro_

graTTe., which explained both of our cases and ou" ailegatio.rs,'arrdprovided some independent supporting evidence of theiiown. i hadalready-been interviewed on a number of occasions by both BBC Ulsterand Radio Television Eirean (RTE) in the republic wirtf, fru-a-prup"rJthe ground ful tLir programme. As a resuit of the RTE p""b"--"(never shown in Britain) questions began to be asked lv'r"iJr, p"iii-icians and a second Garda inquiry was iet up.

This one was headed by Inspector Hennessy, J.p.McMahon _ thechief of Monagh_qn-poli_c9 slation, the Badger's Uor, _.rra Ct l"i-S"p""_intendent Tom Kelly. wh_e-n Iheard of the"inquiry, the frrst ati"c i-dtdwas to write and ask why I had never been brougtli forttt .. u *ii"-"., i"the former investigation. Kelly telephoned me'shortly .fter*u"ds arrdasked me to go over to Dublin as soon as I could. Once again, I wasnaive enough to believe th_at an internal inquiry mignt ictu;fly beconducted with a genuine depth and honesty.'Keilv le? me to u"r"i"uethat he had been called in sp-ecialry by the'iaoiseach because he *asu4tappy with what had happened-beio"u. I now know that he and his:oll,"re"":.la{ one purposl above a]l: to try to get me to help thesadger oft-the hook, because he was threatening that if he became thescapegoat he would reveal just how far the Garai haa m"" pl""iruilaby British Intelligence, and just who had bein involved in ";"p;;;;;;with them.

Kelly and his friends treated me with great respect, and managed to

144

elicit from me a statement which would ensure that the Badger wouldbe seen to be punished for what, after all, had been a commitment thathad helped me in my work, and furthered the frght against terrorlsqon behalf of everyone conceraed. I am not a vindictive man, and I hadno reason to want to see my ex--colleague from the other side of theborder suffer for what he had done. I believed that the inquiry wasbeing held in good faith, and that, as a result of it, my case wouldgather even more momentum. I know now that I was conned. Theiesults were not made public. I was never given a copy of my state-ment. I have little trust, these days in any internal inquiries what-soever.

As a footnote to this, I can say that both Kelly and McMahon havesince been shifted from their roles as investigators, and back onto thecrime squad. It is perhaps a sign that Mr Haughey realizes how-politicised his public servants have become. One can only hope tha-t i{lhere are any further investigations he appoints suitably impartialpeople to carry them out. Those who have been connected closely withBrilistr Intelligence in Ireland are hardly likely to want to be forced toadmit it.

In spite of the inadequacy of the Garda inquiry, questions continrredto be asked in the Republic, and I worked every closely with one Dublinjournalist in particular. He produced a number of articles, as he stilldoes. There have been some unfortunate reporting errors' however.One, recently, led to a considerable furore by implying that an IRAveteran called J.B.O'Hagan had been involved with the Badger, andwas passing Intelligence to the British. This was mistakenly based oncertain remarks of mine, received second hand; rather than check upwith me, the reporter simply went ahead and concocted a sensationalstory, which for a while put O'Hagan's life in danger. I have no ideawhether or not O'Hagan ever met the Garda officer whom I dealt with,alongside the Badger. That officer, certainly, has denied it and threat'enedto sue. In the process, he has algo denied ever meeting me. I amafraid he cannot be believed on this account. I have his telephonenumber in my notebook from the time, along with the Badger's,and another of my police contacts. These men are still serving offrcers-

It is my beliif that th"y, like myself, were authorisedto do what they did by senior officers, and those same senior oflicers,realizing their vulnerability, are carrying out the same sort of cover-up in Southern lreland as the RUC did in my case. After all, both theBlitish and Irish Governments were saying one thing, and doing quiteanother.

In 1987 Colin and I were introduced to Anthony Cavendish anex-MI6 officer who published his memoirs with the specifrc purpose ofclearing Maurice Oldfield's name after MI5 starbed a smear campaignagainst him. Cavendish believes Colin and I and said so in his bookInside Intelligence. This was a welcome reference. I have learned to

145

my cost that all the Security agencies of the State are capable oforganizing smears and misinformation in the media.

In The Independent ofWednesday, 2 September 1987, a front pagearticle and a full page spread in the Home News section was devoted todismissing our claims. My allegations about Robert Nairac wereuntruthfully countered, alongside a column indirectly giving credenceto the Army's version of events concerning my transfer to Netley. ColinWallace was painted as a 'Walter Mitty' type of figure; a phrasefrequently used to discredit him. The actual evidence the journalist,David McKittrick, produced to dismiss our allegations was flimsy andeasily countered. (This was done in a copy oflobster, where the factssupporting Colin's portrayal ofhis caneer, rather than the fabricationsused against him, were brought to light). When I investigated thesource of the information used by McKittrick, I found it led directlyback to the RUC. I personally visited Mr Andreas Whittam-Smith'sofftce at The Independent and offered to make all my evidence avail-able to anotherjournalist from his newspaper, so that he could see forhimself that McKittrick's article was unfounded. Whittam-'Smithdeclined. He also declined to publish any of the letters written by otherjournalists involved with our cases. I had no alternative but to tell himthat we would take effective legal action when and how we chose to. Inthe meantime, McKittrick's article stands as a perfect example of thekind of inaccurate report that is based simply on what the author-ities are prepared to put out. I say'the authorities'quite deliberately,for exactly the same material published in The Independent had beenoffered first to The Sunday Times (who, having looked into my case,refused to publish it), and also to a BBC journalist by none other thanone of the RUC o{ficers investigating my allegations.

After all these years fighting forjustice, I sense that perhaps now, atlast, there is sufficient public awareness and political interest in theevents that have taken place in the province since the British Armywere deployed, to ensure that my story will be heard.

I am indebted to a number ofpeople in recent years and some haveproved uneasy political bedfellows. But my most dedicated ally, andmy most uneasy bedfellow of all, is the man to whom I now look to makethe frnal assault on my behalf. Ken Livingstone, the Labour MP forBrent East, first met me when his election agent contacted me in thesummer of 1987 to ask if I wanted to use a meeting in Brent to put mycase forward to an interested audience. I had been speaking in theprevious months at a number of different venues up and down thecouritry, and I agreed at once. I gave a talk to a very hostile crowd ofLabour supporters -many with Republicans leanings, who made theirhostility very clear. I had a long chat with Ken afterwards, when heasked if he could help in any way. I took him up on his offer, andrequested assistance from his researcher, Neil Grant, to look into anumber of important areas. When Ken was elected to parliament, his

r46

maiden speech was based on the material I had given him.Thanks to the media who ignored the speech to attack the speaker, it

ehrned Ken an even worse riputation than he had had hithlrto. Butthat did not concern him. He realized that he had touched a

"u* rerrne,

and he continued to probe it. There is very little common groundbetween us, but in one wey we are very similar: he will not let gi of mycase, any more than I will.. During the course of 1988 Ken has tabled question after question inthe Commons to try

_ to get some satisfactory answers ; ;;

allegations. Time and again the answers have been evasivJmisleading, or simply untrue. But he has continuea to

"sf.1t "-.---'-'The Establishment-has good reason to be worried about a properjudicial inquiry into all these affairs. This story cannot end until tlathas happened. As far as I am concerned, the sooner it does, the better. Ihave occasionally been under personal surveillance sinee I returneJfrom Rhodesia - or, as it is now known, Zimbabwe. There have beenoccasions when I have actually confronted men sitting in cars, pretend-ing to look the other way. There is always a rule oT thumb in ihesesituations. $ny ordinary person will resp-ond when you go up to theirwindow and stare through it. If it is an undercover poii." o?rr."", he willdo anything but acknowledge you.

Once, when I was meeting Duncan Campbell, to join him for a radiointerview, I- w^as kept under surveillance throughout my journey _ awhole s_quad of trainee agents (iust as we had been in asniora) rottoweame on the,tube, and were left looking rather sheepish when I managedto evade them and then reestablish contact by waving across the ro"ad,as they stood wondering where I had gone. I have grown used to it, as ihave grown used to the idea of a phone-tap, ind *v -"if lli"ginterefered with from time to time.

Somewhat more worrying is the course events took in 1ggg. Aprjvqte detective, someone completely unknown to me, at the time,telephoned me in March to tell me that the RUC were trying to -o.rrisome kind of smear campaign against me (his information lame froman MI5 contact of his). Nothing more came of it, until I received a call{rom a man purporting to be an IRA volunteer, who had been activeduring my time in Ulster,and who had only recently been releasedfrom prison. The man said he wauted to speak to me. fwas suspicious,to say the least, but as I have had many contacts with sources from bothsides of the sectarian divide, I kept an open mind. Only a few dayslater, I was informed by a well-plaied oflieial source in ouutin ttrat trispersonal informer in the RUC had told him something quitesignificant was being set up for me. The private detective nia neertright. I was to be the victim of a smear, which would do for me whatimprisonment had done for colin. Now I began to wonder ifthe contactfrom the IRA man was really a coincidencJ

Thanks to being warned, I was able to create sullicient safeguards to

147

protect myself, if my suspicions prove eorrect.

- A significant advance was made by Colin and I with the publicationby MacMillan in 1989 of Paul Foot's Who Framed Colin Wallace. Colinand I had originally arranged with Paul for him to investigate both outstorles and produce a joint account of them. But we realised that,firstly, this would take too long; and secondly, we would have all ourgggs in one basket. Anthony Cavendish's book Inside Intelligence hadbeen injuncted (though I am happy to say that the government'sattem-pt to suppress it entirely has recently failed) and that injunction,plus the campaign against Peter Wrighds Spycatcher, persuaded usthat we stood a chance ofat least one book coming out ifwe worked onour stories independently. Paul designed his book to compliment thisone and for that I am grateful.

As I write there is a copy ofan earlier draft ofthis book circulatingamong inmates of the Maze prison in Northern Ireland, who includeparamilitaries from the proscribed Protestant organizations. I haveheard from a reliable source in the Maze that I have been targetted bytwo of the former SAS members who worked with the piotestantterrorists in my day. However, I have experience enough ofthis kind ofthreat,_and seen enough active service, not to be intimidated by any-thing they care to set up for me.

