Happy and carefree, Id recently married my handsome husband and was working at GCHQ as a linguist. By design. 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. In a year that the U.S. president is accused of pressuring foreign governments for political gain, the story behind the film Official Secrets seems particularly timely. I grew up in South Africa in the seventies and eighties, when apartheid was really tightening and tightening and tightening. After the initial flurry of media interest, I was left to figure out how to move on with my life and that proved hard. Webdeport Guns husband, Yasar (Adam Bakri), a Muslim Kurdish Turk who was awaiting permanent leave to remain in the U.K. The poor woman is based on a real person. "On the one hand, she's free. Instead, the American coalition was "Still no regrets," she said. Although the story made headlines around the world at the time of the leak and later at the time of her trial, which collapsed after the prosecution withdrew its evidence, it remains largely missing from the official narratives of the build-up to the Iraq war. Im gratified, too, that the film shows the love and support my husband gave me throughout this ordeal. WebWe speak with a British whistleblower whose attempts to expose lies about the Iraq invasion was called "the most important and courageous leak" in history by acclaimed So important was this email, I knew it might even derail the case that Tony Blair was making for joining the Americans in an invasion. As of 2020 Gun lives in Turkey and Britain. And the reason? Only later did I appreciate the extent to which the journalists involved Martin Bright, Peter Beaumont and Ed Vulliamy had to go in order to prove that the email was legitimate. Again. And if, 16 years ago, you had told me that one day my life story would be portrayed by Keira Knightley, Id have laughed and changed the subject. I dont know if theyd have discovered me eventually, but the fact is I couldnt live a lie for ever. Just occasionally What appealed to me in the end is that Katharine is in fact, far more like us. Some of those same birds are still flapping wings in the skies above Washington. Her husband said its a job, its just a goddamn job, I work at a caf. Yet I do think Keira perfectly captures the strain I was under, the isolation and fear. Perhaps they knew it would come out in the courtroom that the entire conflict was based on lies about Saddams weapons of mass destruction and that key UN officials could have been blackmailed. 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. But, did it change the way I approached it? Ed, I know some people have said that Rhys Ifans [who plays Vulliamy] is slightly over the top. So I said goodbye to my mom and moved to America. But depicting that climate, people who were not aware or active at that timedidn't realize how difficult this was to talk against the war both from the journalist's perspective and obviously someone who's in the intelligence community. The story of Katharine Gun, a whistle-blower who exposed NSA spying in the lead-up to the Iraq War, gets the Hollywood treatment. And it was there that, to our amazement and totally without warning, the CPS dropped the charges before the trial had even started. Seven times I've submitted articles to you with an alternate point of view, and seven times you've turned me down. 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? By Katharine Gun, Gchq Whistleblower For The Mail On Sunday, Published: 22:33 GMT, 26 October 2019 | Updated: 16:47 GMT, 8 November 2019. Does anyone have any questions? Liberty, the civil rights organisation, and Ben Emmerson QC had already agreed to defend me and we prepared for trial. "I never aligned myself specifically with the anti-war movement. The editorial position should never be that. We typically, in the movie business, ever since Joseph Campbell wrote The Hero of A Thousand Facesand Im not meaning to be sarcastic because thats a great piece of work, but it spoiled the idea that every development executive is reading these books because the hero we meet and then something upsets their world and the antagonist that must equal the hero, and eventually we go through these loops and the hero triumphs in the end. My job had been to listen to Chinese communications, translate them from Mandarin to English and produce reports for different government departments. If if wasnt, what does that mean for the rule of law? Now someone else may beI don't know if I could hack people's phones and computers, personally. The real-life Gun said: "The attempt at deportation kind of spiked my stress level again for another period of my life." As the Trump administration shreds norms of American governance like a Shih Tzu going to town on a roll of toilet paper, the last worst president is largely silent, busied with .css-umdwtv{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-decoration-thickness:.0625rem;text-decoration-color:#FF3A30;text-underline-offset:0.25rem;color:inherit;-webkit-transition:background 0.4s;transition:background 0.4s;background:linear-gradient(#ffffff, #ffffff 50%, #d5dbe3 50%, #d5dbe3);-webkit-background-size:100% 200%;background-size:100% 200%;}.css-umdwtv:hover{color:#000000;text-decoration-color:border-link-body-hover;-webkit-background-position:100% 100%;background-position:100% 100%;}canine portraiture and now the subject of nearly fond nostalgia. 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. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. I was only a junior analyst, but I knew the email was outrageous: the American government was asking Britain to spy on United Nations diplomats so they could be blackmailed into supporting an invasion of Iraq. 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. Thankfully, time passes and the intensity of feelings fades. 