122. Kim Philby: An Assassin In Spain (Ep 2)

18:42David:He writes for their publications. He visits Berlin with the group. And Philby finds it pretty repulsive, hanging out with the kind of Nazis. This is, after all, what motivated him was hating them. But, you know, he's got to ditch his friends, hang out with Nazis. But that's what he's got to do. And he's kind of cultivating, I guess, this image that he's sensible. He's not pro-Nazi, but he's anti-war. You know, that's his move.

19:06Gordon:Through this period, Deutsch is still running him, right? Yeah. That's the primary relationship that he's got with Soviet intelligence is through Arnold Deutsch.

19:16David:Yeah. So Deutsch is still running him, doing kind of surveillance routes to meet him, public transport, all these things. and passing on messages. But then others also come into the frame. So there's an interesting character called Alexander Orlov, who'd already been posted in America, Paris, Austria. He comes to the UK in the summer of 1934 to be above Deutsch as the head of illegal intelligence. His cover is actually as an American businessman selling imported refrigerators in Regent Street. and Philby and Orlov will meet as well, particularly as there's some worries that Deutsch might be under surveillance.

19:53David:So Orlov starts to meet him after Deutsch, you know, about a dozen times over nine months. Then Orlov has to leave because his cover is blown because he bumps into someone who knew what he was. Next person, very interesting, a guy called Theodor Malley, who is kind of also considered another of the great illegals from 36 he's running Philby he's a Hungarian originally wanted to be a priest ends up joining the Red Army he's again a kind of one of these great recruiters who just has that sensitivity ability to kind of work with with not just Philby but loads of other agents he recruits and there's a kind of very close relationship between the two of them but the problem is for Philby at those this time I mean he's not getting anywhere I mean he's not even making it as a journalist and he's pretty depressed and i mean actually there's a you know for club members there's we're going to hear a really fascinating tape which is a tape of kim philby talking about his early career and how he got into it we're going to be kind of listening to the voice of philby discussing these things and analyzing it but in one part of the tape he philby says i'd reported to my soviet contacts in a state of some despondency i had to confess to failure He, Theodore Malley, as usual, was extremely sympathetic.

21:12David:So he's really, he's not getting anywhere in penetrating the bourgeois institutions.

21:18Gordon:I mean, at this point, he's probably one of the least successful members of the Cambridge Five. But the Soviets, again, are very patient. They encourage him to keep going. The idea that Philby go to Spain to cover the civil war that had broken out there in 1936. Yeah.

21:36David:And it is interesting that the Soviets are kind of, they don't just think, let's get rid of this guy, Philby. We'll keep looking for a way of playing him long, of getting him into the state. And the Spanish Civil War starts in 1936. And again, it's one of those kind of iconic, brutal civil wars of the 30s where the battle between left and right in Europe is being played out because you've got the kind of fascists versus communists. but also it's the kind of nationalists and monarchists as well as the fascists which have got the kind of establishment of landlords clergy and business at one side against the republicans and the leftists you know the peasants the workers lots of other countries pile in you know as a kind of proxy conflict so the soviet union obviously on the leftist side and you get also the volunteers from the left you get the famous kind of international brigade people like george Jolwell go out.

22:32David:And on the other side, the Italian and German governments are helping the fascists, including using the Air Force to carry out bombing raids. Theodore Malley just kind of clearly thinks this is a place where Philby could be useful. So February 37th, they send him out as a freelance journalist, just with some letters of recommendation. And most journalists go out to cover the leftist Republicans, people like Ernest Hemingway. But Philby, they send out to cover the right wing forces. And it kind of makes sense because if you're the Soviets, you want to collect intelligence on the right wing forces.

23:07David:You want him to report back on what he's seeing, developments, the array of forces on one side, support the nationalists are getting from Italy and Germany. Those are the kind of details that they're after.

