Secret Affairs: Britain's Collusion with Radical Islam

381 Pages·2015·2.9 MB·English

by  Mark Curtis

Mark Curtis is an author, journalist and consultant. His previous books include
the best-selling Web of Deceit: Britain’s Real Role in the World, and Unpeople:
Britain’s Secret Human Rights Abuses. He was formerly a Research Fellow at
the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), Director of the
World Development Movement and Head of Policy at ActionAid and Christian
Aid. Websites: www.markcurtis.info and www.curtisresearch.org
SECRET AFFAIRS
BRITAIN’S COLLUSION WITH RADICAL ISLAM
MARK CURTIS
A complete catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library on request The right of
Mark Curtis to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
Copyright © 2010 Mark Curtis
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
First published in 2010 by Serpent’s Tail,
an imprint of Profile Books Ltd
3A Exmouth House Pine Street
London EC1R OJH
website: www.serpentstail.com
ISBN 978 1 84668 763 1
Designed and typeset by folio at Neuadd Bwll, Llanwrtyd Wells Printed and bound in Great Britain by
Clays, Bungay, Suffolk 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper this book is printed on is certified by the © 1996 Forest Stewardship Council A.C. (FSC). It is
ancient-forest friendly. The printer holds FSC chain of custody SGS-COC-2061
Special thanks to John Pilger, Tom Mills for excellent research assistance, my
agent Veronique Baxter, numerous people at Serpent’s Tail, especially Pete
Ayrton, Stephen Brough, Ruthie Petrie, Rebecca Gray and Diana Broccardo.
And, above all, to my wife, Florence.

Contents
INTRODUCTION
1. IMPERIAL DIVIDE AND RULE
2. PARTITION IN INDIA AND PALESTINE
3. SHOCK TROOPS IN IRAN AND EGYPT
4. ISLAM VERSUS NATIONALISM
5. THE GLOBAL ISLAMIC MISSION
6. ‘HANDY WEAPONS’ IN JORDAN AND EGYPT
7. THE SAUDI AND IRANIAN REVOLUTIONS
8. TRAINING IN TERRORISM: THE AFGHAN JIHAD
9. THE DICTATOR, THE KING AND THE AYATOLLAH
10. NURTURING AL-QAIDA
11. PAKISTAN’S SURGE INTO CENTRAL ASIA
12. A COVERT WAR IN BOSNIA
13. KILLING QADAFI, OVERTHROWING SADDAM
14. INTRIGUES IN THE SOUTHERN BALKANS
15. 9/11 CONNECTIONS
16. LONDONISTAN: A ‘GREEN LIGHT’ TO TERRORISM
17. 7/7 AND THE LONDON–ISLAMABAD AXIS
18. CONFRONTING THE NEW MIDDLE EAST
19. ALLIED TO THE ENEMY: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN
NOTES
INDEX
Introduction
THE BRITISH INTELLIGENCE agencies say they have prevented twelve terrorist
plots in Britain over the past decade, and claim there are 2,000 known terrorist
suspects organised in 200 networks.1 Counter-terrorism officials warn of a ‘huge
spectacular’, and shooting and hostage-taking raids involving gunmen with
bombs.2 The extent of the terrorist threat is all too easily exaggerated for
political purposes – the former director of MI5, Stella Rimington, has, for
example, accused the government of ‘frightening people in order to be able to
pass laws which restrict civil liberties’.3 But Britain, along with many other
Western countries, clearly does face a threat from radical Islamic groups. The
July 2005 London bombings, which killed 52 people and injured over 700,
constituted the single worst terrorist atrocity on British soil and the first
‘successful’ attack by Islamists in Britain. The British courts have convicted
over 80 individuals who planned to kill British citizens in acts of terrorism.
Meanwhile, Britain’s most senior military figure calls the threat posed by
Islamist extremism ‘the struggle of our generation – perhaps our Thirty Years’
War’.4
How we got to this point has been the subject of much speculation in the
media. Various answers have been given as to how ‘home-grown’ British
citizens can turn to terrorist violence and be prepared to blow themselves up.
Right-wing commentators typically blame British liberal culture, arguing that
laws have not been tough enough to clamp down on extremism, or even that
multi-culturalism has made it impossible to challenge people of a different
faith.5 The government has been widely attacked since 7/7 for failing for years to
clamp down on a number of Islamist radicals in Britain – most notoriously, Abu
Hamza, the former preacher at the Finsbury Park mosque in north London, who
was allowed to openly espouse violent jihad to numerous young Muslims.6
For others, and many on the political Left, the terrorist threat has been
fuelled by British military interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan and Whitehall’s
siding with Israel in its conflict in occupied Palestine. These are surely major
factors, of which British officials are perfectly aware: in April 2005, for
example, the Joint Intelligence Committee stated, in a report leaked the
following year, that the Iraq conflict ‘has exacerbated the threat from
international terrorism and will continue to have an impact in the long term. It
has reinforced the determination of terrorists who were already committed to
attacking the West and motivated others who were not.’7 This followed a joint
Home Office/Foreign Office report, called ‘Young Muslims and Extremism’,
which was also leaked and which stated that there was ‘a perceived “double
standard”’ among many Muslims in Britain who believe that British foreign
policy, in places such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Kashmir and Chechnya is ‘against
Islam’.8
But there is a big missing link in this commentary, and Britain’s contribution
to the rise of the terrorist threat goes well beyond its current disastrous
interventions in the Middle East. The more important story, which this book
seeks to tell, is that British governments, both Labour and Conservative, have, in
pursuing the so-called ‘national interest’ abroad, colluded for decades with
radical Islamic forces, including terrorist organisations. They have connived
with them, worked alongside them and sometimes trained and financed them, in
order to promote specific foreign policy objectives. Governments have done so
in often desperate attempts to maintain Britain’s global power in the face of
increasing weakness in key regions of the world, being unable to unilaterally
impose their will and lacking other local allies. Thus the story is intimately
related to that of Britain’s imperial decline and the attempt to maintain influence
in the world.
With some of these radical Islamic forces, Britain has been in a permanent,
strategic alliance to secure fundamental, long-term foreign policy goals; with
others, it has been a temporary marriage of convenience to achieve specific
short-term outcomes. The US has been shown by some analysts to have nurtured
Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaida, but Britain’s part in fostering Islamist terrorism
is invariably left out of these accounts, and the history has never been told. Yet
this collusion has had more impact on the rise of the terrorist threat than either
Britain’s liberal culture or the inspiration for jihadism provided by the
occupation of Iraq.
The closest that the mainstream media have got to this story was in the
period immediately after 7/7, when sporadic reports revealed links between the
British security services and Islamist militants living in London. Some of these
individuals were reportedly working as British agents or informers while being
involved in terrorism overseas. Some were apparently being protected by the