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. A manufactured provocation. But she still was not uncomfortable with the other things we've talked about. If I was writing this as fiction, I need a much longer court case, right? The decision to leak it was almost instant I felt I had no choice. The increasing presence of US Navy ships and a B-52 bomber task force in their neighborhood might provoke the Iranians to load up their missiles. She wasnt planning to get caught and then the dilemma was, My friends are all going to have their lives ruined.. 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. Feel free to republish and share widely. 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. Whatever, she blew the whistle ultimately revealing the truth behind the build-up to the Iraq War--regime change, disguised as terrifying threats of weapons of mass destruction. There's an obvious scene of the immigration deportation. Gun sacrificed so much when she decided to leak and has worked only intermittently since. Problem number two: Do you shut up or do you speak up? When you support The American Prospect, youre supporting fellow readers who arent able to give, and countering the class system for information. Whistleblower and former employee of Britain's global surveillance center GCHQ (Government Communications Head Quarters) Katharine Gun smiles as she speaks to the media during a press conference February 25, 2004 in London, England. In the runup to the critical vote on war in Iraq, Katharine Gun exposed a US plot to spy on the UN. If the email did reach the newspapers, I reasoned, there would be no more than a discreet summary. The comments below have been moderated in advance. 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. David Dayen: But he is not a headline journalist at a newspaper. The same countries demanded immediate answers from the British government about its involvement in the spying. Who, one must ask, is provoking whom? She failed. What we have in this country is very precious, and in a sense, when I make these kind of films I don't know if I consciously do it, it's actually reminding about us that authoritarianism and governments gone awry are not okay, and what makes us strongoh, that sounds terribly pretentious, but I think you see where I'm coming from. Throughout her own court case, what only a few knew was that she was also fighting for The spin in this country and in the UK was the threat of deadly weapons ready to be deployed by Saddam. As I walked down the red carpet, I had never in my life experienced the flash of so many cameras. Gun was visiting friends and family in Cheltenham when I talked to her, with the strain obvious on her face but still looking much younger than her 38 years. 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.' David Dayen: Just the notion that the paper would say, we're for the war, that was their editorial position. WebKatharine Gun, as passionately embodied here by Knightley, skews too noble to be particularly interesting, and the film is weakest when its focused on her and her husband Questioner: The only thing that I've wondered while watching the film, since it's a true story, is how could Ms. Gunn, who was a spy, who was a member of an intelligence agency, be surprised when her husband got deportedor when the government came after her husband, how could she be surprised when all of the different reactions she got came forward? What resonates to me is the somewhat more, I hope, timeless thing. Americans find it hard to believe that it could happen, but it happens, it happens fast. I was glad to get back to what I hoped would be normality, but the effect on me had been traumatising. Now there is the possibility that Gun's singular life will be made into a movie. Gavin Hood: Hes not in journalism. "Financially it's the toughest," she said. We need a truth-sayer. The risks Gun took in revealing the UN email's existence were huge. "Because I think people see thatthe leaders of both the US and the UK conceivably could be considered war criminals, and yet they are walking free.". Quality journalism. Every product was carefully curated by an Esquire editor. President Bush visits the National Security Agency in Fort Meade, Maryland, January 25, 2006. First, I contacted someone to this day Ive never named them who had the details of a journalist and anti-war activist. She hoped that if people know about the lengths to which theyve gone to legitimize an invasion of Iraq, then it would blow apart, and people will suddenly think, No, this isnt right, and the whole house of cards would come tumbling down.. Guided by her conscience, Katharine Gun defied her government and leaked the memo to the press, setting off a chain of events that jeopardized her freedom, her safety, but also opened the door to putting the entire Iraq invasion on trial. 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. Cheering crowds have never been my sort of thing. David Dayen: One thing I think you depict really brilliantly in this story is what the climate was like at the time. WebHer 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. I didnt know the story and I googled her. Look at what happened to Reality Winner in this country. Did that change your approach to presenting the film knowing that this was actually going to be somewhat of a surprise to people? ", Left: Dave Benett/Getty. Times have often been tough, not least because of the itinerant life she has chosen for herself. In leaking it to the Observer, she was also doing something unprecedented in the history of espionage. 