23:18Gordon:He's also given the mission, it kind of just shows the remarkable things that the Soviets are going to ask him to do over the course of his career is one of his missions is to get close to Franco, who's the nationalist leader, get close to Franco and collect intelligence that would help with his assassination. So, you know, get into his headquarters, log his security, you know, sort of his pattern of life, who cooks for him, how does he live, what's the daily routine. And I mean, Philby even gets an order to actually kill Franco, which, you know, in retrospect, seems absolutely absurd. It's mad, isn't it?

23:54Gordon:Yeah, it's absolutely mad. I mean, he's a Cambridge undergrad with, you know, a year of journalism experience at this point. And he's being asked to assassinate Franco.

24:05David:I know. I think Theodore Malley, when he passes on the order, knows it's not realistic. But it's clearly come from some, you know, probably from Stalin or someone, you know, like, have we got someone who can do it? And it's just getting passed down the bureaucracy. But, you know, Philby comes back from that initial visit in May, having not even got close to Franco. And Mali tells Moscow, you know, he's in a very depressed state because Philby feels like he's failed at this mission. But then, I think this is so interesting, that he gets another shot at it. And how does he get the connections to kind of go back out there?

24:40David:It's his dad. You know, it's his dad again. Because his dad is so well connected. You know, he's this kind of semi-celebrity explorer of Arabia. One of his old friends is an assistant editor at the Times newspaper, which is the establishment government newspaper. Young Kim is offered the chance to write a piece for it, which is kind of – and the paper is quite pro-nationalist at this time. The foreign editor had been to Westminster School, Old Boys Network, has lunch with Philby's dad, and then proposes that, well, maybe, you know, young Kim could become a special correspondent for us and go and cover Franco and, you know, go to Spain.

25:20David:The dad's connections here are pretty important in that, in him getting that break in journalism.

25:27Gordon:And so that's the big break then. So he goes back to Spain under this journalistic cover in June of 1937. And he's there for nearly two years until 1939. And I guess, I mean, poor Litsy, right? Because Litsy's not coming along for this.

25:46David:No. And I do find this sad. This is some of my sympathies for Kim, because I think these two young lovers who'd met in the snow now have to separate. Because she's clearly too associated.

25:59Gordon:She doesn't know what he's doing, right? She doesn't know.

26:01David:I think she must suspect. I think she suspects, but she's not in the know of the details. Of course, she's so associated with communism that they have to separate. She doesn't like bourgeois life in London. Around the time he goes to Spain, she moves to Paris. Philby will say, well, we just discussed it calmly. I think they both realise they've got to sacrifice the fact They love each other or loved each other for the cause. Philby, he has a charm. I mean, he has a charm and a way with women, we should say. It's very interesting. But, you know, there's something. I think the fact that he's smart, idealistic, he's got a slight man of action to him, as we'll see.

26:49David:He's also got the kind of vulnerability of the stammer. He's pretty successful.

26:55Gordon:Is he still stammering at this point? Yeah. He does, yeah. Still stammering.

26:59David:Yeah. So pretty quickly he gets into a relationship with another kind of interesting character called Lady Frances Lindsay Hogg, who's known to everyone as Bunny, who is a glamorous divorced Canadian actress 10 years older than Kim, but who crucially is very well connected on the royalist side and is quite a fan of fascists. and the two of them kind of shack up together in Spain. And she's this kind of glamorous figure who all the kind of fascist leaders love. And so you can see that for him, hanging out with her and having an affair with her is also pretty useful. I mean, they're a kind of interesting, slightly odd couple.

