The history of the British presence in the Middle East between 1948 and 1963 is one of failure. During this period, from a time of much British influence to the twilight of its Empire, various socio-political factors challenged – and ultimately brought down – most of the partner regimes over which the British had enjoyed their influence. By the late 1950s, despite its once imperial position, Britain had lost all reliable allies, such as Egypt and Iraq, as well as other friendly regimes, such as Jordan and Iran, themselves also increasingly challenged by domestic and international political upheavals. The culmination of the British preoccupation with maintaining influence in the region can be seen in the Suez Crisis of 1956, where Prime Minister Anthony Eden's personal endeavour against the Egyptian leader, Colonel Gamal Abdul Nasser, included collusion with France and Israel.

Intelligence and security was a vital realm in which Britain sought to engage with the Middle East, maintain its regional influence and support friendly regimes. Britain's intelligence and security services and its secret propaganda apparatus – the Information Research Department (IRD) of the Foreign Office – conducted counter-subversion across the Middle East, including in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and Iran. Such activity in foreign countries inevitably raised sensitive issues surrounding cooperation with local authorities, and the murky world of intelligence liaison between British intelligence and security services and their Middle Eastern counterparts. Based on newly declassified and hitherto unexploited records, as well as Middle Eastern sources, this book reveals the history of Britain's subterranean engagement in the post-war Middle East.

At the end of the Second World War, the Middle East consisted of both colonial territories (Cyprus, Aden Colony, the Palestine Mandate and the Arabian/Persian Gulf) and independent states. Britain's interactions with the latter, and its desire to influence their policies, have sometimes been referred to by imperial historians as Britain's ‘informal empire’. Despite the loss of the British mandate in Palestine in 1948, Britain enjoyed unparalleled political influence throughout the Arab world, where many, according to Sir Anthony Parsons, a former British diplomat who served there, heralded Britain as ‘the lion’. Enjoying such reputation and influence, Britain strove to maintain close connections with Middle Eastern governments – and their intelligence services.