Spymaster speaks out

In the James Bond movies the head of British intelligence is portrayed as a patrician civil servant smoking a pipe in a leather arm chair who amiably reprimands 007 for his womanising. In practice, it is one of the most important jobs within the UK Establishment with some of the toughest decisions to make regarding the safety of individual agents and the country’s security. Sir Richard Dearlove was the man in that leather armchair between 1999 and 2004 and on Wednesday October 31st he will give a POLIS lecture about his extraordinary career.