Man on a mission

Retired diplomat and RAF officer Mike Murtagh reflects on his recently published memoir, Spying on the Kremlin. Interview by Barbara Young.

For many of us, the Covid lockdowns provided a rare opportunity to not only reflect on daily lives, but also recall treasured memories of good times and challenges overcome along the way.

For Mike Murtagh, who describes himself as “a working class boy from Swansea, who enjoyed an unlikely life journey”, the sudden enforced seclusion offered perfect timing to sit down over a year and record his extraordinary life experiences.

Little did he realise that this unscheduled opportunity would result in becoming a successful published author with the launch of his fascinating memoir Spying on the Kremlin, which has been well received worldwide.

“With little else to occupy me, it all began when I thought it might be a nice idea to record my Dad’s rather unusual and harrowing experiences in World War II to provide a permanent account for the benefit of the younger members of the family,” explains Mike, who was born in Swansea in 1953 and now lives with his partner Pauline in Lincoln. “I didn’t have a strict writing schedule, it was just governed by whenever something popped into my memory, I would then write it down.

“Once I had written about my father’s experiences, I found that I still had time on my hands, so I started posting random anecdotes about my own life on Facebook. Thanks to encouragement and support from Pauline and to my genuine surprise, people seemed to find my stories interesting and unusual and they encouraged me to write these stories down and try to get them published.”

Mike’s book follows an unlikely life journey from austere 1950s South Wales to the political theatre of the Kremlin and beyond via service as an RAF officer and as a diplomat.

What is crystal clear throughout is that Mike has lived what can be conservatively described as a “full life”, while making the most of grabbing every opportunity that came his way.

“Spying on the Kremlin tells some of the notable events that happened to me during my time in Russia as a serving RAF officer on his last posting and also as a contract Security Officer for the Foreign Office, covering the construction of the new British Embassy in Moscow.

“It was a fascinating time to be in that country – post-Cold War in the Yeltsin years and running into the advent of Vladimir Putin. It was also quite a dangerous period and I consider myself lucky to have got out of there unscathed.”

Officer training
Mike was 28 when he joined the RAF’s Initial Officer Training (IOT) at Cranwell, via a variety of early jobs including working at Manchester Airport and at the DHSS: “The whole process was a massive landmark in my life. It changed everything and, for all the pain, hardship and inconvenience that came along with some parts of it, generally speaking I would not have had it any other way.

“Before I joined up, I was just desperate to do something – a career – that I deemed interesting. I have always been interested in the military and from a very young age, I was fascinated by the stories my dad told me of his time in the Army.

“He was a Regular before World War II, serving and seeing action overseas. He was called up again and spent five years doing forced labour as a PoW in Poland, experiencing a couple of concentration camps there before undertaking a three-month forced march westwards in the worst winter of the century. He ended up getting liberated in Belsen, however his experiences did not affect him unduly and he joined the TA straight after the war, serving until he was 50 years old.”

Russian encounters
Mike’s experiences of living and working in Russia has given him valuable insights into the Russian psyche, as well as the workings and capabilities of the Russian military, which he details with both candour and humour, accompanied by a series of remarkable and insightful photographs from his personal collection.

“I loved it over there, despite the general strangeness and occasional dangers! It was an exciting and very stimulating place and I love the Russian people, too. Warm and generous, I found them to be a lot of fun!

“I’d love to visit there again but it probably wouldn’t be a good idea, after the book’s publication, and I probably wouldn’t get a visa anyway! In fact, I’d probably be more worried if I did get a visa, if you get my drift!”

So did Mike – who has a natural aptitude for foreign languages, studying and becoming fluent in Russian – ever feel intimidated by his posting there?

“If you mean ‘scared’, no, not really,” he says. “That might seem a strange view to take, especially when, amongst other things, I had a gun stuck in my face, a laser sniper-sight trained on me in the street and had been threatened by people working for the Azeri Mafia, but that’s just the way I am. It’s not that I am a notably brave person. It’s just the way my mind works – I just tried to keep an open mind and rolled with the punches.”

Although the memoir has been fact-checked by the MOD ahead of publication with some names and minor details changed for security reasons, Mike has his own opinions on the current conflict, which he shares in his book: “As far as Putin is concerned, and his rationale for acting the way he does on the world stage, it is crucial to understand that his primary focus is on the resurrection of a ‘Greater Russia’ modelled on the territory formerly occupied by the USSR, which explains his hostility towards Ukraine and towards other former-Soviet republics, such as Moldova and the Baltic States. It is a visceral, almost messianic zeal that drives him on.”

Personal development
However, the book contains more than just Mike’s Russian experiences, via a posting to Berlin and later working for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) in Chennai, it’s also a tale of self-development.
“It takes the reader through significant events that, in one way or another, have represented turning points in my life. To that extent, its writing has been a very personal undertaking,” explains Mike.

Mike admits he is “really not very good” at analysing himself, but says that in travelling the world in his job, he became “more confident and worldly-wise than if I hadn’t widened my experiences beyond my hometown”.

He adds: “It’s dawning on me that I have been extremely fortunate to have led what seems to have been an interesting life. I certainly consider myself lucky to be alive after some of my experiences!

“Until recently, I genuinely believed that there was nothing unusual or interesting about my experiences, that these sorts of things happened to everyone!”

Having been associated with Lincolnshire through his career in the RAF, Mike now lives happily in a suburb of the city and says he wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.

“As with many ex-RAF personnel, I sort of washed up in the Lincoln area after my time in the service. I absolutely love it here – Lincoln and Lincolnshire has a lot going for it.”

Mike, who has a personal trainer and visits his local gym three or four times a week, has been asked many times if he’s intending to write a second book, perhaps one detailing his “interesting experiences” in the music world, but for now he says he’s enjoying life while also exploring his creative talents as an artist.

“I’m not sure I have another book in me, but if I do write another book, it certainly won’t be a novel, as I have very little imagination.

“After all the hard work put into the book, I need to get back to my artistic activities, which I have effectively put aside for the last few years. I love to do portraits and figures in a variety of media, examples of which can be seen on my website – www.mikesartwork.co.uk

On the future of Russia, Mike says: “I do not claim to be an expert and I am cautious about those who claim to be, especially in relation to Russia. Churchill got it right when he described Russia (in the context of the Nazi-Soviet Pact in 1939) as, ‘a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.’

“I believe that, if you can grasp that concept, you will be well on the way to understanding that strange and amazing country — whoever is in charge.”

‘Spying on the Kremlin’ by Mike Murtagh is published by Pen & Sword Books, price £28.
Available from www.pen-and-sword.co.uk

We Recommend

Health and Wellbeing

A stitch in time

Food for thought

Car boot sailing

Sprinting ahead to Paris

Howzat, for an English summer?

View all