Life Uncut - In The Boys' Club. Life As A Female CIA Operative. Uncut with Brittany Butler

Episode Date: August 13, 2024

Brittany Butler spent nine years as a targeting officer within the CIA's Directorate of Operations, Counterterrorism Center. Brittany has worked both at Langley and in the Middle East and has first-hand knowledge of how the CIA recruits spies and how intelligence organisations discover and apprehend terrorists. In today’s episode we speak about: How Brittany was recruited to the CIA Our perceptions of what someone in the CIA would look and be like vs reality Whether she told her loved ones what her real job was Meeting terrorists and whether Brittany was ever scared How the collaboration between CIA, FBI, secret services and police works Who was ultimately responsible for the security at former president Trump’s assassination attempt What Brittany is and isn’t allowed to speak about from her time in the CIA Is the CIA a boys' club? Honey pot operations and the value that women bring to intelligence organisations Advocacy for women’s rights in the Middle East Writing spy novels from a female perspective and sharing those experiences! See more from Brittany: Brittany's Website Brittany's Tiktok Brittany's Instagram You can watch us on Youtube Find us on Instagram Join us on tiktok Or join the Facebook Discussion Group Tell your mum, tell your dad, tell your dog, tell your friend and share the love because WE LOVE LOVE! xxSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Life Uncut acknowledges the traditional custodians of country whose lands were never ceded. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Always was, always will be Aboriginal land. This episode was recorded on Cammeraygal land. Hi guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Brittany. And I'm Keisha filling in because Laura has had some family stuff going on at the moment, but today's episode is one that you have been like a kid in a candy store for. Oh my god, I'm sick for it. You guys know I'm like a proper true crime buff. I've been watching it since I was a kid when I wasn't allowed to watch it. I've been reading as much as I can. I used

to watch the X-Files, which probably doesn't count as true crime. But today's episode is one that I have been wanting to do for a really long time. Today we're speaking to a real life ex-CIA operative. Her name is Brittany Butler and she spent nine years as a targeting officer with the CIA's Directorate of Operations Counterterrorism Center. Brittany spearheaded operational efforts to achieve some of the most sensitive foreign intelligence objectives abroad. She has both firsthand knowledge of targeting methodologies used in the recruitment of spies and extensive field experience in working with foreign liaisons to discover and apprehend terrorists abroad. What a mouthful that is, but I'm so excited. Brittany, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you so much for having me. This is such a treat. I'm so excited because we have never had anyone like you on the podcast before, but we start every interview by asking if you have an accidentally unfiltered story, your most embarrassing story. Yeah. So I think this is probably one of my crazier moments working at the CIA. So I started dating my now husband, then boyfriend, probably about a year after I started working in the counterterrorism center and the Iraq department. And we did this kind of absurd thing at Christmas time called the 12 Rays of Christmas. And everybody had to do some kind of like baked

good that symbolized an operation that they were part of a successful operation. And at that time I was targeting an individual that was on Interpol's most wanted. And so there were lots of like unclassified photos of him out there. And so as my, I was part of an operation that led to his demise, right? So I had to do a baked good that symbolized this, which is like really gross and bizarre if you look back at it. So I had his face screamed onto a cake at Harris Teeter, the grocery store here. And my boyfriend, now husband, went into the refrigerator in the middle of the night to get water out. And he saw this huge cake and he didn't know what I did for a living. And it was a huge cake with this dude on it. And he was like, what is this guy?

like what are you doing like what is that so i tried to play it off it was like a joke on a co-worker like not a big deal there's definitely not a terrorist yeah and then like later on i was like yeah that was like a terrorist we were hunting and he's like oh my god you guys are so weird i feel like only the cia is going to like have a baked goods store with terrorist face on it like never ever would you hear something like that was he tasty yeah it was tasty it was so good yeah no I mean this was a really bad dude he was really bad he killed a lot of innocent civilians so like I didn't feel bad about it but I just know that saying that out loud now I'm like wow that seems like so bizarre but yeah we had the 12 raids of Christmas party at the CIA and

the counterterrorism unit but I do wonder and maybe that's something we'll get into I do wonder if you hear this a lot with uh really traumatic situations or really serious situations where people do things where they joke a lot or they make light of situations because you know if everything's always doom and gloom and I wonder if that's something with what you guys were experiencing when your day in and day out I can only imagine is some pretty horrific scenes that maybe that is your way of sort of getting through the day absolutely yeah no that's a really good analysis I think of the situation like whenever I was deployed overseas I worked in Iraq and Afghanistan. And so at the embassy, we had bars set up and like we joked around a lot and we drank

beer because the work was so intense and so all consuming. You needed that release because life was scary a lot of the time. And, you know, you had rocket attacks at that time and you would, you know, be like duck and cover and the sirens would be going off and everything. So, yeah you almost you have to do those things to make a little bit lighter the situation for sure absolutely that I mean that makes complete sense to me but really what was it that made you want to join the CIA were you a little girl who was like you saw a movie or something and you went that's what I want to do one day or were you a grown-up who found your way yeah no not at all so I thought I wanted to be a foreign service officer and I told this story to some of my

