The Team House - From Ground Branch to Station Chief | Dale Bendler | Ep. 265

Episode Date: March 11, 2024

Dale started his service in the Marines and became Force Recon afterwards Dale served in the CIA for over 35 years. He started out as a Paramilitary Officer (PMO) and worked in Latin America and eventually became a station chief in a major European country.Find Dale here:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dale-bendler-consultant?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------To help support the show and for all bonus content including:https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouse-AD FREE AUDIO-AD FREE VIDEO-Access to ALL bonus segments with our guestsSubscribe to our Patreon! ⬇️https://www.patreon.com/TheTeamHouseOr make a one time donation at: ⬇️https://ko-fi.com/theteamhouseTeam House merch: ⬇️https://teespring.com/stores/my-store-10474963Social 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=21Dave’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/dave_parke?s=21Team House Discord: ⬇️https://discord.gg/wHFHYM6SubReddit: ⬇️https://www.reddit.com/r/TheTeamHouse/Jack Murphy's memoir "Murphy's Law" can be found here:⬇️ https://www.amazon.com/Murphys-Law-Journey-Investigative-Journalist/dp/1501191241The Team Room Reading Room (Amazon Affiliate links):⬇️ https://jackmurphywrites.com/the-team-room-reading-room/Intro music by https://www.youtube.com/user/RemixSampleWant to sponsor the show?Email: ⬇️[e-mail]#groundbranch #cia #paramilitaryBecome 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. We would really appreciate it if you guys went and reviewed us on Apple or Spotify. Those reviews really help people find the podcast and help it get recognized. And, you know, if you've been enjoying the show, we really appreciate your support. Another thing that you can do 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 Teamhouse channel and podcast if you'd like to. And we really appreciate that. So go in and check us out at patreon.com slash the team house. The Team House with your host, Jack Murphy, and David Park.

Hey, everyone. Welcome to episode 265 of The Team House. I'm Jack, here with Dave. And our guest on tonight's show is Dale Bendler. He served as a CIA paramilitary officer. And then went on to a number of foreign intelligence assignments, served as Chief of Station in a couple of locations. Really interesting career, Central America. Africa, West Europe. Dale, we're excited to have you here. This has been a long time coming, I feel like.

It's my pleasure. Thanks for coming out. My pleasure. So, I mean, tell us a little bit about, you know, your origin story. I'm hearing that echo D. Can you mute that, please? Tell us a little bit about like how you came up, how you grew up, and what sort of like propelled you towards military service initially. Well, it's middle class, New Jersey. In fact, in the Marine Corps, my nicknought. name was Turnpike, but exit four, so closer to Philadelphia than New York, so hence the South Jersey accent, Philadelphia accent, and we would be Flyers and Sixers and Eagles and Phillies, Phillies fans. Really no mentor, and I don't know why, even after all these years, with a chance

to reflect why I had to scratch that itch and join. join the service and within the service why why the Marine Corps. This was post-Vietnam. This was post-Vietnam. Not a really a popular time to join the military. But you felt it. That's correct. Um, 19705 to 1979. And I reflect back on those years and there's probably a colonel, Colonel of truth to the argument that was a hollow force, that the 82nd existed on paper, the Second Marine Division existed with paper. but they may not have been as effective forces as we wanted them to be.

Racial tensions on all sides, drug abuse, not much budget, no mission, and still an anti-Vietnam sentiment. I cheated to a degree. I escaped to elite units. So the man, to my left or right, were highly motivated as I was at the time. So you went to boot camp as a 0-311 infantrymen. I mean, how did that come about that you ended up like hearing about recon and realized this could be a possibility for you?

Right. So receiving at Camp LeJune in the late summer, early fall of 1975, a E5 or E6 came around and asked who could swim. Some people raised their hand, a lot of people didn't. and what a GT score so that's in the Army you call it yeah it's from the that was decent apparently so they said you're going to recon and it sounded cool and I was I was pleased so I went to second recon battalion out at onslow Beach right there in the Atlantic at Camp of June I was there probably for 18 months and I understand it was an even more elite unit second force recon so

So I went to selection for second force and was accepted. What was that selection for force recant in 1975, 76? So this would have been 77. They gave me a flack jacket, a Vietnam era flack jacket, a gas mask, and an M60, and we started running. And running and running, avoiding all of those little bridges and making sure you went through every creek there was. And then there was a physical fitness test and then a swim test. I think swimming with a folding chair under the length of the pole. And it was...

But like a lot of people in force recon then, physical fitness was what we did. In fact, probably at the expense of learning patrolling or actions at the objectives, we spent a lot of time doing PT. I think the platoon I was in could almost run to max the run for the Marine Corps, the physical fitness test, three miles and 18 minutes, we could almost do it in formation. Wow, that's impressive.

And you mentioned to me earlier that you had also gotten a slot to go to Ranger's School, which, I mean, I went to Ranger School with a couple of recon Marines, but you said it was pretty rare back in those days. I'm going to guess one or two a year, and there's a lot of pressure on us to do well. I was an E5 and I think one because I was a Marine and two, because I was enlisted, I went in January and February. And it was cold. And I have to say, I greatly appreciated Ranger School. And I felt that upon graduation, I finally had become a special operator because of the emphasis on small unit tactics and actions at the objective. where maybe in force recon, at least when I was there, a lot of PT, a lot of jump, a lot of scuba, maybe not as much small unit operations.

With an exception, it was amphibious reconnaissance school at Little Creek was also very good, learning core skills of a reconnaissance marine amphibious mission. And what was it like, you know, being in force recon, now we're getting in mid to late 1970s, I mean, what were you guys training for? Did you have any ideas of missions you might get or deployments that might come up? So there was obviously still post-Vietnam, so tremendous hesitancy to deploy, as your generation did. But it was, it took a year or two,

but I really fell in love with the mission of reconnaissance, and it may have led to a career in the intelligence community because it wasn't to engage the enemy in sort of a direct action, but to be eyes and ears of the fleet and report back the information on the enemy movements. So, yeah, it wasn't hard going from a reconnaissance mission to say a case officer espionage mission. Right, right.

Different type of... Camys, the Brooks Brothers suit. Yeah. When did you start toying with the idea of the agency? Was it before you left the Marine Corps? Was it during college? It was. I was at Second Force Recon at Camp LeJune.

And yes, there is a library. The Marines do have a library. Full of crowns. There's more than one. One book, and there was a book on the Bay of Pigs, and so Bay of Pigs happened in 1961. This book was written in probably 77, and I said this is, the book underscored the contribution of the paramilitary office at CIA, and I said, I think I can do that, but I knew I would have to have a degree.

before I'm answering the question. So you decide to leave the Marine Corps, already with this idea in your mind, that you're going to apply to the agency. Yes. Go to college, it's 1980 at this point. Where did you go to school? What did you major in?

So I went to Rutgers, a state school of New Jersey, and I appreciated the way you framed that, Jack, because for me, it wasn't so much as education. but training, that my Marine Corps time was training to become a CIA officer, and my time in college was training to be a CIA officer. Rectors political science, with as many courses on the Soviet Union as I could take. China was not an issue at the time. And you also got to do a study abroad program? That's correct.

So I went to Mexico City and lived with a Mexican family. And I have to say a year abroad then, it was probably more rewarding than it might be today for young people thinking of a semester abroad because of the iPhone and Google Translate and watching American Flex on YouTube, etc. You had a backpack and a dog ear dictionary in the back if you wanted a servesa or if you wanted to get home. Yeah. So I did bring smoking good Spanish at a three level. I never had to take, the CIA never had to train me in Spanish. So I had these special operation skills from an elite unit. and a degree in political science, and three-level Spanish.

It isn't just the language skill, but living abroad and liking it and wanting more. Because CIA is an external agency, of course. And people always ask, you know, Dave and I on this show, like there are people interested in joining the agency or joining some sort of governmental service, the intelligence community. What was your recruitment process like? What was your application process like? Okay. So I remember sending in my application, of course, it was typewriters then.

And when I got that letter, I still have it that said, you, you're, you, we find you competitive for the first interview. And I only had one suit, and it was a thick wool suit, and it was September in Philadelphia. And I probably got there two hours early for that meeting and stood outside sweltering. I wasn't going to be late, and I remember my interview. I remember the hotel. I thought it went well.

I thought he may have sympathized with me a little bit for having been a grunt. So he said, I think you crawled around on your belly enough. I'm going to give you a shot. So I thought I had a pretty good GPA, and I could write well. also, but that's what it was. And then when I got the GS-9 acceptance letter, I would have taken

the GS-5, but GS-9 seemed really good, second lieutenant. Step 5, I got step 6 for Spanish, and curiously, because I had been to jump school, they gave me another step. Interesting. Step 7, GS-9, step 7. And it was unusual for me. that I was sponsored by Special Activities Division. In other words, that the ground branch wanted me... Like, from the application process, they kind of sucked you up like,

this is a dude we want to have here. That's correct. And I was very thankful for that, flattered. And there were several important operations going on around the world in Central America, and Southern Africa, and Afghan, one. that I wasn't sure in my naivete, I wasn't sure why did I need FI, why did I need to spin my wheels

in Washington and learn to which utensil to use at the farm, there are wars to be fought, and I wanted to go. But I had me and several of my colleagues, contemporaries, We had a, the chief of ground branch at the time, a gentleman named Chuck said, no, no, you're going. You're going. Those wars will be waiting for you. Don't worry, and there will be plenty of wars. You're going to be opt certified.

This was your initial intake when you go to the farm, and they're like, no, no, no, you're going to do the whole thing. Correct. Yeah. The full career trainee program, which was a tad unusual for a paramilitary officer in the day. Many were contractors or maybe paramilitary officers, but not operational certified, case officer certified. But this particular leader we had said, you're going to go. And many of us, many of whom he said that too went on to very senior rank, more senior than I. We all should be very, very thankful.

What was the relationship between special activities and the agency at large at that point in time? Second-class citizens. I lived it. And I mean, you pointed out earlier, too, that, you know, had you not gone through the full, you know, study program at the farm, that for you and your contemporaries, your careers would have stalled out relatively quickly at a certain point, right? You would not have gotten promoted past a certain point. I'm going to say, as I understand it, at the GS-13 level. Yeah.

As I understand it. And these contemporaries I refer to went well into the SIS ranks. But even though you were trained as a case officer just like everyone else, they still regarded you as your first and foremost a Marine grunt. From the FI side, that's how we were, many of us were viewed. There's a stereotype, but certainly a persistent stereotype that impacted careers. Yeah. Yeah. We had some Mac Sog, MacSog. Veterans left over and they were amazing leaders, and we learned much from them. Just, if I may, just going back to those Marine Corps years,

75 to 79, every E6 that we met and every 03 that we met had fallen in nasty Yeah. Counterinsurgency in Vietnam. And many of us really just sucked up everything that they could impart on us. And they were great NCOs and officers. And as it turns out, many of those, many of the small unit tactics that were passed down to us went on to be very useful in the Bush Wars of the 80s. And even one could argue the counterinsurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

and in the Sahel and other Philippines and other places. So what was it like after you graduate from the farm, you arrive at SAD, what's that sort of experience like when you, I mean this was your goal, right? You were excited to be there. I mean, what was it like and how did you start getting involved in the El Salvador program? So I was the happiest person in the world. Yeah. And I couldn't believe I had a chance to serve of my country and remember the Cold War is on, that I get paid while doing it and have a certain prestige, a Foreign Service officer working for the State Department. I was the first out of the gate of my CT career trainee class to PCS overseas and that

was to Eastern El Salvador to a forward operating base. But before that, let me say, I think you both might appreciate. Grand Branch sent several of us to Motlake for SOT. Oh, cool. Yeah. And I remember close quarter battle. Yep. And there were 45s at the time.

Handguns, and they really put a lot of emphasis on shooting. And we did hand-to-hand. And we did sentry takeout. And it was really impressive. So this was by probably 1980. 80. It was actually early 85. So for the people out there who are listening, maybe don't know what SOT or Mott Lake was. In 1977, we had the Blue Light program, the Special Forces Counterterrorism Unit. When they stood that down, they wanted to retain that capability, even though the CT mission

went to Delta at that point, but they wanted to retain some of those skills. And that's why they continue running the SOT program out at Montlake. Up until somewhere in the mid-90s they ran that and at the time I mean no again it's kind of like SF history at this point but at the time that was some of the most dynamic CQB in urban warfare training that was being run anywhere excellent yeah yeah and it almost sounds as though it's it followed because if they're teaching you hand-to-hand and stuff like that it almost sounds like it's following like the old camp-ex paradigm of a little you know training giving you these commando tactics yeah

training you, you know, in these turbocharged sort of commando tactics. Yeah, very cool. Yeah, they had the fuselages out there. There were like shooting lanes, like jungle lanes and stuff. Correct. Shoot houses. Yes, correct. I thought it was excellent.

And good on ground branch to send us there. And we were given black T-shirts, New Defione. And later I didn't know what it meant at the time, but I went on to serve in French-speaking countries, and we'll defend this. Yeah. Excellent. Good for the Army.

