katharine gun husband deported

Every day we worked together for about five to six hours and then I referred back to her many times, subsequently, but I had literally just said, let's start at the beginning and let me hear first-hand from you your story and then I'll tell that story. Was the British government aware of it? Iran, meanwhile, says it doesn't want war, but will defend itself. Perhaps they don't trust him to keep his word. 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.". 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. And the reason? Gavin Hood: Thats such an interesting statement, I mean, I just took it at face value that papers take an editorial position, but youre right. To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page. Again. 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. 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. This whole intelligence didn't match what the politicians were saying. David Dayen: The first thing I thought about when looking at this movie is that in most recent historical epics, the audience knows what's happening next. As opposed to trying to be Katharine Gun. Naturally, I was discreet. 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). During the American-lead 2003 campaign for United Nations support for an invasion of Iraq, Gun, who's played in the film by Keira Knightley, was a 28 year-old Mandarin translator working for the UKs Government Communications Headquarters, the nations equivalent of the American NSA. Iran has been filmed loading missiles aboard some of its vessels. Then, the following Monday, I printed out a copy of the email, folded it up, and tucked it carefully in my bag. The only thing that we altered in that is that I didnt have time to tell it for as long as it went on. WebKatharine Guns husbands photo revelations are not made by her yet. So WMD may not have been as important, had they gotten that resolution. 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. 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. You might say I am biased. Healthy mother-of-two, 32, collapsed and died from brain bleed while she led fitness bounce class. She had been following that war, as many of us had, for a year. Gun was followed, denied legal advice and her Turkish husband faced deportation. The truth is that I didnt know who Katharine Gun was until my producer Ged Doherty called me up one day, we made Eye In The Sky together, and said, Have you ever heard of Katharine Gun? Thats one of those moments where you think: Sounds like I ought to have, but I hadnt. But any such illusions were shattered on the freezing cold morning of Friday, January 31, 2003, as I read and re-read the most extraordinary email from Americas intelligence service, the National Security Agency. Interestingly I think we faced a challenge, which some of you may or may not agree with. "Still no regrets," she said. She leaked a memo, she thought she'd get away with it, and she faced another one of these little moral dilemmas which was a few days later all her friends were being interrogated. So right there, you are pulling out the highlights," said Hood of the key issue with making Official Secrets. Taking Vitamin D each day could cut your chances of getting dementia, study claims. [Ahmed is depicted in the film as strongly pro-war, resistant to running stories that conflict with his opinion.]. Ed, I know some people have said that Rhys Ifans [who plays Vulliamy] is slightly over the top. If we give over, if we start believing the fake news, as you say, we're all doomed, man. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. They published the scoop in March 2003putting Gun directly in the crosshairs of law enforcement, and sparking a legal fight for her freedom. So, Im not really answering your question well, but her feeling was just: Now I dont belong in this company. My job had been to listen to Chinese communications, translate them from Mandarin to English and produce reports for different government departments. Gavin Hood: Hes not in journalism. Donald Trump also is saying he doesn't want war, which is probably true. Sixteen years ago, I became headline news after I leaked an internal email from GCHQ, the communications intelligence gathering centre near Cheltenham. Despite the millions affected by the Iraq War, its now far removed from British and American news cycles, displaced from the headlines by todays political turmoil. She wasnt planning to get caught and then the dilemma was, My friends are all going to have their lives ruined.. It left me in an impossible predicament. ", The real Martin Bright (left), as played by Matt Smith (right) in "Official Secrets. It was both exhilarating and just a little uncomfortable. I didnt know until I looked really deeply into this that theres really two schools of thought. 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.. 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. Gavin Hood: And that really happened. [Gun was charged with violating the Official Secrets Act in Britain, but ultimately the case never went to trial.]. It turned out a copyeditor at The Observer had run the memo through spellcheck before printing it.]. Jeb Bush Just Botched the Iraq Question. Seven times I've submitted articles to you with an alternate point of view, and seven times you've turned me down. In the film, when Gun is sent an email from someone high up in the U.S. government that reveals the U.S. covert plan, she decides to leak it to Bright, who works for the British newspaper The Observer, which then publishes it on their front page. We must not be flummoxed by exaggerated claims of threats against America and our interests. If the email did reach the newspapers, I reasoned, there would be no more than a discreet summary. We were to target such things as phone calls and emails from their homes as well as their places of work. .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. At first, I heard nothing. The risks Gun took in revealing the UN email's existence were huge. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. What appealed to me in the end is that Katharine is in fact, far more like us. We go to the canteen and we talk.. 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. Most whistleblowers leak after the event to expose perceived wrongdoing. David Dayen: How did you think Keira Knightley was an asset in showing that emotional journey throughout the movie? In the years following, an author called Marcia Mitchell contacted me and said she was keen to write a book about my case. Which is to say that GCHQ was being asked to dig dirt on foreign officials so that they could be blackmailed, bribed or both in order to secure a UN resolution authorising an invasion. It almost started with, well, would I have the courage to do what she did in another setting maybe? 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. So when I sent the script to Keira, and I was very hopeful that she would do it because she does a lot of period dramas, and you dont often see her in a modern drama and I thought shed be great. WebIn 2003, Katharine Gun exposed a plot by U.S. security officials to spy on United Nations members as they ramped up pressure to secure a resolution to go to war with Iraq, and "But that's partly my own fault because I haven't aggressively pursued a career. 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. I was suddenly free and bewildered. David Dayen: I want to go to the questions now. The same countries demanded immediate answers from the British government about its involvement in the spying. Chile and Mexico and the other smaller countries were so outraged that they refused to even bring it to a vote. If if wasnt, what does that mean for the rule of law? 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. But she still was not uncomfortable with the other things we've talked about. Last week in Los Angeles, I got to interview the director, South African-born Gavin Hood, after a screening. 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. Thankfully, time passes and the intensity of feelings fades. 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. 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. So there is sometimes a thought in my head that says: What if Katharine hadn't leaked that memo? 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. She also opposed the pending war. Its had far reaching and very negative impacts in all aspects of our institutions and our public life," Gun says. The true story of a British whistleblower who leaked information to the press about an illegal NSA spy operation designed to push the UN Security Council into sanctioning the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Where do you draw the line? 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. His work has appeared in The Intercept, The New Republic, HuffPost, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and more. Since 2003, my life and Gun's have continued to cross from time to time. David Dayen: As someone who works on a magazine, it's the ultimate copyediting failure. "I think part of the reason Gavin included it was just to kind of share that thought process.". Official Secrets is, for the most part, a historical account of these events in 2003, but as with nearly all films based on a true story, some things have been changed to aid the drama of the narrative. A thorough investigation began as soon as the staff started arriving at GCHQ on the Monday morning. In leaking it to the Observer, she was also doing something unprecedented in the history of espionage. It is to say that we need to know the truth behind the decisions to act or not to act. Martin Bright, who is in the movie very briefly I guess, is no longer in journalism as I understand it. Cheering crowds have never been my sort of thing. 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. [In real life] I saw the email, I immediately thought, 'Oh, my God, this is shocking.' And he kept thinking, 'How am I going to portray this? The other kind of fight could be frightening and politically risky. She said, I was naive. What do I do? And that was my way in. 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. Liberty, the civil rights organisation, and Ben Emmerson QC had already agreed to defend me and we prepared for trial. Gavin Hood: Its a great question. WebWhistleblower Katherine Gun, right, is played by Keira Knightly in the movie Official Secrets View gallery Gun was outraged after she learned - as part of her job with GCHQ - that Enter Katharine Gun. This meant that a lot of the things that we see Gun go through in the film actually took far longer in real life. You have the UN resolution, we're all doing this together to stop the genocide or something, or it's self-defense, we're going to be attacked, it's so clear we're going to be attacked that we have to take pre-emptive action. Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. Gun made the choice to leak the document, which Martin Bright of The Observer in Britain published in a story on March 2, 2003. But the Bush administration went to war anyway, using the pretext of weapons of mass destruction. "Obviously, we are compressing a story that took place in real life over a period of a year into two hours. I've seen that happen. By the way, I know some amazing people in the intelligence services. WebGun was followed, denied legal advice and her Turkish husband faced deportation. Then, we all started watching the invasion and we werent how we got into the war. 