WEBVTT

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Special Operations, Cobert Ashby an eye
the Team House with your hopes, Jack

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Murphy and David bark Hey, guys, welcome to episode two hundred and thirty

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one of The Team House. I'm
Jack Murphy here with David Park and we're

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really happy tonight to have in studio
with us. Christopher Whitcomb. Chris served

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in the FBI as a special agent
as a member of the Hostage Rescue Team

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HRT, involved in all sorts of
national level operations, and then went on

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to have a very interesting career outside
of the FBI as well. He actually

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retired on nine to eleven on September
eleventh. So it's very interesting period of

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time that you kind of cross pads. And as I was telling you before

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the show, your book came out
like right after nine to eleven, Cold

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Zero, your memoir, and I
read it as a senior in high school,

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like I and I loved it.
I thought it was so awesome.

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And so You've been on my radar
for a very long time and I'm glad

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we could like make this happen All
these years later, there's still parts of

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your book that kind of like resonate
in the back of my mind. From

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you know now, twenty years ago. Yeah, it's hard. I mean

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it's so long ago. I always
say I forget the lead character's name,

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and which is true. But I
think history is important in the world that

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you guys document on the show.
And I got to start out by saying,

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I'm huge fans. I was.
I was, really I couldn't believe

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it when you called me up and
invited me on the show. I'm a

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huge fan. I think it's remarkable
what you do to document all the heroes

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and the remarkable human beings that are
out on the line doing what they do

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for this country. And anyway,
I really really appreciate you bringing me.

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I got to give a quick shout
out to sponsor of tonight's show, Augustus

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Precious Medals. Go check them out
out Augusta Precious Medals dot Com. Appreciate

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it, guys. So Chris,
I mean, yeah, man, I

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mean, this is like right in
our wheelhouse. I'm really glad to have

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you here today. Let's start off
talking a little bit about you know,

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your background, your your origin story
as it were, how you grew up,

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your upbringing, and like how that
sort of led you towards uh,

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you know, eventually federal law enforcement. I guess I'll warn you right off

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the bat. We talked a little
bit about this, but my story is

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very odd, and for a period
of time it made sense. Small town

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kid joins the FBI, ends up
making the hostage rescue team, and during

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that time was involved in a lot
of really high profile and some notorious cases

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or actions over a course of time. And then when I left the FBI,

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and I resigned on nine to eleven. Coincidentally, by the way,

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it was horrible. Nobody ever wants
to leave the war on terror on nine

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to eleven. That was horrible.
We'll come back to that later. But

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then the story after that is really
kind of wild, and I guess we'll

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get there, but start out,
you want me to talk about yeah,

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and we're gonna you know, we
want to spend a sort of the majority

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of the show talking about your post
FBI career because it's fascinating and it's it's

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an angle of like the intel world
that doesn't get talked about often, if

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at all, So that'll be great. But we do want to talk about,

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you know, your time in the
FBI, what it was, What

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year did you go into the FBI? I'm joined in nineteen eighty seven.

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Yeah, I was twenty seven years
old. And when when I was twenty

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seven getting to the FBI, I
think is a crazy part of the story.

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I grew up in a small town
in northern New Hampshire at the ski

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area. Small town meaning two hundred
and fifty three hundred people home of I

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was born in Bethlehem and then in
a town called Frank Cooney the skier,

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a Cannon Mountain skier, and Frank
Cooney in New Hampshire, home of Bodie

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Miller, who's the most successful ski
year in ski racer in American history,

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but also home of four FBI agents. I was the fourth FBI agent to

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come from this tiny little town,
which sounds very odd and uh and I

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always say that I was. I
was born on a Thursday to seventeen year

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old sweethearts, exactly nine months after
the junior prompts. So my uh so,

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not only did I start out in
a small town, but austor beginnings.

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I suppose My dad was a My
dad and mom dropped out of high

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school. My dad was a ski
patrolman at Cannon Mountain and worked summer's mowing

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ski slopes with a sling blade,
a scythe, a handsaw for like a

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dollar eighteen an hour. So it
was a It was an incredible youth.

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It was a great place to grow
up because everything was outdoor. You know,

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in those days we had one television
channel and all we did was hike,

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rock climb, ski, race and
spend our time outdoors. So,

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you know, I spent my youth
outdoors with no parental controls whatsoever, you

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know, for better or were.
So I grew up in New Hampshire and

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then went away to college and really
never came back after that. And so

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you joined the FBI at age twenty
seven? What I mean? I take

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it you had to go to college
first. Three. I mean there's different

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ways to get into the FBI.
You could go become an accountant, a

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lawyer, or have some sort of
law enforcement background. I mean, what

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was the path you two? Yeah, I think people probably find it interesting.

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I think many shows I watch,
I think a lot of people would

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say, ask this question or ask
that question because a lot of people don't

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really know. There are a lot
of myths flying around the FBI or the

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CIA or military. But the FBI
has very basic rules. I never applied

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to the FBI. I was living
in Washington, DC writing speeches. I

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was a speechwriter for a member of
Congress named Silvio Kanti was a chairman of

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the Appropriations Committee. And I was
fighting boxing out of a gym called Finlay's

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Boxing whatever in northeast Washington. There's
a rough place, really rough place,

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and I went sparred one night and
this guy named Big Bob Moore knocked me

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the fuck out, I mean cold, and so I was a little dizzy.

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I go home, sit down.
I was married. My wife was

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reading a book and she said,
hey, you got mail, and I

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said, okay, whatever. I
checked the envelope and it was from the

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FBI. So I just got knocked
out. I was twenty seven years old.

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I think what most people would,
Why the hell is the FBI after

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me? You know? So I
opened it up and it was an application.

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So she had seen you talk about
recruiting. How do you get recruited

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to this, and how do you
get recruited to that? In my case,

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she watched a television commercial on local
TV in DC. They were recruiting

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Spanish speakers and I said, I
don't speak Spanish, and she said,

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well, one's that is, when
has that ever stopped you? You know,

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give it a try. So I
ended up in the FBI kind of

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by accident. And then the process
you apply, you take a test,

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If you pass the test, you
go on to a background investigation. Then

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they get an interview. And in
this case, it was interesting because going

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back to my youth. At the
time, the Washington Metropolitan Field Office in

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Washington, DC was at a place
called Buzzard Point and it was a hellhole.

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I mean, you didn't want to
get down there unless you are already

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had a gun. It was a
pretty rough spot. Go in, go

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up to the whatever seventh floor,
sit down at the table in a conference

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room with you know, the President
and the Attorney General with pictures on the

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wall and the big FBI seal,
and I'm wearing a suit, and you

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know, I'm thinking, how do
you get in the FBI? It just

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seemed kind of odd. And there
were three people that did the interview.

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And we go through the whole interview
and tell all the stories in the background

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investigation, and one and we got
to the end and this one agent,

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the lead agent in the interview,
said, uh, I had told him

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that this story about the CIA.
I guess should back up at some point

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toub about that, but I was
really should have gone into the CIA.

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I should have applied to the CIA, and I told him that. He

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asked me why I wanted to be
an FBI agent, and I said,

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well, I don't know. You
know, I think I might want to

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go into the CIA as well.
And he said, well, why didn't

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you go? He said, I
know why he didn't apply to go to

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the CIA, and I said,
you do and he said yeah, because

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the CIA doesn't take people who have
used illegal drugs. And I thought shit.

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When I was in college, like
most people in college, and I

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didn't want to go into the FBA. I never thought about it. I

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was in this band called Doctor Neptune
and the Rare Organs, the College Ban.

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We did Frank Zappa covers and uh, you know, I might have

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dropped a bullet two every you know, every once in a while, but

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you didn't inhale. I never inhaled
r I had inhaled the shit out of

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it. But anyway, so he
was so he was a great guy.

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And he said, look, the
FBI has changed his policy and they allow

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experimental use of marijuana but not within
the last three years. And he said,

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so, I'm going to say that
again. The FBI allows experimental use

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of marijuana, but not in the
last three years. So let me ask

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you, mister Witcam, have you
ever tried illegal drugs? And I thought,

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I've tried it, experimental use of
marijuana, but not within the last

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year. So he goes, fantastic
yet, and he said, because if

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you make it, you know,
if you get hired, you'll be the

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fourth FBI agent from frank Coneina,
Hampshire. And I thought, well,

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that sounds almost impossible to believe because
it was such a small town. But

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then it goes back to this story. When I was growing up in this

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tiny town, the FBI agent that
I knew was living in town. His

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name was William Sullivan. William Sullivan
had been the number two assistant director behind

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j Ed Gohoover in the FBI during
the co Intel years. He was in

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charge of domestic intelligence gathering Martin Luther
King, He was in charge of the

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Kennedy assassination investigation, and he was
air apparent to j Edghover. He gotten

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some kind of a pistoon match with
Jedghoover and jedghover looked over him handpicking his

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successor. So William Sullivan said,
screw it. He retired, He wrote

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a book, and he retired in
Sugar Hone, the Hampshire. He was

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scheduled two weeks before the Senate hearings
on the Kennedy assassination to go and testify

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before the United States Senate that Lee
Harvey Oswald did not kill JFK by himself,

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it was a conspiracy. And two
weeks before he scheduled to testify,

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a guy that worked for my dad
shot him and killed him in a hunting

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accident, and that was big news
in frank Conis, Hampshire. I didn't

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notice you didn't do the accident,
No, because I know the kid,

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the guys. He's a really really
nice guy. And the guy's dad was

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a state trooper. He's a remarkable
guy, great guy. It was just

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it was a tragic accident. But
when people talk in my life, and

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I've been involved in a lot of
things in life, but people talk about

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conspiracies. I always look back on
that and think to myself, you cannot

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tell that story and say you've got
to have the right that's the way that

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goes. But to grow up in
a town that's small and where you know

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everybody. I knew the chief of
police, this guy Barney Young. As

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it turns out, there was another
FBI agent named Tim Casey who was at

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the chief of Police's house the night
that William Sullivan was shot and killed.

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The next morning he was hunting season
and you put all of it together and

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it's just it's one of those stories. It has not been widely written about,

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but it is a compelling conspiracy.
It's and it's not a conspiracy.

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It's just a tragic accident. But
that's, you know, that's kind of

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whey that world works. So Tim
Casey, William Sullivan, h the FBI

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agents, the gentleman that was interviewing
me at the when I got in,

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and I was the fourth. I
don't know about anybody since then. So

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that was that small town. But
what was really remarkabout it remarkable, I

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think, is that an adjacent town, Land affterw Hampshire even smaller. The

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man that I grew up calling uncle
Harold's name was Harold Janine. Harold Janine

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doesn't mean much now, but at
the time he was kind of Bill Gates

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and Elon Musk and several others all
put together. He started a company called

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itt Itt now as Community Colleges or
something. Yeah. At the time it

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was the world's first multinational corporation.
They had Sheridan Hotels, they had Avis

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Renakar, they had Continental Bakery.
They made wonderbread and Twinkies Wow. They

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made Cony shock absorbers. They made
the tele communication cables that go under the

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North Atlantic. They were the biggest
multinational corporation in the world. He was

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the chairman of the board and the
CEO. And he had had a farm

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which they called the farm which comes
in later on this hilltop in hand and

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excuse me, on land after New
Hampshire, and that's where I grew up.