Yeah, it's awesome. Previous guest on the show, Ruben Garcia, ran the SOT program for a while. Maybe he was there, but it was Century Takeout with a Garot and K-Barr. Yeah. Throat slit. That's awesome. And so then talk to us about how El Salvador came about for you.

So Mr. Casey was the director. Mr. Reagan was the president. So the Cold War was on. That direct conflict with the Soviets is out of the question. But maybe we can go toe-to-to-toe with them in a third world competition. And so Southern Africa, Central America, and Afghanistan. So I think you had Mr. Devine sitting here and talked eloquently about the Afghan program. So Central America was important and, frankly, closer to home.

And I was assigned to the most remote and most violent part of the country. I would, I'd like to say I did it a tad differently, that most... in the paramilitary world then with TDI and not necessarily with the language and maybe not with case officer skills and I'm not saying I'm better I'm just saying I was fortunate to the case officer certified have three-level Spanish and be a recon Marine and be and then have some some special small unit tactic counterinsurgency experience. So it was all on counterinsurgency with our Salvadoran partners and I

totally believed in the mission. Talk to us about what form that took and you know what it was like going down there getting deployed down there, what the enemy situation was like in the friendly situation and how you kind of evolved that while you PCS down there. Well first I have to give a shout out to your generation because we as dangerous as it was we didn't have to deal with as vests or V-Bids and you two had a deal deal with that. I would also say probably like my Vietnam case officer veterans, my brothers and sisters who went before us in Vietnam, we similarly, when we would have an agent meeting up country, it was just us in a thin skin vehicle and maybe a, well, we

We had the Browning High Power was the CIA issued weapon. And I spoke to language, so I didn't have a linguist, and I was my own targeter, and I was my own analyst. So it's just me with a source. And I looked back on in hindsight, it was dangerous. A bit much, yeah. Correct. But I got to work with Seals, and a seventh group was there,

and that, in the same group, And by the mid-80s, you have that CIA human support to counter-insurgency with NSW and SOF. And from that, when it grew into what it is today, well, it's Vietnam. And we continue the tradition. So who were the insurgents in El Salvador at that time? So it would be the FMLN was the umbrella group, quartermastered by the Soviet Union, and then supported by Cuba directly. And then there were several guerrilla factions underneath.

One of the larger was called the ERP, EHercito Revolutionado de Pueblo, led by a commandante named Joaquin Boloos. A wolf. Famous in anybody who has studied the insurgency, counterinsurgency in El Salvador. Fast forward 20 years, he had moved on to Oxford where he was. doing a dissertation on peace talks, conflict resolution. Yeah. And I went to see him.

Interesting. And it was a fascinating, one-on-one, fascinating experience in insurgency and counterinsurgency. And he said some very interesting points. I documented it and shared it because we were in the special at DOD were in taking on these counterinsurgency missions in the Middle East. When you guys met all those years later, was it like just two professionals like talking shop? Two professionals talking shop. And I remember he said that you often would have that map with the little red dots of insurgents activity. It's actually where there is no

activity is where we have our clandestine infrastructure. Right, right, right. And that's where the nurse is siphoning off one or two penicillin pills per week that goes to the insurgent hospital. The college professor is siphying off two or three pages of eight by eleven that would go into the propaganda. Remember this is the mid-80s or the compasina who hangs laundry on Wednesdays if government forces are in the area. He said that's where we made most of our money.

Right. The insurgents aren't going to attack where their bed down site is. It's like the blank site on the map. It's kind of where you want to look. It's where you needed to be. Yeah. And I'm not sure if that was made its way through Afghanistan and Iraq. It also underscored to me my experiences in El Salvador and the clandestine infrastructure.

It's just how effective and how proud the veterans should be who participated in Phoenix, Phoenix. That really hurt to be a con. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant program. And so for you down there as a paramilitary officer, what was your partner force that you worked with? What were those guys like? So Salvadoran infantry, there was an elite unit called Paral. Petruya, reconnaissance, long distance, like a LERP. Yeah, long distance.

But they were based at a strategic asset, and they were based in San Salvador, the capital. And I wasn't, I didn't, didn't work with them, so I worked with the line battalions. I will say when I PCSed there, my R&R point was San Salvador. I mean, I would try to come back once every two weeks. And there's definitely an assignment wearing camouflage and carrying a brownie. No M4, but just the Browning. High power, right. I mean, you mentioned meeting with sources,

so I mean, it sounds like you really were like the one guy out there supporting these units sort of on the front lines of this counterinsurgency, helping them with their intel, helping them with their training. Right. I had the lead for Morsan, Loneong, and San Miguel, the most conflictive districts, provinces in El Salvador. And please. How are you identifying, you know, if you look at sort of the agency today and targeters and, you know, analysts and collection managers and all that, but you're out there on the ground in a very tactical world. How are you identifying sources?

How are you finding them, recruiting them for the ones that weren't like handed over to you? regularly in the prisons of the Salvadoran police or military. And I spent quite a bit, in fact, I remember distinctly, one of the proudest moments for me was Christmas Day, 25 December, 1985, interrogating a communist insurgent, and trying to uncover that insurgent that insurgent nurse and compassina with the laundry and the professor and just how fulfilling that was that my country could enjoy and the families could enjoy Christmas because some of us were in these kind of places and I'm sure you've had those same same feelings on Thanksgiving and Christmas it was an honor and I remember that I could I feel like I could be in the cell. with that guy today. It was just me and him. Needed language. Right. And you keep talking to insurgents like that. You become a very good analyst and you become a good targeter. Yeah, to go that deep into the culture for that one. And it stayed with me for a couple decades later where I really,

I think, I developed a mature, a sophisticated appreciation for counterinsurgency that would later pay dividends in places like Peru. And so you pointed out that this was like some of the hottest years of the insurgency in Salvador. What was the enemy doing at that point? And what were you guys doing to fight back? So that was still post-Vietnam and it was a limit on, I think it was 55 Green Berets. And one work around that would be, say, sending CIA paramilitary officers or case officers.

and that way it was for whole government 55 plus maybe 10 or 20. I should also say I'd like to give a shout out to the officers who served on my left and right in El Salvador. They went on to assume very senior positions at CIA to include Mr. Jose Rodriguez became the DDO, and he was my branch chief. But so, I mean, again, back to El Salvador, like, what was the enemy activities and what were you guys doing to counter that insurgency? Particularly in Lone. I was in the Gulf of Fonseca, and we wanted to interdic weapons coming in across the Gulf from Nicaragua. And I thought the best way to do that wasn't fleer or... aircraft, of course we had no imagery, right?

And the other three-letter agency, I never heard of them, I never got a single product from them. But let me say, I grew up without that and I never needed it. And when I got it, I appreciated it, but it was a luxury. But I grew up without the GRS, the analyst, the Targeter, the reports officer, support from other three, three-level letter agencies. So maritime operations to interdict the flow of weapons into the country. And then I really wanted to try to get a spy inside of the Cuba nexus. And I was suspected that there was a Cuban, my Cuban counterpart was in country. But I don't think he, he ever. was. We've had Cuban defectors since.

Like a DGI guy. A DGI or a tropos specialis. And they, in the 70s and 80s in Cuba, they were very noble adversaries. Yeah. Very, very capable. They did Nicaragua. Were you ever able to penetrate that nexus? Not as well as I would have

liked to. Yeah. Likely. Yeah. But were you able to start to counter the smuggling routes? Yes. Yes. We everywhere. And I wish walking below us had been my source. We could have probably ended the insurgency, but it's interesting what you learn from the other side post-hostilities. After the fact. As I understand that what comes out of Hanoi, the VC and NVAs take on some of our battles are absolutely fascinating for our veterans. So what did you take away from, like what you learned in hindsight about the conflict you were in?

The cland, particularly the key role of intelligence, human support to the counterinsurgency, and the clandestine infrastructure. And I would have liked to think that that may have been more of a focus in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, And the person without the AK or RPG isbest. Imagine looking at Hamas and what happened on 7 October, you didn't really have to have a Hamas killer to be your source. You could have had someone selling figs

in a market in Gaza saying, you know, my cousin borrowed my motorcycle and he won't tell me why. Right, yeah. Something. Inocuous, maybe. Seeming, seeming, seemingly. Were there any things that came up during your discussion, anything that he said that

when you think about it in retrospect seems obvious and you can't see how the U.S. missed it. Like obviously things, you know, hindsight is 2020, but were there things that like seemed, like when he said it, you're like, ah, yeah, that seems obvious. But we didn't think about it back. Well, as I mentioned, the lack of insurgent activity is where you're going to have. Now, they won't conduct offensive operations in those areas either. Right. We're safe.

Right. We could go to the beach or we can have a beer out in a Pilsner or out in CERVSA out in town. They're not going to stir the pot. Right. So that is, and particularly that's CIA's job. I don't really think that our lesser degree, maybe human certifying. certified SOF, NCO, officer NCO, maybe a little bit, but that's really a CIA case officer's role in a counterinsurgency, is that clandestine infrastructure and having a source inside there.

Because you don't have to recruit somebody with a weapon. And by definition, we can't really get to that insurgent within AK-47. We could get to that Kampasina who hangs a laundering. out. We can get to that professor and we can get to the nurse. The nurse. We can. Yeah. And we did. And does make sense, Susan? Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. So as, you know, you get to the end of your time in El Salvador, how had the situation changed, was the insurgency starting to wind down? Like, what was your perception of how things were going? And counterinsurgency is if at the end of the year you take cumulatively, not in sequence,

20 steps forward and only 19 backs, so it accounts for one step forward. That's a good year. Right. I'm sorry, but for your generation, 20 years in Iraq, 20 years in Afghanistan, imagine if we had taken one step forward. Yeah, right. Yeah. So that's, that's Americans are uncomfortable with that, but it's gray. Maybe Columbia's fight against the FARC, it may have been one step forward, a few those years.

And it'll take... For 50 years. It takes 50 years. Yeah. Yeah. 1984, yeah. So, but your thought, your feelings were that, you know, there were baby steps in the right direction on this thing. Correct.

And how did it actually wind down? Was that before after, or was it after you left that it kind of sputtered out? So that, well, with the dissolution of the Soviet. Union and what that meant for Cuba. Right. And what that meant for, and the bad name that international communism suffered. So it did, it did, it just with it. By 89, it was probably pretty much.

I think 91. 91? Yeah. Yeah, well, I mean, in Nicaragua, it makes sense. It wasn't until, like, what, 90 that the elections were held. Correct. So all this was sort of coming, and the Cubans were leaving Angola, and it was all sort of coming to.

to a conclusion. And then before we move on to the next thing, and I have in my notes, I'm trying to remember exactly what it was that we wanted to talk about, you had some thoughts about foreign intelligence versus paramilitary, because you've done both.

Did you want to comment on anything on that? Maybe after, maybe talk a little bit about Africa, and then... Before you get on to that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. into my rotation. And to the FI.

Yeah. So, 1987, you're back at headquarters. You hear about the Angola Task Force. What's going on? So, 1986,

excuse me, in the fall of 86, I had been out at El Salvador, maybe a month. And I understood there was a program in Southern Africa. And I walked in that office

without telling my chain of command, I said, I'm your man. And I'm going. How'd they respond. Who are you? But it was really important that I had counterinsurgency field experience. Yeah, yeah.

That I was case officer certified. And when I had, I do have conditions. I want to go PCS, not TDIY, and I want to have the language, which wasn't a terrible stretch transitioning from Spanish to Portuguese. It takes about three months, and there's about 300 words that are different. And for viewers and listeners who aren't familiar with the terms, PCS is a permanent change of station, and then TDI is temporary duty. So there is a different, like temporary duty to send you over, whatever the trip is, three months, six months.

Right. And you come back and you get on rotations, and then a PCS is, they move you there. And it's like a two year, like a two or three year bill, whatever it is. But it's, so you wanted to be there sort of permanently. Correct. to spot assess, develop, and recruit, you can't do that TDI. I understand officers go to TDII and work very hard, and I understand they've had successes.

I'm saying, in general, it takes more than a few weeks. Right. So the same sort of question as I asked about El Salvador. I mean, what's going on in Angola at the time? We were with Unita and then it was NPLA on the other side. Correct. And Fenla for a little bit. They sputtered out.

That's correct. And so this was the Cold War was on and we didn't know. No one knew how the Cold War was going to end. And the Cubans had massive forces in country and give credit, once again, I think to Mr. Reagan, this is a chance for us to go against the Soviets via proxy. Yeah. retard Soviet expansionism in the developing world. I think, and this one was,

Mayor El Salvador was counterinsurgency, this was insurgency. And I can tell you, one's a whole lot more fun than the other. That in a remote, not very dangerous, but we didn't know that at the time. I also wanna give a shout out to my brothers and sisters who, who,

served in that area and I'll just say their first names Phil and Greg Scott. They're my friends to this day and they did amazing work there and they went on to assume the highest levels of leadership at CIA. So it's a real honor for me to be associated with people who who did that. Yeah, and those I spoke to two of the three for a piece that I've been working on about about about Willie Merkerson. We'll get it. I mean, another time tell his entire story about his life and service in Vietnam and then in the CIA. But Willie's humility is breathtaking. Yeah. I didn't know he was a DCM. Distinguished Service Cross. Yeah. D.S.E. I didn't know he was and he never told me. Yeah, he is like that. He's just like, yeah.

