Techie in chiefBritain's MI5 looking for real "Q"
Q, the head of Q Branch in James Bond movies, helped Bond escape several scrapes thanks to the wealth of new-fangled gadgets he offered Agent 007; MI5, U.K. domestic intelligence service, is looking for a real Q; applications due by Friday
We liked Q, the impatient engineer who ran the Q Branch in James Bond movies. Played, in most of the movies, by Desmond Llewelyn, Q was always irritated (or did he merely feign irritation?) with what he considered to be Bond’s more frivolous pursuits. “I never joke about my work, 007,” Q sternly reminded Bond in Die Another Day. On his retirement from the service (in The World Is Not Enough), Q turns to the crestfallen Bond and signs off with some touching last words of advice: “I’ve always tried to teach you two things: never let them see you bleed; and always have an escape plan.”
James Bond always went to Q to keep one step ahead of the enemy with the latest smart gadgets, and now the real-life British spies of MI5 are to get their own technology mastermind. AFP reports that Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, commonly called MI5, is seeking a chief scientific adviser “to lead and co-ordinate the scientific work of the Security Service so that the service continues to be supported by excellent science and technology advice,” the service’s Web site said. Applicants must have “world-class scientific expertise and credibility in relevant scientific and technology disciplines,” the advertisement read.
“I think it’s unlikely that the person will be required to develop a weapons system for the latest Aston Martin,” Professor John Beddington, the British government’s chief scientific adviser, told the BBC. The successful candidate, however, will help protect Britain against threats to national security by keeping on top of the latest moves in science and technology. “It will involve a sort of future-gazing to see where technology will be taking us in a year or so,” Beddington said. “There is a really important role in providing scientific and technological advice on addressing problems agents in the field will face.”
MI5’s chief science adviser would help “to frustrate terrorism, to prevent espionage hurting the U.K., protect our critical national infrastructure and to frustrate the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. There’s an enormous amount of scientific content in this role.”
Q’s hi-tech knowhow saw fictional overseas spy Bond out of several scrapes thanks to his wealth of new-fangled gadgets. They included a wrist-mounted dart gun, a leg plaster cast that fires missiles, a flying car, and numerous wacky modifications to Agent 007’s Aston Martin cars.
Applications close on Friday.