_ As for MI5 and its political masters, only by standing out againstthem is there any hope of bringing them to heel. They thrive onpeople's insecurity - what their victims are afraid to lose. In my case, Ihave lost everything anyway. I remain extremely poor, and livefrugally. Unless they are prepared to stoop to the same kind of criminalactivity that went on in Ireland they cannot touch me. For this reason,I can continue to speak out where others might be silent. I can onlyhope my voice will be heard.

POSTSCRIPTThe Full Circle

I have included appendices to these recollections, including docu-mentary evidence of my long battle with the authorities, andtranscripts ofparliamentary debates. By and large, these speak forthemselves, and need no further comment from me.

I am, however, loath to conclude without some reference to the mostrecent evasions on behalf of Her M4jesty's Government. On 2 June1988, Ken Livingstone succeeded in moving an A{oumment Debate,since the anawers to his hundred questions on the Order Paper hadbeen dealt with so unsatisfactorily. Colin Wallace and I believed thatour telephone conversations were being monitored at this time and sowe deliberately discussed Ken's forthcoming debate as ifhe were goingto introduce both ofour cases, raising points about myeelfand Colin.

During the debate, Ken, quite deliberately, did not mention eithermyself or my case, referring only to Colin's allegations. ltre Parlia-mentary Under Secretary for State for the Armed Forces, RogerFreeman, seemed quite thrown by Ken's presentation, and stated thathe had not been given enough time to reply in detail, even though hesubsequently allowed other speakers from his side of the House tointervene on his behalf. Instead, he said he would reply to Ken by letterthe following day. In this letter he took the opportunity to make atotally uncalled for attack on my credibility, even though I was notmentioned in the debate. The letter did, however, provide an answer toexactly the questions Colin and I had discussed on the phone.

Freeman, from paragraph thirteen of his reply, repeated the tiredold offrcial version ofevents, which I hope this book has opened up toserious doubt.

Ken replied, pointing out that my inclusion in Freeman's reply was'particularly odd', given that I had not been mentioned by him, andthat whilst Freeman had gone to some length to discredit both Colinand myself, he had not addressed the question raised in the debate andappeared to be deliberately misleading Members of Parliament.

Freeman's response to this challenge was predictable, and for me,sums up the attitude of the authorities, that of pulling down theshutters and reverting to the party line. He stated that Ken's claim'that full and careful investigations ofthe subject have not taken place'was without foundation, and that his version of events was a matter ofrecord. (What 'record'? Ken Livingstone has repeatedly asked for de-tails of any inquiries into our allegations. No information has beenforthcoming). Considering that no one from authority had ever been to

149

see Colin to frnd out what he was alleging, and only Captain KenKinnersley RJVIP and the so-+alled RUC investigating team, dis-credited by the Essex Police, had ever talked to me, this answer wasquite a good example of Ministry of Defence evasion. Such a goodexample, in fact, that it seems fitting to examine it in some detail, andto expose its dishonesty and hypocrisy.

The gist of Freeman's attack on my credibility in his letter to KenLivingstone (which Freeman subsequently had placed in the library ofthe House of Commons) appears to be as follows:-

That in May 1975, I was removed from my appointment as an MIOand ordered as a patient to attend the Royal Victoria Hospital, Netley,in England, as the result of a compassionate act by my CO, Lt Col B,who believed that I was suffering from mental stress as a result of myfather's death, and that the move was carried out in accordance withArmy Medical Regulations, current at the time.

That upon my release from hospital I quite unreasonably refused toaccept this state of affairs and appealed to the Army Board of theDefence Council, because I had been medically down-graded on thegrounds that I had been emotionallyunstable. Afterathorough invest-igation, the Army Board had ordered that all reference to mentalillness should be removed from my Army records. That, six yearslater, I began to make complaints about my removal from Ulster, andbegan to threaten the Army that if my medical records were notamendbd, then I would make allegations about unlawful acts carriedout in Ulster by members of HM Forces.

That the Army Board had already ordered that no stigma was to beattached to me, and that it never was their intention that I shouldresign my Commission.

Freeman's letter paints a picture of someone who couldn't accept therealities ofhis illness, developed a bee in his bonnet and, many yearslater, threatened blackmail to obtain a change in his medical records.A sad case of someone who is still not quite stable, and who becameunscrupulous in his methods. I imagine the MOD legal staffworkedquite hard on its exact wording. The letter is, however, untruthful bothin cornmission and omission, as I will briefly show.

In May 1975, I was granted one month's leave by my CO, Lt Co B tostart at the end of the month. My CO was aware that I had alreadyobtained and paid for six return tickets to Vancouver, Canada. Heknew that I had planned to take my family for a holiday in the RockyMountains in order that we should all have a chance to get away frommy work and lessen the strains on my marriage. He'compassionately'placed me in hospital four days before I was due to leave.

Lt Col B fabricated two allegations to justifu getting me intohospital: the frrst that I had threatened my wife and family with an'unattributable' hand gun, the second that my wife's doctor hadclaimed that if the Army didn't submit me to a psychiatric exam-

150

ination, then he would. Despite my repeated requeststo see my wife toresolve what exactly she was saying, B refused to allow me access toher.

After ordering me not to discuss my work with the Army MedicalStaffB secretl/made an allegation to them that I had disobeyed

ordeis, and suggested that this was an indication of my mental stress.

On 4 iune f g75 he wrote a report justifying his actions, in which he

alleged that I was mentally ill. (It was from this document that theArniy Board ordered that all reference to mental illness should be

removed, not from my medical records.) I was informed ofthe existence

of thi's report some months after my release from hospital; it was

intended lhat I should never see it. On 12 June 1975, during a visitfrom my CO, he informed me that I would not be returning to my job inUlster (thi. b"foru I had even taken the three written medical tests atthe hospital). He offered me the same job based in England, but with a

three-month tour in the Caribbean, and on my refusing it, attemptedto bribe and then threaten me.

The MOD have refused to address these minor discrepencies, ofcourse, and cannot explain why, after that visit' B informed mywife, in front of a witness, that I was seriously ill and thatshe shouldimmediately take our children from their school and prepare to returnto England.

As to Mr Freeman's account of my stay at Netley hospital, what he

failed to reveal to his audienbe in the House of Commons was thatjustabout very medical regulation appertaining to a person in my positionwas either ignored or broken.

I took three tests at Netley; they were supervised by Major BrownRAMC, the resident psychologist at the hospital, and,-as my c1s9

officer, the only doctoi,-apart irom the Commanding Officer LtColStewart, to have anything to do with me' I was shown my markedpapers by him, which showed me to be'normal'. On my asking why Iwas stili a patient, Brown informed me that he could not make any

comment at I *t. a special case under the sole control of Lt Col

Stewart. Needless to "ay,

Malo. Brown was not invited to be a memberof the Medical Board that sat on my case.

After Lt Col stewart refused to tell me why I was still a patient at thehospital, I demanded a second medical opinion from a doctor of my own

choice. iontrary to Army Medical Regulation, this right was refused.(I was held at thl hospital until my family were removed from Ulster.)

I was refused weekend leave from the hospital, despite leave beinggranted to patients who were diagnosed as ill; this, combined with the6rder I had received confining me to the hospital grounds, was unprece-

dented.I was dischalged from the hospital on 30 June, with a discharge note

signed by Lt Cdi Srcwart, clearly showing me to have been medicallydown-giaded t'rom 52 to Sll {emotionally not fully fit). Yet the MOD

151

have admitted in response to a question in the House from KenLivingstone, that the Medical Board which sat on my case did not do sountil four days later. That Board's President was Lt Col Stewart, itstwo members were Captain Cantlay, the offrcer from Netley who hadinterviewed me for five minutes at Musgrave Park hospital's militarywing in Belfast, and who had referred me to Netley because he had nofacilities there, and a Naval Officer I had been introduced to while Iwas making a telephone call. Those contacts were the only ones I hadwith these two doctors. Readers may find it germane if I explain thedifference between 52 and S3 in the PULHEEMS medical classif-ication system which is applicable to all HM Forces:-

52 Emotionally fit to perform Army Duties adequately under fullcombatant conditions in any part of the world.

S3 Although having a history of emotional instability, at presentwell adjusted and fit to serve in any part ofthe world in a role that is notprimarily a fighting one.

This adjustment is the minimum available that can be used toremove a person from an active service area.

It goes without saying that I had no history of emotional instabilityeither in my childhood medical records or my Army medical recordsbefore the Netley down-grading.

Again, in answer to a question in the House, the MOD admitted thatmy medical records should be made available to my civilian medicaladviser or my legal adviser after I'd left the Army. On the threeoccasions that my medical and legal representative have requested tosee the records the MOD have refused their requests. The reason justmight be that the Medical Board's findings at Netley (which I had thetemerity to obtain brief access to) state quite clearly that the Boardconsidered me to be suffering from'occupational maladjustment'and'environmental disorientation', conditions hardly in keeping with theArmy Board's promulgation that although they are not prepared toamend my medical documents, no stigma should be attached to me.

I am aware from'off the record'briefings that the MOD are perfectlyaware that I am a victim of political psychiatry. One journalist wasinformed by an oflicial Army sp'okesperson some years ago thatalthough he privately conceded the issue, the Army would neverpublicly admit it, because it might lead to genuinely ill soldiers refus-ing to be admitted to hospital, quoting my case as the reason why. 'l'his,of'course, I understand, zrnd the reasoll why, at some disadvanLage tonr-yself , I havt'tlrnc cverything in m.y power to achieve an internal i.rntlprivate settlenrrut ot nry casc. Which brings me to Nlr !'reenrlrn'sdishoncst account of'nr.v attenrpts to seek redress.