It's another day. It's fascinating. Yeah, it's fascinating. Imagine. Yeah, yeah. But again, we'll tell this story another time, but he earned it. He was in combat. Okay, so you're in Angola.

This time the partner forces you need a, you're up against the MPLA, and there's like 50,000 Cuban troops that are over there as well. Soviet Union has their hands in it. What's going on on the ground? You said, in this case, you're sort of waging more, you're playing the role more of the insurgent. So I did get to not work directly with, but observe the SADF, South African Defense Force. And they were very effective. And there was one, again, Soviet quartermastered and Cuban lead, that if you lost a Sukoy or a MiG or a T-55 or a, or a, or a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a. the HALTSA or the 122's, Ketusha?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The Soviet Union would fly in replacements. So in South Africa, there was an arms in Barghu, so it was a lot, they were a lot, the losses weren't easily, easily replaced. It had been the biggest tank battle in Southeast Angola, the biggest tank battle since World War II, now replaced by Ukraine. It was a war worth studying, and we introduced sensitive surface air missile capability. It, it, it, it was a tactical weapon at having a strategic impact.

I've been told that we introduced that into Angola actually before Afghanistan. Imagine. Yeah. Because nobody talks about or knows about it, really. Imagine. Yeah. But how did that start to change the situation over there? It was because it restricted the way the Cubans were able to fly and the closer support they may have been providing? Indeed, a MiG-23 was shot down and the Cuban lieutenant colonel and captain were brought into the Unita base camp.

And I asked permission from, because I'm a Spanish speaker, and I have some expertise on Cuba, that I asked permission if I could participate in the interrogation and it was denied because they were under duress they were prisoners prisoner of war they were uniformed and they were prisoner of war and indeed oh I see and indeed we did ask Subven me to respect their laws human rights yeah and they might be more valuable from a human perspective propaganda perspective and then a value in a prisoner exchange and that is what happened. That's incredible. That's incredible. And I understand I, some months ago I did an interview for Spanish-speaking television, not Spanish television, Spanish-speaking television,

and for the Cuban-American community in Miami, and I talked about this case, and I think the pilot rode into the TV station. It was maybe disputing some aspects of my story, but that's... He's alive, so... That's awesome. I'm sorry. Yeah. So what other activities were you participating in in Angola, or, I mean, going from, like,

Zaire and projecting into Angola? I mean, what was the mission like at that time? So we're very small. where I mentioned El Salvador would have been 55 SF and the defense attaches throughout the embassy but 55 SF up country probably 20 of us case officers, paramilitary officers

where that southern African assignment was two maybe three period Wow. And it was no direct action, but largely, no joint patrolling, but largely lets intel and lethal support to the insurgents. Yeah, it's that sort of OSS mission that people think it's like dagger in your teeth, but a lot of times it's more you're acting as a coordinator and a logistician, right? Yes, yes we were.

And it's, some want to say it's more than that, but it was heavy on, heavy on the logistics. and the intel. But we all certainly believed in the mission. It was very important. The South Africans were assisting with that effort? They were fighting and dying. I know their whole border war, but I mean with your program,

was there any sort of... There was the understanding that we wouldn't recognize each other. Oh, really? Because of the political sense of these, because apartheid was in full... That's really interesting because now I remember the interview we did with Coos

who is a South African Reki during the war. They were very good. They were very good. And I remember him saying he's like, yeah, we knew the agency guys were over there, but our direction was like, don't even look at him, don't talk to him. I will just say that we had a,

well, I'm going to say his name. It's J.J. Walker was a legend in the special forces community. One of those Green Berets who went to Vietnam in the mid-60s and stayed because his dad went away to World War II and only came home when the war was over. So he's going to Vietnam, and he's going to come home when the war is over, and it was an unfair burden of a five or six or seven-year tour.

Yeah, yeah. And he was passing kidney stones, and we didn't know what to do in the middle of the Kalahari Desert. We certainly didn't have our own aircraft, and the South Africans saved his life. Or I better be careful with that. They came in and got him. They came in and got him.

Yeah. And he was hard as nails, like many of those, the Anomera Special Forces NCOs Hard as nails and the pain dropped them Yeah

I looked at one of the stones under a microscope And it looked like a snowflake Sharding glass No thank you Yeah There's a story that I'm recalling Dale And maybe it was your story

It may have been another person I talked to Something about Waning on an airfield and like the South Africans show up and the agency guys had to jump into the bushes because they weren't supposed to talk to them? It's, I, that's not me, but I can see, I believe it. It's another friend of mine, I think.

But I believe it, and, but it wasn't... Hostel, it was just, you're not supposed to have contact. Right, and I think the condition was, well, as I understand the strategy and how the administration, Mr. Reagan, sold it to Congress, was, look, we're weaning you need away from the apartheid regime. Let us do this. I think I would just say looking back in hindsight of a lesson learned,

and I think kudos to your program, because you often ask that of your guests, so that this maybe a future generation doesn't have to reinvent. Yeah. hard lessons learned and we learned that was correct and that is and maybe we could have juxtaposed it on Afghanistan and Iraq and that is when we looked at Angola we looked at East West communism and anti-communism when it was of Mbundo Chokwe Lingala, other tribes, Kimbundal.

And we looked at it as a Cold War conflict. And ignorant of the tribal divisions that are, imagine Afghanistan, Ukraine. It's, it's, it's, it's, I did my best to pass that on to the next generations. Yeah, yeah. Please, please take under, under considerations. Take that under consideration. I would, I would say, based on that experience, that you wouldn't hear me refer to South African as a South African.

I want to know if they're black or white, and if black witch tribe, or colored with OU, their, their word, they're spelling, or if they're white, I don't know, they're black, they English or Afrikaans. Yeah, exactly. And if you're, or if there's Lebanese, don't say Lebanese, because we need to know, Trish and imagine Iraqis. So we need to be, a good case officer needs to be sophisticated in that, in that regard. The French intelligence officer stationed in Washington, D.C. better know the difference between northwest Washington and southeast. Right. Not disparaging one or the other, but there's two different worlds, correct? Well, the French know West Africa pretty well.

Yeah. Yeah. But it's interesting because with, you know, with the United States, and I don't want to say the intelligence, because I think it's just a thing across the border in the United States, so our politicians are public, everything like, we, you know, we don't understand the intricacies of other countries well. And so we could look at the conflicts in, you know, Africa at the time,

as communism versus, you know, freedom or democracy. Meanwhile, these are very personal conflicts going on with these tribes that predate any political system that we're talking about. Even when we look at cultures that are closer to us, Poland, Ukraine, you mentioned these places, they have historical beef going on there. You know, it does go beyond our comprehension a lot of times. It's not saying we don't go to war, I'm just saying,

you need to factor in. in the nuances. In fact, for a foreign intelligence officer, allied or friendly, or not so friendly stationed in Washington, D.C. or at the UN or here across the river, the U.S. is a very complex, complex society. And it don't, just because we make good movies

and people watch the movies, they assume they know us and we have issues. Right. Before we move on from Angola, I mean, well, I want to ask you how it wound down for you, but I also got to ask, like, do you have any hand or anything you can talk about as far as, like, interesting ops that you guys ran in Angola? Like, I've heard some pretty cool stories about training Angolans to do sabotage operations and things that were done to mess with the enemy.

I will say that once we were going to give them some merit, time training and we needed to know if they could swim back to my important my recruitment into recon battalion could I swim and all of them said yes and the safe platoon and special forces legend was down there at the time Ron Franklin oh yeah we had to well we found a river and we would have them swim across it just This is a simple test, maybe 25 meters, not much current. We did throw hand grenades in just to flesh out crocodiles, right? There weren't any.

And two or three people needed to have their lives saved. I mean, it was sheer terror, panic. And I think back, I'm not pretending it's a big deal and I don't want any credit for it, I kind of hung onto a route on the bank of the river and stuck my big long body out, my big boot, and I grabbed it, and I pulled him out. He just, you know, he wasn't going to make it as a surface swimmer somewhere. Were you able to identify an effective, you know, force eventually, though? Correct, correct.

that I would have to say and very little corruption and that really was a pleasure working with those insurgents and they believed in their calls and they were extraordinarily austere, ulsteria conditions

our mail was World War II technology we would get mail once every two or three weeks a two week old Washington Post was a we would fund a read, we got our news through the radio, a short wave, yeah. So how did it wind down for you in 88?

Where was the conflict at by the time you were taking off? So, as I recall, there had been gains for the insurgents slight. Probably I'll use the same analogy, 20 steps forward, 19 back. And the Soviet and communist forces were, we're, we're, not going to wipe out one-third of the population of an embedded insurgency with a safe haven across the border. Right, yeah. You were making this costly for them. Yes, and there was, because of Vietnam, and I mentioned me being in the 70s and learning so much from those who had sacrificed so much over there,

that it gave me, frankly, great professional pleasure to slow bleed the Soviets in revenge for what they did in Vietnam, which was a flood of military hardware to the Viet Cong and NBA to kill and maim our soldiers. It really is interesting because you bring a point that I don't think has been brought up on this show before, because we've talked about insurgencies and counterinsurances, but you talk about the idea of an insurgency, that has a safe haven across the border. And, you know, you look at Vietnam. I mean, we even look at Afghanistan. Like, you look at these places where the insurgents can simply flow back to a place

where they are unbothered, unhastened, and essentially untouchable in another country. In Africa, it's even worse. Yeah. Because the borders barely exist. Yeah. His name was Mr. Marsh, and I think he was a Mac. Macvisog. Macvisog.

S.F. Legend, he may have been a sergeant major, and he came over to Ground Branch. And very early on, he was in eastern Afghanistan, and he pointed at Pakistan and said, that's Cambodia. And it was kind of, it's chilling. Yeah, right, right, yeah.

Chilling. And he was. Yeah. That's Cambodia. Yeah. So you're out of Angola and now you get into the foreign intelligence stuff. How does that take place? So in my experience, and there might be other examples, but in the 1980s for a case officer certified paramilitary officer,

it was important to do what was called an FI rotational. It was important for the agency. It was important for mission. It was important for the officer. And I think too many of them probably went to a certain Latin American country that had its own insurgency at the time. and I think I'll say that Mr. Escobar spent a lot of time in that country. I really thought that was really only half of an FI assignment. Right, right.

And it was good that they went PCS, and it's good that they were in an embassy, traditional embassy, and it was good that they learned in language, Spanish, really. So it's good. But if I'm going to do an FI rotation, I'll go into Europe, And I'm going to be working with the local service. And that's why I'll be vague on the country. But that was more classic espionage. The wall was still up.

So it was Soviet Union, communist China, communist North Korea, communist Cuba, and Islamic Iran. Islamic terrorism was not on the radar at the time. You were going after hard targets. I was. Yeah. Yeah, because we had the hijackings in the 70s and maybe they, but terrorism had kind of fallen by the wayside, right? I think so. As, you know, in terms of like a real strategic focus.

Well, of course, Buckley and the Marine Barracks. Right, yeah, that's right. That's right. But at least for me, in the European country, it was a very traditional trade craft. And it frankly, it was my third tour, but it was really like my first because I was now wearing a suit and tie. And it is different. So it's, I think it's a good time to plug our sponsors? No, no, to go, do we have sponsors?

No, to go back to. To go back to the question you asked, though, about the stigma around foreign intelligence versus P.M. This is where that really comes to play. Let me go ahead and just plug our Patreon first for a second. I just want to let people know that if you subscribe to our Patreon and there's a link down in the description, you get access to all these episodes ad-free and we really appreciate you supporting the show.

We also have a second podcast that's more current events, national security, things that are in the news, called Eyes On, hosted by Andy Milburn and Jason Lyons. And also please check out our friends at Casa Carabello Cigars. You can find them at Casa Cajon. arabeo.com. Another great Cuban-American SF veteran who owns that company. Okay, so let's jump back to your point about the stigma that was following around guys like you at that time in foreign intelligence. So I will welcome views to the contrary from colleagues who didn't

have the experience I did, but this was post-Vietnam and 1980s, and there was a lot of the still a knuckle-drager stereotype and even though they had a certificate to do full-cycle humid recruiting maybe it wasn't their strength and they maybe they weren't necessarily welcomed in a more traditional station. How did you cope with that? So I coped with it by being the first one in the office in the morning and the last one to leave at night and I had to work harder to be equal. And if I would say that if I made a minor contribution in my career to our military officers who later enjoyed easier access to the FI world,

maybe I helped just shoulder the door open a little. Just a little bit. Just a little bit. I remember one instance I was in the office staying late as usual. I wasn't married, right? Same with El Salvador and Angola. So that's why, another reason for the PCS are not TDI by the way. And in Europe, there was a, this is before iPhones and Internet,

so there was a walk-in, which is a very, very big deal for CIA. And the chief of station and the SIS ranks came down afloor. to the bullpen of case officers. I was in there alone. And he was talking to the deputy, and he said, we have a walk-in, who's here? And the deputy said, only Dale. And the chief station said, I don't want

that knuckle-dragger going near this case. It might be something important. And so I remember that. And but he had no choice. And I did fine. I'm not saying I did anything remarkable. But you did your job? I did my job and the language skills helped.

