Inside the real-world Double-O section of Her Majesty's Secret Service

osrisosris Posts: 558MI6 Agent
From The Register:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/10/05/james_bond_007_career_path/

“Bond on Film Thanks to the books and films we all know a lot about James Bond 007. We also know a little about the group he supposedly belongs to, the "Double-O agents" of "Her Majesty's Secret Service" - the only British secret agents with a licence to kill. But just how realistic is the idea? Does anything like the Double-O section really exist in the secret bureaucracies of the British government? If it does, how would you get a job in it?

The answers might seem at first to be a resounding "not very", "no", and "you can't". Of course it's nowadays no secret that Blighty has a secret service - in fact its official title is the Secret Intelligence Service, SIS ("MI6" was never more than a cover name). Its head is known by the initial "C", not "M" as Ian Fleming would have it, but he is also referred to in official circles as "CSS" - Chief of the Secret Service. And indeed, before it became SIS the organisation was known as the Foreign Section of the Secret Service Bureau among other titles, and was at times known even to insiders simply as "the Secret Service".

So yes, Her Majesty does indeed have a Secret Service. And the Secret Service does have "agents" - but these people don't have a desk at the Vauxhall Cross HQ or in any other government building. An agent is, usually, a human-intelligence source: somebody who gives information to SIS. Given the nature of the information SIS is interested in, agents are typically foreign nationals - anyone from hotel receptionists to businessmen to cabinet ministers - and they are seen as traitors or moles by their own governments.

The SIS spies who handle agents and receive their information are called "intelligence officers". They too bear little resemblance to James Bond. Most of the time when they operate overseas they do so as accredited diplomats assigned to a British embassy or consulate under false identities, largely because this means that they therefore have diplomatic immunity from arrest or prosecution. As it is their job to commit the crime of espionage and incite local citizens to do so, this is very useful to them on occasion. (Of course British intelligence officers have sometimes been agents in their own right - but, sadly, they have tended to be agents of foreign opposition services such as the one-time KGB.)

So far from pistols, chop-socky or irresistible sexual magnetism, a normal SIS officer's primary tools for motivating foreigners to do what he wants are bribery, bullshit and in certain circumstances blackmail. The only Bond-like quality a normal SIS officer will be required to show is the ability to drink heavily and remain functional, as any diplomat must on the embassy cocktail circuit.

And indeed, service overseas in an SIS "station" inside an embassy will make up only a minority of a normal SIS officer's career. A "station" will often be just one officer, or perhaps three in a capital of some importance to the UK, say Jakarta. Only in a major espionage centre like Vienna or Hong Kong will the station really be worthy of the title, with a big team of spies. For every SIS officer abroad under diplomatic cover there will be two or more back in London pushing paper at Vauxhall Cross.

That's the reality of life in the Secret Service, then. A mainly deskbound career in London, with occasional forays overseas which may amount to little more than a spell as bagman delivering bribe money to corrupt locals (some of whom may well be making up their information, and not even because they have been doubled by local counterintelligence - simply to get more cash from the silly British spies). Indeed, it's rumoured that on various occasions SIS officers have invented fake agents, fabricated bogus reports and simply pocketed the bribe money themselves.

Even in a more serious station located in a hostile country possessing a dangerous counter-intelligence service, if something goes wrong nothing very terrible will happen to the British spy. He will simply display his diplomatic passport and walk away, perhaps to be expelled by the local government later. His career will probably be in trouble if this happens, but unlike James Bond he runs no physical risks and does not live a life of excitement and danger. He is certainly not required to kill anyone, and never carries a weapon.

So it would seem that James Bond is just a myth, and the Double-O section doesn't exist?

No, in fact. If you should finish your education and join the SIS straight away or after an ordinary job of some kind, yes, you will never be James Bond or anything like him - the life as described above of desks, duplicity and fake diplomacy will be yours. (Assuming you even become an intelligence officer: most SIS employees are actually in support roles such as admin, IT, translation and "artworker".)

But James Bond, as we all know, has an armed-services background before he joined the secret service. In his case he is an ex-Commander, a former naval officer, and in the books we read of another Double-O with previous service in the Royal Marine Commandos. In fact, everyone in the armed forces is really a Double-O in a way: every serviceman is not just licenced but required to kill people if his or her mission demands it.

