Article in today's Wall Street Journal pages: MI5 for the US

[nodular]

MI5 is Britain's agency designed to spy inside Great Britain. James Bond, you'll remember, works for MI6---which is like our CIA.

In the US, the FBI handles the area MI5 covers in Great Britain.

This article is a bad idea, because it would increase the level of our own government spying on us and reduce accountability.

The article argues that the FBI cannot do the job. As evidence, it cites the complete inability of the FBI to digitize their data effectively.

The fact of the FBI's failure is true (I believe they have been trying unsuccessfully to create a computerized data system for 15 years---with the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars for essentially no result).

The fallacy of the article is that the problem in the FBI needs to be solved---for reasons of handling domestic crime as well as dealing with spies or terrorists inside the US. Creating a new agency will leave the FBI dysfunctional---which is unacceptable.

A number of problems have arisen in Great Britain due to the MI5. As you can imagine, it is very hard to get information on these problems.

But I have found a few pieces of relevant info.


"What the papers weren't allowed to say"

Guardian Unlimited, January 1, 2001

http://www.guardian.co.uk/freedom/Story/0,,416805,00.html

"...A classic example is the MI5 operation, now revealed for the first time, to infiltrate the trade unions active in the bruising dockers' strike of 1970. A stream of reports to the newly elected prime minister, Edward Heath, details private conversations and discussions about tactics. The reports were compiled using bugs, phone taps and the observation of agents inserted into the dockers' groups.

"Even today, sections of the report remain blacked-out, the official reason being that the material was "given in confidence" or that it infringes issues of "personal sensitivity".

"So even now we don't know how exactly our secret service agents, whom we employed (and may employ still), used our money to spy on our fellow citizens, or how far they went to influence events to the advantage of the government.

"It would be naive to suppose that any government, however liberal, would expose its intelligence services, or its own internal deliberations, to instant public and press scrutiny. But the obsession in British officialdom means that issues of genuine and deep public concern are dealt with in a way that shields politicians and appointees alike from any inspection; any fear of outcry..."


A more recent example from 2005:

"A Luddite's
view of
Information and
Communication
Technologies"

http://tash.gn.apc.org/info_ludd.pdf

The Nottingham Trent University

"I thought it particularly scary to discover that MI5 had been handing
surveillance information to the McDonalds Corporation during the
recent libel case!!! (16) Hardly a proper use for their activities."