It was in 1972 when the seemingly ordinary Craig Williamson registered at Wits University and joined the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS). Williamson was elected NUSAS’s vice president and in January 1977, when his career in student politics came to an abrupt end, he fled the country and from Europe continued his anti-apartheid ‘work’. But Williamson was not the activist his friends and comrades thought he was. In January 1980, Captain Williamson was unmasked as a South African spy.

Williamson returned to South Africa and during the turbulent 1980s worked for the foreign section of the South African Police’s notorious Security Branch and South Africa’s ‘super-spy’ transformed into a parcel-bomb assassin.

Through a series of interviews with the many people Williamson interacted with while he was undercover and after his secret identity was eventually exposed, Jonathan Ancer details Williamson’s double life, the stories of a generation of courageous activists, and the book eventually culminates with Ancer interviewing South Africa’s ‘super-spy’ face-to-face. It deals with crucial issues of justice, reconciliation, forgiveness, betrayal and the consequences of apartheid that South Africans are still grappling with.

In the world of espionage, truth is the first victim and nothing is as it seems. Here, for the first time, South Africa’s most notorious apartheid spy, Olivia Forsyth, lays bare the story of her remarkable life. With remarkable courage and brutal honesty she attempts to set the record straight.

Olivia Forsyth was a romantic young woman in search of adventure when she joined the Security Police with visions of international derring-do. But Craig Williamson, her unit head, had other ideas. Olivia was trained to spy on students before being dispatched to Rhodes University, a supposed ‘hotbed’ of anti-apartheid radicalism. It wasn’t long before Olivia had infiltrated various student organisations, feeding vital information back to her handler.

She came to hold prominent positions on campus and, as reward, was promoted to Lieutenant. Having reached the end of her studies, Olivia set her sights on a much more ambitious – and dangerous – target: the ANC in exile. But what should have been her greatest triumph as a spy turned into disaster when the ANC threw her into Quatro, the notorious internment camp in Angola. This is a riveting story set in the final years of apartheid.

A series of gruesome killings take place in Dubai, Ghana and America. The victims are all connected with the SAS. In Hereford Danny Black realises they have something more specific in common - they were all involved in training a young Muslim soldier, Ibrahim Khan. Khan has been working under cover in Islamic State in a mission organised by MI6. Danny Black sets out to track him down with the help of Khan's MI6 handler on a trail that leads him to a library of ancient manuscripts in Damascus, the Syrian desert and finally back in the Brecon Beacons. There Danny discovers that he has finally met his match, his deadliest enemy - and it is the last person he ever expected.

In die vroee 1990’s is Suid-Afrika op ’n mespunt. Nelson Mandela is vry, maar ’n vreedsame politieke oorgang lyk byna onmoontlik.Te midde van dreigende geweld kom die NP-regering teen die ANC te staan by Kodesa. As hoof van die Nasionale Intelligensiediens (NI) is Niel Barnard sentraal tot die onstuimige proses. Hy onthul ook hoe vertrouensbande tussen die ANC en NI gesmee is tydens geheime ontmoetings in Europese hotelkamers, en skryf oor sy wedervaringe in Moskou saam met die Russiese KGB.

'One of the biggest intelligence coups in recent years' The Times For years KGB operative Vasili Mitrokhin risked his life hiding top-secret material from Russian secret service archives beneath his family dacha. When he was exfiltrated to the West he took with him what the FBI called 'the most complete and extensive intelligence ever received from any source'. This extraordinary bestselling book is the result. 'Co-authored in a brilliant partnership by Christopher Andrew and the renegade Soviet archivist himself ... This is a truly global expose of major KGB penetrations throughout the Western world' The Times 'This tale of malevolent spymasters, intricate tradecraft and cold-eyed betrayal reads like a cold war novel' Time 'Sensational ... the most informed and detailed study of Soviet subversive intrigues worldwide' Spectator 'The most comprehensive addition to the subject ever published' Sunday Telegraph

