The Team House - Former CIA Targeter: Hunting Terrorists After 9/11 | Brittany Butler

Episode Date: May 23, 2026

Former CIA targeting officer Brittany Butler joins us to discuss her path from a small town in Georgia to the CIA, where she helped build target packages against extremist networks in Iraq and Afghanistan. She breaks down what targeting officers actually do, the realities of working with detainees and liaison partners, and how the fight evolved from AQI toward ISIS and Taliban senior leadership.Brittany also talks about burnout, leaving the agency to focus on family, her work supporting Afghan women, and how those experiences shaped her spy novels The Syndicate Spy and The Patriot’s Daughter.Grab Brittany's book here:https://a.co/d/0j2KhEeKToday's Sponsors:GhostBed ⬇️https://www.ghostbed.com/houseFOR 10% off! Blue Chew ⬇️https://bluechew.com/Get 1 month free when you buy 2 of BlueChew Gold with code "HOUSECALL"Quince⬇️go to: https://www.quince.com/housefor free shipping and 365 day returns For ad free video and audio and access to live streams and Eyes On Geopolitics...JOIN OUR PATREON! https://www.patreon.com/c/TheTeamHouseTo help support the show and for all bonus content including:-live shows and asking guest questions -ad free audio and video-early access to shows-Access to ALL bonus segments with our guestsSubscribe to our Patreon! ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseSupport the show here:⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse___________________________________________________PRE ORDER JACK'S NEW BOOK "THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN" ⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/803651/the-most-dangerous-man-by-jack-murphy/paperback/Subscribe to the new EYES ON podcast here:⬇️https://www.youtube.com/@EyesOnGeopoliticsPod/featured__________________________________Jack Murphy's new book "We Defy: The Lost Chapters of Special Forces History" ⬇️https://www.amazon.com/We-Defy-Chapters-Special-History-ebook/dp/B0DCGC1N1N/——————————————————————Or make a one time donation at: ⬇️https://ko-fi.com/theteamhouseSocial Media: ⬇️The Team House Instagram:https://instagram.com/the.team.house?utm_medium=copy_linkThe Team House Twitter:https://twitter.com/TheTeamHousePodJack’s Instagram:https://instagram.com/jackmcmurph?utm_medium=copy_linkJack’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/jackmurphyrgr?s=21Team House Discord: ⬇️https://discord.gg/wHFHYM6"Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio"00:00 — Start / Britney Butler joins The Team House02:06 — Growing up in Georgia and wanting a life overseas02:39 — Embassy internship in Paris and first getting noticed by CIA07:57 — Applying to CIA and going through the recruitment process10:06 — Lifestyle polygraphs, clearance stress, and “confessing” too much14:15 — From case officer track to CIA targeting officer15:09 — The post-9/11 rise of targeting officers16:16 — Training as a targeter and learning the job under pressure19:09 — Iraq: building target packages against Sunni extremist networks21:21 — Sitting across from detainees and calling out their lies23:48 — Why people joined terrorist groups: coercion, money, and ideology27:19 — AQI, Iraq, and seeing the threat evolve toward ISIS28:22 — Moving to Afghanistan-Pakistan and targeting senior leadership32:46 — Taliban safe haven, Pakistan, and why the war wasn’t going away37:10 — Kill/capture, recruitment, drone strikes, and how targeting changed37:46 — Liaison missions and high-threat meetings without U.S. security41:44 — Marriage, family, and balancing CIA work with home life45:25 — Burnout, maternity leave, and deciding to leave the agency48:11 — Afghan women’s rights work and the start of her writing career52:24 — The Syndicate Spy and writing women into power in the Middle East55:46 — The Patriot’s Daughter, Russia, disinformation, and civil war fiction59:16 — CIA tradecraft in fiction and publication review01:01:00 — Book tour, where to find Britney, and closing questions01:02:20 — Khost, UBL, fallen CIA officers, and final reflectionsBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-team-house--5960890/support.

Hey guys, I want to tell you tonight about my new novel, The Most Dangerous Man, coming out June 9th. I think, like a lot of you, I read in high school, The Short Story, The Greatest Game, which is almost a century old at this point, but it's the classic premise of man-hunting man for sport. This book is based off of that a little bit, but also on stories that I have heard over the years about safari guides that have actually taken. hunting parties, wealthy people, hunting poachers in West Africa. That idea kind of cooked off in my mind when I was asked to write a novel and get back into writing fiction again. And this book is about a Ranger with the Ranger Reconnaissance Company who's on a mission in West Africa and gets kidnapped and hunted for sport by a group of wealthy tech billionaires. I had a lot of fun writing this book and I think you'll have a good time reading it. It's a quick, fast,

and furious, fast-paced action novel. And I hope you all check it out. It's up there. You can find it wherever books are sold, the hard copy, the hard back, the soft cover, and also the Kindle e-book edition. We'll have some links down in the description for you. The book comes out June 9th. And I hope you all let me know what you think of it. Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Team House. I'm Jack Murphy with today's guest. Brittany Butler. Brittany Butler, the author of The Patriots daughter. Brittany served in the CIA as a targeter, as I recall. And now she writes spy novels.

This is your new one. Is this out now? This is out now. Okay. It's out of the 21st of April. So brand new. We'll have links down in the description to the book and get it out there. We'll get to that in a moment.

But let's sort of start off this interview. I'll start asking, I ask pretty much everybody, you can tell us a little bit about kind of like where you grew up, what your upbringing was like and how that sort of took you towards governmental service. Yeah. So I grew up in Georgia, Atlanta, Georgia, a little small town called Snellville. And honestly, like, I never had a plan to go into the CIA or anything like that. I thought I wanted to be a foreign service officer just purely because I wanted to travel.

And so I did an internship my junior year of college at the American Embassy in Paris. in the consulate section. And I think that's kind of what got CIA interested in me, the fact that I had that experience. I studied international affairs at Florida State University and had some knowledge of Arabic naming conventions. And so when I was working at the consulate section at the embassy in Paris, I was able to pinpoint a guy that was trying to get into the United States that really shouldn't be. And my bosses at the time, I didn't know this, but they were undercover CIA officers. And they suggested to me, hey, have you ever thought about, like, applying to the CIA? And so I did.