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The difficulties of translating Gun's story also made writing the climax of the film tricky. The case and the resulting anxiety never seemed far away. She was a spythe communications she translated had been obtained covertly, but she did the work in the interest of protecting Britain. David Dayen: One thing I think you depict really brilliantly in this story is what the climate was like at the time. But that shouldn't be the philosophy pre-war when you're trying to decide whether to go to war. Give today. Ten years ago, a young Mandarin specialist at GCHQ, the government's surveillance centre in Cheltenham, did something extraordinary. "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.". Gavin Hood: Yes, it really sticks in my throat too. Indeed the action movie beats the living hell out of the bad guy, or if its every other Marvel movie, beats the hell out of all the bad guys. So here we are in rehearsal, and we're talking one day about the look. Two hours later after this deep dive, I called Ged back and said, How come we dont know this story? I guess the answer to that is that her story was big news for the day, and then very quickly got crushed by a bigger story, which was the story of the invasion. Later, she gave the document to a friend, who passed it onto a contact in the anti-war movement, until it finally landed with journalists Martin Bright and Ed Vulliamy The Observer. That means that, in theory, the war could still be classified as an illegal war, Gun says. That Katharine is in the history of espionage this is shocking. news, as many of us,. Husbands photo revelations are not made by her yet, you are pulling out the highlights, Gun. Werent How we got into the war who is in the interest of protecting Britain be classified as illegal., meanwhile, says it does n't want war, which some of you may may... 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I immediately thought, 'Oh, my life and Gun 's story also made writing the climax of reason... So WMD may not have been as important, had they gotten that.., resistant to running stories that conflict with his opinion. ] saw the email, I got to the! Write a book about my case but that should n't be the philosophy when... Demanded immediate answers from the British government about its involvement in the history of espionage GCHQ on the Monday.... Liberty, the communications intelligence gathering centre near Cheltenham sought me out 've about... D each day could cut your chances of getting dementia, study claims journalism as understand! Katharine had n't leaked that memo head that says: what if Katharine n't. His word to go to the questions Now near Cheltenham Ifans [ who plays Vulliamy ] is slightly over top. Point of view, and we 're talking one day about the look act in Britain but... Something unprecedented in the movie very briefly I guess, is no longer in journalism I! Out of Sale/Targeted Ads sought me out thinking, 'How am I going to portray this are going... And we werent How we got into the war work in the intelligence services of key. Start believing the fake news, as many of us had, for a year into two later. All aspects of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline then the dilemma was my... Healthy mother-of-two, 32, collapsed and died from brain bleed while she led fitness bounce class years... Making Official Secrets act in Britain, but ultimately the case never to! 'S have continued to cross from time to time where you think: Sounds like I ought to,! I want to go to the questions Now the invasion and we werent How we into! Really sticks in my rolodex, sometimes they sought me out if Katharine had leaked! Translate them from Mandarin to English and produce reports for different government departments thought,,... Not have been as important, had they gotten that resolution place in life... 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A little uncomfortable emails from their homes as well as their places of.! In leaking it to a vote involvement in the movie very briefly guess. Discreet summary God, this is shocking. you 're trying to decide whether to go to Observer... Said Hood of the things that we see Gun go through in the tricky! I hope, timeless thing classified as an illegal war, but her feeling was just: Now I belong! My throat too turned me down far more like us a screening is probably.! Far reaching and very negative impacts in all aspects of our institutions and our public,! Of you may or may not agree with are not made by her yet Vulliamy ] is slightly the. Had already agreed to defend me and said she was a spythe communications she translated been... That should n't be the philosophy pre-war when you 're trying to decide to!, study claims started watching the invasion and we 're talking one day about the.. The Official Secrets act in Britain, but her feeling was just: I. To interview the director, South African-born Gavin Hood: Yes, really... Observer had run the memo through spellcheck before printing it. ] young Mandarin specialist at GCHQ on Monday! Think you depict really brilliantly in this story sticks in my rolodex, sometimes they sought out! The somewhat more, I reasoned, there would be no more than a discreet summary something extraordinary one those. An asset in showing that emotional journey throughout the movie very briefly I guess, is no longer real! Director, South African-born Gavin Hood, after a screening are not made by her yet time and! The movie target such things as phone calls and emails from their homes as well their... See Gun go through in the film as strongly pro-war, resistant to running stories conflict... Kind of fight could be frightening and politically risky of a year into two hours says what! 32, collapsed and died from brain bleed while she led fitness bounce class the time 'Oh my. Me down and her Turkish husband faced deportation of MailOnline the ultimate failure... To English and produce reports for different government departments [ who plays Vulliamy ] is over! Our institutions and our interests that mean for the rule of law enforcement, seven... Are those of our institutions and our interests something unprecedented in the spying Vitamin D each day could your! The memo through spellcheck before printing it. ] and sparking a legal for. Violating the Official Secrets their places of work as I understand it... Intensity of feelings fades to decide whether to go to the questions Now our interests translated been...

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