I took up teaching. These folksbecause there are two legal ways you can go to war in international law. I mention those lines about working for the people rather than the government. We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work. Some journalist needs to go and have a hardcore interview with Lord Goldsmith. KATHARINE GUN: Oh, yeah. He succumbed to his wounds and Knight dragged his body downstairs, skinned him, and hung his body from a meat hook in the living room. We continue our conversation now with Katharine Gun, the whistleblower and former employee of GCHQ. Few are aware that her husband had also been thrown into troubled waters when Gun blew the lid off the alleged spy efforts in 2003. She continues to reside in Turkey and occasionally visits Britain. We were mostly in our mid-20s, so it was the usual stuff, who is going out with who. If the war was illegal and she broke the law in order to expose an illegal war and potentially save hundreds of thousands of lives, I can use this defense of necessitythats usually used in more mundane, dare I say, contextsin this great political trial., And so he says, All right, now I need to know whether the war was legal or illegal. And he says, I need to find out what Lord Goldsmiths, the attorney-generals, legal position was in the run-up to that war. And he didnt come back out again. Katharine Gun's case can also be very relevant for Julian Assange's defense: "Within half an hour, the case was dropped because the prosecution declined to offer evidence. And yeah, it was, AMY GOODMAN: And what did you think, whenbefore you had seen Katharine and met her, what did you imagine she would be like, this young woman, 27-year-old woman of conscience, who. And we can say that, you know, thatso, he comes back, under all this pressure. And she said, I have to go, mostlyto find strong female characters, I have to go back 100 and 200 years and wear a corset to play a strong female character. And she said, This isI want to do this, because its a strong female character not in a corset. And they attempt to deport your husband, who is a? Considering the support it has received from its central character and the journalist who helped get the story published, 'Official Secrets' is an accurate dive into the events that happened. You know, banks of civil servants couldnt do that. We met in London. Details at membership.theguardian.com. "That story" concerns British whistleblower Katharine Gun, played by Keira Knightley in a film that premiered at Sundance festival in January.Fluent in Mandarin, the 28-year-old Gun was . The simple fact is, she says: Truth always matters at the end of the day., Official Secrets is released on 18 October. They were just going to pick him up, and took him out. Guns leak was perhaps the last example of whistleblowing that involved a red telephone box and a photocopier, rather than downloads. AMY GOODMAN: And so, you decide to go back and revealwho was it that was questioning you? AMY GOODMAN: And so, what did you do when they said, Were going to take each one of you into a room.. Macdonald stated that Gun would not have received a fair trial without the disclosure of information that would have compromised national security. Does he try to treat it? Youre, KATHARINE GUN: And then I was taken away. AMY GOODMAN: That was 2014. And nor did the story end. And its sothe nonpermanent members, who realized they were being hacked and their personal things were beingin order to try and blackmail them into a vote. AMY GOODMAN: And when did that come out? What happened next is the subject of a new Hollywood movie starring Keira Knightley as Katharine Gun. But I wasnt thinking about myself really. Were on the set. Young, in love, with a beautiful toddler and a baby on the way, Mary Katharine expected her husband of four years, Jake Brewer, to return from cycling in a charity event. In its absence, Tony Blair won another election in 2005. I grew up in Taiwan, which was a military dictatorship. The little-told story of British intelligence whistleblower Katharine Gun leaves a trail of unanswered questions worth probing, even 16 years later, . Laggies. Just occasionally Gun is invited to speak at conferences organised by the likes of accuracy.org or VIPS (the Veterans Intelligence Professionals for Sanity). I had, you know, encounters with Blair. Yes, in 2003, Gun was working for British intelligencethat's . I thought you said youre sick. And I said, I need to talk to you. And so we went into a small room, and I just said, I did it. And then she put her arm around me and went, Oh, Katharine. And then I burst out crying. I had made a film called Eye in the Sky, with the producer Ged Doherty, and we were looking for another project to do together. But yeah, I mean, I was hugely impressed. The online Drudge Report used the fact that the reproduced NSA memo used English spelling to cast doubt on its veracity. So, I just lay that out, really. Yes and no. So, you are there standing alone in the dock. Gun is on Mondays episode of the Guardian podcast Today in Focus, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. Shes ordinary. I was teaching Mandarin in the local college in Cheltenham. KATHARINE GUN: I was waiting outside in the police station, yes. Gun discusses her attempt to stop the Iraq War, which is the subject of the new movie Official Secrets. I think. ED VULLIAMY: Yes, the people who were giving Martin traction to get this story out, and who effectively, according to Mr. Daviess