The Dark Door explores the evolving relationship between successive British prime ministers and the intelligence agencies, from Asquith’s Key Support Bureau to Cameron’s Country wide Security Council.

Intelligence can execute a prime minister’s dirty work. For greater than a century, secret wars have already been waged straight from Number 10. They possess staved off conflict, defeats and British decline through extravagant footwork, often deceiving friend and foe alike. Yet mainly because the birth of the on the subject of The Black Door: Spies, Top secret Intelligence and English Prime Ministers modern British secret provider in 1909, excellent ministers had been strangers to the secret world – sometimes with disastrous implications. Through the Second World Battle, Winston Churchill oversaw an extraordinary revolution in the exploitation of intelligence, bringing it in to the center of federal government. Chruchill’s wartime regime also created a school of cleverness for future prime ministers, and its secret legacy provides endured. Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and David Cameron all became great enthusiasts for spies and unique causes. Although Britain’s politics leaders have often feigned ignorance in what one excellent minister called this ‘unusual underworld’, some of the most daring and controversial intelligence operations could be traced straight back to Quantity 10.