Some of those same birds are still flapping wings in the skies above Washington. I had, of course, signed the Official Secrets Act, content in the knowledge I was working within the law for Britains protection. David Dayen is the Prospects executive editor. "Because I think people see thatthe leaders of both the US and the UK conceivably could be considered war criminals, and yet they are walking free.". So, Im not really answering your question well, but her feeling was just: Now I dont belong in this company. And just coming from my perspective, the press, because a lot of this is a story about the press, and how they handle it. "Obviously, we are compressing a story that took place in real life over a period of a year into two hours. Katharine Gun, former intelligence specialist turned whistleblower, discusses the new film "Official Secrets" which details why she leaked a classified memo. The issue is provocation. My job had been to listen to Chinese communications, translate them from Mandarin to English and produce reports for different government departments. That seems like the central undercurrent that is playing throughout the entire film. Iraq All Over Again? It should take the facts as they lead. Official Secrets Trailer #1 (2019) | Movieclips Trailers, Imagine Donald Trump Running an Actual War. Keira said no one knows Katharine, and that's not an insult to Katharine. Seven times I've submitted articles to you with an alternate point of view, and seven times you've turned me down. For the future, I hope the film will help locate the missing pieces from the story. And maybe if we went to work for Enron and we liked our job well enough, and its a job. Most whistleblowers leak after the event to expose perceived wrongdoing. By printing off the memo, putting it in her handbag and taking it home, she was already committing a serious breach of the Official Secrets Act. ", Keira Knightley and Katharine Gun at the London premiere of "Official Secrets. But I talk to people and there does seem to be a sense of failure that, despite all the campaigning and all the marching and all the protesting and everything they did, it made not a ha'porth of difference. Exaggerating threats to provoke a war? But Katharine Gun, whos now the subject of a new film, the Gavin Hood-directed Official Secrets, did a lot moreand became one of the most important political whistleblowers that most Americans have never heard of. It was what I was thinking, what I was feeling. Director Gavin Hood Writers Sara Bernstein Gregory Bernstein Gavin Hood Stars Keira Knightley Matt Smith Matthew Goode "Financially it's the toughest," she said. At first, I heard nothing. You dont have to agree with what she did, Im just telling you what she did. I was arrested for a breach of section one of the Official Secrets Act 1989 and held overnight in a cell in the basement of the Cheltenham Police headquarters. That kind of propaganda has to stop. It gives me an interesting pause. You can look up Nicole Mowbray, she wrote an article in The Guardian a couple weeks ago, about this worst day of her life. But I do want to give her credit that I think I didn't do her justice enough in the moment that she leaked that memo; it changed so quickly to war that we don't really get a moment to absorb the fact that as a result of her leaking that memo, there was no vote at the UN Security Council. But ultimately, heres why I thinkthis might sound like a strange statement. We typically, in the movie business, ever since Joseph Campbell wrote The Hero of A Thousand Facesand Im not meaning to be sarcastic because thats a great piece of work, but it spoiled the idea that every development executive is reading these books because the hero we meet and then something upsets their world and the antagonist that must equal the hero, and eventually we go through these loops and the hero triumphs in the end. Then, the world is safer until the sequel when it all happens again. But George W. Bush did something that, thankfully, Trump hasnt pulled off yet: He took us to war. WebIn 2003, Katharine Gun exposed a plot by U.S. security officials to spy on United Nations members as they ramped up pressure to secure a resolution to go to war with Iraq, and Does your loyalty lie to your own conscious, does your loyalty lie to your marriage, does your loyalty lie to your government, does your loyalty lie to your country? And it was there that, to our amazement and totally without warning, the CPS dropped the charges before the trial had even started. To separate fact from fiction, Newsweek spoke to the real Gun and Bright, as well as Official Secrets director Gavin Hood. Progressive values. WebHer husband, Yaar Gn, is a Turkish Kurd. I didnt know until I looked really deeply into this that theres really two schools of thought. It was only later in the green room that I asked what all the fuss had been about, wondering aloud if it had been the environmental protest group Extinction Rebellion. Rishi Sunak is urgently reviewing his private exchanges with Matt Hancock after bombshell leak of ex-Health 'Drinks cold in fridge at DH!' Questioner: It was so heartening to hear you talk about that hero's journey because I feel like we so often take compassion, passion, integrity for granted as a call to action. What It Feels Liketo Survive a Chemical Attack. Truth about Covid care home testing row: Timeline lays bare what was said, by who and when. So important was this email, I knew it might even derail the case that Tony Blair was making for joining the Americans in an invasion. As a film of her story is planned, she tells of her anger and frustration