The Extremism Trap

The real subversives have won

‘Sir, urgent alert in Romford. Reports of males voicing dissatisfaction over asylum policy.’

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Behold! The offical PREVENT definition of beliefs feeding TERROR;

I think Sir Keir ‘Island of Strangers’ Starmer needs to watch his step, before Old Bill arrive at Downing Street. Incidentally, I was a police ‘subject matter expert’ (I hate the word expert, but that’s what they called it) on far-Right extremism (I’ve written about it here). Which is why I’m confident when I say PREVENT is talking overly-simplistic bollocks. Policing’s been hopelessly captured (or infiltrated, or both) by the academic-activist complex. It’s suffering from acute Stockholm Syndrome. And dimwit chief constables have lost the plot.

I’ve written about this stuff before. Indeed, it’s become a recurring theme of this Substack. It’s as much a comedy of errors - and police politics - as it is Orwellian cosplay at the Home Office. Nonetheless, I’m rapidly coming to the conclusion the People In Charge are genuinely nuts. Perhaps it’s a perverse manifestation of human rights and equalities fundamentalism? ‘X’ and ‘Y’ can only be subversive if WE’RE ALL SUBVERSIVES, RIGHT?

It’s only fair. Or what Patrick West describes as ‘asymmetric multiculturalism’, which;

Informs Prevent’s lopsided approach to terrorism, one that overplays the threat posed by the far right and underplays the one posed by Islamists. It was behind the ‘double standard’ that the damning Shawcross Review on Prevent spoke of in 2023, with the programme’s ‘expansive’ definition of right-wing extremism that included ‘mildly controversial or provocative forms of mainstream, right-wing leaning commentary that have no meaningful connection to terrorism or radicalisation’.

I watched this happen, in real-time. Those of us working on the coalface warned our bosses, but we were told to FIFO (Fit In or Fuck Off). It gives me no pleasure seeing our predictions come true, because I don’t want to live in Stasi-land.

Regular readers will know I’m a former Special Branch officer, then worked in SO15, the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command which replaced it (except it didn’t, more of which later). One of my jobs was investigating crime, disorder and threats to the Queen’s Peace motivated by politics and ideology. This is, obviously, a sensitive and controversial area of policing. After SO15 was hatched, back in 2006, I saw a cohort of dim but ambitious senior police officers eagerly swallow the PREVENT pill hook, line and sinker. the Home Office championed subcontracting ‘domestic extremism’ investigation to a woolly, politically-correct hybrid of multi-agency policing and social work. This meant SO15’s senior bosses were unshackled to concentrate on their favourite things; barking orders in flashy operations rooms. Watching the SAS blow stuff up during training exercises. Delivering presentations to the FBI at Quantico (business class, obvs).

This is a story (others are available, LOL) of how this came to be. People deserve to know, especially if we’re going to fix it.

If that isn’t a bit, you know… extreme?

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In 1936, during the Spanish civil war, Nationalist General Emikio Mola advanced on Republican-held Madrid. As four columns of Franco’s troops streamed towards the city, Mola boasted a secretive ‘fifth column.’ These were subversives and militants inside the city, Franco sympathisers. They would rise up, paving the way for the main invasion force. Ever since, ‘Fifth Column’ has been a pejorative term for an enemy within. It’s been used to justify discrimination, such as the 1950s House Un-American Activities Committee.

All governments are alive to the possibility of ‘a threat within.’ Politicians are also, by virtue, often spiteful and narcissistic. They’ll never admit it, but they rather enjoy the idea of keeping a discreet eye on the other side - after all, today’s extremist might well become tomorrow’s mainstream politician. Leading political figures, from all parties, have traditionally flirted with edgy student politics. The police, at their best, provide an institutional buffer between politicians and crime linked to politics.

The concept of subversion - a fifth column - also has parallels with today’s obsession with misinformation and disinformation. Of censorship. A suspicion of technology. The practice of ‘cancelling’ those expressing views contrary to fashionable ideological beliefs.

Nonetheless, there has always been a shadowy interface between politics, ideology and crime. In Western democracies, such threats were monitoried by domestic security agencies, assisted by specialist police departments. For over fifty years, most worked on a model dedicated to foiling Communist subversion, ‘fifth columnists’ sponsored by the USSR.

In Britain, with its localised policing model, each constabulary maintained a department responsible for liaising with MI5, the Security Service. These were special branches (Met SB was formed in the 1880s, predating MI5, to combat ‘Irish Fenian’ extremism). When I joined, the national guidelines stated Subversion (a core SB responsibility) was any activity that might;

“threaten the safety or well-being of the State, and which are intended to undermine or overthrow parliamentary democracy by political, industrial or violent means.”