There was a low-intensity conflict connection to this particular walk-in, so I may have been well-suited for that. And I like to think that proving that I could do it, maybe that convinced other chief of stations and other FI leadership that, hey, some of these case officer-certified paramilitary officers, give them a chance. Did that help or did that Chief of Station in particular kind of like open, become a little more open-minded after all that? I don't think so. Well, it can't hurt to try.

I don't think so. And I think that maybe today, some might not even be aware of that. that history. But then after 11th September, when foreign intelligence really mixed with the PM world that are up-certified paramilitary officers really became first-class citizens. Then it became a... And maybe some FI officers serving in places like why were the second-class citizens. because you had to know a little bit about no intensity. CTC became the focus, yeah.

SAD and CTC. Yeah. Correct. So I'm very proud of that. So it almost went from being like the red-headed stepchild to being like the prodigal child where it gave you bona fides wherever else you went later on. We really needed those guys post-11 September.

And just in time. They did remarkable work. By that time, 11th September, I had transitioned to pure FI. So it was their turn, and I'm very, very pleased that so many of them succeeded. Now, in the agency back in those days, was there the concept of, like, the hardship tour that you had to do in order to further your career? And was SAD considered that? So I want to be fair on the definition of hardship. Okay.

Because the Beijing, Havana, Moscow crowd, that's hardship. Right. So they are the pinnacle of hard skills, different. Right. But if you can do that, that is I've always been impressed with those guys. I did not. Yeah. But in terms of like going to a location that people didn't want to go to.

Post 11 September, yes, it was important. And you almost had to have done it. What about before 9-11? Was that a thing? Like you have to go to Paraguay or you have to go someplace. People don't really want to go. I don't know if people want to go to Paraguay. But you can't just do the European embassy circuit.

You have to do something that people don't want to do in order to advance your career or, you know, things like that. which is even post 11 September. Okay. And what of course happened is, and maybe similar to our DoD brothers and sisters, was that as the GWAT continued, many people became very senior in the director of operations, and they were keeping, maybe they were less impressed with Lisbon or Milan and more impressed with Kandahar. Right. Or Niger. Right. Because I think it's important to know, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, because I might be wrong. But in the military, when you get orders, you get orders. When your units moving out somewhere, like you don't get to say, I don't, this isn't really for me.

And the agency, though, I mean, it's a civilian organization, so they can give you an assignment, but you can also say no, correct? Don't. Excuse me, don't, but don't make it a pattern that will hurt your career. I think as I, towards the latter part of my career, spent time in Europe, it was an operational or tactical reason I preferred Europe, and I'll tell you that in a minute. But as I moved more to Europe, I think I got something of a pass because of the hardship I did early on. Now, by the time we get to 1991, well, maybe before we move on to Peru, just one last question about, you know, that initial FI rotations that you did in Europe. I mean, were you over there when the wall came down? I mean, I got to ask you, what was that like?

that there's a Colonel Truth to the stereotype that a Soviet, now Russian, Lieutenant Colonel, GRU would show up at an embassy and offers services, and we would say, no thanks because we have a two-star in the walking room. Okay, so. So we probably could have done better. But these were extraordinarily hectic days with worldwide ramifications on our operations. And remember, the CIA was built,

created in part because of Pearl Harbor, but really to contain the Soviet Union. That was the main enemy. And that's really all we did. Any embassy anywhere would have, would focus on the Soviet Union. Russian speakers were assigned to Nehemi, NJR, for example.

I got the impression reading Milt Bearden's book that when the wall came down, it sort of like reshuffled the deck of cards in everyone's mind. And they all had to adapt very, very quickly to this literally a new world that, you know, especially as a CIA officer that you're living in.

It was extremely hard for the operations officers who had served in those very difficult locations locations behind the wall and with all the trade craft that that requires that I was never qualified to do and then worry about an S-FEST for a V-bid that is a revolutionary shift in focus and many of them just couldn't do it

right because you know you talk about the advanced training and it was like high threat like it had a specific name and the threat wasn't a suicide bomber the threat was that country the country that you were in like their intelligence service like disclosed, you know, finding your assets. Like it was a major shift, right? Yes, that's correct. And remember threat, there's a CI threat

that can get your asset killed and then there's a high threat. Terrorist threat you could get the case officer killed. Right. And they're different. Right. And it's hard to be good at both. Right.

Some remarkable officers were, I wasn't one of them. I want to say that right. Yeah. So by the time we get to 91, though, it sounds like you're back into the fray down in Peru. Correct. Dealing with Shining Path. Correct. So this was, I think, that I was extraordinarily fortunate,

but maybe the right officer in the right place at the right time. because I, you know, I'd like to think I just didn't serve in El Salvador. I really believed in the counterinsurgency mission. I wanted to understand counterinsurgency. And I wanted to be a counterinsurgeon, it would be good. And then in Southern Africa, I wanted to be, I wanted to understand insurgency and be an insurgent, and I wanted to be really good. So with studying Che and Trinquee and all the, all the,

anything and everything on low-intensity conflict that I could read, and then I got to practice it in those both locations. But still, I was an 18 commander. I was a CIA case officer, and I got to hone the pure humant, the pure espionage piece in Europe. and even under the nose of host services. So I took all that and now I was in my mid-30s because human and counterinsurgency are not necessarily young men, young women's games. And I took all that with me and I was still single so I could be a workaholic opening the station

and closing the station as I did every station I ever worked in for 31 years. And I read everything and I had was gifted with competent Peruvian partners and we took the fight to Sendeiro Luminoso on their own turf and the decapitated the insurgency and I'm very proud of that. Talk to us again, I'm going to ask you some of the same framing questions that I asked about El Salvador and Angola. What was the Shining Path insurgency in Peru at the time? So they were maliced which complicated it because they weren't Marxist-Lennan

this, they weren't loyal to the Soviet Union. And they were rural-based. And for students of counter-insurgeons... Oh, that's why they were maliced. But you pardon? That's why they were maliced because they're rural-based. Yeah. Correct.

Jack, very good point. They, from studying counter-insurgency and studying counter-terrorism that, just like we make mistakes, bad guys make mistakes too. And Abumel, Renoso, Guzman presumptuously thought that the insurgency

was ripe enough that he could move from the rural to the urban. And I think it was T.E. Lawrence, I'm not sure I might be wrong on that, but to win it, to have a successful insurgency, you don't need 10% of the population with you. You just need 10% of the population with you. you just need 10% of the population to look the other way when you're conducting your operations.

And that wasn't, Lima wasn't ready for Guzman, and there was a $10,000 reward for his head in 1991, Third World, 191, 92, Third World Peru. And that's a fortune for most Limeonos, Peru. Of course, I had a very good Spanish now, almost at the four level. And you're a fluent Spanish speaker, very well versed in the history of insurgency and counterinsurgency.

It sounds like maybe you took some of the Phoenix program concepts down there. But I just couldn't tell anybody. You couldn't say that out loud, yeah. That's correct. But this was urban. And the advantage was me working in an embassy and living in the city I could get to, we could look for that clandestine infrastructure and we found it. And we were able to take them down.

Take them, I mean, how did you take them down? Was there a sort of like counter-propaganda effort or direct action? A human source. And then, but human sources tell half truths and human sources assemble and human sources fabricate. And for all sorts of motivations. I will also say at this stage, I should add, that in between all of this, I had a, an assignment at headquarters where I worked the Cuban issue and I was exposed to the Cuban double agent program where the communist Cubans were running we thought we were

recruiting sources in Cuba and they were double agents and there's books written on this but I got a firsthand look look at that and I did spend time with the defector the Cuban defector who revealed all these double agents that the tradecraft went into it so I was also very good at counter insurgents again counterintelligence uh particularly in Latin America and then with the counterinsurgency experience and some paramilitary experience and my he and my case officer skills so it um it sort of all came all came together and none of that is lost when your your your host partners because they they'll they'll see a charlatan I mean they'll know you're

thin. Yeah. Or you're not. And I went to their weddings and I went to their funerals and I went to the 15th birthday of their daughters and got drunk with them. And we, I was very close to my brother, Pruevian brothers and sisters. It's interesting to me that, because this was not a special activities assignment. This was a FI assignment. Counterterrorism. Right. Oh, counterterrorism. But that's also like counterterrorism is also

at the time they're like they're recruiting for additional case. They're not recruiting like SAD is, right? No. No. I would have been the only officer in a rather medium-sized station who had at one time served didn't in ground branch.

And so you're going into an environment that relies heavily on those skills, or at least that knowledge, that knowledge for context, you know, that knowledge for rapport, things like that. But this is something that most case officers, most traditional FI case officers, cannot bring to this setting. That's true. That's correct. I wouldn't to say that I want to give a shout out to the agency. There was a course that I took before I went to Peru. It was called CODA, Coord Operations in a dangerous area. So this is a decade before 11 September, and it was high-threatening.

How to work in like a Beirut and 83 kind of environment. But, well, maybe the Philippines and there was a lot happening. Greece and certainly Beirut. And it was the 38 short barrel for the ankle. And again, it's still the Browning high power. And I thought the 38 on the ankle was extraordinarily applicable to the case officer, maybe not the special, a tier one, special operator. I'm sure it didn't happen in Afghanistan or Iraq, but Ukraine or Libya.

But for the case officer, you're going to be seated in the car a lot. Right. And it was extraordinarily accessible. Right. And I'm not saying about a... Sirreptuously pull it out, yeah. Yeah. And or hotel meeting.

Yeah. Extraordinarily accessible because you're seated so very often. In fact, I probably spent, it seemed like, years of my life sitting in a car. Yeah. And years of my life sitting in a hotel. Yeah. And years of my life. And waste carriers are horrible to draw.

a car like they're so hard to drive. Yeah, I don't, I don't know. But the instructors were excellent when the shoot, when not. And there was, and the Narco Wars were happening. And so it was a, it was an absolutely fantastic course. So it's interesting because, you know, the agency formed the CTC based on, you know, the idea that we need track terrorists and we have, you know, people who are specialized in that and begin to understand the patterns.

Did the agency ever have like a counter-insurgency center where they maintain that knowledge? I think that there was a small analytical cell of a couple of people, probably Vietnam veterans, and I think it withered. Yeah. And that's a shame. Which is wild because so much of the agency's business was in that arena. I am sure that in South Vietnam there were case officers, paramilitary officers, meeting human sources.

And I would love to know their tradecraft and how they did it. Yeah. Communications. Yeah. And not necessarily the NBA, no, full-time regulars, but the Viet Cong, that's cland-dustine infrastructure, nurse. villager and the texter and the university professor yeah no it's interesting because you know who did we have on it was phoenix John Mullen's John Mollins right and you know and to have that knowledge to like work consistently against that infrastructure and then to let that

knowledge go and that you guys didn't benefit her from an Iraq and Afghanistan that's one of the reasons I'm here tonight is to pass one some of the I want to mention in Peru a leadership lesson that I'd like to share what not to do. That after the takedown of Guzman, I was rather popular and I was promoted and was even offered an onward assignment as chief station, small post, but still. I was at the military at Chay's house. He was a bachelor like me and we'd often socialized together and he had an army buddy was visiting from Washington and this like quite a few people in those days wanted to come and talk to me about the successful operation and I was more than happy to go on and on about the

success. I thought that much of the world revolved around me and probably to an extent in that little world it did right so in this particularly even I was going on for about 10 minutes and the man I was talking to was I was in my 30s this man was probably early 60s this is in Lima and it was a one-on-one conversation and I said to him at a certain point excuse me I didn't catch your name he said I'm my name is Dick Meadows so I nodded and here I was talking about myself and Dick Meadows didn't talk about himself didn't even introduce himself so I went into the bathroom looked in the mirror and said never do that again and I'd like to think I never talked about

myself in that way again maybe for your audience you might give a line on mr. Meadows who he is and I mean special forces legends served in Vietnam he was on the Suntei raid yeah and he went on and played a role in Iran under cover gathering intelligence in the run-up to Eagle Claw. There are not many statues at Special Forces headquarters at Fort Bragg except Dick Meadows statue. Yeah, he's out in front of Usa Sock. We looked it up. Yeah, and it's, you know, it's interesting because it's not, like I understand where you were at in that moment.

You would help to facilitate the takedown of... High five, man. Yeah, of like the dude, like the major player. And, you know, in the agency, which is small, like that has, you know, that has, it reverberates, right? It's a major thing. Boots on the ground, none. No need for. Yeah, light footprint.

No need for 19 or 20-year-olds from 10th Mountain Division. Right. The other point that I want to leadership lesson I would like to pass one from Peru is, you know, I'm in my 60s now, but I have a mentor in his 80s, and his name is Felix Rodriguez, another patriotic Cuban American, who's of Che Guevara fame. Felix would never say he captured Che Guevara. He doesn't use that language. He says he assisted in the capture. So I want to say that I assisted it in the capture of Ademoisman. So that's important.

