Ronnie Vallance
Encyclopedia
Assistant Commissioner
Sir Ronald Vallance is a recurring fictional character
in the James Bond novels and short stories by Ian Fleming
and others.
's first meeting with Vallance is in Moonraker. Vallance is the Assistant Commissioner
(AC) at Scotland Yard
with responsibility for the Special Branch
, and Gala Brand
's boss. Bond is favourably impressed by Vallance's freedom from interdepartmental jealousy and regards him as a friend and an ally.
. Vallance's undercover "Ghost Squad" has discovered who is going to be the carrier for the latest delivery of diamonds being smuggled into the United States as part of a vast illicit diamond-trafficking business operating from Sierra Leone
. Vallance arranges for a disguised Bond to meet Rufus B. Saye
, head of the London branch of "The House of Diamonds", which is suspected of being a front operation for the smugglers. Vallance then has the intended courier, Peter Franks, arrested for "conspiring to evade the customs
" and Bond takes on Franks's identity, keeping his rendezvous with Tiffany Case
and smuggling the diamonds into America with the aim of working his way along the smuggling "pipeline".
, the Ghost Squad have penetrated back as far as Italy
, but can get no further. Vallance requests that the Secret Service take on the case, as Bond had done earlier that year in Mexico (related at the beginning of Goldfinger), but M
refuses as this is a misuse of Secret Service resources. To M's chagrin, Vallance goes over his head to the Home Office
and the Ministry of Health
, suggesting that this narcotics traffic may be a deliberate attempt to subvert the UK rather than just a profit-making scheme. The reluctant M is ordered by the Prime Minister
to send Bond to investigate. Vallance's theory is later proved to be correct, as the man behind the drug-smugglers, Kristatos, is revealed to be in the pay of the Russians.
", is given for the first time. M telephones him at his home address on Christmas Day afternoon (disturbing his perusal of a report on teenage prostitution) to enlist his assistance in tracing Polly Tasker, a former patient at the Comte de Bleuville
's allergy clinic in Switzerland
, who is suspected of having introduced fowl pest into the country. He also warns Vallance that ten more girls will be arriving from Switzerland as part of de Bleuville's biological warfare
offensive against the English agricultural economy.
.
, Assistant Commissioner Vallance makes an appearance at the emergency meeting called following M's kidnapping from his home in Windsor Great Park
. Also present are Bond, who did his best to prevent the kidnapping; Bill Tanner
, M's chief of staff
; Inspector Crawford, of the Windsor police
; Sir Ranald Rideout, the Cabinet Minister
responsible for the Secret Service, and Bushnell, the Permanent Under-Secretary. Vallance seems to share the others' dislike of Sir Ranald, and the Minister for his part is described as having mentally dismissed Vallance in the past as "an over-dressed popinjay". Vallance reports on the efforts being made to trace the kidnappers, and the plans for dealing with any publicity. The meeting ends with the agreement that Bond should be sent to Athens
following what slender clues were available.
Assistant Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis
Assistant Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, usually just Assistant Commissioner , is the third highest rank in London's Metropolitan Police, ranking below Deputy Commissioner and above Deputy Assistant Commissioner. There are usually four officers in the rank...
Sir Ronald Vallance is a recurring fictional character
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
in the James Bond novels and short stories by Ian Fleming
Ian Fleming
Ian Lancaster Fleming was a British author, journalist and Naval Intelligence Officer.Fleming is best known for creating the fictional British spy James Bond and for a series of twelve novels and nine short stories about the character, one of the biggest-selling series of fictional books of...
and others.
Moonraker
BondJames Bond (character)
Royal Navy Commander James Bond, CMG, RNVR is a fictional character created by journalist and novelist Ian Fleming in 1953. He is the main protagonist of the James Bond series of novels, films, comics and video games...
's first meeting with Vallance is in Moonraker. Vallance is the Assistant Commissioner
Assistant Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis
Assistant Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, usually just Assistant Commissioner , is the third highest rank in London's Metropolitan Police, ranking below Deputy Commissioner and above Deputy Assistant Commissioner. There are usually four officers in the rank...