Service skills beyond the ordinary

Ordinary servicemen don't generally acquire Bond's skills, however: particularly the iconic one of being a deadly pistol shot. A pistol is not a commonly-issued weapon in the mainstream armed services, and when a handgun is carried by a uniformed serviceman it is typically because that person is not expected to have to shoot anyone, so it doesn't matter that he or she has been given such an inadequate weapon. For someone wearing a military uniform, the concealability of a pistol is pointless and the only reason it is carried is in case of an unforeseen emergency, most usually as a backup in case one's real weapon - a strike aircraft, maybe - is unavailable.

Other Bond-style skills - unarmed combat, scuba diving, free-fall parachuting, demolitions, evasive and pursuit driving in civilian cars - are also rare in the armed services just as they are in the SIS.

But there is a group in the armed forces where such skills become quite common, namely the Special Forces. One SF formation, the relatively obscure Special Reconnaissance Regiment, is particularly Bond-like in the skills it teaches its operatives: SRR soldiers learn to drive like lunatics, often in cars loaded with Q-Branch-style gadgetry. They are also intensively trained in fighting with concealable weapons and as such are probably the best combat pistol shots in Britain - and second to none worldwide. They are also taught to operate undercover in plain clothes, and in various other Bond-like skills such as unobtrusive breaking and entering, the photographing of documents and dirty fighting with bare hands or improvised weapons.

An SRR recruit normally joins the unit from the regular forces, but some are on secondment tours from the other "Tier One"3 special-forces units, the Special Air Service and Special Boat Service. Such men - the SAS and SBS don't recruit women, though the SRR does - may also have acquired most of the rest of James Bond's skill set: explosives expert, frogman, skydiver and so on.

The Special Forces, of course, work for the Ministry of Defence - not the Foreign Office like the SIS. But in fact there is an overlap.

Such things are absolutely not discussed publicly. The SIS, SAS, SBS and SRR are grudgingly acknowledged to exist, but details are not forthcoming and the idea that they have anything to do with each other on a routine basis - that in fact there really is something a bit like a Double-O section - is not discussed.

But we know about it nonetheless, in part from the interesting memoirs of ex-SIS spook Richard Tomlinson, a book titled The Big Breach. SIS spent a long time trying to suppress this, but of course it can easily be downloaded from the internet.

From Tomlinson we learn that while SIS' main task is indeed the running of agents in order to glean secret intelligence, it is also required to be able to mount "Special Operations of a quasi-military nature". SIS' role in these operations is to set the objective and get political clearance to proceed. The Foreign Secretary would be the one who actually had to sign a piece of paper in this case, but actually in reality it would be a rare Secretary who didn't get the Prime Minister involved for any SIS operation which seemed likely to involve British operatives killing people - outside an acknowledged warzone, anyway.

This, then, is James Bond Double-O stuff: quasi-military secret, potentially lethal work on behalf of the Secret Service. And as one might expect, it is not the deskbound mainstream SIS officers who handle such tasks.

Rather, Tomlinson tells us, special sub-units exist drawn from the ranks of both the SAS and the SBS whose job is to handle special taskings from SIS. The SAS secret-service outfit was known to Tomlinson as the Revolutionary Warfare Wing - as opposed to the much better-known Counter Revolutionary Warfare Wing, part of the Special Projects counter-terrorist outfit. The CRW and Special Projects operate on the side of governments to suppress terrorism, as in the case of the Princes Gate embassy assault of 1980: the never-avowed RWW operates against governments, helping insurgents or rebels or freedom fighters ... or, as their opponents might dub them, terrorists.

The RWW and the small SBS team of secret-service frogmen were known to Tomlinson collectively as "the Increment". According to him many Increment members will also have trained and served with the SRR or its precursor unit (14 Int/the Dets, which operated undercover in Northern Ireland) and thus will have a full Bond-style panoply of skills, especially once supplemented by still more special training. Reports in the press in more recent times - Tomlinson was expelled from the SIS in 1995 - suggest that the Increment is nowadays more commonly known as E Squadron, and that it still draws personnel and skillsets from all three secret regiments.

