The Team House - Deep Dive into the Israeli Pager Attack w/ 2 former CIA Officers | EYES ON PODCAST

Episode Date: September 24, 2024

Support the show on Patreon:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseToday we're joined by Mick Mulroy and Marc Polymeropoulos, both former Senior CIA Officers to talk about the Israeli pager attack on over 3000 Hezbollah operatives and what it could mean going forward.Michael “Mick” Patrick  Mulroy is the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East. He is a retired CIA Paramilitary Operations Officer in the Special Activities Center and a retired United States Marine. He is currently the President of Fogbow (a company that enables international humanitarian efforts), a Senior Fellow for the Middle East Institute, an ABC News National Security Analyst, a Co-founder of the Lobo Institute,  the Co-president of End Child Soldiering, and on the Board of Advisors for Plato’s Academy Centre and the Aurelius Foundation.Marc Polymeropoulos retired from the Senior Intelligence Service ranks in 2019 after serving for 26 years in the Intelligence Community in operational field and leadership assignments. He is an expert in counterterrorism, covert action, and human intelligence collection. Marc is one of IC's most highly decorated field officers and has honed a unique leadership style based on decision making under pressure, inclusivity, camaraderie, and competition. His book "Clarity in Crisis:  Leadership Lessons from the CIA" was published in June 2021 by Harper Collins.  Marc's goal is to pass on this knowledge to the sports and business world who can benefit from his unique experiences serving his country in the hot spots of the world.Find Mick here:⬇️https://www.loboinstitute.org/https://x.com/mickmulroy?lang=enFind Marc here:⬇️https://x.com/Mpolymer?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5EauthorFind Andy Milburn here:⬇️Twitterhttps://twitter.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fandymilburn8LinkedInhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2023Substackhttps://amilburn.substack.com/Andy's bookhttps://www.amazon.com/When-Tempest-Gathers-Mogadishu-Operations#pagerexplosion #hezbollah #israelBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey, guys, it's Jack. I just wanted to talk to you today about a way that you can help support the podcast if you're not already. To support the channel is to become a Patreon member. So we have Patreon memberships that start at just $5 a month. And when you sign up, you get access to all of our episodes ad free. That's the big bonus for that. I mean, we also do some Patreon bonus episodes for our subscribers. But this is the biggest and best way that you can support the Team House. channel and podcast if you'd like to, and we really appreciate that. So go and check us out at patreon.com slash the team house. Okay. Hello, everyone. Quarten, the hilarity, please. We just a very lively free session here because we have two extraordinary guests this morning, two regulars, but we had them together. That's what's extraordinary. Mick Mulroy, former Marine, former DASD for the Middle East, former senior agency operative. And the other corner wearing red, we have everyone's other favorite here, Mark P. And Mark, you know, it's such a cliche to say Mark needs little introduction,

but actually he does need little introduction. Mark's a longstanding regular on the team house and eyes on. senior CIA officer and commenter on global affairs extraordinaire, a very level-headed approach. Gentlemen, oh, and Dee, of course, as always. Hello. Thanks, yeah. Thank you. Gentlemen, much to talk about.

And I'm going to stop talking right here. And let's kick off with the mark, because you had some, let's not go right into the sex. scandals. Let's talk about what's happening in the Middle East. Let me just let me just start. I always got to say this. It's it's a it's first of all I love coming on with you all. I can't remember I've lost count how many times I've been on this show and in the team house. But joining me today is Mick Mulroyd, who is a tremendous human being. He was a fantastic agency officer. He's a friend of mine, a great person. And I always think back to my career at CIA where there's this kind of these type A, narcissistic sociopathic personalities.

Like, Mick is actually really truly one of the nice guys. He's a good human being. And so, and I always cherish that. And Mick can tell the story more. But when I, Mick was running a paramilitary base in Afghanistan, I replaced him as the base chief. And I think when I came in that night, I think we were taking incoming 107 millimeter fire.

And my eyes were probably bugged out. And Mick just, you know, met me with a big smile on his face and basically said, you know, hey, welcome to Schen. So I'll never forget that tremendous turnover. over. But I probably crap my pants on the Hilo flight end, but Mick calm me down. And, you know, great human being, great American. So it's awesome to be on with Mick. Amen. Same here, brother. My Greek brother. I guess I got two Greek brothers on this show now. Yeah, that's right. Yep. All right. So, so I'm done kind of telling Mick how great he is. So I can spend the whole time

the whole show doing that. But, you know, I just, you know, the things about what happened over the last, you know, 72 hours in Israel. I mean, one of the things, I've said this on air several times on MSNBC and quoted in the press. And I'm Greek, so I am very prone to hyperbole. So let's just get this out there. So, you know, I'm guilty in that. But, you know, this really wasn't a Israeli masterclass on covert action. And it was, you know, in my mind, the most impressive kinetic covert or most kinetic

intelligence operation I'd ever seen just because the vast scale of it and the audacity of it with not only it being what we thought was a supply chain operation, but I think the Israelis turns out now were the supply chain. I don't think they intercepted real pagers. I think they created the pagers. And so, you know, pretty incredible. We can talk about the tactics of it, which will be fun. I think the, and I, Mick perhaps shares my view on how impressive this was, you know, but was this a strategic success? And I think that probably remains to be seen because I think it was sending a message to Hizbollah that they don't want to water, that they should not want a wider war, that Israel has achieved total kind of intelligence

dominance over them. But, you know, Hizbella gets a vote. And so, you know, as I'm sure Mick is, everyone's kind of assessing day-to-day, Hizbollah's reaction. Yeah. So I want to get in a little bit later to Hizbollah's, you know, kind of whether this was part of a strategic plan. But for either of you, yeah, please just let's talk about how they pulled this off. You mentioned that you think that they didn't break into the supply chain. They manufactured their own pages.

