Hi Kalyn, the OSS was modelled on another organisation formed by Churchill, called the SOE, (Special Operations Executive) there's a film released earlier this year, "The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare", which was Churchills nickname for them. There was also a branch of Military Intelligence call MI9, responsible for prisoners of war, they commandeered Trent Park stately home, and sent high ranking German officers there to live like lords, the different branches, army, navy and air force gossiped and boasted about tactics and what they knew, it never occurred too them that MI9 had the whole place bugged, and found out a lot of things that the Germans should really have kept to themselves.
Stella Remington (see Wikipedia) was the first female Director General of MI5 in the 1990s. She has written an autobiography and a series of novels about a female spy.
Good that you recognise the difference between MI6 & MI5. Many British assume the James Bonds of this world work for MI5 which is home security with MI6 being foreign security. 😊
This is true, in theory, but just as the idea that the CIA doesn't operate on US soil is laughable, I wonder how strictly the MI5/6 demarcation operates in practice. (Have you seen Skyfall?)
@@carltaylor6452well as soon as something crosses boarders you can bet MI6 are involved even if it's joint with MI5..... As I understand it a lot of what MI5 does on a day to day basis is stuff that in the USA would be handled by the FBI, DEA, etc
Hi Kalyn, MI6 use to have a section where you could test you suitability to be an employee, I failed miserably, but you are a lot smarter than I am, maybe give it a go, if it's still there. :)
My uncle actually was a plumber at CIA headquarters, because they don't bring in building maintenance people from outside, due to security concerns. His main job was to wait until something needed repair, but they would also give him odd jobs to keep him busy. He had an electric tool cart, with a remote control, to carry his tools around CIA headquarters. They would often have the CIA carpenters put up walls for a temporary room and have my uncle install a temporary drinking fountain and then have him remove it or move it down the hall at a later date. My aunt was a file clark at CIA headquarters. CIA headquarters has a bulletin board, where employees can post things for sale. Often there are personal weapons and gadgets brought in from other countries posted for sale. Before the shootings outside the CIA headquarters parking entrance, I used to deliver office supply paper to CIA headquarters. When I went to study in Europe, I actually lived like James Bond for several years.
Great video GGL.....Also a major part of MI6/MI5 is GCHQ in Cheltenham....This is a world leader in communications Intel and counter espionage and counter hacking....A friend of mine worked there and said they helped US a lot with a large number of Americans on placement.
I remember that for a while during the Cold War, the exact location of the Post Office Tower, a 581 ft structure that can be seen for many miles, was secret.
Honestly, we only know about their failures and the additional details they choose to tell us. Everything else is classified. I guess that's why we call it the *Secret* Intelligence Service. 😉
There is an official history of British Intelligence. I have a copy. Obviously it doesn't cover recent times, but WW1 had passed the 70 limit on keeping the documents classified. My favourite bit is how MI5 developed a fantastic reputation at the start of WW1 when they arrested every German agent in Britain at the start of the war. The Germans thought they must be brilliant to do that so quickly. In truth MI5 got lucky and the Germans incompetent. One German agent aroused suspicions when asking questions at a pub near a naval base. He was reported to the police who passed it on to MI5. They started intercepting his mail and found he was sending reports to an address in Belgium. So they started intercepting all mail being sent to that address. It turned out that all German agents were sending their reports to that address and MI5 with a staff of about 8 were able to identify them and order their arrest when the war started.
You can walk right up to the MI6 building, and there are no guards to be seen - but there are camerascamerascameras all over its nook-and-cranny-laden front elevation. (The back is plainer, but also camera-laden.)
Fascinating topic. I read "Spycatcher", a biog of Peter Wright, an engineer who worked for British intelligence and became an assistant director of MI5. The book was banned in England but I bought it in Scotland. The real stories are much more interesting than fiction.
Oh, total Streisand effect, yeah. I didn't find it boring, but that's maybe because the cold war spy stuff interests me in the first place. Wright is no Alistair McLean or John Le Carre, that's for sure.
According to a book I have here (Philip H.J. Davies _MI6 and the Machinery of Spying_ ISBN 0-7146-8363-9) the Secret Service Bureau operated as MI11c during WWI, and was reorganised into a separate Security Service ("MI5") and Secret Intelligence Service ("MI6") after 1919 and by 1921 - in the same re-organisation that the SIS got liaison sections with the Foreign Office, Air Ministry, Admiralty, Treasury &c. instead of just the War Office.
A friend of mine at University's father worked for GCHQ and we used laugh about the fact that in theory it was meant to be secret where their Listening Stations around the world were, but if you knew where my friend had lived growing up, then bingo!
SIS's building in Vauxhall was first designed as a general office building which is why it has a striking design; SIS only took it as their HQ when it was nearly finished. If SIS had been designing it from the start, they would have made it look very bland. The river front between the building and the River Thames is a public path (though it's been closed off in the last few years due to a major sewerage project unconnected to intelligence).
I think you'll find tye plans were at least a quadruple bluff. My actual name is an amalgamation of the 2 aforementioned fictional characters ( so hilarious at checking-in, initially after Identity). The last point in video- apologies if aforementioned- 5 eyes is so called group of the 5 Anglophone nations network - US, Canadá,UK, Oz, NZ that share intel. with each other regularly- of course with other allies as well when needed.
Above a Petrol station, I'm not sure. There have been some stories of crazy incompetence, but that goes along with a lucky strike and sometimes pure brilliance. I get the impression their work output is uneven. And so far, it's because luck is on our side. That's what you get for recruiting from mostly young upper class Uni people with no common sense and little experience of life.
@@peterjackson4763 Yes, I believe you. They are recruiting more democratically now. Which is sensible. But on the whole they have targeted mainly university males from higher backgrounds.
As a Brit; let me just correct you on one point. MI6 is a late comer to the British Secret service. The CIVILIAN arm of the service has a far older history. Actually going back to the times of the Tudors; possibly earlier. The agents were in the employ of the British Sovereign in rule. It became a proper service in the reign of Elizabeth 1. the "Spies" reported directly to her on her express priority. This is why we refer to the service as His or Her Majesty's Secret Service. And to some extent the service still reports to the ruling Sovereign before Parliament and the Government in situ. MI6 as you alluded to is Military Intelligence (Now there is a contradiction in terms; and a whole different conversation). You are right about Service Operatives have to keep what they do secret. The British Secrecy act was modified during World War One; and again in World War Two and has some pretty dire consequences for anyone breaching it. During the reign of Elizabet the First; executions were one punishment... and those the Service considered "undesirables" could sometimes disappear without trace never to be heard of again... Ever. The British Secrets act is also connected to The National Security Legislations... And that does tie back to the creation of MI6; before MI^ the Military had their own Secret Service now commonly called MI5. Both have different major roles; but often share information. I'd rather not say much more; you don't know who is listening in.
My copy of the OSA, signed early '70's has the death penalty as the ultimate sentence for Treason. Maybe more MP's and Civil Servants should reread their copies before tweeting. Enforcement appears non existent today. What was overheard being spoken in the rear of a Ministerial car would have definitely resulted in `hold the front page' called out by editors.
@@Poliss95 Not abolished just suspended, still on the statute so can be reinstated quickly (days not months) if required. The current OSA has long prison tariffs for breaches.
MI6 was known as NID (Naval Intelligence Department). Based at Room 40, Admiralty Building, it was often called Room 40. The army had its own Intel Dept, which became I Corps, the Intelligence Corps. There was a hiatus in the early 1920s, when - having just had "the war to end all wars" - the British and US Governments cut all funding to intelligence activity. In Britain there was no resource even to destroy or archive NID's files, which ended up stored in Admiral "Blinker" Hall's cellar. Intelligence was handled ad hoc until both governments eventually came to their senses. It's easy to turn swords into plough shares. It's much more difficult to do the reverse.
Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond books was in UK Naval Intelligence during WW2. John le Carre, the author of the more realistic books featuring George Smiley, that includes “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”, worked for both MI5 and MI6. 😎
Ian Fleming (PA & SOE liaison to the Director of Naval Intelligence) was personally involved in designing the Office for the Coordinator of Information in May 1941, for Col 'Wild Bill' Donovan. This then became the OSS - which then became the CIA. David Cornwell (aka John Le Carré) used some of the greatest true spy stories as his inspiration - although 'The Perfect Spy' seems to have been the most autobiographical.
I thought MI5's US equivalent was Homeland Security? Or the NSA? The FBI seems more like the government's police force, also covering crimes unrelated to espionage and (internal) national security?
MI6 were famous for using business people as agents on an ad hoc basis. So. not direct employees but people who visited foreign countries for trade and scientific research. They'd be asked to have a look at something or visit somewhere or even something as mudane as counting people visiting an office building while sitting in a cafe. Secondly. it should be noted that the CIA has a lot of monitoring facilities but the British have a separate organisation for that called GCHQ which has I believe more employees than MI6. Arguably it is more important as well and no doubt this comment and your video will have been picked up and run through their algorithms to determine if you are a threat.
SIS building was already up in the late 1980s - I could see it distantly from the lab I worked in in Denmark Hill. MI6 formally occupied it in 1984, as noted.
No doubt for brevity joint working with each other and other agencies only got a nod. "Cooperating" doesn't quite cover it, both UK and the US are members of the "5 Eyes" group. Whenever intelligence is shared between friendly powers it is "sanitised" to protect the level of knowledge, sources and methods of the originating organisation. The extent to which it is scrubbed depends in large part on how friendly and leak proof the other party is. Something is inevitably lost in translation. Within 5 Eyes information is shared, if not "as is" but significantly more fully. It is an "elite" club.
@@Stand663 Word association, Plumber correctly has been lost, "Plumber" was internal joke. Random Operation names should be randomly chosen. Snobary on Operational names has its own flaws.