And just applied online. And I was recruited to be a case officer originally. But after going through the interview process, I realized I probably wasn't ready to go overseas for the first 10 years of my career. I was a little bit hesitant about that. But the idea of, like, supporting operations, being operational, but kind of doing it in a TDI fashion was more appealing to. me. So that's why I went the targeting officer route. So it sounds like you always had kind of a a focus abroad that you saw yourself doing something internationally. Yeah, totally. Yeah, I mean, I just being from a small town in Georgia, I like no one really went anywhere or did

anything. It was like the same group of people that like went to high school together, went to college together. They all married each other. Right. And like nothing to be further from like what I wanted. And so I was like, I got to get the hell out of here. And so I was like, where could I, how could I travel for a living? And my two career paths that I was thinking, like, okay, if I can't be a foreign service officer, I'll be a flight attendant. And so I, you know, thankfully the CIA worked out. So I didn't have to go either of those routes. But yeah, always wanted to do something internationally. And like I had a, I loved foreign languages. I spoke French and studied French while in college. And so it was easier for me to pick up other foreign languages because I knew that. one already. And yeah, and I also got really fascinated with Islam and understanding Islam. And, you know, I went to college right after 9-11. And so it, you know, once 9-11 happened, it was like, you know, this big surge in counterterrorism and everybody needed to know more about Islam and how that impacted the whole like Islamic jihad movement. And so I started

studying that pretty intensely and at school. And so that like aligned perfectly with what the CIA was looking for at that time. Right, right. So you started taking some Arabic. Yeah, I did. I did. I don't know about you, your experience, but like having like worked in that field, I would say even if you do know Arabic, you probably should always rely on your translator because there are cultural things that you're just not going to pick up on, even if you're fluent in Arabic. So while I could kind of get by, I never, I never just like relied on myself for like the Arabic. I was always. always working with my translator that was local. Dee, that light is flickering.

Is that, it's obnoxious as hell, but, I mean, is it coming up on, okay. I'll try to, I'll try to. Am I looking the right place? No, no, you're all good. Okay, good, good. I'm just like, I have it right there. It's like, quick, good, good, good, okay. I'm like, okay, cool.

Um, so what was I going to ask? Okay, so you're doing an internship at the, embassy in Paris. And like how did this internship kind of like, I guess you were like vetting green card or, you know, visa applications? Yeah, yeah, just doing like traces on their names. And at the time, like people didn't really know about like Arabic names, the fact that they use Kunyas, like Abu Muhammad al-Baghdadi, for example.

Right. That Abu met father of. Was he trying to get a visa? No, it wasn't him. But they just weren't using their true names when they were applying for these things. And so given I knew that, like, that was just something that I think drew the attention of these CIA officers. They were just like, dude, like this is something that we really, you know, need right now as someone who like understands this and is interested in this and is studying this. So that's kind of got my foot in the door.

And yeah, so you found out, I guess, through that experience that in an embassy, there are CIA officers obviously there, but they have an official cover that they're there as, you know, the consular secretary or whatever the hell it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah, like a porn service officer. Right, right. Yeah, yeah. I remember, yeah, Marty Peterson was sent to Moscow, I think, as a secretary. Oh, really? In the 19th, she was like one of the first, she was the first female case. officer sent to Moscow. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah, she has a, and her husband was a paramilitary guy

killed in Vietnam. I'm sorry, in Laos, actually. Anyway, yeah, that's like, that's another episode with Marty. Yeah. We'll talk about that another time. So now you want to apply for the agency after that's kind of been brought up to you. What was the application process like? Horrible. Yeah. I mean, it's just like really invasive, you know. Yeah, yeah. You know, the, the application itself is pretty simple online or it was at that time. It's like we filled out some questions and you submitted your transcripts from college. And I think you had like some referrals and stuff like that. But you didn't have to fill out the security paperwork initially. So that that's when I was like, when I went to through a security clearance process. I was like, holy shit. This. is a lot. What am I getting into? So yeah, so I filled out the application. They called me, I don't know, maybe like a couple months later. I don't remember exactly. And they did like an initial screening of like what my knowledge was of foreign affairs. Like can you describe the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Can you draw, you know, show it to me on a map? Like just a

general knowledge of international relations. And then the second interview was in person. It's like I met somebody at a hotel and he came up to me speaking French to like test my knowledge of speaking friends. You have to knock, shave and a haircut on the door. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. Yeah. So I did that, past that. And then the next thing was what I actually met with case officers. So like season case officers that had been doing it for years and went through a couple like scenarios with them in terms that they gave me like cover story. That's part of the interview process. Interesting.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, to see, like, what, how well I did, like, under pressure and doing those things. And then came the, like, contingent offer based on my getting through the clearance process. So that, I don't know, y'all do polygraphs, right? Like, y'all in your, in the green, right? Yeah. Not necessarily, no, not unless you're on some special project. Okay. The military normally doesn't do lifestyle polis either.

Yeah, that's a special kind of torture. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I went through like the lifestyle poly. So that was an interesting process because I'm a Catholic and I kind of I treated it like it was confessional. Yeah. And they definitely asked me. They're like, are you Catholic by chance?

I'm like, oh, yeah, I am. How did you know that? And he was like, well, you're like confessing everything and all I need to know is if you're a spy. I was like, oh, shit. You're so good at confessing. Yeah, just like, stop it. Stop telling us every little thing you ever did wrong. Third grade in math class.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, yeah, so that, and they, you know, they screwed with me during that process. Like, they manipulated me a little bit in that there was, like, this one question about I was in a sorority in college and I drank and partied and everything. But I just never did drugs. Like, it just wasn't my thing. My brother, on the other hand, was, like, really in the pot, like, huge pot head. And one day I was like studying for a final and I was just like so stressed about it. We went to college together and he came over to like, I don't know, say hi or whatever.

And he was like, you need to chill the fuck out. And he blew the pot smoke like in my face. And so during the polygraph, I'm like thinking about that. I'm like, wait, did I do drugs? I don't know. Like he blew it in my face and like, I don't know. Did I inhale? I don't remember.

And they're like, you. You did drugs. We know you did drugs. You got to come clean about this. This was like eight hours into the polygraph. And I was like, oh, my God, just get me out of this room. Get me unhoached from all these things. And they said, you know, you're not telling the truth about this.

No, you're not. We're going to walk out of the room and make you really think about this. Think about what you're giving up in terms of a career at the CIA if you don't come clean about the drugs. It's like shaming a little kid. Think about what you've done. Yeah. Yeah. And at the time, I was like, wait a second.

do I lie and say I did it and then I could get the job? No, no, no, that's what they want me to do. I know. That's the opposite of what I'm going to do here. So they came back in the room and they're like, are you ready to come clean? And I was like, I seriously never did drugs. I had that one time my brother threw the, you know, blew the pot smoke in my face. That's it.

That's all I got for you. And they're like, well, sorry. Like you didn't get your clearance. Like, you, you know, you failed. And I walk out of there. And I'm like, you know, upset. You know, I've been through all of this process and I'm like, oh, my gosh, I failed at the end. Two weeks later, I get a letter in the mail saying congratulations, you have your clearance.