Much has been written about espionage, secret agents and MI6 missions abroad - but what of the origins of British Intelligence as we know it today? This is the story of intelligence at the height of the British Empire and the characters that shaped its narrative. William Beaver delves into the mysterious Intelligence Division of the War Office, whose shrewd observations and analysis of international events provided the basis for modern military espionage and changed the landscape of the British Empire from India to South Africa. Focusing on the years between the Crimean War and the formation of MI5 and MI6 at the start of the twentieth century, Beaver charts the Intelligence Division's course from a misunderstood army unit to an elite body central to the British military. Under Every Leaf is a rollicking adventure into the minds behind the muscle of the British Army - their successes, sacrifices and expertise in weaving a global net of information.

How did German intelligence agents in the First World War use dead fish to pass on vital information to their operatives? What did an advertisement for a dog in The Times have to do with the movement of British troops into Egypt? And why did British personnel become suspicious about the trousers hanging on a Belgian woman's washing line? During the First World War, spymasters and their networks of secret agents developed many ingenious - and occasionally hilarious - methods of communication. Puffs of smoke from a chimney, stacks of bread in a bakery window, even knitted woollen jumpers were all used to convey secret messages decipherable only by well-trained eyes. Melanie King retells the astonishing story of these and many other tricks of the espionage trade, now long forgotten, through the memoirs of eight spies. Among them are British intelligence officers working undercover in France and Germany, including a former officer from the Metropolitan Police who once hunted Jack the Ripper. There is also the German Secret Service officer, codenamed Agricola, who spied on the Eastern Front, an American newspaperman and an Austrian agent who disguised himself as everything from a Jewish pedlar to a Russian officer. Drawing on the words of many of the spies themselves, Secrets in a Dead Fish is a fascinating compendium of clever and original ruses that casts new light into the murky world of espionage during the First World War.

Since 1947, domestic and foreign assassinations have been executed under the CIA-led covert action operations team. Before that time, responsibility for taking out America's enemies abroad was even more shrouded in mystery. Despite Hollywood notions of last-minute rogue-operations and external secret hires, covert action is actually a cog in a colossal foreign policy machine, moving through, among others, the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the House and Senate Select Committees. At the end of the day, it is the President, not the CIA, who is singularly in charge. When diplomacy fails and overt military action is not feasible, the President often calls on the Special Activities Division, the most secretive and lowest-profile branch of the CIA. It is this paramilitary team that undertakes dramatic and little-known assignments: hostage rescues, sabotage, and, of course, assassinations. For the first time, Pulitzer Prize finalist and New York Times bestselling author Annie Jacobsen takes us deep inside this top-secret history. With unparalleled access to former operatives, ambassadors, and even past directors of the Secret Service and CIA operations, Jacobsen reveals the inner workings of these teams, and just how far a U.S. president may go, covertly but lawfully, to pursue the nation's interests.

The untold story of the Christian missionaries who played a crucial role in the allied victory in World War II What makes a good missionary makes a good spy. Or so thought "Wild" Bill Donovan when he launched a secret new program under the Office of Strategic Services. His recruits, in turn, believed an American victory would help them protect their foreign ministries and expand the kingdom of God. In Double Crossed, historian Matthew Avery Sutton tells the extraordinary story of the entwined roles of spycraft and faith in World War II. Sutton shows how missionaries, though acutely aware of the conflict between their faith and their role as secret agents, nonetheless played an outsize part in the war, carrying out bombings and assassinations. After securing victory, those who survived helped establish the CIA, ensuring that religion continued to influence American foreign policy. Gripping and authoritative, Double Crossed is a remarkable account of the spiritual stakes of World War II.

