The Big Breach (52 page)

They certainly succeeded if it was their intention. Until the list was produced, the press had been fairly sympathetic to me. But after Cook's accusation, the media turned on me with vitriol. In Britain, the
Sunday Telegraph
led the charge. They accused me of being a traitor who had recklessly endangered the lives of MI6 officers in a selfish pursuit of an employment tribunal and printed the I/OPS propaganda that MI6 sacked me for being `unreliable' and `going on frolics'. Their columnist Andrew Roberts, a contemporary at Cambridge but now an establishment toady and friend of MI6, wrote a petty personal attack on me, making absurd claims such as that I cheated to gain admission to MIT. The tabloid newsapers were equally hostile. The
Sun
tracked down Tosh, now out of 602 Troop and working in the City, and paid him œ500 to claim that I took the troop to a brothel in Split on his birthday. He e-mailed me afterwards to apologise and at least he had the guts to give the newspaper his name, unlike some of the anonymous worms they also dug up from my old TA regiment. The
Sun
also published my e-mail address and encouraged its readers to send me hatemail. I received over ten thousand e-mails over the next week, some of them amounting to death threats. Interestingly, however, by no means all of the e-mails were hostile, perhaps indicating the lack of judgement of the
Sun
's editor and the lack of public support for MI6. The majority of readers who e-mailed me thought that it was a good thing to publish the names of MI6 officers, one writing that I deserved an OBE for services to humanity and another stating that taking Tosh to a brothel was a good use of MI6 money.

The publication of the list had all the hallmarks of a classic I/OPS operation to winkle me out of fortress Switzerland, an objective that was accomplished three weeks later. On Monday, 7 June, Inspector Brandt rang to summon me to the Geneva police headquarters at Chemin de la GraviŠre for a meeting at 2 p.m. I arrived to find a stone-faced Commandant Jourdain, in no mood for small talk. `You must leave Switzerland immediately,' he told me. `You are banned from entering Swiss territory until 7 June 2004, and must be out of the country by 1800 this evening.' My protests that this was an unreasonably short period of notice fell on deaf ears. It would scarcely give me time to pack my suitcase. `And we don't want any publicity in the press,' continued Jourdain. `If you talk to the newspapers about this, we will increase the ban to ten years.'

`So where do you want to go to?' asked Brandt. `We will book the ticket for you.'

`I really don't know,' I replied angrily. Just about every reasonable option was closed off. All of the anglophone countries were out of the question and I feared that I would have legal problems if I stayed in Europe. `OK,' I replied, after some consideration, `get me a ticket to Moscow.' I didn't really want to go there, but I knew that Jourdain would be uncomfortable with expelling me from Switzerland at the request of the British only for me to seek refuge in Moscow.

Jourdain stared at me for a moment while the implication sunk in. `You don't want to go there,' he replied. `It's cold and you don't speak Russian.'

`OK, then I'll go to Havana. It's warm and I speak Spanish.'

From Jourdain's point of view this was no better, and he needed to seek advice from his superiors. `Wait here while I call Berne,' he announced. `All right,' announced Jourdain on his return a few minutes later. `Berne have given you an extension until 1800 tomorrow, so that you have more time to find a place to go,' he smiled weakly. `Telephone Inspector Brandt before 1200 tomorrow with your decision.'

I was very disappointed by the attitude of the Swiss authorities. They had a reputation as a neutral country who were prepared to shelter individuals harassed by foreign powers, and I had helped them a lot over the past six months. Now they were blatantly siding with MI6 and were expelling me for the publication of the list without any evidence that I was the culprit. Even with the extension, there was not much time to sort out my plans. I had become quite established in Switzerland, even though I did not yet have a resident's permit. My French was fluent, I had made some good friends and I was getting some serious job interviews and felt that it would only be a matter of time before one materialised into a job. The Swiss had dealt me a low blow in forcing me to start again from scratch somewhere else (I later discovered the full extent of their double standards: every time I went for a job interview, Jourdain rang the company afterwards and told them not to employ me). My threats to go to Havana or Moscow had bought me some extra time, but I did not really want to go to either of these cities. I would not be able to work there and guessed that after a few months I would be bored. Also, I was in no mood for a long journey. I rang up Geneva station and asked for a rail ticket to the nearest town not in France or Switzerland. They booked me onto a train leaving at 1735 the following evening, 25 minutes before my deadline, arriving at Konstanz in southern Germany at 2235.