Mick, go ahead. Take crack. Yeah, no, I totally agree with you, Mark. I think this is very impressive. We'll get into how it was carried out and when it was carried out, and whether it could be done at a different time that had been more effective. And of course, you can't go past the fact that, you know, innocent civilians, including kids, were killing this thing as well.

So, but to start with, yeah, at day by day, it seems like we get learned more about this operation, which obviously is the case with a lot of covert operations, when everybody wants to say something because they're successful, right? If you think back to the bin Laden raid, I mean, almost the entirety of it came out eventually. But it does look like they actually created the company

that created the pagers and actually made real pagers and had real clients who just thought they were buying pages. Right? So there's a lot of these same type out there, of course, not that were manipulated to have explosives in it. But, you know, they're talking like ABC, verified this morning that this has gone back 10, 15 years. Wow.

And so, you know, all the enemies of Israel should be concerned right now because they don't know what they have that has this, you know, kind of manipulated technical capability, to be frank, because I'm sure they didn't just do it for Hezbollah. It wouldn't make sense. I could just picture some spore schmuck like looking through like invoices to see what company sold them what like the last 10 years so right and you know it doesn't mean they wouldn't have more than one company so this there's a lot of i see duplication coming uh from this once people see how effective it was tactically i can see not just our adversaries but uh you know also

some of our allies looking at how potentially us uh how this could be used although we can also discuss whether the u.s would do something uh similar to this Not a chance. Yeah, not a chance, actually. And there's because there's so much, there's so much risk, right? I mean, now we've got, because, you know, with anything like this, what, 20, 30% didn't go off?

Right. So now they're just floating around out there, right? They could end up on a plane. They could end up on a, you know, who knows, it could end up exploding without, you know, the trigger. I mean, there's so many legal issues in this. You're right. I agree with Mark.

There's no way I think you've done that. But, you know, I think. my speculation, not that I have any information on this, this was done for a purpose. And the best purpose that I could see is if there is a ground war between Israel and Hezbollah, and you can see the Wall Street Journal reporting, which citing several people that indicates that that's where we're heading from the report from this morning, I think they would use it right as it began. Right. So that's when all these operatives are going to be away from their families, right? They're going to be in their positions to try to repel the

invasion. They're going to try to switch off a cell phones, of course. And then handheld radios and beepers and stuff like that would have been their primary communications. You cross a line of departure, you trigger everything. You've taken 3,000 terrorists off the battlefield, and they can't communicate. Right? That's what, so I think, you know, and I've heard rumors to this effect, that the Israelis thought that they had been compromised, that somebody in the Hezbollah, you know, counterintelligence apparatus had figured this out. And so it was either utilize it now or, you know,

you just saw 3,000 pages get thrown in the ocean, right? So I don't know if that's true. So I'm not saying it's, but, you know, my speculation and some people have backed me up from comments they've got from officials that that might have been the case. So that could have been the strategic, you know, level operational impact that they intended and they just had to do it prematurely because of the potential was compromised. Yeah, so ideally, yeah, it would be right before the invasion, right?

And the same way before launching or before supporting an ISAF or Peshmerga attack on the Islamic state, you know, we would we would go after there. I mean, we would have broken into their signals system already, but it didn't become, you know, we didn't go full court press on that until right of before an attack to disable leadership. And so this, yeah, I, the effect would be 72 hours or two afterwards. Sorry, so, so I think that, I think that analysis is correct. So then you get to the point where, if this is true, if the Israeli thought there was a compromise, and you actually saw that the Israeli security cabinet huddling prior to this. You know, there was all these rumors that Galant, the defense minister was going to be fired, and that kind of went away. And all of a sudden, the Israelis went into this kind of closed session. And I think there were a lot of people are wondering what's going on. Well, what I think the discussion was, okay, so, you know, it's this notion of use it or lose it. You know, what do we do with this capability now? This is a tool. So when the intelligence community goes to the policymakers, this is a tool. Originally, this tool was designed for, you know, operational prep in the environment right before an invasion, knock out their whole command infrastructure, cause fear. The Israelis rolled in. Well,

well, that's not going to, that's not what happened. And so, so I think what, I mean, my sense is that the Israelis said, okay, should we, should we actually still use this? And because, you know, some of this stuff that, that I've been hearing is, you know, the answer was, yes, we should, because again, it's, it's almost part of their strategy of escalating to deescalate. That's been Israeli military doctrine for a long time. So they climb the escalator. So the theory would be, okay, we're going to, you know, we're going to, you know, launch this, you know, kinetic intelligence operation, which is, of course, a two-day operation, followed up by strikes, which we saw yesterday in southern Lebanon.

Again, that's the message to Nasrallah. So I think that, you know, there's a saying we used to have, you know, when we kind of ran things on this on a much smaller scale, but, you know, it's the burdened hand. Like, you know, do we go ahead and do this? So I think that's probably where the thinking went. And you even saw yesterday, when these Israelis, you know, jets were, you know, breaking the sound barrier over,

over Beirut as Nassarla was giving his speech. So, so originally this app was probably designed for an actual Israeli kind of rolling into Lebanon. But I think that the policymakers then, with a possible compromise, said, okay, we're going to use it for a little bit of a different effect. The big question, of course, is, you know, how will Hisbala respond? And Nassarala in his speech was pretty defiant. But that doesn't matter.

the big question is, you know, will this lead to a kind of a wider war? Because if you do the kind of escalate to de-escalate strategy, it doesn't work if the other side escalates further. So as you keep climbing that ladder, I'm getting to all this academic think techy stuff. I probably read too much of this. But I think that's what's going on now. So you think that's Rola is, his rhetoric is always fairly aggressive. but he's also known as being a pragmatist, and it'll be interesting.

