Alfred Denning (1899–1999)

I suppose that John Profumo might be the only viable contender with Jeremy Thorpe for the title of ‘Greatest British Political Scandal of the Twentieth Century’. The Profumo Affair certainly offers a cornucopia of those ingredients guaranteed to titillate enduring public interest: a beautiful woman of questionable propriety in thrall to a Machiavellian and mischievous Svengali following his own anguished social aspirations, a dashing, prosperous and successful government minister, a Soviet military attaché, a peer of the realm, some minor West London gangland wannabes and a sprinkling on intelligence officers. If this was pure fiction, readers would be nodding their heads in disbelief fearing that the author had seriously overegged his pudding.

It is now fifty-five years since John Profumo resigned from his post as Secretary of State for War in Harold McMillan's already faltering government, and his name has become synonymous with political sleaze. The basic story is well known: Profumo had met the young Christine Keeler at a house party at Cliveden, ancestral home of the Astor family and site of many political weekends at which prominent members of the Conservative government led by McMillan would gather to relax. Keeler had fled from her poverty-stricken home and, after time spent as a dancer in a Soho Revue show, had found herself living in the flat of society osteopath, Dr Stephen Ward. Ward was a strange character who moved on the fringes of the Cliveden set and was aware of, and occasionally present at, their extravagant parties. Christine Keeler was young, beautiful and available, and within a short time of their first meeting she had embarked upon a brief affair with Profumo.

Unknown to Profumo, however, she was also conducting occasional liaisons with Sergei Ivanov, a Soviet naval attaché on the staff at the Russian Embassy. Naturally it was not long before such a salacious situation came to the attention of the press and the Whitehall rumour mill. Profumo was questioned by several of his fellow ministers, but constantly denied that he and Christine had ever been more than just good friends, even going to the lengths of making a personal statement to that effect before the House of Commons. Of course, as we all now know, Profumo subsequently had to confess that he had indeed had an affair, and his resignation and removal from public life became inevitable. In the same way that it was the failed attempt at a cover-up that rendered the Watergate incident so toxic for President Nixon, it was essentially Profumo’s lies to parliament, rather than the affair with Keeler itself, that less his position untenable.

This book is the report of the official inquiry that was commissioned by Parliament and headed by Lord Denning, and it covers in great detail the events leading up to the resignation, considering the roles of Profumo, Christine Keeler, Stephen Ward, the police, the press and the security services. However, while it might be an official report, it is far from dry. Lord Denning has a lively (if often surprisingly grammatically dodgy_ style, and the pace of the story never flags. All in all, a very enjoyable, and very informative, book.… (mais)

I stumbled across this book when looking for books written by Lord Denning (see my post on The Discipline of Law).

This book is the official transcript of the investigation ordered by Prime Minister Harold Macmillan into the Profumo affair - the political and intelligence scandal in the early 1960s that helped topple the Conservative Party government of Prime Minister
Harold Macmillan. Involving sex, a Russian spy, and the secretary of state for war, the scandal story could just as well have been copied out of ...

Full review posted at BookLikes:
http://brokentune.booklikes.com/post/758284/john-profumo-christine-keeler-lord-d...… (mais)