27:40Gordon:And I guess it allows him to get close to some of the, I guess, press or media officials in the Franco regime. And I guess a way to start putting... some questions to those contacts on, you know, I guess, military details, plans and intentions. I mean, he's he's got to be a bit of an odd duck in the journalistic community in Spain, right? Because now he's he's got this girlfriend named Bunny. He's getting close to Franco. He's not covering the Republicans. So it does seem, I guess, a little odd. And then especially if anyone knew him they would know that he had been a you know a communist sympathizer back at at cambridge so he's kind of an odd stew seen from the outside right when he's when he's in spain

28:29David:and it's interesting when you read the accounts quite a few of the other journalists just actually think he is a british spy you know they think he's working for british yeah and being told to to you know to infiltrate the fascist side but yeah he's doing he does quite well you know goes to the press conferences. You get the permission, you get a pass to go by car to the front lines of the war. Six weeks after he arrives on this second big trip, he gets an interview with Franco. By now, the order to kill him has been rescinded. But he's getting close to people, providing pretty useful intelligence.

29:04David:And then there's an important moment in December of when he's out there in that first trip, where he goes out to see the action at the front line. There's a convoy of cars you know it's new year's eve snowing they approach a village near teruel if i'm pronouncing it right in eastern spain so north of valencia you know they all get out the car the reporters i mean i've done this kind of thing you know places they wander around for a bit two of the journalists go back to the car sit with a bottle of rum to warm up philby comes back to the car and um uh the you know he it had been his seat in the front but someone else is now sat in the front so you know philby says i was fine i'll get into the back of the car they light up some cigarettes open some chocolates as a chocolate is being offered to philby there's a massive explosion and it's funny because philby later says he thought it was exploding chocolates But actually, the car has been shelled by the Republican side.

30:08David:And the other three men in the car, one of them a Pulitzer Prize winning America journalist, they are all going to die from the wounds of that shelling. All of them, apart from Philby, will be dead. and um you know the fact that he'd taken the back seat is just that crazy bit of luck that the shrapnel from this shell goes you know kills the other three and all the other seats in the car but in his one seat in the back you know he's protecting he gets a slightly bloodied head and that's it um and you know next day new year's day it's his 26th birthday and he will always look back on that day and think he was lucky and i think he was well it gives him i guess something

30:51Gordon:of a heroic shine, doesn't it? Because he's survived, he's been bloodied, he's this kind of brave war correspondent. I mean, I find this fascinating. He's given a medal by Franco, personally, for surviving this attack. I mean, it just gives you the sense, I guess, seen from the perspective of his Soviet handlers. this is a guy who you know despite maybe you know sort of against all odds although i guess with a bit of help from his dad and and the times you know has has actually succeeded in the mission that he's given in spain of getting close to penetrating uh franco's maybe not inner circle but penetrating the people around franco uh and giving the soviets actual intelligence about what the nationalists are up to in Spain.

31:51Gordon:So that's a success for Kim Philby. Yeah.

31:53David:He's a kind of successful war correspondent, which gives him, because of this injury, because of the medal, he's got all the access he needs. And that in turn makes him a better agent for the Soviets. He's able to get some pretty good information, which he can feed back to his handlers if he meets them in France. So Philby's reputation is definitely enhanced. This is the point where he's no longer a failure. And the nationalists as well, who he's covering, They're steadily advancing until eventually they win that civil war. And Philby's there in Barcelona in January 1935 when Barcelona falls to the nationalists and reports from the front line as it falls.

32:29David:And then soon after that, Madrid will fall and the civil war will be over.

32:32Gordon:We'll be there, Gordon, with Philby having succeeded at his mission in Spain and with a return to England imminent. Let's take a break and we come back. We will see how Kim Philby joins the British Secret Intelligence Service and begins to hollow it out from the inside.

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35:09Gordon:Welcome back. It is the summer of 1939 and Kim Philby has just returned from Spain. He is back in Britain. He is tougher. He's more experienced. He's more disciplined. He's got a reputation now, Gordon. He's got some experience on the front lines. And I guess you could say he's kind of someone who has had his first taste of success in the spy game.

