Historical Dictionary of British Intelligence

HOUGHTON, HARRY• 249

information to isolate the party’s leader,Chen Ping. The defection

was the culmination of a long antiterrorist campaign conducted dur-

ing theMalaya Emergencyby the Malay Special Branch, which was

largely staffed byMI5personnel seconded from London.

HORNE, SIR ALASTAIR.In 1944, having already transferred from
the Royal Air Force to the Coldstream Guards on the grounds of poor
eyesight, Alastair Horne joinedMI5’s regional branch inCairo, Se-
curity Intelligence Middle East (SIME). He had intended to drive
tanks in the Guards Armoured Division, but instead he was switched
to intelligence duties. His first assignment involved reconnaissance
of Transjordan to determine what areas were accessible to Soviet T-
34 tanks. Horne, who was educated in Switzerland and the United
States, as well as at Jesus College, Cambridge, remained in SIME
until he was demobilized in 1947. Horne’s work in SIME’sPalestine
branch was supervised byMaurice Oldfield, who was later to be
appointed chief of theSecret Intelligence Service(SIS). Horne re-
calls that soon after the end of the war SIS’s cover name in the region
changed from theInter-Services Liaison Departmentto theCom-
bined Research and Planning Office, known as ‘‘CREEPO.’’ This
particular acronym was unfortunate, as much of SIS’s most secret
correspondence was accidentally diverted to the Combined Regimen-
tal Pay Office, located in Jerusalem.
Four years later, in 1952, Horne joined theDaily Telegraphas a
foreign correspondent but left the paper in 1955 upon the publication
of his first book,Back into Power. Over the next 20 years, he wrote
more than a dozen important works of nonfiction, concentrating on
military history and France. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan chose
Horne to be his official biographer.

HOUGHTON, HARRY.Harry Houghton left the Royal Navy in 1945
with an honorable discharge and a small pension after 24 years’ ser-
vice, having achieved the noncommissioned rank of master-at-arms.
He then took a civilian post in the naval dockyards at Gosport. Be-
tween July 1951 and October 1952, he was attached to the British
embassy in Warsaw as a clerk. Here, Houghton was recruited by the
Polish SB, which became aware of his black market activities. After
his return from Warsaw, Houghton worked as a clerk in the Underwa-