I believe that all of this should have been formally acknowledged as part of the history of the second Gulf War. Before 1989, there had been a Public Interest Defence to protect whistleblowers, but that was altered amid the furore surrounding the sinking of the Argentinian Navy cruiser, the General Belgrano, in the course of the Falklands War. Hood said that this was a purposeful choice by Knightley. When do the clocks change in 2023? Right: Entertainment One, Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. Had the film appeared any earlier, however, I dont think Id have been able to watch it, let alone help the makers. One is reminded of the January 31, 2003 Oval Office meeting with George Bush, Tony Blair, and Condoleeza Rice, in which the topic of provoking Iraq to start a war was particularly revealing. Chile and Mexico and the other smaller countries were so outraged that they refused to even bring it to a vote. The difficulties of translating Gun's story also made writing the climax of the film tricky. Gun made the choice to leak the document, which Martin Bright of The Observer in Britain published in a story on March 2, 2003. 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. She said, I thought that might be quite interesting and exciting. Provocation? However, her husband and the father of her daughters name is Yasar Gun. Ive already lost a dear friend, and I cant do thisget called up two months of the year, every year, for the next 12 years. Whatever, she blew the whistle ultimately revealing the truth behind the build-up to the Iraq War--regime change, disguised as terrifying threats of weapons of mass destruction. He is just way out there in a whole other realm. US firms waiting in the wings read to pump 'billions Parents' fury as schools STILL won't tell them if they are closed tomorrow as teacher strikes continue. By the time Gun and around 100 of her colleagues received the emailed memo that would change her life, she had already come to the conclusion that the arguments for war with Iraq were not really valid arguments, she tells me. Who authorised the NSA email, for example? Most directly, it bolstered opposition to the US position from Chilean and Mexican diplomats weary of American "dirty tricks". She was horrified and leaked the email to the Observer. In real life, "the spellcheck largely happened through a series of phone calls," according to Bright, "because on a Sunday newspaper we don't work on a Sunday, and we don't work on a Monday. Is this a matter of threatening to launch a war, or is it a matter of responding to the US positioning itself for war? And isnt it also time to re-examine the Official Secrets Act? I could put a lens on, and now my job is, this actress is doing great work, lets not get tricky, lets just get the audience into her eyes so that you could see those cogs moving. ", Keira Knightley and Katharine Gun at the London premiere of "Official Secrets. "You get to the end, and there's this court case. She said, I was naive. What did you think was going to happen? Seven times I've submitted articles to you with an alternate point of view, and seven times you've turned me down. ", Speaking to Gun, and seeing her in archival footage at the end of the film, it is clear that Knightley didn't try to emulate the look or sound of the real-life Gun. Before 1989, there had been a Public Interest Defence to protect whistleblowers, but that was altered amid the furore surrounding the sinking of the Argentinian Navy cruiser, the General Belgrano, in the course of the Falklands War. "Still no regrets," she said. So, I guess we all have a threshold. I was suddenly free and bewildered. We need another Katharine Gun. Later, she gave the document to a friend, who passed it onto a contact in the anti-war movement, until it finally landed with journalists Martin Bright and Ed Vulliamy The Observer. So, she began to feel uncomfortable in the work she was doing at that point. Amazing lady, shes still a journalist. Jeb Bush Just Botched the Iraq Question. Gun sacrificed so much when she decided to leak and has worked only intermittently since. And that I think was the motivation. She said, You mean I dont have to wear a corset? To your point, in some way, she said to me, As a woman, its kind of ironic as an actress that I so often, even though Im in the modern world, that I have to find heroic women in period dramas wearing corsets. Theres something weird about that. For me as a journalist who was really getting started around that time, this climate of fear that was in place in the United States and also in the UK. Progressive values. But there's no way I would have expressed that to any of my colleagues," Gun explained. At first, I heard nothing. Everyone involved assumed the project had run into the dust, but then it appeared on the Black List, a Hollywood website for unmade film scripts, which has featured Slumdog Millionaire and The King's Speech in the past. Some of those same birds are still flapping wings in the skies above Washington. Or, in this case, when the Office of Special Plans was set up, youve got Feith and someone like Abram Shulsky, whose philosophy of intelligence is very different. Gavin Hood: I asked her the same questions, and on about my second day interviewing her, I said to her, because I wasnt sure if I should make the movie; I mean, I needed to know whose story I was telling and if she was batshit crazy. And then, she said when she got in therenow bear in mind that she still is bound by the Official Secrets Act. This and her other writings about intelligence issues have been critically acclaimed. Which really, really, really happened. Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). But depicting that climate, people who were not aware or active at that timedidn't realize how difficult this was to talk against the war both from the journalist's perspective and obviously someone who's in the intelligence community. We were in development with a particular studio, and I don't mean to be funny after such a heavy film but sometimes we need a little bit of humor. Despite the risk of a harsher sentence, I decided to plead not guilty because I felt strongly that my actions had been intended to prevent the unnecessary loss of life in an illegal war. ", Bright noted that apart from some small flourishes to heighten the drama, he didn't think Official Secrets had "any genuine liberties taken with the truth. Whistleblower Katherine Gun, right, is played by Keira Knightly in the movie Official Secrets, Gun was outraged after she learned - as part of her job with GCHQ - that the United States wanted Britain to assist in spying on fellow United Nations Security Council members to win a vote in favour of a planned war in Iraq. Taking Vitamin D each day could cut your chances of getting dementia, study claims. Was the British government aware of it? This is my second brief moment of fame. If the email did reach the newspapers, I reasoned, there would be no more than a discreet summary. They live on a smallholding, renting a house, in rural Turkey. WebThe Katharine Gun Case. It was what I was thinking, what I was feeling. I didnt know the story and I googled her. And maybe they were right, I don't know. However, Gun added that this was nothing on the anxiety she felt when the memo she had leaked ended up on the front page of The Observer, which she called "the most stressful memo of my life. Cheering crowds have never been my sort of thing. 