Cambridge Five

Cambridge Five   (Spy ring)
Membership	•  Anthony Blunt •  Guy Burgess •  John Cairncross •  Donald Maclean •  Kim Philby
Pre-WWII, Wartime and Cold War spy ring

The Cambridge Five was a Soviet spy ring that began in the 1930s, its number and membership emerging slowly from the 1950s. The spy ring was first publicised in 1951 after the sudden flight of Donald Maclean, codename 'Homer', and Guy Burgess, codename 'Hicks', to the Soviet Union. Suspicion immediately fell on Kim Philby, codenames 'Sonny' and 'Stanley', who eventually fled to the Soviet Union in 1963. Following Philby's flight, British intelligence obtained confessions from Anthony Blunt, codename 'Johnson', and then John Cairncross, codename 'Liszt', who came to be seen as the last two of a group of five. Their involvement was kept secret for many years: until 1979 for Blunt, and 1990 for Cairncross. Designation of Cairncross as the fifth man was confirmed in the 1994 book "My 5 Cambridge Friends: Burgess, Maclean, Philby, Blunt, and Cairncross" written by their KGB controller Yuri Modin.

Defeating fascism

"The Cambridge Five were British members of a KGB spy ring that penetrated the intelligence system of the UK and passed vital information to the Soviets during World War Two and the early stages of the Cold War."

"All five brilliant minds were fully convinced that Marxism-Leninism or the Soviet political system was the best available system in the world to defeat the rise of fascism. All of them managed to pursue very successful careers in important and sensitive branches of the British government. They passed large amounts of intelligence to the Soviet Union which created a demoralising effect in the British establishment and resulted in a mistrust in British security in the United States. No other spy or intelligence agency has done so much damage to Britain and America and provided such valuable intelligence to the Soviet Union as the Cambridge Five."

Cambridge spy ring

Having graduated in the mid-1970s from Peterhouse (Cambridge), Michael Portillo returned to Cambridge University nearly four decades later on one of his "Great British Railway Journeys". In Cambridge, Portillo revisited his former alma mater to hear from journalist Michael Smith about a treacherous time in its past. In Trinity Lane, he learned how during the 1930s, five alumni of Trinity College (Cambridge) were recruited to spy for the Soviet Union:

MP: "The Cambridge spy ring notoriously infiltrated the UK's intelligence agencies and passed vital information to the Soviet Union during the Second World War and the early stages of the Cold War. Four were recruited while students at Trinity College and the fifth also studied at Trinity. I'm meeting author and journalist Michael Smith in Trinity Lane. Michael gave me a picture of the students in the 20s and 30s."

MS: "Well student politics is almost always radical I think, and it was radical in those days. People saw Stalin's Soviet Union in a way we don't see it now, with hindsight. They saw it as the Brave New World, as everyone equal. And this has a real impact on Kim Philby, the first of the Cambridge Five to be recruited. He is determined to do something for communism. It is suggested by one of his tutors that he goes to Austria and he becomes involved with a young communist woman called Litzi Friedmann, who is actually a KGB courier. He marries her in fact and because Friedmann is a KGB courier – he doesn't know at the time – he's already in their system. And when he gets back to London, they recruit him and his handler says 'I want you to go back to Cambridge and come back to me with a list of people who think like us and would be willing to work for us.' Top of the list Donald Maclean, the second member of the Cambridge Five. Right down the bottom is a guy called Guy Burgess, the third member of the Cambridge Five. Burgess then brings his friend Anthony Blunt, and Burgess and Blunt between them worked together with the Russians to bring in the fifth man, John Cairncross."

MP: "After graduating, the Cambridge Five rose to prominent positions within Britain's great offices of state and the security services. Interesting to me, I've scarcely heard of Cairncross, the fifth man."

MS: "Yes, he's a fascinating character really, the only one who didn't go to public school of the five. He topped the entrance exam for the Foreign Office, which tells you how brilliant he was. The first real big thing he does is actually give these two documents to the KGB. Those documents were key to the weapons program. Then he goes to Bletchley Park, and he's walking out of the place with loads of documents stuffed down his trousers."

MP: "Shortly before the end of the war, Philby was promoted to be the head of MI6's Soviet Section, which meant he was the ultimate 'double agent': in charge of running operations against the Soviets whilst being their spy. The thing that is most horrifying about this story is how long it takes to expose the Cambridge spies. Philby is left in position for decade after decade. Blunt is exposed in 1979, Caircross I think in the 1980s. Why are they not exposed earlier?"

MS: "Because they were members of the 'Establishment'. They'd gone to the right schools, the right university. They couldn't possibly be a 'bad egg'."

MP: "The members of the Cambridge spy ring were never prosecuted for their treason. I was already working for Margaret Thatcher's government in November 1979, when she announced to the nation that Sir Anthony Blunt was the fourth man. I remember feeling sick that there was now a fourth Cambridge spy. And what united those four was that they were all public school boys. They were all good types. And no matter how much evidence their espionage mounted up, it was all disregarded because no gentleman could be a Soviet spy!"

 

Known members

All 5 of the members already have pages here:

Member	Description
Anthony Blunt	British art historian and Soviet spy. Member of the Cambridge Five
Guy Burgess	Soviet spy and a British diplomat
John Cairncross	British civil servant who became an intelligence officer and spy during the Second World War. He was confirmed to be the fifth member of the Cambridge Five.
Donald Maclean	British diplomat who conveyed government secrets to the Soviet Union
Kim Philby	British intelligence officer, KGB double agent and member of the Cambridge Five

 

Related Documents

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:The Cambridge Five	Wikispooks Page	2 July 2021	Tariq Aqil	No other spy or agency has done so much damage to Britain and America and provided such valuable intelligence to the Soviet Union as the Cambridge Five
File:Victor Rothschild Soviet Spy.pdf	article	18 March 2018	Mark Hackard	Lord Victor Rothschild’s connections to Soviet intelligence.

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