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Intelligence for security (2021)
Book Chapter
Lomas, D. (2021). Intelligence for security. In A. Masys (Ed.), Handbook of Security Science (1-17). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51761-2_38-1

The use of intelligence by states to improve decision making and per se national security has been commonplace. Intelligence – the collection, processing, analysis and sharing of information – has been seen as a state-based process, ensuring that dec... Read More about Intelligence for security.

Party politics and intelligence : the Labour Party, British intelligence and oversight, 1979-1994 (2021)
Journal Article
Lomas, D. (2021). Party politics and intelligence : the Labour Party, British intelligence and oversight, 1979-1994. Intelligence and National Security, 36(3), 410-430. https://doi.org/10.1080/02684527.2021.1874102

For much of the 20th Century, intelligence and security was a taboo subject for Parliamentarians. While Labour backbenchers had suspicions of the secret state, there was a long-held bipartisan consensus that debates on intelligence were ‘dangerous an... Read More about Party politics and intelligence : the Labour Party, British intelligence and oversight, 1979-1994.

Security, scandal and the security commission report, 1981 (2020)
Journal Article
Lomas, D. (2020). Security, scandal and the security commission report, 1981. Intelligence and National Security, 35(5), 734-750. https://doi.org/10.1080/02684527.2020.1740387

This research note introduces the December 1981 report of the Security Commission. This report was never released with the main conclusions forming the basis of a statement by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, published in May 1982. But the 1981 repo... Read More about Security, scandal and the security commission report, 1981.

‘Hello, world’ : GCHQ, Twitter and social media engagement (2020)
Journal Article
McLoughlin, L., Ward, S., & Lomas, D. (2020). ‘Hello, world’ : GCHQ, Twitter and social media engagement. Intelligence and National Security, 35(2), 233-251. https://doi.org/10.1080/02684527.2020.1713434

In May 2016, Britain’s signals intelligence agency the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) joined the social media platform Twitter with the message ‘Hello, world’. For an agency once seen as the UK’s ‘most secret’, GCHQ’s moved to social m... Read More about ‘Hello, world’ : GCHQ, Twitter and social media engagement.

Facing the dictators : Anthony Eden, the Foreign Office and British Intelligence, 1935 – 1945 (2019)
Journal Article
Lomas, D. (2020). Facing the dictators : Anthony Eden, the Foreign Office and British Intelligence, 1935 – 1945. International History Review, 42(4), 794-812. https://doi.org/10.1080/07075332.2019.1650092

This article uses the inter-war and wartime career of Anthony Eden, as a vehicle to understand the little understood relationship between secret intelligence, British Foreign Secretaries and the Foreign Office. While secret intelligence is no longer... Read More about Facing the dictators : Anthony Eden, the Foreign Office and British Intelligence, 1935 – 1945.

“Crocodiles in the corridors” : security vetting, race and Whitehall, 1945 – 1968 (2019)
Journal Article
Lomas, D. (2021). “Crocodiles in the corridors” : security vetting, race and Whitehall, 1945 – 1968. Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 49(1), 148-177. https://doi.org/10.1080/03086534.2019.1648231

In July 2018, the UK’s Intelligence & Security Committee issued a report into diversity and inclusion across the intelligence and security community. The picture the report painted was far from satisfactory; in short, Britain’s intelligence agencies... Read More about “Crocodiles in the corridors” : security vetting, race and Whitehall, 1945 – 1968.

A tale of torture? Alexander Scotland, the London Cage and post-war British secrecy (2013)
Book Chapter
Lomas, D. (2013). A tale of torture? Alexander Scotland, the London Cage and post-war British secrecy. In C. Moran, & C. Murphy (Eds.), Intelligence Studies in Britain and the US : historiography since 1945 (251-262). Edinburgh University Press

The immediate post-war period saw the publication of a number of secret service accounts recounting wartime exploits, giving the impression that, with the end of hostilities, these could now be revealed. In fact, as has been clearly demonstrated by R... Read More about A tale of torture? Alexander Scotland, the London Cage and post-war British secrecy.