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Harold Janine paid the CIA in nineteen
seventy Harold Janine paid the CIA one

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million dollars in cash to overthrow the
government of Chili. And this is widely

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written about New York Times books,
and the CIA I think did not take

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the million dollars in cash because they
got onto it. Somebody discovered it ahead

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of time, but it was widely
written about at the time. But the

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government was overthrown. Salvadori Enda,
the president of Chili, was killed and

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hit squads came after Uncle Harold.
They blew up the Itt Office building,

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Madison Avenue, Manhattan, and they
came to kill him. He and his

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bodyguards went to the farm in New
Hampshire. So I grew up with those

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guys. I grew up with Jerry
Sabbatino, who we called Bullet, who

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had because odd Job was already taken. He looked he looked just like Odd

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Job. And so I grew up
with all of these guys coming and going

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at all hours a day and night, briefcases and limousines, private jets.

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He had a Grumm and Goose,
an amphibious plane that would land in the

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water in the Connecticut River and take
off. It was It was pretty incredible

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and everything that goes with it,
Like we there's a pool room, right,

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I mean, this was a mansion. It was a really remarkable place.

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And we were playing one day and
we found this secret door in a

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closet by the in the pool room, full of all these eavesdropping devices,

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you know, the pelican cases,
full of all of these weird looking guns

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and stuff. It was pretty incredible. And to hear the stories that he

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would tell about the way the world
really worked. I was thirteen, twelve,

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thirteen years old at the time,
but I remember it very well.

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And he hired a guy named John
mccoone, who called Jack. Jack McCown

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was the most recent director of the
CIA. So Harold Janine was intimately involved

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and historically documented as the private arm
of the CIA at a time when that's

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what was like David Rockefeller or Ross
Perrot in later years. Exactly right,

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00:15:18.759 --> 00:15:22.279
exactly right. So, I mean
he had started out at Bell and Howell,

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and he had worked classified projects all
the way back to World War Two.

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So to grow up in a tiny
town with those stories about the guy

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that worked for my dad shooting the
number two guy in the in the FBI,

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and uncle Harold, who was literally
the the cliving in a Spye novel.

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For a twelve year old kid during
the height of the Cold War,

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I mean, I'd duck and cover
in, you know, in school,

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and I'd go home and we would
check it out as fucking secret stashes of

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guns and closets, and all his
bodyguards would teach us how to shoot.

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It was. It was really remarkable
way to grow up. So then I

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went away to school and that's how
I found my way back in that office

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at Buzzard's point. So one of
the things that stands out in my mind

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again, you know, after I've
read your booking like two thousand and one,

224
00:16:04.320 --> 00:16:08.320
was you're going through your FBI training
and your instructors are trying to drill

225
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into you like, hey man,
this isn't like the movies. You're you're

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00:16:11.039 --> 00:16:15.320
not a g man with a Tommy
gun shooting up gangsters. It doesn't work

227
00:16:15.399 --> 00:16:18.000
like that. And then you get
to your first station, your first day

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as an actual FBI agent out somewhere
out in the Midwest. As I recall,

229
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Yeah, can you tell us a
little bit about that day. Yeah.

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00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:29.279
So, for those who have ever
thought about joining the FBI, you

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00:16:29.320 --> 00:16:33.159
give up your entire life and you
go to the academy at Quantico. The

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00:16:33.200 --> 00:16:38.840
CIA has basically has two academies,
right the Farm and Harvey Point and other

233
00:16:38.840 --> 00:16:41.320
places here, schools and stuff like
that, But the FBI has one.

234
00:16:41.679 --> 00:16:45.720
The academy. It's on the Quantico
Marine Corps reservation. You show up with

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a suitcase, you check in on
a Sunday night, and you stay there

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00:16:49.919 --> 00:16:52.399
for now. I think it might
be eighteen weeks. When I went through,

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00:16:52.399 --> 00:16:55.919
it was sixteen weeks. So you
live there for four months and you

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never see I didn't see my wife, I didn't see my had a brand

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new baby. I didn't see him
at all. And you live there and

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uh, you know, it's it's
it's very different. You really consumed by

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that world. Then one day they
give you orders. In this case,

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it was Kansas City. I didn't
even know what Kansas City was. I

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00:17:15.519 --> 00:17:21.519
mean, I show up in Kansas
City, checked into the Adams Mark Hotel

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or something, and I'm looking out
over the sea. I remember very clearly.

245
00:17:23.519 --> 00:17:29.640
We've driven from Quantico to Kansas City
and a Jeep c J seven with

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00:17:29.680 --> 00:17:33.240
a lift kit and a canvas top, miserable drive with a baby who was

247
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like eight months old and my wife
was pregnant with the next one right nowhere

248
00:17:38.079 --> 00:17:42.880
conditioning in July, and we roll
up there. She's tough as nails and

249
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uh but that's where it started.
So check in, you look out over

250
00:17:47.720 --> 00:17:49.799
the city and say life a fighting
crime, you know, And at the

251
00:17:49.839 --> 00:17:52.559
time it was it was kind of
cool. So the next day go into

252
00:17:52.559 --> 00:17:56.400
the office, You sit around and
you look at read the newspaper, have

253
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a cup of coffee, like you
think of a you know, sitting around

254
00:17:59.319 --> 00:18:03.319
an FBI agent. And so it
was like ten o'clock in the morning or

255
00:18:03.359 --> 00:18:04.720
something like that. I was in
the I was in the bathroom, standing

256
00:18:04.720 --> 00:18:08.480
at a urinal. This guy,
Roger came in said, hey, kid,

257
00:18:08.519 --> 00:18:12.960
let's go. We we got a
situation. And I was on the

258
00:18:12.960 --> 00:18:15.720
bank robbery squad. Now, when
you go in the FBI, you could

259
00:18:15.720 --> 00:18:18.480
work a lot of different classifications.
You could work violent crime, you could

260
00:18:18.480 --> 00:18:22.599
work white color clime, you could
work invest applicants, you could work a

261
00:18:22.599 --> 00:18:25.960
million different things. I just got
lucky ended up on a bank robbery squad

262
00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:27.759
for what I wanted to do.
So we jumped in the car. And

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00:18:27.799 --> 00:18:32.519
now, remember going Before going in
the FBI, I'd been all over the

264
00:18:32.559 --> 00:18:34.559
world. I mean I'd probably been
to twenty countries at that point. I'd

265
00:18:34.599 --> 00:18:40.039
lived in LA and I had a
lot of experiences before I went in.

266
00:18:40.759 --> 00:18:44.039
So and I had been a speechwriter
for a senior member of Congress. I'd

267
00:18:44.160 --> 00:18:45.799
go to every Thursday. We'd go
to the Oval Office, to the to

268
00:18:45.880 --> 00:18:52.799
the White House. My boss had
a nineteen sixty eight gto judge with factory

269
00:18:52.839 --> 00:18:56.680
flames on the side, a red
gto with a white convertible top and I'd

270
00:18:56.680 --> 00:19:00.680
get in the car with him when
we drive down Pennsylvania Avenue, turn left

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00:19:00.079 --> 00:19:03.559
into the White House park in front
of the Oval office. It was cool,

272
00:19:03.599 --> 00:19:06.839
I mean it was remarkable. So
I get in a car with the

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supervisor and with the squad supervisor and
with the ASAC. The ASAC is the

274
00:19:11.799 --> 00:19:15.400
Assistant Special Agent charge, like the
number two and one of the number three

275
00:19:15.440 --> 00:19:18.359
guys in the office. And I'm
in the back seat right so I'm thinking,

276
00:19:18.400 --> 00:19:22.359
cool, I'm riding with the big
boys, first day on the job,

277
00:19:22.799 --> 00:19:26.599
and just complete moron. I was
an idiot, complete idiot. We

278
00:19:26.799 --> 00:19:32.640
roll up on this thing and the
bank robber squad had found a guy in

279
00:19:32.720 --> 00:19:36.799
a house and they thought he had
kids in the house with him and didn't

280
00:19:36.799 --> 00:19:40.039
want to have a hasted situation,
so they put together a ruse where they

281
00:19:40.119 --> 00:19:44.240
dressed two guys up, they dressed
two guys down, and they went to

282
00:19:44.279 --> 00:19:47.680
the front door with like a TV
or something. There was selling raffle tickets

283
00:19:47.720 --> 00:19:51.720
for a Literal League giveaway or something. They knock on the door, the

284
00:19:51.720 --> 00:19:55.039
guy comes out, Oh, I'm
sorry. We were all stationed around like

285
00:19:55.039 --> 00:19:56.319
because a big HiT's gonna go down. Right, We're taking down this armed

286
00:19:56.319 --> 00:20:02.079
bank roarber, armed and dangerous,
and there are streets shut down and people

287
00:20:02.160 --> 00:20:07.039
hiding behind trees like you see,
and I'm thinking cool. The door opens

288
00:20:07.119 --> 00:20:14.720
up and this guy comes out with
this big chrome you know, three fifty

289
00:20:14.720 --> 00:20:18.359
seven forty four magnum whatever, and
it was on man. It was the

290
00:20:18.400 --> 00:20:22.160
guys dive off and everybody's piling out
of their cars with their shotguns and it's

291
00:20:22.200 --> 00:20:26.559
going down ten o'clock in the morning, the mean streets of Kansas City.

292
00:20:26.599 --> 00:20:30.720
And I remember clearing the backseat of
the car coming around, and they teach

293
00:20:30.759 --> 00:20:34.240
you to kneel down behind the tire
because bullets go through sheet metal, obviously,

294
00:20:34.799 --> 00:20:38.119
And I'm behind there and I've got
my gun and uh, you know,

295
00:20:38.200 --> 00:20:41.039
trying to draw a beat on the
guy. And all of a sudden,

296
00:20:41.039 --> 00:20:45.720
I hear somebody yelling wick um,
wick um, and I'm thinking,

297
00:20:45.079 --> 00:20:48.920
am I supposed to charge the house? I'm like, you know, I'm

298
00:20:48.960 --> 00:20:52.400
the one who's gonna save the day. And it was the boss. It

299
00:20:52.440 --> 00:20:55.720
was the Asac and he goes,
you put that fucking gun back in your

300
00:20:55.720 --> 00:20:59.400
holster and you hide behind that tire, and I don't want to see you

301
00:20:59.440 --> 00:21:03.319
again, and I'm I mean I
was destroyed. I was ruined. So

302
00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:06.559
I go, what am I going
to do? So I sat down behind

303
00:21:06.559 --> 00:21:10.319
the tire and then everybody else who's
there, who's fully involved in this thing,

304
00:21:11.160 --> 00:21:15.160
and it was a pretty big deal
and they all see me and they

305
00:21:15.200 --> 00:21:18.960
start screaming at me, what the
hell is wrong with you? Get your

306
00:21:18.960 --> 00:21:22.200
gun out, getting the fight.
So the bosses yelling at me to hide,

307
00:21:22.440 --> 00:21:26.279
and the rest of the crew is
is calling me names but not joining

308
00:21:26.359 --> 00:21:27.839
the fight. So it was that
was quite a first day on the job.