It's like some Willy Wonka type shit, isn't it? Yeah. We're like, congratulations, Charlie. You passed the test. Yeah. You gave me back the everlasting gobstopper. Yeah, yeah. I was like, like, really you had to mess with me this much to get the clearance.

So I went through a couple more of those, you know, throughout my career at the CIA, just given the programs. I was working and they were a little less painful, but just never anything I looked forward to. Yeah. I mean, I've, I mean, we can, we don't have to belabor this. We move on to the next thing, but. Yeah. Sure. Up. Yeah. Do my hair over here? Okay. Better? Okay. Sorry. That's okay. But I mean, I, to opine a little bit, I think the polygraph is nonsense. I don't. think they should even give it to people. It's junk science. And I was having this conversation with someone the other day. There are like some letcherous polygrapherers out there that like

you said get very invasive with young women that come into that process. Yeah. Yeah. They do. I think they can take advantage sometimes of like or like maybe a power trip or something. And I'm like, they just like to see you sweat. And these are the same guys. who go out and do it with our like sources. Yeah. Right? So they're interviewing terrorists and then they come back and interview me. And I'm like, yeah, this is not the same thing.

You're going to chill out. So you suffer through the polygraph. And now you're hired as a case officer. Yeah. And now the next stop is the form. Yes. But I had some discussions with some very senior case officers. and they were like, I expressed to them, I had some reservations about going overseas for the first 10 years of my career.

I grew up as like a little Southern girl and I wanted to get married and have babies. And so I was like, and I told them this, like an idiot. And they're like, yeah, maybe the case officer route isn't the right route for you. Well, they gave you some good advice about that. Yeah, they did. They did. And so, yeah, the targeting officer route was definitely the better fit for me, like, personality-wise and lifestyle-wise. And now this is about what time? 2006. And so this is when the, is this about the time that the agency is, like, drastically increasing the number of targeters that they have?

I think that happened actually a little bit earlier. But, yeah, right around the time, like, we surge in Iraq and they're like, they need this new position. they didn't have targeting officers up until after 9-11. So it was a relatively new position. So they were trying to like figure out what it was and, you know, what the responsibilities were. Initially when I was in Iraq Division, it was solely focused on like the high value targets. And we were developing the targeting packages to send out to the field to nab those guys. Then it kind of morphed more into this like targeting for recruitment operations.

And then it was targeting packages for that, right? like mapping out this is this guy's, you know, vulnerabilities, this is access, this is his background, this is how you contact, you know, all the things. You're essentially like developing weeds for the case officer. Yes, yes. Or the paramilitary officer or the drone program. Right, right. Depending on what you want to do with the guy. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So tell us about the training that you go through to become a targeting officer. Yeah, so when I joined, it was relatively minimal.

It's changed now. You now actually go to the farm and you have like specific training courses. They really just had us work like with a more senior targeting officer when I joined. So we were at at that time, I think we were really stretched in terms of we felt this need to do all this work and to support the war in Iraq. We were also in Afghanistan. We had, you know, troops everywhere. You had special activities everywhere. So there was this need to do all this need to support the war in Iraq. We were also in Afghanistan. We were also in Afghanistan. We had, you know, you know, the troops everywhere. We had troops everywhere. So there was this need to. So there was this need to. We were. We were. We were to support those operations and do it fast and do it effectively. So they just had me train under a senior targeting officer. Like an apprenticeship. Yeah. Yeah. So he like kind of pulled me aside. And he hadn't been doing it for that long.

I think it was like a year and a half or something. And he was like, like, just, you know, gave me the ends and outs about how we targeted people at that time. And I just worked really hard. And, you know, there's, there's a process when you send your operational lead out. We have cables, right? Like how we communicate with the field. And there are, like, reviewers for those cables. So it went through a process with, like, senior, more senior officers would review my work and push it back to me and say, you got to change this. And but I did, like, training on, like, the applications that we use for targeting. So, you know, we've got different gadgets and applications. computer programs that help us to target people. And that I received training on those. And then, of course, before I went out to the field, I got weapons qualifications, the operational security courses that we provide.

But those were like, you know, a couple weeks at a time. It wasn't like this long stent where I went to the farm. But I believe that's changed since I've left. There's some thought that they, I mean, you're going to get deployed to a dicey area. But is there some thought that targeting officers are actually going to kind of end up in the phrase somewhere? Yeah, I think at that time, yes. I think the targeting officer positions worked out so well for the agency that they're starting to put them in different places. It used to be really just a counterterrorism type of position.

But now I think they're applying that to Russia, house, China, whatever. But yeah, no, I think, I mean, I think it's a good position. I did it. I mean, I really felt like the work was really worthwhile for sure. And so for you, it was OJT, just on the job training. Yeah. And where was your first stop after the training process? A rock.

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Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash house for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash house. Thanks for supporting the show, everyone. And what was going on there at that time? So I was, I was, I can't say specifics, obviously, about, like, who we were going after or anything. But I was there to support operations after a SUNY

extremist group. And I sent out an operational lead that led to the roll up of a lot of their senior commanders. And so I was asked to go overseas and help to debrief them to get to the next level of senior commanders. And I was doing that a lot through working with our liaison partners in the field. And so, yeah, that was, they really threw me into the fire. They were like, yeah. Yeah. I mean, Iraq was pretty hot at that time. Yeah. Yeah. And so, So when, I mean, I know there's probably some restrictions on what you're allowed to say here, but how did you go about rolling up that first batch of, you know, that leadership element in Iraq? Target packages. You just like, in terms of, I personally did not roll them up, right?

I know. Of course. So I can't say how that was, that was, I mean, I've learned how they do it. But I can't speak from experience or anything. But it's a matter of bringing together the intent. intelligence picture on an individual or a, like, a leadership structure and saying, okay, these, these tools that I'm using are leading me to believe that he's utilizing these phones, these email addresses. That's what it was all about back then. It was like we were targeting

mostly from a SIGAN perspective. And so it was like, if you got the phone number and you got the MZ and you've got the stuff. And, you know, they caught on to us, right? And so they started changing msies and started changing phones, you know, the way they were communicating and stuff, but we caught on to it too. And so we would just develop better ways of kind of going after them. But yeah, it was a matter of sifting through lots of intelligence reports, sifting through databases where we housed a lot of like the classified information about terrorists and how they communicate and then pulling that all together into something that is actionable for the field. And so that's how we got those senior guys.

And then they send you to be present for the interrogations. Yeah. What was it like when you actually got like face to face with these guys? I mean, they were like, who the fuck are you? What are you doing here? Like it took some work, you know, on the males I was working with before I even came into the room. They were like, listen, this is the expert from Washington. Don't fuck around with her.