In ortler to nail lhe lie lbout my suddenly complaining to the Armysix years after the event. here is the chronology of my attempts to laymy allegations of unlawful activity:*

152

I.27 July L976Initial complaint in writing to Lt Col R Ching RCT, CO of 12 DriverTraining Regiment RCT. Acknowledged and forwarded to higherauthority.2.1976Verbal complaint made to Hampshire police Special Branch atWinchester, where I was warned that if I persisted with my complaint,I would be charged under the Official Secrets Act.3. 1976Verbal complaints made to the Metropolitan Police Special Branch,who refused to accept them 'on orders from the very top'.4.L977Verbal complaints made to MrRobertBanks, my MPandthenShadowDefence Minister, confirmed in correspondence. He refused to processmy complaints after consulting Mr R C Brown, Principal UnderSecretary to the Ministry of Defence.5. t977Formal written statements made to North Yorkshire Police SpecialBranch. Contrary to their assurance to me that they would process mycomplaints, they in fact passed them on to the Metropolitan Police, whotook no action and who have refused to explain their reasons for theirinaction.6.1982Formal written statements made to Essex Police. Special Branch MI5requested the Chief Constable not to process my complaints. Herefused and sent them to the RUC, where they should have been senton previous occasions of complaint.7.1983I received complaints in writing from witnesses supporting mycomplaints that the RUC are refusing to accept evidence and arerefusing to ask witnesses questions that are relevant to their inquiries.The RUC attempt to persuade me to drop my complaints by appealingto my sense of loyalty and claiming that they cannot trace witnessesthat I, with my limited resources, have located. I am visited in myhome by Essex policemen, who state that it is their beliefthatthe RUCare manifestly covering up my case, not investigating it. They re-commend that I approach Duncan Campbellofthe New Statesman andask him to investigate my allegations.8.1984Campbell publishes his findings, substantiating my allegations.9. 1984The DPP (Northern lreland) states that there is insufficient evidenceto substantiate my allegations (despite the RUC's refusal to considerfresh evidence that I possess).

{I possess all the correspondence relating to these attempts.)

153

. A,s for my complaints and requests for an inquiry into the Netleybusiness, they started on the day I was released. The Army claims thaithey have carried out many inquiries into the facts; this is nonsense. Ican comment on one so-+alled 'inquiry'and the facts are interesting. Inreply to my two appeals to the Army Board under Section tgO oitheArmy Act they claimed that they had carried out an inquiry and thatno further inquiry was necessary into new evidence that i hai obtainedand that would be the end of the matter.

I investigated their inquiry, not too dilficult at the time as I was stillserving. What I found was that the Army Board had passed my alleg-ations to Lt Col B whom I was accusing, and that ne naa ordered hissubordinates to -produce statements supporting his judgement.Happl_ly, some refused, others, with an eye-to promotion, wf,o wereactively in dirty tricks, supplied him with what he wanted. Someinvestigation. The correct procedure for dealing with my complaintsshould have been for the Army Board to have

"ilt"d ,rpon the special

Investigation Branch of the Royal Military police to ""rry

orrt ..,inquiry under their own laid-down rules oi procedure. Thai did nothappen. The MOD will not, naturally, address this issue.

There is one final twist to the affair. It may take me many moreyears to discover all the minor details of my story, but it has come as nogreat surprise to me to learn, only last year (19gg), that Lt Col B myCommanding Officer in Ulster and the man who manufactured thlevidence that sent me to Netley, is currently serving as a member ofMI5. He transferred three years ago from theintelligence Corps, and is3rj................

this moment serving undercover in - yes, yon hurn" guessed it -Ulster.

155

GLOSSARY

ANFO An explosive mixture of chemicals used in bomb rnaking byRepublican terrorists.Elf Bomb Intelligence Team, usually composed ol'an officer and stat'I'sergeant plus clerk, based at Brigade Headquarters.Bombord Army designation for IRA produced anti-armour missileand firing tube.Coche Concealed hiding place for weapons and equipment.CASEVAC Casualty evacuation to place oftreatnrent.CID Criminal Investigation Department of police lbrce.C/ondie Slang for clandestine.Co/lofor Person who collates and reviews intellige'nce from all sourcesand evaluates trends.Confro//er Person who directsa handler of sources.CO-OP mix An alternative mixture of chemicals used in bombmaking by Republican terrorists. \,

Cover As in: to take cover, to conceal'oneself from sight or danger; togive cover, to provide protection to another person; cover name, anickname or pseudonym to protect true identity.EOD Explosive Ordnance Disposal.Folse Nome Used by members of MI5 and MI6 whilst working undercover of Cjvil Service appointments.F,NCO Field Intelligence Non*Commissioned Oflicers, menrbers o{'the Intelligence Corps.FEIIX Felix The Cat being the unoff icial symbol of EOD, this wordhas a generic application to matters involving bombs, bombing andthose involved in disposal.GSO General Staff Offrcer, an apppointment, not a rank. GSO 3(Grade 3) are usually Captains, GSO 2's are usually Ma.jorsand GSO l's are usually Lieutenant Colonels. There are horveverexceptions to this rule.Hondler A person who runs a source on a person to person basis.Hide A location from which a person can see without being seen.HQN, Headquarters Northern lreland, based at Lisburn./RSP Irish Republican Socialist Party, in the 1970s a breakawaygroup from the Provisionals and the Offrcials, some of whose memberscarried out acts of terrorism. The IRSP subsequently formed their ownarmed wing, the lNtA- Irish National Liberation Army. Marxist indoctrine./O Intelligence Officer, an appointment in the resident unit.lngrom An extremely small 9mm sub machine gun which could easilybe concealed under a civilian anorak, with a high rate offire and a 30round magazine. It was ideal for covert operations. Offrcially des-ignated MACl0 or MACIl depending on its calibre, it was known tothe British Army by the name of its inventor Gordon B. lngram. It wasissued in Ireland with a very elficient silencer.L34Al Sile.nced sterling sub machine gun, a more arvkward and

156

clumsy 9mm weapon, used predominently in darkness or from cover, itcould not be concealed ifthe firer was in the open.MI5 The Security Service, its role was to combat espionage in theUnited Kingdom and British Overseas Territories, but wrth thedecline of the empire it has sought a new role monitoring domestictargets that are considered subversive by the Government ofthe day.Works closely with the Special Branch.Ml6The Intelligence Service, officially MI6 does not exist, it operatesmainly abroad and is responsible for providing intelligence on anyperceived external threat to the Realm.MIO Military Intelligence Oflicer, a member of the Special MilitaryIntelligence Unit (SMIU), a volunteer, who after training at the JointServices School oflntelligence has been selected for active duty. Onceselected his parent regiment ofcorps show him (or her) to be Extra-Regimentally Employed GRE). His or her tour of duty normally laststhree years.Ml[O Military Intelligence Liaison Offrcer, a volunteer who aftertraining at JSSI is employed by the Intelligence Corps to act as aliaison officer with the police force in the area of conflict.Minor Unit A unit or company, squadron size or below.Nicknomes Although the use of nicknames is general in the armedforces, the SAS use them as policy in order to make identification oftheir members difficult.NIIAT Northern Ireland Tlaining and Advisory Team, a special unitfound in England and with the British Army in Germany, which givespre-theatre training to units due to serve in Ulster. Used as a secondlayer of cover for special forces serving in the Province if their falseunit title proves insufficient to convince fellow soldiers oftheir covertitle.OIRA Offrcial IRA, broke away from the Provisionals in the early1970s in a dispute over ideolory. Arranged a separate truce with theSecurity Forces, but in reality continued to liaise with the Provisionalsand provide them with intelligence and weapons. Sometimes known asStickies because their symbol, a paper lily, worn on the lapel, wasadhesive backed.OP Observation Post, a hidden location from which surveillance canbe carried out.

PO Police Office, the official term for the RUC's interrogation centres,PO1 was at Castlereagh, PO2 at Magilligan.PIRA Provisional IRA, the most overtly active Republican group whohave consistently believed that history has shown that the British willonly withdraw from a colonised country if they are forced to by armedstruggle. Failure to achieve their aim in the 1970s has forced them tomodify their campaign to one of dual armed struggle and politicalinitiative, the Armalite and the Ballot Box.PUTHEEMS A British Joint Services system of Medical Classifi-

.t57

cation used as an assessment in the employment of service men andwgmgn. The system requires the general use of the following ter-minology:

P- Physical CapacityU-UpperLimbsL - LocomotionH - Hearing (hearing acuity)EE -Eyesight (visual acuity)M - Mental capacityS - Stability (emotional)

QCor A civilian vehicle of cument make and type used by servicepersonnel on covert work.Residenl Bn Resident Battalions are the m4jor units allotted to servein^specifrc areas ofthe Province for a tour ofduty which usually coversa four month period.RP9 A Warsaw Pact or Chinese rocket propelled grenade and recoilessLaunching tube designed to destroy armoured ve[icles.lUQRgyal Ulster Constabulary.

-

RUCI-O Royal Ulster Constabulary Liaison Officer, this appointmentcan range from senior NCO attached to a rural police statlon to a Lt.Col. attached to the offrce of the Chief Constable.Ry Rendevous or meeting.Recce Reconnaissance or search.SAS_Special Air Service, a regiment of the British Army.SB Spgcial Branch, this arm of the British police developed from theIrish Branch of scotland Yard's cID set up tb counter the activities ofthe Irish Republican Brotherhood, successors to the Fenians. Until1958 SB was run entirely by the Metropolitan police and most of itsofficers were based in London. Today, all provincial police forcee havetheir own units and it is estimat€d that 1,800 SB oflicers are basedoutside the capitol.SMrU (N,) Special Military Intelligence Unit, Northern lreland.SMIU_s are not permanently establisehd units, they are created forspecific campaigns when it is deemed that the situatibn calls for a unitof this type. They do not appear on the Army List, but are administeredby lhe Intellignce Corps. In Ulster, the Commanding Officer, his 2icand a small clerical staffwere based at RUC He, Knolk, Belfast. Thiscell was co-located with the Head of Special Branch for liaison andintelligence reasons. SMIU provided intllligence trained officers andNCOs to be attached to Special Branch- offices throughout theProvince. These MIOs and FINCOs were given a written charterstating the parameters of their terms of employment and althoughsoldiers, their terms stated that their primeloyalty lay to the RIICSpecial Branch, not to the Army.Their tasks included:

Liaison between Army and Police at a local level;

158

Recruiting and running sources of information and intelligence;Assisting the RUC when requested to do so;-

neg"iutiv briefing the Brigade Commander and his staff on all- -i?rt"ttig"tt"" -alterr relevant to his bailiwick and in matters of

future trends, Province wide;Briefing advance party intelligence staffs ofresident battalions.B;i;fid regularfy resident battalion commanding oflicers and

company commanders;In some cases, with the permission of the commanding offrce-r of

.- SUtUttttIl, running sources and agents for the SecurityIntelligence Service (MI6);

Taking c6vert SAS and SBS units when requested;

Interrogations ofarmy or police held suspects;

Reconnaissance of no-go areas.

