SPECTRE hierarchy question

Dr_Roberts

I was wondering something about the hierarchy of the literary SPECTRE, as described in Thunderball. Fleming states that the SPECTRE executives, bar Blofeld and the two scientists, were composed of three men each from six of the world's greatest criminal organizations, which are: SMERSH, the Gestapo, the Mafia, the Unione Corse, the Communist Yugoslavian secret police, and... KRYSTAL, an enormous Turkish drug-smuggling ring. The first five are obviously historical, but I have never been able to find anything on KRYSTAL. Certainly an organization with influence rivaling that of the first five would be documented somewhere on the Internet, right? And yet, zip. So, that's my question. Was KRYSTAL a historical organization, or did Fleming make it up?

JWESTBROOK

Only thing I found in 5 minutes was an article about drug trafficking from Turkey to Scotland, and the title called the 'contact' the "Turkish Mr Big".

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/turkish-mr-big-plots-to-traffic-1094140

But other than that, I'm betting towards fiction on Fleming's part. Interesting.

Ludovico

Let's not forget that Fleming's SMERSH was also fictionalized and had little to do with the historical SMERSH.

DarthDimi

Here:

http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/2843/the-james-bond-questions-thread/p1