Like, we're right here. Like, and they had never seen a woman with like light hair and light eyes. And they were just like, what is happening? So it took some work, you know? And like, so whenever I was calling them out on their bullshit because I, as a targeting officer, I was also the subject matter expert on the terrorist group, right? So I knew who they knew. And I knew when they were bullshitting us.

I don't know. I don't know that guy. I don't like, you know, push the picture over. I'm like, yeah, you do. You know. So, yeah, I mean, that was challenging. That was challenging. But I worked with some guys that were like, you know, particularly working with liaison. Like they're those, the detainees knew they better behave, you know. Oh, yeah. I know I can imagine which liaison you're thinking of. And I, uh, I actually was held by the political police at one point. Whoa.

Reporting trip. Oh, that's crazy. Outside, um, uh, the hook. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Wow. A little, little, adventure there.

It's just, there's just a night, you know? Oh my gosh. I'd freak out. Yeah, they had alleged that I was in Syria

illegally. There's no proof. That was never proven, but they were alleging. So, yeah, I think I know the people you're talking about. Yeah.

And, yeah, I wouldn't, I wouldn't screw with them. Yeah. Yeah. They're like, hold on a second. We're going to take him

somewhere. We're going to turn off the TV and then we're going to come back. Yeah. Beyond that, I mean, it's kind of like a unique experience, I think, to go from being like, you know, a kid first that's studying the wider world to being trained as a targeting officer. And now you're in the room actually sitting with these dweeps like, hey, bro. What was sort of your takeaway about, like, who these people were and why they had become terrorists? Yeah, I think it was like different for each individual.

I mean, some had some stories that you actually, like, could relate to, like, where it was like, they were held at gunpoint and they were told they were going to, like, their kids were going to die if they didn't join up with this Sunni extremist group. And so, like, in a way, you kind of start to feel for them. Right. And you're like, well, gosh, if, like, my kids' life is, you know, compromised, then I could see this, you know? And then you work with the guys that are, well, you don't work with them. They, they're, you can't convince them to work with us. But the hardcore extremists that truly are true believers. And I didn't, you know, I didn't work with a lot of those because they don't have any interest in working with the U.S. government.

I helped with a recruitment operation in Iraq that was extremely successful in taking out like a big chunk of the leadership. And he was just looking for a better life for his family, you know, and could see that, you know, he didn't want to do the extremist thing anymore. And he never really was, like, radicalized or anything. He was doing it for money. And so it was relatively easy to get him to, like, work with us to roll up these guys. So it just depended. It really depended upon who we were meeting. with and what the circumstances were and what we were trying to achieve with them.

I remember one of the stories I heard was about, this was in Afghanistan. It was a young girl. She eloped with her boyfriend. So they disappear and take off. They're in hiding, basically. A terrorist group went to the brother of the sister. He said, we're holding her. And we'll kill her if you don't start doing terror operations, you know, bombings and so on.

Right. And so you see, like, these people are like press gang. you know, blackmailed into it at times. But then there are hardcore, you know, the Wahhabists and so on or into that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so did that series of interrogations kind of lead you like the next rung up the ladder as far as going after that network? Yeah, in combination with other things, you know, like you're building out a picture of what the next tier looks like. So it's like you get a little bit from the detainee and then you get a little bit with your source and then you intercept the comms and then you've got a better picture and you know a more solid picture and you know

anytime we send out an operational lead like you need to make sure that everything's been corroborated and stuff like i don't want to just send our operators out on like one bogus detainee saying something you know was it mostly the agencies guys or was it the military picking these dudes up mainly it was mainly the task force got you yeah in iraq um the special activities division that i worked with, they mostly did like kind of reconnaissance support. I mean, they could go out in the raids and they would a lot of times, but they were out, they were running the sources too. They were, you know, trained case officers. So they were doing the reconnaissance bit, but it was really the action element, the task force specop guys that were rolling up the guys. And it sounds like

the agency kind of kept you going back and forth to that same station, that same area roughly A couple different ones. Okay. Yeah. As before we move on to the next one, I mean, what was sort of your impression about how these operations degraded the, you know, I'll use the term since we used it in the press, we all used it, AQI, Al-Qaeda and Iraq. By the time you get to 2009 or so, AQI was kind of defeated.

And I mean, I imagine you must have got to see some of that. Yeah. Yeah, I did. Anzrael Sunnah and Israel Islam was another group. Yeah, yeah. A lot of other groups are kind of popping up places. And we definitely grappled with what is this developing into? Is this developing into ISIS?

You know, we were starting to see some of the indicators that it was developing into something even more lethal. And that was kind of discouraging as a. targeting officer because you're like, well, we just took out all the leadership and now these other bad guys are popping up. And so, but then it became like 2009, it was like, why aren't we focus more on Afghanistan? That's where the al-Qaeda senior leadership is or Pakistan. And so that's why I went over to Afghanistan-Pakistan Division was because I kind of like, I felt like things were kind of slowing down in Iraq. And I wanted to be like very much part of the fight still.

And at that time, Afghanistan and Paxan Division and the CIA's counterterrorism division was actually a really like hard position to get. They only took like the best targeting officers. And so I had enough success in Iraq that I could apply like basically I had to apply. and I had to be reviewed. And yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I was moved over to that target set. And I was there, let's see, 2011 through 2014. Okay.

Yeah. So I guess you were hitting it right again. Yeah. And how did Afghanistan differ from Iraq as far as being a targeting officer? It was like set up as kind of boring bureaucracy stuff. but it was set up really differently in terms of like the targeting element and the operational element. So I was in a unique position because they made me like kind of in charge of operations for the sources, like operationalizing our intel from the sources and positioning them

in such a way to report on EQSL. There was also like an entire targeting shop of officers, like a big targeting unit that were focused from a different perspective, they were focused on the target itself. So like using other means to go after that target other than the sources. Interesting. But then I was also like kind of the intermediary between the two and that I had to marry up what the sources were doing with what the targeters were doing. So and there was a little bit like of infighting and like weird.

Yeah. But I had a lot of success. on one of the operations I did in Iraq. And so that's why they put me in this kind of tough position to do this. And yeah, so the targeting was very different in the sense that I was working a lot more with Special Activities Division than I ever did in Iraq Division. Iraq, it was like more like funneling to like the task force, the military. And then in Afghanistan and Pakistan it was more like working with with SAD

on what they had on the ground. And they had the Iraq Afghans and everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Marrying things up with what we're trying to do there. Yeah. I imagine they could do a lot more.

And I mean, Afghanistan is also like such a different country where Iraq was more urban cosmopolitan by comparison to Afghanistan being rural and mountainous. Yeah. Yeah. And you're dealing with like kind of like almost like farmers or country folk. I don't know.

