Who is C?
Our boss, the Chief, commonly referred to as ‘C’, is the only member of our staff who is publicly named. He reports directly to the Foreign Secretary and is responsible for ensuring we operate securely all over the world in our mission to keep the nation safe.
Our current Chief
Our current Chief, Richard Moore, became the 17th Chief of MI6 in October 2020.
He first joined MI6 in 1987, later serving as British Ambassador to Turkey and Director General for Political Affairs in the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office before returning to MI6 as C.
Former Chiefs
There have been 17 Chiefs so far, beginning with Mansfield Cumming, the original ‘C’, in 1909. As an admiral, Cumming's habit of writing in green ink has persisted to this day, with the current C still writing his notes in green. He left other legacies too – to this day we call our reporting ‘CX reports’ after ‘Cumming’s Exclusives’, the name he gave to his reports to government.
Other former chiefs include Rear-Admiral Hugh Sinclair, who founded the Government Code & Cypher School (GC&CS, now known as GCHQ) in 1919 and was appointed Chief of SIS in 1923.
In 1939, Colonel Stewart Menzies took over at a time when SIS comprised 42 officers and 55 secretaries. Menzies oversaw a dramatic expansion of both SIS and GC&CS during the fight to defeat the Axis powers. By the beginning of 1944, 837 people worked at SIS headquarters.
