In this event hosted by Centre for Grand Strategy and the King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence, collection editor Matthew Hefler speaks with intelligence historians and contributors to Intelligence and Contemporary Conflict: Communication in Diplomacy, Statecraft and War.

Speakers: Matthew Hefler, In conversation with: Philip HJ Davies, Daniela Richterova, Steven Wagner

The Centre for Grand Strategy in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, in partnership with the King’s Centre for Study of Intelligence, is pleased to invite you to a book launch for Intelligence and Contemporary Conflict: Communication in Diplomacy, Statecraft and War.

This collection is compromised of essays on some of the most pressing issues of espionage and contemporary security, including intelligence liaison, secrecy and strategic communication, and intelligence in conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.

Beautifully produced by Bokförlaget Stolpe and the Ax:son Johnson Institute for Statecraft and Diplomacy, the collection offers insight from some of the world’s leading intelligence historians and practitioners – some of whom will join the panel for the launch.

Attendees will receive a copy of the book 'Intelligence and Contemporary Conflict: Communication in Diplomacy, Statecraft and War'

About the Speakers:

Dr. Matthew Hefler is an AJI Postdoctoral Fellow based at the Center for Statecraft and Strategic Communication at the Stockholm School of Economics. He is a specialist of international history and intelligence history. He received his PhD as a Commonwealth Scholar in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. His doctoral work on espionage and clandestine diplomacy during the Second World War was shortlisted for the Michael Dockrill Prize by the British International History Group. Hefler is an Affiliate at the Centre for Grand Strategy and a Member of the Board of the Society for Intelligence History. He is editor and a contributor for the collection Intelligence and Contemporary Conflict: Communication in Diplomacy, Statecraft and War. His first monograph, Churchill and de Gaulle: Secret Intelligence and the Failure of Franco-British Relations, is forthcoming. In 2021 he served as Press Secretary to the Premier of Nova Scotia.

Professor Philip H J Davies is Professor of Intelligence Studies and Director of the Brunel Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies at Brunel University of London. He is the author, inter alia, of MI6 and the Machinery of Spying and Intelligence and Government In Britain and the United States, co-author of Spinning the Spies and The Open Side of Secrecy and co-editor of Intelligence Elsewhere: Spies and Espionage Outside the Anglosphere. He has been an author on both the 3rd and 4th editions of the UK military Joint Intelligence Doctrine, and the first edition of the joint doctrine on 'understanding' for operational commanders. He is currently completing a project on defence and military counterintelligence. He recently commenced a study of UK naval intelligence appreciations of the Russian and Soviet fleets with Brunel colleague Professor Matthew Seligmann, on behalf of the Royal Navy's Naval Historical Branch (NHB).

Dr. Daniela Richterova is Senior Lecturer in Intelligence Studies at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. Her research and teaching focus on Cold War intelligence history as well as contemporary issues related to intelligence liaison, covert action, and counterterrorism. Dr Richterova has published in International Affairs, The International History Review, and West European Politics. Her research has been featured in Foreign Policy, The Guardian, BBC, The Times, and in a number of documentaries. Her monograph Watching the Jackals: Prague’s Covert Liaisons with Cold War Terrorists and Revolutionaries – which explores communist Czechoslovakia’s relationship with violent Middle Eastern non-state actors, including the PLO and Carlos the Jackal – was published by Georgetown University Press in January 2025. Dr Richterova is director of the MA in Intelligence and International Security and Co-Director of the King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence.

Dr. Steven Wagner is a Senior Lecturer in International Security at Brunel University in London. He is a historian of intelligence, security, empire, and the modern Middle East. Before joining Brunel, Dr. Wagner was an SSHRC postdoctoral fellow in the Department of History and Classical Studies at McGill University, Montreal. He received his DPhil from the University of Oxford and BA and MA degrees from the University of Calgary. Since 2007, he has been examining declassified records in the UK, USA, and Israel, which shed new light on the story of the Palestine Mandate, but also on the previously unknown role of intelligence in countering terrorism and insurgency and in shaping British policy. His book Statecraft by Stealth: Secret Intelligence and British Rule in Palestine, was published in 2019 by Cornell University Press.