You know, do you think, right, the Israelis could level Beirut in about a second. You know, so, I mean, you know, they have not. So, so, you know, of course, Isbola has this tremendous arsenal of missiles that could target, you know, Israeli population centers. But the Israeli Air Force could cause enormous destruction to Beirut. And so, you know, does Iran want to see their proxy destroyed? Does, does Isbola, which is, you know, an integral part of the Lebanese political system, want to see that go away as well. And so, you know, if you look at neither side, this doesn't make

sense for either side for an all-out war. What the Israelis want is for Isbala to stand down, pull back behind the, you know, the Lutani River and have 70,000 their citizens go back in the north. I mean, that's the, that's the, you know, the war aim of the cabinet. The war, the, Israel's war goal is not to destroy Hezbollah as a fighting force. It's to actually allow their people to go back. So, you know, I think for all sides, it would make sense to stand down. But that, you know, The enemy gets a vote. We got to see what his balla does. Yeah, and if I could just footstomp that, I mean, I just got back from Israel doing the humanitarian stuff we do out there.

But I talk to the people I know from top to bottom, from the, you know, from generals down to the reservists, it's a bartender between, you know, deployments in Nacaza, right? Everybody says, bottom line is we're going to get our people back into their homes, you know, the 70,000 that are populating. hotels in Tel Aviv, and they don't believe that they're going to voluntarily go back to the county river, which is required by the UN resolution on it, 1701. And so they're just, they're just, if you talk to them, it isn't, if it's going to happen, it's when from top to bottom. So I don't know if that's just a psychological effort on their part, or it's just, they just think there's zero chance that Hezbollah can politically voluntarily just,

pick up shop and move what 18 miles i don't know that's that it turned and just basically as a complete concession to israel without being forced to so i mean you could i mean i mean think of a scenario where that would happen so if they won't do it and we if we agree they won't do it then what's going to make them and it isn't going to be air it's going to be it's going to have to include a ground component i don't think i think so that's why the inevitability when you talk to people on the ground is clear from the Israeli perspective that this is going to happen. And from a pragmatic perspective, it's problematic, of course, because the IDF is still recoiling from Gaza, right? I mean, in order to prepare for Lebanon, we haven't seen the

big troop movements yet that would indicate imminent invasion of Lebanon, but at the same time, the Israelis are probably grappling with reconstitution. They've had extended activation of the reserves, which has had an effect on the economy. So, you know, the downside looking ahead is severe disruption to their own economy and indeed their own social fabric if they do go ahead and launch an invasion of Lebanon. Yes, and on that note, one real quick, real quick point is, I said the same thing to a former IDF person I was talking to about something else.

And he said, you know, we could see a traditional large-scale troop movement up to the north, you know, divisions, mechanized divisions, etc. Or you could see, which we already did see, a lot of paratrooper elements moving out of Gaza in other positions, special operations, so that it's more of a, you know, to the extent you can do a surprise type operation that then followed out by massive troop movements, right? So that it will come really quickly and maybe unexpectedly where some ground is taken early on. Some troops are cut off from their supporting elements and then the large-scale conventional forces start moving. Because think of the distances we're talking. This is Israel. This is not that great. I don't think he was saying as something he knew was in the planning,

or I probably wouldn't tell a podcast. But this was his. his speculation based on, you know, and he was a former, you know, Israeli Special Operations Officer. But so that could be the case, too. We might not see the big movement. We might see a quick push airborne air assault type thing and then all of the mobilization come quickly there. Sorry, Mark.

No, I think that's, that's, in terms of, you know, if you see, there's been kind of repeated references in the press to, you know, the idea of Northern Command is, you know, providing these kind of war plans for the security cabinet. So I think that's 100% right, but it's not inevitable. So again, that's part of the kind of that. So if his bullet, and that's a giant if, if they stood down, if there's more diplomacy, these things don't have to occur. And again, that's, that's Israel climbing the escalatory ladder. So, you know, I, I agree with that. You know, the, talking to Israelis, you know, I mean, the, or just are understanding kind of conventional Israeli doctrine. I mean, they fought a war for a year. This is going,

beyond what they're this is that mean Israel and the IDF is built for very quick short campaigns so you know you can make an argument or you can question you know is the IDF actually exhausted right now do they need kind of time to rest and recuperate um because I think his balla which and in Lebanon is a different arena it's that's the existential threat for Israel you know Gaza's not Hamas was not it was heinous what happened on October 7th but um this is a kind of a different ball game so you know one can question, and I think many Israelis probably are, is that, you know, is the IDF actually ready for this? Is this the ideal time? You know, I was talking to a former Israeli intel Mossad official, and that was his argument. He said, war is inevitable. But, you know, or,

but he questioned, are we ready? And I think that's a, that's kind of a fair point, too. And I think Mick alluded to it, like, you know, the Israeli economy suffers if you call up, you know, one or two hundred thousand of the reserves. And they're going to, they would, I would imagine they would have to here. But we haven't seen that yet. So again, I think that's why, you know, these campaign plans are probably, you know, in play. They're on the table. They, you know, they can be initiated, but it's, that's not inevitable. And I think that's probably smart of the Israelis to just kind of keep slowly climbing that ladder. And I just, you know, there's something coming across the wire right now is that the Israelis just whack another senior Hezbollah guy in

in Beirut. So, you know, that probably, um, that probably, um, goes along with that kind of strategy of making this really painful before a decision is made to launch. One last point, too. I mean, we're talking that Lebanon is a quagmire for the Israelis. You know, I was in Damascus in 2006 along the border in Syria. And, you know, the kind of the the result of that, Beirut suffered a lot of destruction. A lot of people were killed, this was not a kind of a high point for the IDF. You know, 2006 was not considered successful. And I think probably many Israelis don't remember, but their occupation in southern Lebanon as well was extremely controversial. So you do have to wonder if they're going to bite off more than they can chew.