No, it was just like a totally different vibe. Was it harder to find people because of that, the people that you were looking for? No, because we had developed so much in terms of our capabilities. Like, not only our technology, but our methodology of going after these guys. Iraq was kind of the training ground, and then we applied lessons learn to the target in Afghanistan, Pakistan. So you had a lot of like targeters that worked Iraq and then moved back over. So initially, obviously, everything was focused Afghanistan after 9-11. Then we got involved in Iraq and the surge went over there.

And everything got kind of effed up over there in Iraq. And then everybody surged back over to Afghanistan. So, but with that, we brought some lessons that we learned about going after these guys and what worked and what did it. Are you allowed to say what worked and what didn't? Not really, because I might get more into like technology and sources and method. I get it. Yeah. So how did Afghanistan kind of like from your perspective, how did that conflict sort of shape over the four years that you were in and out?

I think it became more and more apparent that sadly the Taliban. Taliban wasn't going anywhere. Yeah. And I was really focused, part of my job was really focused on Taliban senior leadership. And so I had a really good understanding of what was happening with them and how they were not, we weren't, we weren't going to be able to like get rid of them entirely. There were these negotiations going on that were all in Doha that was all like really hush, but everybody kind of knew it was happening.

And it was weird because, like, the chief of counterterrorism at the time, I don't know if he's out. He's been outed yet. But he wasn't, they did a really good job in Zero Dark 30 with, like, his character. And that was the character that I worked under. It was really hard, very hard on his officers, the chief character is. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah.

And I don't know if I can say his name. I mean, I know his name. But he was really tough on everything. He was a dude who was like the first one in work every morning and knew everything about his office. He converted to Islam. He was a chain smoker. You always saw him smoking. And he like, when you had to brief him, it was like, you better know your ship backwards and forwards.

And I had to brief him quite a bit. And I remember I had to brief him on a reconnaissance mission. And he was like, have you ever? were done reconnaissance? Do you even know? And I was like, well, I'm telling you, I'm reporting what the, what the operators are telling me. That's what I'm here to do. I'm not here to like run a recon mission. Yeah. Like that's not my job. I'm targeter. So, yeah, it ended up going fine. But yeah, it was, but he got, he's the one who was like, I think this is like, 2000, 14, 15 when he was like,

you know what? Really? You need to go after. Taliban senior leadership. We really need to think about doing that. I was going to ask you because for a long time, the CIA, as I recall, as I know, in Afghanistan was really focused on foreign fighters, aQ, more so than the Taliban. And then that started to shift at what point? I would say 14, 15. Okay. The chief carterism kind of got into his head. You know, we really should be going after Taliban senior leadership. And I remember during, I mean, this was a the press that during the first Trump administration, there was like an official, like some sort of actual policy change where, yeah? Yeah, I mean, it was reported anyway in the media.

Okay, okay. Maybe they were just reporting what had already happened a year previously. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. I got out in 2014. So like, I've been out for a long time. Yeah. So Trump is way after me. Not way after. But. So what your impression again, I mean, mean, of the Taliban that they weren't going anywhere. Was that because they were just like such a solidified part of the culture that they embedded themselves so deeply? I mean, why did you think that we weren't going to be able to defeat them completely? Well, they got a lot of help from Pakistanis, Pakistani intelligence, right?

So they kind of hid in Pakistan and were funded, too, by the Pakistanis. So it was really frustrating for us because, like, we obviously couldn't go into Pakistan. and Nabom. I mean, we did, like, we did do a couple of things, you know, but, like, they went over there, and then they just came back. Right. So they got safe haven over there in Pakistan, and then back to Afghanistan. Sorry.

Thank you. And this was sort of a combination of targeting, like, targeting can be a number of different things, as you explained, like sometimes going after recruitment, sometimes kill capture missions and sometimes just drone strikes. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, and I did all of it. And the ability to do all of it, I think, was something that helped to hone your skills in going after the target set and knowing what worked and what didn't work.

And sometimes we were trying all different things in order to meet our objective. Did you get sent anywhere else during your time there? Where else did you go? Yeah. Some other Middle Eastern countries. Vaguely speaking. Yeah. Mesopotamia.

Yeah. Yeah. Over there. Over there. Yeah. Liaoning with different partners. Yeah. Yeah.

And I would say like those were probably the more challenging missions because like, you know, in Afghanistan and Iraq, like you have, I had the military all around me. So I felt relatively like secure even though we had GRS, you know, going with us on to places. But I didn't have GRS in the Middle Eastern countries that they sent me to. And so I had to really trust the liaison. that they were like going to work with, that they were working with me and that they were being truthful about things. And so I would say that was probably more nerve-wracking for me because, and also like the meetings I would have with sources, they were terrorists, right?

And I'd show up to those meetings. And I wouldn't know, is this guy going to come with like a bomb strap to his chest? So now you're actually going out into the field like a case officer would meeting a guy in the suit or whatever the case. Yeah, yeah. Well, I was always with a case officer. and a translator. Okay, gotcha. And like, the translator was usually like foreign liaison. And because that, the operational lead would usually come from me as the targeter. And I would have the expertise, again, on the target set.

And so I would be there calling the guy's bullshit or not. Well, the case officer was doing the case officer thing, you know, developing the rapport and everything. And I was there to kind of a set. Good cop, bad cop. Yeah, assess his access. So, yeah, that was kind of my job in doing that. Did you ever catch, you know, liaison partners trying to hoodwink you guys? I didn't.

Okay. So it was a pretty good relationship at the end. Yeah. I never had a bad experience. I really felt like they were pretty upstanding with us, at least. So I never felt that way. I definitely knew of stories. Sure.

With that, that hasn't always been the case. But I never had a bad experience with them. And during any of these trips, were there any, like, hairy experiences or dicey situations that you got into that you can talk about? Yeah. I mean, like, certainly, like, when I met with, when I had my first high, um, high threat meeting, when I sent out the operational lead that this terrorist, he had walked into the embassy at one point and said, I want to work with the U.S. government. And we had his phone number and stuff. And, it just so happened, and it's bureaucracy, right, that this stuff happens, but just no one traced his phone number to, like, see if he actually had the access that he did, that he was claiming to have. And I happened to trace his phone number. And I was like, holy shit, he really does know all these guys. And so I sent out the lead to the case officer in the field. And I was like,

you might want to look at this. Yeah. And he was like, oh, shit, we need to get a minute here. So that's when I flew out. And I, you know, went with him. to this meeting, but it was in like a dicey hotel in a Middle Eastern country. There was no metal detectors. So like it just all was like very shady, you know. And so I was nervous. I was really nervous. It was totally different from Iraq where like I've got military right here. I've got the GRS. Like we've got gun. I had my gun on me. I didn't have any weapons on me. It's like there's nothing I could do if this guy was a threat. So I would say that. That was probably the diciest situation I was in.