MIOs and FINCOs attached to RUC Divisions that were active were

obviously quite busy, in safer rural areas, less so'

SOUnCf A p""ron who provides informati-on on Intelligence that,""rit, him oi her to be tai<en on the books ofa handler. Described inpolice terminology as an informant.IOCO Police $enes of Crimes officers, who carry out a range of

sonhisticated forensic tasks at the scene ofa crime'SL'*/.h Continuous buzz or hiss on radio set in use wheir actual

transmissions are not being made.UDA Ulster Defence Association, a non-proscribed Loyalist organ-

lsatlo., which is, and always has been involved in terrorism against

*p"Uti"u"t. Presumably allowed on the principle of my enemy's

enemy is my friend.UVf Unt"t Volunteer Force, the more active and extreme rump of the

UDA, a proscribed organisation'UFf bGt"t Freedori Fighters, another proscribed loyalist organ-

isation and the na-e usud by terrorists from the UDA and uvF when

they have carried out an act ofoutrage.

159

Appendices

The text of my lelter of resignotion f rom the Army.

V Squadron,Royal Corps of T ransport.Buller Batacks,Aldcrshot,HANTS.

T he C o mmanding O fficer,12 Driuer Training Regiment,Royal Corps of Transprt,Aldershot,HANTS.

August 1976

Sir,

Resignation of my Commission in Her Majesty's Forces

During the past sixteen years I have tried to live my life to thestandards set to me by my original Regiment, the 1st Regiment, RoyalHorse Artillery. There, I was taught the fundamentals of soldiering,obedience, honour, truth and justice. What has happened since myservice in Northern Ireland, and the quite proper action that I took tosend my wife and children home to England, has totally detroyed myfaith and conf,rdence in the British Army.

The dishonesty, evasion, blackmail and veiled threats that I have beensubjected to, coupled with the lack ofloyalty and moral courage dis-played by senior officers of my own Corps, have combined to make merealise that only lip-service is being paid to the military virtues. Intruth the British Army is prepared to disown the moral principleswhich it claims to represent if it is politically expedient to do so. It isprepared to betray the trust of those individuals like myself who wishto believe in honour.

The essence of my appeal to the Army Board of the Defence Councilwas simple. A straightforward independent inquiry on oath wouldhave revealed within two weeks what injustice had been done andremedial action could have been taken which would have avoidedmonths of unhappiness and domestic strife.

r60

In retrospect, the initial time taken and the nature ofthe reply fromthe Army Board should have indicated that the Army Board were notprepared to admit that a mistake of grave moral importance had beenmade. Subsequent evidence and appeals forwarded to the Army Boardhave borne this out.

I accuse Lt. Col. B, my former Commanding Officer of:

Negligence, in that he did not carry out an investigation into the truthof the allegations made against me, but accepted them and passedthem on as fact to the medical authorities at Musgrave Park HospitalandVH Netley.Deception and lying, in that he deliberately lied to me and to my wife,compounding an already diflicult situation, (Brigadier DCV StewartAMC has already admitted this to be true).

Using me as his scapegaot, when it became apparent to both him andLt. Col. DCV Stewart that my wife was lying. It was impossible to letme return to Northern Ireland because he would be made to lookfoolish by my presence, hence the offer of the MIO United KingdomLand Forces job and the subsequent downgrading when I refused totake it.

I accuse Brigadier DCV Stewart AMC of:Refusing to allow me my lawful right to a second medical opinion by adoctor of my own choice. (Army Medical Regulations)Being deliberately selective when gathering evidence in my case byrefusing to speak to witnesses in my defence,supportingmywife'sallegations (my wife has written a complete confession stating thatthey were imaginary or grossly overstated) despite her obvious dis-crepencies and independent medical statements supporting my case.

Refusing to re-consider or rmpen my case even on humanitariangrounds to help my wife's condition, despite evidence becoming avail-able which contradicts his diagnosis.(The Army Medical Regulations lay great stress on keeping an openmind and thorough research and evidence taking)

Refusing me an independent appeal within the Army Medical Branch.

I do not know yet, whether Brigadier DCV Stewart behaved un-ethically by letting a so--called Medical Board be used to prevent apolitical embarrassment, or was just incompetent. I frnd it difficult tobelieve the latter however.

The fact that the Army Board of the Defence Council are aware of allthe details ofthe evidence I have produced and yet still allow a diag-

161

nosis to stand in my medical records, despite the doubtful methodsused to produce it, can only lead me to one conclusion.

There is no other alternative but to resign my Commission in a forcewhich has lost its honour.

There are those in the world today who say that Great Britain is nolonger Great, that greed, ambition and lethargy have sapped the willof those who represent it. In the past I have stood with those who deniedthis. I can do so no longer. The trust is broken, those whose duty it wasto set the standards have failed. It is a tragedy that I and others arewitness to.

F. J. Holroyd

]t!t::iYl

162

Ihis document, reioined from the lntelligence course ot the Joint Services School oflnfelligence, delines lhe wrilten ch arter ol oln MtO..(! hove ot o lotertime underlined seciions

of thrfond other documents which ore reproduced here.)

wt{IIE

l0r Where ntllta:ry forres have to bc erployeil ln a mle of atA to ttEolvll porur lt Ttll bc rcocssartrr to arang. Jolnt planntng ard oqduotof operatlons. A Jol.nt 0peratlons Centre aight be eatabllsheil t9lntegrate polloo and ntlltaqy aotlvltlee but Speoial Brarch rhoulil atlllrctaln ulttnats contnol rrrless thct 6 bas boen a vcty aerLous tlctcrtora-tl,on of ttre lnternal sltuatlotr. In sm? territodee, notab\y fiongKong, Joint organlaatlon for lntelllgence and otrrratloas rri1l bc acontinulng feature.

The MIO ln Socclal Branch

11. Ttrc Brdtl.shArry tlcploys a neb€r of offlosrs rtth $!411 staffg tooolonlal or dlependlent toid,torles as l01ltary fntslllgerna OffLcers.Others arc postcdl as Ml1ltar1y Intelltgencc Llalson Offloors (Mllra) wtthformatlons of thc Strsteglc Courantl or in oertal.n ovsrseaa theatres3these oonstitute nescrves fot MI0s but also have thelr wn epeolflotlutles as llalson offl.cers. Both !trOs anit MfIOg are oontrolleil by ttry'Lntstry of Defcrcc ln a r.nit callcct the Sloolat ltH.l"l'taqy Intc11lgerccUrdt.

12, fn all lntenral sccurity qreratlons un(lertakcn ty the Bdtlsh Arty,lnltially ttre prlrrlple source of operatl.onal lntelllgence wiLL be thePoltoe Strrclal Branotr. CcnroanilerE of troops aent to, or olnrat:lng lnpa terr{tlry mrEt hane early and regrrlar access to this Lntelllgenoe ardIt ls the functlon of, the ltrO ln Spoclal Branoh to ensuro that allavallablc relevant lntelllgence feaohes the omnantlcr tn tfute fc Lts uscanit ln a proper usable forn To thls enil MIOs arn part of Brl'ttehaontlngency plannfng, belag statloett per:oanently ln possible troublear,eas ;na iarsequen[iy belng tnfo:netl oontlnuous\r on the 1ocal sltuatlon

14. llte n!,lttary rceponslbllltles rlll be @ncctarea rdth prclraratlon!for ercrgpnoy oonititl,ons, ln parttoular atM.ce to tlrc pollce orr ttrc

163

requJ.rerent.

15. In a state of erErgency where lnsurgent fo ces hail dleveloped holoulil be the apprqrrlato cholce to organize andl take clrarge of anOtrrratl.onal Intelligence Wtng rtrich toulil beconre neoesaarlr in SpeoLalBrarrch.

M[.Og

16. These provlde the llnk betneen the Strategl-c Connand. anil tlctetritonr concerneil when an enErgency ar.Lses. A MII! rt11 nolrnallyPrecefle urrl,ts to a dleslgnated area of operatlcts, effect Llalson nlt*rthe MIO and prordtle contlanrlty of 1ntelJ.1ggnce for the couaandler. Theercployrent of MIIOs ls at the illscretlon of the theatre cormander, eothey are- not subJect to control of Special Brarnh ln any ray. One ornore nlght, hovever, be placeil rlth Special Branch to sirpplarent ttrerork of the ltrO, or to becone ],ltOs trherc one dlil not eAst before.

Conclwlqr

18. No a-ttenpt has been rnailc hcre to conalilcr pr.obJ.erns aristng frmpenetratLon of Spccial Br:anch or of govenilnent deprtrnents genera$r, anttof course these roulil be a pr.l.orlty target fo4 insr:rgents. Nor hasthere been sorril3'cratlon of problems arlsing frm a rped for gwernnentsto presenze thc sccur:lty of special agerri.es or rfi.vltles. A fr:ccnutual erchange of lntelllgence coulit be tnhlbltett r*rlch voulil poseEetions dll.fflcultles for the posltlon of thc ltrO and for Bd.tlsh forcesgenerally ln thc area; horever srrh dlevolopmentE shoulil be anticlpatettatd speclal consl&retLon glven to then at thc time.

sep 73

1-4RES1ITICTEID

17.

tt rcultl enablc hln to

164

Ihis reference cleorly shows thot os for os fhe RUC were concemed, I fully met lhe criterio os

loid down inthe MIO's'chonef.

