Editing Harold Wilson (section)

==Possible plots and conspiracy theories==
{{Main|Harold Wilson plot allegations}}

In 1963, Soviet defector [[Anatoliy Golitsyn]] is said to have secretly claimed that Wilson was a [[KGB]] agent.<ref name="Mitrokhin">[[Vasili Mitrokhin]], [[Christopher Andrew (historian)|Christopher Andrew]] (2000). The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the West. Gardners Books. {{ISBN|978-0-14-028487-4}}</ref> The majority of intelligence officers did not believe that Golitsyn was credible in this and various other claims, but a significant number did (most prominently [[James Jesus Angleton]], Deputy Director of Operations for [[Counterintelligence]] at the U.S. [[Central Intelligence Agency]]) and factional strife broke out between the two groups. Former [[MI5]] officer [[Peter Wright (MI5 officer)|Peter Wright]] claimed in his memoirs, ''[[Spycatcher]]'', that 30 MI5 agents then collaborated in an attempt to undermine Wilson. He later retracted that claim, saying that there was only one man.<ref>Andrew, ''Defend the Realm'', p. 642.</ref>

In March 1987, James Miller, a former agent, claimed that the [[Ulster Workers Council Strike]] of 1974 had been promoted by MI5 to help destabilise Wilson's government.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch87.htm |title=Chronology of the Conflict 1987 |publisher=Cain.ulst.ac.uk |access-date=1 July 2012 |archive-date=7 February 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180207062946/http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch87.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> In July 1987, Labour MP [[Ken Livingstone]] used his [[maiden speech]] to raise the 1975 allegations of a former Army Press officer in Northern Ireland, [[Colin Wallace]], who also alleged a plot to destabilise Wilson. [[Chris Mullin (politician)|Chris Mullin]] MP, speaking on 23 November 1988, argued that sources other than Peter Wright supported claims of a long-standing attempt by MI5 to undermine Wilson's government.<ref>[https://publications.parliament.uk/cgi-bin/newhtml_hl?DB=semukparl&STEMMER=en&WORDS=peter%20wright&ALL=&ANY=&PHRASE=%22Peter%20Wright%20%22&CATEGORIES=&SIMPLE=&SPEAKER=&COLOUR=red&STYLE=s&ANCHOR=Debate-9_spnew6&URL=/pa/cm198889/cmhansrd/1988-11-23/Debate-9.html#Debate-9_spnew6 House of Commons Hansard Debates for 23 November 1988] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181216074028/https://publications.parliament.uk/cgi-bin/newhtml_hl?DB=semukparl&STEMMER=en&WORDS=peter%20wright&ALL=&ANY=&PHRASE=%22Peter%20Wright%20%22&CATEGORIES=&SIMPLE=&SPEAKER=&COLOUR=red&STYLE=s&ANCHOR=Debate-9_spnew6&URL=%2Fpa%2Fcm198889%2Fcmhansrd%2F1988-11-23%2FDebate-9.html#Debate-9_spnew6 |date=16 December 2018 }} Retrieved 1 July 2012.</ref>

On the [[BBC]] television programme ''The Plot Against Harold Wilson'', broadcast on 16 March 2006 on [[BBC Two]], it was claimed there were threats of a ''coup d'état'' against the Wilson government, which were corroborated by leading figures of the time on both the left and the right. Wilson told two BBC journalists, [[Barrie Penrose]] and [[Roger Courtiour]], who recorded the meetings on a [[cassette tape recorder]], that he feared he was being undermined by MI5. The first time was in the late 1960s after the Wilson Government [[devalued]] the pound sterling but the threat faded after [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]] leader [[Edward Heath]] won the [[1970 United Kingdom general election|election of 1970]]. However, following the [[1972 United Kingdom miners' strike|1972 British miners' strike]] Heath decided to hold an election to renew his mandate to govern in [[February 1974 United Kingdom general election|February 1974]] but lost narrowly to Wilson. There was again talk of a military coup, with rumours of [[Lord Mountbatten]] as head of an interim administration after Wilson had been deposed.<ref>{{cite news |last=Wheeler |first=Brian |title=Wilson 'plot': The secret tapes |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4789060.stm |url-status=live |work=[[BBC News]] |date=9 March 2006 |access-date=29 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090215151907/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4789060.stm |archive-date=15 February 2009}}</ref> In 1974, the [[British Army]] occupied [[Heathrow Airport]] on the grounds of training for possible [[Provisional Irish Republican Army|IRA]] terrorist action at the airport. Although the military stated that this was a planned [[military exercise]], [[10 Downing Street]] was not informed in advance, and Wilson himself interpreted it as a show of strength, or warning, being made by the army.<ref>{{cite news |last=Freedland |first=Jonathan |author-link=Jonathan Freedland |title=Enough of this cover-up: the Wilson plot was our Watergate |url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/mar/15/comment.labour1 |url-status=live |newspaper=[[The Guardian]] |location=London |date=15 March 2006 |access-date=10 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211129013134/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/mar/15/comment.labour1 |archive-date=29 November 2021}}</ref>

