Her story, which reveals what a country will do when it wants war and claims it does not, is told in an updated book and a major motion picture soon to be released--Official Secrets (Keira Knightly is Katharine). A translator for UK intelligence agency GCHQ, Gun read a brief from the US National Security Agency urging its British sister organisation to spy on members of the UN Security Council, to gain influence i n a vote At first, I heard nothing. The story of Katharine Gun, a whistle-blower who exposed NSA spying in the lead-up to the Iraq War, gets the Hollywood treatment. As a result of the story the paper published 10 years ago this weekend, she was arrested, lost her job and faced trial under the Official Secrets Act. One is reminded of the January 31, 2003 Oval Office meeting with George Bush, Tony Blair, and Condoleeza Rice, in which the topic of provoking Iraq to start a war was particularly revealing. Then the story went We had planned to demand that the Attorney General Lord Goldsmith disclose the advice he had given on the legality of the war and so put the war itself on trial. For several years, just recalling the events would set my heart racing and my hands trembling. The days and weeks dragged agonisingly by. The same countries demanded immediate answers from the British government about its involvement in the spying. Does anyone have any questions? We go to the canteen and we talk.. Later, it turned out that the Attorney General had indeed judged the war to be illegal in his initial advice, but that fact was not revealed until six years later in 2010. Throughout her own court case, whatonly a few knew wasthat she was also fighting for the right of her husband, who is from Turkey, to remain in the UK. What It Feels Liketo Survive a Chemical Attack. Though celebrated Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg would later call Guns actions the most important and courageous leak in history due to her efforts to save lives through preventing a war, she obviously didnt succeed in stopping the invasion. It left me in an impossible predicament. By printing off the memo, putting it in her handbag and taking it home, she was already committing a serious breach of the Official Secrets Act. She was charged Not only was the cable the most sensitive ever to be disclosed on either side of the Atlantic, it was also unique in its timing. the waning support for public institutions today. Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. To look at someone who I thought was quite accessible and ordinaryand she doesn't mind me saying this because Katharine is someone who keeps her head below and is quiet, and did something extraordinary. Katharine Gun, former intelligence specialist turned whistleblower, discusses the new film "Official Secrets" which details why she leaked a classified memo. Naturally, I was discreet. Enter Katharine Gun. Does your loyalty lie to your own conscious, does your loyalty lie to your marriage, does your loyalty lie to your government, does your loyalty lie to your country? But I do want to give her credit that I think I didn't do her justice enough in the moment that she leaked that memo; it changed so quickly to war that we don't really get a moment to absorb the fact that as a result of her leaking that memo, there was no vote at the UN Security Council. Instead, the American coalition was forced to stake its claim to a legal invasion on grounds of self defense, including now-infamously untrue claims about weapons of mass destruction. Not good enough, the trio decided. Powerful Commons committee could look at case for banning stoves in towns and Love Island hit by hundreds of Ofcom complaints from furious viewers over 'toxic femininity' row and Movie As easy as buying a loaf of bread: Undercover footage reveals how laughing gas is being sold from local Could Northern Ireland become the UK's Silicon Valley? And it was this book which eventually became the script for Official Secrets. But I know some folks because of films I made like Eye in the Sky, and before that I made a film called Rendition. I was suddenly free and bewildered. '", "The scene where all of us receive this email and we're discussing the memo, that never happened. And I think thats why you get this very honest, pure, deeply felt performance. ", As for her own story, she recognises that 10 years on it scarcely registers with the public. Not mine or The Observer's finest hour, has to be said. Had the film appeared any earlier, however, I dont think Id have been able to watch it, let alone help the makers. Chile and Mexico and the other smaller countries were so outraged that they refused to even bring it to a vote. WebKatharine Gun (ne Harwood), 47, is married to Yasar Gn, a Turkish Kurd, with whom she has a 13-year old daughter. They published the scoop in March 2003putting Gun directly in the crosshairs of law enforcement, and sparking a legal fight for her freedom. Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). That's the memo. It's a fascinating film that really evokes the dangers of speaking out in the post-9/11 age, as well as the press's inability to challenge the official story on Iraq, particularly the U.S. press, which really just blacked out the Gun leak entirely. Gun disclosed details of the spying operation as it was happening to stop something she viewed as terrible happening in the future. Then, the following Monday, I printed out a copy of the email, folded it up, and tucked it carefully in my bag. Today, I believe the Act serves as an illiberal, draconian piece of law, little more than a weapon of the state to deter any disclosure, no matter how much in the public interest it might be. A script has been doing the rounds in Hollywood for five years. Iraq All Over Again? The risks Gun took in revealing the UN email's existence were huge. The email was demonstrating the depths to which the American and British governments would descend in order to get spurious legal cover for a war in the Middle East which would have utterly catastrophic consequences, as we know to our cost today. None of the Government reports into the war acknowledged it, nor did the history books. I became a mother, we moved countries and I have come to terms with that year of my life, though it will always define me in some ways. This was her first or second week at the paper. Gabrielle Bruney is a writer and editor for Esquire, where she focuses on politics and culture. It was an interesting experience because you couldn't really go bending things the way you thought would be more dramatic, you just have to make the story itself and hope there was enough drama there. There's an obvious scene of the immigration deportation. Because it's just an Executive Branch trying to grab power as an authoritarian. But again, I cant help but make some small jokes about these things. So when, on the first Sunday of March, 2003, my leak appeared on the front page of The Observer newspaper, I was overcome with shock. I spent the following hours doubled over the toilet bowl in absolute terror. And I thought this is going to end in the worst civil war. ", Left: Dave Benett/Getty. Seven times I've submitted articles to you with an alternate point of view, and seven times you've turned me down. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. She could easily have been me or you at your place of work, where something comes across your desk and you go, This doesn't smell right. ", Keira Knightley and Katharine Gun at the London premiere of "Official Secrets. But when Gun's lawyers threaten to question the U.K. Attorney General Lord Goldsmith about Britain's involvement in the Iraq war, the government drops their case against Gun. I was called on to look this way and that and smile until my face was stiff. She had been following that war, as many of us had, for a year. These superheroes, and I don't just mean superheroes in the movie sense, but larger-than-life big political figures, or Edward Snowden is almost mythical in his brilliance whether you like what he did or not, he is sort of not me. EXCLUSIVE: Lanzarote sticks to its guns and insists it WILL limit tourists and move away from relying on Jeremy Clarkson is axed as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? She thought wow, they need a Mandarin translator at GCHQ. But the falsehoods and unnecessary wars of yesteryear likely have influenced the waning support for public institutions today. Would you risk your job? David Dayen: So why do you think this is an important story to tell now in 2019? But George W. Bush did something that, thankfully, Trump hasnt pulled off yet: He took us to war. But the Bush administration went to war anyway, using the pretext of weapons of mass destruction. "But the more I think about what happened, the more angry and frustrated I get about the fact that nobody acted on intelligence. Right now my priorities are to ensure I am there for my daughter.". "That really happened," Hood confirmed, though it did not go quite as it is shown in the film. Gun, her husband, and their four-year-old daughter shed their coveted privacy long enough to allow Katharine to be one of two former Sam Adams Award winners to present this year's award. Katharine Gun, a shy and studious 28-year-old who spent her days listening in to obscure Chinese intercepts, decided to tell the world about a secret plan by the US government to spy on the United Nations. David Dayen: Just the notion that the paper would say, we're for the war, that was their editorial position. I even thought, naively, Id be able to keep my anonymity. Questioner: It was so heartening to hear you talk about that hero's journey because I feel like we so often take compassion, passion, integrity for granted as a call to action. So, I guess we all have a threshold. Warning: The following contains spoilers for Official Secrets. Daniel Ellsberg, the celebrated American whistleblower who leaked the Pentagon