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 When I got to the interview thats when they told me that its for GCHQ, I didnt know what GCHQ did. So, I think she entered the world out of a sort of strange curiosity. Please, become a member, or make a one-time donation, today. And I thought: this is good. I answered an advert in The Guardian newspaper for a translator. Much to the distress of our former partners in the Iran nuclear deal, Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the agreement and announced tougher sanctions. I don't know that consciously it did, it's just that I didn't know the story and so, for me, it was I asked Katharine, I flew to London, I met her for five days. She thought wow, they need a Mandarin translator at GCHQ. She now has a four-year-old daughter who she is bringing up in Turkey. Never mind that invading another country for the purpose of regime change is illegal according to international laws to which the United States is a signatory. He said she didnt even know what the job was. It turned out a copyeditor at The Observer had run the memo through spellcheck before printing it.]. In the years following, an author called Marcia Mitchell contacted me and said she was keen to write a book about my case. "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. David Dayen: I want to go to the questions now. Now, Trump says, he wants to see Iran back at the negotiating table. Donald Trump also is saying he doesn't want war, which is probably true. Truth and accountability were drilled into me as a child. Perhaps a plane painted in UN colors could be shot down over Iraq. 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. [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.]. That would be awkward. If Keira Knightleys remarkable performance in Official Secrets can help change that, the film will truly have been worthwhile. He was actually gone for three days. And maybe if we went to work for Enron and we liked our job well enough, and its a job. 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. Is this a matter of threatening to launch a war, or is it a matter of responding to the US positioning itself for war? That's really the simplest question: When do you speak up? He really wouldnt; that scene in the movie really happened. A script has been doing the rounds in Hollywood for five years. Ive been impressed by the film-makers determination to stick to the facts Gavin Hood, the director, interviewed me at length over five days and I was consulted throughout the process. So, she began to feel uncomfortable in the work she was doing at that point. Keira calmly said: Oh, that was probably me. I still blush to the tips of my toes when I think about it. So she went along to this interview, and she was 28. America, Britain, and Spain withdrew their proposed resolution on invading Iraq when it became clear that it would not garner the necessary Security Council votes, in part because of the information Gun brought to light. The decision to leak it was almost instant I felt I had no choice. Katharine Gun and Martin Bright could be forgiven for fielding Hollywoods overtures with a degree of skepticism. Public attention is the last thing you expect if, like me, youd settled for a job in the shadowy world of British intelligence. On the other hand, she and Ben, to this day, feel they never got their day in court. The more we find out that in fact the million-person march was a real cause of worry for Downing Street and for Blair personally, it makes you think we were so close and yet so far.". We need another Katharine Gun. She talks about having read all these books [about the war]. They're more polite to their suspects. Ten years ago, a young Mandarin specialist at GCHQ, the government's surveillance centre in Cheltenham, did something extraordinary. We go to the canteen and we talk.. And I didnt have work where I was. Theres not a lot of work for translators; shes a Mandarin translator in England. I could put a lens on, and now my job is, this actress is doing great work, lets not get tricky, lets just get the audience into her eyes so that you could see those cogs moving. It sounds big with Katharine but that's what inspired me. To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page. Taking Vitamin D each day could cut your chances of getting dementia, study claims. WebKatharine Guns husbands photo revelations are not made by her yet. Provocation? He said: "Very close. So here we are in rehearsal, and we're talking one day about the look. Ms Gun worked as a translator at the GCHQ building in Cheltenham, pictured. 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. "Obviously, we are compressing a story that took place in real life over a period of a year into two hours. Which really, really, really happened. She said, I worry what's going to happen, they'll go, Ooh, I don't know if I like Keira Knightly in blonde hair, what's she done to her nose, does she have glasses on? Because they don't have a comparison to make, until you see her at the end of the movie. WebThe Katharine Gun Case. 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. "That really happened," Hood confirmed, though it did not go quite as it is shown in the film. But the Bush administration went to war anyway, using the pretext of weapons of mass destruction. Most whistleblowers leak after the event to expose perceived wrongdoing. WebYou 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. The difficulties of translating Gun's story also made writing the climax of the film tricky. If it was, who cleared it to be passed to GCHQ? Then, the world is safer until the sequel when it all happens again. .css-gk9meg{display:block;font-family:Lausanne,Arial,sans-serif;font-weight:normal;margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0;padding-top:0.25rem;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}@media (any-hover: hover){.css-gk9meg:hover{color:link-hover;}}@media(max-width: 48rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.15;margin-bottom:0.25rem;}}@media(min-width: 40.625rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1rem;line-height:1.2;margin-bottom:0.625rem;}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.2;}}@media(min-width: 73.75rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.2;}}Facts You Didn't Know About That '70s Show, The Cast of 'The Mandalorian' in Real Life, The Hilarious Reason Why Chris Pine Cut His Hair, 'The Mandalorian' Season 3, Episode 1 Recap, Chris Pine Tells All About Harry Styles SpitGate, 15 Books Chris Pine Thinks Everyone Should Read, Your Guide to Every One of Justin Biebers Tattoos, Movie Sequels That Are Better Than the Original. 