WAS THE PRIME MINISTER A CHINESE SPY?

 

48. WAS THE PRIME MINISTER A CHINESE SPY?

The Prime Minister who went down the sea in a diving gear did not come up again. Even after the search by the naval helicopters or the expert divers no trace of the Prime Minister could be found. It was when people thought that the sea had swallowed him that the journalist Anthony Grey came up with a news which startled everyone.

That the Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt was a Chinese spy. A spy who used to leak secrets to China for money before he became politically important. He was forced to continue as a spy even after he became Prime Minister. Ultimately when things reached a stage that the secret would be out Holt went for a swim in the sea off Victoria coast as preplanned in a secret understanding with China. In his book ‘The Prime Minister Was A Spy’ Anthony Grey disclosed that the Prime Minister boarded a waiting Chinese submarine which took him to China without anyone’s knowledge.

The famous West German Chancellor Willy Brandt was another world leader ensnared in espionage. Gunter Guillaume was one of the closest advisers of Willy Brandt. He used to supply to East Germany on a regular basis secrets concerning NATO. When Guillaume was caught it created havoc in world politics. Willy Brandt’s political life came to an end with this. On December 15, 1975 the Dusseldorf court sentenced Guillaume to thirteen years’ rigorous imprisonment.

The American press reporter Jack Anderson had a more interesting fact to share with the public. According to him Willy Barndt himself was a CIA spy. Besides, he was a double agent who used to supply secret documents to the KGB As was to be expected, the German government denied all this. But why didn’t Willy Brandt file a defamation suit against Jack Anderson? It is this that raises suspicion.

There is no nation that does not fall in the espionage trap. Take the case of India. On January 16, 1985 Intelligence Bureau officials raided the house of a big industrialist. Two persons were having a drink in a room there. One was the liaison officer of the company, Coomer Narayan. The other was P Gopalan, PA to Dr P C Alexander, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister. This shed light on a spy ring extending to the offices of the Prime Minister and the President of India. Many were arrested, including several bigwigs. P C Alexander’s personal secretary P N Kher, S Sankaran in the office of President Zail Singh, A K Malhotra and Udaychand of the PMO, officers of the Ministry of Finance and defence and officers of many departments that were privy to official secrets. As the saying goes, the thief was in the ship itself. Absolutely confidential defence secrets were leaked to the enemy through these people. They included the report sent to the Prime Minister by Dr U R Rao, Secretary of Space, regarding Insat satellite and the secret document sent by the defence minister about a particular type of radar. It was alleged that many documents were passed to the enemy through Suresh, son of Jagjivan Ram who was Defence Minister for a long period. Surya magazine under the editorship of Maneka Gandhi revealed on January 22, 1979 that Pakistan could demolish RAW because of the secrets passed on by Suresh who came to know them from his father who was the defence Minister.

Memory is still fresh about the U2 incident which aggravated the cold war in the 1960s. It was through this that that the world came to know of the international spy organizations. Perhaps the U2 incident could have sparked off a world war. This was the incident which shed light on the machinations of the underworld of espionage. The U2 aircraft which carried on continuous surveillance on Russia was a secret known only to the CIA. But in May 1960 the Russian army accurately shot down a U2 aircraft that was flying at an altitude of 68,000 ft hoodwinking the Russian radars. Russian Premier Nikita Khrushchev gave a stunning blow to American imperialism by exhibiting the captured American pilot Gary Powers. Incidentally, Russia came to know of the American U2 mission from two men, Michael and Martin, in the American national security agency who were spying for it.

The Israeli Mossad are experts in espionage. But the Russian KGB was able to permanently establish itself by the side of the Israeli Prime Minister David Ben Gurion crossing all the hurdles created by Mossad. In 1960 Israel Bir who was the principal military adviser to Ben Gurion was arrested in a Tel Aviv restaurant. At that time he was talking in whispers to a Russian agent. He had in his possession many confidential documents including the official diary of the Prime Minister.

MI5 is the British intelligence organization. At one time the British Premier Edward Heath decided to send back some Russian diplomats. This was based on the fact that the MI5 was convinced that they were carrying out espionage for Russia. How did Britain come to know of this? The KGB agent Oleg Lijalin sent to London by the KGB switched his loyalties. As a consequence many of the Russian spies posted in different world capitals had to return to Russia discarding their diplomatic disguise.

Would you believe if you are told that that there are spies who traded secrets for the sake of world peace? Klaus Emil Julius Fuchs was one such. As a nuclear scientist he gave the Russians the secret of atom bomb being made by America. It was the apprehension that if the know-how to make an atom bomb was with America alone then the Americans could make the world toe its line, that influenced this scientist to do so. He believed that if one more country could make the bomb this would act as a deterrent.

The Russian people who were convinced that it was the KGB who sabotaged Gorbachev, expressed their anger by demolishing the statue of the KGB chief whom they had worshipped for more than five decades. Some of the top bureaucrats connected with the KGB issued a statement that if the vaults of the KGB were opened, complete details as to who killed American President John F Kennedy would come to light. In America after the infamous Watergate scandal popular resentment against the American Secret Service, CIA, was unprecedented.

In the circumstances can’t we prohibit these organizations of espionage? Especially now when the world is progressing on the path of mutual friendship, ending the days of cold war. But we should understand that running an administrative machinery is not as easy as moving the wheel of a hand cart. For the journey of a nation many things are inevitable which may not be desirable in the life of an individual. An effective spy ring is necessary for the existence of any country. This is not a philosophy of statecraft born out of the cold war scenario after the world war. This is a principle recognized by the vision of statesmen much before the time of Christ.

In BC 1245 it was through brilliant espionage that Gideon saved his Israeli hosts from the Midians. While the Midian army was sleeping, Gideon led 300 spies with lighted torches to the enemy camp. They had advanced covering the torches with earthen pots so that the enemy would not be attracted to the light of the torches. The spies stood at different points among the Midian army and when their leader sounded the bugle all of them broke the earthen pot and started to sound the bugle in unison. The Midian army that was not fully awake mistakenly thought that they had been surrounded by a 30,000 strong army. In self defence they drew their swords and started attacking whoever was in front of them. It was later the next morning that survivors among the Midians realized that they had been killing their own kinsmen.

Mithridates was an emperor who lived a century before Christ. He was the ruler of Pontus. Mithridates who was famed as a brilliant military strategist had depended on his intelligence organization to expand and strengthen his empire. He became adept at espionage at the age of 14 itself. His style of operation is still discussed for application in the training centres of the American CIA, Russian KGB, Israeli Mossad and our own RAW. Mithridates had a clear understanding much before he became king as to the countries which he had to vanquish after assuming power. Whenever he visited a country he took care not only to imbibe their way of attire, food habits and even their way of talking.

Among those who utilized the services of spies for finding out the secrets of enemies in war, one of the most competent was the Roman soldier Lalius. On instructions from the Roman general Sifio Africanus he entered the Numidian camp with a peace offer. Once there, he cleverly provoked his horse which started running helter skelter. He ran after the horse in an apparent bid to rein it in. In the process he learned much about the layout of the camp which came in handy for his army to win the war.

At a time when espionage could be relied upon, spies conveyed to the palace what they had heard about Sita without distorting the facts. And Sree Ram sent his beloved spouse to the jungle in defence to public opinion. Suppose Ram was the President of a republic now. The launderer who spoke ill of Ram’s wife would fall into the hands of the secret police and disappear. Otherwise, the secret service would spread the rumour that the allegation was about Urmila. And the problem would be conveniently solved by banishing Urmila to the jungle.