girlfriends the other day and they thought it was like so absurd they like could not even believe it was true so my mom had me in beauty pageants I don't know if you guys have those in Australia we don't but we know what they are we know what they are thanks to you guys sorry we do but I don't think they're the same I don't think there is they're not on the level formative yeah okay well in the US at least and they're really big in the south and they were a little ridiculous but one good thing that did come out of it was they asked me as part of like Miss Freshman or whatever for my high school, what do you want to be when you grow up? And it made me really think about this question seriously. And I always knew I wanted to travel. And so I had two kind of like

job avenues that I was pursuing. I'm like, okay, if I do really well in college, I want to be a service officer and work for the State Department. And basically, those are the individuals that go and work at our embassies abroad. Or if that doesn't work out, I don't do well. I want to be like a flight attendant or something just so I can get out and see things. So it was never, it was not on my radar, the CIA at all. But I did an internship at the American embassy in Paris, my junior year of college, and I wanted to be a foreign service officer. So I was kind of doing this internship as like a trial to see like what I thought about it and how I did. And I knew it would look really good on a job application, of course, to actually do an internship with the

State Department. Well, I was involved in some passport fraud cases, and this is back in like 2004. I'm aging myself quite a bit, but we were very much like concerned about who was coming in and out of the country pretty soon after 9-11. And I had some knowledge of Arabic naming conventions, and I was able to pinpoint an individual that was trying to get into the country that really shouldn't be. And I didn't know it at the time, but there were some CIA operatives working at the embassy undercover. And they heard about that I had made this identification and they approached me and they're like, have you ever thought about applying to the CIA? And I was like, absolutely not. It was never in my radar, but they're like, just give it a try, like apply on the website.

So I did. And I was recruited to be a case officer right out of college, which is basically like in the directorate of operations, which is like a division of the CIA that does all the recruiting and handling of spies. They're the ones that recruit and handle spies. And so, yeah, I went through that process and did the full psyche valves, polygraphs. They did the full background investigation, all that good stuff. The more I kind of got involved in that line of work, I realized, you know what? I really think that like a hybrid position would be better for me where I'm not working full time overseas. I wasn't really ready to commit to that at that time in my life. Cause it pigeonholes you quite a bit in terms of, I was in my early twenties and

I was like wanting to get married and you know, that stuff. So I was like, okay, I want to like, be able to like live in the U S and, uh, but you know, TDY abroad, which is like our term for like temporary duty assignment overseas. So yeah, that's how I got into it. was the application process, the recruitment process really difficult? We think that it's this really hardcore recruitment process that, you know, like 1% of the people get into. What was it like? Yeah, it is quite hard. So it's interesting that you asked that question because I've gotten like some really ridiculous comments on social media, especially from men. They're like, there's no way you were in the CIA. You're pretty. They only hire average looking

smart people and I'm like just because I'm pretty like I'm therefore unqualified like what or don't I'm not intelligent enough just because I have looks yeah yeah like I can't pass test no yeah it is a very difficult process there's standardized testing they do IQ test you obviously have to have really good grades in college I was a bit of a nerd in college and I had like you know straight days. And I was in the student government. I was president of my class. I was pretty straight laced in school. And of course, like a big part of it too, is, you know, the lifestyle, they want to make sure that they're not recruiting people that are, you know, like into drugs and alcohol, a whole bunch. So I, I had never tried pot. I had never tried any of that stuff. It just

wasn't my jam. Like I said, I was like the nerd in the library. So like, I think it rules a lot of people out, honestly, given that the standards are so high in terms of your moral code of conduct and your ability to also like withstand a lot of stress. So not everyone can operate successfully in that environment where you are dealing with life or death situations every day that you have so much pressure on you. You know, it's not for everybody. You know, some people are more inclined to result to drugs and alcohol than others. And I think that, you know, just like and doing a background investigation on, you know, their employees, they try to distill kind of the candidates that they feel like are going to be the most successful in the environment. So not

only do you have to have the academic background and then the foreign languages too. So I speak foreign languages, which I picked up in college and study abroad and working abroad, demonstrating an aptitude for foreign language skills. If you know one foreign language, you know, they feel like you're more inclined to be able to speak and learn other foreign languages. Yeah. I thought that was good. What languages do you speak? French and a little bit of Arabic. Oh, amazing. What did you tell people in your life at the time? Did you tell your parents, hey guys, guess what? Just got a job at the CIA. So when I first told my dad, he didn't believe me. He was like, what? How can you be getting into this line of work? So he was in the DIA,

which is the Department of Defense's intelligence organization. And he did like weapon systems, computer science type of work during the cold war so he helped to design some computer programs you know up until he passed away but like about how you identify people using technology that are working on certain weapon systems in foreign countries and so he worked on that computer program and he this is a long story but i'll try to cut it short but basically like that program was cut short because of bureaucracy and he got really mad and he was like, I'm not doing this anymore. I'm leaving Washington. I'm going to go buy an 18-wheeler truck. I'm going to drive across the country and, you know, take produce from one side to the other and I want nothing to do with