!ROl{:

Assistmt Chief Consttble C H Roilgers OBE

THE ROYAL ULSTER CONSTABULARY

Portadown Co Armagh Northcrn lrcland 8T62 3ND

Telephone Portadown 3242415

22 Febnary 19??

My covering letier, senf with theWollocelHolroydfiletothePime Minister,lollowedbyolistofthe filet contents.

From: Fred,erick John Holroyd

Flat 1 tJ1{, Station Road,Westcliffe,Southend-on-Sea,Essex.

/November, 1184.

The Rt.Hon.,Mrs.l'largaret Thatcher,l{P,Prine l.4inister,10, Douning Street,London, SW1.

near Prime Ministe:,

I have been requested by John Colin Wallace to forward his letter andattached. file to you. I was first introduced to Colin I'lallace in HeadquartersNorthern IreIud, Lisburn in 19?3. Our respecti.ve areas of.responsibiliti"eswere separate and I only learnt of his misfortunes J.n early 1lB{. I have spenta considerable anount of tine this year looking at various aspects of his case,and can confirm that many facets mirror my own case.

After eight fruitless years trying to get the Ministry of Defence, vari.ouspoli.ce forces entl rny Members of Parliarnent to process my c.r.se I wentr.in 1983,in desperation to the Press, who confirmed my allegations in the early months ofthi.s year and they in a restraineC way, drew attention to my case. r was there-fore surprised uhen your governnent issued a statement to the DaiI in Dublinclaiming no knowledge of my allegations. As I write this letter I have beforeae colrespondance with Mr. Robert Banks, MP, and ltr. Crofton Broun, PUS Defenca,sholring this not to be the case. After rnuch discussion with Colin Wallace, wehave decicled to make one last atternpt to see justice d.one in our cases, byappealing to you directly and asklng you to take a personal interest in ensuri.ngthat proper i.ngui.ries are carried out. I hope that then, perhaps, the who1esqualid business may be ret,olved satisfactorily w-ith no more publicity,

Yours sincerely,

(* il!*rreo Holro.#.

165

Eo nh@ conce+eil

Captaln Fred J Folt'oyil is well lorown to ue. During hls serice with theg"it1"?, Amy in Northern fralancl J net hio a1oost daily. IIe Ras at thettime a uenber of the Brigede Staff but attechecl to theRoyaL lnster ConstabularT.

I founat hirn to be a nan of unqursli6nr"tle loyaltyr outstantling corirage withilevotl-on to drrty that one fooks for but rar€fy finds totlay,

During the tl.o years he ras attached to the Royal Ulster Constabd'aqy, theForce enjoyed a success reco:d againgt terrorists in rny area whlch has not been

equalled before or since. ft is ny eonsiileled opinlon thet the partCiptain fiolroyrt playetl na6e a ver? significant contrlbution to our succeas.

Eis leaalershlp qualities anil tleilication inspired the nen arouncl hLrn. 116 alxayBput the Sorvice first.

I '.mtl€Tstanal that Captain Folroyd lntentls to spply for a posltion in theRtrodeslan Arroed Forcls. Fron [y long yeam of erP€rienco alealing with terrorrstei ".o

u"y that he ls e:ceptlonally well equippeil for anJr cdmand positLon thatrequires- 1oyaIty, courage, tledicatlon anil antl-torrorist k[ot-hott'

I liecomrnend hi.n uru'oselrredly for the posltion he is oeeking.

I votrld be pleased to 8'ive ansvotlt at any tine conceratlng lilr EolloJdrssuitabtllty

,cAsslst&at ChiRoyal dlster Const.buln!:/

166

corfla$s

1. "Political and security inplications regardiJrg the disclosureof security classified inforuation to assist j-'r the jlvestigationof ihe allegations relatilg to the Kilcora Soysr Hostel, Belfest'rl

2, Li.st of personalLties reLated to serial 1 above.

3. list of Psychologioal Operations targets - lPolitical-r.

4. Activities ttesiSrreci to ciestabllige the Fiarula lail Governrnent.

5. RUC bacicgrowrd brj.ef on r1arar.

6. Anny rurabtributabJ.e press brief on rtarar.

7. rThe Folio Documentr as rleaked.t by Norihern Irelazrd office soulces.

8. tThe Ulster Citizens Arnyr background notes.

9, Seven docu:nents related to serial I sbove.

1C. List of Intelligence, RUC and Arrny personalities related to serials 1-3.

11. "lhe Kincora ilquiry - sunnarlr of events relating to requests forinformation froio John Colia [alIace, forner senior Inforoation oft'icerat Arqy Eeadquariers il Northern Ireland and Captain il the UlsterDefence ilegirnent, by the Royal Jlster Constabulary.rr

12, Civil Service Appeal Board - statement by l{r Peter tsrod'erick.

13. Extracts fron Arurual ConfidentiaL Repo:is tot 1971'74 - John CollnI9a1lace, Senior Infom.etion Cificer, Anay Eeadquariers, N. Irela.ncl.

'|4, Backgrouncl notes - 3enrarrl Dea:sley, 12 idarLe! st, cheriton, Folkestone.

15. Statement by the Institution of Professional Civ1l Servarits.

16. Backgrouncl notes - Civil Service Appeal' Board.

17. Letter fron L{OD Ci'I(A)3c dated 30 Sept 1974

19. il r x il 'r 13Jan1975

19. x rr listrict Secreta4t, Hq NY District dated '11 Feb 1975

20. rr rr Civil Serrice Appeal Boaril dated 9 Oct 1975

21 . 'ir n i,10.D ci,I(A)lc dated 2! llov 19?5

2?-, rr rr Dapattnent of Enploylent dated 22 I'lov 1!'f6

167

Five letters fron Airey l{eave irIP dated, 1)76h7

Letter fron James & Charles Dod.d (solicitors) dated 29 AptL:. 19.1?

2r. Letter to ldr l{ichael l{arshall MP datecl 10 Oct 1!92.

26. Letter fron the Secretary of State for Northern lrelantt dated2O Sept 1!82.

27, Lette: fron The Director of Arrny Security daled.2J Oct 1982,

28. Letter fron itr l;iichael }larshaLl MP dated 2E )ct 1982.

29, letter fron the D/US of S for the Aroed Forces d"ateal 2e O& 19g2.

30. l,etter to the lirecto: of Anny Security d.ated 13 l{ov 1!82.

31. Letter fron Thomas Eggar & Son (solicitors) d.ated 1J Not 1)82.

32. Letter iron ihe )ir:ecio! of Arny Security dated 13 Dec 1982.

33, Letter to the Director of Aroy Security dated,2l Dec 1932.

34. Letter froa the Pri.ne ltriniste! ttatecl 2J Jan 1983.

35, letter to Thonas Eggar & Son (solicitors) regard.ing the Pri-ne ili-nlsteltgletter antl dateil 1.{ Feb 1933.

36, Letter fron ihe Director of Ar.oy Security d.aterl 28 Feb 1983.

17. Letter to the Director of A::ny Security datecl 5 Ms.r 19g3.

18. tetter from the Prime l,finister ilatetl 9 lrlar 19e3.

39. Letter frol the lirector of A:rqr Security d.atett 2! Mat 1983.

40. Leiter fron the Lord ChanceLlor dated 13 April 1983.

41, Letter to the.Lord Cha.ncellor d.ated 1! Ilay 1983.

42. Letter fron the Law Society of Northern IreLand. dabett J l{ay 1983.

43. letber fron the l,ord Charcellol datecl 22 Jurr 19B3.

44, ?eiition to the Ho:oe Secretarlr dated 20 Aug 1983.

45. Letter to the Lorrd. Avebury (inc1 groun,1s for Appe,rl) dated g Jen 1g84,

+6. Letter frorn tre Lorcl Avebury to Je.rnes Clevett datect 2J Jan 1984.

47. rrApplications for leave to appeal against Conviction a;:.d. Senience -counenbs on the .Iud.gernent.rl

4e. Petiticn to the Eoae Secretary datecl 1! l{arch 1!S{.

23,

24,

168

49. Letter fron l{r David. llellor IdP to the Lord Avebury dated 17 Aug 1984.

50. Reply frora the Eone Office to ny tro petitions d.atecl 2l August 1!8{.

,1. Petition io the Houe Secretary dated 2J August 1984.

52. Letter io i.tr iriichael I'iarshall l,[P d.ated 1 Sept 1!8{.

,3, letier froa the Horoe Oifice to 1..Ir l{ichael l.larshaLl d.ated { Oct 1984,

54. Copy of fake C.I.A. Identity Card'.

,r. Copy of falce rJoro,-owristr leaflet planted in Crange Halls etc.

56, Copy of fo:ged labour Party leaflet

57, Ccpies of fo:ged bark stateneqts for!-

-

(etut4l''i

Ti 4 5pt{ , ta* tltt*+..)

Aiter lhe government onnounced tlre creolion of on 'lnfelligence Counsellor'- someone forintelligence oflicers lo foke comploinslond onxielies io - Ken Livingstone osked the Speokerof tfre-Houseo numberof quesfions in l-',lovember 1987 oboutlhepossibilityof ColinWolloceond myself tolking lo this 'Counsellor'. Ihe Speoke r ruled lhe queslions out ol order until Kenproduced evidence tfioieitlrer Colin or mysell hodbeen members of, orhod seled,in Ml5or'M16.

But the Ministty ol Defence refused io confirm or deny this. Ken presenled onolherseries of queslions in Februory, 1988, osking whether the governmenl would omend theCounsellort remit to enoble him to see Colin ond mysel[. The Prime Minisbrt onswer wos'no'.

169

The.regly fromlhe Prime Minisfer/s office-os we nowknow,,lhorough,rnvestigolions ne,ertrookploce.

loffi

DOWNING STREET

From the Private Setetary 21 November 1984

''>-/ f\4 *iJt,The Prime triinister has asked me to thank you for your

letter of I November, with which you enclosed a letter fromMr. Colin lrlallace.