but not her regrets, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning, Katharine Gun back in Cheltenham last week: 'This is the ugly truth of what goes on.' Right now my priorities are to ensure I am there for my daughter.". However, her husband and the father of her daughters name is Yasar Gun. "And she then said: 'My way into this is what would I as the unadorned, no-makeup, no-fancy-edges Keira Knightley what would I feel like if this memo landed on my desk?'". Liberty, the civil rights organisation, and Ben Emmerson QC had already agreed to defend me and we prepared for trial. So I said goodbye to my mom and moved to America. If there had been a UN resolution, there would have been no need to make a WMD argument because there are two legal ways to go to war. David Dayen: But he is not a headline journalist at a newspaper. This and her other writings about intelligence issues have been critically acclaimed. For example, a scene where Gun tries to get her husband out of an immigration detention center actually played out over three days during which she did not know where he was. Guided by her conscience, Katharine Gun defied her government and leaked the memo to the press, setting off a chain of events that jeopardized her freedom, her safety, but also opened the door to putting the entire Iraq invasion on trial. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images). Sound familiar? Throughout her own court case, whatonly a few knew wasthat she was also fighting for the right of her husband, who is from Turkey, to remain in the UK. The risks Gun took in revealing the UN email's existence were huge. WebWe speak with a British whistleblower whose attempts to expose lies about the Iraq invasion was called "the most important and courageous leak" in history by acclaimed I dont know if theyd have discovered me eventually, but the fact is I couldnt live a lie for ever. An insider with courage. And I think thats why you get this very honest, pure, deeply felt performance. She talks about having read all these books [about the war]. So here we are in rehearsal, and we're talking one day about the look. ", As for her own story, she recognises that 10 years on it scarcely registers with the public. 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 members of the UN Security Council, to effectively blackmail them into voting for a second resolution that would make legal the invasion of Iraq. She's based (and born and raised) in Brooklyn, New York. So she said, Can I just do nothing with my hair, put on the jeans like Katharine wore? So the wardrobe is accurate to Katharine's style. ", "I think Gavin had a really difficult time telling this story because it doesn't fit into a normal sort of storytelling mode," said Gun. She wasnt charged for eight months a gruelling period which is depicted as just a few WebThe Katharine Gun Case. She didnt know where he was for three days and she took the train down from Charlton to London to see the MP, Nigel Jones, who said exactly what he says in the movie. As the Trump administration shreds norms of American governance like a Shih Tzu going to town on a roll of toilet paper, the last worst president is largely silent, busied with .css-umdwtv{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-decoration-thickness:.0625rem;text-decoration-color:#FF3A30;text-underline-offset:0.25rem;color:inherit;-webkit-transition:background 0.4s;transition:background 0.4s;background:linear-gradient(#ffffff, #ffffff 50%, #d5dbe3 50%, #d5dbe3);-webkit-background-size:100% 200%;background-size:100% 200%;}.css-umdwtv:hover{color:#000000;text-decoration-color:border-link-body-hover;-webkit-background-position:100% 100%;background-position:100% 100%;}canine portraiture and now the subject of nearly fond nostalgia. However, Gun was well aware that any attempt to release the memo would find her running afoul of Britains Official Secrets Act, which criminalizes the leaking of intelligence-related information. And in her case, she risked both her job and her freedom and whatever you think of her politically, I think that takes some guts. WebAnd they failed, in part, I believe, because Katharine Gun leaked that memo, Official Secrets director Gavin Hood told Democracy Now!. Hundreds of thousands were killed. The difficulties of translating Gun's story also made writing the climax of the film tricky. During the American-lead 2003 campaign for United Nations support for an invasion of Iraq, Gun, who's played in the film by Keira Knightley, was a 28 year-old Mandarin translator working for the UKs Government Communications Headquarters, the nations equivalent of the American NSA. WebKatharine Gun was a young specialist working for Britains Government Communications Headquarters when she exposed a highly confidential memo that revealed the United Over the weekend, I got to work. So when, on the first Sunday of March, 2003, my leak appeared on the front page of The Observer newspaper, I was overcome with shock. When you support The American Prospect, youre supporting fellow readers who arent able to give, and countering the class system for information. Iran, meanwhile, says it doesn't want war, but will defend itself. I did feel like, Well, I failed.. So, to find that it would be dramatised on the big screen was as wonderfully welcome as it was astonishing. The poor woman is based on a real person. And Where Is Katharine Gun, JUST 36 HOURS TO GO IN OUR WINTER CAMPAIGN. Ms Gun worked as a translator at the GCHQ building in Cheltenham, pictured. the waning support for public institutions today. 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