John le Carré based his famous master spy, George Smiley, on his MI5 mentor, John Bingham, who played a crucial role in counter-espionage during the Second World War. Their relationship turned sour, as Alistair Lexden made clear in a letter published in The Daily Telegraph on March 4 (which can be found in the letters section of the website).
His letter, to which John le Carré replied in The Telegraph, led to a flurry of articles in The Telegraph itself, The Times and Daily Mail. The story, and Alistair Lexden’s part in it, was reported prominently on the main BBC morning news bulletins on March 5.