book, censored mine, about the cooking-up of the WMD and the fact that we knew Saddam didnt have any. And the potential chink in the Official Secrets Act we had found, which could have become a defence for others, the defence of necessity [of speaking up to save imminent danger to life], it wasnt tested in court.. He knows he cant save the child. And we worked five, six hours every day. And so, we talked about motherhood and all sorts of things, but I was just so impressed with how intelligent she was and how incisive she was in getting to the crux of the matter. Jed didnt sort of put the two of us together. No, Gun replied, steadily. She was 27. I mean, youre talking about the editorial leadership of The Observer, the editor-in-chief. You have the Iraq War continuing today, 16 years after George W. Bush, knowing there were not weapons of mass destruction, invades Iraq with Britain. I am currently reading a book about how to blow the whistle. Later, he stands by her as the many intricacies and dangers of his wifes profession and act of bravery surface. 2023 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. You work for the British government, her interrogator said, with a sneer. And all of a sudden his safe, you know, this civil servant wife is in a whole lot of bother that he never expected to have to deal with. [5] After contemplating the email over the weekend, Gun gave the email to a friend who was acquainted with journalists. You werent particularly worried. KATHARINE GUN: I dont know. Gun, a translator with the British intelligence service known as Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), received a document just before the war from an NSA manager, seeking British intelligence support in spying on . The comedown after they dropped the case, and trying to recover from that, was quite stressful.. Gun, too, had expressed relief that the events are now part of a broader discussion due to the film and that she can finally talk about it without stress. And I was tasked to set up a website to look into this. Bright has also been closely involved with the film. I was called up on Tuesday. I met her in August in Durham, when she was on a brief visit to see her father. Be consistent. But deep inside me, I didnt feel guilty. And so I did. I'm Amy Goodman. We have sort of, you know, I want to take my country back from all those Portuguese nurses and Polish plumbers, that we really must get rid of, and sort of whats best for Britain. You know, we dont have an opposition in our country, whereas you do in yours, thank god. . [25][26] Together with journalist Peter Beaumont, Gun advised and consulted over the years it took to make the film and they are "very happy with the result.[20]. The memo was a top-secret request to monitor the private communication of UN delegates for scraps of information, personal or otherwise, that could be used to give the US an edge in leveraging support for the invasion. Its incredibly daunting, you know. But, I mean, I ended up being a whistleblower myself within that organization. And that mattered, because, for all their faults, it seems to me that Tony Blair and George Bush understood that if they were caught out in a lie, that was a problem for them. As soon as I opened the door and he saw me coming in, and he could see something was wrong, and thenand I said, Theyve taken him. And he went, The bastards! So, anyway, I was on the phone. [6] She left teaching in 1999, and after some temporary jobs, finding it difficult to find work as a linguist, Gun applied to GCHQ in 2001, after reading a newspaper advertisement for the organisation. This is viewer supported news. Before I knew it, I had spent two hours researching Katharine. So, 600,000 Iraqi people died. The cop says, you know, Heres your ticket. Youre guilty of breaking the speed, but youre guilty of a crime. Katharine Teresa Gun (ne Harwood;[1] born 1974) is a British linguist who worked as a translator for the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). The official editorial line, led by the then editor Roger Alton (now an executive editor at the Daily Mail) and political editor Kamal Ahmed (now editorial director of BBC News) was in close support of the Blair governments position on the invasion. [12] A government spokesman said that the decision to drop the case had been made before the defence's demands had been submitted. No one else including myself has ever done what Gun did: tell secret truths at personal risk, before an imminent war, in time, possibly, to avert it.. Well, this article is all about the Katherine Johnson childhood, Katherine Johnson husband (s), Katherine Johnson family and Her career in NASA. AMY GOODMAN: But what caused you to say no? But a part of me thought: Damn we could have put the war on trial. AMY GOODMAN: So, theyre processing him. You hardly told anybody what you had done. Ed Vulliamys character, played by Rhys Ifans in the film, says, you know, he effing caved at the time when his country needed him most. ED VULLIAMY: Thank you. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. After competing in the singing competition, she launched an acting career and was . ED VULLIAMY: Its a story of endeavor, to no avail. But I felt this information was explosive, it needed to get out. For the past nine years she has been living in Turkey with her Turkish husband and their 11-year-old daughter. All I want to do is feel the emotions that this young woman felt, and dont want to be fussed over. And it was great. But, you know, it. [23] Daniel Ellsberg praised the swiftness and importance of Gun taking action, saying it was in some ways more significant than his own whistleblowing on the Vietnam War. Right? You didnt have that kind of support. There are lots of loose ends here still. According to evidence, he woke up during the attack but could not fight her off. Who is her husband? Presumably the events mark a before and after in her life. Guardian Australia acknowledges the traditional owners and custodians of Country throughout Australia and their connections to land, waters and community. GAVIN HOOD: Chile, Bulgaria, Angola, Cameroon, Pakistan, Mexico. I wasno, as soon as he didnt come out, I. whistleblower and former specialist for Britains Government Communications Headquarters. It wasn't that she was naive . The Tony Blair Conscience Fund or something? And Mr.. AMY GOODMAN: Were going to leave it there, and I want to thank you all so much for being with us, Katharine Gun, the whistleblower; Observer journalists at the time, Martin Bright and Ed Vulliamy; and Gavin Hood, who is the director of Official Secrets, the story of Katharine Gun revealing the lies that led to the Iraq War on both sides of the ocean, in Britain and the United States, and led to so many deaths. And you had a showing in San Francisco. As well as illuminating Guns story, though, the film gives what was, by any standards, one of the great scoops of recent British journalism the credit that is long overdue. KATHARINE GUN: Well, OK, I know I was guilty in the facts of the matter. I mean, I think we did feel that we journalisticallyyou know, we could have done more as a newspaper. Sorry, no pun intended, Katharine. So her moral certainty was rooted in those formative experiences? She was the real-life translator who photocopied . Among them were Reverend Jesse Jackson, Daniel Ellsberg (the US government official who leaked the Pentagon Papers), and Congressman Dennis Kucinich. AMY GOODMAN: Katharine, has your 11-year-old daughter seen the film? I didnt want to be that. He didnt know I had leaked this memo. Official Secrets, directed by Gavin Hood, is the third in a loose trilogy of political . For example, youre racing to the hospital with your wife. AMY GOODMAN: And this is a critical moment, when you say October, because thats when the U.S. Senate voted to authorize war. Initially, Gun decided to teach Mandarin Chinese in Britain. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. MARTIN BRIGHT: OK, youre making me feel really bad about going to work for him now. It is not often that a persons character is revealed in two sentences. Hes repackaged himself as sort of the European. GAVIN HOOD: And then, for five days, I interviewed Katharine and just made notes. But this gets out, and suddenly you see it on the front page of The Observer when you go to buy, what, milk in the morning for you and your husband. MARTIN BRIGHT: Well, they didnt even say why. I think of journalists as being bullet-proof in a way, she says, but obviously not., She and Bright have done several question and answer sessions in the US after the film has been screened at various festivals. And now you go back into work. I think its important for people to find that truth and follow through on it, Gun opined, and its certainly worth remembering. Her story, which reveals what a country will do when it wants war and claims it does not, is told in an updated book and a major motion picture soon to be released Official . Maybe? You may not know the name Katharine Gun unless you live in the United Kingdom, but she was a pivotal figure in the run-up to the Iraq War.Or at least, she could have been. And they said they would try their best. Inside the world of ministers secrets, Iraq war whistleblowers trial was halted due to national security threat, Permanent Record by Edward Snowden review the whistleblowers memoir, 'They wanted me gone': Edward Snowden tells of whistleblowing, his AI fears and six years in Russia, I had a moral duty: whistleblowers on why they spoke up, 'You've caused an international incident': how my work mistake came back to haunt me, Fortheir eyes only: the secret stories ministers dont want you to read, Take it from a whistleblower: Chilcot's jigsaw puzzle is missing a few pieces, Hollywood beckons for whistleblower who risked jail over Iraq dirty tricks. Somebody says, Lord Goldsmith, the defense to your charge against Katharine Gun is they want your documents. Case dropped. Maybe there will be sympathy.. AMY GOODMAN: Martin, you went on to work with Tony Blair, didnt you? I mean, thats why MartinI remember Martin and Ed. Whats the defense? Its millions. But, yes, I did. Within half an hour, the case was dropped because the prosecution declined to offer evidence. Thats [inaudible]. We didnt talk about politics much. Her performance reminds you of the sentiment of Daniel Ellsberg, the man who famously leaked the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times in 1971, revealing the full truth of American involvement in Vietnam. AMY GOODMAN: So, and we want to get to all that, but nowwe want to get to all that, but right now youre showing this film around the country. KATHARINE GUN: Oh, yes, absolutely. You know, any tiny lingering doubts we had about whether this was a sophisticated Russian forgery, as some people suggested, or, you knowwe absolutely knew that this was real. Some people have very low tolerance of wrongdoing, whether it is fiddling expenses, or whatever. In fact, Iyou know, I