JOHN SCHINDLER: Britain’s leaving is a big deal for the European Union, but not for Britain’s security—or America’s.
The reality is that Britain’s close ties with foreign security services will be unaffected by Brexit in any serious or long-term way. In intelligence terms, the EU hardly matters at all. It has lots of liaison jobs, no end of meetings on intelligence sharing, plus endless retreats for spy agency higher-ups—but the hard work, day in and day out, of intelligence cooperation is still largely a bilateral matter. No matter what happens with Brexit, London’s secret ties with key partners in Paris, Berlin and beyond will continue, no matter what pundits and politicos say.
Above all the Special Relationship in intelligence among Britain, America and our Anglosphere partners will go forward, as it has for more than three-quarters of a century. It began in the bleak summer of 1940, just after the fall of France to Nazi Germany, when London stood virtually alone against Berlin. American intelligence offered its precious code-breaking secrets to Britain, and our new friends quickly began their sharing their closely guarded secrets too. Soon Canada, Australia and New Zealand joined in, and together the five Anglosphere countries forged an intelligence partnership to defeat Germany and Japan like the world had never seen.
That Special Relationship continued after the war, being formalized in the late 1940s in a series of secret spy agreements. Called Five Eyes to the present day, it began with signals intelligence but soon spread across intelligence disciplines. Together, the Five Eyes countries waged and won the Cold War, and their joint work against terrorism, nuclear proliferation, and regional aggression is as robust as it ever was.
Brexit seems more likely to improve Britain’s security situation than anything else.