I mean, you're always scared when you're like flying over a rock, you know, like or Afghanistan and those cargo planes. I was always afraid we're going to go down. But I would say like operationally, that was when I felt the most vulnerable. Yeah. You're like Brittany Butler, consular reports officer on paper. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Like, I, yeah.

I and I mean not to pry too much and shut me down anytime but your your other desire to have a family yeah is that starting to like emerge around this time I mean how are you kind of balancing your your CIA career with that yeah yeah so I met my husband in 2007 so I was already like into it you know and I was already deploying and stuff and he had friends you know D.C is like a pretty small town in a sense that like everybody knows somebody works at CIA and um it just so happened that his really good friend worked in the same division as I did in a rock department yeah and he so much we worked together so closely that he was sitting at my desk one day this his buddy and my then boyfriend now husband called me at work and the his buddy picked up and he knew his buddy

worked at CIA. And he was like, wait, Brittany works there? What? And so it was funny. They like had that we had, we all had a good laugh about it. But he like came to visit me at work. Like it wasn't a big deal. Like he came. He couldn't come into the vaults or anything, but he came. We had coffee. We went to the Starbucks down the lobby. Yeah. Yeah. Like it was. And like you really respect what I did. And he thought it was awesome. And he was really proud of me. And so whenever I needed to, like, go on these missions, sometimes I'd have him drive me to the airport. And, of course, this is a time where we had, like, the unmarked planes at Dulles. And they were, like, kind of around the back of the airport.

And he'd have to, like, he would drive me to this. And I would just, like, walk up into the airplane. And he was like, this is crazy. I can't believe you're doing this. And he'd get nervous and stuff. But he knew there was, like, no stopping me. Like, I was totally dedicated to what I was doing. And, yeah, we got married in 2010, had our first kid, 2011.

Okay, so you're still in the agency. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I was in the agency up until we had our second son with three sons. Wow. Yeah. Oh, that's, no, that's great. It reminds me of a story about one guy who's at the agency goes out on a date with a woman in D.C. And she's like, you know, what do you do?

Yeah. He's allowed to say, like, look, I was force recon Marine. I was special forces. I'm a CIA paramilitary guy. And she was like, this guy's so full of shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But because it's D.C. And it's, like you said, it's a small world.

She's able to, like, call up her friend that works at SAD. Right. And they're like, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know.

But there's also like a lot of people, like we had this one friend. It was so hilarious. So me and this other woman, we both worked at CIA. and we actually, we happened to be dating buddies. Like they were, our, both of our, our boyfriends were buddies. And she was like a secretary. I was in operations. And we had, there was a guy within our friend group that said he was CIA.

And wasn't. And didn't know that we really were CIA. And it's like the worst place in the world to pretend to be a CIA. You don't want to pretend to be that. And we were like asking questions. We're like, what's it really like? What's it like to kill a man? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he would be like, well. We had so much fun. I don't know. This guy's probably still saying it to try to get women to sleep with him or something. Yeah. Yeah, I know. I wish you had had a tape recording of those conversations. I know. Amazing. Yeah, totally.

So how are you juggling family in the CIA career at this point? Yeah, yeah. Not well. I, it was really hard on the CIA career. family. It was hard on me mentally. I was really exhausted all the time. I was working 10, 12-hour days. Granted, I wasn't like overseas all the time, but when I was at Langley, they were still working me to death. And I felt like I wasn't 100% at either job, not being a mom or being, you know, a CIA officer. So it got to a point, and I had done 10 years by the time I had my second son in the counterterrorism Center. And it's quite an intense environment and especially like with targeting. And so I was burnout. I was I was really sick. And I told my husband like, I don't care what you have to do. You mail jiggleau for all I care. I'm not going back to work. And then he was like, what? Like,

what are you saying? Like we need both of our incomes to like have this house. And I'm like, I don't fucking care. Figure it out. And so. So I called, and I told everybody before I left, like, I'm not coming back. I went on maternity leave, and that's when I left. And they're like, there's no way. You are obsessed with what you do. There's no way you can't do this job. You are going to be back here.

And I was like, nope, nope, I'm not coming back. I'm not coming back. And when my maternity leave expired, I called them. And I was like, yep, not come back. And like, they were completely shocked that I really wasn't coming back. And I got phone calls for a couple years after that. Like, hey, like, we could really use you. Like, this would be so great.

Like, you were really good at this. We need you for this. They want you to come back as, like, a green badger and contract? No. They didn't. I mean, it was really, what they wanted me to do was, like, a specific thing that I was good at. And I can't get into specifics. But whether that was a green or a blue, it wasn't really even discussed.

It was just, like, they. They were trying to sway me with the job. Gotcha. What it was and what they were needing me to do. What did you do? What do you mean? I mean, you just hang it up and you tell the CIA, no, I'm not coming back into the office. Yeah.

Yeah. What is like the next phase for? Yeah. Yeah. I told them like I'm not coming back. And then you just go and you sign all the secrecy agreements saying you're not going to say anything about, you know, anything. that you did. You're not going to reveal sources and methods. And yeah. And so then I was a stay-at-home mom. And I worked because the last target said I worked at a counterterrorism center was Afghanistan, Pakistan.

And like I said, I specialized in Taliban senior leadership. I became very aware of how they treated women. And I promised myself if I ever left that I would do something for women's rights in Afghanistan. And so I joined an organization called Women for Afghan Women. And at one time, we helped provide funding for, it was like 45 shelters in Afghanistan for women and children fleeing domestic abuse situations. So I was a full-time mom, but like I also did kind of dabble in that. Some non-for-profit work. Yeah, yeah, volunteer work.

And it was because of that experience, though, that I worked alongside these really awesome Afghan women. and they encouraged me to write a book about women empowerment in the Middle East. And so that was my first novel, The Syndicate Spy, that came out in 2023, and just found that I loved writing. And I just wanted to keep on doing it. So that's where I am. I want to ask you about the books. But I think, you know, we talk on the podcast a lot about, like, the difficulty in transitioning out of the military. And I'm sure the people like you have the same.

version of that. Like, what was it like transitioning from being a targeting officer to like driving the kids to school every day? Like, you love to do it. Of course, you want to be around your kids, but there are difficulties in changing your mindset. Absolutely. Well, I mean, it was really hard to not have that like sense of purpose every day. Like that just like, I have a mission. I'm going to go find the bad guys. My work. Yeah. Means something. Like I get up. motivated. And it just changes so much because, like, you don't have that, like, mission anymore in your life. And you, like, there's this intensity that I feel like I have kind of an intense personality. And so, like, it's like, how do I channel this? Like, before I was channeling

it and targeting and going after bad guys. And now I'm, you know, changing diapers. Like, how do I channel this. How do I navigate this new life? And for me, the writing element was a like form of therapy and like how to express yourself. Yeah, express myself, my experiences, like kind of what that world was like. I feel like it was really unique that I was in like a young woman, you know, in the Middle East doing these things. And so it's been really therapeutic for me to write novels. And I'm not sure if I didn't have that, it would be as easy to transition into normal civilian life. I mean, I was always a civilian. But you know what I mean?