So an E-Squadron/Increment operator can expect to go overseas under a fake cover identity (or perhaps multiple identities) without diplomatic immunity, wearing plain clothes and armed with concealed weapons - and thus he or she certainly has a "licence to kill" if the operation requires it, though military types are more likely to use terms such as "rules of engagement" and "escalation of force" to describe the rules governing their use of lethal methods.

That's surely getting pretty close to a real live Double-O section, though the great majority of E-squadron operators will be gritty non-commissioned sergeants rather than suave members of the officer/diplomatic class as Fleming and Bond producer Cubby Broccoli have depicted the Double-Os.

Tomlinson also tells us of a perhaps still-shadowier organisation which he called UKN, whose members are part-timers paid as freelancers rather than government employees - and whose SIS handlers are themselves using false cover identity when dealing with them. An E-squadron serviceman, while seldom possessing any diplomatic immunity on an operation, might still expect that the British government would try to get him (maybe her) released in the event of capture. A UKN member - a secret agent in the SIS sense of the word - might well be simply abandoned. Tomlinson suggests that UKN people in his time had various Bond-style attributes such as being expert light-aircraft pilots and yacht captains.

The reality still, in all likelihood, falls a little short of the movies. In particular, James Bond 007 the solo all-rounder operative would in real life probably be a team, most likely one or two SIS officers accompanied by a few E-Squadron secret soldiers as minders - the kind of group whose mission to establish liaison with the Libyan rebels famously went wrong recently. We hear of similar operations elsewhere in the world from Tomlinson and other sources.

Between them such a team would be able to do everything James Bond can do - the SIS types would have some local contacts, be capable of drinking a lot of cocktails without passing out and would also perhaps be able to trade on a bit of Oxbridge/public-school/Sandhurst/Foreign Office snobbery. The E-Squadron types would be crack shots, lunatic drivers, skydivers and/or frogmen as required, dab hands with a lump of plastic explosive and deadly even when unarmed.

That said, members of subcultures like the E-Squadron/SIS/UKN nexus do tend to move about and transfer between the various organisations. Reports have it that E-Squadron/the Increment is much bigger now than it used to be in Tomlinson's pre-9/11 days, and that some SIS officers may now be recruited from it or directly from the special-ops formations. Even in Tomlinson's day there was a special-forces major always on secondment to SIS headquarters.

An agent for all seasons

So it's quite possible to imagine a career path which would wind up creating an individual with all Bond's many unusual skills and finish up with him working for the secret service itself (as opposed to E Squadron), often enough finding himself abroad carrying a false passport and a gun under his jacket - and thus with a licence to kill if necessary. It's even just possible that he would be an ex-Commander, maybe a former naval aviator or frogman who had later acquired relatively high rank behind a military desk at some point, though he'd be far more likely to have started off in the Army or Royal Marines.

As an example, in the film Tomorrow Never Dies we see Bond in uniform at one stage. Naturally it is the uniform of a Royal Navy commander (Fleming specified the wavy-striped Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, in which he himself had served during World War II, but this disappeared in 1958). Bond also wears the sleeve wings of a naval pilot, suggesting that he must have started out in the Fleet Air Arm. Certainly this might explain his ability to fly jets and helicopters as seen in various other films.

Rather unusually he appears then to have applied for special-forces Selection and wound up in the Army SAS, as he also wears flat-topped "Sabre" shoulder parachute wings, a badge only ever displayed by the SAS. It might seem more likely for a naval officer to join the maritime-focused Special Boat Service, but in fact a successful Selection candidate could go either way - and indeed some former Royal Marines are known to choose the SAS as this avoids the need to get through an arduous boating and diving course on top of the rigours of Selection.

Plainly a modern Bond must, having served with the direct-action special forces long enough to become a frogman, skydiver and all-around hard case, then have done a secondment to the SRR and become an expert driver, burglar and pistolero too. A spell with E Squadron might follow. Some military desk work or a return to the regular forces would then be more or less essential to swiftly achieve the rank of Commander, though there are a handful of jobs at this relatively senior level in the special-ops units. Finally our man might then transfer to the SIS itself, acquiring any lacking languages and diplomatic polish in the process.

And there we are: Commander Bond, at your (secret) service.

