Tony Comer

Formerly Departmental Historian GCHQ

TCHisTree at one other place; @tonycomer.bsky.social at another.

[Dr. Dan Lomas @Sandbagger_01]

👀 Great to see Dr. Chris Baxter's new website. Chris is an outstanding historian of early Twentieth Century security, intelligence and diplomacy, who was involved with the Cabinet Office and FCO/FCDO on exciting projects. Have a look ⏬️

🔗 https://t.co/QUh0qGynFR

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

On 27 November 1943, Guy Liddell, a senior MI5 officer recorded a story about Winston Churchill.

(Source TNA KV4/192)

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

How you maintain Communications Security in the heat of battle? A new post at https://t.co/WRLJBi3eCN looks at the Battle of the North Cape and concludes that leaving it pragmatically to the people on the spot may be the most sensible approach.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

@pinstripedline @SchemieG 'little known' perhaps rather than 'forgotten'. An excellent thread.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

@ChrisGreenwayUK Sorry, Chris: I've just seen this. I've commented on your comment (and corrected the mistake you noticed).

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

I explore need-to-know again in a post at https://t.co/KYBT2dhRZV looking at an Official Secrets Act case in which a clear Sigint connection was ignored because the investigators had no idea it existed.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

@pinstripedline Did it get subsumed into Hinsley?

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

How good is 'I was there' as a guarantee of historical memory? Not, perhaps, as good as it might seem. A new post at https://t.co/kVWXp6vQ90 looks at records and memory.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

It's easy to overclassify and it's easy to be nervous about release. An illustration of this point in a new post on https://t.co/kVWXp6wnYy

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

@shashj @CiarliniKoerner Thanks, @shashj. I posted about the encryption of Italian Diplomatic, not military, messages. @CiarliniKoerner is right that the English-language history of Sigint in the Mediterranean during the SWW (and the skill of Italian cryptanalysts) is inadequate.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

A new post at https://t.co/gtoFfKPGab looks at what can happen when two opposing sides are using the same cryptosystems.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

Excellent news that Bill Tutte is being commemorated on a VE-80 stamp. What a pity that the Post Office doesn't seem to know that 'codebreak' isn't a verb and that codes and ciphers are different. If only there was a national agency that they could have approached for advice ...

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

This is excellent, spelling out the difficulties for an Inquiry asked to assess, not just how intelligence was acquired and assessed a quarter of a century ago, but how, at that time, without the benefit of hindsight, it should have been acted on.
https://t.co/IXGo0xTE8I

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

A really interesting edition of Código Crystal. An interview with former CNI Head Felix Sanz Roldán (in Spanish) about secrecy and transparency. He argues that a release and declassification legislation would increase trust in intelligence agencies.

https://t.co/969CL0MxtF

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

Austerity was really hard in 1949: but there was a welcome mitigation for staff at GCHQ. See https://t.co/kVWXp6vQ90 for what happened.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

This is a fascinating thread and illustrates why security plays a large part in the details of the UKUSA Agreement. Recipients have to give assurance before they receive classified material that they will protect it to the originator's satisfaction, but these waters can run deep.

[Sir Humphrey @pinstripedline]

In 1960 the Joint Intelligence Committee and GCHQ launched an urgent investigation when it became clear that Sir Winston Churchills private papers, then in public hands, contained 'ULTRA' material.

Short thread and PSL blog on keeping ULTRA secret in the 1960s...

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

The link should of course be https://t.co/WRLJBi2GNf

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

Is the earliest satirical novel about IA a heavily disguised satire on GCHQ as well? See my latest post on https://t.co/WOAIRHIACH ...

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

The lives traitors live(d)! Post-confession Anthony Blunt's drinks bill was £100 a month in 1965 and he claims to have lived for a day on gin: when gin was £1/10/- (£1.50) a bottle.

[Tony Comer @TCHisTree]

Some first thoughts on what newly released MI5 files on John Cairncross tell us about his time as a Soviet agent at Bletchley Park available at https://t.co/WRLJBi3eCN. Some new detail, but there's nothing particularly spectacular.