Can you tell us a little bit about Guzman and then sort of whatever you're comfortable revealing about the events leading up to his capture? So we'll say what's in the press. And so human is fragile. It's critical, but it's fragile. And was the source telling the truth. But let's see. And trash analysis played a huge role because of, surveillance of the safe housekeepers, they never smoked yet there were cigarette butts.

I guess with more modern technology, we would have been able to get DNA read of those cigarette butts. Then also the lack of anything electronic coming or going. And then there were a few documents in English that I helped translate. And enough is enough, we're going to go and we're going to raid this house. And just like with the Cuban pilots in Angola, it matters to win these insurgencies, these counter-insurgencies that you can't just be, you can't just be brutal, you have to be smart as well. Yeah.

Surgical. Yeah. And they spared this third world police force with a notorious reputation spared his life. They probably could have found an excuse that he was bin Laden like reaching for a weapon. Right. And he died in prison probably, I think, a year or two ago. And when you look back on it, was that the decisive point that sort of broke the back of this organization?

That's correct. Because it's with insurgency, counterinsurgency, it's mowing grass or whack-a-mole with leadership. But I think if it's not just the leader, but if it's the founder and leader, it can have a profound, a founder and leader, profound effect. Bin Laden take down this issue with Senderra liminozo. that they're, and also just to let the population know the Prudian, the neutrals, that these people aren't, these insurgents aren't 10 feet tall. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because they were sort of, but it's interesting that these,

phantom-like. These decapitation strikes don't always work, right? Like on a strategic level. You know, we tried in Iraq and Afghanistan. Hote men died in natural causes during the war, and the Viacong NBA pressed on. Right. Not always. And why do you think this one of Guzman, why do you think that was different?

I mean, you mentioned he was a founder, but also there had to be other inputs. I think also maybe as we saw in Afghanistan that insurgencies, that back to T.E. Lawrence, the non-combatant, but sort of trying to determine which way the wind's blowing in the insurgency. And with a blow like this, that hey, I'm not going to get... Yeah, and hey, I'm not going to get involved because the Peruvian police are actually quite effective. I might get killed or captured. And again, they were not 10 feet tall. They were flesh and blood.

Do you think part of it, does the, I mean, malism, does a malice ideal, an agrarian, you know, or communism based on agrarianism or whether, does it appeal, does it lack appeal to the, like, the general populace if it's an urban country? So it's a very good question. I spent a lot of time looking at that. there's well frankly in our own country you got a rural rural urban divide right and but it's a it's exacerbated yeah and when you had a third world because the poverty it's it's it's the richer almost as rich as are rich and the poor are well frankly they're making away the southern southern US border right of the dire dire situation and just like I told you that in in Africa we often look at those rather symmetrical borders that Europeans drew right and not paying

attention to the tribes in Peru it's understated and it's a sensitive subject but there's also a racial dimension and fair-skinned people tend to be higher socioeconomically and they're coastal and people more indigenous indigenous features tend to be in the autoplano in the in the Andes and mestizos of course are a mix of the two correct but Guzman's safe house keep where safe housekeepers were as white as the three of us wow Peruvians and that mattered because a mestizo cop is not going to stop a fair-skinned Peruvian walking around me to Flores or Semi Cid

the Upper East Side or the Chelsea or Trebekah of Lima. Was that indicative of some sort of like a bourgeois leadership inside the organization? Correct. Okay. And remember that's, you know, you've got to catch well, you got a completely different language and they were living in a rather nice house. Right. It's very interesting. Very interesting.

So after all of that, you then got the chief of station position. Correct. huge promotion for an agency officer. It's the saying goes, regardless of how small it is, always take your first chief's job because it can lead to others. And I was back in Southern Africa. And what was that like now that you're running the whole station?

As a knuckle-drager? So, correct. There weren't money. And PCS with the language, and good skills, but very focused on the walls down now, so I'll say Russia, not China. I say Russia, not Soviet Union, Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and a lot of Cuba, and still no Islamic jihad in 93, 4 and 5. I mean, that's interesting.

Like, I never really thought about North Korea in regards to Angola, like, that they have interests in that country. Significant. Really? I was unaware of that. Angola, like Mozambique, was coming out of communist. I should say Angola, a communist Jose Eduardo, the Sanchez was in power

I think 30, 40 or 40 years. 30, 35. And, I mean, anything you can or want to tell us about your first chief of station position? So, only a few less people than I have on this hand,

but it's command nevertheless. less. If Jack and Dave that I think Mr. Devine was sitting here and he explained that on the foreign intelligence side, it's quite a bit more sensitive. Yeah. And it's easy to talk about the counterterrorism of a paramilitary operation because there was a boom. Right. Makes the papers. So that's sensitive. And I'll pass if that's okay. Of course. I get it. Thank you. So after that, you're off to continue your education at the Naval War College. Correct. I really enjoyed it. I studied counterinsurgency and insurgency.

Surprise, surprise. So it's interesting to me because, like, I don't know at what rank naval officers or Marine officers go to Naval War College, but here you are somebody with real-world insurgency and counterinsurgency experience. What did you think of the course, the courses when you took them? I want to give a shout out to my Uniform brothers and sisters because they were just coming from Gulf War I. And to a man and a woman, they said, let's study every other war, but don't study that one,

because we're never going to be given such a... Straightforward mission. Straightforward mission, conventional, and with such lead time for the logistics. So I was really impressed. And I really got to read Mao and Clausewitz. And I think I want to, again, what DOD does right is it's mid-level. So I was a GS-14, so there were lieutenant colonels.

Or commanders in the Navy. And so you brought 10 to 15 years of practical experience, and now you can maybe look at a more strategic level. And I think that the saying goes, I think in uniform or for civilian, that you really don't put a lot of that education to practice as a GS-14-15 as a 05 or 06. But once you get into the flag rank, you start looking back on it. And indeed, when I was the deputy of a component in Washington, at CIA headquarters, I would dial back some of my leadership notes and lessons learned from the Naval War College.

But I'm curious about, because you're talking about commanders and lieutenant colonels, who have a lot of experience, but not in insurgency, counterinsurgency, not in their respective fields. And you're also probably dealing professors who are such, matter experts but not necessarily but maybe haven't been on the ground in these and

you are bringing a lot of real-world experience having been personally involved in these so I'm curious as to you know outside of you know the classic text like house of what's what what what how was your experience like and how was your interaction with your professors and with your peers and things like that so I was a guest there, it's their school and but heavily focused on carrier battle groups. And they love the Falklands War. Some Marines, Marines. Navy got to play a role. Right, right.

Marines. Interesting war and what I did learn from that, and I passed it on to other officers and through all my insurgency counterinsurgency, experience was a country can be third world it's true but elites from that country are as elite as any of us right they've gone to our university yeah yeah a Q Khan and nukes and don't ever underestimate yeah third world elites they are they are us yeah maybe with our Cuban double agent debacle we fell for a banana republic stereotype and they are as good as we are yeah I mean we mentioned some

of the amazing Cuban Americans who have contributed to national security, but for the grace of God and timing, they may have been there. Yeah, right, right, right. How would you like Felix Rodriguez to be the Minister of Interior? Right, no thanks. Run the Intel service. Yeah, or Rick Prado being like part of there. Yeah, yeah.

We're looking to have them, right? So they are two great examples. Yeah, yeah. Don't do that. My point is, I bring you that the Malvianus or Falkland context because the Argentine pilots. Right. Not the Argentine troops who were used to taking batons and bashing in the heads of student

protesters or disappearing the econ professor at some university. Right. But now you're going up against SAS and British Royal Marines. But the Argentine pilots, I mean, I think the Sheffield, they sunk a ship, right? There was a ship. Yeah, that's so serious. And then off to headquarters and you got to learn French? I learned French and went to a French-speaking country in the heart of Europe as the number three.

And I was more Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and Cuba. And now let me say that Islamic jihad started. it percolating, particularly in Europe where there's a big Mograb population. So we began to track that. In defense of CIA, we were looking at that well before 11 September. I'd like to ask you, what did you think of your French-speaking liaison partners? That intelligence service and their paramilitary guys seem to be kind of unusually aggressive for a Western European country.

I just wonder if you had any thoughts or observations. I thought that, I think they make for excellent counterinsurgency and counterterrorism partners, different systems. We do some things better. They might do some things better, but they have an amazing history when it comes to counterinsurgency. And you mentioned West Africa or a Maghreb, but don't forget Southeast Asia, when our early Vietnamese

special forces advisors, I think some of them were reading maps in French or the Vietnamese elite spoke French and there's also French in the Levant. So it's a very important language. And Roger Trinquier is a really worth a read for insurgency counterinsurgency. Oh, is he the one who wrote the Centurians? No, no, that name escapes me, but Thrancheye wrote a small pamphlet on Indochina and Algiers where the French may have won the battle for Algiers but lost the war for Algeria. Right. And rolling raids based on humit, harsh interrogations, a Western army, largely Christian,

occupying an Arab country, majority Muslim. tremendous lessons in there, in fact the movie, the Battle for the Algeria. There's an amazing ups test in there that could apply to insurgencies, counterinsurgencies, where the French turn a prisoner, where, no, the insurgents want to recruit an Algerian and they test him by giving him a pistol to assassinate a French police officer. but it's there's no I mean no rounds in a revolver and it's it's quite interesting there's also scenes where Western Christian soldiers need to search women in Burkhas and the women protests naturally for gender and Islamic sensitities

but they were have they were carrying bombs and things and there's also the the urban terror and when does that become? Yeah, that's a great movie. Yeah, and we've talked about it before on the show. In fact, we've talked about the spooky sat by the door. And the idea that a lot of the, like in the 70s, you know, a lot of the sort of homegrown terrorist organizations would use that movie as training material.

They showed it to us when we're in the Q-Cube Corps. Yeah, but yeah. And also if you're studying French, you can watch it and maybe remove subtitles and rewind it to work in French. And it's particularly useful if you're in insurgency, counterinsurgency, because that's the vocabulary you're going to use. Remember when it comes to the French and Africa that, let me get this right, that if you are from, and I'm just going to pick one, if you're from Mali, if you were born in 1964, you were born with a French passport. I don't care what color skin you wear, what religion, you're a French passport. And by the way, in Angola, if you were born in 1974, you were born with a Portuguese passport.

I know. I grew up around a lot of them after they left the country. Yeah. In the Northeast? Yeah, in the Northeast here in Westchester County, New York. Portuguese families that came from Angola, immigrated. Well, I'm sure they stopped in Portugal. but then immigrated to the United States. Fall River. Yeah.

The carnation coup. Yes, correct. My wife's from Angola, by the way. Oh, really? I didn't know that. Married 29 years. Wow. I remember once I was with her in when I was a chief station in Europe, so rather senior, and the Cuban ambassador passed by,

and I said to him, Mr. I never had a chance to thank you for your intervention in Angola without without your intervention I would not have met my wife of 25 years and we have three beautiful children and he said because of that you think we're close I said we're as close as heaven is to hell I walked away okay so the your next The next assignment, I mean, this is a tough one I know, but tell us about where you were on 9-11. Okay. Sure.

Yes, thank you. So I, after that European assignment, I came to New York to work closely with our FBI brothers and sisters, again, on the harder targets. And everybody's in New York. Right. I'll tell one more story, but I'm going to blur the nationality. Sure. But this hard target liked to fish in the East River because... A brave man.

Everything meant in the stew pot. And they didn't have a lot of money. So we were... But we're going to fish into East River as well, right next to them, and maybe sort of develop a relationship. So we thought maybe even better, let's... that's impress him somehow. So can we get a hold of a fish, hook it, and slip it in the water?

Smart. And, you know, look at the bait that we use. So we even considered maybe touching bait with NSW, and could we possibly have divers in the water and... Yeah, on draggers. Yeah, on re-breaters, poking your fish, yeah. And then we, yeah, so I said make sure it's something indigenous to these waters and it's not an exotic. Sturgeoned.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A barracur. Don't be a smart ass and go down to the, buy a frozen fish and look at the line, I reel it in. Yeah. But it never, never came to pass.

But excellent cooperation with our FBI brothers and sisters on that. Yeah, so I Without going too many details, why But I happen to be in Tower 7 that day And I happen to be looking out the window Up Broadway And only because I had to Collect my thoughts because I was

composing an email Did I notice a speculous sky over Central Park And I didn't think anything of it. I had only been in the city, I'm not from New York City, I don't live in the city with two or three weeks, and that spec grew bigger. But I actually went back to my note because JFK, LaGuardia, Teterboro, Newark, and those. And, but really only because I had to collect my thought again that I look out the window and it was a 767 below the impact

Empire State Building coming down Broadway directly for me. Holy shit. And there was probably two or three seconds when I thought, I guess, I'm going to catch this in the chest. And but those two or three seconds passed, and I could see the belly of the aircraft, which, in which meant it was above me. I mean, it sounds extraordinarily basic, but when your life's flashing before your eyes, basic is good. Yeah. And it roared over our building, which is the Solomon building, I think, 55 stories.

