in his well, his fingers who's in the sort of public consciousness, but actually one once i've, i certainly, i find, i'd forgotten an enormous amount about it. michael, there's so many new elements to it, especially any brand sewell and former art critic of a london paper, new entity, blunt. so you have the queen's, a hanger of pictures as it were, but i mean, we had andrew lonnie on about his book on fill be in his as reachable recently. and you eco, his view and other views. this is a huge class dimension to this. he was protected, defacto, protected as a soviet agent did the highest echelons of britain's intelligence services because of his class. well, that's right. yes. of course, they didn't know he was a, he was a russians by bed, but everybody assumed that he was a nice chap and his father had been, was well established in cambridge. and he'd known lots of people at cambridge a song. and it was assumed he was a nice guy and he was very likable, very polite, very kind or quite charismatic. i think very charismatic. yes,

women loved him. certainly. i mean, he was, for somebody said he had an order of sexual suggestiveness about him when he walked into a room. and just to remind us about why he turned to communism, i think many people will have seen books if they know about philby, about him being a traitor. and it's full of vitriol against the people that died because he was a spy for the soviet. i don't think i've ever read in a british book about philby. he had a social conscience load. his parents, boss, close friends, being corrupted out of them by money, had seen other social democratic left vacillated, shrank for failure to confront fascism and the moderation of principles of his youth with the selling out just as the labor party had done, the ramsey mcdonnell left i do know some people i say the kissed armor left austerity of yeah, yeah, there was, there was britain when through a most of europe went through a terrible time in the late twenty's early thirty's. and he was horrified that the

labor party, which was the convention regarded by then as the conventional way of opposing capitalism, if you like. and he was horrified that in the labor party sold out in effect, he went into a national coalition, a government of national unity, as it was called. and he thought that the left had sold out, and soon afterwards he went to to austria. ah, he then later went to spain and he was just very fond up and he thought, democratic so for democracy doesn't, doesn't do the job. and he saw that the rise of hitler in germany and of course must illini and franklin's initially and franco in spain. and he did see the soviet union as, as a bulwark against coming against against fascism and that whole block later life. he visited cuba when he deal with defected by that. well, yes he indeed indeed, but i think he, he, he was an idealist. he was an ideological zealot. ah,

and he had no, you know, he just thought democratic politics is not gonna is not going to stand up for the working class, but no less ideological. then the people that say, theoretically, were his best friends, although he was changing on them as it were, who were involved in the coo against monster, there can iran who were involved in all sorts of intelligence activities to destroy parties in the global south. yeah, he was, well, he was on the other side. i think i think the other thing that the cannot should not be forgotten about him was he did have an extraordinary capacity for deceit. he was brave. he was a brilliant liar. now it seems to me there's no reason why people who have that talent, if you regard as a talent, why they should be excluded from having higher aspirations for society. and so if you can still be an idea, idealist and be a liar. i mean, i, you know,

i don't know, journalist. yeah. well, i mean, arguably you, one of britain's top experts on the excesses of all the god go and journalism in this country. and it's very depressing for any journalist to read the capture of journalism at the time in the fifty's and sixty's, later on to sixty's by the intelligent services in by the united states intelligence as and the british ones tell me about the how he ends up in the observer in the economist in beirut. well i, that's your tongue. the capture. i'm not sure i'd use that term. i think the woman that he marries for the last time, the ex husband sam brewer. you don't miss him who works for the new york papers? yes. i mean, sam brewer was sambro, had worked in the war for the 4 runner of the cia, and also been a journalist. and when he left the paper he was with then and joined the new york times. new york times said you've got to cut all your links with the security

services, and he said yet here, sure, i'll do that. but i didn't think anybody believes he did. i and journalist will, will tell you the world over intelligence. people talk to journalists and vice versa . and they, there's a sort of symbiotic relationship, whether it's quite capture, i'm not sure i'd agree, easy observed david aster was happy with all his journalists in effect rather than speaking truth to power or whatever the free as they were. they were, i think he was said all griffith, i'm not an expert. i'm not an expert. and david, as to i, my sense is that he was a bit naive. it was pretty naive actually. and there was a genuine sense that philby had been done wrong. that he'd been, he'd had a raw deal. he'd been accused of being a russian spy and the government in the end, the british government, in 1955, had cleared him. and his friends said, well, we told you, we told you not to russians by. we've got to look out to this guy is