Like doing that kind of stuff and- Very relatable. I mean, I got out of the Army, started college the same year, started working on a novel. I mean. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All this, like, weird stuff that, you know, you experience and you're carrying around and then when you go in in your living suburban life and normal life, it's very isolating because like, who can you talk to about this stuff? Like the stuff we're talking about in this interview, you can't talk about it at a PTA meeting. No, no. And like half the time,

it's like my friends I've made after DC, after my work at the agency, they're like, wait, what did you used to do? What? It's like they can't really believe it, you know, because I just, I'm like, a soccer mom. Yeah. You know, so they're like, what? That's so bizarre that you did those things. And even part of myself, like, I look at those pictures and what I used to do. And I'm like, I can't believe I did that. Yeah. Yeah. Like, wow. Just from like a stupidity, I'm like, wow, I was so stupid to like put myself into such dangerous situations. I think having had kids now, being older, a little bit wiser, I hope. Like, I'm not sure I would sign up for those same things today. They're a different place in life now.

Yeah. Yeah, certainly. Tell us about the syndicate spy. You said that book was kind of an outgrowth of your work with Afghan women. Yes, yes. So I really wanted to write a story about what it would be like if women took over the Middle East. Because I feel like they've just been marginalized for so long. And the women I worked with just refused to be victimized.

And they were really strong women. And they just needed like a voice. And so in my novel, I thought, hey, wouldn't it be cool if like a female CIA case officer and let's say a Saudi princess that was born into this family that like really put her down in terms of like her rights and stuff. But she wanted rights. She wanted rights for women in Saudi Arabia and then the rest of the Middle East. What if I partnered them together? And what if my CIA officer and her team kind of helped her launch coup within the Middle East? Yeah. So I had so much fun with it. And there's a lot of twists and turns in it. But it's born of this idea that Afghan women, Arab women, women that have found themselves in this situation that they really should not be seen as victims and that they're really powerful. And like if you study Islam enough, you know like Muhammad's first wife was this really powerful.

business owner and she is Fatima's from her name. That's the ideal of the Muslim woman. And it's interesting you talk to people who really understand their faith, really understand Islam. That's what they refer back to. It's like that that example. And so I thought, hey, how cool would it be if I just like incorporate all that into this novel and, you know, gave it my own little spin? Did you ever look at the Kurdish women in Syria? Not in Syria, but in Iraq. That's a, it's a really interesting case study where the YPJ, the female militia in northern Syria. I mean, the way they just kind of took political power, like they didn't really ask for permission for it.

It's like, yeah, we're running things now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, we're going to have a council. There's going to be a male council and a female council. council in every town and this is how it's going to work now. And the way, like, these ideas that we have about the Middle East that, you know, it can only work in this one way that, you know, ISIS was the epitome of that. We're going back to the Middle Ages here. Right. But it was fascinating to travel around those areas and see, like, once the mullahs were out of power and this

more secular organization came and seized political power, how quickly all the norms changed. Right. And you had a Kurdish woman leading a battalion of Arab men. I mean, the things that would be like unthinkable. Wow. Uh, previously. It's just amazing how quickly that can change. Yeah.

Yeah. I love that. I love stories like that. That's awesome. Yeah. I look up some stuff about that. But, um, so the syndicate spy came out, uh, what year? 2023.

Okay. So, okay, just a few years ago. Yeah. Um, and then how did the next one come about? had the Patriots daughter. Yeah. So I was actually contacted by the publisher to write this book. So we share a publisher.

Yeah. And Matt reached out to me and said, hey, I read the syndicate spy and I loved it. Cool. And I've been following you on social media. Would you think about writing like a new homeland series for us? So like the Carrie Matheson type of deal. And I was like, yeah, get paid to write. let's do it. And so we actually worked together on the outline for this book. And he had a good sense

of, okay, this is what's selling. And he had the idea that, you know, it was harder for readers to grasp the Middle Eastern target. So like to you and I, we like really understand the Middle Eastern target. We understand them as the enemy, the foreign adversary. But readers, I guess, for whatever reason, it's easier for them to grasp onto like Russia as the bad guy. Then like getting into the Sunni Shia. Yeah, yeah. And Mohammed and Abu and back, you know, all the different names. That it's a Russian guy twirling his mustache.

Yeah, yeah. And he was like, okay, so bad guy needs to be Russia. And we need to end up back in the homeland. It needs to end up back in the United States. And that was all the guidance he gave me. Okay. And then I just went for it. And I started to, you know,

at CIA, you're trained to look at the threats and what are the upcoming threats. And so two years ago when I started brainstorming about this book and writing outlines, I was looking at what was going on in the media and social media in particular in terms of like the disinformation that was occurring, the fact that like when you pick up your phone every time, it's not necessarily like when you look at it, most people aren't like, is this true or not? you're thinking, you're asking the question, is, does this align with my belief system already? And what that essentially was doing was helping to, like, to create more and more of a divide in the country. And what I saw that as is an opportunity for a foreign adversary like Russia

that would create the perfect opportunity for them to come in and basically assert themselves as the new superpower. And so that's the premise that the book is built on, that this disinformation campaign that it's divided the country has gotten so bad that civil wars broken out. And we think Russia is possibly behind it. And so you encounter a young woman named Ava and she works for the CIA and she's sent to Moscow to put an end to this cyber campaign that's tearing the country apart. And she's asked to recruit a member of the SVR, Russian intelligence. And at the same time, she's grappling with her own internal stuff and that her mom was also worked for the CIA when she was a young, when she was young. And she left on a mission when Ava, the main character, was 11 years old, and she never came home.