Historian [[Christopher Andrew (historian)|Christopher Andrew]]'s official history of MI5, ''[[The Defence of the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5]]'', included a chapter (section E part 4) specifically alluding to a conspiracy instead of a plot against Wilson in the 1970s:
{{blockquote|The characterisation of Harold Wilson as paranoid does not take account of the political context of the time, which was characterised by a paranoid political style generally which applied to both left and right (including MI5 itself). The suspicion of Wilson and others towards the unlawful activities of the security services and other right-wing figures resulted from concrete domestic and international developments discussed in more detail below. Andrew is correct to be sceptical, and there remains limited evidence of a 'plot' if a plot is defined as a tightly organised high-level conspiracy with a detailed plan. However, there is evidence of a conspiracy: a loosely connected series of unlawful manoeuvres against an elected government by a group of like-minded figures.<ref>Jon Moran, "Conspiracy and contemporary history: revisiting MI5 and the Wilson plot[s]." ''Journal of Intelligence History'' (2014) 13#2, pp. 161–175, quote at p. 162.</ref>}}

The Director-General of the Security Service assured Prime Minister [[Margaret Thatcher]], and she told the House of Commons on 6 May 1987:
{{blockquote|He has found no evidence of any truth in the allegations. He has given me his personal assurance that the stories are false. In particular, he has advised me that all the Security Service officers who have been interviewed have categorically denied that they were involved in, or were aware of, any activities or plans to undermine or discredit Lord Wilson and his Government when he was prime minister.<ref>Jon Moran, "Conspiracy and contemporary history" at fn 32.</ref><ref>See [https://www.mi5.gov.uk/the-wilson-plot MI5, "The Wilson Plot"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180108075322/https://www.mi5.gov.uk/the-wilson-plot |date=8 January 2018}}</ref>}}

In 2009, ''The Defence of the Realm'' held that while MI5 kept a file on Wilson from 1945 when he became an MP—because communist civil servants claimed that he had similar political sympathies—there was no bugging of his home or office, and no conspiracy against him.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8288247.stm |title=MI5 kept file on former PM Wilson |date=3 October 2009 |work=[[BBC News]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201109025629/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8288247.stm |archive-date=9 November 2020 }}</ref> In 2010 newspaper reports made detailed allegations that the [[Cabinet Office]] had required that the section on bugging of [[10 Downing Street]] be omitted from the history for "wider public interest reasons". In 1963, on Macmillan's orders following the Profumo affair, MI5 bugged the Cabinet room, the waiting room, and the prime minister's study until the devices were removed in 1977 on Callaghan's orders. From the records, it is unclear if Wilson or Heath knew of the bugging, and no recorded conversations were retained by MI5 so possibly the bugs were never activated.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7101127.ece|title=Allegations No.10 was bugged by MI5 'removed' from official history|first=Brendan|last=Bourne|date=18 April 2010|work=The Sunday Times|location=London|access-date=20 April 2010|archive-date=10 January 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220110130537/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/|url-status=dead}}</ref> Professor Andrew had previously recorded in the preface of the history that "One significant excision as a result of these [Cabinet Office] requirements (in the chapter on The Wilson Plot) is, I believe, hard to justify", giving credence to these new allegations.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M84O5pYh3rcC&q=%22One+significant+excision+as+a+result+of+these%22&pg=PR20 |title=Defend the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5 |date=3 November 2009 |isbn=9780307272911 |access-date=22 April 2021 |last=Andrew |first=Christopher |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing |archive-date=9 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211009111759/https://books.google.com/books?id=M84O5pYh3rcC&q=%22One+significant+excision+as+a+result+of+these%22&pg=PR20 |url-status=live}}</ref>

As a result of his concerns about the danger to British parliamentary democracy, Wilson issued instructions that no agency should ever bug the telephones of any members of Parliament, a policy (still in place) which came to be known as the [[Wilson Doctrine]].{{Cn|date=February 2025}}