a good guy. he's straight forward and so on. we've got to find him a job. so they, as you say, they found him a job with the observer and economist and they sent him off to beirut. i mean, while since you were at the evening standard, i have to ask this because christopher steele, the discredited m. i. 6 agent, interviewed recently with great fanfare, saying, boris johnson made the son of the owner of the standard. now he doesn't understand that actually the russian, any limit, if he made him appear in the house of lords. if now, boys johnson, equally from that class is a russian spy. i mean, you said, and were you around spies of the evening standard, the london noted. i was a world i was, i was told jack the cartoonist, i don't remember him, but jack was said to be on a list of assets. now, this is a very murky area and as i say, a lot of journalists talked to talk to see intelligent people and they exchange information. and they're useful to tell her where the money changes hands,

which is seems to me crossing a line, i'm not sure. so i don't know, but on boris. yes, you could, i'm sure you could paint one could come up with a great scenario about boris. his father, who is said it has been reported to be, have been in my 6 and boys, went to wheaton and therefore probably could put $2.00 and $2.00 together. this sounds like a conversation at the st. george barn bay root will actually describe this place nice amount in the hello. hello. of course, it's sadly in the news because of what's happening in lebanon right now. but what happens in evidence happens everywhere in the middle. i mean the effects, the middle east, and therefore the whole world. okay. yeah, yeah, this and george's was, was the place. i mean, barret was a, was the new kero in away. a lot of people were moving away from kara, this is intelligence people, journalist businesses. and so, because they were a bit nervous about about nasa and they thought lebanon was a safer place to bring up, bring up children, and so on. so, and it was of a,

a st still a very happy place. it seems, at least if you were had a bit of money and were you was a u. s. proxy american government, yet as me was, it was, and i the, the st. george's, the bar of the san george's hotel was the place where the diplomat spies, journalist would all meet in the evening, or sometimes indeed in the morning and spend all day there. and it was the place where you were, you know, if you wanted to know what was going on, you got plugged into the saint george's. and you would be sure to meet some senior member of the government or some senior spy or whatever. and that was the place to be sent, at least that was better than press releases. i mean, the amount of alcohol that flows through this book, the 10 o'clock you tell us what the 10 o'clock club is it? yeah, i was, i was the, the 2 chairman of that were sam pope brewer, who, whose wife ended up marrying philby and a friend of his, who was

a senior cia man. and they would arrive at 10 o'clock for pick up their post. but the newspapers under their arm and go sit at the bar and just chat and you know, have the 1st martini of the day at 10 am. and they would discuss what that what the new york times might begin to. right and the following day. and sam brewer became rather over reliant on that on his, on his official sources. and, and which is, which is a sad thing actually in later life. yeah, i mean, i think we're all familiar with journalists who become over reliant on, on intelligent sources. well, over here there's a big scandal. integrity initiative, the institute of state crime, they listed journalists that were people that were favored to leak to that. that document itself leaked out. i was told, i didn't know whether you were now on it when i get no information or no one tells me no from oh, but i,

b m c. i are incredibly annoyed by all of this. quite rightly that they're giving a story. they're giving information to it. why is it that the americans didn't? i mean, you mentioned one theory that they were going to kill him. the americans went very well and the, soon as they found out he was a spy. gee. and then you go into a long explanation of different theories as to whether the intelligence service is here, basically rescued him in a way and got him out to moscow because they didn't want to public trial here that would embarrass intelligence services in front of the world. i don't believe they went to more to, to be route to in order to encourage him to go to moscow. i think, i think they still believed even when they were pretty certain that effective. they were certain that he missed by the russians. they still believed that they could turn turn in. this is one of the secrets when one of the key fact it seems to me

