Britain's Secret Propaganda War

by Lashmar, Paul; Oliver, James

• ISBN13: 9780750916684
• ISBN10: 0750916680
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-05-01
• Publisher: Sutton Pub Ltd

Summary

Britain's Secret Propaganda War is the first book to be written about The Foreign Office's Information Research Department (IRD) -- an important chapter in the history of the Cold War. The narrative is driven by actual accounts of IRD covert operations and includes a number of "exclusives." The IRD was set up under the Labour Government in 1948 and clandestinely financed from the Secret Intelligence Service budget. A large organisation with close links to MI6 -- with whom it shared many personnel -- it waged a vigorous covert propaganda campaign against Eastern Bloc Communism for nearly thirty years using journalists, politicians, academics and trade unionists -none of whom were "unwitting." Such famous names as George Orwell, Denis Healey, Stephen Spender, Bertrand Russell and Guy Burgess helped or backed the work of IRD.

Table of Contents

List of Plates	vii
Abbreviations	ix
Acknowledgements	xi
Introduction	xiii
Indonesia: Prelude to Slaughter	1	(10)
`Lies and Treachery': the Origins of IRD	11	(10)
Origins of the Cold War	21	(8)
A Crusade Begins	29	(10)
Korea: a Hot War in a Cold War	39	(10)
Offensive: into the 1950s	49	(8)
Nothing but the Truth: IRD and the BBC	57	(10)
The Medium is the Message: IRD and M16	67	(10)
Agencies of Change: the News Agency Network	77	(6)
Imperial Adventures: IRD and the Colonies	83	(12)
Spreading the Word: IRD Publishes	95	(10)
Internal Affairs: IRD's Domestic Campaigns	105	(12)
IRD's Fellow Travellers	117	(8)
A Mirror Image: the CIA	125	(12)
The Fat Years: the 1960s	137	(8)
Indian Summer: IRD and the EEC	145	(8)
Painting it Red: IRD and Northern Ireland	153	(10)
The Fall	163	(16)
Conclusions	175	(4)
Appendix	179	(8)
Notes	187	(22)
Bibliography	209	(6)
Index	215