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7 Episodes 1980 - 1980
Episode 1
51 mins
Neil Burnside is advised by his colleague Edward Tyler, the Director of Intelligence, that the domestic security service, MI5, has targeted the wife the London CIA Station Chief Jeff Ross. When Jeff subsequently confirms that he and his wife have hit a rough patch in their relationship, Burnside is concerned that his friend's wife may have fallen into the hands of a KGB agent. What he learns is that there is a far more complex game being played. Burnside also has to deal with the new "C", someone with whom he crossed swords in the past. The latest issue is the proposed closure of the SIS Station in the Caribbean and Burnside's view that not enough is being done to save it.
Episode 2
50 mins
Neil Burnside faces a dilemma when the Director of Intelligence, Edward Tyler, goes off on a holiday to Malta. Under normal circumstances that wouldn't be a problem but when the local station learn that he is spending time with a woman, alarm bells go off. Protocols require that Tyler tell them if he is seeing someone and his apparent clandestine rendezvous with the woman leads them to believe the worse. When the CIA confirms that the woman is in fact a KGB agent, Burnside heads to Malta knowing that he may have to assassinate his colleague.
Episode 3
50 mins
Not having taken any annual leave for over two years, Neil Burnside finds himself ordered to accompany Deputy Chief Matthew Peele and Sir Geoffrey Wellingham to a planning conference in Rhodes. As soon as he's left, CIA station chief Jeff Ross asks Willie Caine to help him extract an injured American agent from inside the Soviet Union. Willie dispatches Mike Wallace but too late realizes that they have been set up. In Rhodes, Burnside is approached by an attractive Greek woman and believing her to be a KGB agent, decides to play along.
Episode 4
50 mins
Neil Burnside wants to plant a sleeper agent, Anna Wiseman, in the USSR but doesn't want to tell the Deputy Chief Matthew Peele, her actual mission. Peele isn't prepared to sanction the mission, so Burnside decides to go ahead with the mission unofficially. The real mission is to embarrass the USSR on its human rights record and Burnside decides that the best way to do so is to create maximum publicity.
Episode 5
50 mins
Alarm bells go off when a British businessman living in Prague - who just happens to be a vital source of information on the Czech electronics industry - is killed in a car crash. The facts don't quite add up and there is an immediate suspicion that he has been snatched or will defect. Willie Caine is dispatched and finds that the man in question is defecting for love - and Willie's protestations that the woman is a professional KGB officer who will drop him as soon as he crosses the line, falls on deaf ears. Burnside and Caine then proceed to make sure he returns to the UK of his own volition and provide him with the information - not necessarily accurate - to ensure he does.
Episode 6
50 mins
When the SIS medical officer suggests that Neil Burnside is under stress and should be rested, Deputy Chief Matthew Peele sees his chance to replace him with the new Director of Intelligence, Paul Dalgetty. The final nail in Burnside's coffin seems to be a secret CIA assessment of the SIS where Burnside is described as a major negative influence. However, when Burnside confronts his CIA colleague Jeff Ross, he gets a different side of the story and goes on the attack.
Episode 7
48 mins
Willie Caine and Mike Wallace find themselves providing security for the UK delegation at the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks in Malta. Neal Burnside is philosophically opposed to the SALT talks and would do anything to disrupt them. An opportunity to do so presents itself when Yuri Filatov, a KGB agent in the employ of SIS, wants to be lifted and sent to England. Burnside knows that by lifting Filatov during the conference the Soviets will walk out, but Matthew Peele and Geoffrey Wellingham make sure his plan fails. Burnside's plan does have unintended consequences when one of the Sandbaggers is shot.