Britain Vietnam Solidarity Front (BVSF)

The Britain Vietnam Solidarity Front (BVSF) was a Maoist group that existed from June 1966 to 1973, though its activities seriously declined after the height of the protests in 1968. It was founded in parallel with the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign (VSC) Vietnam Solidarity Campaign (VSC) The Vietnam Solidarity Campaign (VSC) was formed in 1966 as a collaboration between the International Marxist Group and the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation. Though dominated by Trotskyists, the VSC was able to forge broad coalitions across the left through its use of ad-hoc committees to plan specific actions. The VSC’s campaigning activities went into sharp decline in 1969, ceasing to function from October that year. Full page: Vietnam Solidarity Campaign (VSC)  after Abhimanyu Manchanda staged a walkout at the VSC’s founding conference, reconvening at a hall nearby to organise under an alternative name and with closer ties to Maoism. 

Observers from the Chinese embassy attended the initial meeting of the BVSF, along with Vietnamese News Agency journalists in London who acted as unofficial ambassadors in the UK of the National Liberation Front. African liberation-movement delegates who were in the pro-Chinese camp, including the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania, were also present.

Despite the split with the VSC, members of the BVSF sometimes took part in VSC ad-hoc committees, though political differences were to remain significant. Despite some degree of cooperation, the two groups differed on tactical matters. 

For example, in the lead-up to the large demonstration on 27 October 1968, the BVSF argued that the march should target the US embassy in Grosvenor Square rather than follow the official route agreed with the police. At a public mass meeting at Conway Hall on 17 September 1968, the BVSF lost the vote on this point and set up a parallel October 27th Committee for Solidarity with Vietnam. 

The BVSF was aligned – and shared membership – with the other Maoist groups set up by Manchanda and his partner Diane Langford; the Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League (RMLL)  The Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League (RMLL) was a small Maoist political party instigated by Abhimanyu Manchanda in 1968 after his expulsion from the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1965. There were a number of other organisations closely related to it, such as the British Vietnam Solidarity Front, Friends of China, and the Women’s Liberation Front. The RMLL was targeted by HN335 Mike Tyrrell, HN45 ‘Dave Robertson’ and HN348 ‘Sandra Davies’. Full page: Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League (RMLL)   and Women’s Liberation Front. Women’s Liberation Front (WLF) Women’s Liberation Front (WLF) was a Maoist organisation founded in 1969 by members of the Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League and closely affiliated to the British Vietnam Solidarity Front, Friends of China and the Revolutionary Socialist Students Federation. The WLF campaigned on key feminist concerns including equal pay, domestic work, childcare, and birth control, and its members were involved in industrial action and in broader left struggles. It changed its name to the Revolutionary Women’s Union in February 1972 and went into decline the following year. The WLF was infiltrated by HN348 'Sandra Davies', and reported on by HN45 'Dave Robertson'. Full page: Women’s Liberation Front (WLF)