As for the overpowering sexual magnetism, the comfortable private fortune needed for the suits, cocktails and personal Aston Martin - not to mention the possibly-related luck and skill at the card table... well, he'd just have to have been born with those."
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Comments

  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    Interesting. I knew most of this, but there was some completely new information too. Special Reconnaissance Service in particular is a unit I want to learn more about. I also think SRS could be an interesting background for a Bond girl.
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    Number24 wrote:
    Interesting. I knew most of this, but there was some completely new information too. Special Reconnaissance Service in particular is a unit I want to learn more about. I also think SRS could be an interesting background for a Bond girl.


    ASP 9mm is the man to contact about The SRS ,there's nothing he doesn't know about it , he is the guvnor on this topic but don't tell him I told you so
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    SRR. Regiment, not Service ;)
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    Told you
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Told you

    “They are also intensively trained in fighting with concealable weapons and as such are probably the best combat pistol shots in Britain - and second to none worldwide.”

    -engaging smug mode-
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    Thank you for the correct ion. I never make mistakes other than the times when I do. :p
    Is language and cultural training a big part of SRR training? Do they read Dostojevskij in Russian and learn to make falafel?
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Not really, operatives engaging targets on their own territory in their own language isn’t really an option. Even local dialects and mistakes impersonating them can lead to compromise. That’s strictly for the movies and TV dramas. It’s not done. Given the theatre of operation, operatives within the Regiment will be chosen with specialist knowledge of the area/language/people. But overall, it’s about surveillance and intelligence gathering and not contact. Although given the higher level of danger involved in these operations, operatives are very highly trained in ‘contact’.
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  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    Hiding in lofts with a camera and binoculars?

    BTW: The Norwegian training that comes closest to SRR actually expect them to read Dostojevskij, eat local food. But they specialize in one culture and region. The students who start the three-year training this year my focus on Arabia. The new students next year will become Russia experts etc.
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    More like hiding in hedgerows with a stack of cling film and immodium.
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    edited August 2018
    I love it when those who have signed the OSA forget and bump their gums like it’s acceptable!

    Arrogance and self awareness seldom go hand in hand as ‘M’ or ‘C’ would say :D

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    edited August 2018
    Thats very rude, self righteous and presumptuous. You can find any of the info I just put up on the WWW.
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  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    edited August 2018
    Asp9mm wrote:
    Thats very rude, self righteous and presumptuous. You can find any of the info I just put up on the WWW.
    Easy Tiger - the source of the article was Tomlinson - few who knew him in service spoke very highly of him - hence my previous comment. Unless you have written your memoirs I wouldn't take it personally.

    As you say rest is pretty much available on the WWW, but making it public just makes the job harder - for those who do it. There is a reason it is secret - protection of those who serve and do the job for real.

    But I fully understand the interest it garners.

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Bond44 wrote:
    Asp9mm wrote:
    Thats very rude, self righteous and presumptuous. You can find any of the info I just put up on the WWW.
    Easy Tiger - the source of the article was Tomlinson - few who knew him in service spoke very highly of him - hence my previous comment.

    As you say rest is pretty much available on the WWW, but making it public just makes the job harder - for those who do it. There is a reason it is secret - protection of those who serve and do the job for real.

    But I fully understand the interest it garners.

    Cheers :007)

    Apologies. Nothing I post has any relevance to today’s opsec. It’s at least 20 years out of date and fluffy. It’s far from relevant in today’s theatre.

    Tomlinson is contemptible.
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  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    Back on topic:

    I wonder how many countries have "licence to kill" units? I'm not talking about regular military, more assassination units.

    I would guess/know the US, UK, Russia, Israel, China, Iran and North Korea.
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Number24 wrote:
    Back on topic:

    I wonder how many countries have "licence to kill" units? I'm not talking about regular military, more assassination units.

    I would guess/know the US, UK, Russia, Israel, China, Iran and North Korea.

