How Kim Philby infiltrated MI6, with a lot of help from his friends* Third Man in Cambridge spy ring also helped by luck and rivalry between MI5 and MI6* Philby's first meeting with Russian agent went unnoticedSuch a lot has been written about Kim Philby and the Cambridge spy ring that people may be forgiven for thinking that's enough. They would be wrong.There remains much, ranging from the exotic to the banal, to make the story of the Cambridge spies of perennial interest.A new account shows how Philby, the "third man" of the Ring of Five, came, partly by sheer luck, to head the counter intelligence branch of MI6 and ended up being responsible for co-ordinating British secret operations in the Soviet Union.As Edward Harrison, author of The Young Kim Philby, published on 1 October by the University of Exeter Press, points out, this Soviet agent was at the heart of Britain's secret cold war.How he got there is described in detail, some of it fresh, most of it very telling. It tells you as much as about the British establishment, as about Philby personally. A highly qualified woman in MI6 was passed over.
Philby could be suitably deferential. He had charm, helped along perhaps by his stammer. He was not particularly cunning.He did not need to be. Philby got away with it because surveillance by MI5 and the police special branch was patchy. Both Harrison and Gorden Corera, in his book, MI6: Life and Death in the British Secret Service (newly out in paperback, published by Phoenix), point to the significance of one specific incident.Neither MI5 nor the police kept tabs on Edith Tudor-Hart, Philby's talent spotter. In 1934, she walked Philby to Regents Park and introduced him to Arnold Deutsch, the Soviet Union's spy recruiter in Britain.
"If Edith had been followed to Regent's Park, Deutsch would have become suspect and Philby blown before he was even started," writes Harrison.Philby was also helped by the rivalry between MI5 and MI6, fed by a clash of personalities in the two agencies.As Harrison notes, Philby could play one off against the other. Corera writes: "MI5 were seen as little more than policemen.and their well-tailored relatives from MI6 certainly never left them in any doubt that they did not move in the same circles or inhabit quite the same world as MI6 did with its gentlemanly values".Philby's flight to the Soviet Union in 1963 shocked the British establishment. Many of his colleagues in MI6 found it difficult to believe he could have been such a betrayer. Years later, they spoke fondly of Philby to this writer.
His friends included Nicholas Elliott, who was sent to offer Philby immunity from prosecution in return for a full confession. Philby confessed, a bit, before deciding to join his spymasters in Moscow.Harrison suggests that Philby's father, St John Philby, was the most powerful influence in Kim's life. The Arabist, explorer, colonial intelligence officer and eccentric kept his friends in MI6 though he was far from loyal to Britain and British interests in the Middle East.Yet in the end Philby was probably not as valuable to Moscow as other members of the Ring of Five, including Anthony Blunt and John Cairncross who were also offered immunity from prosecution in return for confessing. (The other two members of the ring were Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess).Ironically, chronic suspicion in the Lubyanka fed by Stalin's paranoia, led many Moscow spymasters to suggest that the members of the Ring of Five were actually double agents.As Harrison puts it: "It was impossible to believe that the British government was so foolish as to employ all these old communists in top secret posts.
" Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian, Defence and Security Blog.