35:35David:Yeah. And it's interesting. Tim Milne, his old friend from school, definitely finds him changed. He says, it was not just that he'd grown fatter, too fat for a young man, but he seemed to have discarded all his previous asceticism and idealism, which I had admired. Now the talk was all about the flesh pots of Spain, the booze, the marvellous seafood. He was more cynical, more worldly wise, more interested in material comforts, more gregarious. He also talks about how it's with some glee Philby boasts that a doctor had told him that he, then 27 years old, had the arteries of a man of 50. I mean, that doesn't sound like a thing to boast about to me.

36:18David:But he's back in London. He's passing his material to Moscow. But this is a really interesting point, kind of 3940, because he's actually poorly handled by Moscow at this point. Having been brilliantly recruited by

36:36Gordon:Arnold Deutsch - I can't imagine why everything was going so smoothly inside the intelligence apparatus of the Soviet Union in the late 1930s. What could have possibly happened, Gordon?

36:46David:What possibly happened was that in 1937 to 1938, the great terror of the purges strike Moscow. I mean, it's this mad bit of Stalinism, isn't it? Where Stalin's purges of the kind of military and of the Communist Party then extend to the NKVD or the KGB itself. And, you know, basically they can't start purging all the spies, including all these people who'd handled, you know, Philby. And Philby's got no idea what's going on, but his handlers, you know, keep getting withdrawn very quickly. You know, and the reason is because they're getting purged. You know, Theodore Malley, this, you know, this kind of brilliant of the illegals, the one who'd sent him to Spain gets recalled, tortured and shot in 1938 as a German spy, which he wasn't.

37:33David:Others, there's a couple, Kravitsky and Orlov, who knew a little bit about Philby, who defect but don't spill the beans, but they kind of leave. Very interesting. Orlov is a very interesting case because he'd handled Philby and he defects to the West, but says to Stalin or sends a message through to the top going, I know lots of secrets and I will agree not to reveal them if you don't harm my family still in the Soviet Union. and the deal basically holds. So even though he's defected to the West, he never reveals the kind of, you know, the fact of what Philby is doing. It's kind of interesting.

38:12Gordon:That is kind of a mutually assured destruction in a way there because Stalin could go after his family and he's got the secrets that could uproot one of Stalin's best spies. So they just stay quiet. That's incredible.

38:25David:Yeah. What about Deutsch? Yeah, Deutsch. Well, Deutsch, it's a little bit mysterious because he's not, we don't think purged. So the best guess is he dies during the war, it's thought, possibly at sea. But it's not entirely clear what happens to him, which is a bit of a shame because he's such a kind of interesting character that you'd kind of like to know a bit more about that. But there seems to be some mystery to it. But the result is all these handlers are getting purged. Moscow is worried the British embassy has been penetrated. There's only one person left. They're also a bit suspicious about the Cambridge spies because also, of course, technically the people who recruited and ran them have now been purged as German spies.

39:11David:So does that mean that these agents were compromised? So it's all a little bit kind of actually haphazard for Philby. And Philby is complaining to Burgess McLean and the others and kind of going, I'm really struggling to contact my Soviet handlers. And then you get as well this other big moment, August 1939, which is the Nazi-Soviet pact. And I think this is so interesting, isn't it? Because this is when Hitler and Stalin briefly make a deal that they're going to be allies. And you kind of think to yourself, well, how must that feel to someone like Philby, who anti-fascism had been his thing? I mean, it's wild, isn't it, what it must have been like when you read that in the news?

39:57Gordon:Philby and others, including Burgess, will basically say, I mean, some people just totally walk away from the communist cause when this happens. But I guess Burgess and Philby basically say that this is a necessary tactical move on the sort of march toward the glorious communist future that sort of Stalin had to do this to kind of live to fight another day, I guess you could say. But even so, I mean, it's got to be very disturbing to watch.