And she never knows what happened to her mom. And so she goes to Moscow not only to put a stop to the cyber campaign, but also to find out what really happened to her mom. Right, right. Yeah. Yeah, there's a personal stake in all this. Yeah, yeah. I read as much of the book as I could, and I mean, towards the end, like, things get really crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. How much of, I mean, whenever you write a book like this, you put a lot of yourself into it. Yeah. How much of your, like, personal experiences from the agency did you have to draw into and reflect on as you were writing the book? Yeah, so it was interesting. I had this conversation yesterday with Tracy Walder, who interviewed me in Dallas. And she was like, the amount of tradecraft that is in here, like, how did you get this past the CIA's publication review board? And I was like, oh, I didn't even realize I did. That I put so much tradecraft in there. So if you're, if you've ever wondered about the psychology behind how we get people to work with us, there's a really great chapter in here when Ava is meeting with her potential SVR source named Constantine. And you're, you're

moving through it with her in terms of how she convinces him to be a spy. And that's like really how we do it. And yeah, it went through the CIA's publication review board and they were totally fine with publishing it. But yeah, obviously like I couldn't write that without having the CIA experience. And so I think that shines through on both in the syndicate spy and the Patriots daughter, that tradecraft element. If you're really curious about how it works at the CIA and how that happened. The agency didn't give you any guff about the book. Really? They were just like, they're like, it's good. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. I've gotten really good about talking around it. Like, I'm on Instagram, TikTok and stuff. Kind of a necessary evil in publishing these days.

And I've gotten good about talking around things. And so I think I was able to do that in the writing, too. And right now you're kind of torn around with the book, right? Going to Thriller Fest here. New York. What else is planned as far as? Yeah. Yeah. So I did, oh my gosh, I've done like, I did five events last week. This week. I've done. So I've, um, I started off in Washington, D.C. at the Spy Museum was like the big launch. I did politics and prose on Connecticut Avenue. Um, I've done, um, there's like Buxton books. I've done the village bookseller in Charleston. I did Texas last this past week where I visited murder by the book in Houston, and then I went to Intrabang Books in Dallas.

That's cool. Yeah. And now I'm here in New York. And this is kind of the end for right now. As far as upcoming events, I have a couple more in South Carolina, like local stuff. I've won in Florence at the Barnes & Noble there. I've hit a bunch of Barnes and Noble's along the way too. Awesome.

And so the syndicate spy and the Patriots daughter are both out now. Yeah. We'll have links in the description. Where can people, you mentioned TikTok, Instagram, where can people find you online? Yeah. So at Brittany Butler Books is my handle on TikTok and Instagram. Okay, cool. Yeah.

Yes, Dimitri. So, Brittany, you mentioned that you worked on the AFPAC desk from 2011 to 2014. So like 2009, the coast bombing happened. And we've had a ton of people on who've said, like after that went down, like the CIA really put the, you know, the pedal up to the metal. Yeah. You know, also in 2011, a little thing happened. Osama bin Laden got smoked in Pakistan.

Right. Did you work on that? Were you anywhere near that? I can't talk about that. Okay. Great questions. Blink twice. Blink twice if you can.

Great questions. So I knew two of the officers that died in Coast, Darren Labonte and the Jordanian case officer. we worked together in Jordan. And two months before Darren died, he and I worked on an operation together. And he was an amazing case officer. And I was like, dude, like, you're like rocking it. Like you're doing so great. Like, you know, I'm learning a lot from you. And he was like, don't be, like, impressed by me. I'm not a good husband. I'm not a good father. And those are the two most important things. And if I had to do it all over again, that's what I would focus all my effort on. And, you know, a couple months later, he was dead. And he had a two-year-old

daughter. And I went to the funeral in Arlington Cemetery and saw his daughter and his wife and everything. And that stayed with me, especially as I started having my own family. I was like, I can't. Yeah, someone who's like super technically competent at their job. But it's like, there's, There's like a trade-off to be made, you know, when you live that kind of life. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It was rough. But as far as like a crackdown in Aft Pack division, I didn't really see that after Coast.

So it's kind of like business. We're still taking risks. Yeah. Yeah. Because we hadn't gotten UBL yet. So they were like, anybody got any ideas? Yeah. Priority number one.

Let's go. Whatever we can do. Let's figure this out. And then the other interesting character, of course, is Zawahiri. As the other guy that you were looking for all the time. Yeah, yeah. They finally nabbed him on my birthday. What? A couple years ago, I was so excited. I was like, I mean, I was way out. I was out of the agency for years by then. And I was like, oh, my God, what a great birthday present. Well, and like, that's the coast bombing that the doctor supposedly had intel on Zahuehiri.

And that's, so that was like a really pivotal thing that we finally were able to nab him. I had a, I mean, speaking of targeting, I had an agency guy tell me we were never able to pin down exactly where Zawahiri was to an area smaller than like Rhode Island. Like, you're like, yeah. And we ended up like getting him on his balcony or something. Yeah, and Kabul. Yeah. Yeah. obviously something changed.

Right. The technology. Yeah. And drones and stuff. Yeah. Or old-fashioned tradecraft. I mean, I really don't know how they did, how they eventually got them. There you go.

So what's next? Is there another book in the works? Yeah. So everything depends on book one sales. And they're going really, really well. So it looks like there will be a book two. Awesome. Which I'm really pumped about.

It's just a matter of working out. details. You think it's going to be like a direct sequel? Yeah. Yeah. This will be a continuation of this story. Very cool. Okay. I'm excited to write it. Yeah. One more question. Yeah. So you said you were chasing

high level Taliban guys. How frustrating on the level of one to ten was it not being able to get and smoke Hakani and his network? So that was actually a different target set from, yeah, the Hakani network was different from,

the Taliban here is that we were going to quite a that gives you an idea little Amar no walk in or anything Dimitri's going to push you

I've asked that to many CIA officers I asked that to Mark Polymopolis like early on and it gave me the which I'm sure he's like just watch Zero Dark 30 exactly like that. That's how it happened. I mean, seriously.

Come on. Brittany, come on. We keep the brass knuckles there in case you don't like the question. I know. I'm like, I saw those walking in. I'm like, what? Yeah, that's what they're there for. If you feel the need. Yeah. Yeah. Watch Darry Dark 30. I don't want to. Wait, you've never seen it? I think I saw it on an airplane.

It's literally like, I'm, it's pretty accurate. Really? Oh, yeah. I thought we were doing well. Come on. Yeah, I mean, it's, it suffers, I mean, I guess maybe some of the same Hollywoodization that, like, maybe Black Hawk Down does where they, like, combine all these characters. But I get what you're saying, like, in essence. Jessica Chastain is a real person.

Yeah, I know. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You probably, like, know her. I've had to ask her things. Okay. She's like, I have no idea what you're talking about, Jack. She's like, just watch the movie.

She didn't tell me that. Pretty close, though. Is she still in? No, no. She's retired. Okay. Yeah. So I hope people go and pick up the Patriots daughter.

It is available wherever books are sold. Brittany, I really appreciate you coming in studio. I'm glad this worked out. Yeah, we were initially going to do this remotely. But then when I saw you were coming in for Thriller Fest, I was like, okay, it all works out. It's awesome. Yeah. No, thanks for having me.

Yeah, and feel free to reach out when the next book comes out. Yeah, thank you. I will. And anything else you want to plug or tell people about before we get going? I think so. All right. So we'll see all you guys next time. Thanks for joining us.

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