Remembering Archie Barr, Canada's honourable spy

[PanaEng]

Interesting individual.
By Neil MacDonald, CBC:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/08/28/f-rfa-macdonald-archie-barr.html

When I first met him, in 1982, he was still a cop — a chief superintendent in the RCMP security service, where he'd spent a career chasing around Cold War spies and trying to persuade East Bloc diplomats and citizens to betray their countries.

I had met lots of cops by that time, but none like him.

He didn't believe in the us-versus-them code that guides most police.

He believed that law enforcement agencies are there to protect the civil rights of the population, not violate them. He believed that if someone is investigated and found to be without fault, the fact that person was investigated at all should remain a deeply guarded secret.

He also believed, as did at least two royal commissions that examined the sometimes illegal antics of the RCMP, that police, with their black-and-white, arrest-the-bad-guy approach, don't make good intelligence agents.

 

[PanaEng]

another interesting quote from the article:

And he talked freely about "our sins." He felt the Mounties had some atoning to do.
Starting CSIS

That view didn't make him particularly popular in certain circles of the RCMP. Nonetheless, he went on to become the guiding intellect behind the establishment of CSIS, Canada's first civilian intelligence agency.

"It would not have happened without Archie," an old colleague who followed him into CSIS told me this week. "It was uncommon within the RCMP to run into someone with his intelligence and determination."

CSIS was a quid pro quo. The new agency was given unheard-of powers, subject to judicial approval.

In return, Archie Barr ensured CSIS submitted to an unheard-of level of oversight — both its inspector general and the Security Intelligence Review Committee have carte blanche to go through its files.

"He knew the faith and credit of the Canadian public was the agency's bread and butter," said his former co-spy. "He is probably most responsible for what we have now, which is a pretty good agency, with a reputation around the world."

Barr was a counter-intelligence guy from another era. He was a close friend of Sir William Stephenson, the famed Canadian "Man called Intrepid" whose spying on Nazi Germany helped change the course of the Second World War. Barr even introduced me once to the great spymaster.