`Herr Tomlinson?' The voice behind me was friendly, but still my anger flashed within. It was late in the evening, I had arrived in a strange town in a country I hardly knew and whose language I hardly spoke, it was raining outside, I had nowhere to stay and I had only struggled a few yards off the station platform with my two heavy suitcases, yet already somebody - presumably an official - wanted a word with me. I spun around, scowling with hostility. `Nein, Ich bin nicht Herr Tomlinson.' It was about the limit of my German.

A stone-faced uniformed police officer and two civilians, one male in his mid-40s, one a blonde female, stood before me. `Ausweis, bitte,' ordered the uniformed officer.

`What?' I replied impatiently and rudely.

`Your papers, please,' interpreted the civilian male.

`Oh fuck off,' I replied and picked up my luggage. I couldn't help my language. The Swiss must have tipped off the Germans and now, I presumed, I was about to be arrested. If they wanted to arrest me, I would not make it easy for them.

`No, no, wait, you're not under arrest, Herr Tomlinson.' The civilian grabbed me by the shoulder, as if to get my attention rather than to restrain me. `We just want to talk to you, Richard,' the female spoke for the first time, smiling sweetly.

I shifted to face my interlocutors squarely, still suspicious. `I am Herr Kugel, from the BfV (Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz), and this is my colleague, Fr„ulein Gajabski.'

`We guess you must be tired after your journey, and as it's so late, we've booked you into a hotel for the night,' Gajabski said in flawless English.

`We'll help you with your luggage,' added Kugel. He dismissed the uniformed police officer with a short command and whistled up a railway porter who scuttled over with a baggage trolley.

`Don't worry, you are not in any trouble,' Gajabski assured me. `We'll just have a quick drink tonight, then if it is OK with you, we'll have lunch tomorrow.'

Kugel and Gajabski escorted me in the drizzle over to the Halm Hotel opposite the station, the porter struggling behind with my heavy luggage. Kugel checked me in, paying the bill in advance, while Gajabski tipped and dismissed the porter. `We guess you'll want to go up to your room for a few minutes. We'll meet you at the bar at 11 p.m.,' Kugel said. It was more of a firm request than a direct order, but in any case I was intrigued to know what they wanted. Also, I needed a beer.

`Fr„ulein Gajabski and myself are from the BfV,' explained Kugel once three bottles of Becks had been served, with glasses. `Our duty is to protect the German constitution, particularly against the activities of foreign intelligence services. We've read about your case in the newspapers, and we think that you may be able to help us with our investigations into British and American operations against Germany.'

The Swiss Federal police must have tipped them off about my arrival in Konstanz. Jourdain had previously questioned me about ORCADA, the spy in the German ministry of finance that Markham had run in Bonn, even offering me money for his identity. The Swiss Federal police work closely with their counterparts in Germany, particularly on the banking and finance sectors, and it was inevitable that Jourdain would tip off the Germans. The two BfV officers did not push me hard at the first meeting, but they asked me to reflect on their request overnight and insisted that I take lunch with them the next day.

`So, have you decided if you are going to help us?' asked Kugel hopefully. We were nearing the end of a long lunch in the Seerestaurant of the Steigenberger Inselhotel overlooking Lake Constance. Kugel and Gajabski used all the cultivation tricks on me that I learnt on the IONEC. They were sympathetic to my situation, flattered me on my very limited German, assured me that any information that I gave them would be treated with the utmost confidentiality and offered me help in settling in Germany. Now, as the meal was ending, they were putting to me their final recruitment pitch. I could imagine how eagerly anticipated my reply would be and how they must already be mentally writing up their contact report.

