MI6

Coordinates: 51°29′14″N 0°07′27″W

The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6

(Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service Secret Intelligence Service
of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas (MI6)
collection and analysis of human intelligence in support of the
UK's national security. SIS is one of the British intelligence
agencies and the Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service ("C") is
directly accountable to the Foreign Secretary.[3]

Formed in 1909 as the foreign section of the Secret Service

Bureau, the section grew greatly during the First World War
officially adopting its current name around 1920.[4] The name
"MI6" (meaning Military Intelligence, Section 6) originated as a
convenient label during the Second World War, when SIS was
known by many names. It is still commonly used today.[4] The
existence of SIS was not officially acknowledged until 1994.[5] SIS Building, the headquarters of
That year the Intelligence Services Act 1994 (ISA) was introduced MI6 in London
to Parliament, to place the organisation on a statutory footing for
Agency overview
the first time. It provides the legal basis for its operations. Today,
SIS is subject to public oversight by the Investigatory Powers Formed 4 July 1909
Tribunal and the Intelligence and Security Committee of Preceding Secret Service
Parliament.[6]
Bureau
The stated priority roles of SIS are counter-terrorism, counter- Type Foreign
proliferation, providing intelligence in support of cyber security, intelligence service
and supporting stability overseas to disrupt terrorism and other
Jurisdiction His Majesty's
criminal activities.[7] Unlike its main sister agencies, Security
Government
Service (MI5) and Government Communications Headquarters
(GCHQ), SIS works exclusively in foreign intelligence gathering; Headquarters SIS Building
the ISA allows it to carry out operations only against persons London, England
outside the British Islands.[8] Some of SIS's actions since the United Kingdom
2000s have attracted significant controversy, such as its alleged 51°29′14″N
complicity in acts of enhanced interrogation techniques and 0°07′27″W
extraordinary rendition.[9][10]
Motto Semper Occultus
Since 1994, SIS headquarters have been in the SIS Building in ("Always Secret")
London, on the South Bank of the River Thames.[11] Employees 3,644[1]
Annual Single Intelligence
History and development budget Account £3.711
billion (2021–22)[1]
Minister James Cleverly,
Foundation
responsible Foreign
Secretary
The service derived from the Secret Service Bureau, which was Agency Richard Moore,
founded on 1 October 1909.[4] The Bureau was a joint initiative of executive Chief[2]
the Admiralty and the War Office to control secret intelligence
operations in the UK and overseas, particularly concentrating on Website www.sis.gov.uk (htt
the activities of the Imperial German government. The bureau was ps://www.sis.gov.u
split into naval and army sections which, over time, specialised in k/)
foreign espionage and internal counter-espionage activities,
respectively. This specialisation was because the Admiralty wanted to know the maritime strength of the
Imperial German Navy. This specialisation was formalised before 1914. During the First World War in
1916, the two sections underwent administrative changes so that the foreign section became the section
MI1(c) of the Directorate of Military Intelligence.[12]

Its first director was Captain Sir Mansfield George Smith-Cumming, who often dropped the Smith in
routine communication. He typically signed correspondence with his initial C in green ink. This usage
evolved as a code name, and has been adhered to by all subsequent directors of SIS when signing
documents to retain anonymity.[4][13][14]

First World War

The service's performance during the First World War was mixed, because it was unable to establish a
network in Germany itself. Most of its results came from military and commercial intelligence collected
through networks in neutral countries, occupied territories, and Russia.[15] During the war, MI6 had its
main European office in Rotterdam from where it coordinated espionage in Germany and occupied
Belgium.[16]

Inter-war period

After the war, resources were significantly reduced but during the
1920s, SIS established a close operational relationship with the
diplomatic service. In August 1919, Cumming created the new
passport control department, providing diplomatic cover for agents
abroad. The post of Passport Control Officer provided operatives
with diplomatic immunity.[17]

Circulating Sections established intelligence requirements and

passed the intelligence back to its consumer departments, mainly the
War Office and Admiralty.[18]

The debate over the future structure of British Intelligence

continued at length after the end of hostilities but Cumming
managed to engineer the return of the Service to Foreign Office
control. At this time, the organisation was known in Whitehall by a
variety of titles including the Foreign Intelligence Service, the 54 Broadway, SIS headquarters from
Secret Service, MI1(c), the Special Intelligence Service and even C's 1924 until 1964
organisation. Around 1920, it began increasingly to be referred to
as the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), a title that it has continued
to use to the present day and which was enshrined in statute in the Intelligence Services Act 1994. During
the Second World War, the name MI6 was used as a flag of convenience, the name by which it is
frequently known in popular culture since.[4]
In the immediate post-war years under Sir Mansfield George Smith-Cumming and throughout most of the
1920s, SIS was focused on Communism, in particular, Russian Bolshevism. Examples include a thwarted
operation to overthrow the Bolshevik government[19] in 1918 by SIS agents Sidney George Reilly[20] and
Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart,[21] as well as more orthodox espionage efforts within early Soviet Russia
headed by Captain George Hill.[22]

Smith-Cumming died suddenly at his home on 14 June 1923, shortly before he was due to retire, and was
replaced as C by Admiral Sir Hugh "Quex" Sinclair. Sinclair created the following sections:

A central foreign counter-espionage Circulating Section, Section V, to liaise with the Security
Service to collate counter-espionage reports from overseas stations.
An economic intelligence section, Section VII, to deal with trade, industry and contraband.
A clandestine radio communications organisation, Section VIII, to communicate with
operatives and agents overseas.
Section N to exploit the contents of foreign diplomatic bags

* Section D to conduct political covert actions and paramilitary operations in time of war. Section D would
organise the Home Defence Scheme resistance organisation in the UK and come to be the foundation of
the Special Operations Executive (SOE) during the Second World War.[17][23]

With the emergence of Germany as a threat following the ascendence of the Nazis, in the early 1930s
attention was shifted in that direction.[17]