Does that make sense? Yeah. And I agree that it's not inevitable. I think, I don't think Hezbo wants it. And I think the IDF is stretched in. And I think that's part of the reason that there's so much friction between Minister Galant and Prime Minister Netanyahu. So I don't think it's inevitable. Well, I think they want us to think that they think it's inevitable because then it puts so much pressure on us. You know, Amos, Holstein, who's the primary, apparently, on this, to get the Hesbollah to withdraw, right? Right. Because they don't want to think, they want us to think that we're, they're headed toward this regardless, and that we have to be the ones to derail the conflict. But this is, they are extended.

Everybody you talk to over there realizes the IDF is, is not only fighting, that would be a second front. and it's a front that they didn't they weren't as successful as they'd like in 2006. What thing, Andy, can I raise this a topic that I think it'll be kind of interesting fun to discuss? And that's the idea of kind of the deterrent factor or the fear factor that Israel once had been then lost on October 7th. And I think it's an important subject. And, you know, Mick has, I haven't been Israel for a while, but Mick was just there. I think that he probably felt that as well.

You know, October 7th kind of shattered that myth of the, you know, the invincible Mossad, the invincible shin bet, the IDF that was kind of the, you know, the, you know, standing on the ramparts for the country. So not only was the Israeli intelligence community reeling, but, you know, the Israeli population was like, hold on a second, you know, these institutions that are kind of bedrock of our nation has been, has been shown to be, you know, less than ideal. I mean, the intelligence failures of October 7th were catastrophic. But look what's happened since then.

You know, you have Mossad conducting the operation that killed Fuad Shooker in Beirut back in July, every American, I think, and I'm sure this crew here would celebrate this. Sorry, you just should because he was, you know, Shuker was one of the planners for the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon, killed 241 American personnel. And so they conducted the Shooker op. they gathered intelligence would then allow the IDF, the Israeli Air Force, to preempt the Isbala retaliation. And then they conduct this kind of incredible 48-hour campaign of, you know, of, you know,

the exploding pagers and, and, and the radios for emergency comms. And so, you know, you can make an argument that the Israeli intelligence services along the IDF are kind of restoring the fear that they put in their adversaries. That's important. The assassination on Henea, too. And the assassination in Iran, absolutely. Absolutely. And so, you know, so when, you know, they're back, you know, they got kind of got their, they pulled themselves up with their bootstraps. They got their mojo back a bit. But that's important also for the Israeli, the psyche of the Israeli population, I think. Mick, I'm curious if you, if you kind of felt that when you were there. Because, I mean, again, that, you know, these are, these are institutions, which are, you know, obviously there's conscription in Israel, but are seen very favorably by the Israeli public. Oh, yes, absolutely. I concur. You know, and you'd really have to, and I don't have enough information to make the full assessment is how much of this was October 7th intelligence failure, how much was a leadership failure, right? I mean, how much did they know and disregard? How much did they just assume that this was all for show that they're literally, you know, training right next to, you know, Israel and Gaza on, you know, these type of operations that essentially exactly.

exactly what they did, right? I mean, if you look back and do the forensic, you didn't have to be a top-notch spy agency to know what they at least wanted you to think they were trying to prepare for. And then was it disregarded? But I do think that because it's viewed as at least somewhat of the intelligence failure, they've been super aggressive to try to prove, you know, the capabilities that we all know they have. And they really have. I mean, if you look at the details of the hynea, assassination in Tehran. It's like textbook. It's like something that would happen in a movie and you wouldn't believe it be true, right? You know, a bomb under the bed of the place. I mean, I don't even think they killed the bodyguard. It was in the room or the room adjacent.

It's just him. I mean, I mean, it's, it's, it's really impressive. And obviously this, you know, whether we would have done it or not, this was a highly effective operation when it came to these pages. and push a talk. So I think they're one, they're doing what they do best. And they have confidence. I mean, let's face it.

They're offering Sinwar, you know, free passage out of there. So they get a ceasefire, right? At least that's being reported. Why? Because they have a lot of confidence in Mossad, right? They're like, hey, man, we'll let you go. But we're going to catch you down the road. And I think probably one of the reasons, although I think he's such a psychopath,

he wouldn't take it even if he thought he could get away. he realizes he being Sinwar that he's going to get he's going to get smoked whether it's in it's in Gaza or wherever he goes so I do think they've ringed in their footing and I think they're going to be less restricted when it comes to you know like 1972 right the operation wrath of God after the Munich Olympics I think we're seeing that now and there's going to be probably things that don't make the press that they're doing in more sensitive areas and I think they're showing that they're very capable.

Isn't there something to be said though that like maybe that was the play after October 7th rather than going into Gaza and smoking 40,000 people? Sorry. That's my dumb question. That they could have done that instead of military? Yeah. I mean, I don't think there was any

scenario of the Israelis wouldn't have gone in militarily to Gaza after October 7th. They have, I mean, military objectives, destruction of the tunnels, the destruction of their actual military capability. I think they had like 30 battalions worth of terrorists. And then, of course, the leadership, which by all accounts, from my understanding, is still primarily in Gaza. Right. I mean, so the only way to get there is this. There's different estimations on where they are on those objectives.

