John Ferris is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He is Professor of History at the University of Calgary, an Honorary Professor at the Department of International Politics of the University of Aberystwyth, and the Department of Law and Politics, Brunel University, and is an Associate Member of Nuffield College, Oxford. He has written or edited eight books and over 100 articles or chapters on diplomatic, intelligence, imperial, international, military and strategic history, and strategic studies. His latest book is Behind the Enigma: The Authorised History of GCHQ, Britain’s Secret Cyber Intelligence Agency. He lives in Calgary.
Today, we have John Ferris on the blog to answer a few of our questions about Behind the Enigma. Read on …
John Ferris (Photo by Laura Johnston @ Laura Grace Photography)
Tell us about your book, Behind the Enigma!
JF: Behind the Enigma studies the history of Britain’s signals intelligence agency, The Government Communications Headquarters. GCHQ is best known for its work against German cipher machines during the Second World War, at Bletchley Park, but it also was fundamental to Allied intelligence against the USSR during the Cold War, and to British victories in many matters, such as the Falklands conflict. Behind the Enigma is the first full study of any signals intelligence organisation since that art began in 1914. It is the first book to look at SIGINT (signals intelligence) as a whole over the period, and to assess how it has affected power, power politics, and war for the past century. I also provide the first account based on documents about the “Five Eyes”, the SIGINT arrangement, which binds Australia, Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the United States, and has been a secret bulwark for Western security since 1945.
How did you come to be interested in intelligence and cybersecurity?
JF: As a student, I was interested in the topic, but I moved into the area initially by chance. When I started as a PhD student in 1979, the British government treated SIGINT as top secret, and hid most records on the matter from public records. However, it failed to hide many records in the area where I conducted my PhD dissertation about British strategy after the First World War. When I told other people about what I had found, they said that I couldn’t actually have done so; so I decided to prove them wrong. I taught myself the technical side of SIGINT and wireless, and began to write works on the topic, which caught the attention of professional SIGINT-ers. They liked my work, as did other students of intelligence, and I became one of the few academics writing in the area. I remember thinking to myself in 1984, “Wouldn’t it be funny if someday I wrote the official history of GCHQ”.
How would you describe the impact that the work of GCHQ has had on the course of history so far?
JF: At little cost, it has given Britain one of the world’s best SIGINT agencies for over a century. GCHQ has played minor or secondary parts in most areas of British diplomacy, power politics and war, and sometimes has been essential to major British successes on great matters. It has achieved these ends without infringing on the liberty of the people of Britain (or the Five Eyes).
Can you tell us a little bit about your approach to research for the writing of this book? Did you run into any difficulties obtaining information about GCHQ?
JF: Until 1995, the British government kept most material about GCHQ hidden, and determining anything about it took more work than anything else I ever have done as an historian. Things have changed, and in 2015 GCHQ asked me to write its authorised history. GCHQ would not let me see anything about certain areas, like diplomatic codebreaking after 1945, or techniques with current technical applicability, but it gave me good access to secret material on matters like policy, structure, training, budget, and on their major areas of work during the Cold War. Later on, GCHQ gave me access to material on its evolution until 2020, especially regarding its part-secret and part-open branch, The National Cyber Security Centre. GCHQ lived up to its promises, and other members of the Five Eyes were generous as well.
Was there anything you discovered about GCHQ that truly surprised you while you were writing this book?
JF: How it did so much with such limited resources, and how few university graduates it had during the Cold War (outside of the crypto-mathematicians who handled codebreaking). GCHQ is a remarkably flexible and nimble organisation which could turn Titanic around on a tuppence.
Why do you think it’s important that we know the history of an organisation like GCHQ?
JF: SIGINT has been a normal state activity since 1914, and it is still covered by secrecy. Many important matters are inexplicable unless you know the SIGINT record—think about how revelation of the Ultra secret changed the way we think about the Second World War. Today, foreign states and cyber criminals use cyber intelligence to attack us, our businesses, and our way of life. GCHQ and its allies, like the Australian Signals Directorate, are our guardians against such dangers. We must know who they are and what they do, if we are to trust and control them. Absolute secrecy is no longer possible or acceptable for their work: SIGINT agencies must be translucent, though transparency is impossible.
What is your greatest concern for the future in terms of cybersecurity?
JF: We already are in that future. We are surrounded by SIGINT —cybercriminals attempt to prey on us as individuals through SIGINT, foreign cyber intelligence and subversion endanger our societies, all exploiting the way that we display our lives on the internet. Nothing like this ever has happened before, much of it is unpleasant, and it is not going away—neither are our enemies. The internet has enriched our lives, but also militarised them. I find this conclusion quite depressing.
What kind of role do you believe GCHQ will play in that future?
JF: GCHQ and its Five Eyes partners will be the guardian of the cyber borders for our societies, and also our sword and shield against the SIGINT agencies of our foes. They will be one of the most important government agencies in our lives. We will know little about their successes, but must hope for them.
And finally, what’s up next for you?
JF: I am completing academic books on signals intelligence and economic warfare during the First World War, on the blockade during the same conflict, and on intelligence, deception and the outbreak of the Pacific War, which I treat as a success for Japan, rather than as a failure by Britain and the United States.
Thanks John!
—Behind the Enigma: The Authorised History of GCHQ, Britain’s Secret Cyber Intelligence Agency by John Ferris (Bloomsbury Publishing Australia) is out now.
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Behind the Enigma
The Authorised History of GCHQ, Britain's Secret Cyber Intelligence Agency
For a hundred years GCHQ Government Communications Headquarters has been at the forefront of British secret statecraft. It is the UK's biggest intelligence, security and cyber agency and a powerful tool of the British state.
Famed primarily for its codebreaking achievements at Bletchley Park against Enigma ciphers in the Second World War, GCHQ has intercepted, interpreted and disrupted the information networks of Britain's foes for a century, and yet...
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