And there was sort of a shutter. But I thought it was after just exhaust from the aircraft, maybe a mechanical problem. And I wasn't sure what to think of it. And then I heard, I thought it was female laughter, but then the second or third laugh was a scream. I said, damn, the aircraft. So I was looking north up Broadway and went to look south towards the north face of Tower 1, and there was a gaping hole.

And you know how narrow those streets are. So maybe 30, 40 meters, 50 meters apart. And in that instance, I recalled watching the plane, and now I could, the windows are. opaque but I could tinted but of course if I could have seen it with Muhammad Atta who was crabbing slightly left to get dead center and which mattered because it was there's we didn't know but they were gorged with have gas and flying from Boston Mohammed out that's flight from Boston to LA and we did I was the number three so I talked to the chief

of station and she agreed that I would get a message out to counterterrorism center. So I called Kofa Black, whom I happened to know, and he was in a meeting, but I said, could I need to talk to him? I guess Rick Prado was with him and he was the number three at the time. And I said, look, I can't say it's terrorism, but I could tell you it was an American airline, In 767, it was deliberate. The weather's perfect, and Mr. Black was silent, and then he asked another question,

and at that moment there was a fireball out the window, and it was the second plane. Man, it hit. So I wish I had a hero story to tell. I don't. The first responders were the heroes, correct. And again, a shout out to our FBI brothers and sisters. We made our way to 26 federal and hung out with the FBI.

And then we have a rather large presence in New York. And then I'd like to thank our brothers and sisters from the Department of State who took us in the U.S. mission to the U.N. and cleared up the basement and gave us a home. Is that because your station was destroyed and the collapse? That's a sensitive topic, I think I'll pass on that. You know, on a personal level, like, this had a profound effect on you. Yeah, I'll have to take that to my grave, correct? It was an intelligent, Pearl Harbor before my eyes.

Worse, civilian target. Worse, we had Pearl Harbor as an experience. so it's precedent it's one thing to be have it suffer a strategic surprise but not when there's precedent this is what's getting eating at the Israelis right now

because they had Yon Kippa and now they have a strategic surprise yeah and you took it and I'm just going off what you said prior to the show so please correct me if I'm wrong about it but there was you had you took it personally because you feel as though

this was the agency's bail Liewick and the agency, it was their wheelhouse and they missed it. How could you blame the FBI? How could you blame DIA? How could you blame our tier one, two or three operators? How could you do that? So you had this intelligence failure, and I'm going to guess that 11 September, of course led to Afghanistan, we get that, but it probably led to Iraq.

Did you serve in Iraq? I've been there, yeah. Did you serve with Iraq? Yeah. and you know and you mentioned a little bit of if you don't mind talking about it um you mentioned a little bit of survival skill you mentioned a little bit like moral injury correct can can you talk a little bit about like what that is for you and and and in how you're managing it or how you have managed um can i a little bit a little bit more scotch please yeah absolutely so you had you a lot

You asked how odd-minded you get. Do you want more ice? No, I'm okay. Thank you. Sorry. No, no. That's right. That's fine. Yeah, obviously, extraordinarily humbling experience, and, you know, you're standing there

and your Brooks Brothers suit and you're a big bad CIA officer and your civilian population depends on you to get it right and you let them down like that tremendously. And in a certain way, I can feel for not so much Massad, but Chinbet for 7 October, politics aside, that a former director of operations said after that the CIA in that in 2001 had produced 10,000 intelligence reports, really we only need to. one. Yeah. Plans and intentions and activities. The mystery, one of the many mysteries is that if there had been reporting that

19 unknown Arabs are going to drop the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and maybe Congress, that it may not have been disseminated because it was sensational. So. Which is, I mean, is exactly what we're hearing about, the reports about Hamas, that there was accurate reports. that there was activity and potentially an imminent threat and mid-level officers felt as though it was sensational reporting and fanciful. Yes, I understand there was a FBI special agent, in this case a female, I think in Arizona,

who famously reported that when we got a Middle Eastern out here who wants to learn to take off and fly but not land. Right. And she's heroin. And I understand there was a female analyst that... in the IDF who something had bothered her. Correct, yeah. So after 9-11, I mean, you got to go spend some time as an instructor at the form.

Right, and I needed some stability after that. I wish it weren't the case, and I want to thank you. my leadership at CIA for allowing me to do that. It's not always did you go there to be an instructor's at GS-15, a full colonel, when it's really a major or lieutenant colonel at most slot. And it also indicated that I probably was plateauing and that was that was it for my career. And I didn't have any issues with that because I had I had failed. Remember when they talk, when one When civilians referenced they and the U.S. I was the day.

I was in Europe when Muhammad Alta was hatching this plot. Now it's an unfair burden, one officer, and I was busy and doing quite well against other targets that were important, but missed it. But, I mean, to play the devil's advocate, was there intel or? Was there a piece that you were privy to ignored or was this something that just never even came up on the radar? That Islamic terrorism might be one z-toosies, a drive-by, a hand grenade.

And frankly, thank you in fairness, Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and lesser but still Cuba. And these were important issues. I would say the other damage, the fallout from that intelligence failure was that starting on 12 September, we started wearing about 19 year old shitheads with s-vests. Right. And maybe, well, not maybe, I mean just sheer numbers, I'm not saying we completely took our off of Russia or China or Iran or North Korea but how could we right how could we right right you had to worry about a 19-year-old shithead with an S-Fest right an entire

station an entire liaison service right yeah I and an S-fess is a suicide dust you know you know somebody wears it and clacks off how I How do you not also, though, and I understand the idea that there was a CIA intelligence failure, but how do you also not under, like also hold the FBI to some level of responsibility in the terms that, you know, like you said, it was an FBI agent who had reported on this. The FBI, the CIA doesn't have any lawful arrest authority here in the United, you know, in the United States. The FBI, there were elements to the FBI that were aware of these people. and it stopped there.

How do you not share that sort of that burden and that responsibility with them? We're an external service, and we have the lead, and this was a foreign plot by foreigners. So the FBI, it's there only as good as what we inform in this instance, in fairness to the Bureau. I would disagree with that.

Some others do. I understand. I feel as though the FBI really dropped the ball on this too. Like, yes, agency missed, you know, sort of the external piece of this. Mohamedanaath was in Germany. We can get to him in Germany. He wasn't in Kandhar.

Yeah, no, I understand. The problem is that a lot of it wasn't missed. Like, we actually did pick it up, but they did not coordinate all of the information and put together that there was this larger plot taking place. No, I agree with you. When I say missed, I mean, like, missed the opportunity. We didn't need one of the 19 hijackers. remember that clandestine infrastructure.

Right. Somebody who, to say, just like, you didn't need a Hamas assassin, the cousin who's borrowed a motorcycle and is not telling what it's for, or hanging around new friends or are going quiet. Right.

You know, it's interesting to me because, like I said, the FBI has the arrest authority here. There was a report sent up by one of their agents. and none of her higher-ups at any point they either said we don't want to focus on this individual or these individuals because they're Muslim we don't want to appear

to be you know xenophobic or they said it or they said what like okay these people are want to learn how to take off but not land no problem that's a perfectly normal request that's a perfectly normal behavior pattern

You know, like, so I feel as though the FBI bears every bit as much of the responsibility as the agency for missing this. The other mystery for me is that had we been on the Muhammadata and had the Bureau surveilled him and they're excellent at that, especially in Conis, where it's their turf, there's, I think there's a possibility that they may have followed. Muhammad Hotsa to Logan and allowed him the board and let the Los Angeles field office be ready to receive him and then see who he meets over there and the same would have happened. There's been a lot of stuff that's come out over the subsequent years as things are declassified that these guys were meeting with Saudi intelligence operatives and things like there's some weird stuff that went down. I really don't have my arms around. I understand. I heard that story. I really don't have my arms around it.

Yeah, I mean, people can look it up for themselves. I mean, some of the stuff that's been declassified. But, I mean, you had an amazing career at CIA, went up to senior intelligence staff, and then when you retired, you went right back to contracting for the agency and did some pretty cool things there, too. I'd like to think,

because I think in part because of 11 September, I needed to give back a little bit because maybe I could have done better that day or before, but that's just a personal feeling. And that I also liked when I was retired and contracting, I was able to be very tactical. So when I was rather senior, I was in many high-level meetings at the cabinet level,

sitting in the back, never, not pretending I was at the table, but backbenching. And I thought a lot of those more strategic discussions were rather boring. And I really always was a tactical, tactical person. And as a contractor, I was able to be tactical. And I'd like to think I made a,

continue to make a minor contribution with sort of meeting some of our problematic human sources and maybe turning a mediocre source good or even a good source great. And maybe tightening things up when it comes to dissembling, withholding information, or even outright fabricating. Is this, I've heard that we have a program or a project where it's like our very top humint guys are kind of sent after the types of people you're talking about for vetting.

Jack, because humant is not a young person's game, and I contend that a serious case officer really doesn't reach his or her prime until their 40s. And the reason for that is you, you, you, espionage is a window into the soul. Right. Right. And, um, that you have, you have to have some empathy and you have to mirror image and you have to have been passed over for promotion. Right. And you have to have a mortgage. And you have to, maybe you're not happy with the sexual orientation of your, what you're expected, your child's sexual orientation debate or whatever you buried a loved one or you're dealing with a medical issue when you're 21 22 23 24 25 you tend not to have those experiences right and i just think i went

down the list of what can really motivate and i'm not talking about a confidential informant sort of snitch i'm talking about a serious right spy in place you're talking about building that keeps giving about about building that rapport but in order to build that rapport it can't be fake you have to have true empathy and I would person has to know you want you get them and I would add to it and this is a something I did wrong and I would like to think that I imparted it on my my students when I was an instructor that remember comport yourself seriously and professionally when you're out about town or even at a diplomatic reception particularly

that a potential spy, someone who wants to commit treason against their country and spy for the United States might be sizing you up as their potential handler and it's a life or death situation for him and his family. Right, right. And so are you flirting with the Swedish third secretary and are you pounding your chest about what you did in El Salvador or Southern Africa? Are you drinking too much? Are you informally dressed when everyone else is wearing a tie that take it serious? And I probably could have done, when I was in my European assignment, I won't go wear occasion, I probably could have been more professional, nothing negative. But,

that's really important, an important aspect. And I think that 25 or 45, and the 25-year-old's going to go out to the club later that night, and the 45 is going to go home, and you need to commit treason, you might want to talk to the 45-year-old. Yeah. It makes sense. I mean, it's like if you walked into an attorney's office and the eternity, you know, to defend you in a case, and they're wearing a suit, they're sitting there in a T-shirt with the wrist. rito powder on their lips.

It honestly does not speak to their competency, but it's that, but it's, who am I trusting? Yeah, yeah, you're talking about, like, maintaining that professionalism, even in smaller things that maybe, you don't think of. And these people face jail or potential execution if you're not confident in your job of protecting them while they are spying.

A deal breaker. Yeah. No, that's a very good summary. that, yeah, and I lived it, and it's extraordinarily important. I do know that, as I understand it, the KGB and SVR, extraordinarily formidable, noble adversary for many, many years, that for their big cases, such as in Ames, a particularly senior gray beard would go out

and maturely handle the asset. Right. Because remember, agents are humans and there's all kinds of foibles and ups and downs and being avuncular

is very important. Especially when you're recruiting a member of a foreign intelligence service like they know the game. Yeah. That's a totally different type of target. It's important. Yeah.

And I mean, you understandably, I mean, I get it why you had to kind of beat around the bush a little bit, but I mean, it sounds like you had quite a bit of experience pitching and recruiting agents around the world. Next question. Better than many, but not as good as some.

Sure, sure. And there's extraordinary officers out there with special skills that are, whether it's a foreign language or something technical. And I've always been very, very, always wished I could do what they, They did, but I just... But it sounds like the agency brought you in as one of those guys that could do some vetting on, I think you described it, potentially problematic sources. I mentioned also why I gravitated to Europe, and when you spend years in Europe, other officers tend to make fun of you because life can be nice there.

But I also did it as a 6'4, 245-pound white male that I just couldn't walk around Lima. I can't. I can't walk around Bangkok. I can't. I can walk around Berlin and Brussels. Right. And Paris. And Vienna.

And the UK. I can't. Even Madrid. Or Italy. I can't. And that's, you know, I'll never be a gray man. But I'm not shocking people either. Right, right, right.

I remember when I was in interrogating. an insurgent in El Salvador, I was asking age of an insurgent comendante. I wanted information, and I said, age, eye color, et cetera, and tall, and said, yeah, tall. You know, the guy was very sophisticated and probably didn't know a lot about even feet or inches and even meters, but I said tall and I stuck, I said tall like me. He said, no, tall like normal people, not that, not you. In fact, I had an anecdote to this guy. He was so unsophisticated.

