Agents of Influence Britain’s Secret Intelligence War Against the IRA

Recruited by British Intelligence to infiltrate the IRA and Sinn Féin during the height of the Northern Ireland Troubles, they were Agents of Influence. With codenames like INFLICTION, STAKE KNIFE, 3007 and CAROL, these spies played a pivotal role in the fight against the IRA. Now, for the first time, some of these agents have emerged from the shadows to tell their compelling stories. Agents of Influence takes you behind the scenes of the secret intelligence war which helped bring the IRA’s armed struggle to an end. Historian Aaron Edwards, the critically acclaimed author of UVF: Behind the Mask, explains how the IRA was penetrated, with explosive new revelations about the hidden agendas of leading figures like Martin McGuinness, Denis Donaldson and Freddie Scappaticci, and how British Intelligence was able to read the minutes of the IRA’s top-secret meetings before they were distributed to its membership.

Aaron Edwards is a Senior Lecturer in Defence and International Affairs at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and an Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Leicester. He is the author of several books, including Mad Mitch’s Tribal Law: Aden and the End of Empire (2014) and UVF: Behind the Mask (2017). His work has featured in The Irish Times, Belfast Telegraph, Belfast NewsLetter and The Irish News.