Gay Spies: Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt, and the Cambridge Five (Ep.63)

Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt were part of the Cambridge Five, a cohort of well-heeled English gentlemen spies at the center of the biggest espionage scandal in British history. Intrigue! Scandal! Lots of drinking on Guy's part! And gay stuff! 

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Transcript

London. Late 1940s.

A government official stumbles out of a Westminster pub after another night of heavy drinking. He’s messy, clothes disheveled, staggering down the street. Tucked beneath his arm are classified British documents he never should have taken out in public.

Somewhere along the walk, the papers slip free and scatter across the street.

Secret government files — lying on the pavement for anyone to find.

Remarkably, the incident does not destroy his career. The documents are recovered, and despite growing concern about his drinking and recklessness, he escapes serious punishment. In the insular world of Britain’s ruling class, certain men were protected no matter how reckless their behavior became.

What almost nobody realized at the time was that the drunken official was being reckless AND THEN SOME. He was at a place in his existence where getting reprimanded by his superiors, or betraying even the slightest hint of instability could get him caught. Because this particular government official was a traitor.

He was a Soviet spy and his name was Guy Burgess. He was part of a ring of Cambridge-educated British traitors who spent years feeding secrets to the Soviet Union from deep inside the British government and intelligence services. The group would later become known as the Cambridge Five.

Some members of the ring, including Burgess and his fellow spy Anthony Blunt, were gay at a time when homosexuality was still criminalized in Britain. All of them lived double lives in one way or another — respected establishment figures in public, secret Soviet agents in private.

Together, they penetrated the highest levels of British intelligence during World War II and the Cold War, compromising operations, exposing secrets, and helping create one of the greatest espionage scandals in modern history.

You’re listening to Wicked Gay, a true crime podcast about gay people doing awful things. 

Hello! Happy spring almost summer! I’m your host J. Harvey, and I have exciting news. Wicked Gay has been optioned for a feature film! I’m kidding. That would be a really weird feature film. And I shudder to think who they would get to play me. I often think I look like what would happen if Paul Giamatti coupled with a potato. Which why not -  potatoes are delicious.

No, the News is I’m sorry this episode is kinda late, I got super busy with work, and school, and a social life and being a frightfully mediocre cis white man that I got bogged down. But I did sorta get the patreon ep in on time and that’s the one people pay me for, so hey - I got that going for me. 

So I find tonight’s episode fascinating because. wait, what’s half of five, 2.5 of this evening’s band of evil-doers are queer, AND they got away with it, for the most part. They didn’t think they were evil, though. And the jury is kind of still out on that. Not to be wishy washy but these guys thought that, by betraying their country in favor of a communist one, they were actually striking a blow against fascism. Or whatever it is elite British aristocrats with first class breeding and education and posh jobs  can spare the time and energy to think about when the rest of their lives is pretty much set. They can focus on politics and philosophy and existentialism and what is my place in the world type of stuff instead of shit the IRS wants to get paid now, or Ashley needs braces, or fuck I have a heroin addiction or Im a person of color in a country built on systemic racism. And what these five guys did is decide that they were going to work for the U.S.SR. and infiltrate the highest offices they could, and do a lot of photocopying. Or actually,this was the 40s, so a lot of mimeographiing. The amount of paper involved must have been incredible.

This episode was also a challenge for me. Because despite this situation sounding like it was full of queer danger and intrigue, and the penalty for treason in the UK at the time being hanging, well, when I researched, I discovered there really wasnt a lot of action packed James Bond manuevers involved. No guns or knives or karate fights. Barely any sex. Just a lot of guys doing sort of evil office job work and drinking a lot. So it was kind of a challenge for me to see if I could make it interesting Jay without dead bodies, or bloody pentagrams, or hollywood glamour,  Just a lot of dapper suits, and bushy eyebrows people casually fleeing to the Commies. But ill make do and so will you so damnit 

This is Episode 63: Gay Spies: Guy Burgess, Anthonyy Blunt and the Cambridge Five

My sources for this episode were Wikipedia, YouTube, and the CBC. Speaking of the CBC, that Guy Burgess clip you heard at the beginning was taken from an interview from 1959 with a Canadian news program called Close Up. 