I heard around 12 battalions degraded to a point of complete incapable of conducting military operations, but that leaves a lot. So we might be seeing a lot more of this conflict there. I don't know if that's accurate. The Israeli count is much higher. I think it's 20 plus, but I've just seen independent analysis. And I don't know where they're getting it from. But either way, they're not done with the destruction of the battalions.

with the destruction of the tunnels, and obviously Sinwar still running around somewhere or hiding in a bunker for the tunnel. Can we talk about how they pulled this off with the pages because there's been a lot of speculation? I know the British papers were talking about like 10 grams of explosive, but others are talking about it being just a direct cyber attack

on the lithium battery. Hard, you know, hard to tell for us, right? Because we, we've only seen videos of the scale of damage and we haven't seen the wreckage.

But what are your thoughts? I don't think, I mean, look, this is, the, 1996, the Israelis killed Yayaaya Yash, who was a master Hamas bomb maker

using an exploding cell phone. And command detonated it as well. So this, you know, they've undertaken kinetic operations, command detonating stuff. you know, they killed in Magamak Mugmia in Damascus. In 2007, again, command detonated an explosive in a tire of a Mitsubishi Pajero outside of

his Ballas Safehouse. So the technology of that, to me, is not all that new or impressive is the wrong word, but, you know, the idea of putting explosives in a device and then being able to remotely detonate it, I think that, you know, for everyone I talk to who knows a lot more than me, the idea of heating up a lithium battery. I don't think that's necessarily accurate. So it looks like the, you know, the Israelis did get a hold of these devices. Again, we talked about before. Was it, you know, did they actually get actual pagers and then modify them or were they the supply chain themselves? I got to be careful on how I say this. I have met some of the

senior Israeli bomb makers. They have them. It was a strange meeting, but they're really good. And they've been good for a very long time because they do this. So, you know, the, I think the speculation on that, on that, I think it's more interesting to think about how they put together, as Mick said before, these kind of front companies in Europe. And so, you know, the Taiwan-based company with a subsidiary in Hungary, but it looks like the Mossad Front was in Sofia was in Bulgaria. I had a journalist on the phone with me who were actually in Sophia looking for this front company. Of course, it's gone. it's a building with no face on it. And the person who was there, I think it was like someone with the Norwegian passport, who shockingly is no longer in country.

I mean, you know, so, you know, this is a lot of what we call non-official covered officers with the Russians called legal. So the way they run their operative operations, you know, the Mossad will have declared station chief in an embassy, but most of their clandestine operations are run by Knox. And so this is what they did. You know, they were very patient in setting up these, these front companies and you know we we kind of alluded to it before it's in the u.s.

intelligence community has no patience a to do that um you know where you know where's the return on investment you know what are the metrics on this i mean for 10 15 years to put something lace to this together um you know that's just something we we we unfortunately don't do uh and and then and kind of again the the the second part of that um uh is uh is just you know someone in the Israeli national security infrastructure, the decision-making is much different than ours. They have a different view of civilian casualty. I've talked about this forever. It's not condemning them nor condoning them, but we would never get an operation approved like this because you don't know, you know, the effects, and there's going to be civcast. And so, I mean, it is beyond even

comprehension that the U.S. would have approved an operation like this, you know, especially on the scale, because, you know, you just don't know and you don't have control. we conduct these kinetic operations. There's almost, you know, a visual. There's an ISR. There's a targeting aspect of it that you actually have to have so many safeguards that you're killing the right person. In this case, the Mossad and the Israelis would not have had that. But, you know, the forensics of this are going to be fun. I mean, you know, Mick and I will probably geek out on this. Like, you know, we will look very closely on how they pulled this off because what was the tradecraft involved in setting up the front companies? What was the travel of Mossad Knox?

you know, where did they actually modify the pagers or create the pagers? Where do they build them? How did they get them in, eventually into Lebanon? I mean, so the reports yesterday were all these companies, by the way, it's not great for a brand. Your pager or your walkie talkies blowing up everywhere. But they're saying, hey, there's no trace of any kind of custom shipments anywhere. How the Israelis get them in. A lot of this stuff is going to be, at least in my kind of weird twist.

mine fun to go through the forensics of it. And I had, I was talking about one, sorry go. So just it was a comment on Mark's comment. I was talking to one Israeli, he says, it was kind of surprised that just how much lawyers are involved in our operational decision process, right? He goes, you know, our lawyers basically help us write our wills and powers of attorney. And then, you know, we don't see him again, right?

So, I mean, I'm not advocating for that. You know, we have a system of checks and balances. oversight, which I think is absolutely essential to our system. But for them, they don't, they don't view legal views in the same light. I do think if they were going to go to this effort, which is a lesson learned, I would agree to the U.S. intelligence that we should have long term, because you never know what capability you need. And if you didn't build it, you don't have it. But I think if they're going to go to that effort, they would have inserted some kind of explosives to increase, you know, the impact of the detonation. You know, they had the,

they had the opportunity. So I think they would because they don't necessarily, they didn't want these guys to be dead if they had a chance. They're certainly injured to a point of being knocked out of the fight entirely. So I think they likely did that. And I hope, I hope they're sharing all the information with us as much as we can because we do need to figure out, from our perspective, our covert capabilities, how we can do operations at, and, you know, involve this level of sophistication. I agree. We wouldn't have done this, but there's other applications of getting in the supply chain, getting or actually creating the supply chain to this level when it comes to clandestine operations. We could, we should always be willing to learn from other people.

