The Foreign Office ‘Thought Police’: Foreign Office Security, the Security Department and the ‘Missing Diplomats’, 1940 – 1952

Murphy, Christopher J.; Lomas, DWB

Abstract

The protection of diplomats, embassies and sensitive information has always been
an important aspect of diplomacy. Today, security is an accepted norm of day-to-day diplomatic work,
yet the importance of security in the UK Foreign Office was not always appreciated, with the
department witnessing embarrassing security lapses and scandals during the first half of the Twentieth
Century. This article highlights the importance of security to diplomacy, offering the first significant
study of the origins and early development of the Foreign Office’s Security Department, established
in 1946. It also explores the tensions between security officials and the wider Foreign Office, which
indicate the extent to which organisational and internal cultural issues stymied good diplomatic
security, issues that were laid bare in the aftermath of the defection of Foreign Office officials Guy
Burgess and Donald Maclean in 1951.

Citation

Murphy, C. J., & Lomas, D. (2023). The Foreign Office ‘Thought Police’: Foreign Office Security, the Security Department and the ‘Missing Diplomats’, 1940 – 1952. Diplomacy and Statecraft, 34(3), 433-463. https://doi.org/10.1080/09592296.2023.2239638

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Dec 22, 2022
• Online Publication Date: Aug 24, 2023
• Publication Date: Jul 3, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jan 9, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 4, 2025
• Journal: Diplomacy and Statecraft
• Print ISSN: 0959-2296
• Electronic ISSN: 1557-301X
• Publisher: Routledge
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 34
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 433-463
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09592296.2023.2239638
• Keywords: Political Science and International Relations, Sociology and Political Science, History