Washington. So when he heard I was being recruited by the CIA, he was like, I cannot believe this. You cannot go to Washington. Everyone is corrupt. Stay far away from that kind of bureaucracy. and I was like no I want to do this I feel compelled to do this I was passionate about the counterterrorism mission in particular and so yeah I signed up but and then also you know because of the background check they go to every place you've ever lived and they interview like at least five or six people so when you know the government people roll in and they're black unblanked cars and suits and they're talking to my parents and they're talking to my parents friends and like people know that you're probably doing some kind of government work but I tried to

as a general rule they tell you just try to sound as boring as possible or as dumb as possible like so that people are just not interested what you have to do so like if I was like out at a bar and like talking to people I'd be like I'm an IT consulting like I don't know like I you know I just because no one wants to ask you questions on it consultancy was like oh my god i think that's kind of one of the reasons too like why i was recruited they don't want anyone that looks like a spy because then you see them coming like a hundred miles away and they also want people that are personable if you're like hanging out your trench coat like a hat on you're like squirrely i mean there are those people that are there but they're usually like analysts they're not

recruiting spies. They're not trying to get people to trust them. They need people with people skills that can have conversations and get people comfortable and get people to open up about secrets. This conversation is already taking so many avenues that I want to go down. I'm dying to ask you, but let's just start. What actually is a targeting officer? You're a part of the counterterrorism center. What was your role as a targeting officer? I did targeting for of counterterrorism operations. And that involves doing targeting to help pinpoint individuals that would be good for our recruitment efforts. So people that could be potential spies. So helping to outline for the field and kind of present to the field, like our stations and bases overseas,

this individual has the right access. They have the right vulnerabilities. This is how I see this approach going. This is how to contact this individual. I've done the vetting on him. I've seen through our different tools and databases that he does have the access that he proclaims to have. I think we should target him, right? So targeting officer, target him for recruitment. Another kind of targeting work, which was done primarily whenever we were in Iraq and Afghanistan was targeting for high value targets. So like individuals, members of Al Qaeda that were responsible for killing innocent civilians. And so part of those efforts to target those individuals and help to provide the operational leads to our folks in the field, whether that be

special forces, we worked really closely with, or like with our drone program. I'm going to struggle not kind of jumping around, but we will get into a little bit more about your book. But the characters in the book that you wrote about, there was one in particular who, and I don't want to give too much away for anyone who's going to read it, but it's the best friend of the main character. And the story that kind of plays out between these women is that there's a moment where the main character isn't sure whether she can trust the source, you know, trust the best friend. Is that something that as a targeting officer you dealt with a lot? I guess I'm asking like, did you learn how to spot what you could trust in someone? Or were you always doubtful of

the fact that they could be playing you. Yeah. They could be someone who was working for an opposing side or could be giving you false information. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. That's always something that you worry about in that line of work is if someone is lying to you or not, or if their motivations make sense and working with you. So I think that's part of like the vetting process before you even recruit a source. So they're called something called a developmental and they stay in the developmental for quite some time where you are constantly trying to corroborate or find another source of information to corroborate what they're saying to you as proving that they're being truthful or proving that they're a liar. And then we have all sorts

of tools to do that. So one of them, of course, is all the intelligence that we have and all the databases that we have to corroborate information that we're getting from other sources. The other piece is the polygraph, right? We use the polygraph not just to like get the truth out, but to see if someone is, you know, is more inclined to be nervous, getting like hooked up to all that stuff and has something to hide. Yeah, it's interesting what happens under pressure for people who are not telling the truth.

And you start to pick up on nonverbal cues, of course, but then we have different tools in our toolbox to say, listen, I know you're not telling the truth about this. And as the CIA, I think there's a certain amount of credibility we have that we kind of like know everything. And so you bring that power with you to an operational meeting and say, like, listen, I know what you're saying is not true. And I think that it is hard as an officer in that organization not to carry those skills over into your personal life and dealing with interactions with everyday people. I try not to do it, but I could definitely pick up on if there's like a girlfriend that's not being truthful or, you know, not acting on the up and up. I feel like I could

pick up on that pretty quickly. Your kids must have such a hard time. Like, like I lied to my parents about sneaking out and you'd be like, bullshit, sit down. I'm hooking you up to the lie detector test. Yeah. Brittany, what are some of the things that you look for to spot whether someone is lying well you you need to baseline them first so understanding how they talk and how they act and what their mannerisms are whenever they're telling the truth and then you ask them a question and what you know you know they the correct answer and then you see if they're gonna lie about it and then you think they might lie about it and watch how they respond i haven't done that to anyone besides like well my kids my almost 13 year old son a lot of it's

common sense, honestly. He told me the other day, oh yeah, I did not say a cuss word. And I said, well, I've heard that you did say a cuss word. So you need to tell me the truth right now. I have cameras all over this house, which is not true. I don't have cameras inside the house, but I have them on the outside. So I was like, I have cameras and I watch everything you do. So you better tell me right now. So you can choose. You can either right now confess, that's up to the fact that you said this cuss word and you'll be on restriction for just one a week from video games. But if you lie to me and I watch the video and it's showing that you cut your cussing, you're off video games for a whole month. And he was like, I cuss. And he was like,

did you just do your CIA thing on me? And I was like, no, I mean, kind of. I mean, a little bit. A little bit. A huge part of your job in counterterrorism, I mean, you were on the ground in Afghanistan, but you are trying to gain such sensitive information that's going to thwart these attacks. And a part of that, I imagine, is forming relationships and a lot of trust. And I have heard you speaking about this, about trying to form these relationships with sources and offering them protection. You know, we are going to look after you. You are going to be okay if you do this for us. But that's not always true, is it? No. And I think that's probably the hardest part of the job is, I mean, we do do that. I keep on saying we, I'm not part of the