about phoebe that everybody underestimated the strength of his ideological commitment. including from, as i said, the russians. but the british still believes that good old came underneath it, all was one of us. and that if they confronted him with his what they regarded as his youthful folly of his, his anti fascism and so on. and they said, look, we can do a deal, we'll come back to us, tell us who else was involved. we can clean the whole thing up. and once they had the confession and they did have a sort of confession, i know this is not comfortable news for some people, but they did have a form of confession from him. and once they had that with some fake information in that, oh, which certainly was a fake information and quite what he was doing is not clear, but he was at the very least playing for time. but they say that the british

believed it seems to me the british believe that once they had that confession, they thought okay, came back with us. he will tell us he can stay in beirut and so on. and he will tell us what's been going on. and that is why nicholas elliott felt comfortable in, disappearing back to london. and i think better off to africa where his next job was to seem surprising, the dick quite around way. 5 for the building next door to the studio would think of to decades with so much information and secret stuff was being leaked, say the k g b in that summer. that suddenly turn one new element or because he didn't, i was, he's to me because he didn't want to. he didn't want to go. i think he, he did miss britain when he, when he got, when he got to moscow he was. and this is, this is a very murky area and i can't tell you for sure. he was madly in love with eleanor because nobody really knows what was going on. a field is mine, but it seems to me he was very, very fond developer. he was having a,

an okay time in beirut. he was drinking off a lot, but this is, life is usually what she did on the american. it almost, we'll need to fact that that's right. that's right. but i think, i think ultimately he didn't particularly want to go to moscow, but he ended up, he ended up doing so for reasons i go into in the book, james, i'll stop you there. more on the cold was most famous british by after this break. ah, hello german by drink shaped man center senators with there's sinks. we dared to ask

in a ah, you are too. there was bands your eyes and your posture that it would stop you from having real friends and finding a girlfriend. but what they fail to mention is that you can make thousands of dollars every weekend by simply playing video games. a stacy been a couple of them because i always wanted to push them. wesley bits of this is a lot of them to profit as it was originally. it was pretty much what it breaks up is normal sooner course to make video games a high paying job. you have to be gifted and quick with it. i'm going to offer with respect to the installation and fitness to live near bottom in this santa with

webpage bentley up amongst the booth, but even started yet, glove voice. when you mo stormy mothers, do it out. oh, you mean? yeah. was it mules fuel guy? uh, the owner, without that vehicle it will still be stuck with these odd to do. i also need a welcome back. i'm still here with james having author of he'll be in beirut. the one problem here is that they're not releasing papers. nicholas elliott, his best friend of the intelligence services, were to memoir the intelligence services. he was in 2021. they can't publish it. why? well, i'm one spy. experts said to me, am i 6 never reveals anything because it's bad for business. it's just, it sets a bad precedent if you release anything, then you are undermining the face in off potentials when they do selectively

stuff gets to journalists and so on. there is a bit of that. yeah, no, i agree. i agree. i didn't quite know, i didn't quite know why they went release, specifically why they weren't released nicholas elliott's version. equally. i'm not certain that nicholas elliot knew the full story. i think, i think, as i say in the book, i think antony blunt had a major role that a lot of people did not want to get on to this because i was, i wasn't aware of that at all. no, this is one of britain's most famous say, art critics hanger at the the queen's pictures friend of the queen for long. yeah, i'm related in fact to the queen, mother and he has to do distance. i mean there's so much in the book, john kerry comes out terribly wanting to kill phil b. but tell me about blunt why? yes, he in beirut, around the same normally be in london in the center london of the quarter all dec. exactitude for art. exactly. it seems to me and i'm,

there's a degree of speculation in this, i confess. but i, i think i proved that anthony brown was in bare route for 3 or 4 weeks before phil . b was interviewed by elliott and i think antony blunt, her became aware that philby was going to be confronted. now blunt had lost his faith in communism. i spoke to your remote in in moscow about 2018 years ago. and he talked about how blunted just lost his faith in communism, and he'd never really been committed. he was a marxist in a kind of our aesthetic sense. but he was, he'd really joined up because of his friend god, burgess, and blunts faith in the soviet union. had gone and i think when blunt heard that philby was going to be confronted that but he felt