The Prime Minister understands t.hat all your allegationsof criminal activity have been the subject of a very

Mr. wallace's case has alsomost thorough consideration. Ileunderstands, petitioned the Homeabout his trial and conviction

enquLies Tnto-Gircumstances which led up to his resignationfrom the Ministry of Defence, and into the nKincora affairi,

I return [t{r.your letter.

l{allace's file which you forwarded with

been thehas, the

Secretary

and in both cases

170

Fufther obfuscotion in the 'correspondence' compoign - cleorly, it mokes o great deol ofdifference whether you possess on originol o r a coPY, ond Colin Wolloce's file wos .olwoysovoiloble for the Commitfee io loo k ot, were the outhorities inclined lo let him show them it!

l.'r'()i;r: ;1 P.laiiielrl , Cencral Staff Secrel,aritLi 2

MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

Maln Buildlng Whitehall London SWIA 2HB

Telephon€: (Dlroct Dlalllng) 01-218(Swltchbo.rd) 01'2189000

F liolr'oyd EsqF1a.i. 1

3l-a iiia lion Fload\testcliffeSou thend-on-SeaEssex

Your ielgrenc€

Our rerference Ii / G iiD/CS

Oat€

lTtlarclr 19B6

i3ec/66/73/It;ec/66/r3/2

-D* l\. 1tog},

i have once agla.in been asked to rei:1y t.o your 1€1test letter 1-o

Lord Trefgarne of 9 I'larch 1935.

in fact, lhere is very little I can adcl Lo my previous lethers; tovou, The questi on of wilethel' or rio L the f i Ie :'eturned l.o vou was -photocop.y € tfi:rt you sent to the Prirne iii+iFter is in fac[ of-f:.rrlteg itnport-a-nce. A.s I have already explained, so f:-tl' ali c:ln be-ascer"l:rined frolr, our reco|ds the file v,/as I.eturneci in the same st;ai|ils i1. was r^ecr.)ivecl ancl:rL tlte Lirre vJe had no reason to believe othe!viSe.ifaco}ryw€JSinadVertent1ysubstiluted_.Ugj.@.'even :hougil out'. irlvestig.lt-ions have not p|odl'.lced anything io suggesrrtnat ttris djcl happen - i,his does not al-ter the fact lilat we have be|tunable t,o find either'lihe orj.ilj.nals or any other conli)1et.e copy.i:-qual1y, a conplete file was I'eturned (whei.her pilotosiaE o)'original

I Lee h:)d

1*.

/4> &#\---

17'l

Once ogoin,the'officiol'version skotes overlhe focts , ond doesn't oddress ihe keyguestionseither of my medicol downgroding (efiectively borring me from future odive service inNorthernlreland)orthemonnerinwhich my removolfroi Northern lrelondwos engineered.

MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

MAIN BUILDING WHITEHALL LONDON SW,IA 2HB

rerephone or ^a7..i.6.€

., o',"r, oiat^stI

01 218 gOOO(Swirchboard)

1 C/ February I986L-O

sltuatlon 1n the Provlnce alpersonal safety, the adrnlsslonpsychlatrlc hospltal, he wasbhe Royal Vlctorla Hospltal

Thank you for your letter of I February ralslng the case ofCaptaln Fredrlck Holroyd of Flat l, 314 Statlon Road, Westcllff,and also that of Mr Col-ln Wa1lace. Both these cases are weflknown to me as both have been regular correspondents not only wlthmyseLf but also wlth the Prlme Mlnlster and the Home Secretary.

Captaln Holroyd was posted to Northern Ireland 1n the mld 1970sand .eJqjq9.E_L.g, spent ln a very hlgh-pressure Job, a sltuatlonexacerbated by the hlgh standards he set hlmself r .b9&DEiIIg!L!.e,

After one nonth Captaln Holroyd was dlscharged from Hospltal j,nd

unable to do thls as they consldered that, as laynen, l,Ig.y_Cpffk|.not suppress A-_Qsc_t-.o-p.r.q -q4p-r9s.s-!q[--of _f_rfs pr9!9-s-S1Ar-r.A_l--!lsg!gl

M'niste. of State for Defence Support

D,/Mln(DS)DGT 01440

of a mllltary offlcer to a c1v111anreturned to England and referred toNetIey.

chlat rlc

bo a ment roblem were

ver, Captaln Holroyd was not satls.flled

172

gplglg3r furthermore such al"teratlons could 1n future prove to beagalnst the lnterest of the patlent. @was assured that the fact that he had been referl'ello-Ne'tlg,y-@ur;*care#'.Desplte havlng thls assurance and havlng had a slgnlflcant portlonof h1s appeal upheld Captaln Holroyd wa8 not satlsfled and herestgned 7n I976.

can therefore

pursue

on the q ue s t l on of lLe*fel teF-e, qI: l-'lf*9._o.-ULl{ellpge.-J.g-e!lgtg_t_hat 1s q. matter f oI -!trg .Homg. s9.gle-t,qry qnd {l-,W_o-Uld _49_t_.Le_-*A;p ro6;ffi;Toi;:-E-e- !e-- c qmm-e-nt*-

* -

-)**,Lord Trefgarne

_.99--Per-s34v 111-. butwas mencan be no questl.!I__g_f-_qqt:lpenqa

MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

MAIN BUILDING WHITEHALL LONDON SWIA 2HB

Telephone 01-218. .. . . .. lDrrect Dialhng)

01-218 9ooo lsw[chboard )

PARLIAMENTARY UNOER. SECRflARY OF STATEFOR THE ARMED FORCES

D,/US of S(AF) RNF 418r>J .rury 1986

le.Jr4 r

Thank you for conlng to dlscuss the case of your constltuent, MrFrederlck Holroyd.

A s I e xpla 1 ne d, -the.__Yl-1n_1-g-!Jl_o_!*_Le_q9_n-9 9r -rCr-nA.1 ns una b1e t o ac c e p tmgnJ__gl_!ttg_qg.tg-!19! p,o-l,nts rnade by Mr Holroyd or that he lsentltled to compens . I was, however, able to clear up at l_eastone polnt on whlch there seems to have been a genulnemlsunderstandlng. Mr Holroyd may have galned the lmpresslon frorn acomment 1n one of Davld Trefgarners l-etters to you that the Mlnlstryof Defence belleved that Mr Holroyd had attempted to cover up hlsv1slt to DublLn 1n May l_975. Davld Trefgarners comment, whlch wasnot lntended to glve that lmpresslon, was made 1n a speclflccontext; lt was lntended s1nply to show that Mr Holroyd had admlttedthat he had dlsobeyed the order and had clearly behaved 1n an '_-!rregular nanler :!g=_pot-6eekTne -I-mgong_Sg. As Davld Trefgarne made clear ln a subsequent-letter, MrHolroyd had flled reports on the lnformatlon obtalned durlng thevlslt whlch would have brought the lncldent to l1ght 1n due course.I am happy to conflrm therefore that we certalnly accept that MrHolroyd dld not seek to cover up thls v1slt. I hope also that I wasable to reassure you about what was I belleve your maln concern,

173

amely that thg_Utnlg-lpy ls not 1n any way seeklng to put obstaclesn the way of Mr Holroydrs atternpts to make a new career for

h-LmlslJ

Mr Holroyd has been parttcularly anxlous that the clrcumstances 1nwhlch he left Northern Ireland In I975 should not be mlslnterpretedby any prospective future employer. I was therefore slad of thegpportunlty_ to make_clear that whlIe baptafn llolroyd (as_ ne tdertildFf was cohs1tiEFet-tn-may-Tt75 to ne sufferlng from trre errects orsTress-, €-h1s vias a purely temporary problem arislng f rom sevEF6--

174

prellures_ both at home and at work andr after a relatlvely shortperiod, Captaln Holroyd was consldered to have recoveredcsrnpFtel-y_. Thls lempo-_f_il'yjroqlem.dld not 1n any way reflectadversely on elther h1s character or hls competence as an offlcerand, had he chosen to remaln ln the Army he could have done sowlthout detrlment bo his career. I was also able to confirm.that,!cl_I_o!.,1n9 hls appeal to the Army Bbarci- in-T975, all CaptalnEoTroydtS Army personnel recordswere amended to ensu-iFthaL there:,{ele ng ,rele_lences whlch mlqlrt have been read as lmply1ng-t,hs!-yrHotroyd had beenie1taffy_111. The Army Board also statedr!x[11cltly that 6-FEfEma"Frrbura be attached either to the SpeclalConfldential Report or to the fact that Captal_n Holroyd had been toNetley, and I am happy to repeat this.

You also asked whether 1t woul-d be posslble to provlde a referencebased on Mr Holroydrs Army servlce whlch he could show to aprospectlve empl-oyer. If__Uf ,lplroyd requlres a detail_ed cha!'A_ctefrefqrence 1t w111, of eourse, be necessary for hlm to app4oachsomtione r^i-ho knew hlm well personally, such as a former ioma_anq-pgoEllCei. Nevertheless, I attach a g?nera1 record of Ur HofroVEiservlce drawn from h1s Army records whlch I hope w1lI be he1pfu1.

I wlll- be taklng the opportunity of the recess to study further thevery large number of papers relating to this case and would bewl1]1ng to discuss the matter agaln ln due course 1f you feel thlswoul-d be helpful .

t{ '^" 'H\'

[)-".^,Roger Freernan

rhis leffer shows thol the MoD wete not prepored to move on inch lowords occepting theresponsibilily for their complicity in these events, ond indeed, the ,Stotement ol Sei,i..,(opposite) implicitly suggests thot they were oding in my best inferests!

175

ilIMSTRY OF DEFENCE

Maia Builrtir.g lThitchrl, London swr.r zslTdcphorc (Dircct Dirlling) or-zr8

(Srirchbord) or-2r8 9@

F J HOLROYD - STATEMENT OF SERVICE

Mr Holroyd jolned the Arrny in 1960 and was commlssioned in1964. He was promoted Captaln in 1969 and held this rank until hisresignation in 9eptember 1976.

