By Joseph de Burca. Introduction to Village’s online pamphlet on the Colin Wallace Affair. The Tory Government of Boris Johnson is routinely accused of deceiving the House of Commons. Many British commentators behave as if this is a new low in their democratic history. Yet, there is nothing unusual about the situation. The UK’s Parliament has been misled by ministers at the behest of Britain’s intelligence services, especially MI5 for decades. MI5 is attached to the Home Office and is responsible for internal security. The deception of Parliament has been nowhere more evident than in the case of Colin Wallace, the man who tried to expose the notorious Kincora Boys’ Home child sex abuse scandal. Village readers will be familiar with the case of Wallace. In the 1970s he worked at the British Army HQNI at Thiepval Barracks, Lisburn. He had a public job but also a clandestine one. On the surface, he performed public relations duties for the army. Towards this end, he briefed journalists about an array of routine military activities. His ‘open’ superior was Peter Broderick, a very senior official of the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Broderick served as the head of the Army Press Desk. Secretly, Wallace was also reporting to Col Maurice Tugwell and later Col Geoffrey Hutton who were in charge of the Information Policy Unit (IPU) which conducted psychological operations known as ‘PsyOps’. Hutton took over from Col Tugwell in March 1973 and was in post for two years. He was in charge when Wallace left NI in February 1975. Wallace has just issued proceedings in the High Court in Belfast with the intention of prising out further documents which are in the possession of the British government which will confirm his PsyOps role in detail. In 1974-75 Ian Cameron of MI5 plotted against Wallace who wanted to expose the Kincora Boys’ Home scandal and was refusing to engage in smear campaigns directed against British politicians. During the course of his work, Wallace was ordered to leak certain documents to the journalist Robert Fisk. He was then disciplined for what he had done. At his disciplinary hearing, MI5 and others conspired to deceive the tribunal hearing his case. They alleged that he had only one role – his ordinary PR duties – and therefore should not have leaked anything sensitive to Fisk. Secretly, Cameron contacted the chair of the tribunal and told him that Wallace was in the UVF. Wallace, of course, had nothing to do with the UVF. Wallace lost his job. Worse still, in the 1980s he was framed for manslaughter on the basis of fabricated evidence by a corrupt Home Office pathologist who lied to the Court. The conviction was later overturned but not before Wallace spent six years in prison. The MoD has alleged that all of the files belonging to the IPU were destroyed in 1980. The Ministry has admitted that those responsible for the destruction of the files have never been interviewed. It is highly unlikely that the documents were actually destroyed. In the main, this article – which is intended as an online version of the old fashioned pamphlet – has been drawn together from reports which have already appeared in Village. This account has been prepared in response to the launch of Wallace’s legal action in Belfast. The materials included in the ‘pamphlet’ merely represent a portion of the evidence which shows that Wallace has been telling the truth for decades and the MoD, NIO, Home Office, Conservative Party and Whitehall have been lying. Readers should also watch the documentary ‘The Man Who Knew Too Much’ which is available on Youtube. More information about Colin Wallace can be found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Wallace WALLACE AND THE PERILOUS PANTIES Wearing his IPU hat, Wallace and the members of his team were responsible for waging psychological warfare against Loyalist and Republican paramilitaries. It is important to bear in mind that psychological warfare is not solely about spreading false information, it is about the use of intelligence and factual information in such a way as to influence the behaviour of others. For example, one of Colin Wallace’s more amusing and notable successes was to deter female members and collaborators of the IRA from transporting explosives for the organisation. Wallace put a story into circulation that the static from the typical female pair of nylon knickers generated sufficient electricity to explode the bomb materials being carried. As a result, there was a great reluctance to transport explosives. There was a scientific basis at the root of the story, as can be seen from a document entitled: ‘Ammunition and Explosives Safety Standards’. At pages 85-99 it stated: Explosives. The explosives or explosive mixtures that are sensitive to static discharge (electro-static sensitivity of 0.1 joule or less) when exposed are generally primer, initiator, detonator, igniter, tracer, incendiary, and pyrotechnic mixtures. In reality, the chances of explosions being caused by static electricity were very small. Similarly, the PsyOps unit pointed out that the use of nitro benzene in home-made explosives was potentially carcinogenic. This claim is supported by the United States Environmental Protection Agency who considered nitro benzene a likely human carcinogen. See “Nitrobenzene CASRN 98-95-3 – IRIS – US EPA, ORD”. An excellent account of Wallace’s exploitation of fears about devil worship stories can be watched on the Man Who Knew Too Much documentary. THE INFORMATION RESEARCH DEPARTMENT (IRD) The Army’s IPU was not the only organisation engaged in PsyOps. The notorious Information Research Department (IRD) was too. The IRD was part of the Foreign Office and worked closely with the British Secret Service, MI6, which is also attached to the Foreign Office. The IRD operated from a building in London called Riverbank House. The IRD was a Cold War Intelligence organisation designed to counter Soviet expansion globally. Inevitably, its staff became involved in the propaganda war in Ireland. The department’s representative in NI was Hugh Mooney, a graduate from Trinity College with Irish roots who had once worked for The Irish