309
00:21:29.000 --> 00:21:32.160
I love the idea of like your
first you know, your first day

310
00:21:32.200 --> 00:21:34.799
on the job. Everybody has this
image in the cells and it sounds like

311
00:21:34.839 --> 00:21:38.119
you're getting called up to the show. Like they see like they see how

312
00:21:38.119 --> 00:21:45.640
cool I am. I'm they recognize
talents exactly right, Like, let me

313
00:21:45.640 --> 00:21:48.200
just think about it, getting called
by name up to the show. It

314
00:21:48.240 --> 00:21:51.880
doesn't matter what you go into,
any brands of the military, ating laws

315
00:21:51.920 --> 00:21:55.640
and whatever else you think. When
you join, you're a special. You're

316
00:21:55.680 --> 00:21:57.279
special. I mean they give you
a badge and a gun. Yeah,

317
00:21:57.519 --> 00:22:02.359
and you've got thirty statutes that you
can enforce. You know, you're the

318
00:22:02.359 --> 00:22:06.240
guy who's supposed to save democracy,
the hero in the Western world, and

319
00:22:06.559 --> 00:22:08.880
it happens. It's not like I
gotta wait two years before I get involved

320
00:22:08.920 --> 00:22:12.279
in something. It's day one,
ten o'clock in the morning. It's not

321
00:22:12.440 --> 00:22:15.799
your first cup of coffee. The
next thing you know, you're in this

322
00:22:15.680 --> 00:22:18.759
but row down. But but it's
just it's just the reality. It's like

323
00:22:18.839 --> 00:22:22.319
it reminds me of Star Wars,
whereverybody feels like, you know, they're

324
00:22:22.359 --> 00:22:26.759
Luke Skywalker and you know they're usually
like read two or whoever gets blown out

325
00:22:26.799 --> 00:22:30.200
or you're like, yeah, but
the idea that I'm getting called up and

326
00:22:30.200 --> 00:22:33.279
then from put your gun away,
it's like, oh shit, yeah.

327
00:22:33.279 --> 00:22:37.400
But well, in my case,
I was an idiot, complete one,

328
00:22:37.480 --> 00:22:38.599
but I didn't know what to do. But you know, it worked out

329
00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:44.400
and they sent me. The FBI
has offices field offices around the country,

330
00:22:44.400 --> 00:22:48.559
and they have satellite offices they called
resident agencies, and it was a resident

331
00:22:48.640 --> 00:22:52.759
agency about two hours south, two
or three hours south in Springfield, and

332
00:22:52.759 --> 00:22:56.599
they sent me down there and then
it was four years of just incredible work.

333
00:22:56.640 --> 00:23:00.640
It was just it was a dream
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So, Chris, when did HRT
first come up on your radar? Like

367
00:25:33.640 --> 00:25:38.720
that even becomes something you hear about
in those days? Very different world.

368
00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:41.799
Back then. In those days,
nobody really knew a lot about anything.

369
00:25:41.920 --> 00:25:45.119
I mean, now we live in
a magic age of information. You guys,

370
00:25:45.200 --> 00:25:51.599
as in this podcast bring the average
person face to face with remarkable human

371
00:25:51.640 --> 00:25:53.880
beings who've done incredible things. Right, None of that existed back then,

372
00:25:53.960 --> 00:25:57.680
even within the FBI. So all
I knew about the Hostage Reski team at

373
00:25:57.680 --> 00:26:03.559
the time, and we're talking now
nine ninety one, nineteen ninety all I

374
00:26:03.599 --> 00:26:07.720
really knew was there was a group
at the FBI Academy who had a compound

375
00:26:07.839 --> 00:26:10.920
off in the woods, off to
the side, and they had helicopters,

376
00:26:10.960 --> 00:26:14.160
and they wore No Mac's flight suits, and you'd see him in the gym

377
00:26:14.279 --> 00:26:19.359
or in the cafeteria. You did, people to talk kind of in hush

378
00:26:19.400 --> 00:26:22.799
tones about them. You didn't really
know much about it. So the way

379
00:26:22.839 --> 00:26:27.000
the FBI works, in particular at
that time, they would they the FBI

380
00:26:27.079 --> 00:26:33.519
would move new agents or excuse me, would move agents based on the needs

381
00:26:33.519 --> 00:26:36.359
of the bureau. So if you
had been a certain amount of time in

382
00:26:36.400 --> 00:26:40.400
one office, they could arbitrarily move
you without much notice at all. So

383
00:26:40.440 --> 00:26:45.119
after four years I got a call
from Kansas City and they said, look

384
00:26:45.160 --> 00:26:49.279
at your time's up. You're going
to rotate out and you're gonna go either

385
00:26:49.359 --> 00:26:53.000
in New York or to la I
had two sons at the time, Mick

386
00:26:53.079 --> 00:26:59.960
and Jake, and it was great. I mean, working in the FBI

387
00:27:00.160 --> 00:27:03.160
at that time in Springfield, Missouri
was kind of the white picket fence,

388
00:27:03.240 --> 00:27:07.839
right. I had a nice house. You worked essentially from eight to six

389
00:27:07.960 --> 00:27:11.200
or something like that. It was
really a straightforward job, and you're kind

390
00:27:11.240 --> 00:27:15.440
of a small business person, a
contractor really in the sense that you go

391
00:27:15.559 --> 00:27:18.519
find your own cases. You don't
just go in In a bigger city,

392
00:27:18.519 --> 00:27:22.519
it's different New York Field office,
it's very, very different. But a

393
00:27:22.559 --> 00:27:26.559
resident agency, you would have a
case load in my case, maybe twenty

394
00:27:26.640 --> 00:27:29.519
twenty five case or something like that, and I could go out and work

395
00:27:29.799 --> 00:27:33.279
a bank robbery suspect in the middle
of the ozark someplace by myself and not

396
00:27:33.279 --> 00:27:37.279
see anybody else. So it was
a great gig. My gig was up.

397
00:27:37.559 --> 00:27:38.400
I didn't want to go to New
York and I didn't want to go

398
00:27:38.440 --> 00:27:41.839
to LA. Talked to Rose,
my wife, and said, what are

399
00:27:41.839 --> 00:27:45.079
we going to do? And I
had heard about knew something about this hostage

400
00:27:45.079 --> 00:27:48.400
Rescue team and they had a selection
once a year and the selection came in

401
00:27:48.480 --> 00:27:52.640
March. So I said, I'm
going to try out. So I applied,

402
00:27:52.440 --> 00:27:56.960
I got a try out. I
went back to Quantico, I made

403
00:27:56.960 --> 00:28:00.160
it through the tryout, and I
somehow got picked for the team. That's

404
00:28:00.200 --> 00:28:03.599
how it happened. And what year
was that? Ninety one? So yeah,

405
00:28:03.599 --> 00:28:07.559
and this was also I mean you
didn't know it at the time,

406
00:28:07.599 --> 00:28:11.240
but coming up on like a pivotal
time of American history. Uh. You

407
00:28:11.279 --> 00:28:15.240
know, we've had Danny Colson on
the show, who you know, has

408
00:28:15.359 --> 00:28:19.799
created HRT. We've had Gary Nosner, yeah, who was one of the

409
00:28:19.839 --> 00:28:23.240
negotiators. So do you want to
start talking about a little bit about,

410
00:28:23.279 --> 00:28:26.720
you know, what was going on
domestically at that time and sort of like

411
00:28:26.799 --> 00:28:30.079
what HRT's portfolio looked like at that
moment. Yeah. Two things. One,

412
00:28:30.400 --> 00:28:36.240
the United States government at that time
looked at terrorism as a domestic law

413
00:28:36.400 --> 00:28:38.559
enforcement function, and it was the
domain of the FBI. It was a

414
00:28:38.599 --> 00:28:45.839
federal offense terrorism at large. So
at that time, just for example,

415
00:28:45.839 --> 00:28:49.400
on nine eleven, well I'm skipping
ahead. Let me come back and just

416
00:28:49.480 --> 00:28:53.279
say that at that time I joined
HRT nineteen ninety one, they were about

417
00:28:53.359 --> 00:29:00.440
seventy seven zero designated terrorist organizations throughout
the world, one of which was Al

418
00:29:00.519 --> 00:29:03.599
Qaeda, just one. I mean, they might have been number thirty down

419
00:29:03.680 --> 00:29:07.720
the list. There were Red brigades, and there were endless numbers of them,

420
00:29:07.799 --> 00:29:12.160
and they were prolific. In the
nineteen eighties, hijacking was a regular

421
00:29:12.200 --> 00:29:15.960
occurrence and they I mean, anybody
that goes back and does a research.

422
00:29:17.240 --> 00:29:21.960
Terrorism was a completely different world than
it is today. Something would happen all

423
00:29:22.000 --> 00:29:23.400
the time. There would be a
bombing, a hijacking, a murder,

424
00:29:23.440 --> 00:29:27.720
or something really extraordinary, and the
United States government looked at it as a

425
00:29:27.759 --> 00:29:33.480
criminal, criminal enterprise that would be
investigated by the FBI and prosecuted by United

426
00:29:33.519 --> 00:29:36.519
States attorneys. That's the way the
system worked, Okay, So anywhere we

427
00:29:36.640 --> 00:29:38.519
found terrorists, we would go and
get them, like the weatherman and the

428
00:29:38.599 --> 00:29:44.000
weatherman, I mean there were so
many. I mean, yeah, but

429
00:29:44.039 --> 00:29:52.480
we would then, Yes, Irish
Republican Army Black September Red Brigades. I

430
00:29:52.480 --> 00:29:53.960
think I'm shun Rico was a little
bit later, but there were so many

431
00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:59.319
of them. My point being that
prior to nine to eleven, it was

432
00:29:59.400 --> 00:30:03.160
not the per view of the military. It was almost exclusive the FBI.

433
00:30:03.279 --> 00:30:07.559
So we the FBI would work with
the CIA in terms of putting together different

434
00:30:08.640 --> 00:30:12.960
actions, especially outside the United States. And one myth many people think the

435
00:30:14.000 --> 00:30:18.519
FBI works inside the United States and
the CIA works outside. Couldn't be further

436
00:30:18.559 --> 00:30:22.680
from the truth. The FBI has
legal attaches or field offices throughout the world,

437
00:30:23.400 --> 00:30:30.079
and we can chase, investigate,
and help prosecute crimes wherever they occur

438
00:30:30.119 --> 00:30:33.640
in the world involving Americans. Okay, so that's one aspect of what HRT

439
00:30:33.799 --> 00:30:37.160
did at the time in the early
nineteen nineties. And then also we would

440
00:30:37.200 --> 00:30:41.519
work anything that was a high profile
crime that would escalate to that point.

441
00:30:41.839 --> 00:30:48.599
People think various things about HRT because
it's very very poorly understood. The Hostage

442
00:30:48.599 --> 00:30:52.079
Resky Team is not a swat team. They are not a negotiation element.