40:29David:Yeah, yeah. And I think that must be the lowest moment for Philby because he's kind of badly handled, intermittent contact, struggling to talk to them, Nazi-Soviet pact. I mean, he must, I think, have had doubts about his choice at this point, you know, and wonder, what have I done? But what's interesting, and I think this is very Philby, is he doesn't walk away. I've made my bed alive. I'm going to keep going. And he does. And he gets this next journalistic assignment from the Times, which is now the Second World War proper, as we think of it, starts when Hitler invades Poland at the start of September 1939.

41:08David:And the Times newspaper can send one correspondent to be accredited with the British Expeditionary Force in France, the British Army in Europe. And they They picked Philby because he is their Star War correspondent, having done the Spanish Civil War. So he goes out to the kind of headquarters of the British Army in Europe, sits with the British military. He's reporting on what's happening. I mean, it's not that much happening at this point, but he's actually in military uniform. I mean, I hadn't realised this until I saw some of the pictures. He gets a British military uniform to wear, but now he is crossing a line.

41:49David:because the Nazis and the Soviets at this point are allies against the British. I mean, it doesn't last long, but I think this is interesting because this is the first moment where, you know, you raised this earlier, when is he really betraying his country, really betraying his country? And I think this is the first moment where he's really crossing a line, but very briefly.

42:11Gordon:Yeah, I mean, I guess it seems unlikely if, even though he'd been in touch with with deutsche other handlers prior to this point it seems unlikely that if even if all of that had come to light you would have been able to prosecute filthy for espionage right i mean there may not have even been a willingness to do it yeah um but there there may not have been enough of a there there to do anything about him at this point i guess you think about it it's you know you're right to this point in time he has not I mean, I guess he spied on his own father, which is a psychological piece we sort of glossed over.

42:50Gordon:But he hasn't spent that much time actually directing his energies at British interests. Most of his work to this point has actually been working to penetrate the Franco regime in Spain.

43:05David:He is passing on information about British military. And I think that is definitely crossing a line. But of course, here's the crazy thing. At this point, Moscow is in a kind of bit of a mess. The London residency, the London spy base in the embassy of the Soviet Union is in a mess. And effectively, they're pausing contact with him. He's kind of not being handled at this moment where actually he's perhaps doing his most dangerous thing so far. And so it's a kind of odd situation I think he's in. And then finally, Germany attacks France and the low countries. The Germans make this rapid advance through Belgium and France.

43:44David:And very quickly, of course, those countries collapse and their militaries collapse. And just ahead of the evacuation of what's left of the British army from Dunkirk on these famous little boats, Filby heads back to Britain. So by the summer of 1940, he's back in Britain. But his relationship with the Soviets seems effectively to have broken down. He's struggling to make any contact with them.

44:09Gordon:This is what I this is remarkable, I think, and it shows the extent to which Philby was a sort of self-driven true believer, because even though his relationship with the Soviet Union is in shambles and even though I mean, even, you know, by this point, the Moscow Center has kind of concluded insanely that the Cambridge network was not actually working for the Soviet Union and had been, you know, sort of of controlled by enemies of the people, right? It's Philby who patches it back up and restarts the relationship with the Soviet Union. It's not the other way around. It's his energy that brings it all back together, which again, it's sort of another data point in how deeply committed he is to this cause.

45:03David:Yeah. Yeah. So he's kind of trying to get mcclain and others to say can you get me in touch and he and he you know and it he's not getting much back but he keeps the faith because i think it is a faith i think that's the point and it's only actually after a few months that moscow will respond to that and that's because basically philby himself is incredibly successful and it's worth saying at this point until now the other cambridge spies have been doing much much better at penetrating the bourgeois institutions you know Donald McLean is at the Foreign Office and he's a rising star. He's passing on tons of secrets, tons of documents to his handler.

45:40David:They're kind of running out of film to photograph it all. Burgess has recruited Blunt, who's in turn recruited others. Blunt is in MI5. He's in the security service. John Cairncross, we talked about, has joined the Foreign Office and then the Treasury and then is the kind of private secretary to a cabinet minister, Lord Hankey. And he has tons of access to secret documents. I mean, Kair Kros is really important. I mean, he possibly gives the first information about the plan of the Allies to develop an atomic bomb to the Soviets, who was definitely one of the first. 1935, if you go back a few years, he decided the best way to distance himself from his communist past was to being an aide to a right-wing Tory MP.

