The British MI6 Agent Turned Russian Spy | Kim Philby | Timeline
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Published 2017-07-12
In 1963, at the height of the Cold War, a well-educated Englishman called Kim Philby boarded a Russian freighter in Beirut and defected to Moscow from under the nose of British Intelligence. For the best part of thirty years he had been spying for the Soviet Union, much of that time while holding senior jobs in MI6.
Fifty years on, more questions than answers still surround his defection. Had he really confessed before he went? Was his escape from justice an embarrassing mistake or part of the plan?
This film, shot in Beirut, London and Moscow, sets out to find the answers, revealing the blind spots in the British ruling class that made it so vulnerable to KGB penetration.
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All Comments (21)
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He wasn't an MI-6 agent who became a spy. He was a spy who became an MI-6 agent.
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I love this documentary. The narration, casual shooting style yet very well researched. It's very immersive.
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I met Kim Philby in Beirut in 1961. I was six years old and lived with my parents and family in the same apartment building as him.
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Thank you for this wonderful documentary..the last line spoken by his daughter closed the book in spectacular fashion.
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Chapman Pincher died aged 100 in August 2014 so I presume this was filmed just before then. In this video, his recall is very clear and precise.
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The entire story of the Cambridge Five is pretty interesting.
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I first became aware of Kim Philby from the book "Great True Spy Stories" which I read in the late 1970s. He intrigued me and I became attentive to any scrap of news about him that was publicized up to the time of his death in 1988. I would later read Philby's book "MY SILENT WAR: The Autobiography of a Spy" and very recently, Ben Macintyre's fantastic book "A SPY AMONG FRIENDS: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal." Philby was an unrepentant believer in the Soviet Union (to whom he pledged fealty in the early 1930s) until his death.
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There seems to be some sort of video mixed up in the ads🙄
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16.08...the whopper, eyes shifted and he masked a smirk then a smile. Huge "tells" in body language.
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there's a mini-series about this dude and 4 others titled "Cambridge Spies, well worth it.
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This was a very productive and useful video. Thank you for making it.
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Fascinating. Thanks for uploading.
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The KGB guy and Philby's daughter are the smartest, most interesting characters in this sorry tale. And Chapman Pincher, super-sleuth, of course.
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Parliament passed a law years ago that all main exits from a British Embassy must be located within 40 steps from a pub or bar.
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Kim Philby-public school, Trinity, promised immunity for a full confession . Anthony Blunt-public school, Trinity, given immunity for a full confession. John Cairncross public school, Trinity, given immunity for a full confession. George Blake- no public school. didn`t go to Trinity, full confession and given 42 years in prison. surprise ,surprise.
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The man in charge of "Anti Soviet Section" is in face a "Soviet Agent" My Goodness KGB, you guys were Pure Artists lol
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John le Carré described Ben Macintyre's fact based novel, The Spy and The Traitor, as "the best true spy story I have ever read". It was about Kim Philby's Russian counterpart, a KGB Colonel named Oleg Gordievsky, codename Sunbeam. In 1974 Gordievsky became a double agent working for MI6 in Copenhagen which was when Bill Fairclough aka Edward Burlington unwittingly launched his career as a secret agent for MI6. Fairclough and le Carré knew of each other: le Carré had even rejected Fairclough's suggestion in 2014 that they collaborate on a book. As le Carré said at the time, "Why should I? I've got by so far without collaboration so why bother now?" A realistic response from a famous expert in fiction in his eighties! Gordievsky never met Fairclough, but he did know Fairclough's handler, Colonel Alan McKenzie aka Colonel Alan Pemberton. It is little wonder therefore that in Beyond Enkription, the first fact based novel in The Burlington Files espionage series, genuine double agents, disinformation and deception weave wondrously within the relentless twists and turns of evolving events. Beyond Enkription is set in 1974 in London, Nassau, Port au Prince and the Americas. Edward Burlington, a far from boring accountant, unwittingly started working for Alan McKenzie in MI6 and later worked eyes wide open for the CIA. What happens is so exhilarating and bone chilling it makes one wonder why bother reading espionage fiction when facts are so much more breathtaking. Len Deighton and Mick Herron could be forgiven for thinking they co-wrote the raw noir anti-Bond narrative, Beyond Enkription. Atmospherically it's reminiscent of Ted Lewis' Get Carter of Michael Caine fame. If anyone ever makes a film based on Beyond Enkription they'll only have themselves to blame if it doesn't go down in history as a classic espionage thriller.
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I'm still amazed he was able to fool Angelton the way he did. Old Jim went off the deep end after that.
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Blake gets 42 years in jail, while the 'establishment' 'to the manor born' other 5 all get the chance to scoot.