Sure. And one other point to add on this is that, you know, so this is going to sound complicated, but, you know, is this a cyber operation or is it a kinetic operation? Well, no, it's actually, It's a human-enabled supply chain operation with a cyber component and a kinetic finish. I mean, that's mind-blowing, putting all this together. So if you think, you know, I mean, I can't imagine that the Israelis didn't have a tremendous agent network inside, inside Hezbollah for this for so many different reasons. But think about even Hezbollah's move from cell phones to pagers. You know, you can see a scenario of most Israeli penetrations would actually have encouraged that. Think of Hisball as, you know, then, of course, the procurement officials choosing a certain company.

Again, so, and this is why, and one point to raise, and this is clearly this is part of Israeli planning as well, and they should amplify this. But there's going to be a brutal counterintelligence view inside his ball. They're going to tear themselves apart with a witch hunt. And this is great. This is exactly what, you know, we all kind of collectively would want because what does it do? You know, so they're their communications, they're commanding trolls all. incapacitated. They have 3,000 personnel maimed or injured, you know, taken off the battlefield. And now there's going to be a counterintelligence witch hunt. I mean, this is fantastic from the Israelis point of

view, again, to completely throw Isabella off its game. But that CI aspect of it, I think, is going to be really interesting to see. And you already see some media reporting on that. There's going to be quite the investigation inside. And that gives more opportunities for almost covert influence themes from the Israelis. You know, you want to stir the pot on this. You want this to actually happen. Did you ever snow about this? Beforehead?

So in my experience, mostly at the Pentagon, the Israelis generally inform us of significant operations where it could impact forces that we have in the region. But it's usually the last minute, right? And if it's a really intel-heavy-driven operations, there's no details, right? So I don't disbelieve the White House's statement that they are basically told some big operation is going to happen in Hesmela in like, you know, 42 minutes, right? I've been in that situation, you know, and it's always on Friday night and you're trying to get

home and then you've got to turn around and in my case, go tell the secretary's office. but I think that's and I don't think we'd be involved in the actual operation because it's it's it's contrary to U.S. legal and and policy right the U.S. wants to see a reduction intentions in the region they want to see a ceasefire agreement which is obviously not going to help so it's contrary to U.S. policy on the subject so I don't know but I don't think we would have been involved in those two reasons and I don't I do think they would have informed us but probably at the last minute so that they could, they could, you know, technically say that we knew and that we could prepare for any kind of retaliation in light.

So two things on that. One is, you know, they don't need us. In my time working with Mossad, if they need us, they'll ask. And when they don't need us, they won't ask, number one. And number two is, we object to this. It makes 100% right. Like, there's no way the Israelis would want to give us any opportunity to, A, say no. And second, to, leak it because in some ways this does go against kind of U.S. policy of trying to de-escalate. You know, I've had so many instances of, you know, Israelis kind of wink and nod to me when they've done something after the fact. I was actually in Israel when, in 2007, when, just on a separate matter, when the Israelis bombed El Kabar, which is the North Korean built nuclear reactor

in northern Syria, which was subject of enormous back and forth with the U.S. government and And Condoleezza Rice, you know, and George W. Bush did not want the Israelis to take it out. And then we want, you know, I walked in the embassy that day. And I remember seeing the station chief. And he said, there's a big smoking hole in the desert. And I laughed. And then I went to see Mossad afterwards and they were smiling. So sometimes they don't tell us when they think it's in their interest or more so when we think they think we're going to, we're going to object. And, and, you know, U.S. officials understand that. There's also a part of it, too, is that there's I think there's a worry constantly that, you know, we're so tied in to Israeli actions is that the retaliation might come against the United States.

So I find it sometimes annoying when we have these public statements saying we didn't know because Hezbollah is a terrorist group. But there's a reason for that because the fear is if Hezbollah kind of retaliates in other matters, other manners, which would be kind of asymmetric warfork, terrorist attacks against soft targets against Israeli's embassy. et cetera, that if the U.S. is seen as being, you know, part of this operation that we would then end up being a target. And so I think there's kind of a combination of those factors. But yeah, it's always fun when, you know, you've got a wink and a nod. And the Israelis will eventually tell us. I think in this case, they said that Galant called Secretary of Defense Austin, said, we're going to do something. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Which is like saying nothing, right? Something's going to blow up over

they are at any given time. Yeah, like, yeah, no shit. Thanks, bro. So what lies ahead? If you were, if you were betting men, which I know in many ways you are. You know, unfortunately, I think the ceasefire negotiations have taken such a turn that no matter what we say optimistically, that nobody believes this anymore, right? The U.S. has been like, we're right there.

It's just going to happen tomorrow and all that. And I know they were trying to use that as leverage to push Israel. So I might being too critical, but if you talk to people in the region, they don't even listen to our, our characterization of where the negotiations are anymore. Although I do have to say the level of effort has been incredible, you know, from not just the State Department, as you expect, but, you know, being Mark's former organization. But I just don't think, unfortunately, for the hostages that are there,

that they're really going anywhere. Medellahu doesn't seem to want one, want a ceasefire period for both his objectives and his future. And Hezbo, I mean, excuse me, Hamas won't take one unless it's a permanent ceasefire because they don't see the purpose of incrementally, you know, handing back hostages,

like if the war is just going to start again. So that's super unfortunate for those hostages. however if this uh if this war in the north kicks off people are unfortunately going to even stop talking about gaza this is going to be so catastrophic that the entire focus of the world which does matter is going to be on trying to stop that from just spiraling out of control you know it's going to be bad enough if it's just between uh hesbola and israel uh but if iran thinks to mark's earlier point that their proxy force is about to get eradicated, you know, what are they going to do?