Papers about the build-up to the war in Vietnam, described it as "the most important and courageous leak I have ever seen".He added: "No one else including myself has ever done what Katharine Gun did: tell secret truths at personal risk, before an imminent war, in time, possibly, to avert it.". Gavin Hood: Hes not in journalism. Surely, she thought, when people realised that the UK was being asked to collaborate in an operation to find out personal information that could be used to blackmail UN delegates, they would be outraged and the UK government would halt its slide into war. As one of the journalists who broke the story, I feel a certain responsibility for how things have turned out. Where do you draw the line? When my moment came, I found myself standing alone in the dock facing the judge and surrounded by lawyers, journalists and supporters. WebKatharine Gun was a young specialist working for Britains Government Communications Headquarters when she exposed a highly confidential memo that revealed the United [Gun was charged with violating the Official Secrets Act in Britain, but ultimately the case never went to trial.]. An insider with courage. The truth was that in April of 2002, the two world leaders secretly had agreed on a plan to take out Saddam, all the while giving speeches insisting that the only motivation for even considering war was that horrific stockpile of deadly weapons. But I talk to people and there does seem to be a sense of failure that, despite all the campaigning and all the marching and all the protesting and everything they did, it made not a ha'porth of difference. His work has appeared in The Intercept, The New Republic, HuffPost, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and more. Do you vote, do you analyze who you should vote for or do you just take it for granted? Some called her a traitor; others insisted she was a hero. And Assange is the same. "I never aligned myself specifically with the anti-war movement. You are sitting in the intelligence services, and Ive spoken to many now because Ive made other films in that world and I have some interesting folks that Ive been able to talk to, and the struggle was were being disloyal if you dont toe a party line, as it were, but we know this isnt right. Sixteen years ago, I became headline news after I leaked an internal email from GCHQ, the communications intelligence gathering centre near Cheltenham. Do you go vote? I was arrested for a breach of section one of the Official Secrets Act 1989 and held overnight in a cell in the basement of the Cheltenham Police headquarters. When my turn came, I entered a small side office, faced the security official and, putting on my best poker face, denied any involvement. David Dayen: How did you think Keira Knightley was an asset in showing that emotional journey throughout the movie? Director Gavin Hood Writers Sara Bernstein Gregory Bernstein Gavin Hood Stars Keira Knightley Matt Smith Matthew Goode Then, we all started watching the invasion and we werent how we got into the war. To legitimize an invasion and get rid of Saddam, a new UN Security Council resolution, going beyond SC1441 and specifically sanctioning the invasion, was the answer. Provocation? After the charges against her were dropped in 2004, she found it difficult to find a new We must not be flummoxed by exaggerated claims of threats against America and our interests. From nightmares to candy cravings, the seemingly innocuous habits in Man is banned from touching every parking meter in Liverpool for two years after being convicted of theft, Katharine Gun, Gchq Whistleblower For The Mail On Sunday, Do not sell or share my personal information. [Gun's husband Yasar, a Kurd, was nearly deported back to the Middle East at one point, even though he had nothing to do with the leak.]. But this specificinstance is the ugly truth of what goes on.". Id immediately be transported back to GCHQ and that email the anger I felt and the decisions I made. When do the clocks change in 2023? However, the Pentagon says the US deployment is "in response to indications of heightened Iranian readiness to conduct offensive operations against US forces and our interests.". He really wouldnt; that scene in the movie really happened. Before 1989, there had been a Public Interest Defence to protect whistleblowers, but that was altered amid the furore surrounding the sinking of the Argentinian Navy cruiser, the General Belgrano, in the course of the Falklands War. Photograph: Andy Hall for the Observer, en years ago, a young Mandarin specialist at GCHQ, the government's surveillance centre in Cheltenham, did something extraordinary. Exaggerating threats to provoke a war? WebIts the tale of whistleblower Katharine Gun, a former translator for the UKs Government Communications HQ, who leaked a top-secret memo in 2003 on the eve of a divisive US-led war. I was glad to get back to what I hoped would be normality, but the effect on me had been