`No, I am sorry, I really can't help you,' I replied. I could see the disappointment in their eyes. They would have to report back negatively to their line-manager, and would not get the pat on the back they were hoping for. `I could go to jail for 40 years in Britain under their Official Secrets Act, and it is just not worth it.' The 1911 OSA, which stops Britons `collaborating with a potential enemy', was enacted just before the First World War to stop British naval engineers helping the Germans to rebuild their navy. I could just imagine `expert witnesses' like Redd taking the witness stand to argue that Germany was still a potential enemy.

`But we can assure you, Richard, that your identity will never go beyond the two of us at the table,' Gajabski argued.

It was just what we had been trained to say to potential informers too, and I knew that it was not true. `But even if I do help you,' I argued, `how do I know that you will help me? I helped the Swiss police with their enquiries and where did that get me?'

Kugel and Gajabski had no reply.

Though I had arrived in Konstanz with the intention of quickly moving on elsewhere, the meeting with the BfV persuaded me that I was better off staying put in Germany. They would be unlikely to bother me at MI6's request after they had tried to recruit me. As there was a language school in Konstanz, I decided to study until my German was good enough to look for a job. I found a bedsit and started an intensive four hours per day language course. Living in a European Union country had other advantages. Unlike Switzerland, I needed no work permit or residence permit because my British passport automatically gave me those rights. I registered as a resident, opened a bank account, obtained a phone-line in my own name and even bought a car. The little second-hand BMW I got from a dealer in Hamburg gave me mobility and so if I had to move again suddenly, I would not have to throw away most of my possessions as I had done in Switzerland.

Kugel and Gajabski contacted me several times over the next few months and took me out to two further lunches at the Tolle Knolle restaurant on the Bodanplatz in Konstanz to persuade me to talk about ORCADA or other aspects of British and American operations against Germany, but finally they realised that I would not cooperate with them and told me that our meeting in September would be the last. I was relieved when they assured me that I could stay in Germany and that they would not bother me again.

Driving back to Konstanz from a day out in Austria one Sunday in late September, I accidentally strayed into a Swiss border post near Bregenz. Before I realised my mistake, the guard tapped on my window demanding my documents. I lowered the window, `Nein, nichts,' I replied honestly, and tried to reverse away from the control post.

But that just made the guard suspicious and he blocked me off. `Ausweis,' he snapped, holding out his hands for my passport. Realising that there was no way out I handed over my papers and he took them into his kiosk to check them. Two guards came out five minutes later, hauled me out of the car and threw me into a holding cell. The police arrived two hours later, strip-searched me, handcuffed me and took me to the police station. A day in a Swiss police cell was not much hardship - it was really very comfortable with clean bedding, a spotless toilet and sink and even a welcoming bar of soap and a towel, neatly folded on the bed, just like in a Hilton - but nevertheless the inconvenience was annoying and did not endear either the Swiss or MI6 to me.

By October my German was fairly fluent and I found a job as a private mathematics coach for a wealthy German family in a town in southern Bavaria. I moved to Oberstdorf, a small village nearby, nestled in the foothills of the German Alps. I only had to teach for a couple of hours per evening, so as soon as the snow started to fall I bought a new snowboard and got a day-job teaching snowboarding on the nearby Fellhorn range. Things were starting to look up for me - I was earning enough to make ends meet, was making a few friends in Oberstdorf and MI6 appeared to be leaving me alone. But I was wrong on that last count.

Since arriving in Germany, I had avoided talking to journalists and there had been scarcely an article about me in the British press. Warren Templeton meanwhile was energetically seeking to open dialogue with MI6 to put an end to the dispute. But despite my ceasefire and genuine attempts at conciliation, MI6 were determined to cause me as much inconvenience, cost and hassle as they could.