Karla Quotes

George Smiley: Is there anything you would like me to pass on to Ann?
Bill Haydon: That was nothing personal, George. You have to understand. Karla said that you were good; the one we had to worry about. If I were to known as Ann's lover, he'd figure that you wouldn't be able to see me straight. And he was right, up to a point...
George

Smiley: Up to a point.

Minister: I thought Lacon had made it clear to you: keep your nose bloody well out of Witchcraft's business!
George Smiley: It's Lacon's advice I'm following.
[to Lacon]
George Smiley: You told me to follow in Control's footsteps.
Minister: I wouldn't consider that sound advice, given the mess Control

left us with. It has taken Alleline - and if I may say so, myself - this long to get us back in the game.
George Smiley: The man Alleline and the others meet is called Polyakov. You believe his role is to bring information from Witchcraft to you. His real role is to receive information from the mole, to take back to Karla.
Minister: [laughing

incredulously] That... that's not possible.
George Smiley: Made possible, by you, in the house which you persuaded the Treasury to pay for.
Minister: Witchcraft's intelligence is genuine! It's been gold!
George Smiley: It's just enough glitter amongst the chickenfeed. Control didn't believe in miracles, and he didn't believe

in Witchcraft. But you were lazy, and you were greedy, and so you hounded him out of the Circus and you let Karla in. You've opened negotiations to exchange intelligence with the Americans...
[Realizing the implications of what Smiley is saying, the Minister starts to tremble]
George Smiley: What they tell the Circus, they'll be telling the Kremlin. Witchcraft's

information, the "gold" Karla let you have, it wasn't to lure you. It was to lure the Americans. Now... do you want to take credit for that?

Oliver Lacon: The treasurer can't understand why can't the intelligence service simply put in a request for a general increase in funding and then you'll account for the spend on your special operation?
Percy Alleline: Operation 'Witchcraft' needs to remain a secret; it's a fiefdom of its own.
Oliver Lacon: Yes, that's what's winding

us; whole thing's very unaccountable isn't it? This London house that no one knows the address of, is that really necessary?
Percy Alleline: Now more than ever, we need to protect our Soviet source.
Roy Bland: [lights a cigarette] So where do you propose we meet, in a café?
Oliver Lacon: The rent and rates on this house

have... doubled.
Roy Bland: We spent millions on nuclear warheads, we're asking for a few thousand for a house. I wonder if Karla has the same problem with the treasury at the Kremlin.
Oliver Lacon: Look, nobody underestimates the importance of the jobs you chaps are doing.What happened in Budapest last year... That was a disaster.
Roy

Bland: With respect, sir, that wasn't one of your civil servants that got killed, was it? Now this isn't about soldiers in trenches anymore. We're the front line now...
Oliver Lacon: Roy...
Roy Bland: For 25 years we've been the only ones standing between them and Karla and Moscow and the Third bloody World War!
Oliver

Lacon: Look, the minister is very pleased with your progress so far. He's less pleased though, with our progress with our American cousins. You see, in their eyes... You're still a leaky ship.