The history of British intelligence is long and filled with a surprising amount if politics and bureaucracy and interdepartmental cat fighting. For all that un WW2 SOE or the special operations executive was create from virtually scratch to becoming operationally active in around a year despite reporting to a minister Churchill despised.
After 9/11 I interviewed with 6, went through regional form filling and vetting, then met with a few other people in big grilling interviews, if I could’ve afforded the pay cut, I’d probably have taken the job, you can’t live in London on those wages, well not very well anyway.
MI6 is just like me, sure, I believe you. I often pass that building. Trust me, I also work in a place where no-one can get in and nobody ever leaves. We're exactly the same. 🙄
No. The CIA actually organizes wars. During the Vietnam war, the CIA had a free hand to do what it wanted in LAOS, which was supposed to be a NEUTRAL country. The CIA also backed the CONTRAS against the Sandinistas of Nicaragua.
I know from first hand experience that 3 cia officers have used private US citizens as pawns and have abused me, my daughter and my oldest daughter, but my oldest was so abused by them, she killed herself, and I’ve been trying to get Justice ever since. I’ve turned in the 3 specific cia officers, but they’ve been able to obstruct Justice for over a decade
The Institute for Justice do great work, they have a youtube channel but check their website first. They're a group of lawyers who take on cases that individuals cannot afford to persue due to legal costs, they survive off donations meaning they do not charge a fee.
Anne Sacoolas was a senior CIA officer when she killed 19 y.o. Harry Dunn outside RAF Croughton, in the UK. Originally pretending only to be the wife of a CIA officer, she was spirited out of the UK on a military flight by Trump's State Department, to avoid having to appear in court.
The American who set up the US Intelligence Agencies based them on the British ones. His rationale was along the lines of "They work really well so why try to reinvent the wheel?". 🙂
"MI6 is more shrouded in secrecy and leans into the James Bond stereotype"... The secret agant who tells everyone his name, is known by every villain he faces, and is a borderline alcoholic?
Taking tourist photos from a distance is fine just don't linger too long.... Anyway who knows how much is actually run from that building.... Sure it's probably full of data analysts and office functions but it's far too flashy to house the really important stuff
I've oftern wondered why the US has both the CIA & FBI? We don't have the equivalent in the UK Although we do have MI5, GCHQ, plus the Defence Intelligence service. Which according to Wiki make up the Joint Intelligence Commitee
We do in fact have an equivalent agency to the FBI, it is called the NCA (the National Crime Agency). It deals with serious and organised crime. The FBI's remit on counter intelligence is mainly handled by the Security Service (MI5) in the UK. The CIA and FBI have different functions. The CIA is mainly about gathering foreign intelligence, though they do other things as well. The FBI primarily, but not exclusively, operates in the US. The majority of its work relates to serious and organised crime, like the NCA in the UK. It also performs counter intelligence work, like MI5 in the UK.
Do you know about the "Five Eyes"? The intelligence services of the US, The UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand share a great deal of intelligence, and work together in what is almost certainly the most effective and comprehensive global intelligence arrangement. I'm hopeful that Japan will soon join, so it becomes the Six Eyes - that could make it significantly more effective again.
My family moved to Cheltenham in the mid 70’s - our next door neighbour worked for GCHQ (I remember him having some?radio equipment in his house). GCHQ in those days appeared to be a series single storey brick buildings behind a
The CIA can call in Delta Force if direct action is needed. No disrespect to Delta, they're highly skilled and serious people, a top-tier outfit. But if there's a terrorist threat in the UK that needs dealt with, we call in the SAS. They are widely recognised as the best in the business, they wrote the book.
I had an interview at MI5 (I'm not allowed to tell you that, but as I didn't get the role I don't suppose it matters) The only building I've ever entered with armed to the teeth security in reception.
I had a MI5 officer come and interview me, when as an ordinary Whitehall civil servant I wanted to work in a minister's office. He went through every aspect of my life, from primary school onwards. I use to have my lunch in what is now MI5 headquarters. There was a canteen and a bar in the basement of Thames House South on Millbank.
MI 6 was forme in 1906 it means military intelegance 6 there where 10 of mi originally James bond if the fiction of Ian Fleming who worked for royal navy the name James bond was of someone who study birds the real hero's where call osi who risked there live for all freedom must say like you vids as I send time both side of ponds
Ahem ... it is Day-Ta not Dar-Ta ... if you cannot rectify this, please embark at your nearest airport for return the United States of Mispronounced English Words :p
Well the CIA / FBI have now had two cracks at offing trump without success and MI6 managed to off lady Diana spectacularly on the first attempt perhaps the Democrats should have hired MI6 for the job lol 😊
You're mistaken. Ask yourself who benefitted - and why Trump no longer has any external ear injury. Or why a supersonic round passing through an ear wouldn't cause any hearing loss or brain injury?
This is a daft video. You cannot compare MI6 and CIA as they are SECRET! You would have to work in both organisations to be able to ascertain the difference in working practises.
