Spy story

Whitehall admits to major security lapses over members of Cambridge spy ring

Senior Whitehall officials privately admitted to extraordinary security lapses over two of Britain’s most notorious spies for the Soviet Union, and then conspired to play down the hugely embarrassing scandal of their flight to Moscow, according to top secret documents seen by the Guardian.

A hitherto unpublished report on the flight of Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess – two prominent members of the Cambridge spy ring – more than 60 years ago, says they could have been suspected sooner had the Foreign Office linked their bouts of extreme drunken behaviour to their spying.