Secrets and Spies Podcast: Espionage | Global Issues | Current Affairs

On this episode we are joined by author Tom Parker and we reflect on the legacy of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.Tom has written a fantastic in-depth book called “Avoiding the Terrorist Trap”.  You can get a copy of the book here: https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/p995You can follow Tom on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/tdgparkerOur film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: https://www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0%E2%80%A6BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

We are joined by counterterrorism analyst Angie Gad and we reflect on the legacy of 9/11.You can connect with Angie on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/Angieslyst Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: https://www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0%E2%80%A6BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On this brief podcast, I just wanted to take a moment to share my memories of 9/11 in London 20 years ago. I also wanted to give you a quick update about the podcast. We will have two 9/11 specials over the following week. The podcast will then take a break over October and return on Friday 5th November and continue once a month, with the odd extra episode if time allows.I just want to say if anyone listening was affected in 9/11 you are in my thoughts on this anniversary.

License to Parent On today’s podcast we are joined by former CIA officer Christina Hillsberg, who has written a fantastic book about how she and her husband Ryan have used their CIA training to raise resourceful and self-sufficient children. Christina’s book is great as it gives a real snap shot of how CIA officers think and gives practical examples of how they use that training in their day to day lives. I personally think the book is great for spy buffs and it is also a great self-help book for adults who don’t plan to raise children but want to sharpen their own personal skills. There is literally something for everyone in this book! You can find out more about Christina and Ryan’s story and their book here: https://www.christinahillsberg.com/Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here:
youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4
And you can buy the film here:
www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic
Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird)
You can check out his work here: www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0…BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon 
Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3
www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop:
https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER
twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK
www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On this episode we are joined Dr Ayesha Ray who is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Kings College in Pennsylvania.We discuss the situation in Afghanistan, the media and online reaction to the fall of Kabul.  We also take a look at the wider geo-political consequences of the Taliban take over of Afghanistan and we discuss why Pakistan supports them.It’s quite a packed episode!You can follow Dr Ray on twitter here: https://twitter.com/DrAyeshaRayOur film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: https://www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0%E2%80%A6BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On this episode of Secrets & Spies, we are joined by former CIA officer and Peabody Award-winning investigative journalist Frank Snepp.Frank was a CIA officer who served in the Vietnam war and he was there at the fall of Saigon, so in light of the recent events in Afghanistan we take a look at the similarity and differences between the fall of Saigon and Kabul. We also discuss the intelligence picture that led up to the chaotic scenes we have witnessed as US and NATO forces attempt to evacuate personnel and Afghan allies from Afghanistan.Frank has asked me to add this about the fall of Saigon:"Because of US Ambassador Graham Martin’s reluctance to accelerate departures and risk upsetting the “controlled conditions he thought were needed for a diplomatic solution to the military crisis, the pullout from Saigon devolved into every man and woman for themselves.  Every agency battled for seat space on outgoing aircraft, violating the quotas assigned to each one. Vietnamese girlfriends and maids were often shoehorned into evacuee lists ahead of Vietnamese who had loyally at great hazard worked with US agencies in sensitive positions.  On the last day of the war there was no master list in the embassy of the Vietnamese at highest risk and most deserving of being flown to safety. As Snepp points out in his memoir of these events, Decent Interval, nearly 52,000 people were lifted out of Vietnam in the month of April 1975 on American military aircraft – 6,763 Americans and roughly 46,000 Vietnamese and other third-party personnel. Counting people who departed by commercial carriers, undocumented black flights and the 6,000 who came out by barge the total number of evacuees for which the embassy could claim some responsibility that month was 65,000. Another 65,000 escaped on their own just before the Communist takeover and in the two years that followed, bringing the total evacuees for that period to 140,000.Ambassador Martin told Congress in early 1976 that 22,294 Vietnamese employed by US agencies had been evacuated by April 30 of the previous year. That was a small fraction of the indigenous employees of these agencies and their families – 90,000. To judge from Martin’s figures less than one third of these deeply imperiled people benefitted from the airlift.Only the Defense Attaché’s Office which had largely controlled available aircraft and the boarding process, came close to evacuating all the “locals” on its payroll, 3,800. But Colonel William Le Gro, who headed DAO intelligence operations, later acknowledged that only 20 percent of the Vietnamese whom his staff had ushered onto outgoing aircraft were truly high risk.Out of the 1,900 “indigenous employees” of the CIA station only about 500 were finally evacuated – together with 2,000 others including family members who had enjoyed privileged contacts with the Agency over the years." You can read more about Frank’s experiences in Vietnam in his excellent books “Decent Interval” and “Irreparable Harm” which are both available to buy via Frank’s website:http://franksnepp.com/Frank’s journalism and other writings can be viewed on his blog: franksneppexclusives.com/ Check out our past interview with Frank about the CIA mission in Vietnamhttps://pod.fo/e/213e1Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: https://www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0%E2%80%A6BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast” on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On this episode of Secrets & Spies, we are joined by Rolf Mowatt-Larssen. Rolf is a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, Belfer Centre, prior to that appointment he was the Director of Intelligence & Counter Intelligence at the US Department of Energy. Before that he served in the CIA for 23 years as an intelligence officer.On this podcast we discuss future intelligence threats such climate change, WMD’s, Chemical Weapons and more.You can find out more about Rolf here: https://www.belfercenter.org/person/rolf-mowatt-larssenAnd you can get an copy of his excellent memoir “A State of Mind: Faith and the CIA.” https://amzn.to/3eBqUeNOur film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: https://www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0%E2%80%A6BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On today’s podcast we are joined by Ben West and we take a look at money laundering, its connection to organised crime and an FBI sting operation called “Trojan Shield” Ben is a Senior Global Security Analyst with Stratfor, a RANE company. You can read Ben's two articles on money laundering here: https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/basics-money-laundering-how-criminal-organizations-move-illicit-revenue-legal-economy https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/basics-money-laundering-case-studies Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released!Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilmMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here: www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0…BdNQbuCvt9KWUPlease support this podcastPatreon Become a “Friend of the podcast”  on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpiesVisit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996Connect with us here:TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpiesFACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies

On 28th June 2016 I recorded my first interview for the podcast. Back then the podcast was called “The Dry Cleanercast” named after my film “The Dry Cleaner” and now the podcast is “Secrets & Spies”I have decided to re-air the first episode with a little behind the scenes story about the recording of that first interview.You can find out more about Meredith Tax and her two books “The Double Bind” & “A road unforeseen” here at here website: https://www.meredithtax.org/book.phpThank you for listening to the podcast for five years. Keep an ear out for Season Six starting on Friday 2nd July Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released! Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilm  MUSICMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here:www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0…BdNQbuCvt9KWU  Please support this podcast Patreon Become a “Friend of the podcast” on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpies   Visit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996   Connect with us here: TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpies  FACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies 

On this episode of “Secrets and Spies”, we are joined by author and former intelligence officer Anthony WellsWe discuss Anthony’s excellent book “Between Five Eyes”, which takes a detailed look at UK-US intelligence through a personal lens based on working uniquely for UK intelligence as a British citizen and US intelligence as a US citizen. You can find out more the book here: https://www.casematepublishers.com/between-five-eyes.html#.YLntCuvTWjg   Our film “The Dry Cleaner” has been released! Check out the trailer here: youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 And you can buy the film here: www.drycleanercast.co.uk/watchthefilm   MUSICMusic Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) You can check out his work here:www.monsteromnibus.com/?fbclid=IwAR0…BdNQbuCvt9KWU  Please support this podcast Patreon Become a “Friend of the podcast” on Patreon for £3 www.patreon.com/SecretsAndSpies   Visit our new memorabilia shop: https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/60934996   Connect with us here: TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpies  FACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies