hi davie,,, i dont believe in that conspiracy crap same as you dont, i think they all were just clutching at straws hoping maybe some crew were still alive,
it was just another awful tragedy and a sad loss to the industry
as regarding the spying, yes it went on, we had a naval officer with us on ranger boreas 1970, while fishing off the russian coast and often seen ruskie warships shadowing us, he stayed the full trip then never saw him again, but that trip we had several new airials fitted and still have the pics, they also removed all the heavy mooring bollards from all the other c class after the Gaul sank and replaced them with light alloy bollards, and i can still say,,, it was a great life on the trawlers and never had any regrets, regards brian_c