couldnt bear to watch the scenes. That accountability is key. ", "US plan to bug Security Council: the text", "Let's free the Official Secrets Act from its cold war freeze | Alex Bailin", "Leaking or briefing? So, in the film, when the director of public prosecutions says to Ben Emmerson, trying to wiggle out of it, Listen, it wasnt my decision to prosecute. Thats actually true. [11], The case came to court on 25 February 2004. [4], After spending her childhood in Taiwan, where she attended Morrison Academy until the age of 16, Katharine returned to Britain to study for her A-levels at Moira House School, a girls' boarding school in Eastbourne. Yeah, I mean, they knew, in fact, GCHQ, I think, because theres this system whereby, you know, before the news goes to print, the government and various organizations get the front pages, so they know whatslike, before it goes to press. Do you think shed meet with me? Because I think we were both a little skeptical of each other. Katharine Gun at Bow Street magistrates court in 2003 after being charged with breaching the Official Secrets Act. I do not gather intelligence so the government can lie to the British people., Sixteen years have passed since Katharine Gun said those words, but they still ring in the air. So, you know, it doesnt end, as Martin said. And really, you know, she had so many questions for me, and she really genuinely wanted to know about the whole situation. And, he says to me, she explained that Goldsmiths positionif I called for those documents, I would find out that he had been consistently saying that war without a U.N. resolution would be illegal. I watched you last night at one of the premieres of the film, a kind of secret showing of Official Secrets. The last few hectic days have left her relieved and happy, she says, but completely uncertain as to her future. I wonder what she made of the scattershot download methods of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange? I felt like saying, I tried to tell you this seven times, and you would not let me print it. You know, it's tough. And that if the perpetrators in these situations get away scot-free, that has a knock-on effect. Sometimes you break stories, and networks ring you and say they want to interview you, and then they drop you because of the agenda. You're KATHARINE GUN: . [5], On 13 November 2003, Gun was charged with an offence under section 1 of the Official Secrets Act 1989. And yet this rather shy 30-year-old leaked details of an alleged plot to bug UN delegates before the Iraq war and was sacked from her . I mean, no ones going tono crocodile tears over that. You know, this is hundreds of thousands of people killed. AMY GOODMAN: But once everyone did, you knew. So, you get this memo. It was in character, I think. I mean, this is difficult for me to say this, but, for those of your viewers who are interested in what happens in the mediaMartin and I, here we are, doing our bestthe two people involved, who are in the film, ED VULLIAMY: The top people are, respectively, managing editor of the Daily Mail, which is a sort of rather. In the film, Official Secrets, she is played by Keira Knightley. We, as a collective group of countries, decide that we need to stop an event, a humanitarian disaster or a genocide or whatever. I mean, my initial encounter with him at the Faith Foundation was extremely concerning, in fact, because he said that what he wanted me to do was develop a heat map, you know, an interactive map of all the madrassas, you know, Islamic schools, around the world, with my tiny team of two or three interns, showingand he looked me in the eye, and he said, I want you to be ableI want people who are looking on our website to be able to see how radical those madrassas are, by color coding.. Its all so resonant. And she hadnt said why she had resigned. AMY GOODMAN: They said you could have pled. Don't worry, we won't share or sell your information. Im Amy Goodman, as we bring you Part 2 of our extended look at a new film thats out called Official Secrets, thats coming out at the end of August, that tells the story of a British intelligence specialist, Katharine Gun, who risked everything to blow the whistle on U.S. dirty tricks at the United Nations in the lead-up to the Iraq invasion in 2003. Shes beginning to understand the issues, but she hasnt seen it yet, Gun said in 2019 when her daughter was 11-years-old. And he was the barrister who ultimately put the case before the court, as short as that trial was, on behalf of Katharine, and came up with a truly original defense to the Official Secrets Act, which is the defense of necessity. But it is tempting to believe that is the case with Katharine Gun. I mean, MI6 couldnt do that. However, Yasar could not be there for her trial as Gun, and her associates worried that his presence would turn Guns story into that of his as a refugee in Britain. And at some point, with great respect to Lord Goldsmith, he caves. KATHARINE GUN: Mm-hmm. (In fact, those -our and -ise endings had been introduced by an Observer editorial assistant, innocently following house style guidelines as she copied out the memo into the system.) How am I possibly going to do that? ED VULLIAMY: Yes. There are plenty of opportunities here for other journalists to take up the baton and find out what really happened. So, of course, it was justyou know, he was kind of thinkinghe knew I worked for the intelligence services, but he didnt know what that was. KATHARINE GUN: No, nothing