| Honorific Prefix: | Sir |
| John Rennie | |
| Service: | Secret Intelligence Service (SIS/MI6) |
| Serviceyears: | 1968–1973 |
| Rank: | Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service |
| Awards: | KCMG |
| Birth Date: | 13 January 1914 |
| Birth Place: | Marylebone, England |
| Death Place: | Lambeth, England |
| Spouse: | Jennifer Margaret Wainwright |
| Children: | David Rennie, Charles Rennie |
| Occupation: | Intelligence officer |
| Alma Mater: | Balliol College, Oxford |
Sir John Ogilvy Rennie, (13 January 1914 – 30 September 1981)[1] was the 6th Director of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) from 1968 to 1973. He was once the head of the Information Research Department (IRD), a secret branch of the UK Foreign Office dedicated to pro-colonial and anti-communist propaganda during the Cold War.
Educated at Wellington College and Balliol College, Oxford, Rennie joined an advertising agency in New York City in 1935.[2] [3] During World War II he worked at an organisation in Baltimore combating German propaganda.[2]
In 1946 he joined the Foreign Office and was posted to Washington, D.C., and then to Warsaw.[2] In 1953 he was appointed Head of the Information Research Department, a controversial body established to disseminate information about the dangers of Soviet-style communism.[2] During the Suez Crisis he chaired a committee established to disseminate British propaganda in the Middle East.[2] He was posted to Buenos Aires in 1958 and Washington, D.C., in 1960.[2] He served on the Civil Service Commission in 1966;[2] in 1968 he was appointed Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service.[2]
On 15 January 1973, Rennie's son Charles Tatham Ogilvy Rennie, and his daughter-in-law were arrested for an alleged involvement in the importation of large quantities of heroin from Hong Kong.[2] Rennie resigned not long afterwards.[2]
He was made a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1967.[2]