We took him for a helicopter ride and we landed. It was only about five minutes. And we landed at our base. We had an American flag there at our FOB. And he looked, he said, oh, we're in the United States. I said, no, dude, five minute helicopter ride from the jungle of Central America. No, no, no concept. But that's a lot of SF people and agency paramilitary

or else who's had dealt with that lack of sophistication in the developing world. Yeah, yeah. I remember you had some funny stories. Yeah, like, yeah, yeah, like, you know, showing. A keyboard elf? Huh? A keyboard elf? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. But also just showing, like, showing them imagery, like showing them a top down of two or three blocks of their village, and it's like they just cannot conceptualize what they're looking at. And it's our burden to work at that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And then you also, during this time, also spent some time on black sites. So I was a number, see, so director, counterterrorism deputy, then the chief operations, and the chief operations had two deputies. I was one of the two deputies, and so I had peripherally was involved in some of that. And since you bring it up, I want to give a shout out to two elements that I think did tremendous damage to this global Islamic insurgency of al-Qaeda. And the first one is the SEAL teams because they ruthlessly pursued that enemy and they smelled the enemy.

I understand all sorts of other units were involved, but there was a laser focus of those guys on the enemy. And then CIA's rendition and harsh interrogation smelled the enemy, and the men seals men, but quite a few ladies, men and women of CIA really took it to the enemy. And both of those units took some heat for trying to make it fit within this democracy of ours probably took it just about to the limit that our society and our laws would accept and there were some some maybe a step or two over bounds on occasion but make sense yeah and please push back if you know I know I was gonna I was actually going to say it's an unpopular opinion but when it comes to what they called enhanced interrogation or harsh interrogation

I agree with you and I would like to hear your ideas on people who call it torture or people, people who say it wasn't an effective, was not effective. I'd like to hear your experience or your ideas on that. Sure. You'll have a vehement kind of argument for me, basically along the grounds of in the fall of 2001 and all of 2002. It wasn't if, it was when, and we weren't going to let it happen. Clearly, in the winter and spring of 2024, I understand those arguments. But you have to...

I remember the fear of that time, yeah. I mean, it wasn't if, it was when and how. And it was terrible. using some sleep deprivation techniques or some stress positions, it's one thing debatable whether or not it's torture, I suppose, but when we start handing over detainees to the Egyptian intelligence service and these black sites that are completely unaccountable, the one in Poland that was completely illegal, you do start to run into these issues, as you mentioned, like what's acceptable in a liberal democracy, and maybe a liberal democracy is able to accept

you know, waterboarding a hardcore terrorist. They're like, where does that line exist? Like, if I as an American start pulling out of dude's fingernails, it's like, is that... Well, but I think that is the line. I think that if somebody after, you know, a few days of sleep and some good meals and whatnot, if they walk out of that detention or if they're the same person, not missing fingernails, not missing body parts, not having... Are they the same person, though, right?

Like everything we know about PTSD today. I remember I read this, I think it might be true, and it might be SAS selection, that there was a guy, a candidate bound to a rail, train track, and hooded, and a double rail, right? Two sets of tracks, right? Right. And here goes a high-speed train down the other set where he was not bound. But he can hear the train coming. Yeah, that's, you're going to hurt people mentally with that.

It's like throwing someone out of the helicopter when it's hovering a foot or two. So I think with our sear training, regardless of how professional it is, you know at the end of the day there's a doctor there and you can you can you can quit on the waterboarding or I think there was an Ivo grab photo where it may have been wires two fingers yeah and that that was not enhanced interrogation to be clear that was just torture that is yeah that was just army people going I think the detainee didn't know that we no one was ever going to plug that into 220 okay um yeah I in to CIA, it was always, always the minimum to get that piece of information. It was a foreign,

it was a foreign FI operation to collect intelligence. It was never punitive. Right, right. And that was And there has to be a lot of screening, I feel, that goes into programs like that. Like, you cannot hire the sadist. You can't hire the person who enjoys, like... It's Dave, it's interesting. You say this. I have a... a group of retired officers. We have a group chat. It's called pork and it's Rob and Joe, Mike, Don, Gail, Reg, and we talk about a lot of things. And I was, of all that has happened with Ukraine and Russia, nothing bothered me more than Novalny, killing a caged man, is an extraordinary cowardly thing to do. Even some of these, the Litvinenko and the assassination of Berlin

and the assassination that just happened in Spain, it took some, actually took a decent tradecraft, some Cajonis to do this inside of a NATO country. The assassins in Madrid haven't been captured, but killing a caged man. What a coward. Pardon me. Before, and we move on to the next thing, but I mean, the last question I just like, I feel like I have to ask you because this is always the question, right? Did enhanced interrogation lead to actionable intelligence that prevented terrorist attacks on America? Yes. Are there any, like, examples that you can cite where?

I can't. But I'm confident that, and now it has, of course, become political on one side of the aisle and the other, and that's unfortunate in this divided country of ours to include the location of bin Laden. So I will push back on some who claim no. And that, in fairness, CIA, it's a very brilliant piece of work. And it was rather frustrating to people like me who were humitors that we wanted to be a spy in his camp. It really wasn't more on the interrogation, the analytical side. And kudos and great job. So then you went on it.

Fair enough, is that? I mean, I understand that's as much as you're able to say. But then you went on and did some training with the special operations community, kind of like in your wheelhouse. I mean, you talk about working with SWIC a little bit. I really enjoyed it. I probably went Fort Bragg, Camp Liberty. Fort Liberty now. Fort Liberty.

Yeah, that's what we're supposed to call it now. It should be Fort Cash, but that's okay. Could be Fort many things. Yeah, Fort Benevitas. I spent one of my favorite speeches is Master Sergeant Benavita's thought that is a great motivating speech that is really good. Are you talking about the one that it's on YouTube where he talks about the guys? Yeah, I know he thought he was dead.

They thought he was Vietnamese and dead so they, but he wasn't dead. I was he great, he wears his uniform and just a great. I remember the one you're talking about. that in addition to teaching at SWIC, Special Warfare Center and School, I helped with operational design course, and that's really the T-Soc show, and I was role-play as chief of station, and then network development course. Again, role-playing as chief of station, so that NCOs and to include junior NCOs and junior officers and a few warrants that they would and SIOP civil affairs and Levin Bravo's SF they would the first time they'd met a COS

would be in training and not in the field and my job was to share some insider trading tips of the trade, how to get a chief station to say yes for your operational proposal. So I think it was good for the agency and good for the intelligence community, good for the country team, and good for our soft brothers and sisters. And I did NSW as well and some Marsok. What was that like going from, I mean, you worked some like at a pretty strategic level doing strategic intelligence and now like this is where the rubber meets the asphalt like a E5, E6 that's going to be doing like that sort of

taxi cab driver human intelligence overseas. The low level. Because you know the E5 is going to win the insurgency or is it. I'm sorry, General Petraeus. Yeah, yeah. Admiral McRaven. It's a squad leader. I'm sorry. But they're going to, what's the name of the novel

or the book in Vietnam, the village about Marine E4s and Fives? Really. I don't know that. Really good. I don't think I didn't think it's called the Village. I think it's kind of insurgency. Yeah. Really good. Well, and you know, it's interesting because, you know, earlier before the show, we talked about the difference between, like, DIA case officers and CIA case officers in, like, Iraq and the restrictions that the CIA case officers wondered that the DIA weren't. And

in a lot of times, and I know a lot of, like, CIA case officers in Iraq were, like, bitter actually about being there. And they're like, this isn't our job. And they weren't necessarily. wrong in the sense of it does take those... The oldest war stuff isn't what we're trying for. Yeah, it does take those, you know, the E5, E6 out there, being able to run the low level, the tactical sources as opposed to the strategic sources. Well, that was one of the revolutionary byproducts of a post-11 September world that, my career was Cold War and then the Wall.

came down and then the towers came down so I spanned both and that and maybe why I wasn't necessarily myself a good fit for the G-WAT global war and hate and terror because because of just how very very tactical it was and what I mean by that is I was trained and much more comfortable and rather good at of producing a an intelligence rule report that was four or five paragraphs long and the plans and tensions and activities of the Taliban during the upcoming rainy season pretty important or do you want a geocord so you can put a warhead on a forehead no seriously and that's a really good debate right now you got you want the geocord or

a street address such as a Baghdadi or a Badabad bin Laden or do you want four or five paragraphs plans intentions activities of Iran vis-a-vis the Taliban. Right. Plans and tensions, activities of Putin in 2024, for Ukraine. Pretty, pretty, pretty, or the location of Wagner units in Mali.

I mean, I still subscribe to the four or five paragraph report. Right. I mean, what's a geocord? What's the president going to do with that? What's sex state? What's sect going to do with that? How does that fit into the PDB? Right. The four or five paragraphs is really important. And I think we lost a little bit of that post-11 September because we needed a street asset, an email address or a geocord. That's us. Imagine the FBI. Yeah. So you have since retired from the contracting work as well. And, you know, retired a living down in Florida.

You want to talk about some of the volunteer work that you do down there? So when I can, I help out the Cuban-American community by way of the Bay of Pigs veterans. There's not many left. So I participate in those activities when I can. I also do some work with wounded warriors. the foundation and then other veteran organizations and I run a small LLC and I always try to in fact I only hire veterans who are transitioning. That's fantastic.

Tell us about the startup company that you're with and what you guys do because you've told me about it a few times and it sounds like it's something that's like really needed. Sorry, so name of the company's 1.61, that's a golden ratio, a business partner who picked got the name and it's cyber and urban safety and it was really geared towards high-end wealthy Latin Americans who were having issues at home and they would come up to Miami where we live and we have a classroom and the neighborhood we would teach him Uber safety and subway safety and counter-stalking and drink spiking and last resort self-defense and particularly cyber but because there's some madness in this country not as peaceful some say but not as

violent as others say again we're divided country but so some Americans and so we think that you can do a whole lot to be safe without disrupting your daily life and you don't really have to go to the whole concealed carry around which is a lifestyle change and not just for executives but teenagers and and very important nannies. And the company was just certified by the state of Florida. Human trafficking is a big deal. Yeah.

In Florida, the state mandates, and you will be inspected that the front end of the hotel, all hotels in all of Florida, remember, there's no state income tax because of the tourist industry, must be trained in human trafficking, red flags, front desk and cleaning crew. Not necessarily the chef, but that's, so we're certified to do that as well.

So I think it might be a little bit different that a CIA guy doing something like this, but Jack and Dave, as you know, you know from your time there that, Dave, that, you know, you have this collection mission, so you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you avoid the X, but if you get on the X, you get off the X, you get off the X, right? So we think about 90% of what we do is to avoid trouble in the first place, but if trouble finds you, we want you to get home. Not when, just get home. Well, and, you know, you speak to the avoid trouble part,

and it's interesting because, I mean, the example that comes to mind is Kim Kardashian when she posted... In Paris. Yeah, she posts that photo of, like, out her hotel window, and then somebody, you know, dismissed her security, and she got robbed. She got, what, tied up and robbed, right? Holy shit, right?

Yeah. All because of a social media post, I think, right? We've only been in Operation 18 months, and we constantly have to upgrade our cyber because now we have artificial intelligence and voice cloning, especially from a teenager to a mom or dad. Right.

Yeah, yeah. And then you have, I understand, some cell phones are snatched here on the streets of New York and the criminal why the person's texting or talking, which isn't uncommon, and the criminal keeps tapping their screen to keep it the phone open. And they get it to the safe house where the PayPal or the Zelle is emptied. So we work on that as well. So never use face ID to open your phone and always use face ID to open the apps on the phone.

Like it's kind of, yeah. That's correct. Also, never ever post anything on social media about where you are. Yeah. You post about where you were. Yeah. Like after the vacation. That's, yeah.

And Snapshot and Mr. Zuckerberg's apology to parents whose children committed suicide because of different things. Right. That's happening. Yeah, yeah. So that's a sex exploitation. Very complicated. because it's really targets, frankly, families that have income of $150,000 or more. Vulnerable kids.

They zillow trillia the house and they know how much the house is worth and they know if they go to the Dalton school on the Upper West Side what tuition is and they know they can pay. Right. Yeah. It's, yeah, it's challenging. And the thing is, is the parent, you know, it's, I'm not a parent. But it's very, I imagine it's very hard to keep control over your children's communications.

And the children aren't, you know, they're just being kids. Like, you know, and if everybody else is posting their stuff on social media, they're going to post their stuff on social media. And that leaves them open to exploitation by very savvy, very savvy operators a lot of times. Correct. I do want to compliment the Team House, your show, and the interviewing that you do, and getting opinions, experiences on the record, what we wouldn't give for some of those case officers from Vietnam.

Oh, yeah. And those stations and bases and how they handled penetrations of the Viet Cong, I would sit and watch every episode even though I'm now retired, but what value they would have been to me in El Salvador or Southern Africa and what tradecraft was used. Yeah. That is, and maybe some of them even learned to be Vietnamese, and that is, so maybe some of this will be useful to future generations.

I hope so. That would be my dream. I feel as though after every conflict or after every, you know, we've, not just the military, but the intelligence community, like they purge, you know, it's like we downsize or we get rid of these people and then we have to rebuild. And it's, you know, fortunately we're in a time now because how amazing would have been to talk to somebody at War I to hear their stories about trench warfare or War II, like to be able to interview those guys and to have that. And it's like, fortunately we're in a time now where, you know, people like yourself, people with this incredible experience who are gracious enough to come on and share that experience with us, we hope that it's, you know, that we're documenting for future generations. Great job.