CIA anymore. So I can't, I don't speak for them. It's just my own experiences, which are that there was a very high threshold for someone to be relocated, to be taken out of a dangerous situation. So by a high threshold, I mean like their reporting has to be like at a really high level, the head of whatever ABC organization is. And taking this individual out means the next 9-11 and it's not going to happen. Because I think it has stuff to do with the resources available. I hate that's such a bureaucratic answer, but I think that's just the reality of the situation. We just simply could not afford to relocate every source that ever worked for us. But yeah, it's really difficult work to do. It's work that needs to be done. I want to be really careful

because I have friends that are currently doing this work and it's so dangerous and it's so honorable of them to be working, you know, alongside these individuals to help protect our country, you know, the suicide bombers, and they want the same thing to happen. So, you know, we're working with them, you know, in many ways, we were empowering them to be able to stop those individuals because they didn't have the manpower or the resources to stop terrorism within their own country. In your career, was there ever a time that you feed for your life? Yeah, yeah, definitely. In the war zones, I was quite scared a couple times. But you know, whenever I worked in the war zones, the US was occupying those countries. So I was

really surrounded by a lot of US military. I always had guards with me on any kind of operational meeting, operational act I was doing. So I always felt very safe then. Probably the scariest situation I was in was in another Middle Eastern country that the US was not occupying. And we were working with an Arab intelligence service. And we were meeting with an individual that I helped to identify as a very high penetration of a terrorist network. It was very scary because you walk into those high threat meetings, the initial meetings, not knowing if they're going to show up with a bomb strapped to their chest. And that happened to some very close friends of mine. There was an attack at a CIA based in coast Afghanistan that killed eight of our officers. And the source

showed up with a bomb strapped to his chest. And I worked with two of those officers in this Middle Eastern country right before that happened to them. So yeah, you're always worried about that. You can do all the research, all of the background investigation you can on a source, but at the end of the day, you're meeting with a terrorist. You're meeting with somebody that has access to these really bad guys. And so you have to be prepared. That being said, there are security protocols in place to protect our officers. And as long as those security protocols are followed through, everybody should be safe in that meeting. Something I think we hear all the time as the public is, oh, you don't know how close you are to an attack. You don't know how

many things that have been stopped right before they happened. And I never know if that is just scare tactic or how close we all have been to something happening. What are the statistics like of that, if you can tell us? As the public, have we come closer than ever without knowing to some of these attacks that the CIA have stopped? I don't have the numbers for you. And if I did, I couldn't say what those are, but I know I've been a part of thwarting attacks. And so I can say for certain that, yeah, that we have thwarted many attacks. But something that I feel like people don't really understand about the CIA is when you work there, you don't have access to everything the CIA does. It's not like you're read into every single program. The director of

the CIA is, but you're not. So you are responsible for one little area and you need to know everything about that area. And that's, that's your job. As far as like knowing what's going on in China and Russia and like what those threats are to the U S that wasn't my job. And, you know, of course I would read the morning reports or whatever that would come out of the analysts would do. And they would brief the president on sometimes I could read some of those reports depending upon what I was working on, if that was involved in that. But we have something at the CIA called a need to know and if you didn't have a need to know it you know you weren't gonna learn it it's not like water cooler chat you don't just all hey what's happening over in russia this is what's

happening now yeah it's not like that no and you're very closely monitored there you don't want to step out of line there are cameras inside there unlike your house not like my house there are cameras there yeah well just like there they monitor things that you're doing on your computer and yeah if you're like chatting with your buddy about something you're not supposed to I'm very interested about the collaboration between the CIA and other forms of, I guess, policing or the FBI. How much do you work together and how much do you go, that's for us and not for you? Yeah. So FBI's jurisdiction is much different from the CIA. So the FBI is responsible for everything domestically. So everything internal to the United States. The CIA, our jurisdiction

is overseas. So I had this question come up as it pertained to the recent assassination attempt on former President Trump, as everybody was coming out of woodwork being like, what's your opinion about this? Like, how could this happen? It's like, well, CIA doesn't have anything to do with that unless it's in a foreign country. Now, if Trump was in Europe or in the Middle East or Asia or whatever, then the CIA would have something to do with that because they'd be in charge of working with the FBI and the Secret Service. And again, the Secret Service is like a whole other government organization that is ultimately in charge of the president's security. We would be working with them in tandem to make sure that any potential threats to the

president are being mitigated. But because that's not our jurisdiction, like we didn't have anything to do with that, what happened with the Trump assassination. So, yeah, I mean, one of the big things that came out of the 9-11 commission report was the collaboration between FBI and CIA wasn't happening very well. I guess a lot of what was being learned by the CIA overseas about Osama bin Laden, about how far along he was in the planning process, was it being communicated to the federal level and then backed out into the local and state level. So what I would hope has happened, and I certainly saw this happening a lot, was more collaboration between the CIA and FBI. Like if there is a threat to the homeland, we are going to let our FBI counterparts know