46:22David:And then they go on a fact-finding trip around Nazi Germany, where, according to Guy Burgess, he has sex with lots of men from the Hitler Youth, which is just classic Guy Burgess, mixing work with pleasure. He's got this amazing network of wrens, many of them, Gabe, but not all of them, in London. Famously, this will be known as the Homintern as opposed to the Comintern. It's a kind of gaggle of people with his flamboyant character he's mixing with. Where does he join, though, David, in 1936? Where is the best... On his path to the establishment, BBC. Where else would you go?

47:05Gordon:BBC. BBC. Yeah. I mean, I guess it's blazing the straight path from having sex with tons of men in the Hitler youth straight to the BBC. Yes, exactly.

47:18David:I don't think that's an option anymore on the career when you're doing your previous experience. qualifies you for this job. But he ends up in the BBC as a talks producer, where he's persuading people to come on a talk. And again, he's so well-connected. He's so charismatic. He's got this just brilliant network. And I mean, he gets to know Churchill pretty well before Churchill's prime minister. Churchill inscribes one of his books to Guy as a present. And then in January 39, Guy's left the BBC for a position in something new, which is called Section D of MI6. What's the D for, David? The D is for destruction.

47:59Gordon:Destruction, yes. I wish we got to name sections this way of intelligence agencies. It reminds me, I think we did those episodes, this is now over, I think almost over a year ago, Gordon, on North Korean cyber bank robbers. And we talked about the North Korean Reconnaissance General Bureau and they have like a, I think they had a unit called like the Enemy Destruction Sabotage Unit or something like that. This is very redolent of those kind of muscular North Korean aiming conventions. I'm a fan.

48:42David:Yeah, so it's a new section for MI6 focusing on sabotage and destruction, but also propaganda um it's a bit of a it's new bit of a sideshow and burgess is in the bit basically dealing with propaganda because he's got his background in talks at the bbc so he's a kind of liaison between section d propaganda and ministry of information but then of course he's now into it's a it's a new bit it's a kind of adjacent to the main british secret service but it's part of it and of course he lobbies to get philby into it his old friend and and philby you can see why Philby is perfect for it, because he's an experienced war correspondent.

49:22David:He knows Europe. He's good at languages. He knows about the military. He's been embedded with the military in France, but he also knows about irregular warfare from having covered the Spanish Civil War. Philby has also been trying to drop hints with all his contacts in the previous months. Journalists and others love to do something for the war. A female journalist, I think, with intelligence links is the one he thinks plays a role, but definitely Burgess is the one who kind of helps get him in.

49:51Gordon:Philby says, he's talking about this meeting with Burgess, says, I was sitting in the office in the Times with very little to do when suddenly the telephone rang and a voice asked me to go to a certain room in a certain hotel on a certain day. And I asked why. And they said, well, look here, it's rather special work we are thinking for you about and please be as discreet as you can. Simply come to us and don't say anything. And so this is the connection that I guess Burgess helps facilitate for Philby to the secret intelligence service that is going to really shape all of Philby's romantic life and legacy.

50:31David:Yeah, that's right. So he has a couple of interview at the St. Ermin's Hotel, which is still there. and he's asked to sign the Official Secrets Act. He's into this Section D and Guy shows him up to his new office. No one knows what it's doing because it's new. It's the start of the war. There's reorganisation. It's all a bit of a mess. He's got a vague role, Philby, helping Burgess, of all things. And there's a great description in Philby's memoir. I have to say his memoir is pretty unreliable in parts, but I do love the title. Shockingly. Yeah, shockingly. Written partly by the KGV, but it is called My Silent War, which I think is a great title for his memoir.

