Word: blunts
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Burgess, who dined with British Cabinet ministers, concentrated on political intelligence; Maclean was an expert on the U.S. and British atomic-bomb programs. What secrets Blunt gave to the Soviets is unknown. He had no access to classified information after 1945, but he stayed in touch with Soviet intelligence...
...Twelve years later, the British government identified H.A.R. ("Kim") Philby, a diplomat-turned-journalist and fellow spy, as the "third man," who had tipped the two that they were about to be caught. Philby had by then followed Burgess and Maclean to Moscow. But Boyle claims that it was Blunt who was the tipster, phoning Burgess on May 25, 1951, a Friday, to warn him that British authorities would begin interrogating Maclean the following Monday...
...Blunt confess in 1964? Boyle says he did it voluntarily, out of fear that he would be exposed. Then, says Boyle, the government voluntarily promised him immunity from prosecution-a clear implication that the British Establishment was covering...
Thatcher's version is different. According to her, British intelligence questioned Blunt eleven times between 1951 and 1964. In the initial investigation of Burgess and Maclean, said Thatcher, an unnamed source told the spy catchers that Maclean had said he was a "Comintern agent" as early as 1937 and that Blunt was one of his contacts. But the investigators could find no concrete evidence of treason, and finally decided that only an offer of immunity could induce Blunt to talk. The offer was made, Thatcher said. Blunt confessed and "subsequently provided useful information about Russian intelligence activities." The Queen...
...before Thatcher made that public statement, an official of the Cabinet Office discreetly warned Blunt of the impending disclosures and the erstwhile curator immediately vanished from his London flat. "The situation is quite scandalous," declared Labor M.P. James Wellbeloved. The Prime Minister's spokesman replied that the warning was a "common courtesy" and denied that Blunt was a fugitive from justice. Though the Queen stripped him of his knighthood last week, he apparently will incur no other punishment. Reflecting widespread public indignation over the incident, the Guardian charged that the cover-up by successive governments was "a totally abject...