about it. And if we don't, we get in big trouble, you know, for obvious reasons. But, you know, that being said, we have a duty to protect our sources and methods so that we don't, you know, reveal our sources to people who shouldn't know. Because the more people that know the true identity of our sources, the more at risk they are. And so we're responsible for protecting their lives. So we take that very seriously. So distilling the information, making sure it gets to the right people is definitely done. But it's kind of like we strip out a lot of where we get this from and who is the source and blah, blah, blah. Speaking of Donald Trump's attempted assassination, I'd kick myself for not asking your opinion on this as someone that was once

on the inside do you have a view knowing how it all works knowing what the security level would have been like knowing that it just skimmed his ear he jumped straight up he fist pumped he didn't run off like the whole scenario there's a lot of theories going around about maybe it's been an inside job it just played out almost seamlessly what are your thoughts yeah I don't understand why there's all these conspiracy theories when like honestly I think it comes back to just poor communication between the federal and state level. Like I think that probably someone saw something and that wasn't communicated properly, or once it was communicated, then the right authorities weren't provided to shoot the shooter. I think it was just like bureaucracy at its worst where

they're not working well together. Like I know that the local police was in charge of securing the outer perimeter. So the, the building on which the shooter was on. And so, but at the same time, the state department is responsible for approving any kind of plans that the local police have in place to protect the president. So they, and the local police said they warned the secret service before they said, we just don't have the manpower to do this. And I don't know if the secret service didn't respond to that or what the story was, but the secret service are the ones ultimately responsible for the failure. And so I'm just theorizing here. I'm not privy to any information that you guys are not privy to. I think it's just a failure on the

Secret Service's behalf. I don't think that there's this large conspiracy theory. I don't know. I just don't. Especially knowing what we know about the shooter. Now, if more things come out, oh, he was talking online with someone in Iran, or he has ties to this group, then we might be talking about something different, but it seems to be that this was just like a very disturbed individual that did it. Speaking about being privy to information, you had a lot at your time in the CIA. How is it that you're now able to publicize the fact that you were a part of the CIA and talk about the operations? Is there a level that you have to check things by? I do know that you had to check your book by certain people to make sure that you weren't letting out too much information.

Like where is the line for that and what's the process like for you to be able to speak about it publicly? So as long as I'm not speaking about specific operations, so like sources that we recruited, individuals we targeted, specific countries that I went into clandestinely, I kind of know how to talk around a lot of it and still sound somewhat interesting. I don't know. I guess I just, I've been doing it now for a year since my book came out and I've just gotten pretty good at it, at talking about it without revealing sources and methods or people that I

work with or anything like that. Like, you know, you just have to be really secretive about that stuff. But yeah, no, unfortunately I have not told you guys anything that's not, it's all unclassified. So when you leave this AIA, is it a process that they make you kind of gradually pull back on what they tell you or is it just cut and dry no more information for you you can't talk about it for five years yeah I mean well I can't talk about anything I did ever in my lifetime like specific operations I was a part of yeah I mean I can talk about in general terms but I can't get into the weeds about personalities or people or anything like that and then like with my book I anytime I write something yeah it has to get through the publication review board and I went through that

process with the book i'm going i went through the process my second book like that's just something that always has to be done anytime anything i write anything about espionage it has to go through that process when we were going to interview you i put into like a big group chat that i have hey everyone uh great interview coming up what would you want to ask an ex-cia agent operative and the immediate response was oh ask him this everyone was saying ask him this see if he did this. I just clocked it myself. And I was like, that's funny that this preconceived idea that everyone is like a middle-aged white man that's in the CIA. I wrote back and said, oh, it's actually a woman. But being, you were young, you are beautiful. You are obviously

highly intelligent. Did you face any uphill battle being a woman in intelligence in the CIA? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I get it online right now. You know, it's this, oh, you must be part of a honeypot operation, or you were part of a honeypot operation, which for those who don't understand what a honeypot operation is, it's like basically where you use sex to get information. And it's just, that's a huge part of why I wrote the book, because I was just so sick of the way women are portrayed as these kind of sexual dominatrixes in TV and movies and

books written primarily by men that our only value is to provide sex for information that our only value is is how we look and nothing could be further from the truth especially in counterterrorism any kind of foreign intelligence a collection the number one thing they tell you when they you come in and they tell men and women this like you a hundred percent can never sleep with anyone in this line of work ever yeah like you will get fired like that which is so funny because it's it's the opposite to what we're led to believe with thanks to hollywood like you think of angelina jolie and mr and mrs smith sex bomb sleeps with whoever she needs to just to sort of get it like that's the way we're led to believe and all of a

sudden they're saying to you do not touch anyone yeah you do not you do not i mean there's so many reasons why i mean like first of all i would never do it but then also there's so many reasons why that doesn't work. The Russians do it. The Chinese do it. There are a lot of intelligence organizations that do do it. So I can understand why people might think that the CIA is the same way, but it's absolutely not true. I mean, think about where it works, right? In counterterrorism and the Middle East. If I was going around sleeping with my sources, would anyone respect me? Would anybody put their lives in my hands and say, yeah, here's all this information for your for your government? No, like they need it, especially within that area of the world where