443
00:30:52.240 --> 00:30:57.920
They are a tactical hostage rescue component. That is, and people talk about

444
00:30:57.960 --> 00:31:00.960
Tier one. Yea, I don't
even know what that means. There are

445
00:31:00.960 --> 00:31:04.599
certain entities people who say that term
don't know what it means. Yeah,

446
00:31:04.240 --> 00:31:08.039
I don't even know where that came
from. In the nineteen nineties, there

447
00:31:08.079 --> 00:31:15.799
were three tactical elements the United States
relied upon for in extremist violence. Delta

448
00:31:15.880 --> 00:31:22.000
Force or whatever the unit or Combat
Application Group in the day, it was

449
00:31:22.000 --> 00:31:26.039
still called Delta Force, Seal Team
six with DEV group, and because of

450
00:31:26.039 --> 00:31:30.640
a lack hall the Possecommatatas, the
United States government could not send military in

451
00:31:30.920 --> 00:31:36.240
a law enforcement crisis in the United
States. So if you had a hastage

452
00:31:36.240 --> 00:31:40.240
situation, well, I'll use the
Olympics, the Olympics in Los Angeles.

453
00:31:40.680 --> 00:31:45.480
Coming out of the Olympics in Munich
where all of those athletes were killed in

454
00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:48.599
the terrorist action, the United States
government didn't want that to happen. So

455
00:31:48.640 --> 00:31:52.720
the Attorney General at the time went
to Fort Bragg to see a demonstration by

456
00:31:52.799 --> 00:31:57.880
Delta to show how they would resolve
a hastage situation for the Los Angeles Olympics,

457
00:31:57.880 --> 00:32:04.039
which was nineteen eighty four I think
was eighty four eighty six, So

458
00:32:04.240 --> 00:32:07.039
he went down. It was a
very famous story, and he went up,

459
00:32:07.200 --> 00:32:09.279
I mean it was Delta, right, I'm sure it was a remarkable

460
00:32:09.319 --> 00:32:14.400
demonstration. Went up and said,
fabulous. The only thing I don't see

461
00:32:14.519 --> 00:32:16.240
is handcuffs. Were the handcuffs And
the guy, one of the operators,

462
00:32:16.279 --> 00:32:19.160
looks at him and goes, I
don't know what you're talking about. We

463
00:32:19.200 --> 00:32:22.240
give them all too right here,
right, the handcuffs. And he thought

464
00:32:22.279 --> 00:32:27.319
to himself, as Attorney General,
you know, the number one law enforcement

465
00:32:28.240 --> 00:32:32.519
agent agent opera official in the United
States, and he said, okay,

466
00:32:32.519 --> 00:32:37.279
we can't have that. So,
and I've said this before. When Delta

467
00:32:37.440 --> 00:32:43.440
started as a hostage rescue component,
not even a special warfare component, but

468
00:32:43.480 --> 00:32:46.680
a specific entity, they had to
invent all that shit. They invented CQB,

469
00:32:46.880 --> 00:32:52.960
they invented fast roping, they invented
tactical rapping, they invented all of

470
00:32:52.960 --> 00:32:55.640
those different things, and a lot
of that came out of the swap community.

471
00:32:55.680 --> 00:33:02.319
So when Delta started, they pioneered
those tactics based on what had come

472
00:33:02.319 --> 00:33:09.680
from the Los Angeles Swat Team Los
Angeles Policeman squat Team, and received a

473
00:33:09.720 --> 00:33:14.359
lot of help from the FBI.
And I've said this before, and I

474
00:33:14.400 --> 00:33:16.240
hope I'm right, But I've been
told by numerous sources that most of the

475
00:33:16.240 --> 00:33:22.279
original Delta guys came through the FBI
Academy undercover in order to work in that

476
00:33:22.359 --> 00:33:25.759
world, right, which will come
back, because I truly believe you never

477
00:33:25.759 --> 00:33:30.960
know who the fuck anybody is anyways. But so anyways, when HRT,

478
00:33:30.839 --> 00:33:35.200
excuse me, when the US government
decided to get ready for the Los Angeles

479
00:33:35.240 --> 00:33:39.319
Olympics, they decided to put together
a civilian component that became HRT, and

480
00:33:39.319 --> 00:33:42.559
they had to put it someplace,
so they put it in the FBI.

481
00:33:42.920 --> 00:33:47.480
So they created a civilian version of
Delta, same weapons, tactics, same

482
00:33:47.519 --> 00:33:52.680
command structure, even a very very
similar selection process. And they built and

483
00:33:52.960 --> 00:33:55.880
they built that put it in the
FBI, and that started. Danny Colson

484
00:33:55.920 --> 00:34:00.640
started that nineteen eighty three. So
I always found it interesting. Fascinates me

485
00:34:00.680 --> 00:34:05.400
about HRTs. They have that counter
terrorism capability that you describe, but they're

486
00:34:05.400 --> 00:34:08.920
also cops. They can investigate crimes, collect evidence, make arrests. Well,

487
00:34:09.519 --> 00:34:13.360
the short answer is yes. So
you have people who ask me,

488
00:34:13.400 --> 00:34:19.559
what are the legal justifications and it
is Title eighteen us COO. Title eighteen

489
00:34:20.119 --> 00:34:30.159
provides for certain capabilities and authorizations for
federal law enforcement. And you could have

490
00:34:30.440 --> 00:34:34.960
a special agent in different agencies.
But the special agent people always say,

491
00:34:34.960 --> 00:34:37.039
what's so special special about you?
Right, you're not going to trail apark

492
00:34:37.079 --> 00:34:40.119
at two in the morning. And
that's the first thing I always say,

493
00:34:40.159 --> 00:34:46.760
what's so special about you? That's
the that's the authorization, and the specific

494
00:34:46.800 --> 00:34:51.519
designation is eighteen eleven. That is
a specific designation that you can carry a

495
00:34:51.519 --> 00:34:54.159
gun and you have arrest authority and
all of that. The FBI has certain

496
00:34:54.239 --> 00:35:00.880
criminal violations that they investigate, one
of which is not murder. Murder is

497
00:35:00.920 --> 00:35:06.360
not even a federal crime except in
certain applications I mean, like political violence,

498
00:35:06.519 --> 00:35:10.119
political violence certain judges. Yes,
exactly right. So you have late,

499
00:35:10.360 --> 00:35:15.199
local, state, and federal organizations. Each has their own jurisdictions.

500
00:35:15.239 --> 00:35:21.119
The FBI has a specific one has
a set of specific Did they also get

501
00:35:21.119 --> 00:35:25.039
involved where in it's across state lines? Like yes, that's how it originally

502
00:35:25.119 --> 00:35:29.920
started that if you have a crime
in Iowa, you can't chase across state

503
00:35:29.920 --> 00:35:34.880
lines to another And Jed Goober what
started as the Bureau of Investigation before the

504
00:35:34.880 --> 00:35:42.159
Federal Bureau of Investigation was designed to
allow an entity to chase crime across borders,

505
00:35:42.159 --> 00:35:45.280
and then it went from their financial
crimes, financial instruments, things like

506
00:35:45.320 --> 00:35:52.199
that. So at the time terrorism
was considered a federal crime, the Hostage

507
00:35:52.199 --> 00:35:59.320
Rescue Team was a highly evolved tactical
component that could chase anywhere in the world

508
00:36:00.320 --> 00:36:05.840
any crime involving an American, specifically
terrorism, with the idea that if someone

509
00:36:05.880 --> 00:36:07.599
were taken hostage, you would need
somebody to go in and resolve it,

510
00:36:07.599 --> 00:36:12.280
and that's what they did. So
when I joined HRT, that was their

511
00:36:12.320 --> 00:36:17.679
primary operation. Coming back to this
the second point, which is some of

512
00:36:17.719 --> 00:36:27.360
those crimes escalate too unusual circumstances,
which is where this conversation always goes,

513
00:36:27.400 --> 00:36:31.559
which is Ruby Ridge and Waco.
Right, I was a both. Some

514
00:36:31.599 --> 00:36:36.360
people may have seen the Netflix documentary
Abound Waco, and I will say two

515
00:36:36.400 --> 00:36:39.840
things. One that I'm sick of
talking about it, but I understand that

516
00:36:40.480 --> 00:36:45.719
it is a pivotal thing in America
and history. And I fully understand that

517
00:36:45.800 --> 00:36:49.639
it is a hot button issue that
I hate to talk about just because I

518
00:36:49.679 --> 00:36:52.400
have to go over and over and
over and over again. But it's a

519
00:36:52.440 --> 00:36:54.599
tragedy. I mean, eighty five
or eighty seven people or something like that

520
00:36:54.599 --> 00:37:00.800
I died at Waco and on both
sides enforcement and the civilians inside, and

521
00:37:00.840 --> 00:37:07.400
the same with Ruby Ridge. So
they are events that I remember in a

522
00:37:07.440 --> 00:37:10.599
lifetime of events, but they are
events that stand out as pivotal moments in

523
00:37:10.639 --> 00:37:15.599
American history, and I respect that. I try to do my best to

524
00:37:15.639 --> 00:37:22.639
explain my perspectives, fully aware that
there are many different perspectives. So if

525
00:37:22.679 --> 00:37:25.039
you have any questions about did you
watch the documentary? Yeah, did?

526
00:37:25.199 --> 00:37:28.519
What did you think of it?
Do you think it for people who are

527
00:37:28.519 --> 00:37:31.039
curious about it or want to know
more that it's a good source of information

528
00:37:31.079 --> 00:37:34.559
for them. The director's name is
Tilla Russell. He's a brilliant guy.

529
00:37:34.719 --> 00:37:38.840
He did an impossible job, and
I think it was if I could leave

530
00:37:38.880 --> 00:37:43.079
any lasting testament to Wakele, that
would be it. I think he did

531
00:37:43.119 --> 00:37:45.480
a brilliant job in a theatrical setting, meaning you know, we had to

532
00:37:45.519 --> 00:37:51.280
present it in three hours, and
you can't tell something that lasted that long.

533
00:37:51.400 --> 00:37:53.360
You could do three hours just on
the last morning. So there are

534
00:37:53.360 --> 00:37:57.360
lots of things that I would have
talked about in the documentary, But there's

535
00:37:57.400 --> 00:37:59.800
lots of things that Branch Davidians would
have as Well, so I thought Till

536
00:38:00.239 --> 00:38:04.559
a remarkable job, and I think
it was a very fair and very balanced

537
00:38:05.119 --> 00:38:09.000
way of saying everybody dicked up.
I mean, it was a it was

538
00:38:09.039 --> 00:38:15.760
a mess. It was awful,
had tragic consequences for federal law enforcement officers,

539
00:38:15.760 --> 00:38:19.639
and for for women and children and
and men that died in that thing.

540
00:38:19.679 --> 00:38:22.480
It was a It was awful,
and the same with the same with

541
00:38:22.519 --> 00:38:27.880
it would be rich Well in the
it's the documentary is called American Apocalypse.

542
00:38:28.000 --> 00:38:30.320
Yes, yeah, if people want
to go and check it out on Netflix.

