S.P.E.C.T.R.E.
SPECTRE logo
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| Universe | James Bond series |
|---|---|
| Type | |
| Founded | Circa mid-1950s |
| Location | Paris, 136 Boulevard Haussmann SPECTRE island SPECTRE yacht SPECTRE Bird One launch base Tangier Numerous |
| Key people |
Ernst Stavro Blofeld (leader) Emilio Largo (second-in-command) Rosa Klebb Irma Bunt Dr.Julius No Tamil Rahani Jay Autem Holy Nena Bisquamer (nee Blofeld) Mr. White Le Chiffre Dominic Greene Raoul Silva Mr. Hinx |
| Purpose | Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, Extortion, World domination |
| Subsidiaries |
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SPECTRE (SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) is a fictional organisation featured in the James Bond novels by Ian Fleming, the films based on those novels, and James Bond video games. Led by evil genius and supervillain Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the international organisation first formally appeared in the novel Thunderball (1961) and in the film Dr. No (1962). As an NGO, SPECTRE is not aligned to any nation or political ideology, enabling the later Bond books and Bond films to be regarded as somewhat apolitical though the former Gestapo members are a clear sign of Fleming's warning of the Nazi fascists surviving after the Second World War first detailed in the novel Moonraker (1954). SPECTRE began in the novels as a small group of criminals but became a vast international organisation with its own SPECTRE Island training base in the films, to replace the Soviet SMERSH.
In Ian Fleming's novels, SPECTRE is a commercial enterprise led by Blofeld. The top level of the organisation is made up of twenty-one individuals, eighteen of whom handle day-to-day affairs and are drawn in groups of three from six of the world's most notorious organisations—the Gestapo, the Soviet SMERSH, Marshal Josip Broz Tito's secret police, the Italian Mafia, the Unione Corse, and a massive heroin-smuggling operation based in Turkey. Their début is in the 9th Bond book, Thunderball (1961). At the time of writing the novel—1959—Fleming believed that the Cold War might end during the two years it would take to produce the film, and came to the conclusion that the inclusion of a contemporary political villain would leave the film looking dated; he therefore thought it better to create a politically neutral enemy for Bond. Fleming's SPECTRE has elements inspired by mafia syndicates and organised crime rings that were actively hunted by law enforcement in the 1950s. The strict codes of loyalty and silence, and the hard retributions that followed violations, were hallmarks of American gangster rings, Mafia, the Unione Corse, the Chinese Tongs and Triads and the Japanese Yakuza and Black Dragon Society. During the events of Thunderball, SPECTRE successfully hijack two nuclear warheads and plan to hold the world to ransom.
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Wikipedia