they do not see women as their equal. You needed to establish right away who was in charge. You know, the fact that you are here for a professional relationship, a professional relationship only you have everything there is to know about the individual from their color of, you know, their mom's hair to what their mom used to call him whenever he was a little boy. Like, you know everything. You go in there armed with information, you call them out on their lies, and you do not play around with like flirting or anything like that. Like you cannot, you cannot do that. But what about interrelations in the CIA? Like, was it a battle for you work-wise within your own colleagues, within your own organization? Yeah. Yeah. That also was a

little bit of a challenge, but I learned through a lot of my colleagues and friends that I just was never interested in that. My husband's in a totally different line of work. I liked the separation. I liked being able to like come home and like not talk about it and him to bring something different to the relationship. And there was never like this competitive thing that I saw happening with my female friends that had married within the CIA because it can really complicate it. It can make things easy because you can go overseas more easily and find jobs more easily. But oftentimes what happens is the men are promoted and the women are not. And so you almost have to decide like whose career is going to take primacy.

And it's oftentimes the men. It's still very much a good old boys network where men run the show. And I think a large part of that is because they don't make it easy for moms to do that kind of work. I mean, there are just different requirements on us. You know, whenever we become mothers, it just kind of is the way it is. And so, you know, we go out for maternity leave. the guy doesn't go out for maternity leave. I come back from maternity leave and someone else

has got my job or someone else got that promotion. I was up for a really big promotion right before I left. I was pregnant with our second son, the guy that's doing the exact same work as me without the reputation that I had for getting the right people. He got it. I swear it was because I was pregnant and they were like, Oh, she needs to like be a mom or whatever. And so, yeah, it was really difficult. And then like when I went out to the war zones, I had this one instance that was just nuts. I went to a base and at the base, they told me there was no more room to stay at the base with the other CIA officers that I had to stay at another location where all the special forces guys were staying. And I was like, I don't really understand this. Like you guys have known

that i was coming out tdy for months like how can you not have any room for me at the base and they're like well something we've observed is like young female officers love to stay there with the special forces guys because they hook up and i was like 100 get me down to base i am not interested in that i'm here to do a job and like if i started doing that again how am i going to be respected by people I you you almost had to be a bitch you're like just to stay away from everyone it's almost like they weren't doing that for you though like that's like quite backhanded they're not saying oh most other women like to stay there it's saying we're putting you there because the men probably like to have you there like it's the opposite right right I don't want

to be there I don't want to be there at all yes it was gross it was gross yeah so I got moved down but I was like, this is absurd, you guys. And then I couldn't talk to anybody. Even if you sat next to a man in the mess hall or whatever, they automatically assume that you're sleeping with him. So you can't even sit next or be friends with anyone because they'll just assume you're having sex with them. It was absurd. So I had to be a real bitch, honestly, to every man because otherwise they would think, oh, she's whatever. Then all of a sudden you're a bitch. Oh, totally. I was about to say. And then you have to suffer the consequences of being the person who's hard to work with. It's incredibly reductive. In your book, again, I don't want to

give away too much, but there is a bit of a love story. Yes. Yes. You said that you weren't allowed to hook up with any of the sources. Are you allowed to hook up with other people within the organization if you want to? Yeah. Yeah. But they also told you before you went over to the war zones, they like, you felt like you're in high school again, because they brought out like a jar of condoms and they were like make sure you protect yourself because there was like an std outbreak whenever right before i went over there yeah because everyone was sleeping with each other because that you know like the war zones people are stressed out they're their spouses it's like the olympic village but there's also totally nothing wrong with that if

it's not interrupting anyone's life or the work that they're doing like we're not saying there's anything wrong with that what there's something wrong with is assuming that that's just what you would want because you're a woman. That's, yeah, that's where I have the issue. Brittany, since you've left the CIA, you've gone on to be a staunch advocate for women's rights in the Middle East. Was it through your experiences over there that it initiated that passion for you? Yes. So my last account at the CIA was in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the counterterrorism division. And I was really involved with the Taliban was, you know, trying to gain a foothold again in the country. And, you know, it was a question then with the U.S. government,

do we work with the Taliban? Since it's a new leadership, are they any different from the old Taliban that allowed al Qaeda to basically train in their country? Or is this the same old type of organization? What I saw consistently was the human rights abuses towards women, whatever their foreign policy stance, they were very much against women being educated, having any kind of rights or life of their own. And whenever the United States left Afghanistan, I and a lot of, I think a lot of other people that worked in the military and intelligence felt really horrible and helpless because we left a lot of people behind and especially the women and, you know, all the schools closed, you know, the restrictions were placed on women again about travel. And

it's been really hard because we also don't have the same foothold in that country that we used to to be able to help women in that country. So we're kind of like in this hard place right now. A lot of the human rights organizations that I've helped that specialize in women's rights, Women for Afghan Women is one of them. And they were really a wonderful organization that had 50 shelters throughout Afghanistan that helped to provide a safe haven for women and children fleeing domestic abuse. And it was wonderful to be a part of those efforts. But since we left Afghanistan, we have no way of really helping those efforts anymore. So it's become more of like kind of a refugee type of organization where we help to reestablish

women and children in the United States that are fleeing the Taliban, that are fleeing human rights abuses. So that work was really inspiring for me because I worked alongside these women who had underwent generations of hardship and civil unrest and human rights abuses, but just refused to be sidelined, refused to stand down and were so compelling and strong and did not want to be seen as a victim. But I think a lot of like how they've been portrayed in the media and movies and stuff, they're portrayed as like these victims, helpless victims, but like they're really very, very strong women.

