UK TV - 'Modern Spies' investigation on BBC2, Monday night

Show: Modern Spies
Channel: BBC 2 (UK)
Time: 21:00
Date: Monday 2nd April 2012

1/2. Part one of two. Peter Taylor investigates the world of the modern-day spy, and serving British secret agents talk about their work for the first time on television. Peter begins by exploring how spies are recruited, before probing the secrets of spycraft, from the sleeper cell to the brush pass and the cut out to the cyber spy.

Real spying is not like the movies. That’s the message Peter Taylor’s interviewees (many silhouettes voiced by actors) keep repeating in this fascinating look at the nuts and bolts of espionage.

But it is a bit like the movies. Yes, there may be a lot of paperwork and dull meetings, but there are also stings and burn notices; there are brush passes, dead doubles and cut-outs. Taylor (whose films include State of Terror, Provos, Loyalists and Brits) explains all the jargon with reference to some extraordinary real operations. And his conversation with “Curveball” — the rogue source whose lies about biological weapons were used to justify the invasion of Iraq — is chilling.

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