BVSF was infiltrated by HN218 Barry Moss ‘Barry Morris’ HN218 Barry Moss 'Barry Morris' HN218 is the nominal given to SDS officer Barry Moss 'Barry Morris', who spied on the October 27th Committee for Solidarity with Vietnam and Vietnam Solidarity Campaign during his short deployment in 1968. He later returned as Detective Chief Inspector in charge of SDS operations in February/March 1980, eventually rising to become Commander of Special Branch in October 1996. He retired in 1999. Full page: HN218 Barry Moss 'Barry Morris' , HN336 ‘Dick Epps’ HN336 'Dick Epps' ‘Dick Epps’ is the cover name used by the former SDS undercover officer deployed into the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign, Stop the Seventy Tour and the International Marxist Group from late 1968 to mid-1970. For the Undercover Policing Inquiry and Operation Herne, Epps is referred to by the cypher HN336. In 2002, Epps appeared on the True Spies television documentary, using the pseudonym ‘Dan’. Full page: HN336 'Dick Epps'  and most significantly by HN45 ‘Dave Robertson.’ HN45 'Dave Robertson' 'Dave Robertson' is the assumed name of an undercover in the Special Demonstration Squad, active between October 1970 and 6 February 1973. He infiltrated Maoist groups connected with activist Abhimanyu Manchanda, including the Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League, British Vietnam Solidarity Front and early meetings of the Women's LIberation Front. Robertson was withdrawn after 6 February 1973 when he was recognised as a police officer by a friend of one of the people he was spying on. In the mid-1980s he returned to work for the SDS for three years in a variety of administrative roles. Full page: HN45 'Dave Robertson'  It was reported on by HN135 Michael Ferguson HN135 Michael 'Mike' Ferguson Michael (Mike) Ferguson started as an undercover officer in March 1969 with HN336 ‘Dick Epps’. He infiltrated the Maoist Britain Vietnam Solidarity Front, the Islington branch of the Irish Civil Rights Solidarity Campaign and the Stop The Seventy Tour. His deployment ended in July 1970. Ferguson would return in the late 1970s to lead the SDS for a couple of years. He retired in 1985 and died in 1999 at the age of 60. , HN294 HN294 HN294 was an undercover and manager in the SDS between at least December 1969 and March 1974; he wrote the 1972 and 1973 SDS Annual Reports. He rose to the rank of detective chief inspector and under his leadership SDS officers spied on children, took positions of responsibility and were prosecuted for crimes in their undercover identities. HN294 is dead, his real name has been restricted and his cover name is unknown. Full page: HN294 , HN322 HN322 HN322 was born in the late 1940s, joined the Metropolitan Police in the early 1960s and served in the SDS for five weeks between October and December 1968, but was never deployed into any group. After leaving the SDS he continued his career in Special Branch. He retired in 1998 at the rank of detective inspector. Full page: HN322 , HN328 Joan Hillier HN328 Joan Hillier Joan Florence Hillier had only recently joined the Metropolitan Police Special Branch when she was recruited into the first cohort of Special Demonstration Squad officers on 31 July 1968. An administrator in the SDS back office, she attended a handful of Notting Hill Vietnam Solidarity Campaign meetings in October 1968 but left the SDS in July 1969, moving to A Squad. She retired from the Metropolitan Police in 1984. Full page: HN328 Joan Hillier , HN335 Michael Tyrrell HN335 Mike Tyrrell HN335 Michael 'Mike' Paul Tyrrell was an early SDS undercover who infiltrated the Earls Court branch of the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign; Britain Vietnam Solidarity Front; Revolutionary Socialist Students Federation; West London Palestine Solidarity Campaign and connected Maoist groups from September 1968 to February 1970. Now dead, he has been given the nominal HN335 in the Undercover Policing Inquiry. His cover name is unknown and was not recalled by other undercovers. Full page: HN335 Mike Tyrrell , HN339 ‘Stewart Goodman’ HN339 'Stewart Goodman' ‘Stewart Goodman’ is the cover name used by a former undercover officer with the Special Demonstration Squad. He was deployed into the Anti-Apartheid Movement, Dambusters Mobilising Committee and the International Socialists between 1970 and 1971. Goodman is referred to as HN339 in the Undercover Policing Inquiry. Full page: HN339 'Stewart Goodman'  and HN346 Jill Mosdell. HN346 Jill Mosdell HN346 Jill Mosdell was an SDS undercover who spied on anti-apartheid campaigns - the north-west London Stop the Seventy Tour, south-west London Action Committee Against Racialism and the Anti-Apartheid Movement - from at least April 1970. She later infiltrated Maoist groups in north London. She was withdrawn in February 1973 after fellow undercover HN45 ‘Dave Robertson’, who was spying on similar groups, was recognised as a police officer. Mosdell is dead and her cover name is unknown. Full page: HN346 Jill Mosdell  

According to Inquiry core participant Diane Langford, activists in the BVSF and other Maoist groups suspected Robertson was an undercover officer. This was confirmed when a work colleague of Langford’s recognised Robertson as a police officer at a meeting of the Indo-China Solidarity Committee, which led to his immediate withdrawal.

Langford alleged in her evidence to the Inquiry that Robertson pulled aside the woman who had recognised him and threatened her with violence if she told anyone. First Witness Statement of Diane Langford (non state core participant), given in the UCPI, Tranche 1, Phase 2, 15 Feb 2021.View Document  Robertson denied this in his evidence, giving an entirely different account of where and when the encounter took place. HN45 'Dave Robertson' 'Dave Robertson' is the assumed name of an undercover in the Special Demonstration Squad, active between October 1970 and 6 February 1973. He infiltrated Maoist groups connected with activist Abhimanyu Manchanda, including the Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist League, British Vietnam Solidarity Front and early meetings of the Women's LIberation Front. Robertson was withdrawn after 6 February 1973 when he was recognised as a police officer by a friend of one of the people he was spying on. In the mid-1980s he returned to work for the SDS for three years in a variety of administrative roles. Full page: HN45 'Dave Robertson'

Sources

Diane Langford: The Manchanda Connection. Diane Langford, The Manchanda Connection, 2015.