Detailed look at the intelligence work carried out by the allies before D-Day could take place Full of previously unseen recently de-classified material Foreword by General Sir Gordon Messenger, KCB, DSO, OBE, ADC Vice Chief of Defence Staff

Bletchley Park was where one of the war's most famous - and crucial - achievements was made: the cracking of Germany's "Enigma" code in which its most important military communications were couched. This country house in the Buckinghamshire countryside was home to Britain's most brilliant mathematical brains, like Alan Turing, and the scene of immense advances in technology - indeed, the birth of modern computing. The military codes deciphered there were instrumental in turning both the Battle of the Atlantic and the war in North Africa. But, though plenty has been written about the boffins, and the codebreaking, fictional and non-fiction - from Robert Harris and Ian McEwan to Andrew Hodges' biography of Turing - what of the thousands of men and women who lived and worked there during the war? What was life like for them - an odd, secret territory between the civilian and the military? Sinclair McKay's book is the first history for the general reader of life at Bletchley Park, and an amazing compendium of memories from people now in their eighties - of skating on the frozen lake in the grounds (a depressed Angus Wilson, the novelist, once threw himself in) - of a youthful Roy Jenkins, useless at codebreaking, of the high jinks at nearby accommodation hostels - and of the implacable secrecy that meant girlfriend and boyfriend working in adjacent huts knew nothing about each other's work.

For more than four years, Martin McGartland lived a double-life. To the IRA, he was a trusted intelligence officer and an integral member of an active-service unit. To the British Government, however, he was known only as 'Agent Carol'. McGartland is credited by British Intelligence with having saved the lives of at least fifty people. Working within the ruthless network of the IRA, every time he tipped off the authorities, he saved a life, but with each success came a higher risk of detection. He continued to pass on life-saving information until, one day, his cover was blown. . .

A RICHARD AND JUDY BOOK CLUB SELECTION One April morning in 1943, a sardine fisherman spotted the corpse of a British soldier floating in the sea off the coast of Spain and set in train a course of events that would change the course of the Second World War. Operation Mincemeat was the most successful wartime deception ever attempted, and certainly the strangest. It hoodwinked the Nazi espionage chiefs, sent German troops hurtling in the wrong direction, and saved thousands of lives by deploying a secret agent who was different, in one crucial respect, from any spy before or since: he was dead. His mission: to convince the Germans that instead of attacking Sicily, the Allied armies planned to invade Greece. The brainchild of an eccentric RAF officer and a brilliant Jewish barrister, the great hoax involved an extraordinary cast of characters including a famous forensic pathologist, a gold-prospector, an inventor, a beautiful secret service secretary, a submarine captain, three novelists, a transvestite English spymaster, an irascible admiral who loved fly-fishing, and a dead Welsh tramp. Using fraud, imagination and seduction, Churchill's team of spies spun a web of deceit so elaborate and so convincing that they began to believe it themselves. The deception started in a windowless basement beneath Whitehall. It travelled from London to Scotland to Spain to Germany. And it ended up on Hitler's desk. Ben Macintyre, bestselling author of Agent Zigzag, weaves together private documents, photographs, memories, letters and diaries, as well as newly released material from the intelligence files of MI5 and Naval Intelligence, to tell for the first time the full story of Operation Mincemeat.

Operation Fortitude was the ingenious web of deception spun by the Allies to mislead the Nazis as to how and where the D-Day landings were to be mounted. 'One of the most creative intelligence operations of all time' - Kim Philby The story of how this web was woven is one of intrigue, personal drama, ground-breaking techniques, internal resistance, and good fortune. It is a tale of double agents, black radio broadcasts, phantom armies, 'Ultra' decrypts, and dummy parachute drops. These diverse tactics were intended to come together to create a single narrative so compelling that it would convince Adolf Hitler of its authenticity. Operation Fortitude was intended to create the false impression that the Normandy landings were merely a feint to disguise a massive forthcoming invasion by this American force in the Pas de Calais. In other words, the success of D-Day - the beginning of the end of the Second World War - was made possible by the efforts of men and women who were not present on the Normandy beaches. Men such as Juan Pujol, a Spanish double-agent (code-name GARBO) who sent hundreds of wireless messages from London to Madrid in the build-up to D-Day relaying supposed intelligence from his fictitious spy network. This allowed the enemy to conclude that the number of Allied divisions preparing to invade was twice the actual number. Men such as R.V Jones, the head of British Scientific Intelligence, who masterminded the dropping of tinfoil confetti from the bomb-bay doors of Lancaster bombers, creating a false impression that a flotilla of Allied ships was heading in the opposite direction to the genuine invasion fleet. Using first hand sources from a wide range of archives, government documents, letters and memos Operation Fortitude builds a picture of what wartime Britain was like, as well as the immense pressure these men and women were working under and insure D-Day succeeded.

