SpyCast

The United States and Iran have been at daggers drawn for more than thirty years. While this rivalry has never erupted into open war, it has been an enduring “twilight war” in which spies and terrorists often play the lead role. US Government historian David Crist will discuss his groundbreaking book which pulls back the curtain on many of the deepest secrets of this lethal struggle. Among other fascinating revelations, hear about the massive spy network that the CIA developed in Iran with German help in the 1980s, how these spies communicated with their handlers using invisible ink, and how their discovery led to the deaths of more than two dozen people. This event took place on 1 August 2012.

In Castro’s Secrets, Brian Latell, former National Intelligence Officer for Latin America and long-time Cuba analyst, offers a strikingly original image of Fidel Castro as Cuba's supreme spymaster. Latell exposes many long-buried secrets of Castro's lengthy reign, including the extent of Cuba’s double agent operations against the United States. In writing this book, Latell spoke with many high-level defectors from Cuba’s powerful intelligence and security services; some had never told their stories on the record before. He also probed dispassionately into the CIA's plots against Cuba, including previously obscure schemes to assassinate Castro and presents dramatic new conclusions about what Castro actually knew of Lee Harvey Oswald prior to the assassination of John F. Kennedy. This event took place on October 10 2012.

In the days after 9/11, the CIA directed Henry Crumpton to organize and lead its covert action campaign in Afghanistan. In less than 90 days Al Qaeda and the Taliban were routed. The Art of Intelligence draws from the full arc of Crumpton’s espionage and covert action exploits to explain what America’s spies do and why their service is more valuable than ever. This event took place 12 June 2012.

The surprise of September 11 2001 was, in part, a failure of imagination and CIA Director George Tenet did not want that to happen again. On September 13 he created the Red Cell and staffed it with “people who were willing to take their analysis to a whole new zip code.” CIA analyst Mark Henshaw’s first novel, Red Cell, is about the adventures of two analysts assigned to that team during a military crisis with China. The story is fiction, but it draws on Henshaw’s three years in the Red Cell. Join him and SPY Historian Mark Stout as they discuss what goes on in Room 2G31 at CIA Headquarters.

Juan Pujol was the Walter Mitty of World War II, a nobody who at one doomed venture after another while dreaming of doing something interesting with his life -- saving Western civilization, if possible. Journalist Stephan Talty, whose work has appeared widely, including in the New York Times Magazine and GQ, has told the remarkable story of how against all the odds, Pujol did just that by becoming agent GARBO, the most important double agent of World War II. Hear Talty discuss his new book with SPY Historian Mark Stout in this author debriefing which took place on July 12, 2012.

Peter concludes his conversation with longtime CIA officer George Cave with a brief discussion of some of the funny and unusual events that took place in the course of his career in the Clandestine Service.

The history of Israel’s intelligence community—led by the feared and famous Mossad—includes stunning successes and embarrassing failures with important implications for war and peace today. CBS journalist Dan Raviv co-author with Israeli journalist Yossi Melman, of Spies Against Armageddon, traces this history from the country’s independence in 1948 right up to the crises of today.

Russia was a chaotic hotspot after the Revolution of 1917 and an extraordinary collection of spies, adventurers, and opportunists poured into the roiling Russian political scene. Outsized characters like Sidney “Ace of Spies” Reilly, communist activist John Reed, and author/spy Somerset Maugham all played their parts…under the watchful eye of Feliks Dzerzhinsky, the head of the ruthless Cheka, the first of the Soviet state security organizations. Listen to renown British historian Robert Service discuss his thrilling new book about this turning point of twentieth century history.

Peter continues his discussion with career CIA officer George Cave. They cover Cave’s time in Saudi Arabia—from which he was expelled when a candid cable he wrote about Saudi politics leaked to the press—and back in Washington where he became embroiled in the Iran-Contra Affair. Hear his account of a clandestine trip with Robert McFarlane and Oliver North for talks with Ayatollah Khomeini’s government and other inside details of this scandal.

George Cave is a legend in the CIA’s Clandestine Service. He was recruited into the CIA in 1956 as a fluent Farsi speaker and was pulled out of his entry training and sent to Afghanistan to deal with an urgent operation there. He never looked back. Join Peter and George as they relive the assassination attempts in Iran against the US Ambassador and George himself in the early 1970s and discuss CIA’s operations in the Middle East over three decades.

Peter continues his discussion with legendary case officer Dick Holm, the author of The Craft We Chose: My Life in the CIA. Holm discusses several highlights and low points of his career. Learn about his work with Belgian intelligence in thwarting a Belgian Air Force officer who was spying for Russia and his role in the embarrassing “spy flap” when he was the CIA chief in Paris. Get the book: http://www.spymuseumstore.org/craft-we-chose-life-in-cia-book.html#.Vz3rhPkrIdU

In 1948, when Whittaker Chambers accused Ivy League-educated senior diplomat Alger Hiss of spying for the Soviets, few Americans were willing to believe him. In fact, Hiss went to his grave protesting his innocence, but now it seems clear that he was guilty, given the evidence available since the end of the Cold War. Retired counterintelligence officer Christina Shelton has written a new biography of Hiss. She highlights the many missed opportunities and poor judgments in the Hiss case, and discusses them in the context of wide-scale Soviet infiltration and espionage. Join Shelton and SPY historian Mark Stout for a discussion of this provocative new book about one of America’s most controversial icons. Get the book: http://www.spymuseumstore.org/zimmermann-telegram-book.html#.Vxk4aZMrJTY

Josh Meyer, co-author with Terry McDermott of The Hunt for KSM, visits the International Spy Museum to talk about the decade-long FBI and CIA effort to capture Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Meyer discusses the repeated failed attempts to find the evil genius who had plotted to kill the Pope and President Clinton and explode a dozen planes over the Pacific Ocean, all before masterminding the 9/11 attacks. Finally, hear how the US finally grabbed KSM as a result of the interrogation of another terrorist, Abu Zubaydah.

Today Peter starts a conversation with Dick Holm, a legendary CIA operations officer, who has served all over the world. Dick, the author of The Craft We Chose: My Life in the CIA, talks about the importance of intelligence and reveals the terrible price that he paid for serving his country as a young officer in the Congo in the 1960s. Get the book: http://www.spymuseumstore.org/craft-we-chose-life-in-cia-book.html#.Vz3rhPkrIdU

Intelligence officers and investigative journalists both depend on clandestine sources to divulge secrets. But why do people betray a trust? Peter interviews veteran journalist Max Holland about his new book, Leak, which probes the mind and motivations of one of the most famous clandestine sources in American history: Deep Throat. Hear why Mark Felt, the Deputy Director of the FBI, betrayed President Nixon by leaking to the Washington Post and Time about Watergate. Were Felt’s motives patriotic or self-serving…or both? Get the book: http://www.spymuseumstore.org/leak-shy-mark-felt-became-deep-throat.html#.Vz3q4PkrIdU