a out of loyalty to philby and b to save his own neck because he, he was worried what philby might tell them. blunt felt he had to go to beirut himself and tell list and tell philby that he was going to be confronted. now blunt, isn't blunt. well exactly. peter said, well, of course, why did he not just bring the soviet embassy in london or ring ring a contact in london? because i think blunt wanted phil be wanted to give phil be the choice himself as to what he did. and blunt was fearful that if he enrolled the russians, phil bes future might be taken out of his hands, that the russians might to say, right? you're coming with us. so he wanted philby to have the opportunity of being forewarned himself and making a decision for himself rather than or rather than it being

it being decided for him by the russian. why is it that no, i mean you joke about town or eat jokes, will be jokes about saying when confronted about being a spy thing across i am initially and actually given the yemen, we been giving yemen quite a bit, the world's worst humanitarian crisis. a when the $962.00 marks is river revolution out there in south human. it's obvious to his friends. i wouldn't be obvious people's, i mean, i think you mentioned how he, in polite conversation towards the end of his life is musing on the spanish civil war on austerity, on the poor analogy. people around him just thought, well, caring man for yes. no, that's right. and and her one of his a for a former foreign correspondent, guy from the telegraph. a couple of nights before he'll be disappeared in beirut. he said that guy really cares his. he is very motivated by by, but by humanitarian concerns. i think that's right. and he's not,

he's not well regarded in britain for obvious reasons, and he deceived a lot of people and he cheated. and you can call it a conceit whatever. but i think i think he is owed at least a some sort of understanding of his motivation of well to them. i think it's a gun. exactly. i i yeah. so right now we have a ice was arguable right wing labor leader. we have austerity. are the effects of the 28 crisis, arguably rising inequality of labor and tory governments who have was disastrous was the canister one of his. he was mainly what do you think she'll be would think of her the current situation. ah, my wonder indicates, i wonder yes. i mean, there are, there are lots of, i mean there are lots of middle shells i can use at a middle class colbin. i'm still around and still feeling we need something more

more extreme, whether philby would ah, i don't know. what can we delete it? well that, i mean, that's the question. i think, i mean his is arnold deutsche. he who recruited him in the thirty's, he said you could achieve so much more. he go on the cover. now i don't think you can argue with that. i think he, i mean he did a lot of damage to the west and so on. so by that judgment deutsche was right, whether philby would do do the same thing again. i don't know. i think he ate cost him a lot. i think in terms of personal friendships, i mean he can say he was asking for it, but all that drinking and stuff, he was not, he was not happy, nobody can pretend he was happy. he may have felt inspired by a higher cause and so on. but he was, nobody can pretend he was. he was a happy bunny. and while over here older, the fifty's and sixty's, we would have anyone reading british newspapers would have seen how evil the soviet

union was. from his perspective, the seeing british imperialism dying of his he had, i mean to was the enemy. rudy was the, the echoes of the nasa to his crisis and still very important. yes. i mean, i think that me, i think we both he and blunt from what i've read a blunts thinking on this. but they both felt certainly philby will be in 1933 or so before said war is coming with hitler. there war is coming. you know, and i think he felt he could see the future and i'm not being facetious. i think he felt history was on his side and, and this was, this is part of the whole, the whole analysis of colonialism and so on was, i think he would feel completely vindicated by that. and everything, you know, in the and eden and so on. and it's, i mean, it was, it was a mess. what happened? why was he not impressed by washington? he was the most senior intelligence person from m, i 6 in washington as well as previously heading the anti russia. and the soviet

union department was being as of its way here in london. i think he was a, i think a, she was a bit of a snob. and i came across some notes which, which nobody's seen before from patrick seals. but from when patrick seal, who wrote a biography, philby and somebody was very close to philby, had spoken to seal, and it talked about how unhappy he was in washington. he, he affected to be enjoying it. and so, but he, he really didn't like it. and i think he, i think he just felt the him, i just felt the americans were bit vulgar. i think. i mean i knew i knew patrick seal. you say he was an intelligence with the i don't say that i didn't say was his father. i don't think his father was a it was easily famous for the biographer acids. father of a received patrick seal. the late late patrick's. yes. but t m g think today there's still lingering there. echoes of that in the corridors of