    Lots, if not most, if not all. It’s a basic human/animal trait to protect its territory by any means necessary. Some more overtly than others.
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  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    'Define License to Kill'
    As ASP said most countries probably under the guise of self defence - its the most human right (if you think your life or that of others is in danger or imminent threat)

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    I think most countries have units that could do it if the situation ever demanded it, but they aren't spesifically trained for it. One examples would be the Norwegian organisation E-14 (active in the 90's and early naughties). They worked for Military Inteligence and came from special forces, the police and civilian life. They worked in civilian clothes, pretended to be from NGO's or tourists and gathered inteligence in places like Pakistan, Iran, Mali etc. I bet they could do it if asked,

    Very few countries have units trained and created to do assassinations, I think.
  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    Number24 wrote:
    I think most countries have units that could do it if the situation ever demanded it, but they aren't spesifically trained for it. One examples would be the Norwegian organisation E-14 (active in the 90's and early naughties). They worked for Military Inteligence and came from special forces, the police and civilian life. They worked in civilian clothes, pretended to be from NGO's or tourists and gathered inteligence in places like Pakistan, Iran, Mali etc. I bet they could do it if asked,

    Very few countries have units trained and created to do assassinations, I think.
    You would be surprised it is probably more than you may think, with advances in tech and the rise of global terrorism most countries probably have a unit or two (military or other) that could do such a job. Inter agency co operation is common these days due to the latter, with many countries following similar structures to that of modern westernised countries (intelligence, surveillance, cyber and strike capabilities be they human, tech or other).

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    Asp9mm wrote:
    More like hiding in hedgerows with a stack of cling film and immodium.
    I have mentioned this before a few years back , as our esteemed agent says, whilst hiding in a hedgerow with me trusty bins , some one weed on my head , there's nothing worse than a soggy balaclava soaked in someone's else's piss
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    :)) They never showed that glamorous side in "Spooks"
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Like stuffing cling film wrapped turds into your Bergen.
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    Asp9mm wrote:
    More like hiding in hedgerows with a stack of cling film and immodium.
    I have mentioned this before a few years back , as our esteemed agent says, whilst hiding in a hedgerow with me trusty bins , some one weed on my head , there's nothing worse than a soggy balaclava soaked in someone's else's piss
    I thought that was the cure for jelly fish stings :D
    Had a close call with a rather portly and somewhat angry wild boar once in a similar situation. Not sure who squealed the most - fortunately we were both equally high pitched so did not raise suspicion!

    Thank god for technology you can do it all remotely these days (a la Eye in the Sky) but not half as much fun :D

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • Bond44Bond44 Vauxhall CrossPosts: 1,581MI6 Agent
    Asp9mm wrote:
    Like stuffing cling film wrapped turds into your Bergen.
    Some things never change, bit like square mess tins :D

    Cheers :007)
    My name is Bond, Basildon Bond - I have letters after my name!
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    :)) They never showed that glamorous side in "Spooks"
    on the few occasions I saw the SAS lads (you notice I didn't say worked with) we was on the same OP , apart from being glamorous lady killers , these guys were all 5 feet 5 nose picking Scots and Geordies .couldnt understand a bleeding word they said :))
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    I always used the Crusader cooker set. Those mess tins were well named.

    I was scared witless by a curious badger once. Damn those things make a bizarre noise when startled.
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    :)) :)) :))
    So Daniel Craig is closer to reality than many of us realised.
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,699MI6 Agent
    Asp9mm wrote:
    Like stuffing cling film wrapped turds into your Bergen.

    We'd better put that one on the Wish List for Bond25 :007)
  • osrisosris Posts: 558MI6 Agent
    Asp9mm wrote:
    Like stuffing cling film wrapped turds into your Bergen.

    How does one wash their hand in such instances? Serious question. Have always wondered this.
  • osrisosris Posts: 558MI6 Agent
    Bond44 wrote:
    'Define License to Kill'
    As ASP said most countries probably under the guise of self defence - its the most human right (if you think your life or that of others is in danger or imminent threat)

    Cheers :007)

    Yes, it is essential it be under the guise of self-defence of ones country, State or colleagues. Yet in some instances it can be politically expedient as in the case of PC Yvonne Fletcher who was allegedly assassinated by the SAS. See

    http://www.deepblacklies.co.uk/terminal_velocity.htm
  • osrisosris Posts: 558MI6 Agent
    :)) :)) :))
    So Daniel Craig is closer to reality than many of us realised.

    Well observed.
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