And so that's why I created the character I did in The Syndicate Spy, Mary Malthad, because I wanted to showcase this really powerful Arab woman who takes her life into her own hands and really does something for women in that region. Because I'm a strong advocate for it can't be me, an American woman, going in there and being like, you guys need women's rights. It has to be within their own culture, within their own framework. It has to be those women. And then men, too. men, brothers, fathers, a standing up side husband, standing up aside these women and helping them to fight for their rights. Well, they do need people like yourself, Americans coming in to help and Australians and foreigners, because at the end of the day,

what these women are doing is extremely brave and extremely dangerous because they do not have rights and they are silenced from within when we've seen it over and over again. Even with Masa Amini, we saw what happened with anyone that came and rioted and stood up for her. I can't imagine it's something that you can ever unsee as well. Once you have gone in there on the ground, like it's easy for us to hear about it and to say, oh, we need to help. But when you've seen the things that you've seen on the ground, I imagine it gives you that extra inspiration to be a bit more hands-on. Yeah. Well, it's interesting because I've talked to a lot of publishers. I'm in the process of trying to get my second book published. And some of the feedback

I've gotten is like, people just don't care what's happening with women in the Middle East, Brittany, like they just don't care. And I'm like, and I'm like, yes, I do. You know, so I, I'm just going to keep fighting. I'm just going to keep on trying. But it's just so sad to hear that because I'm like, well, I really think that you're not giving people the benefit of the doubt. I don't think that you're I think people are more educated than you might think and are paying attention to things like what happened in Iran and would love to see, you know, something like a powerful woman that's changing women's rights in the Middle East showcased. I mean, I'm a big proponent of like, I think through literature, poetry, that medium, you can reach a lot of

different people that might not be open to the idea of helping to promote women's rights. But maybe if you walk alongside in a fictional story and you read this really inspiring story about an Arab woman, like, like, wow, what can I do to help? There's this wonderful organization here in Charleston where it's Lutheran, it's called Lutheran services. And they help to provide like furniture and clothing and all these different things for Afghan women that are trying to resettle in the Carolinas. And I've been so happy to be a part of that. But also like, as I go on the book tour and I talk about my book, I'm also trying to help highlight these organizations that are doing such good work. And people just don't know. They just don't know enough about

their work. You know, maybe their social media budget isn't really high. And, you know, just because I'm out talking about these things. So I'm hoping, I'm hoping to shed some light on it and just start a conversation about around the issues. Do you think our perspectives on refugees, particularly for women fleeing countries like the ones that you experienced firsthand, do you think that they need to shift? Do you think that we have an accurate representation of firstly, what they're fleeing from and how they're welcomed into our countries. Yeah. I mean, America, right? We're like a land of refugees. So it's so ridiculous. I think sometimes when you hear people, there's this huge border issue thing going on right now.

You know, there's this debate about letting immigrants come in, that we need to secure our border. And of course, I'm all about the legal way of getting into the United States. I don't want a bunch of criminals here either or terrorists or whatever. But I think there's like a balance. And then also realizing where we come from, which is a country of immigrants. I mean, my great grandparents were immigrants. Most people I know, same things. And they were all fleeing something. For me, my ancestors were Irish and they were fleeing the famine. They didn't have a way of feeding their families. And so it's the same kind of thing where you're fleeing something or religious persecution, right? Like the foundation of the United States,

like people wanted to be able to worship freely. And so, and they were being persecuted horribly for it in other countries. So they fled to America. So yeah, same thing with, you know, Afghans or Indians or Pakistanis or whoever is coming into the country. Yeah. We don't want any criminals here, but like people who are really fleeing some horrible things and that want to be contributors to society. It's interesting that there's this huge focus on Mexico, and don't let the Mexicans in and they're criminals. Like all of the cleaners all over, I know I'm making a huge generalization,

but I'll say it anyway, like they're all Hispanic and they are the hardest working people I have ever met. They're building our homes and they're building our streets and they're cleaning our homes. And it's not, they're not taking jobs away. Trump is saying, I don't know, I'm getting a little bit political, but. No, it's like they're enabling you

to live the life that you live. and we have this view that they are lesser because they're not born in the same place that we were lucky enough to come out of a uterus. Right, exactly. Brittany, a question a lot of people had is, is there ever a time in your relationship, so when you were engaged or married, that you are allowed to bring people into your world and actually tell them what you were doing? And if so, what does that look like?