MI6 assisted the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police, with "the exchange of information about communism" as
late as October 1937, well into the Nazi era; the head of the British agency's Berlin station, Frank Foley,
was still able to describe his relationship with the Gestapo's so-called communism expert as "cordial".[24]

Sinclair died in 1939, after an illness, and was replaced as C by Lt

Col. Stewart Menzies (Horse Guards), who had been with the
service since the end of World War I.[25]

On 26 and 27 July 1939,[26] in Pyry near Warsaw, British military

intelligence representatives including Dilly Knox, Alastair
Denniston and Humphrey Sandwith were introduced by their allied
Polish counterparts into their Enigma-decryption techniques and
equipment, including Zygalski sheets and the cryptologic "Bomba",
and were promised future delivery of a reverse-engineered, Polish-
built duplicate Enigma machine. The demonstration represented a
vital basis for the later British continuation and effort.[27] During
the war, British cryptologists decrypted a vast number of messages
enciphered on Enigma. The intelligence gleaned from this source,
codenamed "Ultra" by the British, was a substantial aid to the
Allied war effort.[28]

Second World War

A young Englishman, member of the
During the Second World War the human intelligence work of the Secret Intelligence Service, in
service was complemented by several other initiatives: Yatung, Tibet, photographed by
Ernst Schäfer in 1939
The cryptanalytic effort undertaken by the Government
Code and Cypher School (GC&CS), the bureau
 responsible for interception and decryption of foreign communications at Bletchley Park.
(See above.)
The extensive 'double-cross' system run by MI5 to feed misleading intelligence to the
Germans.
Imagery intelligence activities conducted by the RAF Photographic Reconnaissance Unit
(now JARIC, The National Imagery Exploitation Centre).

GC&CS was the source of Ultra intelligence, which was very useful.[29]

The chief of SIS, Stewart Menzies, insisted on wartime control of codebreaking, and this gave him
immense power and influence, which he used judiciously. By distributing the Ultra material collected by
the Government Code & Cypher School, MI6 became, for the first time, an important branch of the
government. Extensive breaches of Nazi Enigma signals gave Menzies and his team enormous insight into
Adolf Hitler's strategy, and this was kept a closely held secret.[30]

The British intelligence services signed a special agreement with their allied Polish counterparts 1940. In
July 2005, the British and Polish governments jointly produced a two-volume study of bilateral intelligence
cooperation in the War, which revealed information that had until then been officially secret. The Report of
the Anglo-Polish Historical Committee was written by leading historians and experts who had been granted
unprecedented access to British intelligence archives, and concluded that 48 percent of all reports received
by British secret services from continental Europe in 1939–45 had come from Polish sources.[31] This was
facilitated by the fact that occupied Poland had a tradition of insurgency organisations passed down through
generations, with networks in emigre Polish communities in Germany and France. A major part of Polish
resistance activity was clandestine and involved cellular intelligence networks; while Nazi Germany used
Poles as forced labourers across the continent, putting them in a unique position to spy on the enemy.
Liaison was undertaken by SIS officer Wilfred Dunderdale, and reports included advance warning of the
Afrikakorps' departure for Libya, awareness of the readiness of Vichy French units to fight against the
Allies or switch sides in Operation Torch, and advance warning both of Operation Barbarossa and
Operation Edelweiss, the German Caucasus campaign. Polish-sourced reporting on German secret
weapons began in 1941, and Operation Wildhorn enabled a British special operations flight to airlift a V-2
Rocket that had been captured by the Polish resistance. Polish secret agent Jan Karski delivered the British
the first Allied intelligence on the Holocaust. Via a female Polish agent, the British also had a channel to the
anti-Nazi chief of the Abwehr, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris.[31]

1939 saw the most significant failure of the service during the war, known as the Venlo incident for the
Dutch town where much of the operation took place. Agents of the German army secret service, the
Abwehr, and the counter-espionage section of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD), posed as high-ranking officers
involved in a plot to depose Hitler. In a series of meetings between SIS agents and the 'conspirators', SS
plans to abduct the SIS team were shelved due to the presence of Dutch police. On the night of 8–9
November, a meeting took place without police presence. There, the two SIS agents were duly abducted by
the SS.[32]

In 1940, journalist and Soviet agent Kim Philby applied for a vacancy in Section D of SIS, and was vetted
by his friend and fellow Soviet agent Guy Burgess. When Section D was absorbed by Special Operations
Executive (SOE) in summer of 1940, Philby was appointed as an instructor in black propaganda at the
SOE's training establishment in Beaulieu, Hampshire.[33]

In May 1940, MI6 set up British Security Co-ordination (BSC), on the authorisation of Prime Minister
Winston Churchill over the objections of Stewart Menzies.[34][35] This was a covert organisation based in
New York City, headed by William Stephenson intended to investigate enemy activities, prevent sabotage
against British interests in the Americas, and mobilise pro-British opinion in the Americas.[36][37] BSC also
founded Camp X in Canada to train clandestine operators and to establish (in 1942) a telecommunications
relay station, code name Hydra, operated by engineer Benjamin deForest Bayly.[38]

In early 1944, MI6 re-established Section IX, its prewar anti-Soviet section, and Philby took a position
there. He was able to alert the NKVD about all British intelligence on the Soviets—including what the
American OSS had shared with the British about the Soviets.[39]

Despite these difficulties the service nevertheless conducted substantial and successful operations in both
occupied Europe and in the Middle East and Far East where it operated under the cover name Inter-
Services Liaison Department (ISLD).[40]

Cold War

In August 1945 Soviet intelligence officer Konstantin Volkov tried to defect to the UK, offering the names
of all Soviet agents working inside British intelligence. Philby received the memo on Volkov's offer and
alerted the Soviets, so they could arrest him.[39] In 1946, SIS absorbed the "rump" remnant of the Special
Operations Executive (SOE), dispersing the latter's personnel and equipment between its operational
divisions or "controllerates" and new Directorates for Training and Development and for War Planning.[41]
The 1921 arrangement was streamlined with the geographical, operational units redesignated "Production
Sections", sorted regionally under Controllers, all under a Director of Production. The Circulating Sections
were renamed "Requirements Sections" and placed under a Directorate of Requirements.[42]