The story begins in the early 1930s at University of Cambridge.

Europe was in chaos. Fascism was rising. Hitler was gaining power. Many young intellectuals in Britain saw capitalism as a failure. I mean, it’s led to some fucked up shit, look around these parts. To elite students at Cambridge, communism seemed modern, anti-fascist, kinda trendy and a legit answer to the world’s problems.

Soviet recruiters noticed this. and A Soviet operative named Arnold Deutsch started quietly targeting promising upper-class students who could eventually penetrate British intelligence and government.

Among those recruits were five men - Guy Burgess, Donald Maclean, Anthony Blunt, John Cairncross and the man who would become the most prominent and sort of the leader of this little band of well-heeled traitors - Kim Philby— this little group later came to be called the Cambridge Five.

And this is Wicked Gay, so sexuality mattered here.

Several members of the group moved in overlapping queer social circles at Cambridge at a time when homosexuality was criminalized in Britain. Secrecy was already built into their lives. And notice I didnt say baked in because ugh, i hate “baked in”. Stop staying “baked in”, its just rotten banana bread to me, What the hell am I talking about. Oh as for the having to already hiding being into dudes, Some historians argue that this double existence — a privileged public persona masking a hidden one — made espionage psychologically easier for these cats.
Let’s start with the head bitch in charge. we won’t get into him as much because by all accounts he was heterosexual, but he figures heavily in all of this so we need to get into him to get into the other guys.

Harold “Kim” Philby was the most successful — and arguably most dangerous — member of the Cambridge spy ring. Born in India in 1912 to a prominent British family, Philby attended Trinity College, Cambridge in the 1930s, where he became active in left-wing political circles as fascism spread across Europe. Around 1934, he was introduced through mutual communist contacts to Arnold Deutsch, an Austrian-born Soviet intelligence operative posing as an academic researcher in London. Deutsch had been sent by Soviet intelligence to identify promising young British elites who could infiltrate the government from within. Philby was exactly what he was looking for: intelligent, charming, ambitious, and well connected. During their early meetings, Deutsch reportedly urged Philby to abandon visible communist activism altogether and instead cultivate the image of a conventional British establishment figure — the perfect cover for a future spy. The strategy worked almost perfectly. Philby eventually rose to a senior role within MI6, Britain’s foreign intelligence service, becoming a trusted liaison between British and American intelligence during the early Cold War while secretly feeding information to Moscow. Historians believe Philby’s betrayals may have led to the exposure — and possible deaths — of Western agents operating behind the Iron Curtain. 

For example, and for why Philby shouldn’t be exalted as some sort of anti-hero here, because as in most situations involving global politics, there are no heroes, there’s just power games and evil and people imagining they know best for everyone else: One of the darkest episodes connected to Kim Philby involved Soviet intelligence officer Konstantin Volkov in 1945. Volkov secretly approached British officials in Istanbul offering to defect and reveal the names of Soviet agents operating inside British intelligence — including, unknowingly, Philby himself. Because Philby was then working in British intelligence’s anti-Soviet section, he was assigned to handle the case. Instead of moving quickly to extract Volkov, Philby secretly alerted Moscow and deliberately slowed the British response. By the time British officials arrived in Turkey, Volkov and his wife had vanished, reportedly abducted by Soviet agents and taken back to the USSR. Most historians believe the couple were executed. The incident is widely viewed as one of Philby’s most chilling betrayals because he likely sacrificed two people to protect his own cover inside British intelligence.

After years under suspicion, he finally fled to Moscow in 1963, where he spent the rest of his life as a celebrated Soviet defector, though his later years reportedly descended into alcoholism and bitterness.

And speaking of alcoholism, how about the messiest figure in this whole mess: Guy Burgess.

Burgess was born in 1911 into a respectable upper-middle-class family. He attended Eton which is the world renowned boarding school for the sons of prime ministers and such, then Trinity College, Cambridge. On paper he looked like the perfect British upper class stalwart world beater.

In reality, he was an agent of gay chaos. 

Accounts describe him as brilliant, manipulative, sloppy, promiscuous, and catastrophically alcoholic. He could charm almost anyone. He also frequently offended, humiliated, or alarmed the people around him.

