The American investigative columnist Jack Anderson has had some scoops in his time but none more significant than his revelation - in January 1990 - that in mid-March 1989, three months after Lockerbie, George Bush rang Margaret Thatcher to warn her to 'cool it' on the subject. On what seems to have been the very same day, perhaps a few hours earlier, Thatcher's Secretary of State for Transport, Paul Channon, was the guest of five prominent political correspondents at a lunch at the Garrick Club. It was agreed that anything said at the lunch was 'on strict lobby terms' - that is, for the journalists only, not their readers. Channon then announced that the Dumfries and Galloway Police - the smallest police force in Britain - had concluded a brilliant criminal investigation into the Lockerbie crash. They had found who was responsible and arrests were expected before long. The Minister could not conceal his delight at the speed and efficiency of the PC McPlods from Dumfries, and was unstinting in his praise of the European intelligence.

LRB 6 January 1994 | PDF Download