LAYING THE GHOSTS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000403760004-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 21, 2010
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: November 7, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/21 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000403760004-9
ARTICLE APPEAR2D
ON FAGL_i
Spies
Laying the ghosts
Yet another ghostly figure of the Russian
spy network recruited at Cambridge Uni-
versity in the 19303 has emerged. Mr Leo
Lor.g; an undergraduate at Trinity Col-
lege in 1935, this week described how he
had been- part of the Soviet spy ring run
by :.,e 'traitor Mr Anthony Blunt. Mr
Long claimed that during the war, when
working in a section of the British intelli-
gence service which dealt with German
troop movements, he passed information
to the Russians.
Although Mr Long was publicly identi-
fied only this week, he confessed to the
British security service in 1964. He was
not given immunity from prosecution
(which was how M15 managed to per-
suade Mr Blunt to confess), but none the
less M15 decided, apparently without any
ministerial authority, not to bring him to
court. .
Mr Long was clearly small fry in a spy
network which included much bigger fish
in Burgess, Maclean;- Blake, Philby and
Blunt. But his story once again raises
concern. How wide and deep was the
Soviet penetration? How long did it con-
tinue? How many other known spies
were allowed to live or die in quiet
retirement? Most of what has emerged
has come from investigative journalists
such as Mr Andrew Boyle, whose book
"The Climate of Treason" persuaded
Mrs Thatcher (to her credit and against
the advice of her civil servants) to expose
Blunt in November, 1979. Until then he
had been a pillar of the British establishment as Professor Sir Anthony Blunt,
knight commander of the Victorian order
and member of the Queen's household.
Tae E C';`r _i'(IST
7 Nov--~-~bnr 1951.
In March of this year Mr Chapman
Pincher, another investigative journalist,
said that one longtime agent of the Rus-
sian intelligence service had been the late
Sir Roger Hollis, who was director-gener-
al of Britain's security service (MIS) from
1956-65 (the period during which Philby
received the tip-off that enabled him to
escape. to Russia and when both Blunt
and Long were unmasked). Mrs Thatcher
told parliament that in the 1960s Hollis
had indeed been suspected and investi-
gated. The interrogation had proved in-
conclusive. In 1974 Lord Trend, a former
secretary of the cabinet, reviewed the
case and was unable to prove Hollis was
innocent but agreed with those who had
concluded he-was not a Russian spy.
Mr Roy Hattersley, Labour's shadow
home secretary, this week urged Mrs
Thatcher tostart a fresh investigation. He
is right to do so. Until the ghosts have
been laid, doubts about Britain's security
service will continue. There may be five
or six other traitors from the Blunt era.
who have never been named, but are
known to M15. Most of these were re-
cruited before the war, when many hon-
ourable men and women became commu-
ar.
w
The inquiry should cover the 20-year
period 1930-50 and should enable Mrs
Thatcher to express to parliament her
satisfaction that she has been told of all
those who were suspected or proved
guilty of treachery, whether or not their
names were ever made public. Only then
rnn'ri, racPt.i.n4 -F d....h, 1.s ..1..-~.~
mists. They will now have retired from
public service.
Mrs Thatcher should entrust this fresh
inquiry to two people acting jointly, who
know both the security service and the
personalities of the period under review.
One should be Lord Diplock, a law lord
who has been chairman of the security
commission for the past 10 years. The
other could be somebody like Lord Roth-
schild who, apart from distinguished pub-
lic service as head of the cabinet office's
central police review staff under both Mr
Heath and Sir Harold Wilson, was him-
self of the prewar Cambridge generation,
knew men like Mr Blunt personally, and
was involved in intelligence work in the
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/21 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000403760004-9