traumatising. Which really, really, really happened. Well, you don't have one and get that almost anti-climactic moment that is a punch in the gut," said Hood. According to the Guardian, Donald Trump also is saying he doesn't want war, which is probably true. Jeb Bush Just Botched the Iraq Question. Feel free to republish and share widely. As of 2020 Gun lives in Turkey and Britain. Cheering crowds have never been my sort of thing. Who, one must ask, is provoking whom? And I didnt have work where I was. Theres not a lot of work for translators; shes a Mandarin translator in England. Sometimes movies can be an effective way to make forgotten stories part of our national narrative, and in that sense, Official Secrets comes not a moment too soon. David Dayen: I want to go to the questions now. We all, in some ways, make these decisions. Ed, I know some people have said that Rhys Ifans [who plays Vulliamy] is slightly over the top. Unfortunately, perhaps, I have a conscience and my dishonesty gnawed at me persistently until the next day, when I confessed. If the email did reach the newspapers, I reasoned, there would be no more than a discreet summary. At some point, as you probably know, Bush and Rumsfeld decided to bypass the CIA and take out that Office of Special Plans. The issue is provocation. "There seems to be this blas attitude the spying goes on, everyone does it and so it's nothing to get all hot under the collar about. Who knows whether they would've bent those other nations to vote for a resolution. And just coming from my perspective, the press, because a lot of this is a story about the press, and how they handle it. Healthy mother-of-two, 32, collapsed and died from brain bleed while she led fitness bounce class. Before 1989, there had been a Public Interest Defence to protect whistleblowers, but that was altered amid the furore surrounding the sinking of the Argentinian Navy cruiser, the General Belgrano, in the course of the Falklands War. And it's also true that we were then attacked by the Drudge Report for what would now be called 'fake news. Who spoke to the homeland secretary? Thankfully, time passes and the intensity of feelings fades. Gavin Hood: Its a great question. Her late husband, Tom, a former special agent of the FBI and one-time head of counter-intelligence in New York, co-authored the Gun story. So she said, Can I just do nothing with my hair, put on the jeans like Katharine wore? So the wardrobe is accurate to Katharine's style. To me, it was a way of showing that Iraq cannot be dismissed as a horror show of suffering, but is an ancient and sophisticated culture that goes back thousands of years. Truth and accountability were drilled into me as a child. Iran, of course, isn't interested in dealing with him. Despite the risk of a harsher sentence, I decided to plead not guilty because I felt strongly that my actions had been intended to prevent the unnecessary loss of life in an illegal war. As a result, there never was any second UN resolution. This whole intelligence didn't match what the politicians were saying. I was 27 when it all began. So here we are in rehearsal, and we're talking one day about the look. Was it because we had demanded the Attorney Generals legal advice as part of my defence? Koza was in effect issuing a direct order to the employees of a UK security agency to gather "the whole gamut of information that could give US policymakers an edge in obtaining results favourable to US goals or to head off surprises". My job had been to listen to Chinese communications, translate them from Mandarin to English and produce reports for different government departments. Most whistleblowers leak after the event to expose perceived wrongdoing. Only now, more than a decade and a half later, is this disturbing sequence of events once again receiving the attention it deserves thanks to Official Secrets, a brilliant new movie starring Keira and former Doctor Who, Matt Smith. As it was, a second UN resolution directly to authorise war against Iraq never materialised and air strikes began on 19 March 2003. It was what I was thinking, what I was feeling. We were to target such things as phone calls and emails from their homes as well as their places of work. Yet I do think Keira perfectly captures the strain I was under, the isolation and fear. It almost started with, well, would I have the courage to do what she did in another setting maybe? So we're in this development meeting, and the executive looks at me and goes, Gavin, I mean we need her running down alleys more, someone needs to throw a brick through her damn window, and when does she don her cape? It was literally the line. So, to find that it would be dramatised on the big screen was as wonderfully welcome as it was astonishing. Perhaps a plane painted in UN colors could be shot down over Iraq. It is to say that a government, for its own reasons may, either by design or through miscalculation, lead a country into an unnecessary