Although this was never a statutory definition, it was one we worked to. It turned on intent, including violent and non-violent activities so, inevitably, created grey areas. Obviously, not all extreme left-wing groups (for example) were formenting violent revolt. Some, on the other hand, were. For example, Trots are programmed to attempt entryism to subvert less militant organisations. I give you, for example, the Trade Union and wider Labour movement. It’s always suffered from an existential struggle between moderates and wannabe tankies.

Anyhow, this isn’t a history of the Soviet threat to Western democracy, except to say intelligence agencies on both sides actively sought to undermine the economies and societies of the other. KGB money - ‘Red Gold’ - funded left-wing causes and terrorist groups. CIA money funded right-wing causes and terrorist groups. Domestically, there was collateral damage; idealistic young people dabbling in radical politics occasionally ended up with Security Service files (not that it did them much harm, for example Jack Straw ended up as Home Secretary). Veteran Trots knew the most effective members of their strange little grouplets were MI5 informants - they worked harder than anyone else in order to glean information. In short, it was all a bit Le Carre-esque (and, occasionally, Kafkaesque too).

The Cold War over, domestic intelligence agencies shifted their attention to terrorism and organised crime. Yes, extremism too, but not on the same scale - that was shunted off to Plod in a dog-eared envelope labelled ‘public order’. I remember special branch, in the late 90s, still navigating this post-Cold War world. We were still busy. There was, of course, the IRA. There were also Eco-warriors and animal rights nutters (who cost the British economy a bloody fortune due to protest activity, disruption and sabotage), not to mention the occasional Neo-Nazi. Real ones, with bombs and stuff. Taking on a public order investigation impacting on freedom of speech? It was a big deal, the legislation used sparingly. I know, because my old squad were the only unit in the Met who dealt with them. The CPS would - quite properly - scrutinise such cases for reasons of proportionality. Yes, this was before the internet became the forum it is now. Nonetheless, the threshold for prosecution was high.

Then, this happened:

Today’s intelligence and security services were forged in the crucible of 9/11. This included a focus on containing and deterring extremism in an increaingly multicultural society.

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9/11. The most significant moment in postwar counter terrorism. Virtually every part of the British intelligence, security and law enforcement apparatus was reconfigured to combat Islamist mass-casualty terrorism. I switched role; I spent 2006, for example, working on Operation Overt and associated operations, which were tremendous examples of CT policing.

That was twenty years ago. Mass casualty terrorism remains a significant threat, but now there are others. Technology, rapid socioeconomic changes and all of the other fuckery we associate with the 2020s means police and intelligence services are tackling a new threat environment… using the tools of the old. This reminds me of the 1990s, when our Cold War / IRA mindset required refiguring for Al-Qaeda. Generals always fight the last war. And, when change happens, babies are always thrown out with the bathwater. Was ever thus.

However, there was a wild card. The bosses didn’t see it (or they’d already jumped on the bandwagon). Those of us who did were labelled malignant backwoodsmen. The wild card? Policing’s increasing obsession with politically-divisive social justice politics and Human Rights legislation, given rocket boosters by the Blair administration. After the Macpherson Report, the direction of travel was clear - a journey involving the police accepting the tenets of critical theory. I won’t dwell on what I call ‘The Blairite Reformation’ too much, but here’s an article I wrote for The Pimlico Journal touching on the subject. It discusses, among other things, how;

Public bodies have pandered to human rights utopianism ever since, to the detriment of service delivery. Blairite law satisfies only our legal clerisy, activist quangocracy, and the criminal classes. The police soon found themselves stymied by their duty to act compatibly with ECHR convention rights by the Human Rights Act 1998. But the Human Rights Act was only the start: later, intersectional politics ran riot in forces due to the ‘protected characteristics’ requirements under the Equality Act 2010 — enacted in the dying days of New Labour, but supported and primarily implemented by the Tories.

This is the philosophy informing counter extremism and PREVENT. Why? Because it’s underpinned by law.

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When they reconfigured CT in 2006, traditional approach to investigating domestic extremism was seen as effete, elitist and not in keeping with the new management’s macho, bash-’em-up policing style. SB officers reading newspapers, discussing anarcho-syndicalism and pondering the Kremlinology of fringe political groups baffled the Flying Squad guvnors drafted into CT. They’d no interest in how we informed operational decision-making for uniformed commanders (SB, in many respects, acted as the Job’s default think tank / research unit on ideology and social issues).

The new bosses worked to a simple calculus; ‘reorganisation means seventy jobs are up for grabs. Do we keep these wankers doing The Times crossword, or carve up their posts for our mates languishing on divisional CID? They can take statements, do CCTV trawls and sit in the cafe inside St. James’s Park station drinking cappuccino.’