Yeah, thank you. And it's all because of you. It's all because of you and the rest of our guests who come on and are willing to share your experiences. Do we have questions for Dale? Let me check. Dee, did you want to check Patreon? And Dale, while he's pulling that up, do you want to tell people where they can find your business

if they want to hire you and your staff to come and give classes and briefings? Sure, so the easiest is through my LinkedIn and reach out to me, you can direct message me. We'll just have a website, 161, PPP.com, personal protective techniques.com, 161Pt.com, is our website, and LinkedIn is very, very useful. You know, we've talked a couple times about, you know, what you guys do. And, like, so I've heard a little bit about your curriculum and what you guys go into.

And, I mean, it's the kind of stuff, like, when I listen to it, it's like, they should teach this to every kid in freaking elementary school. should have this sort of information like very basic there's because you do everything from like situational awareness security on the street road rage uh to to to the cyber security like just really basic things that every kid should do to protect themselves well you and it's interesting because like when when i was in high school i don't know about you jack like i don't know i think high schools have changed but like home meck was a course right um home economics like where you learn how to do basic stuff around the house. Like, you know, and it's almost as if, I don't know if they still teach courses like that,

but it's almost like courses like what you teach should be a part, just like basic finance should be a part of an education. A course like this, these days and modern times should be a part of basic education for kids. Unfortunately, yes, but it's, you can't have a, bad situation present itself and flip a switch and say I wish I had had that right do I do CPR right right yeah restore the breathing first or stop the bleeding which one is it an active shooter and yeah and this isn't like you know living out in the mountain survivalist nonsense this is like actual yeah it's very practical things for everybody you're not telling people

to get off the grid you're saying you're we don't expect you to be become a hermit and have no social media presence, but this is how you manage your life in these times. Right, exactly. Right. Is that a... Minimal disruption to your existing daily routine. Right. Otherwise, you know, just stay home and throw your phone away.

Right. No, no, nobody's going to do that, right? Right. We don't want bin Laden's. Right. It's not fine. Unabombers. But, but, you know, and you mentioned how, like, concealed carry is a lifestyle change.

whereas, you know, just taking these basic measures, you know, these preventive measures isn't necessarily. But it's also interesting how the people who are very concerned with concealed carry and stuff like that, not all of them, but a small population of them are also very vociferous on social media. And it's like, you're not doing this, right? Like, you have to protect yourself in all ways. You can't, you know, like if you're taking this, this change to protect yourself with concealed carry, like stop blabbing about oh that you conceal carry

all the time it's not everything you do yeah yeah yeah yeah EDC is that yeah everyday carry yeah spare magazine and yeah so and I support concealed carry I'm not saying like don't do it it's

it's it's just that if you're doing it but everybody knows you're doing it you really want to tell the bad guys that you're yeah when a client comes to us and they want to learn to shoot and we live in Florida so we have the Everglades and very access to great facilities. We always say we're going to do five things in the range.

Safety, safety, and then more safety. Yeah. Legal considerations, and then we'll learn to shoot. Are you sure you want to do this? The link to Dale's business is down in the description if you guys want to check it out. Okay, real quick, the questions. M. Corbyn, thank you very much. How can we bring the tried and true qualities of classical human, human intelligence,

sourcing into the cyber realm? If I have any luck with this, I'll never see a clearance. Would any alphabet boys even notice? Very good question. And one of the reasons I fully retired is I felt that I was losing some relevancy, that I might know UAVs, but I really don't know drone swarms. And I'll get to the question in a second, but that's, as I understand the, the, the Turkish drone that the Ukrainians were flying two years ago is now obsolete.

And the First View drone, disposable $400 to the three-pound warhead is now proliferating. Right. I haven't done it, so I can't really lead that. Yeah. And I greatly admire the current generation that can work that issue. And not far behind that is cyber. I'm pretty going to defensive cyber, but offensive cyber. I haven't done it, so I don't feel unqualified to lead it.

So it is blessing and a curse, digitization, and human source. But it's not going anywhere. I mean it's only going to continue because particularly GWAT, we just can't, as a case officer working out of an embassy, you just can't meet some of these targets that we want to meet on the diplomatic circuit. So be very careful. I know there's been some issues with electronic. communications, and maybe I should leave it to that. I'm just not qualified to comment on only that it scares me. I would like... For source protection. Yeah, I would like you, I'm going to ask you for pure speculation right now, just an opinion in terms of you've worked in foreign intelligence in a clandestine capacity. We've just talked about social media and things like

this, things that the agency has never had to really deal with before. You know, when we start talking about biometrics, how do you think, whether it's now or 10 years from now, how do you think technology is going to change the face of, you know, covert activities, of, you know, clandestine services, things like that? So I'm really not terribly qualified. to expand on that very complex topic. I can just say that growing up in an agency where after you left the embassy or even the Fobb downrange and you completed your operational act and once you got back to the embassy or the Fob or home, it was over. Now, I mean, if I served in Europe 10 years ago, and I did have a cell phone, I'm sure that 8 March 2012, there's a record of where my cell phone was pinging.

So it's always discoverable. And that's one of the reasons I probably was not very communicative. on some of the topics. Yeah. That it's just can... Right. Someone can start to figure out where you were when. Yeah, can walk that back.

I'm sorry to not get a terribly sophisticated. I don't know if there's one out there either. No, it's perfectly fine. I'm just curious because, you know, you mentioned this idea, you know, of like kids on social media and, you know, we talk about this. And kids are growing up now documenting their lives publicly, right? And we've all, we all do this.

Like we like or most of us do, but but most of us do it I think after our time and, you know, service and whatnot because social media wasn't really a thing prior to that. And and things like PIMIs and the AI, like the AI capacity to, to collate this stuff. This brings up the issue is that maybe the world isn't as messy as we think it is because surely 100,000. years ago, two villages in Eastern Congo, Zaire Congo, they one tribe pillaged another, and we would have never heard about it in 2019, March of 1924 here in New York, but if it happens tomorrow, we're going to see YouTube. Right. So what I'm saying, the world has always been this complex,

but just now that we, it's now that we know about it. Yeah. So I was actually checking into booking the reservation for my hotel here, and we're teaching a course, we're down in Tribeca. and when I was talking to hotel management, they knew the name of my company because it was a corporate event, and they were Googling it

and they asked me questions from the website as I spoke to them. I mean, it's just, you have to be prepared for that. Yeah, it's very interesting. Stunning. Let's see your next question. Kim Zee, thank you very much. What do you think about China investing

in Mexico's surveillance technology and the new canal project to make Mexico a new hub of commerce. So I think that the intelligence community has it right, that it's, our national security threats are China, China, China, China, and then China,

and then some Russia and some Iran. I mean, it is an extraordinary perplexing, and I'm not so sure we're good at it, that let me ask you is, I mean, we know all about the Chinese military attaché, a two PLA officer at the Chinese embassy in Quito or the Chinese consulate in Layaquil. But who's more important, that individual or the Huawei rep? Right. So what do we do? I mean, how do we do that?

Right. There's an insurgency in northern Mozambique. we send an A team and A teams are very potent national security asset, really. But the Chinese send a two-star who's an engineer and they're going to build a port. What do we do? Right. And so that's, and they do, and they do send, they do build a port and a bridge. Right.

and we're looking for a 19-year-old shithead with an asbest. ISIS, West Africa, or ISIS Central Africa, I forget, there's the name of the insurgency. Yeah, strange. Well, even outside of, like, Africa, here in the United States, how do we deal with that Huawei rep, or how do we deal with Fang Fang? Or how do we, you know, how do we counter, like, the constant, like, penetration, that it seems as though they're able to achieve here.

Correct. And Danny, thank you very much. Does Mr. Vindler have any opinions on private military companies? Were they as prominent as they are now during his career? So actually, yes. And so I have some Southern Africa experience, and there was a executive outcome. Was a South African post-Atharp apartheid. private military company and they were quite effective in Angola so they went on the payroll of

their former enemy and the white South Africans were quite efficient in the bush that area and I understand they also had a success in Sierra Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone. We've had a Eden Barrow. We had them on the show. Yeah it was great. Very interesting and then I I also think that in the case of, I think, in the case of Blackwater, I think it's more of a private security company.

It was really a defensive permitor important, and they did very good work for the U.S. government. But I don't think they were a private military company in that maneuver elements moving in the direction of fire, as did the executive outcomes and Russia's Wagner. Yeah. Correct. Yeah, no, I think Eric Prince always wished he could be, Abin Barlow, but couldn't quite cut it. Yeah. Anything else for Dale?

I do think that will be, they're despised until a country needs them. So, and they do being, I do think, and it wasn't my idea, but maybe in Afghanistan, where I think you two serve, that maybe we could have transitioned to a model like that. Some gray beards, while we take out the 18, 19, 20-year-old 10th Mountain guys, patrolling villages, and let's get some guys like you out there working with the locals and showing them some logistic and intel support. And maybe we could have given the Afghan forces a chance to assure themselves off.

Yeah, yeah, no, I get it. I'm sorry, yeah. Hindsight, it's not worth any. No, but it makes sense. I mean, especially, you know, like talking to Scott Mann and others about, like, the village stability operations and how the U.S. government basically bailed on them. Like, well, what fills that vacuum? We've got one more for Dale.

Kimsey, thank you. My agency caught some Russian nationals who are posing as ATT reps going into backyards to major funfalls and telecom on equipment. Jack, help me with this. millennial Y-W-Y-W-YT? Say that again, Dee? What do you think? What, oh, what do you think? The AT&T issue?

Yeah. Well, I mean, it's, I mean, part of our training in my company is that when you don't have an iPhone, I mean, when it's a Katrina or it's an 11th September, or it's your phone stolen, or, I mean, there was a life, there was a world without iPhones, and it might have Correct me if I'm wrong. We had iron compasses when you went through the Q-course. Then GPS just came in now iron compasses are back? I mean, we always had compasses. I don't think compass, I mean, they always did land nav and SF. That's never going away. But you had to, because GPS, it could fall in the hand of the enemy, it has locations on it. It can be spoofed. Yeah, it can be spoofed. Yeah, yes. So an iron compass is important. So yeah. It's also tough, I think, to.

shoot a quick azmuth with a GPS like you know fly your company yeah um corbin said it's original question we talked about that though how can we bring tried and true qualities class we talked about that one sourcing in the set room yeah um all right so and that's it Dale I mean any any final thoughts or anything that you like you think I failed to cover here that you'd like to bring up oh sorry Corbin's saying his first question we got one we asked it Yeah. Final thoughts. All good.

Thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity and keep up the good work, documenting these experiences. Hopefully, I did a balance of some hard lessons learned and not necessarily the other way. No, we, yeah, you did, and we deeply appreciate. We deeply appreciate you, like, sharing your experience and see your time with this. We actually have one more question from Joel. have we put an over-reliance on technical means as an extension of that, have we overshared between bureaus and agencies?

Have we? Overshared between bureaus and agencies? Well, the scar of 911. 911 is not, yeah. When I worked with my FBI partners, when I came to the CT issue, they have what we have, and hopefully we had what they have. I mean, we can't let that happen again. Right.

And I only had positive experiences post-11 September. I mean, it took the vaporization of 3,000 souls for us to cooperate, and we do. Yeah. So I... You know, Dale, thank you so much for coming in here and sharing your experiences with us. I mean, from El Salvador to Angola to Western Europe. I mean, it is a piece of history. And, you know, it's always interesting to me because it's a living history.

like you have to go and talk to the people because as I found out even with FOIA requests sometimes the records don't even exist oh yeah we actually have one more comment it's not really a question it's from Drew Benler great interview love you dad what was it from is that your son Drew Brenner great interview love you dad so I have um next point three boys The youngest is an elite college, 6% acceptance rate, just to put it in perspective. Middle son just graduated from a good school just north of Chicago, D3 football player. And my oldest son is an E3 on active duty. So I love them all equally.

I'm equally proud of them, but one of them is my hero. Can you guess which one? guy that's an E3. He'll be deploying shortly. We're very proud of him. Like his grandfather, great-grandfather, grandfather, his father, and his uncle. It's a wonderful. My pleasure.

Well, we wish all three of them the best. Yeah. Yeah, thank you for this, Dale. Thank you. And you know, you're welcome back anytime. Thanks for making the trip up to see us. Yeah, really. Like, it's always great to talk to, like, people like you with such a storied career.

It's always more fun when you can sit here with us. Yeah, for sure. Smug some cigars. We're here for the cigar in the scratch. There you go. You can come for a cigar in a scotch. We're not afraid to bribe. New York Times knows us as the podcast that gets drunk and talks about.

So next Friday, Jim Shorten's on the show, Mack v. Sog veteran, excited to talk to him. We have coming up, I think next month, Jonah Mendez. Wow. That's amazing. Her book just came out this week. Got it in the mail. So, Dave, that's for you, man. So, yeah, we'll be talking to her shortly as well.

So thank you, Dale. Thank you. My pleasure. Thank you. Thanks, everyone out there. Thank you so much, Dale. I really appreciate it.