Are they going to step in and try to make this a regional conflict of which they're fully involved? And if that's a case, it's not good for anybody. And then, well, Israel just take that as, okay, you're in. So we're going to do everything we can to mitigate your capabilities to include any kind of nuclear ambition you have, which we just escalated even further. So I'm not saying that's going to happen, but, you know, I think everybody should want to see it turn around and go the other way. But, you know, that's my two cents on where we stand right now and where I think the U.S.

thinks we could go if something isn't changed in the trajectory. I think I go back and forth on this. So the hard time I have on this is that, you know, his bullet is an organization that has killed a hell of a lot of Americans. And, you know, this goes back to 1983, 1984. Don't forget they captured and tortured and murder our station chief. And, you know, they were involved in even Iran's proxy wars in Iraq, let alone the Marine Corps barracks bombing and the bombing at the U.S. Embassy. In Bayrude, there's a lot of blood on their hands. Many CIA officers over the years have worked as much on Hisbollah against Hisbalah as they have against al-Qaeda.

and so I have a hard time being agnostic because I'm going to read a quote I gave to that I shouldn't have done this my wife was pissed to Tom Rogan in the watch and exam and he published it and he said listing his balls at tax on Americans Polymropolis added so watching their nuts get blown off I'm enjoying this all of it and my wife is like are you out of your mind like you sound like can you please be as I'm looking at Mick in a suit right now And I'm in one of your doctor, she's like, can you please you a little more professional? I got messages from people all over the world saying, I cannot believe you said that in a public forum. But, you know, D knows me. Everybody's thinking it. That's for sure. You know, on the one side of me, a fight against a terrorist group is a fight always worth having.

I mean, I do believe that, you know, in violence of action in this. That said, putting your kind of analyst hat on, U.S. policymaker had on, you know, there is a lot that can go, you know, way wrong in terms of a huge flare-up, including the U.S. getting involved. And so I think that, you know, ultimately, if, you know, what happens, you know, I go back to the old kind of saying you have as an intelligence officer, where it depends. Like, it's okay to say, I don't know because there's so many different factors. But I think that we have to be careful, you know, I saw, you know, Matt Miller,

the State Department spokesman yesterday, you know, being almost critical of Israeli actions about the pager. We got to remember Hizbollah as a terrorist group. And I know it's part of the political fabric of Lebanon, but, you know, even when we act as an intermediary in terms of the negotiations with Israel and Hamas and Gaza, Hamas is a terrorist group that killed 43 Americans. So I struggle to kind of put my adult hat on and my old kind of, you know, CIA officer had on when, you know, you know, a lot of work was done to really disrupt the terror and sometimes, you know, removed from the battlefield these individuals and terrorist groups. A long way of saying is, I don't know, I'm not sure. So many different things depend on. And then again, I just, as something's coming across,

I think the Israelis just whacked a very senior Hisbalah guy in Beirut. And so, so the question is, are they now, you know, are they now provoking Hisbala to the point, humiliating them so much that on the one hand, is his ball going to stand down? Or is Nisraeli and Iran going to say just, hey, fuck it. It's game on. I don't know. Hey, one quick point on that, because Mark brought up a really good point, I think, because so many Americans seem to think that we should be some kind of mediator in this whole event.

Like we're not involved, you know? Like, we didn't lose, what, 40 Americans on October 7th? Like, they still don't have. I mean, we're not a disinterested party. We're we're parted. I mean, we're a party to this, right? Hezbollah, I mean, I heard the stats. I don't know if it's correct,

but it killed more Americans than any other terrorist groups, except for al-Qaeda. That's right. So, you know, these guys, they need to get this, right? And in many ways, not in this operation, but the U.S. would be 100% behind them when it comes to fighting these assholes, to be frank. So, I mean, we have to view ourselves not just as a part of a negotiator.

I mean, that's fine and a ceasefire, but we're not, we're not some, we're not switching on this, right? And we shouldn't view ourselves that way. I'm bringing out the old neck here. This is good. Yeah, yeah, right? This is the thing that I know. People can be critical of Boston, how we conducted our operations in the GY, right?

But, you know, for a lot of us, we remember we were like, you know, they had a different view. We weren't so analytical because we shouldn't have been. We were, they attacked us, they killed our people and our job isn't to just sit there and wring our hands. Our job is to drag them down. One of the things that, Mick, that I saw was, so in the reaction, so look, so people are very upset about the 40,000 or whatever the number of casualties in Gaza. But the same people are criticizing Israel for a targeted campaign that clearly was much more in line with LOWAC. in terms of the pagers in the walkie. You're never going to win.

What's the law act, Mark? It's law of armed conflict. Okay. So, you know, and so, you know, reducing civilian casualties. Listen, I'm one of the guys per people that are like, maybe 40,000 people didn't have to get smoked in Gaza, but I'm also cool with, like, smoking the actual bad guys using intelligence and doing it the right way kind of strategically rather than just.

But a lot of people are not. A lot of people from the left now are, you know, are, you know, screaming at the Israelis and the UN as well. I mean, you know, Mick can't say anything because he works with the UN now. But the UN has come out, you know, condemned the Israeli. I'm going to, this is fun.

The UN has come out and condemn the Israelis for the pay drop and the walkie-talkie op. So we're never going to satisfy, in the counterterrorism world, you're never going to satisfy a kind of big chunk of credits. And I think you just have to go forward anyway. Mick, you don't have to comment on the UN. True.