And unlike many gay men of the era, Burgess often made very little effort to hide his sexuality.
Which is crazy because This was a time when homosexuality was illegal in Britain. Men could lose jobs, reputations, freedom — everything. Burgess somehow bulldozed through elite society anyway.

moving through London’s queer underground while simultaneously infiltrating the British state.

Multiple sources describe him as flamboyant and openly homosexual by the standards of the time.

He also reportedly had relationships with men across political and intelligence circles. Some accounts claim he and his future fellow Cambridge 5 Cambridgian Anthony Blunt were briefly lovers.

Burgess first worked at the BBC in the 1930s, then entered British intelligence and later the Foreign Office. And Throughout it all, he passed secrets to the Soviets.

And the scale was enormous.

According to Soviet archive material later cited by historians, Burgess handed over hundreds of classified documents.

And These weren’t harmless leaks about the Queen’s Corgis.

The Cambridge 5 spies compromised military strategy, diplomatic intelligence, and counterintelligence operations during World War II and the early Cold War.

Historians still debate the exact human cost, but intelligence failures linked to Soviet penetration almost certainly endangered Western agents and operations.

Some believe people died because of information the ring passed to Moscow.

And through all this, Burgess drank heavily — constantly.

Soviet handlers themselves reportedly considered Burgess and another Cambridge 5 member, the reportedly bisexual Donald Maclean, to be quote, “hopeless drunks.”

Imagine being a Soviet intelligence officer trying to run a sophisticated espionage network and your star British asset is stumbling out of bars with stolen files falling out of his coat. That was Guy Burgess.

More fun Guy Burgess messery in this dancery

He was notorious for being drunk almost constantly. One MI5 officer reportedly said he had never seen anyone consume so much liquor so quickly. Burgess treated government offices, BBC studios, embassies, and diplomatic functions like extensions of a cocktail party.

He openly insulted people at high levels of government and diplomacy. Some acquaintances thought the outrageousness itself protected him because nobody believed a real spy would behave so recklessly.

He drove so badly and so recklessly while briefly stationed in Washington, D.C., that British authorities recalled him to London partly because of his behavior. Ironically, that recall helped trigger one of the biggest spy scandals in British history: shortly afterward, Burgess fled to Moscow alongside fellow spy Donald Maclean in 1951. But we’ll get to it. 

He had a talent for saying wildly incriminating things in casual conversation. According to one account, he drunkenly told an American friend that Kim Philby was a spy — and somehow the friend just thought Burgess was being eccentric.

His apartment became legendary for filth and chaos. Friends described overflowing ashtrays, piles of papers, dirty laundry, empty bottles, rent boys under couches, i made up that last part. Yet this same man could effortlessly discuss literature, politics, music, and intelligence matters with elite intellectuals.

Possibly the darkest anecdote: because heavy boozing can make you paranoid, this one make sense.  Guy once reportedly suggested that Soviet intelligence assassinate a friend of his because he knew too much because Guy had been blabbing too much facts at him due to his excessive drinking. Reportedly, even the NKVD, which was the KGB before the KBG, even thety thought that was excessive.

If Burgess was the mess, Anthony Blunt was the mask.

Blunt was older, colder, more controlled.

Born in 1907, he came from a deeply respectable family connected to the Church of England. He became a fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge, and quickly fell into Burgess’s orbit.

Blunt was highly intelligent and emotionally reserved. He specialized in art history and eventually became one of Britain’s leading experts on French painting.

He was also gay.

Unlike Burgess, Blunt was extremely discreet. Sources describe him as careful and guarded about his sexuality.

During World War II he joined MI5 — the British domestic intelligence agency

This gave him access to sensitive information and counterintelligence operations.

And according to historical accounts, Blunt didn’t just pass information to the Soviets. He also warned fellow spies when investigations were getting close. He helped protect the whole network.

He later played a major role in helping Burgess and Maclean flee Britain in 1951 before they could be arrested.

Blunt’s rise is insane, the entire time he was helping the Soviets he just kept rising higher and higher in his field and inside the establishment.

After the war, he ose to extraordinary prestige.

