Home · Politics · National Security · A mole in MI5
A mole in MI5
Broadcast Date: March 29, 1981
In 1981 a spy scandal breaks in Britain's Security Service, MI5. A new book suggests that Sir Roger Hollis, a high-ranking MI5 agent who interrogated Igor Gouzenko back in 1945, was actually a Soviet mole at the time.Upon seeing transcripts of his conversations with Hollis, Gouzenko is shocked to find they are full of inaccuracies that undermine his testimony. He describes his suspicions of Hollis and wonders what other damage the agent has done.
A mole in MI5
• MI5 is the United Kingdom's security intelligence agency. Their job is to protect national security and economic well-being, and to help detect and prevent serious crime.• After Pincher's book Their Trade is Treachery, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher admitted that her government had investigated allegations that Hollis was a spy. But the Trend inquiry of 1974 cleared Hollis of the accusation.
A mole in MI5
Medium: Radio
Program: Sunday Morning
Broadcast Date: March 29, 1981
Guest(s): Igor Gouzenko
Reporter: Douglas Grant
Duration: 5:37
Photo: Newspaper Headline: London Daily Mail, March 25, 1981
Last updated:
April 20, 2004
Television
13:30
A disguised Igor Gouzenko appears in his famous This Hour Has Seven Days interview.
Television
2:53
After 36 years Igor Gouzenko's secret testimony is made public, but a new film suggests the government bungled his case.
Conspiracy theorist and former MI5 officer, Peter Wright postulated that Roger Hollis had been working as a double agent throughout the Gouzenko investigation. According to Christopher Andrew's (2009)book 'Defence of the Realm-the authorized history of MI5' the "KGB found the Hollis conspiracy theory so bizarre that some of it's foreign intelligence officers suspected that it derived from mysterious, internal British intrigue" (p.350). Gouzenko's evidence revealed two agents codenamed ELLI, Kay Wilsher was quickly identified and imprisioned in 1946 for breaching the Official secrets act. Peter Wright convincingly argued that Hollis was the second ELLI. ELLI's true identity was uncovered by Oleg Gordievsky (a KGB/SIS double agent)in 1982, as Leo Long. Long was an NKGB (later KGB) agent, Gouzenko worked for the GRU (military intelligence)and could only provide partial information regarding ELLI's identity.
Submitted by: Al