51:12David:And he says, Sometimes in the early weeks, I felt perhaps that I had not made the grade after all. It seemed that somewhere lurking in deep shadow, there must be another service, really secret and really powerful, capable of Backstair's machination on such a scale as to justify the perennial suspicions of, say, the French. But it soon became clear that such was not the case. It was the death of an illusion. Its passing caused me no pain. You feel like that when you entered in the CIA, David, first time?

51:45Gordon:Yeah, I was going to say, I think all intelligence officers and analysts, people who joined these secret services, must go through some version of this moment. Because you have been fed this image of these services as being extremely capable, omniscient, omnipotent in some ways, like all seeing. And then you get in and you realize that they're organizations that are run by human beings. And they're just, you know, they're broken and messed up and insane in all the ways that, you know, non-secret organizations are. And sometimes it's even worse. I think this is a very common feeling. I think it's interesting, though, that for people who are loyal to these institutions in some way, shape, or form, the passing of that illusion does cause some pain because you'd idealized some picture of this thing that is now gone.

52:43Gordon:And I think in Filby's case, because he's an enemy within, he's probably more than happy to see that it's run to some degree as any other organization would where you've got lunatics and incompetents who are staffing some key positions, right? It's a bureaucracy.

53:00David:Yeah. That's right. Yeah. So he's in this Section D. He's going to go to a kind of training school and be involved in training exiles in propaganda. And he's good at it, actually. and at this point the soviets finally respond to his contact requests and you can imagine how surprised they must be because like this guy who they thought was a kind of you know he's doing okay and suddenly he's like i'm in mi6 you know i've got into a kind of bit of the british secret service but section d doesn't really last very long because it sits you know they're real this is a kind of period of great change for british intelligence it's the start of a war so soon they're going to create the Special Operations Executive, this famous organisation, to set Europe ablaze and to do sabotage, which means that MI6 can therefore focus much more on just intelligence gathering.

53:48David:And so this kind of creation of the SOE is bad news for Burgess, because the new bosses at SOE can see that he's not their kind of guy. They're a bit more military. He's not SOE material. He's not SOE material. Burgess is not SOE material. This drunken, lecherous young man who's basically been trying it on with all the soldiers is not suitable to be training in SOE. And he's living this kind of wild life at this flat in Bentic Street. And he also just gets done for drunk driving at this point as well. So as a result, Burgess, who's got Philby in, is thrown out. But what do you do with someone like that, who's been clearly not suitable for this kind of work?

54:27David:I know. Back to the BBC. Back to the BBC.

54:33Gordon:between my legs one day david he goes he does go back to the bbc though only briefly and then

54:41David:he goes to the foreign office yeah of course because he's he's a drunk lecherous dangerous where else would you put him but in the foreign office with access to secrets diplomacy you've got a future in diplomacy yeah but meanwhile philby though of course you know That's Burgess. But Philby, who's been brought in by Burgess partly, I think they can see he looks capable. So here is the crucial moment, which is, can he get into the real MI6? Not this offshoot, which is being now absorbed, but the inner sanctum. And there is this chance. So MI6 decide they need to check him out before joining up. There's a quick cursory check of the files, nothing found.

55:21David:Now, the number two in MI6, one of the number twos, there were two deputies, Valentine Vivian, VV, head of security, decides to check out Philby, whether he's good enough to join the British Secret Service. What do you do? You have lunch with him and his dad. Because Valentine Vivian has known his father. Very British. Very British, Gordon.

55:48Gordon:him.

55:49David:Sinjin Philby had known Valentine Vivian back in India when Vivian had been there 30 years earlier. They used to play bridge together. Philby's mother, Kim Philby's mother, is an old friend of Valentine Vivian's wife. So they decide they're going to meet. And of course, we'd slightly lost track of the mad Sinjin Philby story, hadn't we? Where did we leave him last? I think he'd converted to Islam, hadn't he, in the 30s?