In this biography of Edward Lansdale (1908-1987), the man said to be the model for Greene's The Quiet American, Max Boot demonstrates how Lansdale pioneered a 'hearts and minds' diplomacy, first in the Philippines, then in Vietnam. It was a visionary policy that, as Boot reveals, was ultimately crushed by America's giant military bureaucracy, steered by elitist generals who favoured napalm bombs over winning the trust of the people. Through dozens of interviews and access to never-before-seen documents, Boot recasts this cautionary American story, tracing the bold rise and the crashing fall of Lansdale from the battle of Dien Bien Phu to the humiliating American evaculation in 1975. Boot rescues Lansdale from historical ignominy and suggests that Vietnam could have been different had we only listened. With reverberations that continue to resonate, this is a biography of profound historical consequence.

Through dramatic incidents tells for the first time the full story of the development of Cold War naval intelligence from the end of WWII to the breakup the Soviet Union in 1991, from both sides, East and West. Unlike other accounts, which focus on submarine confrontations and accidents, the authors cover all types of naval intelligence, human collection (racing with the Soviets to capture Nazi subs, successful and losing spies and defectors), signal intelligence (surface, air, satellite and navy commando teams in balaclavas launched by speed boats from subs), acoustic (passive underwater arrays and tapping phone lines), and the aerial and space reconnaissance. The authors give details of operations in all these areas, some of which were witnessed first hand.

""A new light is shed on the spy ships incidents of the 1960s and on submarine intrusions in Swedish waters. Excerpts of the Soviet Navy instructions on UFOs and accounts of Soviet naval encounters with unexplained objects are also published for the first time outside of Russia; and much more.""

In the winter of 1875, a young British officer set out across central Asia on an unofficial mission to investigate the latest Russian moves in the Great Game. His goal was the mysterious Central Asian city of Khiva, closed to all European travellers by the Russians following their seizure of it two years earlier. His aim was to discover whether this remote and dangerous oasis could be used as a springboard for an invasion of India. An immediate bestseller when first published in 1877, Burnaby s delight in a life of risk and adventure still burns through the pages, as does his spontaneous affection for the Cossack troopers and Tartar, Khirgiz and Turkoman tribesmen that he encounters on his way.

Security intelligence continues to be of central importance to the contemporary world: individuals, organizations and states all seek timely and actionable intelligence in order to increase their sense of security. But what exactly is intelligence? Who seeks to develop it and to what ends? How can we ensure that intelligence is not abused? In this third edition of their classic text, Peter Gill and Mark Phythian set out a comprehensive framework for the study of intelligence, discussing how states organize the collection and analysis of information in order to produce intelligence, how it is acted upon, why it may fail and how the process should be governed in order to uphold democratic rights. Fully revised and updated throughout, the book covers recent developments, including the impact of the Snowden leaks on the role of intelligence agencies in Internet and social media surveillance and in defensive and offensive cyber operations, and the legal and political arrangements for democratic control. The role of intelligence as part of 'hybrid' warfare in the case of Russia and Ukraine is also explored, and the problems facing intelligence in the realm of counterterrorism is considered in the context of the recent wave of attacks in Western Europe. Intelligence in an Insecure World is an authoritative and accessible guide to a rapidly expanding area of inquiry - one that everyone has an interest in understanding.

