CIA Files: True Stories of U.S Intelligence

British aristocrat Donald Maclean, as a member of the Cambridge 5, worked his way to the top of the British Foreign Office while secretly working as KGB spy. His wife was in on it the whole time. How did an extremely wealthy and noticeable couple successfully spy for so long, and why? Learn about their backgrounds, deeds, and fates. This is the fourth episode to deal with the Cambridge 5. The othe...

This is our third episode in a three part series on CIA Directors who shaped US policy towards the Soviet Union and now Russie. I give an overview of the life of John Brennan, a straight talking Irishman from New Jersey. The episode ends with anecdotes about a stateside former American sailor pretending to be in the Donbass while promoting pro-Kremlin propaganda, a Ukrainian operation to trick Rus...

This is our second episode in a three part series on CIA Directors who shaped US policy towards the Soviet Union. I give an overview of the life of Robert Gates a proverbial and literal boyscout. We also give a brief news update about Wagner in Sudan and Armenia's frustration with Russia.

From the OSS to CIA Director William Casey is the CIA Director who shaped America's Cold War policy and indirectly gave us GPS. Find out how. This is the first episode in a three part series on CIA Directors who influenced our present policy towards Russia. Though a sober man Casey was not without controversy. At minute 19:00 there is an interview with Rebecca Maciorowski. She is an American n...

We're taking a break from our weekly conversations to focus on our proper episodes. Look out for Frank Wisner, part 2 in two weeks. Then we're taking a short break to get things prepped for what we're generously calling Season 2 of CIA Files. Meanwhile, for international news, check out This Week Explained , which does a great job of covering current events around the globe. And we're working hard...

Picture this: You're a high-ranking Air Force official overseeing research and development of new, top-secret aircraft. Your job is Operational Security, which is to say, keeping it secret. Then one day, a civilian who's an expert on radio waves, as well as a bit of a photography buff, comes to you with a massive collection of pictures and data related to the top-secret aircraft you're supposed to...

In 1986, computers were still the domain of the wily nerd. They wouldn't become cool until the World Wide Web was invented. And even then, computers weren't really that much cooler until DSL connections came along. But Clifford Stoll, an unemployed astronomer, took an IT job at a university, where his superior nerdity would lead him to be the first IT person to discover and track down a computer h...

Brandon walks us through some of the misunderstood, overblown, and under-reported aspects of Russia's long-term efforts to sow derision and division among Americans. How involved was Russia with the NRA? Has the Kremlin been stirring up secessionist movements? And what's up with those crazy Russian dashcam videos? We don't really talk about that last question, but we're still curious. NRA Infiltra...

On Monday, August 8th, the FBI conducted a search of Trump’s Mar A Lago mansion, seizing 11 boxes of documents. It was later disclosed that the boxes were classified material, including some labeled Top Secret, that the National Archives and the Department of Justice say Trump was not authorized to take with him after he left the White House.  In mid January, 2022, 15 boxes of presidential re...

Sorry for the delay. We recorded this episode to release last week, but I (Topher) had a lot going on and neglected to edit and publish it on time. So here it is for this week. We hope you didn't miss us too much. In this episode, we dive into the world of "signature reduction" -- which is made up of efforts to hide agents' true identities online in the world of social media and open-source intell...

This week, we review CIA Director Bill Burns' track record so far. 

Who is current CIA Director William J. Burns? Not a soldier, nor a lawyer, nor a long-time intelligence officer. Instead of the usual suspects for the role, Bill Burns is a legacy civil servant and a career diplomat. Under his direction, the CIA seems to be trying a few new things, like being transparent (or is he?!) and meeting face-to-face with world leaders instead of trying to overthrow them f...

The 1950s might be regarded by some as the salad days of the CIA. No ideas were too wacky, and the money was flowing into research and development like a cool, clean mountain spring. So when CIA mad scientist Dr. Sidney Gottlieb decided to hire an up-close magician to write some instruction manuals on how to perform their own sort of magic --  the kind that might involve slipping a drug into...

No episode this week, but we'll be back next week.

Julian Assange began hacking in the 80s when he was just 16 years old. Now he's perhaps the most famous whistleblower in the world. The United States wants to put him on trial for espionage, but his defenders say he was simply working as a journalist to uncover injustices committed by the U.S. military, and what U.S. officials actually want is to punish him for exposing American crimes and to scar...

That's right, folks. This is our last news episode. We will still be releasing proper episodes highlighting the lives of the people involved with the CIA. And we'll be releasing more short episodes as well. We will also be launching a new show soon, so keep an eye out for that. Updates to follow.

Jim Angleton dedicated his life to building and maintaining the CIA. He spent years manipulating people and policy from his self-labeled "wilderness of mirrors," motivated by his own paranoia, and informed by an opportunistic Russian defector named Anotoli Golytsin. Eventually, despite his monumental efforts to cover his tracks, Angleton's chickens came home to roost.  Sources: The Ghost: The...

Chinese fighter pilots are full of beans. Are things looking up in Yemen? Because they aren't in Tigray. A CIA whistleblower dies. And if you're looking for classified tank information, you might want to check some online video game forums.

More news from around the world -- an update on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a look at Ethiopia's record number of displaced people, and a discussion about the decline of democracy and the rise of autocracy and authoritarianism.

We discuss global food shortages. Finland officially wants in NATO. Badass e-bikes with missile launchers. George W. Bush makes a textbook Freudian slip. And we've got an update on UFOs, or I guess UAPs now, from the Pentagon. 

Finland wants in NATO. Elections in the Philippines go retro as the Marcos family gets back into the mix. Did Star Trek: The Next Generation correctly predict Irish reunification? Also, what's going on in Ukraine? Old Russian tanks enjoy more time in the spotlight. Speaking of old Russian things, times continue to be tough for old Russian oligarchs, especially if they visit shamans for toad venom...

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/exclusive-cia-chief-told-bolsonaro-government-not-mess-with-brazil-election-2022-05-05/ https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/nkorea-fires-unidentified-projectile-off-its-east-coast-skorea-military-2022-05-07/ https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/yemen-officials-commanders-killed-clash-militants-84560637 https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20...

I don't feel well, so imagine a clever blurb and insert that here.  https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/reputed-federal-informant-whistleblower-found-dead-l-reported-missing-rcna26382 https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/valentin-broeksmit-federal-informant-whistleblower-dead-el-sereno-high-school/ https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/4/28/yemen-saudi-arabia-to-release-163-houthi-prisoners...

A string of odd coincidences has Brandon posing some interesting hypotheticals about what might be happening behind the scenes in Moscow as Putin's bloody invasion seems to be scratching some unusual itches. There's the occasional fire at one or two or three (who's counting?) top secret Russian facilities, and a handful of strange murder-suicides among Russia's retired oligarch community. Also, ar...

News of President Kennedy’s assassination sent shockwaves around the world. And at the epicenter of those shockwaves sat one Jim Angleton. His actions following Kennedy’s death would help stoke tales of conspiracies that, perhaps, people within the U.S. government had killed their own Commander-In-Chief, a concern the President himself expressed just before his untimely death. Angleton played a ke...