543
00:38:30.519 --> 00:38:35.719
I've I've watched it. It's definitely
worth worth your time. Well,

544
00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:37.599
I guess, well, one of
the one of the big things that you

545
00:38:37.599 --> 00:38:42.440
know, I think it's kind of
a kind of shocking or interesting to hear

546
00:38:42.639 --> 00:38:45.639
you know, your part in it. I mean you were a an HRT

547
00:38:45.800 --> 00:38:50.400
sniper on both events, and you
talk at one point about having David koresh

548
00:38:50.480 --> 00:38:54.239
himself in your sights and how that's
kind of like something that haunts you even

549
00:38:54.280 --> 00:38:58.360
even today. Yeah, I wouldn't
say, han, I think maybe the

550
00:38:58.360 --> 00:39:01.079
show made it sound like that.
Yeah, yeah, that's not what's your

551
00:39:01.119 --> 00:39:07.320
perspective. My perspective is this that
we had a specific mission. And you

552
00:39:07.320 --> 00:39:09.000
guys know this mission, right.
The objective is to go in and kill

553
00:39:09.000 --> 00:39:12.480
the bad guys, and you save
the good guys and you go home.

554
00:39:12.840 --> 00:39:16.400
That's it. You're you're a strike
a fast action asset. We didn't.

555
00:39:16.480 --> 00:39:19.559
We were not designed to go in
and say, dropped the gun. We

556
00:39:19.559 --> 00:39:22.400
were not designed to go in with
smoke and mirrors. And it was a

557
00:39:22.559 --> 00:39:29.320
last resort. So typically at that
time, Delta or six or HRT would

558
00:39:29.320 --> 00:39:34.159
be held in reserve until every other
thing, every other option had failed.

559
00:39:34.320 --> 00:39:37.800
There were no more options. At
that time, negotiation was just becoming a

560
00:39:37.840 --> 00:39:43.000
big deal. Gary probably talked about
this. It was a new construct.

561
00:39:43.000 --> 00:39:45.960
It was a new concept that you
could talk somebody out of a situation,

562
00:39:45.239 --> 00:39:51.360
because, let's face it, what
the Texas Rangers and law enforcement through the

563
00:39:51.360 --> 00:39:55.280
Wild West, up through the Prohibition
errors with al Capone and the Saint Valentine's

564
00:39:55.599 --> 00:40:00.559
Valentine's Day massacre, law enforcement up
to a certain point in American history was

565
00:40:00.800 --> 00:40:02.800
we're the good guys, you're the
bad guys. Do what we say.

566
00:40:02.800 --> 00:40:07.159
We're going to kill your right.
When we got to that point nineteen ninety

567
00:40:07.199 --> 00:40:15.360
two, ninety three Waco first,
were we origin and Waco were right together.

568
00:40:15.039 --> 00:40:22.239
When we get to that point,
we the United States government had new

569
00:40:22.280 --> 00:40:27.599
assets, specifically the Hostage Rescue Team, and did not as a government as

570
00:40:27.639 --> 00:40:30.800
a country, really have a strong
sense of what we would do with them.

571
00:40:30.840 --> 00:40:34.400
And I'll say it for this very
specifically. At that time, in

572
00:40:34.440 --> 00:40:42.239
the early nineteen nineties, the most
prevalent conversation about what was wrong in America

573
00:40:42.239 --> 00:40:49.519
at the time was what was called
white nationalist, white supremacist organizations like the

574
00:40:49.519 --> 00:40:52.559
Covenant, the Sword in the Arm
of the World of Mission Danny was involved

575
00:40:52.559 --> 00:40:55.079
in, and there were a lot
of those organizations that came out of what

576
00:40:55.159 --> 00:40:59.199
was called the Turner Diaries. There
was a book called the Turner Diaries,

577
00:40:59.239 --> 00:41:02.079
and it was the end. It
was Zionists occupied government. It was a

578
00:41:02.119 --> 00:41:06.159
big deal. And people don't know
those things now, so they don't put

579
00:41:06.159 --> 00:41:10.199
it in that frame of reference.
Domestic terrorists based on white supremacist, white

580
00:41:10.320 --> 00:41:17.559
nationalist identity politics movement was the singular
focus of federal law enforcement at that level

581
00:41:19.119 --> 00:41:23.000
at that time. So when we
went to Ruby Ridge and we went to

582
00:41:23.039 --> 00:41:29.079
Waco, they were wrapped within a
national sentiment that you've got these crazies living

583
00:41:29.079 --> 00:41:32.159
out in the woods or living out
in the field and they're dangerous. I'm

584
00:41:32.199 --> 00:41:36.360
not saying that's the reality of it. I'm saying that was the perception that

585
00:41:36.400 --> 00:41:42.679
they had these training camps that they're
basically preparing to that's exactly conduct violent accents.

586
00:41:42.719 --> 00:41:45.599
That's exactly right. So we now
know Randy Weaver and Kevin Harris in

587
00:41:45.639 --> 00:41:50.119
the Harris family. That's not the
that's not it at all. But we

588
00:41:50.159 --> 00:41:53.480
didn't have the information at the time. We the hosted Rescue team had information

589
00:41:53.480 --> 00:41:58.920
that we got from other entities.
And I mean we didn't even have We

590
00:41:58.960 --> 00:42:02.920
had no Google, we had online
based, computerized system of gathering information.

591
00:42:04.719 --> 00:42:08.199
It was it was primitive. You
were reliant on the agency, the organization,

592
00:42:10.599 --> 00:42:14.079
right, And I talked about in
the ATF right well, one was

593
00:42:14.119 --> 00:42:17.159
the marshals and one was the ATP. Well, the ATF at wake Marshals

594
00:42:17.199 --> 00:42:22.320
and ATF it was an ATF investigation. It became a marshal's response because they

595
00:42:22.360 --> 00:42:25.320
were supposed to go into the arrest. But they were both non FBI cases.

596
00:42:25.760 --> 00:42:29.599
But because you escalate the latter,
remember that we had the United States

597
00:42:29.599 --> 00:42:32.840
government had one counter terrorism excuse me, had one tactical asset that was the

598
00:42:32.880 --> 00:42:36.559
hostage Rescue Team, and it could
go anywhere. It could go to a

599
00:42:37.519 --> 00:42:42.559
to a county in Tennessee, it
could go to a federal UH install,

600
00:42:42.800 --> 00:42:47.079
to an airport, and to JIKI
standard. It could be absolutely anything.

601
00:42:47.519 --> 00:42:54.760
So it was a time in American
history where a set of circumstances met with

602
00:42:55.119 --> 00:43:00.480
a set of demands that led to
a set of failures that was still talking

603
00:43:00.480 --> 00:43:06.199
about thirty years later. Did that
lead to I don't know about the overall

604
00:43:06.199 --> 00:43:10.199
FBI that specifically for the hostage Rescue
team. Did that lead you guys to

605
00:43:10.400 --> 00:43:15.599
distrust of other agencies, you know, whether it was the ATF for the

606
00:43:15.599 --> 00:43:20.039
marshal or even local law enforcement.
The idea of you guys landing on the

607
00:43:20.039 --> 00:43:23.760
ground and not having a recall from
reading your book from cold zero, I

608
00:43:23.800 --> 00:43:28.400
mean, if I recall correctly,
I mean expressed even like outright anger with

609
00:43:28.440 --> 00:43:30.880
the negotiators that there you guys were
did not have good comms with each other.

610
00:43:31.360 --> 00:43:35.599
Well, it's very tough, and
I'll say this a couple of things.

611
00:43:35.639 --> 00:43:38.480
One, I was a member of
the FBI Hostage Rescue Team a long

612
00:43:38.519 --> 00:43:45.360
time ago, and it is a
very different entity. It is a remarkable

613
00:43:45.440 --> 00:43:47.960
organization that you should have somebody newer
on to talk about what they do and

614
00:43:49.000 --> 00:43:52.440
how they do it and the endless
series of successes that they've had. Right,

615
00:43:52.440 --> 00:43:54.480
there were a remarkable group of people
that I'm no longer part of.

616
00:43:55.199 --> 00:43:59.760
I was a member of that team
at a time in history that people still

617
00:43:59.800 --> 00:44:04.639
too to talk about. But you
should really have an HRT guy we're talking

618
00:44:04.639 --> 00:44:08.599
about, Yeah, Well, I
mean there's some truly some remarkable human beings.

619
00:44:08.639 --> 00:44:10.760
I mean, these guys, we
can tell stories about who they are

620
00:44:10.760 --> 00:44:15.400
and where they come from, but
they're just anyway. I'll go back and

621
00:44:15.440 --> 00:44:21.440
say at that time my personal perspective, and everybody has a different perspective on

622
00:44:21.519 --> 00:44:25.039
something like that. For example,
at Ruby Ridge, I heard more gunshots

623
00:44:25.079 --> 00:44:29.480
and testified before the Senate that I
heard things that nobody else did because the

624
00:44:29.480 --> 00:44:32.320
way sound moves in mountains, everything
is a little bit different. My perspective

625
00:44:34.119 --> 00:44:38.960
at the time in Waco was that
we were going in to kill the bad

626
00:44:39.000 --> 00:44:42.760
guys and save the good guys.
That night, I was on a climbing

627
00:44:42.800 --> 00:44:45.320
trip. As I said in a
documentary, we had a climbing team,

628
00:44:45.360 --> 00:44:52.000
and I grew up rock climbing.
We had a climbing trip in Phoenix,

629
00:44:52.039 --> 00:44:58.519
Arizona, and Tucson. I guess, and we went back up too.

630
00:44:58.760 --> 00:45:01.519
Or we flew to Waco and the
rest of the team hadn't come in,

631
00:45:01.599 --> 00:45:05.480
but they came in later that night. There were seven of us that arrived

632
00:45:05.519 --> 00:45:08.320
first at Waco, and I thought
we would do what we were supposed to

633
00:45:08.320 --> 00:45:15.360
do. At the time, negotiations
was becoming a much bigger play, and

634
00:45:15.800 --> 00:45:20.039
negotiation is, in my opinion,
always the best way to go. Loss

635
00:45:20.039 --> 00:45:23.840
of life and a military action is
part of the process. Loss of life

636
00:45:24.280 --> 00:45:28.920
and a law enforcement organ and a
law enforcement action in the United States of

637
00:45:28.960 --> 00:45:43.519
America is a It's bad, it
is costly, it is irrevably. It

638
00:45:43.719 --> 00:45:49.280
lasts in ways that surprised me.
Now we're talking about this thirty years later.

639
00:45:50.159 --> 00:45:53.039
It causes lasting harm to everyone.
Yea, to everyone. So my

640
00:45:53.199 --> 00:45:57.800
lasting harm was saying I thought we
were gonna go in, We were gonna

641
00:45:58.159 --> 00:46:00.800
do what we did and resolve it
and go home. It didn't work that

642
00:46:00.840 --> 00:46:06.119
way. We stayed, and then
you have I don't want to use an

643
00:46:06.119 --> 00:46:08.760
improper metaphor, but if you have
the shop trip of a spear or whatever,

644
00:46:08.760 --> 00:46:12.400
the metaphor you want to use and
you just lay it there. Eventually

645
00:46:12.440 --> 00:46:14.719
it's going to rust, or eventually
it's going to get lost, or it's

646
00:46:14.719 --> 00:46:16.440
going to get knocked around, whatever
metaphor you want to use. And it

647
00:46:16.639 --> 00:46:23.679
just became a two month long babysitting
enterprise, and everything broke down. It

648
00:46:23.760 --> 00:46:27.920
broke down within the FBI, It
broke down within the federal government, Janet

649
00:46:27.920 --> 00:46:30.719
Reno and the Attorney General, Bill
Clinton, the president. It became political.

650
00:46:30.880 --> 00:46:37.519
It became everything that it was not. And so I have my perspectives.

651
00:46:37.800 --> 00:46:39.599
I don't think anybody should really care
what my perspectives are. I did

652
00:46:39.599 --> 00:46:43.840
my best. Yeah, I did
my job. And then the last day,

653
00:46:44.760 --> 00:46:50.199
the ship storm went down of heroic
proportions. It was awful and that

654
00:46:50.239 --> 00:46:52.079
part was not really talked about in
the show. But when we started the

655
00:46:52.119 --> 00:46:58.280
operation the last day, so we
go in secure the compound. The United

656
00:46:58.280 --> 00:47:01.559
States government, through the FBI hostage
negotiators tried to talk this thing out.

657
00:47:01.760 --> 00:47:05.840
Everybody came down. The director of
the FBI wanted to come down, The

658
00:47:05.880 --> 00:47:08.599
sheriff was involved, everybody was trying
to get involved in this thing. We

659
00:47:08.639 --> 00:47:13.320
just sat and watched. We would
do whatever anybody wanted. So we had

660
00:47:13.440 --> 00:47:17.079
armored vehicles. Everybody's seen the videotape. The last day, six o'clock in

661
00:47:17.119 --> 00:47:22.480
the morning, we are told that
we're supposed to insert gas into the building

662
00:47:22.519 --> 00:47:24.320
to force the people out of the
building. And that's where you see the

663
00:47:24.360 --> 00:47:30.360
tanks going up to the building construction
the cev's construction engineering vehicles. Instead of

664
00:47:31.079 --> 00:47:38.320
turret mounted guns, they had turret
mounted gas projectors, poked holes, put

665
00:47:38.400 --> 00:47:43.440
in gas. The moment they pierced
the skin, the branch Davidians opened up

666
00:47:43.480 --> 00:47:47.440
on us and hosed us thousands of
rounds for hours at a time, and

667
00:47:47.480 --> 00:47:52.119
we wrote it out. I mean, I was sitting behind a plates of

668
00:47:52.159 --> 00:47:54.800
steel and sand dikes. It was
no it's no threat. Nobody shot back.

669
00:47:55.480 --> 00:48:00.920
Took a cease fire about ten in
the morning, ceasefire from now and

670
00:48:00.199 --> 00:48:06.559
uh. And then after negotiations broke
down again, we started inserting gas again

671
00:48:07.239 --> 00:48:09.840
and then the fire started in the
place burned down. So it was that

672
00:48:09.960 --> 00:48:14.559
last morning. It started about six
in the morning and it ended about noon.

673
00:48:15.519 --> 00:48:19.559
And I remember you talking about,
you know, watching the compound burn

674
00:48:19.639 --> 00:48:22.760
to the ground and you came down
out of your sniper hide with your partner,

675
00:48:22.800 --> 00:48:24.719
your sniper partner and standing there,
like, what are you thinking as

676
00:48:24.719 --> 00:48:36.559
you're like watching this this catastrophe.
What I say would not come across.

677
00:48:36.599 --> 00:48:38.199
Well, so I'm not going to
say anything about it. I mean,

678
00:48:38.199 --> 00:48:43.400
when you sit there and you count
fifty one days and all the shit that

679
00:48:43.440 --> 00:48:45.280
you go through not knowing what's going
on, and what you think about the

680
00:48:45.280 --> 00:48:47.920
world, and what you think about
right and wrong, and what you think

681
00:48:47.960 --> 00:48:53.159
about those children that you'd see every
day, I mean they I have photographs

682
00:48:53.159 --> 00:48:57.559
of everything. I have a complete
archive of every photograph taken during wake,

683
00:48:57.800 --> 00:49:00.920
hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of photographs, and I I you know, I

684
00:49:00.920 --> 00:49:04.079
showed some of them to tell them, not all of them, but a

685
00:49:04.079 --> 00:49:07.119
few of them. But I have
a series of photographs of this little kid,

686
00:49:07.239 --> 00:49:09.719
probably four years old, little blond
headed kid, and he's wearing a

687
00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:14.760
red puffy jacket. It was cold, right, It's March, February,

688
00:49:14.760 --> 00:49:22.920
March, and the mighty men David
Koresh's soldiers, his branch Davidian followers.

689
00:49:22.920 --> 00:49:25.039
I shouldn't call them soldiers, says
he called them mighty men. I will

690
00:49:25.079 --> 00:49:30.000
call them branch Davidians would come to
the window and hold this little kid up

691
00:49:30.039 --> 00:49:34.280
as a human shield. And taunt
us, or they'd have their guns and

692
00:49:34.280 --> 00:49:38.639
they set up their sniper hides,
and they were very militaristic in their own

693
00:49:38.679 --> 00:49:43.039
right. We knew they had grenades, we knew they had two fifty cows

694
00:49:43.079 --> 00:49:45.719
because we saw them. They were
very, very, very heavily armed.

695
00:49:46.159 --> 00:49:52.519
But to see these kids and to
see them in the windows every single day,

696
00:49:52.920 --> 00:49:55.880
we all had kids, we all
had families, and then that last

697
00:49:55.920 --> 00:50:00.039
day realized that they're all dying.
There's no way a human being, in

698
00:50:00.079 --> 00:50:08.679
my opinion, can go through something
like that and not stumble fall down a

699
00:50:08.719 --> 00:50:12.000
little bit. I mean, it's
that That's sort of what I was what

700
00:50:12.079 --> 00:50:15.440
I was trying to ask, Like, as a as a cop, you

701
00:50:15.440 --> 00:50:17.559
know, you have this as an
HRT agent, you have this vision in

702
00:50:17.599 --> 00:50:22.039
your mind of like, we're the
good guys, We're here to save people.

703
00:50:22.239 --> 00:50:24.079
Yes, I mean did standing there
watching that? I mean, did

704
00:50:24.119 --> 00:50:28.400
it? Did it change your view
either of yourself or of your country or

705
00:50:28.440 --> 00:50:32.039
of that of the Bureau. Now
it didn't. It didn't change any sense

706
00:50:32.119 --> 00:50:36.719
of myself or the mission or the
people that I worked with, because I

707
00:50:36.719 --> 00:50:38.559
believed in them, I believed in
myself. I still do. I still

708
00:50:39.079 --> 00:50:47.719
I believe in the heroism of all
who serve first responders, and I mean

709
00:50:49.719 --> 00:50:54.199
across the board. I come from
a family of fireman and military, law

710
00:50:54.320 --> 00:51:01.000
enforcement. Anybody to put their ass
on the line in the cause of good

711
00:51:01.119 --> 00:51:07.119
and my book is a hero and
I will always believe very very strongly that

712
00:51:07.119 --> 00:51:12.920
those guys rank among the very best, because not only could they have done

713
00:51:12.920 --> 00:51:15.039
anything else in life. Just getting
into the fbis kind of hard, right,

714
00:51:15.079 --> 00:51:17.639
I mean, you gotta have a
master's degree and you got to you

715
00:51:17.760 --> 00:51:22.360
got to live a good life and
stuff. Getting to HRT is harder.

716
00:51:22.519 --> 00:51:27.719
I mean, getting on HRT is
hard. There was thirteen thousand FBI agents

717
00:51:27.719 --> 00:51:30.400
and this fifty guys, fifty shooters
on HRT. In my opinion, there's

718
00:51:30.400 --> 00:51:32.760
some of the most remarkable human beings
I've ever met in my life. The

719
00:51:32.800 --> 00:51:40.039
smartest, the fastest, the most
dedicated. They're devoted at the risk of

720
00:51:40.079 --> 00:51:45.679
their own life. And you know, I say it, a significant number

721
00:51:45.679 --> 00:51:51.039
of HRT operators have died in training. Yeah, it's a very very dangerous

722
00:51:51.079 --> 00:51:52.880
job, and you have to commit
in ways that most people don't even think

723
00:51:52.920 --> 00:51:55.920
about. And you have to do
that for a reason. And the reason

724
00:51:57.079 --> 00:52:00.119
is good and when you do something
you think is in the name of good

725
00:52:00.159 --> 00:52:05.400
that turns out to be something different, it really makes you think what went

726
00:52:05.480 --> 00:52:08.119
wrong and how to make it better. Well, and that's one of the

727
00:52:08.119 --> 00:52:12.119
things that uh, you know,
the HRC has. They have an incredibly

728
00:52:12.199 --> 00:52:15.920
difficult job because a lot of times
they can face the exact same threat profile

729
00:52:16.360 --> 00:52:22.800
of somebody and the military special Operations
unit, but without the lethal recourse,

730
00:52:22.320 --> 00:52:27.039
right, you can't if you start
taking fire from an objective, you can't

731
00:52:27.079 --> 00:52:30.440
step back and then bomb the objective. You know, there's well and we

732
00:52:30.440 --> 00:52:34.199
don't. I mean, we didn't
have suppressive fire, right. I mean,

733
00:52:34.320 --> 00:52:37.159
let's just let's just take a Waco. Let's say let's say they shot

734
00:52:37.199 --> 00:52:43.159
ten thousand rounds. Nobody fired a
shot back. Not one. Now,

735
00:52:43.280 --> 00:52:45.840
people would argue while we were in
tanks and we were behind sandbags, and

736
00:52:45.840 --> 00:52:47.119
I would say, you're absolutely right, that's why we didn't shoot back.

737
00:52:47.599 --> 00:52:50.760
But you know, I walked out
at the end. I talked about it

738
00:52:50.800 --> 00:52:52.719
in the documentary. I walked out
when the fully the building was fully involved

739
00:52:52.920 --> 00:52:57.679
and I walked out of our position
to cover just to watch the fire.

740
00:52:57.679 --> 00:53:00.360
I mean, I was dumbfounded.
Nobody could believe that the place burning,

741
00:53:00.360 --> 00:53:01.599
and you saw it on television.
It was a horrendous fire. Yeah,

742
00:53:01.840 --> 00:53:06.119
And I walked outside and I was
standing there next to a guy that you

743
00:53:06.199 --> 00:53:09.800
used to work with, and we
were standing there shoulder to shoulder, and

744
00:53:09.880 --> 00:53:13.880
a guy cranked off around and it
went right between our head. And anybody

745
00:53:13.880 --> 00:53:15.800
who's ever been in any kind of
live fire situation, you know, you

746
00:53:15.800 --> 00:53:19.639
know, you feel the vapor trail
going past your head, and that snapped,

747
00:53:19.639 --> 00:53:23.760
that hype supersonic snap. And it's
not that he almost killed us.

748
00:53:23.760 --> 00:53:25.760
I mean, you know, it's
not the first time I was almost been

749
00:53:25.840 --> 00:53:30.159
killed. But it was that the
building was fully involved in flames. And

750
00:53:30.199 --> 00:53:35.119
I said this in the documentary,
The guy that tried to kill me,

751
00:53:35.159 --> 00:53:37.760
that almost did kill me, had
to have been fully involved in flames.

752
00:53:37.840 --> 00:53:40.840
When he pulled the trigger. His
legs were on fire, his arms were

753
00:53:40.840 --> 00:53:45.119
on fire, his clothes were on
fire. And the last act he took

754
00:53:45.159 --> 00:53:47.039
as a human being on the planet
Earth was to try to kill me.

755
00:53:47.400 --> 00:53:50.760
So, you know, I always
say, in terms of commitment, you

756
00:53:50.800 --> 00:53:53.320
can look at Waco anyway you want, but law enforcement is a very very

757
00:53:53.320 --> 00:53:59.199
difficult function in a lot of different
ways, and we did have military situations

758
00:54:00.039 --> 00:54:04.760
outside Waco and didn't have the same
things. We had flash bang grenades instead

759
00:54:04.800 --> 00:54:07.920
of frag grenades, right, we
didn't have we could not use suppress a

760
00:54:07.000 --> 00:54:13.880
fire. We had helicopters and saws
and sixties and fifties and everything else,

761
00:54:14.079 --> 00:54:16.639
but very very carefully prescribed rules of
engagement on how we could use them.

762
00:54:17.000 --> 00:54:20.440
So it's a very tough thing.
And you know, as a sniper,

763
00:54:20.960 --> 00:54:22.599
a lot of people you've had on
with snipers, you talk about it,

764
00:54:23.199 --> 00:54:25.960
and I've talked to various people.
In a military application, you can have

765
00:54:27.000 --> 00:54:30.119
two guys stand by side by side
in the combat situation and you shoot somebody

766
00:54:30.159 --> 00:54:34.320
with a fifty eight at a thousand
meters and if you hit the wrong guy,

767
00:54:34.360 --> 00:54:37.599
it's still wins, right, Right, if you shoot somebody in a

768
00:54:37.679 --> 00:54:40.639
law enforcement action and it's two twin
brothers and you shoot the wrong twin,

769
00:54:40.840 --> 00:54:44.360
even if a good shot you get
the wrong guy. If you fuck up

770
00:54:44.400 --> 00:54:47.920
for any reason whatsoever, you're probably
going to jail. You're definitely going to

771
00:54:49.000 --> 00:54:52.840
get civil action. You're probably going
to lose your job, and it's going

772
00:54:52.880 --> 00:54:54.599
to ruin your life. So you
say I'm gonna take this job, and

773
00:54:54.639 --> 00:54:58.519
I'm going to give up my family. I'm going to do all these things

774
00:54:58.519 --> 00:55:04.599
to make these sacrifices, and the
margin of era is so small it's hard

775
00:55:04.639 --> 00:55:07.480
even to explain. Yeah, And
so I'm not saying that's a bad thing.

776
00:55:07.559 --> 00:55:12.599
We all take that risk understanding that
is the liability. But I think

777
00:55:12.639 --> 00:55:15.280
people outside of Waco and Ruby Ridge, I'm just saying, there are human

778
00:55:15.320 --> 00:55:22.159
beings working today and tonight in the
military and law enforcement, first responders of

779
00:55:22.199 --> 00:55:27.440
every kind, who put their lives
on the line, who take extraordinary chances,

780
00:55:27.679 --> 00:55:30.760
make extraordinary sacrifices, and occasionally they
get it wrong. Yeah, because

781
00:55:30.800 --> 00:55:37.119
it's it's what humans do. Ye. So final thoughts on Waco and Ruby

782
00:55:37.199 --> 00:55:40.599
Ridge. You know, from your
perspective, I mean big takeaways, lessons

783
00:55:40.679 --> 00:55:46.079
learned, things that changed within the
organization. In the aftermath, everything changed,

784
00:55:46.719 --> 00:55:52.199
everything change, the world changed.
The first thing, the first and

785
00:55:52.239 --> 00:55:55.159
most obvious change, was the creation
of the Critical Incident Response Group, the

786
00:55:55.239 --> 00:56:00.559
mechanism within the FBI where the federal
government said, we are going to pull

787
00:56:00.599 --> 00:56:05.119
all of the component parts together and
we're going to create a super unit that

788
00:56:05.159 --> 00:56:08.280
can look at all eventualities so that
we never fuck up again. In those

789
00:56:08.320 --> 00:56:13.039
ways. So what do you need
in a crisis situation You need to resolve

790
00:56:13.480 --> 00:56:17.920
You need to deal with the criminal
with the what are we gonna call the

791
00:56:17.960 --> 00:56:22.880
psychology the threat, the psychology of
the threat, but the human mind,

792
00:56:22.360 --> 00:56:29.400
the human construct of decision making in
a situation, the first thing you want

793
00:56:29.400 --> 00:56:32.199
to do is figure out who they
are. So we have the behavioral scientists

794
00:56:32.280 --> 00:56:39.360
or what we call profilers, the
profiles, a national what most people call

795
00:56:39.679 --> 00:56:45.880
profiles. That unit is part of
critical critical Incident Response Group. The negotiators

796
00:56:45.880 --> 00:56:53.800
who take that information and time proven
methods of influencing behavior to try and resolve

797
00:56:53.840 --> 00:56:59.000
the thing peacefully. Those guys are
part of that organization. If that fails,

798
00:56:59.079 --> 00:57:02.239
you need a tactical component to save
those lives, and that's the hostage

799
00:57:02.239 --> 00:57:07.079
rescue team. And then there's a
logistical component. There's there are other components,

800
00:57:07.360 --> 00:57:12.039
all brought together are palletized air mobile. At a moment's notice, they

801
00:57:12.039 --> 00:57:17.480
can get on the ground and address
a situation in a coordinated manner to try

802
00:57:17.599 --> 00:57:22.280
and prevent that from happening. And
they've been remarkably successful. I mean,

803
00:57:22.280 --> 00:57:27.079
if you look at what's happened within
the FBI, within federal lawnforcement writ large

804
00:57:27.079 --> 00:57:30.960
since nineteen ninety three, in thirty
years, it is a remarkable history of

805
00:57:31.039 --> 00:57:36.920
extraordinary successes. Yeah, we don't
talk about wacos because there haven't been anyway

806
00:57:37.480 --> 00:57:43.519
in thirty thirty years. And wasn't
the bunker boy, wasn't that what an

807
00:57:43.519 --> 00:57:47.840
incredibly heroic When you actually look at
what happened, I got goosebumps on the

808
00:57:47.840 --> 00:57:51.159
back of my neck. That's why
I say you should talk to real HRT

809
00:57:51.280 --> 00:57:53.360
guys. You should talk to current
HRT guys. I mean, you know,

810
00:57:53.400 --> 00:57:58.719
I'm old school. The new guys
have tactics, they have techniques,

811
00:57:59.159 --> 00:58:02.440
they have process that didn't even exist
in those days, and that's why they're

812
00:58:02.440 --> 00:58:07.320
so successful. But when you look
at what's been printed about what happened with

813
00:58:07.360 --> 00:58:10.880
that bunker and how they went down
excuse me, and save that child,

814
00:58:12.679 --> 00:58:16.239
it was remarkable. I mean these
guys jumped into a phone booth and a

815
00:58:16.239 --> 00:58:20.159
live fire gunfight. Yeah, I
mean you talk about having a knife fight

816
00:58:20.159 --> 00:58:22.800
in the phone booth. These guys
had fully automatic weapons and it was wired

817
00:58:22.840 --> 00:58:27.280
to blow up, and they jumped
in there, and I mean they're literally

818
00:58:27.840 --> 00:58:32.920
gunfighting hit I mean holding each other
and feeling body parts to know where to

819
00:58:32.960 --> 00:58:38.159
shoot. So the success is I
come on these shows and I feel really

820
00:58:38.159 --> 00:58:40.920
badly about it because I go on
and I talk about something that's a that's

821
00:58:40.920 --> 00:58:45.199
a failure thirty years ago, and
I say, talk to the heroes,

822
00:58:45.239 --> 00:58:47.719
talk to the remarkable guys and ostrage
rescue team that did this today, and

823
00:58:50.639 --> 00:58:52.880
they will. I mean, you'll
get them on. Yeah, we'd love

824
00:58:52.920 --> 00:58:54.719
to. We'll want to hand it
off to the guys that really do Yeah.

825
00:58:54.760 --> 00:58:58.599
Now, and they're there. And
here's here's the other thing. And

826
00:58:59.159 --> 00:59:01.239
this is true about the military,
is true about true about the intelligence community.

827
00:59:01.280 --> 00:59:06.480
It's true about the law enforcement community. Is that you're always going to

828
00:59:06.599 --> 00:59:10.199
hear about the failures, and and
everybody who's going to judge those organizations based

829
00:59:10.320 --> 00:59:15.079
on their failures, you know,
whether it's a single competent abuse of situation,

830
00:59:15.400 --> 00:59:17.360
whether it's Waco, whether it's you
know, like my lie or you

831
00:59:17.360 --> 00:59:23.000
know or or you know, even
in the grade that Danny Coulson talked about,

832
00:59:23.000 --> 00:59:27.239
where they diffuse the situation successfully,
and there is no laws of way

833
00:59:27.320 --> 00:59:32.039
like those judge. I hadn't heard
of that. It's not newsworthy, it's

834
00:59:30.719 --> 00:59:38.360
one exactly one the successful operations generally
won't even get acknowledged because they were successful

835
00:59:38.440 --> 00:59:42.719
and they just happened. And two, it's just not news where that nobody

836
00:59:42.760 --> 00:59:45.760
wants to really, unless it's something
like the Bunk Roar, where it's you

837
00:59:45.800 --> 00:59:51.440
know, this insane situation and these
these men act with these outrageous courage.

838
00:59:52.360 --> 00:59:55.960
But generally, like most situations,
if it if you resolve a situation safely,

839
00:59:57.480 --> 01:00:00.320
that's not sex. Nobody's going to
print that. That's not sexy.

840
01:00:00.400 --> 01:00:07.840
First of all, HRT has been
involved in more than eight hundred, eight

841
01:00:07.960 --> 01:00:14.320
hundred tactical resolutions in the last thirty
years since Waco eight hundred and how many

842
01:00:14.360 --> 01:00:16.639
of you heard about zero, Well, you heard about the boy and the

843
01:00:16.679 --> 01:00:21.000
bunker. Yeah, you don't hear
about him because they're successful, right,

844
01:00:21.159 --> 01:00:24.880
and that kind of a track record
eight hundred and zero, right is I

845
01:00:24.920 --> 01:00:28.239
don't even know how to put that
on. My sense, correct me if

846
01:00:28.239 --> 01:00:30.000
I'm wrong, churis. My sense
is that they often try to blend in

847
01:00:30.039 --> 01:00:34.119
with the local law enforcement guys and
you just never really know. Okay,

848
01:00:34.119 --> 01:00:36.480
So here's the perfect example, right, and this is where we're gonna go

849
01:00:36.559 --> 01:00:39.079
somewhere down the line. So in
my crazy life. We haven't got two

850
01:00:39.159 --> 01:00:44.039
yet. I ended up in Patriot
Day, the movie about the Boston marathon

851
01:00:44.079 --> 01:00:47.599
bombing, right Buddy, Mine's a
movie director, and I ended up righting

852
01:00:47.639 --> 01:00:52.079
part of it, and I ended
up being playing a guy they call the

853
01:00:52.800 --> 01:00:54.320
Virginian. His name is Derek.
I'm not going to say his last name,

854
01:00:54.320 --> 01:00:59.239
but he was the head of a
hostage rescue team component that went into

855
01:00:59.280 --> 01:01:04.559
Boston to get the Sarnev brothers.
Once they'd been identified, they found one

856
01:01:04.599 --> 01:01:07.320
of the kids in the boat in
the backyard. And maybe you've seen the

857
01:01:07.320 --> 01:01:10.280
movie. If you've seen the movie, there's there's a Netflix documentary on the

858
01:01:10.280 --> 01:01:14.239
Boston bombing too that okay, I
found very interesting. Okay, Well,

859
01:01:14.239 --> 01:01:15.760
these guys came in and it was
funny because he's thinking, can a fast

860
01:01:15.840 --> 01:01:20.599
rope in and and uh, you
know, saved the day for Boston.