Well, I can't comment on this. I mean, from the Israeli perspective, this is like the largest scale, almost simultaneous attack on a fighting force, a terrorist type of war, that had such low collateral damage. Right. Right. You can spend this whole thing on its head.

I mean, and, you know, the UN condemns Israel for everything. Every day, Hezbollah launches, you know, rockets in missiles directly at civilian populations. Right. That's terrorist activity. When you directly target civilians, that's terror. When you, when you directly target a combatant, um, that's not. Now, you still have the proportionality issue, and I'm not excusing anybody, including ourselves and not doing that, but from the Israeli perspective, they're like, this is,

this is the lowest civilian casualties to target 3,000, you know, individuals that are spread out, right, across the spectrum. So there's a couple different ways to look at this. And, you know, I don't, I don't know that Israel could have done something like this in the way that had fewer than cash. Always bad, including when we do it. But it's part of warfare, unfortunately. Well, fellas, as we get into kind of the home stretch, what haven't we talked about?

Is Galant going to get fired? We solved the problems from the Middle East. Is Galant going to get fired? That's my question. Looks like that talk has died down now. We're moving a defense minister at a time of a possible, you know, massive regional war. would be ridiculous. You know, I geek out on Israeli politics. And this, I mean, this is going to

sound weird. This is like from like Netanyahu's wife who was pushing this. And so, you know, it's ultimately, I think that, that, you know, there is a huge part of Netanyahu's actions that are always, can be attributed to his desire to remain in power, not potentially go to jail. But, but I think that's probably the, you know, that's probably off the table now. And there's some question even in Israeli press, if this was just kind of a, you know, a trial balloon thrown out there. I mean, the one individual of the United States government trusts, well, certainly would be David Barnaya, the Masachi, but Galant is very popular in U.S. circles. Mitt could talk about that further, perhaps. But I think, you know, if you care about the U.S. Israeli strategic relationship,

and Netanyahu does, even though he's going to be an asshole sometimes, I think we're moving at this point would be disastrous. But again, you know, B.B. will do things unconventional. sometime. So we'll see. I agree. I think it was a trial balloon and it got popped like almost immediately, right? So the Israeli population, I think they have confident in a lot of these leaders that have the experience. And Gallant was, you know, a two star. Galant was the head of Shaitat 13, you know, was doing a lot of these operations, including the one that rescued the hostages recently. He has the credits, is what I'm saying. Right. And most of the discipline,

agreements is is completely backed up by the rank and file IDF to include a levy. Right. So, I mean, if you fire them, it's just, it's more of the condemnation against the whole Israeli national security apparatus. It's not, it's not just a line. Yeah. So it would really, I mean, he's been fired once already. Yeah.

Yeah. And, and, and, and, I mean, they'll say, uh, it's, uh, kind of a IDF-wide outcry, especially among the reservists and support of him, he knows he has a strong power base. And he knows he has the ear of the Secretary of Defense and also the president, more so perhaps than Netanyahu,

which in other words, you notice that a lot of the interaction takes place between Austin and Galan rather than Biden and Netanyahu. You know, I mean, a lot of below the surface. So if Galant goes, Netanyahu realizes he loses that last kind of strong link, even though it undermines him. Mick raised a really interesting point is that, you know, the Israeli national security

establishment, you know, the IDF, Mossad, and Shindbat, the chiefs, all of them were actually really pushed for the ceasefire deal. Now, there is, you know, it's clear that there's issues with Hamas, the ISA. and more, you know, may not may be a huge obstacle of this as well. But there's no question Netanyahu was, too, in fighting for his political survival, worrying that, you know, his, his government would fall if he agreed to anything because of his kind of crazies on the right. But, but it's, but, you know, the, the, the, one of the really interesting storylines, I think, in Israel is the tension between the prime minister and, uh, the entire Israeli national

security apparatus, everybody. Um, what, what I think might, what has changed, and that had to do with Gaza and the hostages and the ceasefire deal, Where that changes a little bit now, I think, is in Lebanon. I'm sorry, is a, yeah, is, is, is, is, is kind of this pending battle with, with Isbalah because of, um, just the kind of complete political outcry that, uh, the 70,000 Israelis can't return to their home. So in some sense, maybe that tension will dissipate a little bit. Um, I think it, of course, uh, depends on, on what happens. Um, but I think you, you have, I mean, Israelis I talk to, uh, there's very divided views on what to do

about Gaza and the hostages. You know, for the hostages and, you know, Mick certainly knows it's, you know, Israeli doctrine is, you know, you get everyone home here. You trade a thousand Palestinian prisoners for one Israeli hostage. And that's actually almost written in Israeli national security doctrine. So there's a lot of people very upset that the hostages are not out. When it comes to Lebanon, though, in the north, I don't know. I think there's probably some more, not unanimity, but the majority of the Israeli public probably supports a very strong line. so you might see that tension between the defense establishment intelligence establishment and then you know how dissipate a little bit at least at least right now

boys anything else no man it's great talking to you guys that was a great chat andy what do you should do this as a quad more often no that's yeah i'd love to do it absolutely it's been it's been awesome having both you guys on do the uh yeah do the final rundown then everybody make sure to check out mick he's uh the lobo institute all the links will be in the description Mark, of course. He's going to be on the Team House network soon. I can feel it. But check out his podcast, above average intelligence, is on Deep State Radio.

Andy Milburn, all his links are in the description. His book is incredible. Watch it. Watch Andy. He was just on Cleared Hot with Andy Stumpf. Great, great podcast. All the links will be in the description. And the best way you can help the show is patreon.com slash the team house.

Please. And thank you. Thanks, guys. Thank you.