Following the Second World War, tens of thousands of Holocaust survivors attempted to reach Palestine as
part of the Aliyah Bet refugee movement. As part of British government efforts to stem this migration,
Operation Embarrass saw the SIS bomb five ships in Italy in 1947-48 to prevent them being used by the
refugees, and set up a fake Palestinian group to take responsibility for the attacks. However, some in SIS
wanted the policy to go further, noting that "intimidation is only likely to be effective if some members of
the group of people to be intimidated actually suffer unpleasant consequences" and criticising the decision
to not take stronger action against Exodus 1947 (which was, instead, seized and returned to mainland
Europe).[43]

SIS operations against the USSR were extensively compromised by

the presence of an agent working for the Soviet Union, Harold
Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby, in the post-war Counter-Espionage
Section, R5. SIS suffered further embarrassment when it turned out
that an officer involved in both the Vienna and Berlin tunnel
operations had been turned as a Soviet agent during internment by
the Chinese during the Korean War. This agent, George Blake,
returned from his internment to be treated as something of a hero by
his contemporaries in "the office". His security authorisation was
restored, and in 1953 he was posted to the Vienna Station where the
original Vienna tunnels had been running for years. After
compromising these to his Soviet controllers, he was subsequently
assigned to the British team involved on Operation Gold, the Berlin
tunnel, and which was, consequently, blown from the outset. In
1956, SIS Director John Sinclair had to resign after the botched
affair of the death of Lionel Crabb.[44]
Operation Gold: the Berlin tunnel in
1956
SIS activities included a range of covert political actions, including the overthrow of Mohammed Mossadeq
in Iran in the 1953 Iranian coup d'état (in collaboration with the US Central Intelligence Agency).[45]

Despite earlier Soviet penetration, SIS began to recover as a result of improved vetting and security, and a
series of successful penetrations. From 1958, SIS had three moles in the Polish UB, the most successful of
which was codenamed NODDY.[46] The CIA described the information SIS received from these Poles as
"some of the most valuable intelligence ever collected", and rewarded SIS with $20 million to expand their
Polish operation.[46] In 1961 Polish defector Michael Goleniewski exposed George Blake as a Soviet
agent. Blake was identified, arrested, tried for espionage and sent to prison. He escaped and was exfiltrated
to the USSR in 1966.[47]

Also, in the GRU, they recruited Colonel Oleg Penkovsky. Penkovsky ran for two years as a considerable
success, providing several thousand photographed documents, including Red Army rocketry manuals that
allowed US National Photographic Interpretation Center (NPIC) analysts to recognise the deployment
pattern of Soviet SS4 MRBMs and SS5 IRBMs in Cuba in October 1962.[48] SIS operations against the
USSR continued to gain pace through the remainder of the Cold War, arguably peaking with the
recruitment in the 1970s of Oleg Gordievsky who SIS ran for the better part of a decade, then successfully
exfiltrated from the USSR across the Finnish border in 1985.[49]

During the Soviet–Afghan War, SIS supported the Islamic resistance group commanded by Ahmad Shah
Massoud and he became a key ally in the fight against the Soviets. An annual mission of two SIS officers,
as well as military instructors, were sent to Massoud and his fighters. Through them, weapons and supplies,
radios and vital intelligence on Soviet battle plans were all sent to the Afghan resistance. SIS also helped to
retrieve crashed Soviet helicopters from Afghanistan.[50]

The real scale and impact of SIS activities during the second half of the Cold War remains unknown,
however, because the bulk of their most successful targeting operations against Soviet officials were the
result of "Third Country" operations recruiting Soviet sources travelling abroad in Asia and Africa. These
included the defection to the SIS Tehran station in 1982 of KGB officer Vladimir Kuzichkin, the son of a
senior Politburo member and a member of the KGB's internal Second Chief Directorate who provided SIS
and the British government with warning of the mobilisation of the KGB's Alpha Force during the 1991
August Coup which briefly toppled Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.[51]

After the Cold War

The end of the Cold War led to a reshuffle of existing priorities. The Soviet Bloc ceased to swallow the
lion's share of operational priorities, although the stability and intentions of a weakened but still nuclear-
capable Federal Russia constituted a significant concern. Instead, functional rather than geographical
intelligence requirements came to the fore such as counter-proliferation (via the agency's Production and
Targeting, Counter-Proliferation Section) which had been a sphere of activity since the discovery of
Pakistani physics students studying nuclear-weapons related subjects in 1974; counter-terrorism (via two
joint sections run in collaboration with the Security Service, one for Irish republicanism and one for
international terrorism); counter-narcotics and serious crime (originally set up under the Western
Hemisphere controllerate in 1989); and a 'global issues' section looking at matters such as the environment
and other public welfare issues. In the mid-1990s these were consolidated into a new post of Controller,
Global and Functional.[52]

During the transition, then-C Sir Colin McColl embraced a new, albeit limited, policy of openness towards
the press and public, with 'public affairs' falling into the brief of Director, Counter-Intelligence and Security
(renamed Director, Security and Public Affairs). McColl's policies were part and parcel with a wider 'open
government initiative' developed from 1993 by the government of John Major. As part of this, SIS
operations, and those of the national signals intelligence agency, GCHQ, were placed on a statutory footing
through the 1994 Intelligence Services Act. Although the Act provided procedures for authorisations and
warrants, this essentially enshrined mechanisms that had been in place at least since 1953 (for
authorisations) and 1985 (under the Interception of Communications Act, for warrants). Under this Act,
since 1994, SIS and GCHQ activities have been subject to scrutiny by Parliament's Intelligence and
Security Committee.[53]