(AC) at Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard
Scotland Yard is a metonym for the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service of London, UK. It derives from the location of the original Metropolitan Police headquarters at 4 Whitehall Place, which had a rear entrance on a street called Great Scotland Yard. The Scotland Yard entrance became...
with responsibility for the Special Branch
Special Branch
Special Branch is a label customarily used to identify units responsible for matters of national security in British and Commonwealth police forces, as well as in the Royal Thai Police...
, and Gala Brand
Gala Brand
Gala Brand is a fictional character in the James Bond novel Moonraker. She does not appear in the movie version of the novel, however, as the film is an almost total rewrite of the novel. The only other Bond girl of the Ian Fleming novels to share this fate is Vivienne Michel of the novel The Spy...
's boss. Bond is favourably impressed by Vallance's freedom from interdepartmental jealousy and regards him as a friend and an ally.
Diamonds are Forever
Bond meets Vallance again in Diamonds are ForeverDiamonds Are Forever (novel)
Diamonds Are Forever is the fourth of Ian Fleming's James Bond series of novels. It was first published by Jonathan Cape in the UK on 26 March 1956 and the first print run of 12,500 copies sold out quickly...
. Vallance's undercover "Ghost Squad" has discovered who is going to be the carrier for the latest delivery of diamonds being smuggled into the United States as part of a vast illicit diamond-trafficking business operating from Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone , officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea to the north and east, Liberia to the southeast, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west and southwest. Sierra Leone covers a total area of and has an estimated population between 5.4 and 6.4...
. Vallance arranges for a disguised Bond to meet Rufus B. Saye
Jack Spang
Jack Spang is a fictional character in Ian Fleming's 1957 James Bond novel Diamonds Are Forever. He does not appear in the 1971 film adaptation of the novel, which substantially revises the plot and makes Ernst Stavro Blofeld the chief villain....
, head of the London branch of "The House of Diamonds", which is suspected of being a front operation for the smugglers. Vallance then has the intended courier, Peter Franks, arrested for "conspiring to evade the customs
Her Majesty's Customs and Excise
HM Customs and Excise was, until April 2005, a department of the British Government in the UK. It was responsible for the collection of Value added tax , Customs Duties, Excise Duties, and other indirect taxes such as Air Passenger Duty, Climate Change Levy, Insurance Premium Tax, Landfill Tax and...
" and Bond takes on Franks's identity, keeping his rendezvous with Tiffany Case
Tiffany Case
Tiffany Case is a fictional character in the James Bond novel and film Diamonds Are Forever. For the 1971 film she was portrayed by Jill St. John...
and smuggling the diamonds into America with the aim of working his way along the smuggling "pipeline".
"Risico"
Vallance and his Ghost Squad are next mentioned in the short story "Risico". In attempting to halt the influx of heroin into BritainUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, the Ghost Squad have penetrated back as far as Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, but can get no further. Vallance requests that the Secret Service take on the case, as Bond had done earlier that year in Mexico (related at the beginning of Goldfinger), but M
M (James Bond)
M is a fictional character in Ian Fleming's James Bond series, as well as the films in the Bond franchise. The head of MI6 and Bond's superior, M has been portrayed by three actors in the official Bond film series: Bernard Lee, Robert Brown and since 1995 by Judi Dench. Background =Ian Fleming...
refuses as this is a misuse of Secret Service resources. To M's chagrin, Vallance goes over his head to the Home Office
Home Office
The Home Office is the United Kingdom government department responsible for immigration control, security, and order. As such it is responsible for the police, UK Border Agency, and the Security Service . It is also in charge of government policy on security-related issues such as drugs,...
and the Ministry of Health
Department of Health (United Kingdom)
The Department of Health is a department of the United Kingdom government with responsibility for government policy for health and social care matters and for the National Health Service in England along with a few elements of the same matters which are not otherwise devolved to the Scottish,...