langley in virginia. the ca, that can quite trust the british there. they're intelligent services. he had class still matters. i don't know. i suspect less than i suspect less than formerly than done was the case. i think, i mean, the americans were looking around the world in the 10 years after the war and realizing that maybe they needed to get more involved, that isolationism was, was not doing them any favors. and they were looking at the way the british in the french had been running things and thought this isn't great idea, but recently we had the afghanistan withdrawal. and according to, if we believe the press here, i mean, i don't know how close they are to the intelligence services. the government here were taking on the hope about the all afghanistan withdrawal. yeah. thought it wasn't going to happen. and the americans being which withholding information in case it leaks out from her. and it tells us that maybe the case if your stuff

they'll be wearing stuff leaks out. and if it leaks out, then they can ask her. the journalists will ask questions and washington and embarrass the americans of sure, i can believe that. i mean, that's a basic need to know i need to know arrangement among, among spooks and i. yeah, the special relationship is always, always been fairly rocky. i. i think it's difficult to, to generalize that. that's the one thing i would say, i think personal relationships are very important. and in some cases they would override the kind of big picture. but certainly in the case of afghanistan, it does, you know, all the mood music suggests that british were very much taken on the hall and, and this book, i hope it's doing well. but even in the you describe when phil b is trying to write a stuff and serialization in british newspapers how close the intelligence services are to newspaper proprietor saying don't touch this and that eleanor. the,

the final wife tries to publish things and the reviews are uniformly poor. yeah. without any element of the complex context, not even just on the political level on the psychological level. i mean, i don't know where that is. the reaction to this book as well. the need to always go his evil stop thinking about the complexities of the case of came philby. yeah, i mean that's something i mean i, i've said to somebody the other day, most people's reaction to read off. hitler is not anger. it's. it's you want to understand and it seems to me, philby is entitled to that as well. but where is an awful lot of people in britain just want to kick filbert? they just did. and i think he did some terrible things. but i think in this, whatever it is 40 is after he died that 303233. as of today he is entitled at least

to some kind of understanding. now, you know, i don't, i don't see myself as an apologise for him at all. but i, you know, i think he think he's owed that james, having thank you. that's ever the show will be back on wednesday. 59 years to the month that soviet double agents are under the blunder. queen elizabeth the 2nd ot advisor, visited beverage, allegedly, to arrange, she'll be escaped to moscow until then. get in touch with us. why social media let us know if you think the media in the intelligence services are still in bed with each other. ah, well the fund i make no ship, you know board is just like to tease and you as a merge, we don't have a charity. we don't have a back seen, whole world needs to take action and to be ready. people are judgment.

common crisis with we can do better, we should be better. everyone is contributing each in their own way, but we also know that this crisis will not go on forever. the challenge is great for the response, has been massive, so many good people are helping us. it makes us feel very proud that we're in it together with legacy media continued to prepare a western audiences for a military conflict and ukraine. another war of choice. also, the united states doesn't export much these days, maybe except for so called values, or those values attractive anymore. the postal service delivers a $155000000000.00 pieces of mail every year. approximately 40 percent of the

world's mail right now the us postal service is in the fight of its life history. that is really bad financial shape now facing default, the postal service as a cash cow. and there was a way to pull money out of the postal service to put into a federal budget. there was a mandate that you're bringing $100000.00, new revenue every month. the nature of privatization in the us postal service is very much hidden from public view. it's privatization from the inside out. that's a big business in money. it's not about the public and given them the service that they deserve. it's not about quality train warfare. it's about with

live at 5 from moscow headlines this hour on a crawl, new coverage, straight from south africa, presents a high risk globally. the w h chose saying, as it spreads around the world with nations, no counseling, flight leaving, keeping the fully vaccinated in isolation. shoplifting and vandalism. as the festive season begins, flash malden smash and grab robberies for us. authorities to the test a new in a leaked new document suggest germany tried to pressure the us not to impose sanctions against the nod stream to new gas pipeline. as berlin's envoy to ukraine says that gas line to europe won't start operations for another 6 months.