David Spedding
Sir David Rolland Spedding KCMG , CVO , OBE (March 7, 1943 - June 13, 2001 ) was a British intelligence officer and most recently between 1994 and 1999 head of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS).
Life
Spedding became an employee of the Secret Intelligence Service, also known as MI6 or Secret Service , in 1967 and was employed in the following years as an intelligence officer in Lebanon and then from 1972 to 1974 in Chile , where he was officially Second Secretary of the British Embassy . This was a position that later led to speculation that he was aware of a possible conspiracy by the United States against the elected Socialist President Salvador Allende , who was ultimately overthrown by General Augusto Pinochet on September 11, 1973 .
After completing this position, he worked in the United Arab Emirates and Jordan , becoming an intelligence specialist on terrorism in the Middle East .
In 1994 Spedding succeeded Sir Colin McColl as head of the SIS, the actual existence of which was not officially confirmed by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office up to this point. Spedding was not only the youngest head of MI6 since its inception in 1909, but also the first head of MI6 who was not a specialist in the Soviet Union , which was due to the previous focus of foreign intelligence work during the Cold War era . In 1996 he was promoted to Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George and from then on carried the title Sir .
Like his predecessors, he was known within the SIS and the government as "C" for boss and thus also the inspiration for "M", the head of the secret service in the books and film adaptations of Ian Fleming's James Bond . In 1998 he invited the film actress Dame Judi Dench , who played "M" in numerous James Bond films, to a Christmas dinner after she showed an interest in meeting the real head of the SIS. The head of the SIS is the only secret service agent who writes his notes in green ink and is also the only employee whose identity is made public, with Spedding also allowing his photograph to be published.
In 1999 he resigned as head of SIS and was replaced by Richard Dearlove .
Web links
| predecessor | Office | successor |
|---|---|---|
| Colin McColl |
Head of the Secret Intelligence Service 1994–1999 |
Richard Dearlove |
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Spedding, David |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Spedding, Sir David Rolland |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British secret agent, head of SIS (MI6) |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 7, 1943 |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 13, 2001 |