Every nation has to face a lot of challenges nowadays, especially when it comes to security. If a nation is doing something right, there will be someone somewhere attempting to take that away from them in order to succeed as well. In our modern day society, the biggest threats a nation such as the United Kingdom faces are extremely serious. These threats include terrorism, espionage and weapons of mass destruction. These are all threats that, if given the chance, will certainly terminate the nation as we know it.
As such, and pretty much like every government out there in the world, the United Kingdom needs to have government agencies protecting it against threats. Its citizens are not completely aware of these threats which means that they are not able to defeat them on their own – without some form of organized defensive method. In the movies, we see these agencies a lot, since they are represented while defending their nation and protecting the citizens against outside threats.
In the United Kingdom, the two most famous agencies protecting the nation are basically the MI5 and the MI6. Again, if we look at the movies, the famous spy James Bond belongs to the MI6. MI5 is the Security Service, also known as the UK’s security intelligence agency, responsible for protecting the nation and its citizens against foreign threats. They focus mainly on the British economic interest as well as anti-terrorism and counter-espionage operations.
Commonly, the MI5 is worried about internal and domestic issues, with overseas support on its mission (but this doesn’t happen very often). The service MI5 provides the country is overseen by a security committee of members of the parliament that are directly chosen by the Prime Minister himself. One can compare MI5 to a very famous American agency known as the FBI.
On the other hand, MI6 (Secret Intelligence Service, SIS) operates all over the world, and is the agency chosen to gather data and intelligence outside the United Kingdom in order to support the defense and security of the government, the economy and of foreign policies. This is the agency that provides the British government with foreign intelligence, which helps the government know all about what is happening in the world outside of the regular mainstream media.
The actions that MI5 has to perform are of extreme importance because threats might enter the nation without MI6 detecting them. For example, let’s take a look at the current terrorist threat there is out there. A lot of Muslim citizens enter the United Kingdom coming from nations in the Middle East on a daily basis and it is simply impossible to monitor every citizen that tries to enter the nation, regardless of origin. People are able to enter the nation through a whole variety of methods and as such, MI6 isn’t able to keep track of all of them.
Once inside the nation, the MI5 needs to detect these threats and prevent them from causing any damage to the nation itself or its citizens. Furthermore, a lot of threats might arise within the nation itself if a firm grip isn’t kept on its citizens. For example, radicalist groups and parties emerge all the time and if they are allowed free propaganda, a civil war might break out within the United Kingdom itself. These are obviously extreme examples, but they are also very real threats.
Even though the work of MI5 is extremely important, the work of MI6 doesn’t fall behind. There are literally over 200 nations in the world other than the United Kingdom, and although a lot of nations are allied to the UK itself, a lot of nations don’t like the British a lot. The actions of the MI6 not only help the government prevent wars from breaking out and attacks to be done on the nation itself, but also help the nation solve problems through political and economic actions due to the intelligence gathered about foreign nations. Solving problems this way ultimately allows the nation to avoid the use of force, which ends up saving lives.
When international threats seem to arise, both MI5 and MI6 work closely in order to counter the threat and guarantee the security of the nation. Both these agencies run covert operations. MI6 organizes covert operations all over the world with the use of human and technical resources, allowing them to gather intelligence of other nations. Mi5 on the other hand runs the same type of operations but instead of doing it all over the world, they do it within the nation itself, guaranteeing the security.
To summarize it all up: The MI5 is a government security agency charged with the protection of the nation’s economic, parliamentary interests as well as anti-terrorism and counter-espionage operations within the United Kingdom itself. These actions are of utmost important since they will allow the citizens of the nation to keep their integrity as well as their own nation. The MI6, on the other hand, is responsible for gathering foreign intelligence that the government will use to avoid international problems as well as to support other nations in their own struggles. Both foreign and internal security issues exist nowadays and the work of these agencies needs to keep on going, and if a concerning threat is detected, both of these agencies will work closely in order to protect the government and the citizens of the United Kingdom.