and brutal war. Theyre talking about diplomatic negotiations, and having all the cards on the table, but behind that what theyre doing is trying to bribe UN diplomatic members to vote for a war which has no legal justifications, Gun says. And I went back in 93 and did another two years with the new Department of Health. There it was spotted by Debs Paterson, director of the critically acclaimed Africa United, who met Katharine Gun last week with a view to making the film of her life. It sounds big with Katharine but that's what inspired me. It was written in technical language, but the meaning was clear enough: the Americans were asking around 100 people in GCHQ to gather information from the communications made by diplomats from six nations Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea and Pakistan all which were then sitting on the United Nations Security Council. US firms waiting in the wings read to pump 'billions Parents' fury as schools STILL won't tell them if they are closed tomorrow as teacher strikes continue. So, Im not really answering your question well, but her feeling was just: Now I dont belong in this company. The story went around the world and the leak electrified the international debate during the weeks of diplomatic deadlock. What did you think was going to happen? To this day, however, there has been barely a mention of the year I spent living under a cloud. We need a truth-sayer. We have a blondish-looking Katharine. Ive already lost a dear friend, and I cant do thisget called up two months of the year, every year, for the next 12 years. You may not know the name Katharine Gun unless you live in the United Kingdom, but she was a pivotal figure in the run-up to the Iraq War. They failed. So there is sometimes a thought in my head that says: What if Katharine hadn't leaked that memo? I don't think I've ever met a more determined character and she remained utterly convinced of the justice of her cause: "There's nothing subsequent to the invasion that makes me think it was the right decision made by Bush and Blair." The real-life Gun said: "The attempt at deportation kind of spiked my stress level again for another period of my life." Me, you, not some big picture. But Katharine only ever leaked this one memo. I sensed a slight flash of anger as she said: "It's not even a footnote in the history of Iraq." Iran has been filmed loading missiles aboard some of its vessels. The comments below have been moderated in advance. The work shed signed up to do was covered by British law, and would be something to do with whatever that was necessary to keep British lives safe. The memo, however represented the actual twisting of diplomatic arms in order to secure a war which [was] based on lies., But it also represented an opportunity to show the world the tactics American and British officials were willing to employ in their push for an invasion. I've seen that happen. We even got as far as the Old Bailey. Perhaps it was no wonder that Tony Blairs government decided to abandon the case without offering any evidence. And then there is the Gulf of Tonkin incident that led America deeply into war against North Vietnam. Not the truth, but the war. A thorough investigation began as soon as the staff started arriving at GCHQ on the Monday morning. So, that's where we had to go for WMD. My shock turned to anger as the significance sank in. Sorry to digress. Katharine Gun, a British former government employee, faced two years imprisonment in England for the crime of telling the truth. She said, You mean I dont have to wear a corset? To your point, in some way, she said to me, As a woman, its kind of ironic as an actress that I so often, even though Im in the modern world, that I have to find heroic women in period dramas wearing corsets. Theres something weird about that. Following the incident, Gun struggled to find work that she Then, the following November, after eight months of worry, I was finally charged. Martin Bright, who is in the movie very briefly I guess, is no longer in journalism as I understand it. As opposed to trying to be Katharine Gun. "You get to the end, and there's this court case. The other kind of fight could be frightening and politically risky. Keira said no one knows Katharine, and that's not an insult to Katharine. David Dayen is the Prospects executive editor. Is this a matter of threatening to launch a war, or is it a matter of responding to the US positioning itself for war? Abandoned blue sleeping bag, tents and several wooden shelters are found in woodland close to where police Don't just stick to the Malbec! As a film of her story is planned, she tells of her anger and frustration but not her regrets, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning, Katharine Gun back in Cheltenham last week: 'This is the ugly truth of what goes on.' Gun said that the UK government still had some explaining to do: "I thinkthere need to be more questions asked about whether