He became director of the Courtauld Institute of Art which  is one of Britain’s most prestigious centers for the study of art history, conservation, and fine art research.

Then he became Surveyor of the King’s — later Queen Elizabeth II’s — Pictures. he royal official responsible for overseeing, managing, and advising the monarchy on the Royal Collection’s vast holdings of paintings and artwork.Essentially, he was a trusted royal art adviser living inside the cultural heart of the British establishment.

He was knighted in 1956. A Soviet spy. Knighted.

And now we come to Donald McLean

Donald Maclean was different from Burgess and Blunt.
More serious. More disciplined. Less theatrical.
Born in 1913, he came from a politically connected family and entered the British diplomatic service.
Maclean’s sexuality remains debated. Some historians and intelligence writers have described him as bisexual or as having relationships with men despite his marriage. But he clearly moved within the same elite Cambridge social world.

And unlike Burgess, Maclean became extremely valuable to Soviet intelligence. Probably because MacLean wasn’t messcakin around like his girl Guy.

He worked in the British Foreign Office and eventually in Washington, D.C., where he gained access to highly sensitive information — including atomic policy discussions. Maclean supplied the Soviets with information connected to nuclear strategy and Western diplomacy during the early Cold War At the dawn of the nuclear age, 

By the late 1940s, Western intelligence had begun to suspect there was a high-level Soviet mole inside British diplomatic circles. Eventually suspicion narrowed toward Maclean. And that panic triggered the collapse of the entire ring. In 1951, British and American investigators were closing in on Donald Maclean.

In May 1951, after British intelligence began closing in on Soviet spy Donald Maclean, fellow Cambridge spy Guy Burgess was sent to warn him. The two men abruptly vanished from England, driving to Southampton, boarding a ferry to France, and ultimately resurfacing in Moscow, where they confirmed years of suspicion about a Soviet espionage ring inside the British establishment. Their dramatic defection stunned Britain and the United States, embarrassed MI5 and the Foreign Office, and intensified the Cold War panic surrounding the so-called Cambridge Five.

For years, Kim Philby was one of Britain’s most trusted intelligence officers, even serving as liaison between MI6 and the CIA while secretly working for the Soviets. Suspicion followed him after the defections of Burgess and Maclean in 1951, but he repeatedly denied being a spy and escaped prosecution. By 1963, however, fellow Soviet agent Nicholas Elliott confronted Philby in Beirut after new evidence and the confession of Soviet defector Anatoliy Golitsyn pointed directly at him. Before British authorities could act, Philby vanished aboard a Soviet freighter and resurfaced in Moscow, where he was celebrated as a KGB hero.

After years of suspicion surrounding the Cambridge spy ring, Anthony Blunt privately confessed in 1964 to having worked for Soviet intelligence while serving in British intelligence during World War II. In exchange for immunity, the British government kept his confession secret, allowing him to continue his prestigious career as an art historian and Surveyor of the King’s — later Queen Elizabeth II’s — Pictures. His double life remained hidden until 1979, when Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher publicly exposed him in Parliament, triggering a national scandal that stripped Blunt of his knighthood and permanently disgraced him.

The final years of the Cambridge spies unfolded very differently. Guy Burgess spent his last years in Moscow battling alcoholism and declining health before dying in 1963 at just 52. Donald Maclean also remained in the Soviet Union, eventually becoming more settled and respected by Soviet officials before his death in 1983. Kim Philby lived long enough to become a celebrated KGB figure in Moscow, though friends described him as increasingly isolated and alcoholic before he died in 1988. Anthony Blunt spent his final years in disgrace after his public exposure, dying in London in 1983. Meanwhile, John Cairncross largely escaped public fury altogether, living quietly in France and Italy before dying in 1995. Straight guys.

I kid. Some of my best friends are straight guys. So that’s the story of the Cambridge Five, and literally - these dudes got away with this shit because they were privileged and no one really questioned them despite there benign significant evidence that strange things were afoot at the Circle K, or Big Ben or Downing St or whatever. Trust no one, especially rich people. Thank you for joining me this evening. If you like Wicked Gay, well do something about it! The recording after this will give you some suggestions. Goodnight my friends.