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The Oddest Conspiracies that Ever Saw the Light of Day

Khalid Elhassan January 30, 2022 38 min

29. A Plan by Partisan Intelligence Officials to Swing an Election With Fake Evidence

Ramsay MacDonald’s Labour Party formed a UK government for the first time in early 1924. However, it was a minority government in a House of Commons split between Labour, the Conservatives, and the Liberals. To say that the British establishment was less than happy to have a Prime Minister from a socialist-leaning party would be an understatement. So it set out to undermine him and his government at every turn. On October 10^th, 1924, MI5 – Britain’s version of the FBI – received a copy of the Zinoviev letter, dated September 15^th. It was determined to be a fake, and after it was shown to the Prime Minister, MI5’s chief Vernon Kell agreed that it should remain secret.

Press coverage of the Zinoviev letter sank the Labour Party at the polls in 1924. BBC

Secret, that is, until just a few days before the election. At the most damaging moment for Ramsay MacDonald, Kell or one of his subordinates leaked the letter in order to damage the Prime Minister’s electoral prospects. A review by Britain’s Foreign Office concluded that the letter was likely forged by Russian Tsarist exiles, angry that the Labour government had signed a treaty with the USSR, and agreed to extend it a loan. They saw to it that it reached MI5. Between MI5 and MI6 – Britain’s version of the CIA – conservative British intelligence officials ensured that the letter reached the press just in time shiv the Labour Party.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.