for the Annual Enigma Reunion
celebrating the 70th anniversary of the arrival of Alan Turing & Gordon Welchman.
My day began listening to Professor Nick Gesslar's talk on Cuban Numbers Station: The Little Spy Engine . Fascinating story revealed of Ana Belen Montes,
US Defence Intelligence Agency's primary intelligence analyst responsible for Cuba and Latin America, arrested days after the 9/11 attacks for espionage: "She had nothing to do with the terrorist strikes, but her arrest had everything to do with protecting the country at a time when national security was of paramount importance." ( from FBI's Case of the Cuban Spy).
Professor Gesslar discussed Scott Carmichael, Defense Intelligence Agency's senior counter-intelligence investigator covering 2000 intelligence agents including Montes. In his book True Believer, Montes is revealed as a rewarded agent who detested the manner in which the US treated its neighbour, Cuba. She considered US's actions cruel, unjust and overly aggressive. Apparently she has these words on a piece of paper pinned to a wall in her prison cell:
The king hath note of all that they intend by interceptions which they dream not of
Lancaster bomber flypasts, and a 1940s fashion show, were other notable parts of an eventful day, as were the company and reminiscence of Julia and Anna, two wonderful ladies I met at Bletchley's excellent 70th anniversary Annual Enigma Reunion.
9.9.09 postscript:
Bletchley Park features in BBC1's The Week We Went to War.