56:11Gordon:He'd converted to Islam, potentially to help secure more lucrative business deals in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

56:20David:And also, by the kind of late 30s, he's very anti-war, pro-peace with the Germans, and he becomes a little bit pro-Hitler. You know, not totally. Stands for parliament in Britain for a far-right party. And then, crucially, at the start of the war, he's actually encouraging the Arabs to stay out of the Second World War when it starts. And Hibn Saud is clearly kind of sufficiently kind of worried about this behaviour that he kind of tells the Brits. And then St. Jim Philby gets detained and deported to Britain, where he's held for months as a kind of risk to public safety. This is the bit where you just go, this is just so weird and it's so Britain.

57:00David:So he gets held for a few months, then he gets released. And yet just after that, he's having lunch with the number two of MI6 because they're old friends. I mean, it's just like, it's nuts, isn't it?

57:10Gordon:I've actually been bottling up this question on the British class system, because I think we Americans, at least Americans like me, Gordon, you know, a pretty decent middle class guy from a flyover state who isn't part of any sort of class establishment. Ordinary Joes like me, Gordon, we don't get the class system. But I guess this is, is this a demonstration of that class system in action here where if you're kind of in, And I know Sinjin isn't exactly in the upper class, but if you're kind of in or if you know a few people who sort of vouch for you, that's enough. I mean, what is the best way to understand this dynamic that we've just seen here where this guy, a bigamist, a bigamist who converted to Islam and who has actually been deported back to his home country from abroad because he is a threat to safety and security, winds up vouching for his son to join the British Secret Intelligence Service.

58:08Gordon:Like, why can you unpack that dynamic for us? Why does that work?

58:12David:So I think it's partly about class, although it's worth saying none of these people are like upper class. They're not the aristocracy and they are kind of upper middle professional class and they're not rich, but they are from a certain world where everyone knew each other. So I think the way to think of it is partly about class, but not as upper class, but more as what people call the old boys network, which is people who'd been to school together and where if you're one of them and you're trusted by them, then you're OK. And I mean, you see that with this lunch, this fascinating lunch, because it's the three of them having lunch.

58:49David:deputy head of one of the number twos at MI6, Sinjin and Kim. Kim goes to the bathroom and Valentine Vivian from MI6 turns to the father and says, he was a bit of a communist at Cambridge, wasn't he? And Sinjin replies, that was all schoolboy nonsense. He's a reformed character now. And that is it.

59:07Gordon:It's an astounding misjudgment on the part of the father. Exactly. Because he probably actually believes it too. He's not covering up for his son. He genuinely thinks that it was schoolboy nonsense. VV's got the stamp of approval.

59:24David:Yeah. And he's been vouched for by one of us. It's clear now. He's been told he was once a communist and yet it's fine to employ. And Valentine Vivian later says, I mean, I love this line as well. Later he will say he let him in because he was vouched for. And he said, I was asked about him and I said, I knew his people. That's what Valentine Vivian says. I was asked about him, Philby, and I said I knew his people, in other words, his father, his type of people. And I think it's so interesting because that is the kind of old-fashioned British elite and establishment in action. It's a good lunch, someone saying you're a good chap, a good egg, and you're in MI6.

1:00:06Gordon:Well, Gordon, I think there is the perfect place to stop for right now with Kim Philby about to enter the inner sanctum, thanks to a very good lunch and a completely out-to-lunch father who has no idea what's going on in his son's life. But he is about to join SIS, and when we come back next time, we'll see how Kim Philby begins to penetrate this most bourgeois institution, the British secret intelligence service.

1:00:39David:But of course, just a reminder, if you want to hear the next couple of episodes, right away you can. Go join the Declassified Club at the rest is classified.com. Lots more there for you, including some bonus material and that tape where you can hear Kim Philby himself talking about being recruited into MI6. So we'll see you next time. We'll see you next time.

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