During the mid-1990s the British intelligence community was subjected to a comprehensive costing review
by the government. As part of broader defence cut-backs SIS had its resources cut back twenty-five percent
across the board and senior management was reduced by forty percent. As a consequence of these cuts, the
Requirements division (formerly the Circulating Sections of the 1921 Arrangement) were deprived of any
representation on the board of directors. At the same time, the Middle East and Africa controllerates were
pared back and amalgamated. According to the findings of Lord Butler of Brockwell's Review of Weapons
of Mass Destruction, the reduction of operational capabilities in the Middle East and of the Requirements
division's ability to challenge the quality of the information the Middle East Controllerate was providing
weakened the Joint Intelligence Committee's estimates of Iraq's non-conventional weapons programmes.
These weaknesses were major contributors to the UK's erroneous assessments of Iraq's 'weapons of mass
destruction' prior to the 2003 invasion of that country.[54]

On one occasion in 1998, MI6 believed it might be able to obtain 'actionable intelligence' which could help
the CIA capture Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda. But given that this might result in his being
transferred or rendered to the United States, MI6 decided it had to ask for ministerial approval before
passing the intelligence on (in case he faced the death penalty or mistreatment). This was approved by a
minister 'provided the CIA gave assurances regarding humane treatment'. In the end, not enough
intelligence came through to make it worthwhile going ahead.[55]

In 2001, it became clear that working with Ahmad Shah Massoud and his forces was the best option for
going after Bin Laden; the priority for MI6 was developing intelligence coverage. The first real sources
were being established, although no one penetrated the upper tier of the Al Qaeda leadership itself. As the
year progressed, plans were drawn up and slowly worked their way up to the White House on 4 September
2001-which involved increasing dramatically support for Massoud. MI6 were involved in these plans.[56]

War on Terror

During the Global War on Terror, SIS accepted information from the CIA that was obtained through
torture, including the extraordinary rendition programme. Craig Murray, a UK ambassador to Uzbekistan,
had written several memos critical of the UK's acceptance of this information; he was then sacked from his
job.[57]

Following the September 11 attacks, on 28 September the British Foreign Secretary approved the
deployment of MI6 officers to Afghanistan and the wider region, utilising people involved with the
mujahadeen in the 1980s and who had language skills and regional expertise. At the end of the month, a
handful of MI6 officers with a budget of $7 million landed in northeast Afghanistan, where they met with
General Mohammed Fahim of the Northern Alliance and began working with other contacts in the north
and south to build alliances, secure support, and to bribe as many Taliban commanders as they could to
change sides or leave the fight.[58]

During the United States invasion of Afghanistan, the SIS established a presence in Kabul following its fall
to the coalition.[59] MI6 members and the British Special Boat Service took part in the Battle of Tora
Bora.[60] After members of the 22nd Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment returned to the UK in mid-
December 2001, members of both territorial SAS regiments remained in the country to provide close
protection to SIS members.[61]

In mid-December, MI6 officers who had been deployed to the region began to interview prisoners held by
the Northern Alliance. In January 2002, they began interviewing prisoners held by the Americans. On 10
January 2002, an MI6 officer conducted his first interview of a detainee held by the Americans. He
reported back to London that there were aspects of how the detainee had been handled by the US military
before the interview that did not seem consistent with the Geneva Conventions. Two days after the
interview, he was sent instructions, copied to all MI5 and MI6 officers in Afghanistan, about how to solve
concerns over mistreatment, referring to signs of abuse: "Given that they are not within our custody or
control, the law does not require you to intervene to protect this." It went on to say that the Americans had
to understand that the UK did not condone such mistreatment and that a complaint should be made to a
senior US official if there was any coercion by the US in conjunction with an MI6 interview.[62]

In the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, it is alleged, although not confirmed, that some SIS members
conducted Operation Mass Appeal, which was a campaign to plant stories about Iraq's WMDs in the
media. The operation was exposed in The Sunday Times in December 2003.[63][64] Claims by former
weapons inspector Scott Ritter suggest that similar propaganda campaigns against Iraq date back well into
the 1990s. Ritter says that SIS recruited him in 1997 to help with the propaganda effort, saying "the aim
was to convince the public that Iraq was a far greater threat than it actually was."[63] Towards the end of
the invasion, SIS officers operating out of Baghdad International Airport with Special Air Service (SAS)
protection, began to re-establish a station in Baghdad and began gathering intelligence, in particular on
WMDs. After it became clear that Iraq did not possess any WMDs, MI6 officially withdrew pre-invasion
intelligence about them. In the months after the invasion, they also began gathering political intelligence;
predicting what would happen in post-Baathist Iraq. MI6 personnel in the country never exceeded 50; in
early 2004, apart from supporting Task Force Black in hunting down former senior Ba'athist party
members, MI6 also made an effort to target "transnational terrorism"/jihadist networks that led to the SAS
carrying out Operation Aston in February 2004: They conducted a raid on a house in Baghdad that was
part of a "jihadist pipeline" that ran from Iran to Iraq that US and UK intelligence agencies were tracking
suspects on – the raid captured members of Pakistan based terrorist group.[65]

Shortly before the Second Battle of Fallujah, MI6 personnel visited JSOCs TSF (Temporary Screening
Facility) at Balad Air Base to question a suspected insurgent. Afterwards, they raised concerns about the
poor detention conditions there. As a result, the British government informed JSOC in Iraq that prisoners
captured by British special forces would only be turned over to JSOC if there was an undertaking not to
send them to Balad. In spring 2005, the SAS detachment operating in Basra and southern Iraq, known as
Operation Hathor, escorted MI6 case officers into Basra so they could meet their sources and handlers. MI6
provided information that enabled the detachment to carry out surveillance operations. MI6 were also
involved in resolving the Basra prison incident; the SIS played a central role in the British withdrawal from
Basra in 2007.[65]

In Afghanistan, MI6 worked closely with the military, delivering tactical information and working in small
cells alongside Special Forces, surveillance teams, and GCHQ to track individuals from the Taliban and Al
Qaeda.[66]