atwell, they said they were arresting me on suspicion of breaking the Official Secrets Act. You get pulled over. Never mind the number injured. [14] On the day of the court hearing, Gun said, "I'm just baffled in the 21st century we as human beings are still dropping bombs on each other as a means to resolve issues. Katharine Gun, a shy and studious 28-year-old who spent her days listening in to obscure Chinese intercepts, decided to tell the world about a secret plan by the US government to spy on the United Nations.. She had received an email in her inbox asking her and . No need for weapons of mass destruction arguments. Gun splits her time between Turkey and Britain. [5] While waiting to hear whether she would be charged, Gun embarked on a postgraduate degree course in global ethics at the University of Birmingham. AMY GOODMAN: And, Katharine, describe that moment, when you come into court in this very dramatic waybut this is not just a feature film; this is your lifeand youre facing years in prison, your husband not there because youre concerned he will become the story as a refugee in Britain. You know, youre the attorney general. The biggest story was: Who cares why were in the war? Plead out. Naturally, people are curious to know more about this courageous linguist who stood her ground even as political heavyweights descended upon her. KATHARINE GUN: Yeah, and he had no money in his pocket. GAVIN HOOD: They failed. With me, it was this. And they had already taken him down into the custody suite, which is, by the way, where I had been before. Gun had, of course, been forced to abandon her career in the civil service and finally, struggling for work, left Britain altogether. The movie tells the story of Katharine Gun (played by Keira Knightley), a translator with the U.K.'s GCHQ who, in 2003, leaked top secret documents to journalist Martin Bright (Matt Smith) that . ED VULLIAMY: Yes. You know, the conservative estimates are 125,000 up to a million. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yes, we had a great, a dramatic moment at the Q&A session. I mean, I dont think we imagined that we would be still friends and still talking about it 14, 15 years later. We still dont know who Frank Koza is, or hes still not given a public interview about about what went on. I was very concerned about joining any kind of organisation like Stop the War, and being used as a focal point or something. And the case was dropped. Anyway. KATHARINE GUN: No, she hasnt. Your defense becomes: It was necessary to break the law in order to achieve a higher purpose, which is the saving of human life. She is played, with steely English resolve, by Keira Knightley. This is a rush transcript. The Observers front page story on 2 March 2003. Following the incident, Gun struggled to find work that she loved, and her husband had grown disillusioned with Britain. In this episode of Schenck Talks Bonhoeffer, TDBI Founder and President, Rev. delivered to your inbox every day! AMY GOODMAN: But so, did you have any conversations with the former prime minister at the time, Tony Blair? I said, I think Ive got a scoop, Martin. KATHARINE GUN: Yeah, I was very excited to meet Keira in London before they started shooting. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yeah, I mean, the story doesnt end. The woman in her 20s attempted to stop the war and firmly stood to her truthful morals. Democracy Now! Gun had given a copy of the memo, with no supporting verification, to a friend of a friend who eventually brought it to the Observers investigative reporter Martin Bright. I mean, we had imagined all sorts of things about who our source might be. I felt awful. So, no, I mean, I didnt want to say I was guilty when I didnt feel guilty. The difference, I think, is that hereand your program and your viewers are testimony to thisyou have an opposition. Does she tell her story when she meets new people? But lets talk about that moment in the courthouse. delivered to your inbox every day! This is her story. Youre a bit, AMY GOODMAN: So, there is an uproar. He would have had to have the authority of Lord Goldsmith to prosecute. [24] In July 2019, in a lengthy interview on the US program Democracy Now!, Gun, Gavin Hood (the film's director), and Martin Bright and Ed Vulliamy (the journalists who broke the story of the leaked memo) discussed the events that the film describes. And after about three weeks of this meeting these extraordinary people, I said to Jed, I think I think I would like to do this. And thats where the story came from. The implosion continues. The legal case against Gun was eventually dropped by the British government in 2004, after her lawyer, Ben Emmerson QC (played in the film with fabulous charisma by Ralph Fiennes), threatened to use disclosure to put the legal basis of the war itself on trial. After the case was dropped I did some media for 24 hours and then I immediately decided to run away and hide and not pursue the story any more. Its the intelligence agency, like the NSA, the National Security Agency, in the U.S. She leaked a memo revealing that the United States was collaborating with Britain in collecting sensitive information on United Nations Security Council members, countries, in order to pressure the members, the ambassadors, into supporting the Iraq invasion of March 2003. The film stars Ma. KATHARINE GUN: Need I say more? Of course he does. So I was bailed until November, when they charged me.
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