The Second World War had been won, but relationships between the Western allies and the Soviet Union were becoming increasingly strained, as the nuclear arms race made world peace precarious. It was vital that Britain knew the Soviets' intentions and military capabilities, both offensive and defensive. As a Military Attache in Sofia, and Commandant of an Intelligence Centre in the Balkans, it was SIS officer Colonel John Sanderson's job to find out. Sanderson handled agents who operated secretly behind the Iron Curtain at the height of the Cold War and organised hidden arms depots for stay-behind agents in case of a Red Army invasion. Based on Sanderson's letters and personal accounts of his time with MI4 and MI6, we learn how he was sent to observe sessions of the Paris UNO Security Council in 1948 and to recruit emigres for infiltration behind the Iron Curtain, into Communist Bulgaria. Fluent in French and Bulgarian, in 1949 Captain Sanderson was posted to Sofia as a Press Attache with diplomatic immunity, reporting on the Communist show trials. Colonel Sanderson returned there twelve years later as the Military, Naval and Air Attache. In 1961, having been tasked by London with photographing the latest MIG fighter, he was driven at night to Sofia airport's perimeter by a CIA colleague. Closely followed by the Bulgarian secret police, he parachute-rolled, unobserved, out of the car with his camera. Arrested at daylight, he escaped to the border and drove across Europe, still pursued by the ruthless Bulgarian Security Services. John Sanderson's early service life was equally challenging, from helping defend Britain's coastline in 1940, picking up shot-down pilots around Dover on a motorbike during the Battle of Britain, to fighting the Japanese in the Burmese and Indian jungles, before returning to London to join the Secret Intelligence Services. In parallel with Sanderson's SIS career, living with Russian emigres in Paris, posted to SIS headquarters in the Berlin Olympic stadium, and later working together in the Intelligence Division of NATO headquarters Paris during the Cuban Missile Crisis, was his SIS friend RAF Squadron Leader John Aldwinckle, a veteran of SOE wartime operations in Halifax bombers. All Aldwinckle's agents were betrayed by the traitor George Blake, as were all Sanderson's by Kim Philby. In John Sanderson's biography we get the detailed inside story of the Berlin Air Lift, the Suez Invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the fall of the Berlin Wall. We see the results of Philby and Blake's treachery and the effects which the courageous actions of the two 'Olegs', the Russian Colonels Penkovsky and Gordievsky, had on the international politics of Khrushchev, Kennedy, Gorbachev, Thatcher and Reagan - and the consequences their decisions had for the course of world history. For over thirty years, John Sanderson worked for the British Secret Services - with his last mission, aged 74, as exciting as his first, being helicoptered into Sarajevo with an SAS team at the height of the Balkan War.

This is a true account of secret operations carried out by the British Army's most clandestine unit- the Force Research Unit. Through the author's own experiences, the story of an essential instrument in the fight against terrorism, that of covert intelligence gathering, is told.

In 2013, Edward Snowden revealed that the NSA and its partners had been engaging in warrantless mass surveillance, using the internet and cellphone data, and driven by fear of terrorism under the sign of 'security'. In this compelling account, surveillance expert David Lyon guides the reader through Snowden's ongoing disclosures: the technological shifts involved, the steady rise of invisible monitoring of innocent citizens, the collusion of government agencies and for-profit companies and the implications for how we conceive of privacy in a democratic society infused by the lure of big data. Lyon discusses the distinct global reactions to Snowden and shows why some basic issues must be faced: how we frame surveillance, and the place of the human in a digital world. Surveillance after Snowden is crucial reading for anyone interested in politics, technology and society.