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. For the future, I hope the film will help locate the missing pieces from the story. Gun was followed, denied legal advice and her Turkish husband faced deportation. Why did the British authorities wait eight months before charging me and then drop the charges, claiming there was insufficient evi-dence for prosecution when I had confessed to the leak from the start? And people do this in every country; they spy, they listen to what are the Chinese going to do when they get to this conference. And she said, Yep, I have no problem being asked to listen in, in instances where I might help prevent a terror attack. What this memo suggested was neither of those things it was a bridge too far for her. So we're in this development meeting, and the executive looks at me and goes, Gavin, I mean we need her running down alleys more, someone needs to throw a brick through her damn window, and when does she don her cape? It was literally the line. It wasone of the reasons I came to this country in 89 was because we were getting drafted, and I thought I cant do this. She was a spythe communications she translated had been obtained covertly, but she did the work in the interest of protecting Britain. The invasion was a huge blow, says Gun. I didnt know until I looked really deeply into this that theres really two schools of thought. "On the one hand, she's free. We need a truth-sayer. In the runup to the critical vote on war in Iraq, Katharine Gun exposed a US plot to spy on the UN. His most recent book is Monopolized: Life in the Age of Corporate Power.. There were some audience questions as well. Following the trauma inflicted on Gun, the U.K. Attorney General dropped the case against her with no warning. 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? What we have in this country is very precious, and in a sense, when I make these kind of films I don't know if I consciously do it, it's actually reminding about us that authoritarianism and governments gone awry are not okay, and what makes us strongoh, that sounds terribly pretentious, but I think you see where I'm coming from. David Dayen: I want to go to the questions now. There's an obvious scene of the immigration deportation. I don't think I've ever met a more determined character and she remained utterly convinced of the justice of her cause: "There's nothing subsequent to the invasion that makes me think it was the right decision made by Bush and Blair." Where do you draw the line? And Where Is Katharine Gun, JUST 36 HOURS TO GO IN OUR WINTER CAMPAIGN. 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. This was her first or second week at the paper. My shock turned to anger as the significance sank in. Do you vote, do you analyze who you should vote for or do you just take it for granted? However, the Pentagon says the US deployment is "in response to indications of heightened Iranian readiness to conduct offensive operations against US forces and our interests.". If Keira Knightleys remarkable performance in Official Secrets can help change that, the film will truly have been worthwhile. Gun had hoped the leak would prick the conscience of the British public, large sections of which were already taking to the streets in opposition to the war. After the charges against her were dropped in 2004, she found it difficult to find a new The paper had taken the controversial decision to back intervention in Iraq. Thankfully, time passes and the intensity of feelings fades. The truth was that in April of 2002, the two world leaders secretly had agreed on a plan to take out Saddam, all the while giving speeches insisting that the only motivation for even considering war was that horrific stockpile of deadly weapons. That's really the simplest question: When do you speak up? And I didnt have work where I was. Theres not a lot of work for translators; shes a Mandarin translator in England. I spent the following hours doubled over the toilet bowl in absolute terror. The truth is when she speaks to me, and she says, Gavin, we also go to lunch like everybody else in any other office. You work for the government. Happy and carefree, Id recently married my handsome husband and was working at GCHQ as a linguist. Webdeport Guns husband, Yasar (Adam Bakri), a Muslim Kurdish Turk who was awaiting permanent leave to remain in the U.K. 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 It was like a neon sign that was flashing at me, Gun says. And it was this book which eventually became the script for Official Secrets. David Dayen is the Prospects executive editor. Its Straussian, over the top and pretentious but basically amounts to this. WebYou 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. Yet here was a story that had the capacity to derail the war altogether. It almost started with, well, would I have the courage to do what she did in another setting maybe? Gun had, of course, been forced to abandon her career in the civil service Was it because we had demanded the Attorney Generals legal advice as part of my defence? 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. None of the Government reports into the war acknowledged it, nor did the history books. So it was a pretty awful thing to happen to her. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. [Gun was charged with violating the Official Secrets Act in Britain, but ultimately the case never went to trial.]. 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. And just coming from my perspective, the press, because a lot of this is a story about the press, and how they handle it. Maybe thats rewarding. But my point is simply this: The underpinnings of this country matter. Iran, meanwhile, says it doesn't want war, but will defend itself. And I thought: this is good. He is wonderfully articulate but super pissed off, and his PTSDbecause hes been in Iraq for yearsmanifests at just disdain for that certain person you mentioned.