, suggesting that this narcotics traffic may be a deliberate attempt to subvert the UK rather than just a profit-making scheme. The reluctant M is ordered by the Prime Minister
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the Head of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Sovereign, to Parliament, to their political party and...
to send Bond to investigate. Vallance's theory is later proved to be correct, as the man behind the drug-smugglers, Kristatos, is revealed to be in the pay of the Russians.
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
Vallance is briefly mentioned in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, when his full name, "Sir Ronald Vallance of the CIDCriminal Investigation Department
The Crime Investigation Department is the branch of all Territorial police forces within the British Police and many other Commonwealth police forces, to which plain clothes detectives belong. It is thus distinct from the Uniformed Branch and the Special Branch.The Metropolitan Police Service CID,...
", is given for the first time. M telephones him at his home address on Christmas Day afternoon (disturbing his perusal of a report on teenage prostitution) to enlist his assistance in tracing Polly Tasker, a former patient at the Comte de Bleuville
Ernst Stavro Blofeld
Ernst Stavro Blofeld is a fictional character and a supervillain from the James Bond series of novels and films, who was created by Ian Fleming and Kevin McClory. An evil genius with aspirations of world domination, he is the archenemy of the British Secret Service agent James Bond and is arguably...
's allergy clinic in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
, who is suspected of having introduced fowl pest into the country. He also warns Vallance that ten more girls will be arriving from Switzerland as part of de Bleuville's biological warfare
Biological warfare
Biological warfare is the use of biological toxins or infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, and fungi with intent to kill or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an act of war...
offensive against the English agricultural economy.
"The Property of a Lady"
Bond briefly invokes Vallance's name when pretending to be from the CID during his visit to WartskiWartski
Wartski is a family-owned firm of antique dealers specialising in Russian works of art; particularly those by Carl Fabergé, fine jewellery and silver. Founded in North Wales in 1865 the business is now located at 14 Grafton Street in Mayfair, London. The company holds royal appointments as...
.
Colonel Sun
In the first James Bond novel to be written after Fleming's death, Colonel SunColonel Sun
Colonel Sun , by Kingsley Amis, is the first James Bond continuation novel published after Ian Fleming's death in 1964; Glidrose Productions used the collective pseudonym "Robert Markham", for British novelist Kingsley Amis, with the intent of so publishing other novels by different writers...
, Assistant Commissioner Vallance makes an appearance at the emergency meeting called following M's kidnapping from his home in Windsor Great Park
Windsor Great Park
Windsor Great Park is a large deer park of , to the south of the town of Windsor on the border of Berkshire and Surrey in England. The park was, for many centuries, the private hunting ground of Windsor Castle and dates primarily from the mid-13th century...
. Also present are Bond, who did his best to prevent the kidnapping; Bill Tanner
Bill Tanner
Bill Tanner is a fictional character in the James Bond film and novel series.-Character summary:Superb in a crisis, and blessed with a dry sense of humour, Tanner is M's Chief of Staff. He is also Bond's staunchest ally in the Service, and they often enjoy a round of golf when off-duty...
, M's chief of staff
Chief of Staff
The title, chief of staff, identifies the leader of a complex organization, institution, or body of persons and it also may identify a Principal Staff Officer , who is the coordinator of the supporting staff or a primary aide to an important individual, such as a president.In general, a chief of...
; Inspector Crawford, of the Windsor police
Berkshire Constabulary
Berkshire Constabulary is a former Home Office police force which was responsible for policing the county of Berkshire in Southern England. Berkshire Constabulary was merged with several other adjacent police forces in 1968 to form the Thames Valley Police....
; Sir Ranald Rideout, the Cabinet Minister
Cabinet of the United Kingdom
The Cabinet of the United Kingdom is the collective decision-making body of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom, composed of the Prime Minister and some 22 Cabinet Ministers, the most senior of the government ministers....
responsible for the Secret Service, and Bushnell, the Permanent Under-Secretary. Vallance seems to share the others' dislike of Sir Ranald, and the Minister for his part is described as having mentally dismissed Vallance in the past as "an over-dressed popinjay". Vallance reports on the efforts being made to trace the kidnappers, and the plans for dealing with any publicity. The meeting ends with the agreement that Bond should be sent to Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
following what slender clues were available.