You know, sign their life away on a non-disclaimer. Or is it something that you are told they can never fully know until you leave? so I see that as two kind of separate questions so one I could tell my now spouse that I worked at the CIA once we were engaged I could tell him a little bit more about where I worked exactly and what exactly I was doing and just in terms of I'm working in operations I'm helping to catch terrorists like that's as broad and that's as in the weeds as I got with him same thing with anybody else that I could tell, like my mom and my dad, like you can tell your mom and your dad. They encourage you to keep it a secret from as many people as you can, because the more people

to know, the more inclined it is that they're going to blow your cover. And working clandestinely, like I really didn't want anyone to know that I worked there. Now it's a bit different because I'm not doing that work anymore. I don't have access to the information. So I could be a little bit more free about like talking like, yeah, I used to work there, but again, not getting into any kind of operational details. Question about the logistics. When we travel, we go to the airport, we go through customs or whatever it is. We land in the country, you open up your passport, you get a little stamp on it and you might pay a visa. How does it work when you're flying to places like Afghanistan? So we had private planes at that time that would take us. So my husband

actually took me to the airport once. This is like one of the first deployments I went on when we were together. We're just dating. And he pulled up. So international, the Dulles airport in Virginia, there's like a huge terminal and there's all these planes taking off from there. And he pulled up to the front and I was like, no, it's actually not right here. You have to like go around back. And he was like, go around back. What do you mean? And so he drove around back and like there's like an unmarked plane and I just like walk into it and go and so it's not like did he know at this point was he like yeah he was like uh I feel like he knew I was going to Middle East he didn't know where exactly but yeah that was nerve-wracking for him and like

really weird he would like after I got back home he was like don't ever do that to me again he was just scared he wasn't it wasn't like you know don't ever go again because he knew like it's funny. My dad actually said to him once, like, I can't believe you let her go and do this. It's so dangerous. And he was like, have you ever met your daughter? Like, I'm not going to ever tell her what to do. Speaking of your dad, you mentioned earlier that your dad had sort of advised you against going into this work, against going into the organization because they were all corrupt. Now that you're on the outside and you've done it, you've got your dad's experience. You've got your own personal experience. What is your view on the level of corruption? I don't know.

I don't know. Did I use the word corrupt? Yeah, I did. I apologize. That was the wrong word. I think more bureaucratic, like just the bureaucracy is just so slow moving and it's really hard to get things done. And I don't know, I think it's getting better. I think that they're trying to cut through a lot of red tape, but it can be very frustrating when like, you're like, okay, as the targeting officer on the ground, you're like, I found this guy that's really, really bad and wants to you know kill americans can we get him please can we get him he's right here he's right here he's gonna move he's gonna move he's gonna move and they're like well wait we have to get this approval and then that approval and then la la la la la that could be

like really like you want to like pull your hair out then all of a sudden he's gone and then he's gone and he's like the opportunity is missed and who knows where he is now and where he's attacking next so yeah like there was a lot of those kind of moments where i could see from my dad's perspective like yeah this is really frustrating it's so much out of your control and for all those instances where that happens there's that one instance where you're part of this operation where you get this really bad guy and you're like I feel great this is awesome to be a part of this mission all these different people working together something that Hollywood never highlights which is that it's not one James Bond or Jason Bourne, like saving the world. It is

many committed individuals with lots of different trade crafts. You know, you've got your signals analysts, you've got your comms expert, you've got your geospatial analysts, you've got your linguists, you have all these people working together to put together an operation. And when it all works beautifully, it's like, awesome. And then you have your cake. And then you have your cake. I love so much that your rebellion was joining the CIA. Ours was like going out and hooking up with boys and dating people that our parents wouldn't have approved.

It's so funny to me. But Brittany, you are, I've seen on social media that you have written your second book. What's kind of like next for you? Yeah, I got my second book written. So we'll see what happens with that. If I stay in this spy thriller genre or if I move on to another genre, I've actually started dabbling in a little bit of romantasy. Romance fantasy is like really taking off right now. We here call it clitorature on Life Uncut. What do you call it? We call it clitorature.

Oh my gosh, that's amazing. Love it. Yeah, no, I love reading it. So I was like, I'm going to try to write this. And it's actually a lot easier to write than what I was writing before. So I'm having a lot of fun with it. And the real reason why is like, so a spy thriller genre in the U S is male dominated. Like all the authors are male. Most of the readers are male. So it's been really difficult for me, honestly, to break in to that genre because I do think that the female perspective needs to get out there. And I was really excited to be able to do it, but I think it's taking a chance on something new. Like you just don't see a lot of females writing in this space. And you also don't see a lot of female CIA officers being showcased in an

accurate way. So, but like I'm making my books, my book is really fun and there's lots of, there's like sex scenes in it. They're really spicy. And like, I mean, it's a really fun read, so it's not too serious. I think sometimes, you know, you might think, oh, it's a spy thriller. I don't want to use my brain. I want to just check out, you know, which I totally get too. You want to just be able to lose yourself because we all deal with real life crap every day. And who wants to sit and study for a couple hours at the end of the day. So it's definitely one of those books that you can grab a glass of wine because that's what I like to do. Well, that is The Syndicate Spy for everyone that wants to know more. It's a wonderful mix where fact meets fiction. And

hopefully we see book two. We're going to put in the show notes links to Brittany's TikTok and Instagram and the book, et cetera. So if you do want to know more, I love perusing your page, like the insight that I get watching all your reels, truly fascinating. So we cannot thank you enough for giving us your insight, your intelligence, your beauty, and your time today, Brittany. Of course. Thank you guys so much. Thank you for the opportunity. I really appreciate it. We'll be right back.