The first MI6 knew of the US carrying out the mission that killed Osama bin Laden on 2 May 2011 was
after it happened, when its chief called his American counterpart for an explanation.[67] In July 2011 it was
reported that SIS had closed several of its stations, particularly in Iraq, where it had several outposts in the
south of the country in the region of Basra. The closures have allowed the service to focus its attention on
Pakistan and Afghanistan, which are its principal stations.[68] On 12 July 2011, MI6 intelligence officers,
along with other intelligence agencies, tracked two British-Afghans to a hotel in Herat, Afghanistan, who
were discovered to be trying to establish contact with the Taliban or al-Qaeda to learn bomb-making skills;
operators from the SAS captured them and they are believed to be the first Britons to be captured alive in
Afghanistan since 2001.[69][70]

By 2012, MI6 had reorganised after 9/11 and reshuffled its staff, opening new stations overseas, with
Islamabad becoming the largest station. MI6's increase in funding was not as large as that for MI5, and it
still struggled to recruit at the required rate; former members were rehired to help out. MI6 maintained
intelligence coverage of suspects as they moved from the UK overseas, particularity to Pakistan.[71]

In October 2013, SIS appealed for reinforcements and extra staff from other intelligence agencies amid
growing concern about a terrorist threat from Afghanistan and that the country would become an
"intelligence vacuum" after British troops withdraw at the end of 2014.[72]

In March 2016, it was reported that MI6 had been involved in the Libyan Civil War since January of that
year, having been escorted by the SAS to meet with Libyan officials to discuss the supplying of weapons
and training for the Syrian Army and the militias fighting against ISIS.[73] In April 2016, it was revealed
that MI6 teams with members of the Special Reconnaissance Regiment seconded to them had been
deployed to Yemen to train Yemeni forces fighting AQAP, as well as identifying targets for drone
strikes.[74] In November 2016, The Independent reported that MI6, MI5 and GCHQ supplied the SAS and
other British special forces a list of 200 British jihadists to kill or capture before they attempt to return to the
UK. The jihadists are senior members of ISIS who pose a direct threat to the UK. Sources said SAS
soldiers have been told that the mission could be the most important in the regiment's 75-year history.[75]

Other activities

On 6 May 2004 it was announced that Sir Richard Dearlove was to be replaced as head of SIS by John
Scarlett, former chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee. Scarlett was an unusually high-profile
appointment to the job, and gave evidence at the Hutton Inquiry.[76]

SIS has been active in the Balkans, playing a vital role in hunting down people wanted by the International
War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague. British intelligence operations in the Balkans are thought to have
played a vital role in the handover of the former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milošević to The Hague; SIS
was also heavily involved in the hunt for Radovan Karadžić and General Ratko Mladic, who are linked to
a vast range of war crimes including the murder of Srebrenica's surrendering male population and
organising the Siege of Sarajevo.[77]

On 27 September 2004, it was reported that British spies across the Balkans, including an SIS officer in
Belgrade and another spy in Sarajevo, were moved or forced to withdraw after they were publicly
identified in a number of media reports planted by disgruntled local intelligence services – particularly in
Croatia and Serbia. A third individual was branded a British spy in the Balkans and left the office of the
High Representative in Bosnia, whilst a further two British intelligence officers working in Zagreb,
remained in place despite their cover being blown in the local press. The exposure of the agents across the
three capitals markedly undermined the British intelligence operations in the area, including SIS efforts to
capture The Hague's most wanted men, which riled many local intelligence agencies in the Balkans, some
of which are suspected of continuing ties to alleged war criminals. They were riled due to MI6 operating
"not so much a spy network as a network of influence within Balkan security services and the media," said
the director of the International Crisis Group in Serbia and Bosnia, which caused some of them to be
"upset". In Serbia, the SIS station chief was forced to leave his post in August 2004 after a campaign
against him led by the country's DB intelligence agency, where his work investigating the 2003
assassination of the reformist prime minister Zoran Djindjic won him few friends.[77]
On 15 November 2006, SIS allowed an interview with current operations officers for the first time. The
interview was on the Colin Murray Show on BBC Radio 1. The two officers (one male and one female)
had their voices disguised for security reasons. The officers compared their real experience with the
fictional portrayal of SIS in the James Bond films. While denying that there ever existed a "licence to kill"
and reiterating that SIS operated under British law, the officers confirmed that there is a 'Q'-like figure who
is head of the technology department, and that their director is referred to as 'C'. The officers described the
lifestyle as quite glamorous and very varied, with plenty of overseas travel and adventure, and described
their role primarily as intelligence gatherers, developing relationships with potential sources.[78]

Sir John Sawers became head of the SIS in November 2009, the first outsider to head SIS in more than 40
years. Sawers came from the Diplomatic Service, previously having been the British Permanent
Representative to the United Nations.[79]

On 7 June 2011, John Sawers received Romania's President Traian Băsescu and George-Cristian Malor, the
head of the Serviciul Roman de Informatii (SRI) at SIS headquarters.[80]

Libyan Civil War

Five years before the Libyan Civil War, a UK Special Forces unit was formed called E Squadron which
was composed of selected members of the 22nd SAS Regiment, the SBS and the SRR. It was tasked by
the Director Special Forces to support MI6's operations (akin to the CIA's SAC – a covert paramilitary unit
for SIS). It was not a formal squadron within the establishment of any individual UK Special Forces unit,
but at the disposal of both the Director Special Forces and the SIS; previously, SIS relied primarily on
contractor personnel. The Squadron carried out missions that required 'maximum discretion' in places that
were 'off the radar or considered dangerous'; the Squadron's members often operated in plain clothes, with
the full range of national support, such as false identities at its disposal. In early March 2011, during the
Libyan Civil War, a covert operation in Libya involving E Squadron went wrong: The aim of the mission
was to cement SIS's contacts with the rebels by flying in two SIS officers in a Chinook helicopter to meet a
Libyan Intermediary in a town near Benghazi, who had promised to fix them up a meeting with the NTC.
A team consisting of six E Squadron members (all from the SAS) and two SIS officers were flown into
Libya by an RAF Special Forces Flight Chinook; the Squadron's members were carrying bags containing
arms, ammunition, explosives, computers, maps and passports from at least four nationalities. Despite
technical backup, the team landed in Libya without any prior agreement with the rebel leadership, and the
plan failed as soon as the team landed. The locals became suspicious they were foreign mercenaries or spies
and the team was detained by rebel forces and taken to a military base in Benghazi. They were then hauled
before a senior rebel leader; the team told him that they were in the country to determine the rebels' needs
and to offer assistance, but the discovery of British troops on the ground enraged the rebels who were
fearful that Gaddafi would use such evidence to destroy the credibility of the NTC. Negotiations between
senior rebel leaders and British officials in London finally led to their release and they were allowed to
board HMS Cumberland.[81][82][83]

On 16 November 2011 SIS warned the national transitional council in Benghazi after discovering details of
planned strikes, said foreign secretary William Hague. 'The agencies obtained firm intelligence, were able
to warn the NTC of the threat, and the attacks were prevented,' he said. In a rare speech on the intelligence
agencies, he praised the key role played by SIS and GCHQ in bringing Gaddafi's 42-year dictatorship to an
end, describing them as 'vital assets' with a 'fundamental and indispensable role' in keeping the nation safe.
'They worked to identify key political figures, develop contacts with the emerging opposition and provide
political and military intelligence. 'Most importantly, they saved lives,' he said. The speech follows criticism
that SIS had been too close to the Libyan regime and was involved in the extraordinary rendition of anti-
Gaddafi activists. Mr Hague also defended controversial proposals for secrecy in civil courts in cases
involving intelligence material.[68]
In February 2013 Channel Four News reported on evidence of SIS spying on opponents of the Gaddafi
regime and handing the information to the regime in Libya. The files looked at contained "a memorandum
of understanding, dating from October 2002, detailing a two-day meeting in Libya between Gaddafi's
external intelligence agency and two senior heads of SIS and one from MI5 outlining joint plans for
"intelligence exchange, counter-terrorism and mutual co-operation".[84]

2015 onwards

In February 2015, The Daily Telegraph reported that MI6 contacted their counterparts in the South African
intelligence services to seek assistance in an effort to recruit a North Korean "asset" to spy on North
Korea's nuclear programme. MI6 had contacted the man who had inside information on North Korea's
nuclear programme, he considered the offer and wanted to arrange another meeting, but a year passed
without MI6 hearing from him, which prompted them to request South African assistance when they learnt
he would be travelling through South Africa. It is not known whether the North Korean man ever agreed to
work for MI6.[85]

In July 2020, it was revealed that intelligence officials from a number of repressive regimes received
training from senior officials of MI6 and MI5 in last two days. In 2019, an 11-day International Intelligence
Directors Course was attended by top intelligence officers from 26 countries, including Saudi Arabia, the
United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Oman, Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria, Afghanistan and others. A
British academic, Matthew Hedges questioned the UK's training programme for allowing officials of the
UAE, where he was detained on false charges and faced psychological torture.[86]

Cover name

MI6 is known sometimes to use Government Communications Bureau as a cover name, for example,
when sponsoring research.[87]

Personnel awards
MI6 personnel are recognised annually by King Charles III (formerly the Prince of Wales) at the Prince of
Wales's Intelligence Community Awards at St James's Palace or Clarence House alongside members of the
Security Service (MI5), and GCHQ.[88] Awards and citations are given to teams within the agencies as
well as individuals.[88]

Centenary and art exhibition

The year 2009 was the centenary of the Secret Intelligence Service.[89] An official history of the first forty
years was commissioned to mark the occasion and was published in 2010. To further mark the centenary,
the Secret Intelligence Service invited artist James Hart Dyke to become artist in residence.[89]

A year with MI6

A year with MI6 was a public art exhibition, showing a collection of paintings and drawings by artist James
Hart Dyke to mark the centenary of the British Secret Intelligence Service.[89] The project saw Hart Dyke
working closely with the SIS for a year, both in the United Kingdom and abroad.[90] The Service allowed
Hart Dyke access to enable him to undertake the project, sending him on hostile environment courses to
allow him to work in dangerous parts of the world, and admitting him into their Vauxhall Cross
headquarters. The sensitivity of SIS work required Hart Dyke to maintain secrecy, and his access was
carefully controlled.[89]
The works were exhibited publicly to promote understanding of the SIS's work, and why their operations
must be secret.[91][89] The exhibition ran from 15 to 26 February 2011 at the Mount Street Galleries,
Mayfair, London.[89] More than 40 original oil paintings and many sketches and studies were exhibited
after being screened for security; the content and meaning of some of the paintings was intentionally left
ambiguous.[89]

Notable people
Cambridge Five, a Cold War Soviet spy ring
Anthony Blunt (cryptonym: Johnson), MI5 officer and Soviet agent
Guy Burgess (cryptonym: Hicks), SIS officer and Soviet agent
John Cairncross (cryptonym: Liszt), SIS officer and Soviet agent
Donald Maclean (cryptonym: Homer), SIS officer and Soviet agent
Kim Philby (cryptonym: Stanley), SIS officer and Soviet agent
David Cornwell (known as John le Carré), author, former SIS officer
Andrew Fulton, chairman of the Scottish Conservative Party
Charles Cumming, author
Paul Dukes, SIS officer and author
Ian Fleming, author of James Bond novels, former NID officer
Graham Greene, author, former SIS officer
Bill Hudson, SIS agent
Ralph Izzard, journalist, author, former NID officer
Horst Kopkow, SS officer who worked for SIS after the Second World War
W. Somerset Maugham, playwright, novelist, short-story writer, SIS agent in Switzerland and
Russia before the October Revolution of 1917 in the Russian Empire
Daphne Park, clandestine senior controller, former head of station in Léopoldville.
Duško Popov, a Second World War double agent; he was the key for operations in Nazi
Germany and, as an MI6 agent, he was the inspiration for Ian Fleming's James Bond
William Stephenson, head of the British Security Co-ordination during WWII
Amy Elizabeth Thorpe, glamorous seductress who gathered information from diplomats
during World War II.
Richard Tomlinson, author, former SIS officer
Valentine Vivian, Vice-Chief of SIS and head of counter-espionage, Section V
Gareth Williams, seconded to SIS from GCHQ, died under suspicious circumstances.
Krystyna Skarbek, aka Christine Granville, agent in Poland and Eastern Europe; later
Special Operations Executive agent.
Aggie MacKenzie, TV presenter and journalist who spent two years working for MI6
Meta Ramsay, former SIS Head of Station, member of the House of Lords
Sidney Reilly, Ace of Spies, worked for SIS and others