they responded to that request, why they felt it was within their scope of work to respond to that sort of request, and what is the manner of the relationship between UK politics and US politics. That means that, in theory, the war could still be classified as an illegal war, Gun says. This is not to say that Iran does not have a trick up its sleeve, or that wild-eyed Iranian hawks aren't circling its leaders. We need another Katharine Gun. Quality journalism. Even though she didn't stop the war and some people are like what's the point if she didn't stop the warwell, the point is how do you sleep at night? I actually think the little memo lands on our lap more often than we think, even if it's just who I should vote for. Now there is the possibility that Gun's singular life will be made into a movie. The central issues of whistle-blower protection, public interest disclosures, journalistic freedom and the accountability of our elected representatives continue to be just as relevant today. And I did the same for the journalists and the lawyers and everybody. The email, which was sent by an American NSA official, suggested that the US was just as well aware that it couldnt earn UN support through valid arguments alone: The memo outlined a plan to bug diplomats from non-permanent UN Security Council Nations Chile, Pakistan, Bulgaria, Guinea, Angola, and Cameroon in search of intelligence that could be used to cajole and possibly even blackmail them into supporting the invasion. You might say I am biased. Was the British government aware of it? David Dayen: And you were dealing with a story that was about a leak that didn't stop a war and leading to a trial that didn't happen. And I know whose throat it really sticks in, is [British journalist] Ed Vulliamy, who I adore. We started working on this three years ago and even then it felt relevant in the sense that the challenges we talked about earlier: Where does my loyalty lie? This is a special case because this story is very little-known in the United States. Some called her a traitor; others Happy and carefree, Id recently married my handsome husband and was working at GCHQ as a linguist. However, Gun added that this was nothing on the anxiety she felt when the memo she had leaked ended up on the front page of The Observer, which she called "the most stressful memo of my life. The only thing that we altered in that is that I didnt have time to tell it for as long as it went on. Everyone involved assumed the project had run into the dust, but then it appeared on the Black List, a Hollywood website for unmade film scripts, which has featured Slumdog Millionaire and The King's Speech in the past. One is kind of what I thought it was, which is the CIA is the Central Intelligence Agency, walled off from politicians and the executive in a perfect world, where all the intelligence comes in, they analyze it and they then present their best intelligence estimates; this is pre-war, youre not at war, to the executive branch. WebKatharine Gun wasn't looking for attention or any type of notoriety when in 2003, while working as a British intelligence specialist, she leaked a top secret memo. Thank you! The case and the resulting anxiety never seemed far away. So right there, you are pulling out the highlights," said Hood of the key issue with making Official Secrets. And we keep that system alive. As the working day came to close, I tried to project a sense of calm I didnt feel, walked out of the gates and put the incriminating email in the post. For all the relief, there was a weird sense of anti-climax that we would now be unable to give our side of the story to the public. But, did it change the way I approached it? Gun had, of course, been forced to abandon her career in the civil service It was only later in the green room that I asked what all the fuss had been about, wondering aloud if it had been the environmental protest group Extinction Rebellion. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. She said to me, Gavin, I had no problem doing the work that involved a lot of listening in, in order to give information about trade negotiations, to give our country the advantage of trade negotiations when they go. And I went, Oh, that's how much that superhero myth is in our system. We didn't end up making it with that studio. Surely, after 16 years, we are entitled to have answers. WebKatharine Guns husbands photo revelations are not made by her yet. For the Observer too, it was a story full of risks. David Dayen: One thing I think you depict really brilliantly in this story is what the climate was like at the time. You dont have to agree with what she did, Im just telling you what she did. Marcia Mitchell is a writer, researcher, and the author of "The Spy Who Tried to Stop a War: Katharine Gun and the Secret Plot to Sanction the Iraq Invasion." A transcript, lightly edited with explainers where necessary, follows. 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