Yes, this is a bitchy generalisation. SB had its fair share of floggers. Reform was no bad thing. Nonetheless, the stereotype contains an uncomfortable grain of truth. In fact, more than a grain; I met more than a few gloating SO15 detectives who insisted ‘they’d won’ some sort of existential struggle between Special Branch and the CID.

This is all something of a footnote, I suppose, but as I was there I’ll mention it for posterity. It also caused an unintended consequence, because everything political - including policing - abhors a vacuum. The void created when SO15 banished its SB officers to staff reactive investigation teams created opportunities for ambitious police officers, civil servants and the activists-posing-as-academics increasingly informing their thinking.

And, thus, three things happened (via the CONTEST strategy);

1. The police developed an almost childlike belief: online monitoring could effectively replace conventional, messy, counter-extremism investigation (I ended up working on such units, our management honestly thought Twitter was a crystal ball of top grade intelligence, rather than the Internet’s toilet wall)

2. Offline engagement would be delivered via PREVENT, which would monitor those people prone to radicalisation leading to violent extremism. In short, Stasi-like ‘interventions’ in schools and workplaces in order to detect wrongthink. Interventions, incidentally, were the stuff of Key Performance Indicators. Yes, I’m sure you can work it out for yourself. Low-hanging fruit and all that.

3. The Blairite legal-political genome spliced into policing’s DNA rendered it uniquely vulnerable to the ‘Awokening’ of 2020 onwards. This is why the fatuous Lysenkoism influencing Non-Crime Hate Incidents (etc) became so influential.

As the Shawcross Review into PREVENT suggested (being a too little, too late Tory attempt to curb the programme’s excesses), ‘asymmetric multiculturalism’ whereby wider sensitivities around Islamist terrorism - and potentially offending Muslim communities - became the default position. Long before PREVENT became a bete noire among freedom of speech advocates, it was despised among the Left and Islamist groups too. In any case, the Starmer administration didn’t like Shawcross’s conclusions (look at the Cabinet’s slender majorities in their seats) and therefore ignored them.

Yes, the Police have lost their way. Nonetheless, they implement laws and, increasingly, take their cues from our political elites. The British Establishment is now firmly of the ‘social justice’ left.

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So he we are. In a cack-handed attempt to juggle to contradictions of a rapidly changing multicultural society, our establishment ended up implementing what critics describe as a version of the Ottoman ‘Millet’ system. This involves, in a multi-faith society, dividing everyone into identity and interest groups with limited autonomy. Ours, though, includes the majority.

As a young SB officer, I’d prepare assessments on the political and ideological factors impacting on policing environments (we were encouraged to read journals, broadsheet newspapers and textbooks in office time). Back in the 1990s, there would have been nothing controversial about positing how a society facing a dizzyingly rapid level of immigration, during a time of economic and political turbulence, might experience growing nativist political sentiment. Nonetheless, much of this sentiment would be legitimate and not necessarily indicative of crypto-fascism*.

After all, in 1970, 95% of Britons were ‘White British.’ By 2024 it was hovering around 80%. That’s an unprecedented level of change. Of course, people should be free to argue whether this is good, bad or indifferent. Nonetheless, it doesn’t take (as they say in the army) ‘the brains of an archbishop’ to predict a few dramas might occur along the way. Now? I wonder if suggesting something this obvious might attract the attention of PREVENT. If they like, they can pop over for a chat and a cuppa. Be warned, though, I charge an hourly rate for advice.

And so old-fashioned domestic extremism investigation (looking for potential offenders amongst certain political groups, accepting not all involved might commit offences) was replaced with… monitoring us all, just in case. It’s easier, when you think about it. It’s an Aldi ‘middle-aisle-of-crap’ variety of authoritarianism. Look for a stupid comment on Facebook. Maybe consider a bit of the old malicious communications. Perhaps issue an NCHI warning, or if there’s been fisticuffs, get the Attorney General involved. You know, that one. Old Bill get a pat on the head from the Home Office and the rest of the Blob in charge of policing.

Is this a conspiracy? I’m not sure it is. Not really. It’s certainly a direction of travel, albeit seeded with ideological booby-traps. As for the postmodern academics and activists who infiltrated policing? The police chiefs who swallowed handfuls of diversity, equality and equity pills? They, perhaps, were the real subversives all along.

Bravo.

As someone who used to keep an eye on you - and knew your game - I can only say well-played. Now, I’m putting the kettle on. The police know who I am and where I live, after all. And they might fancy a cup of tea.

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* Back in the 1990s, this approach was referred to as ‘being fair-minded.’