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. This is a special case because this story is very little-known in the United States. When I was a young law student, we studied the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Spoilers to follow as well. 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. It remains entirely to the credit of Roger Alton, at the time the paper's editor, that he stuck with the story, despite its potential implications. After a police interview, at which I repeated my admission, I was released on bail to await the decision of the Crown Prosecution Service. Do you vote, do you analyze who you should vote for or do you just take it for granted? What do I do? And that was my way in. Iran has been filmed loading missiles aboard some of its vessels. 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. David Dayen: As someone who works on a magazine, it's the ultimate copyediting failure. Thank you! By the way, I know some amazing people in the intelligence services. Direct to your inbox. But she said she would still be prepared to give evidence to the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war. However, when her friends start being interrogated about the leak, Gun confesses to being the whistleblower, leading to her being arrested and taken to court for breaching the Official Secrets Act. Or at least, she could have been. Was the British government aware of it? When Official Secrets received its British premiere at Londons BFI Film Festival earlier this month, I was determined to wear something that held a special meaning and settled on a dress by an Iraqi designer. However, her husband and the father of her daughters name is Yasar Gun. What might, IKeira Knightley, feel if I'm sitting at my desk and this happened to me?" Right: Entertainment One, Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. Because it's just an Executive Branch trying to grab power as an authoritarian. As opposed to trying to be Katharine Gun. So somehow in my rolodex, sometimes they sought me out. Supported by Liberty, the prominent British civil-rights campaigning organiza-tion, Gun and her lawyer, Ben Emmerson (Ralph Fiennes), decided to cite grounds of necessity in order to contest the charges laid against her. 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." Martin Bright, who is in the movie very briefly I guess, is no longer in journalism as I understand it. At some point, as you probably know, Bush and Rumsfeld decided to bypass the CIA and take out that Office of Special Plans. It left me in an impossible predicament. So we start with hair, and then we start with glasses, and Keira says, "Gavin, what if I just was me?" WebAnd they failed, in part, I believe, because Katharine Gun leaked that memo, Official Secrets director Gavin Hood told Democracy Now!. Gun, a translator with the British intelligence service known as Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), received a document just before the war from an NSA manager, seeking British intelligence support in spying on members of the UN Security Council, to effectively blackmail them into voting for a second resolution that would make legal the invasion of Iraq. "And she then said: 'My way into this is what would I as the unadorned, no-makeup, no-fancy-edges Keira Knightley what would I feel like if this memo landed on my desk?'". So, I guess we all have a threshold. It gives me an interesting pause. Gavin Hood: Yes, it really sticks in my throat too. And he kept thinking, 'How am I going to portray this? To tell too much more of the story would spoil the film, but one part of its ending is clear. 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. It was the first time I had worked with characters who were still alive, and they very much wanted it to be accurate or they wouldn't sign over their life rights. He is wonderfully articulate but super pissed off, and his PTSDbecause hes been in Iraq for yearsmanifests at just disdain for that certain person you mentioned. 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. This, remember, was a conflict that caused the deaths of 179 British servicemen, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and caused countless more to suffer serious wounds, both physical and psychological. So it was a pretty awful thing to happen to her. It is to say that we need to know the truth behind the decisions to act or not to act. Amazing lady, shes still a journalist. A decade on, sitting in a cafe in Cheltenham, not far from GCHQ, I asked her if she still stood by what she had done. ", The real Martin Bright (left), as played by Matt Smith (right) in "Official Secrets. Id never seen anything like it. She had been following that war, as many of us had, for a year. Reflect the views expressed in the United States the contents above are those our. Civil rights organisation, and we 're for the war ] curated by Esquire... 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