Mark Curtis (British author)

In 2003, Curtis published Web of Deceit: Britain's Real Role in the World. This book has been his most successful to date. It offers a new approach to the role of the United Kingdom in the post-1945 world and in the "war against terrorism", and a critique of the Blair government's foreign policy.

Curtis argues that Britain is an "outlaw state", often a violator of international law and ally of many repressive regimes. He reasons not only that Britain's foreign policies are generally unethical but that they are also making the world more dangerous and unequal.

Curtis draws much of his research from declassified documents from the UK national archives. He aims to demonstrate the role and complicity of the British in the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Indonesians in 1965, the toppling of the governments of Iran and Guyana, and what he describes as repressive colonial policies in the former colonies of Kenya, Oman and Malaysia.[2][3]

In 2004, Unpeople: Britain's Secret Human Rights Abuses was first published. The book analyses the Blair government's foreign policies since the invasion of Iraq and, using evidence unearthed from formerly secret documents, reveals a series of British policies, including: support for the Ramadan Revolution in Iraq in 1963; the private backing of the US in its war against Vietnam; support for the rise of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin; the running of a covert war in Yemen in the 1960s; secret campaigns with the US to overthrow the governments of Indonesia and British Guiana; and the welcoming of Augusto Pinochet's coup in Chile in 1973.[4]

Curtis estimates that Britain bears "significant responsibility" for the direct or indirect deaths of 8.6 million to 13.5 million people throughout the world since 1945.[5]

In Secret Affairs: Britain's Collusion with Radical Islam (2010), Curtis analyses the covert history of British collusion with radical Islamic and terrorist groups, covering how governments since the 1940s have connived with militant forces to control oil resources and overthrow governments. In addition, he analyses Britain’s foreign policy objectives, by discussing its interference in the 1953 Iranian coup d'état, Soviet–Afghan War, Kosovo War and Syrian Civil War, and its training and dealing with militants from Fada'iyan-e Islam, Harkat ul-Ansar, Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, Kosovo Liberation Army and the Islamic Front (Syria).[6] The book also outlines the unreported attempts by Britain to cultivate relations with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt after the fall of Mubarak, the military intervention on the side of Libyan rebel forces which included pro-al-Qaeda elements, and the ongoing reliance on Saudi Arabia to safeguard its interest in the Middle East.[7][8]