PRAISE FOR PREVIOUS EDITIONS:

"Excellent for answering quick reference questions on the nations of the world." "-American Reference "Books Annual"A valuable, easy-to-use worldwide information source." "-World Affairs Council Booknotes""Excellent . . . a wealth of unclassified data is provided. . . . An indispensable reference for those involved in global political, military, diplomatic, or economic affairs." "-Sea Power""The World Factbook," produced annually by the CIA, has become the ultimate, authoritative source of information on all the nations of the world. It provides current data for more than 250 countries and territories, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. Potomac Books publishes a commercial version of "The World Factbook" in order to extend the limited audience reached by the CIA's own publication. This current Potomac Books edition is identified by the year 2008, following the pattern used in our other annual publications. The CIA completes its volume late each year, and Potomac Books republishes it the following year.Topics addressed include the political climate, natural resources, environment, population, ethnic groups, GDP, agriculture, industries, defense expenditures, literacy rate, religion, legal system, and much more. Key data are grouped under the headings of geography, people, government, economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues. "The World Factbook" also contains maps of each country and of key territories. In addition, readers will find handy appendixes on international organizations and groups, international environmental agreements, and a cross-referenced list of geographic names. "The World Factbook" provides theindispensable reference for curious individuals concerned about a rapidly changing world.

When the Royal Canadian Air Force wouldn't accept him as a pilot in the summer of 1939, Keith `Skeets' Ogilvie walked across the street in Ottawa and joined the Royal Air Force. A week later he was on a boat to England and a future he could not have imagined. Some unusual luck won him a transfer as a Spitfire pilot to No. 609 (White Rose) Squadron, just as the Battle of Britain was being joined. Over the next months he firmly established his credentials with six confirmed victories and two probables, along with several enemy aircraft damaged. Shot down over France the following July, he was fortunate to be treated for grievous injuries by top German surgeons. Skeets' home for the balance of the war was Stalag Luft III prison camp. He was the second last man out of the `Great Escape' tunnel but was recaptured three days later. For reasons he never understood, Skeets was one of 23 escapees who were spared from being murdered by the Gestapo. 50 of his fellows were not so lucky. In London on a night off from flying duties, Skeets had been introduced to a fellow Canadian expatriate, Irene Lockwood. While he was testing the limits of his luck, his future wife was experiencing her own adventures in London, living through the daily stress of the Luftwaffe bombing campaign and working with MI12, and later as a wartime photographer with the RCAF. You Never Know Your Luck is the story of two modest people who found themselves in extraordinary circumstances, and who rose to the occasion like so many of their contemporaries. Skeets' and Irene's own words and memories are the foundations on which the experience of wartime unfolds. A unique perspective from individuals who never failed to wonder at their own fortune.

Surprise... your target. Kill... your enemy. Vanish... without a trace. From Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen, the untold story of the CIA's secret paramilitary units. When diplomacy fails, and war is unwise, the president calls on the CIA's Special Activities Division, a highly-classified branch of the CIA and the most effective, black operations force in the world. Originally known as the president's guerrilla warfare corps, SAD conducts risky and ruthless operations that have evolved over time to defend America from its enemies. Almost every American president since World War II has asked the CIA to conduct sabotage, subversion and, yes, assassination. With unprecedented access to forty-two men and women who proudly and secretly worked on CIA covert operations from the dawn of the Cold War to the present day, along with declassified documents and deep historical research, Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen unveils-like never before-a complex world of individuals working in treacherous environments populated with killers, connivers and saboteurs. Despite Hollywood notions of off-book operations and external secret hires, covert action is actually one piece in a colossal foreign policy machine. Written with the pacing of a thriller, SURPRISE, KILL, VANISH brings to vivid life the sheer pandemonium and chaos, as well as the unforgettable human will to survive and the intellectual challenge of not giving up hope that define paramilitary and intelligence work. Jacobsen's exclusive interviews-with members of the CIA's Senior Intelligence Service (equivalent to the Pentagon's generals), its counterterrorism chiefs, targeting officers, and Special Activities Division's Ground Branch operators who conduct today's close-quarters killing operations around the world-reveal, for the first time, the enormity of this shocking, controversial and morally complex terrain. Is the CIA's paramilitary army America's weaponized strength, or a liability to its principled standing in the world? Every operation reported in this book, however unsettling, is legal.