Mr Holroydts personnel record shows him to have been athoroughly competent officer who performed well in a wide variety ofposts. His reports remark upon h1s enthusiasm and drive arld referto his enJoyment of chal.lenging; physically demanding tasks. Thereis r:o reason why, had Mr Holroyd chosen to remaln in the Army, heshoulci not have been able to pursue a worthwhi-Ie and fr_rtfilLing

Mr Holroyd has expressed concern that ln incident during hiscareer in the Army could affect his job prospects in civilian 1if,e.Luring L974/75 Mr Holroyd was ggpleyld in a very demanding post fromwhich it was fe-l-t necessary io "Lmoi. him as he was displiying slgnsof stress. Howes€r, aft94'a relatively short period mr Hoiroya wasconsidered to have r€oovered completely and this temporary proUlemdid not in any way reflect adverlely oi either his character or hiscompetence as an offiggt.

176

I would hove been osicnished, lwe nly yeors ogo, to think thot I would lind myself the subjeclof o m.oiden speech by o left-wing Lobour MP, but on this molter we see eye to eye. Ihis islhe relevont porl ol lhot 'infomous' speech by Ken Livingsione.

During my clcction camptip in Brcnt, Erst, thcre wrsen unuual public mccting. An indivi$ual war invited toit who har ncvcr bcen r Socialist, who will ncvcr bGprcpared to votc l,abour tnd who thinks that thc Toryparty is thc natural governing pany of Eritain. Hc wasinvitcd to sharc a platform with mysclf and somc of therelatives of thosc who have bccn subjcct to miscarriagcs ofjustice by thc British courts over issucs of bombing hcrein Britain. Wc invitcd Mr. Frcd Holroyd. For thosc whodo not know, Mr. Holroyd scrvcd in Northcrn lrclandwith distinction. At I said, hc is no Socialist. He comcsfrom a military family. Hc wcnt to a lorkshirc grammarschool. His wholc objectivc in lifc was to scrve in thcBritish Army. Hc bclicvcd in it totally. He enlistcd as aprivatc in the gunncnt and thrce years latcr hc wascommissioned into thc Royal Corps of Transport. Hcvolunteered for the Spccial Military Intelligencc unit inNorthern lrcland when thc prescnt troublcs began, and hcwas traincd at the Joint Serviccs School of lntclligencc.Oncc his training was finisbcd,. he was starioncd inPortadown, where, for two and a half ycars, he ran a s€ricsof intelligencc opcrations. I quote him so that thcre can bcno suspicion that hc might bc a liccret membcr of theMilitant Tendency or a secret republican. At thc publicmecting, his words were that he believed that the Armyofficers and men with whom he worked wcre"gcnuincly honest men trying to do rhc bcst job in rhecircumstances. They were in a no-win situation."

When he was recruited as an MI6 officer, he said ofthem that thcy were not disagreeable; thcir ethics wercrcasonable; they werc secking a political solution. Hiscomplaint, which eventually led to his removal from theArmy and an attempt to discredit him, which has becnlargely successful, was made when the MI6 operation wastaken over by MI5 in 1975-by many of rhe samcpeople who are dealt with in Peter Wright's book, andmany of thc same pcople who are alleged to have beenpractising treason against the elected Labour Government

177

of the time. He said that once thc MI5 took over, thercasonable ethics of MI6 wcre pushed aside by opcrativesin thc intclligcncc world who supportcd thc vicws of Mr.Kitson and thc policies and tactics of subvcrting thesubverters. I rccommend Brigadier Kitson's words tothose who are not aware of them. His attitude was toGrcate a countcr-terror group, to have agents provocateur,to infrltrate, and io run a dirty tricks campaign in anattempt to discrcdit thc IRA.

Mr. Holroyd continued to bclievc that what hc wasdoing was in the bcst interests of the British state untilearly in 1975, when Captain Robert Nairac, who, as manyhon. Members will know, was later murdered by the IRA,wcnt into his ofncc, frcsh from a cross-bord€iopcration-something that of coursc is complctely iltegal-andshowed him thc colour photographs it at trua den takcnby Captain Nairac's tcam. Cap-tain N"iro. had crossed theborder with some voluntecrs from rhe UDF.

-ge had

Northern lreland Act !971 234

assassinated John Francis Grcen, an actiw membcr of thcIRA who was living routh of thc bordcr. At rn agent ofthc British Government opcrating acros thc bordcr at ansssassin hc had brought back photographs er proofofthatopcration. Whcn Captain Nainc rhourcd thcphotographs, Mr. Holroyd started to obirt, nor b6aus€bc objccted to an activc mcmbcr of thc IRA bcingassasinatcd in a highly illcgal cro*bordcr raid butbccausc hc rcaliscd that oncs thc Brifirh rtrtc startcd toPcrPctratc ruch mcthd3 thcre war no way that.cvcotur[y, Britain would not alienatc yest lcctions of thecommunily and cvcntually losc the srruggle for thc hcartsand minds of thc lrish people.

Holroyd lhcn startcd to objcct to thc usc of such illegalmcthods by Ml5 officcn. Hc was immediatcly shufBed toonc sidc by thc cxpcdicnt mcthod of bcing takcn to amcntal hospital and being declarcd basically unfit for duty.During the month that hc spcnt in the British mentalhospital. the threc tcs(s that were administcred to him werecomplctcly successfully passed. Certainly, ovcr a dccadclater, having met him. I can see no evidence whatsover thathe was in some sensc mentally unbalanced. He was a spy

178

\vho rcaliscd thar thc operations of thc BritishGovernment wcrc counter-productive. He startcd toobject, and was pushed to one side for his pains.

I raisc the link with Captain Robert Nairac bccausc, asI said, Fred Holroyd had qualms abour this but was norparticularly shocked; thesc things happen in a war. Thematter needs to bc investigated. I can;ror prove the claimsbut allegations aie being made extensively here in Brirain,

.in republican circles and on lrish radio and television. Aparticularly honifying incident that many hon. Membcrswill rcmembcr was the murder of three members of theMiami showband-completely innocenr musicians withno political affiliations wharsoever. It rook placc in themidst of the ceascfire that had been negotiated by the thcnLabour Governmenr and the IRA. The right hon. Memberfor Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Rees) pushed it throughand sustained it, although there was considcrableopposition from within the security scrvices and withinmany political parties. The Labour Government dideverything possible to make the ceasefire work, but it wasnot wholly accepted within the appararus of Mlj-ouroperatives who allegedly were working on bchalf of thcBritish state in Northern lreland.

What is particularly disrurbing is that what looked atthe timc like a random act of maniacal violcnce andscctarian killing now begins to take on a much moresinister stance. It has begun to emerge thar Captain RobcrtNairac is quite likely to have been rhe person whoorganised the killing of the three Miami showbandmusicians. The evidence for that alleeation is forensic andmembers of thc UDF are prepared io say that they wereaware of thc dealings between members of the UDF gangwho actually underrook thc murder of thc Miarnishowband musicians. The evidence is quite clear. Thc samegun that was used by Captain Nairac on his cross-bordertrip to assassinate John Francis Green was used in theMiami showband massacre.

Earlier this year, the radio and television servicc ofsouthern lreland, RTE, showed a documentary in whichthe makers-not mysclf; no one could accuie RTE ofbcing.pro-IRA-that allege they havc now had contactswith members of rhc UDF in rhar area who say thatCaptain Nairac passed the explosires and the guns to the

't79

UDF and set up the killing of rhe Miami showband

235 Norrlrcrn lreland ,4ct 1974

musicians. If that is true. it needs to be investigated. Theallegation'was made on the broadcasting networks ofsouthern lreland. lt is supported by men who served onbehalf of Bntarn as spies in the area at the time. It needsto be investigated and disproved, or the people bchind itrooted out. ll one wanred to find a way of ending theceasefire that had been negotiated between the LabourGovernment and the IRA. what better way to do so thanto encourage random sectarian killings? I believe that thatwas happening.

It is likely that many of the officers mentioned in PeterWright's book who were practising treason against theBritish Government at home were also practising treasonagainst the British Government in Ireland. If thcallegations are true, they we re prepared to murderinnocent Catholics to start a wave of sectarian killingwbich would bring to an end the truce that thc LabourGovernment had negotiated with the IRA. No democraticsociety can allow that sort of allegation to gouninvestigated. It is made by people who served on ourbehalf as intelligence officers in the area.

We saw in last Sunday's edition of The Observer lhalanother intelligence officer, Colin Wallace, who wasclosely linked with Fred Holroyd in a canrpaign to exposewhat is going on. has been dismissed as irrelevant by theBritish Government. We see now that The Observer,'usingforensic tests, has been able to demonstrate that the notesthat he wrote were nor written in the past couple of yearsby somebody who is embittered and is trying to cash in onwhat has started to come out. A clear analysis of the inkthat was used in the notes shows that they were written inthe early 1970s. Slowly. it all begins to pull together.

The interesting thing about the Peter Wright case is thatin his defence in court he said that he was a loyal scrvantof Britain. and that he sought only to expose corruptionand spies in Britain and an establishment that coveredthem up. One ol the arguments by which he demonstratidhis loyalty to Britain \r'as when he said in his book that hcdid not deal with *'hat he knew abbut operations in

180

lreland because that could still be damaging to the BritishGovernmenl

One needs to take together the accusations of Wallaceand Holroyd and link them clearly to what is bcing saidby Peter Wright.,There was not just treason by somc Ml5officers in Britain. Treason was also taking placc inlreland. Those employed by rhe British srate are alleged tohave been responsible for killing innocent civilians in ordcr

. to end a ceasefire u'ith which they disagreed bccausc thcirpolitical objectives were different from those of the LabourGovernment of the day. That is a most horrifying crime.

Wallace and Holroyd are making these quite specificallegations. They are now drafting a book that will exposemuch more. and we need to ask why thc BritishGovernmcnt take no action to stop them or to silencethem. They pursue Peter Wright. but they arc tcrrificd thatif they take Wallace and Holroyd to court they will exposein court things rhat will shake the Government to. itsfoundations.

A stupid thing happcned when the British Arniydecided to get Holro),d out and discredit him. The officcrput in as his replacement, and who was unaware of whathad been going on, arrived in the officc and as'sembted allof Holroyd's papers into a large container and dispatchedthem to his homc. Beforc the British Govcrnment startrubbishing Holroyd too flamboyantly. rhey should bcwarned that he rerains almost all the casc papcrs that werein his control. They deal with his operations and his workand they arc safely out of this country and bcyond thereach of the Covcrnment.