Buildings

SIS headquarters
Since 1995, SIS headquarters has been at 85
Vauxhall Cross, along the Albert Embankment in
Vauxhall on the south bank of the River Thames
by Vauxhall Bridge, London. Previous
headquarters have been Century House, 100
Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth (1966–
1995),[92] 54 Broadway, off Victoria Street,
London (1924–1966)[92] and 2 Whitehall Court
(1911–1922).[92][93] Although SIS operated from
Broadway, it made considerable use of the
adjoining St. Ermin's Hotel.[94]

The new building was designed by Sir Terry The SIS Building at Vauxhall Cross, south London,
Farrell and built by John Laing. [95] The developer seen from Vauxhall Bridge
Regalian Properties approached the government in
1987 to see if they had any interest in the
proposed building. At the same time, the Security Service MI5 was seeking alternative accommodation and
co-location of the two services was studied. In the end, this proposal was abandoned due to the lack of
buildings of adequate size (existing or proposed) and the security considerations of providing a single target
for attacks. In December 1987, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's government approved the purchase of
the new building for the SIS.[96]

The building design was reviewed to incorporate the necessary protection for the UK's foreign intelligence-
gathering agency. This includes overall increased security, extensive computer suites, technical areas, bomb
blast protection, emergency back-up systems and protection against electronic eavesdropping. While the
details and cost of construction have been released, about ten years after the original National Audit Office
(NAO) report was written, some of the service's special requirements remain classified. The NAO report
Thames House and Vauxhall Cross has certain details omitted, describing in detail the cost and problems of
certain modifications, but not what these are.[96] Rob Humphrey's London: The Rough Guide suggests one
of these omitted modifications is a tunnel beneath the Thames to Whitehall. The NAO put the final cost at
£135.05 million for site purchase and the basic building, or £152.6 million including the service's special
requirements.[96]

The setting of the SIS Headquarters was featured in the James Bond films GoldenEye, The World Is Not
Enough, Die Another Day, Skyfall, and Spectre. SIS allowed filming of the building itself for the first time
in The World is Not Enough for the pre-credits sequence, where a bomb hidden in a briefcase full of money
is detonated inside the building, blowing out an exterior wall. A Daily Telegraph article said that the British
government opposed the filming, but this was denied by a Foreign Office spokesperson. In Skyfall the
building is once again attacked by an explosion, this time by a cyber attack turning on a gas line and
igniting the fumes the blast results in eight MI6 agents inside being killed, after the attack SIS operations are
moved to a secret underground facility.[97] In Spectre, the building has been abandoned and due for
demolition. The evil head of crime organisation SPECTRE, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, traps Agent 007 James
Bond alongside the film's Bond girl Madeleine Swann inside the ruins of the building. Blofeld then
detonated bombs planted in the building, demolishing what was left of the building fully, though Bond
managed to save Swann and escape before the building exploded and then collapsed.[98]
On the evening of 20 September 2000, the building was attacked using a Russian-built RPG-22 anti-tank
rocket launcher. Striking the eighth floor, the missile caused only superficial damage. The Metropolitan
Police Anti-Terrorist Branch attributed responsibility to the Real IRA.[99]

Other buildings

Most other buildings are held or nominally occupied by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office. They
include:

Hanslope Park: on the outskirts of Milton Keynes housing His Majesty's Government
Communications Centre, which supports the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development
Office and the British intelligence community.[100]
Fort Monckton in Gosport, Hampshire: a former fort dating from the 1780s, rebuilt in the
1880s, is now the field operations training centre for SIS.[101]
Special Forces Club: a private club in Knightsbridge catering exclusively to members, both
current and retired, of the intelligence services in Britain and abroad, along with the Special
Air Service (SAS).[102]

The Circus

MI6 is nicknamed The Circus. Some say this was coined by John le Carré (former SIS officer David
Cornwell) in his espionage novels and named after a fictional building on Cambridge Circus. (In le Carré's
universe, "The Circus", the highest command body of the agency, is a metonym for the agency itself.) Leo
Marks explains in his World War II memoir Between Silk and Cyanide that the name arose because a
section of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) was housed in a building at 1 Dorset Square, London,
which had formerly belonged to the directors of Bertram Mills circus.[103]

Chiefs
1909–1923: Sir Mansfield Smith-Cumming, KCMG CB
1923–1939: Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, KCB
1939–1952: Major General Sir Stewart Menzies, KCB KCMG DSO MC
1953–1956: Sir John Sinclair, KCMG CB OBE
1956–1968: Sir Richard White, KCMG KBE
1968–1973: Sir John Rennie, KCMG
1973–1978: Sir Maurice Oldfield, GCMG CBE
1979–1982: Sir Dick Franks, KCMG
1982–1985: Sir Colin Figures, KCMG OBE
1985–1989: Sir Christopher Curwen, KCMG
1989–1994: Sir Colin McColl, KCMG
1994–1999: Sir David Spedding, KCMG CVO OBE
1999–2004: Sir Richard Dearlove, KCMG OBE
2004–2009: Sir John Scarlett, KCMG OBE
2009–2014: Sir John Sawers, GCMG
2014–2020: Sir Alex Younger, KCMG
 2020–: Richard Moore, CMG

See also
British intelligence agencies
List of intelligence agencies
History of espionage
British Security Co-ordination, the WWII operation headed by William Stephenson in the
Americas, set up by MI6
Camp X, training facility in Canada for clandestine operators during WWII

Explanatory notes

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General bibliography
Aldrich, Richard J. (2006). The Hidden Hand: Britain, America and Cold War Secret
Intelligence, London, John Murray, ISBN 1-58567-274-2
Aldrich, Richard J. and Rory Cormac (2016). The Black Door: Spies, Secret Intelligence and
British Prime Ministers, London, Collins, ISBN 978-0-00755544-4
Atkin, Malcolm (2015). Fighting Nazi Occupation: British Resistance 1939–1945. Barnsley:
Pen and Sword. ISBN 978-1-47383-377-7.
Bethell, N. (1984). The Great Betrayal: the Untold Story of Kim Philby's Biggest Coup,
London, Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN 978-0-34035701-9.
Borovik, G. (1994). The Philby Files, London, Little and Brown. ISBN 978-0316102841.
Bower, Tom. (1995). The Perfect English Spy: Sir Dick White and the Secret War, 1939–90,
London, Heinemann, ISBN 978-0-74932332-5.
Bristow, Desmond with Bill Bristow (1993). A Game of Moles: the Deceptions of an MI6
Officer, London, Little, Brown, ISBN 978-031690335-6.
Cave Brown, A. (1987). "C": The Secret Life of Sir Stewart Graham Menzies, Spymaster to
Winston Churchill, Macmillan, ISBN 978-0-02049131-6.
Cavendish, A. (1990). Inside Intelligence, HarperCollins, ISBN 978-0-00215742-1.
Corera, G. (2013). The Art of Betrayal: The Secret History of MI6, Pegasus Books, ISBN 978-
1-45327159-9.
Cormac, Rory (2018). Disrupt and Deny: Spies, Special Forces and the Secret Pursuit of
British Foreign Policy, Oxford University Press.
Davies, Philip H. J. (2004). MI6 and the Machinery of Spying London: Frank Cass, ISBN 0-
7146-8363-9 (h/b).
Davies, Philip H. J. (2005). 'The Machinery of Spying Breaks Down' in Studies in
Intelligence, Summer 2005 Declassified Edition.
Deacon, Richard (1985). "C": A Biography of Sir Maurice Oldfield, Macdonald, ISBN 978-0-
35610400-3.
Dorril, Stephen (2001). MI6: Fifty Years of Special Operations, London: Fourth Estate,
ISBN 1-85702-701-9.
Hastings, Max (2015). The Secret War: Spies, Codes and Guerrillas 1939–1945. London:
William Collins. ISBN 978-0-00-750374-2.
Hayes, P. (2015). Queen of Spies: Daphne Park, Britain's Cold War Spy Master, Duckworth,
ISBN 978-0-71565043-1.
Hermiston, R. (2014). The Greatest Traitor: the Secret Lives of Agent George Blake, London,
Aurum, ISBN 978-1-78131046-5.
Humphrey, Rob (1999). London: The Rough Guide, Rough Guides, ISBN 1-85828-404-X.
Jeffery, Keith (2010). MI6: The History of the Secret Intelligence Service, 1909–1949.
London: Bloomsbury. ISBN 978-0-7475-9183-2.
Judd, Alan (1999). The quest for C : Sir Mansfield Cumming and the founding of the British
Secret Service. London: HarperCollins, ISBN 0-00-255901-3.
Quinlan, Kevin (2014). The Secret War Between the Wars: MI5 in the 1920s and the 1930s.
Bowyer. ISBN 978-1-84383-938-5..
Read, Anthony, and David Fisher (1984). Colonel Z: The Life and Times of a Master of Spies
(London: Hodder and Stoughton 1984).
Seeger, Kirsten Olstrup (2008). Friendly Fire (DK) ISBN 978-87-7799-193-6. A biography of
the author's father who was a member of the Danish resistance during the Second World
War.
Smith, Michael (2010). SIX: A History of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service Pt 1 Murder and
Mayhem 1909–1939, London: Dialogue, ISBN 978-1-906447-00-7.
Smiley, Colonel David (1994). Irregular Regular. Norwich: Editions Michael Russell. ISBN 0-
85955-202-0. An autobiography of a British officer, honorary colonel of the Royal Horse
Guards, David de Crespigny Smiley LVO, OBE, MC, who served in the Special Operations
Executive during World War II (Albania, Thailand) and was a MI6 officer after the war
(Poland, Malta, Oman, Yemen).
Tomlinson, Richard; Nick Fielding (2001). The Big Breach: From Top Secret to Maximum
Security. Mainstream Publishing. ISBN 1-903813-01-8.
Vilasi, Colonna A. (2013). The History of MI-6, Penguin Group Publishing, UK/USA Release.
Walton, Calder (2012). Empire of Secrets. London: Harperpress. ISBN 978-0-00745796-0.
West, Nigel (1988). The Friends: Britain's Post-war Secret Intelligence Operations, London,
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, ISBN 978-0-29779430-1.
West, Nigel (2006). At Her Majesty's Secret Service: The Chiefs of Britain's Intelligence
Agency, MI6. London, Greenhill. ISBN 978-1-85367702-1.
Winterbotham, F. W. (1974). The Ultra Secret. New York: Harper & Row. ISBN 978-0-06-
014678-8.
External links
Official website (https://www.sis.gov.uk/)
"Information about SIS" (https://web.archive.org/web/20070825075055/http://www.fco.gov.u
k/servlet/Front?pagename=OpenMarket%2FXcelerate%2FShowPage&c=Page&cid=10597
36061019). Archived from the original (http://www.fco.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pagename=Open
Market/Xcelerate/ShowPage&c=Page&cid=1059736061019) on 25 August 2007. from the
Foreign and Commonwealth Office's website
BBC interview with MI6 spy. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theoneshow/consumer/2008/09/2
3/exclusive-justin-at-spy-hq.html) BBC's The One show presenter interviews MI6 spy

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