We must have a full investigation. Before I couldhappily vote for this extension of direct rule, I want to seespme evidence th{t thc Government are prepared to ensuretfrat thcsCabuses are exposed. I want itrcm to guarantreeftrat similar abuscs arc not continuing. The whole series ofevents about which I have spoken must be investigated.Vcry soon we must have the full cvidencc about the shoot-to-kill policy of lhe RUC bccause I have no doubt that thatis being covered up. It would have been most useful if JohnStalkcr had becn able to conclude his inquiry after thcattempt to discredit him had been exposed and overturncdby the local police authority.

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Index

Aldershot, Mons OIIicer CadetSchool 11

Armagh, Gough Barracks 82Ashford - Joint Services IntelligenceTlaining Centre 22

agsaseination attempt - on RobertMugabe 127

Baker, Albert "Ginger" 86-8;BritishArmyand UDA86

blackmail 136'booby traps'59-61;killing of Eugene Mceuaid 845

BritishArmy:Army Board, Holroyd appeals 1SB;covert operati ons 7 I,7 2:cross botder operations - use ofhired kidnappers ?3 - collusionwith Protestsnt terrorists l2B (seealso'crossborder operations');defene of Catholic'targets'66;

Headquarters Lurgan 34;Holroyd's request for inquiry ll5;illegalities carried out 88, l3g;cover-up ofkilling 8b;riek to innocent people 8E;penetration of UDA & ,Ginger'Baker86;

and Police, co-operation of post

-Offrce and telephone eervices 44;& MI5100;MI0's and RUC Special Branch 34;rivalry between MIE & MI6 - riekto soldiers & RUC 9l-2.

British Government: covert/illegalactivities 74;Labour & IRA 63;misleadingpublic ll4;Rhodesia 126;Under Secretary of State for ArmedForces (Boger Fleeman) l4&lb 1.

Campbell,Duncan: documents siezedfrom l3l, 132.

Cavendish, Anthony, andMI6 144Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)attempt to recruit Holroyd 29

'Chalet Bar' or'shamrock Club' 66-9Conepiracy against:Fbed Holroyd 103Colin Wallaee lBZ

'Counter-insurgency' BrigadierKitson andMRF86

Counter Terorism, Lecture on byBrigadierKitson 29

Cover-up in Eire 144Covert Operations:

& British Army ?1,22,British Army, cross border & hiredkidnappers ?4

& cover for Nairac'g (SAS) unit 4?& innocent victi ms 7 l, 7 2,& involvement ofjudiciary ?2& MI6lLurgan 40,sabotage 83;

crime -'ordinary', links with t€rror-ist activity 67-8.

Cmee Border Operations:British Army & Protestant terror-ists 123,British Army, Sabotage,involvement of Garda S4,

British Army, use of hired kid-nappers 73

& 'Bunny'Dearsley 41,'dirty tricks'?0& Garda 43,73,Garda & British Security Serviceg4,

Garda & MI6 102& Garda inquiriee into lg2,1gg& tn5&RUC 100&MI6 42.

82

Garda: British Army cross borderoperations 84,co-operation with MI6 102,149,inquiry into crosrborder activity132,133

-second inquiry 143

- results of 144.'Gilford Castle' shootings - British

Army & RUC 61Green, John Francis, kiUing of: 26,involvement of Robert Nairac 27,links with 'Miami Showband'kill-ings 79

Gurkha TYansport Regiment: FredHolroyd and, 12,in Kluang, Thailand 13.

Harrogate, Holroyd family back-ground I

Haughey, Charles 144Holroyd, Fiona:marriage to Fred Holroyd 12diffrculties in 20in Northern Ireland 38allegations against Fred, BritishArmy reaction to 109,110.

Holroyd, Fred:& British Army Air Despatch Corpst4

MI0's in Northern Ireland B0denial oflegal rights by 111,114Medical Investigation by 9?,98Netley 104,150appeals to Army Board 158,Resignation from Army 114,1lbBritish Government 148compensation offer 110dossier to Downing Street 142;conspiracy against 99, 103MinistryofDefence 150informants, treatment of g0MI5130,136redress, chronology of attempts at152,L53RUC 'smear campaign' against 146;RhodesianArmy 119Taylor, Teddy M.P. 140"Today, Tonight" documentary on143; under surveillance117,118,146,148

inRhodesia I2O,L2LWallace, Colin 136,137

II.M.Forces:Medical Classifrcation system 151;Under Secretary of State for ArmedForces, Roger Freeman 14&1b1

'Independent, The'14bInformants/sources: 43 ;recruitment of - British Army andRUC 30;

from IRA 41;treatment of: by Fred &'Bunny'90;by MIs 90;by MI6 89,90.

Interrogation techniques 24, 68IRA - recruitment ofby Security

forces 41

Joint Serwices Intelligence TrainingCentre, Ashford,, Kett 22

kidnappers - hired by British Army73

killer - gangs 130Kincora Boys Home 130,186;investigation ofby -British Police 138,Justice Hughes Committee 141,RUC 130;press coverage of 143

Kitson, Brigadier Frank & counterterrorism techniques in NorthernIreland 29

Knock, RUC HQ 32

Labour Government, and IRA 6BLisburn, British Army HQ, NorthernIreland 31,32

Livingstone, Ken M.P:assistance to Holroyd 141,146questions raised in House ofCommons 87, 148, 151

'Lobster'magazine 143Loyalty, Holroyd's duty of to:British Army 34,35RUC 32,35

Lurgan: British Army He 14;operations in 59;by MI6 40;rivalry between MI5 and MI6 91

McQuaid, Eugene : killing of 84-5'Miami Showband' killings 78Military Intelligence Offrcer 20;training in preparation forNorthern lreland 23;work of39

Ministry of Defence:& covert operations 47,& response to Fred Holroyd andColin Wallace 149-53

MI5:and Holroyd 130,136illegalities 70informants, treatment of 90Oldfield, Maurice 144;relations with - British Army 100,

RUC 100,131,RUC Special Branch 102,103,SAS 90;rivalry with MI6 69, 89-94, 99, 100,1L7,r23,

& risk to British soldiers and RUC92

Rhodesia 123Taylor, Teddy M.P. L42Ulster 153Wilson, Harold 136, 143.

MI6, or Secret Intelligence Service30,40Cavendish, Anthony 144Covert operations 83, Lurgan 40;cross border operations and Garda

101,102,143information on INLA 102informants, treatment of 89,90;relationship with other securityforces 41

recruitment of British Army per-sonnel 44

rivalry with MI5 69,89-94,99,100,1 17,123

Smellie, Craig40.Mobile Reconaissance Force (MRF)

86Mugabe, Robert, assassinationattempt on 127

Nairac, Captain Robert, 47Intelligence role 55

183

killing of John Francis Green 77;SAS in Northera Ireland 47 and,covert operations 74-6

Netley, British Army Hospital,Holroyd and assessment at 109;events at 106-€, 150return to duty 113transported to 104.

'New Statesman', and Holroyd'sallegations 132,133Colin Wallace, 136

Northern lreland:British Army analysis 28;posting to ofHolroyd 20,30;'psy--ops'133

Oman, "The Secret War: Dhofar197l-72" David Arkless 14

Ponting, Clive 131Pope, Brigadier; Mons Officer Cadet

School 11Portadown, RUC Special Branch 34;& miscarriage ofjustice 80-B

Protestant terrorist groups, bombingof 'Chalet Bar'66; inlluence in RUC46,90-3

'psy--ops' in Northern Ireland, andColinWallace 133

Republic of Ireland: reaction to'Diverse Reports' programme 132:"Today, Tonight" 143

Rhodesia: British involvement inwar settlement 126;Fred Holroyd 120;Lancaster House 126;Military Intelligence l2l,I22;MI5 sanctions busting 123;Thatchers promise to rig electionL26

Royal Artillery 11RUC:

& British Army 30,32-3,44,60;cross border operations 100;'dirty tricks'70;HQ, Knock 32;Holroyd's allegations 130-133,smear campaiga against 146;

I

184

informants 30;Kincora Boys'Home 130;MI5 100,102,103,131;Proteetant bias .16;

Protestant temorists 8H.3;Special Branch, miscarriage ofjustice 80-83, MIO's 30,34,

MI6 55.

Sabotage: British Army and Garda84

SAS:Covert involvement in NorthernIreland 47,

Britieh Goverament in ignoranc47,cover up ofkilling 85;MI5 90;Robert Nairac and crovert/illegaloperations 74-6;

RUC 85,Special Branch and hoteetantterroriets 79:

Thailand, covert operation in 13

threat to Holroydby 147.'Shamrock Club' or'Chalet Bar' 66-9Security Forces in Northern lreland:relationship between 32,34,35;sabotage by 84-5

Special Branch GUC) MI6 55'Spycatcher'and Colin Wallae 139Smellie, Craig MI640Stalker, John 73: smearing of79,139Surveillance:

of Holroyd, Rhodeaia 121

ofRepublicans 44training in techni gu.ea 25--7

Taylor, Teddy M.P. and HolroYd139, 140; offrce burgled 141

firailand: SAS covert operation 13Thatcher, Margaret 126,136,140,141"Today, Tonight" current affairspmgramme 14il

UDA:'Ginger'Baker86RUC 87;tIvT'66

UDR:BritishArmy46;British Security Forces 133;I'IVT.78

UVF: Miami Showband killings 78;Portadown 37,38; UDR 78

Ulster: MI5 undercover 153

Wallace, Colin 180,142,143allegations: Kincora Boys' Home,police investigation 138,MI5 plot againet Harold Wilson -Peter Wright ('Spycatrher') 143;

Iluncan Campbell 133;Paul Foot - "Who Framed ColinWallace?" 147:

& Holroyd 136,137:doesier to Downing Street 14I-;"Iobster" magazine articles 143;surveillance oflal8;'Today, Tonight" programme 143

West Germany, Fred Holroyd postedto, 11

Wilson, Harold, campaign against136

Wright, Peter: 'Spycatcher', & ColinWallace allegations 14il