861
01:01:20.639 --> 01:01:22.920
What they came in in a minivan. They got to Boston, all the

862
01:01:22.920 --> 01:01:28.199
rent at cars were taken, and
so they showed up at the gunfight in

863
01:01:28.199 --> 01:01:32.199
a minivan and went out and instead
of coming in and saying, like you

864
01:01:32.280 --> 01:01:35.599
see in the movies where the FBI, we got it, boss, you

865
01:01:35.639 --> 01:01:37.599
know, and whatever you hitting the
piston match. They went in, talked

866
01:01:38.840 --> 01:01:45.079
behind the scenes with the Boston police
entities, not just a Boston police department,

867
01:01:45.239 --> 01:01:46.079
And you talk to any of them, and I have. I've talked

868
01:01:46.119 --> 01:01:49.559
to them all and dragged beer with
them, and you know the time I

869
01:01:49.639 --> 01:01:51.960
was up there for the movie,
which was two months or whatever. And

870
01:01:52.000 --> 01:01:54.559
to a person, they'll all say
the same thing that who were those guys?

871
01:01:55.039 --> 01:01:59.239
They were remarkable that the way they
came in out of nowhere, they

872
01:01:59.280 --> 01:02:05.039
contributed, they helped to resolve it
in a professional, tactical and silent manner,

873
01:02:05.360 --> 01:02:09.320
and disappeared without a press release.
And I think to this day you

874
01:02:09.360 --> 01:02:14.639
would talk to anybody involved in that
situation and they'll still say the same thing,

875
01:02:14.920 --> 01:02:17.480
who were those guys? Yeah,
And that's what you want, an

876
01:02:17.599 --> 01:02:22.639
entity that is so good even to
this And I'll say this, Once HRT

877
01:02:22.800 --> 01:02:25.079
got the guys out of the boat
or they talked to him, a negotiator

878
01:02:25.320 --> 01:02:30.280
who happened to be this remarkable guy. He was an HRT operator, became

879
01:02:30.320 --> 01:02:34.719
a negotiator, left the team,
became a negotiator, and he talked him

880
01:02:34.719 --> 01:02:42.119
out of the boat and HRT affected
the catcher. But rather than hook the

881
01:02:42.159 --> 01:02:45.519
guy up and take him away,
the best known terrorist in America at the

882
01:02:45.559 --> 01:02:49.840
time. Once it was resolved in
the backyard, away from the cameras and

883
01:02:49.880 --> 01:02:52.880
away from everybody else, they turned
it to a component of all the different

884
01:02:52.920 --> 01:02:59.719
law enforcement organizations who went in handcuffed
him and took him out themselves and brought

885
01:02:59.800 --> 01:03:07.199
him to justice. Meaning they went
in resolved and disappeared. And what the

886
01:03:07.400 --> 01:03:13.360
quiet professionalism you would most want in
an entity like that. There were absolutely

887
01:03:13.480 --> 01:03:22.480
remarkable group of guys, Yeah,
that have been very badly misunderstood, mischaracterized,

888
01:03:22.159 --> 01:03:28.960
and I hope that changes. But
another moment, you know, kind

889
01:03:28.960 --> 01:03:32.679
of wrapping up the HRT stuff,
another moment that stands out all these years

890
01:03:32.760 --> 01:03:37.480
later from from your book is you
talked about being down, you know,

891
01:03:37.559 --> 01:03:42.079
behind your long gun out at the
range one day shooting. You're going to

892
01:03:42.119 --> 01:03:45.599
the Marine Corps Scout sniper cours as
I recall, Yeah, I graduated Marine

893
01:03:45.639 --> 01:03:49.800
cors Scot Sniper school, and so
you're you're out there on the range shooting

894
01:03:49.960 --> 01:03:52.239
and you said you got up and
you just realized that they you were,

895
01:03:52.000 --> 01:03:55.159
you were done. You had proved
everything you felt you had approved to yourself

896
01:03:55.159 --> 01:03:59.239
behind a rifle. Well, could
you talk a little bit about like what

897
01:03:59.280 --> 01:04:01.440
that moment was. I mean,
you said also quitting HRT was like one

898
01:04:01.440 --> 01:04:10.320
of the hardest decisions of your life. Well, I wrote a book about

899
01:04:10.360 --> 01:04:14.079
it, you know. But the
book came out twenty three years ago.

900
01:04:14.199 --> 01:04:17.159
Yeah, twenty three years ago,
and not happened after that. Well you

901
01:04:17.199 --> 01:04:20.280
can see it had like an outsized, you know, impact on a teenage

902
01:04:20.360 --> 01:04:24.000
Jack Murphy. You know. Yes, these things stand out my mind.

903
01:04:24.159 --> 01:04:27.400
No, and listen, what I
wrote about it at that time was accurate,

904
01:04:27.719 --> 01:04:30.840
It was honest, and I'm and
I stand by what I wrote.

905
01:04:31.079 --> 01:04:33.840
There was a day when it was
over. It was more complex than that.

906
01:04:33.880 --> 01:04:35.599
And here's why. Yeah, I
way it out. Man, when

907
01:04:35.639 --> 01:04:39.840
you're an FBI agent and you want
if you're an FBI agent, you can't

908
01:04:39.840 --> 01:04:42.400
have an outside job, right,
you can't work on the side to make

909
01:04:42.440 --> 01:04:45.159
more money. You've got to get
anything has to be approved. If you

910
01:04:45.199 --> 01:04:47.239
write a book, you're stepping in
ship. Yeah, you just can't write

911
01:04:47.239 --> 01:04:50.840
a book if you're an FBI agent. But what we haven't discussed yet is

912
01:04:51.400 --> 01:04:55.079
I didn't want to become an FBI
agent. I wanted to write books.

913
01:04:55.360 --> 01:04:58.280
I grew up. I thought it
was going to be. I was a

914
01:04:58.320 --> 01:05:00.960
speechwriter. I went to Californity to
be a rock star right out of college.

915
01:05:01.039 --> 01:05:03.400
Right I went to California be a
rock star. I didn't work out

916
01:05:03.440 --> 01:05:08.280
very well. So I served and
I was a bartender and I wrote.

917
01:05:08.320 --> 01:05:11.480
I got my first gig writing for
Orange Coast magazine, Big Deal. I

918
01:05:11.480 --> 01:05:15.519
wrote about alternative energy in the eighties. Right then I got hired from there

919
01:05:16.039 --> 01:05:20.119
to teach English at a boarding school. So I went to the Berkshire School

920
01:05:20.519 --> 01:05:26.519
in western Massachusetts, and I taught
English and ran the theater program. That's

921
01:05:26.519 --> 01:05:29.840
what I thought I was going to
do with my life. I had no

922
01:05:29.920 --> 01:05:32.800
interest in all this other stuff.
Then I went from there to a newspaper.

923
01:05:34.079 --> 01:05:36.199
We're going to get to the rest
of the story. I went to

924
01:05:36.280 --> 01:05:42.039
the North Adams Transcript in North Adams, Massachusetts, and I became the city

925
01:05:42.039 --> 01:05:47.480
hall reporter, so magazine writer,
rock filled rock star magazine reporter, English

926
01:05:47.480 --> 01:05:53.599
teacher at a boarding school, newspaper
reporter. I left the newspaper reporting job

927
01:05:53.679 --> 01:06:00.119
for a couple of different reasons.
And the guy that took my job was

928
01:06:00.199 --> 01:06:04.960
Danny Pearl. Daniel Pearl, Yeah, he took He took the city hall

929
01:06:05.719 --> 01:06:10.079
reporting job the North Adams Transcript.
He was even the same fraternity I was

930
01:06:10.119 --> 01:06:13.079
in. I was Aha Alpha Delta
Phi fraternity in college, and so was

931
01:06:13.079 --> 01:06:16.480
he. These these bizarre parallels that
kind of follow through my life. But

932
01:06:16.519 --> 01:06:23.519
I left the newspaper and I got
called by this congressman who said he had

933
01:06:23.519 --> 01:06:25.639
read an article that I had written
about him, and said, hey,

934
01:06:25.679 --> 01:06:28.000
you want to come to work for
me. But I said, all right,

935
01:06:28.079 --> 01:06:29.800
I got on a bus, or
excuse me, I got on a

936
01:06:29.840 --> 01:06:31.519
train and I went to DC and
I wrote speeches. So it had all

937
01:06:31.559 --> 01:06:34.920
been writing, it had all been
chasing art, It had all been something

938
01:06:35.199 --> 01:06:40.320
that had nothing to do with law
enforcement, but always with the CIA and

939
01:06:40.360 --> 01:06:44.519
the back of my mind because of
Uncle Harold. I mean, I literally

940
01:06:44.559 --> 01:06:50.039
grew up at the farm with surrounded
by guys with weird guns and recording devices

941
01:06:50.559 --> 01:06:55.400
and people coming from Chile to try
to kill him. And I mean you

942
01:06:55.400 --> 01:06:57.679
can read about all this in the
New York Times, in various books.

943
01:06:57.679 --> 01:07:00.119
I'm you know, I'm not exaggerating. Any of it was wild. So

944
01:07:00.199 --> 01:07:04.360
anyway, so I got into the
FBI and it went from there, but

945
01:07:04.480 --> 01:07:09.199
that's not where it was originally intended
to go. So while I was in

946
01:07:09.239 --> 01:07:14.000
the FBI. I continued to write
after Ruby Ridge. I wrote a novel

947
01:07:14.719 --> 01:07:18.960
called Rules of Engagement, and it
was basically about a white supremacist group and

948
01:07:19.000 --> 01:07:24.639
a guy goes in undercover and had
a lot of overtones of Ruby Ridge.

949
01:07:24.880 --> 01:07:28.239
I kind of played it out in
a novel. Couldn't sell it, couldn't

950
01:07:28.280 --> 01:07:30.920
get arrested. In those days,
you would send out a self draft stamped

951
01:07:31.000 --> 01:07:35.239
envelope in a query letter and they
would stack some of them. You know,

952
01:07:35.280 --> 01:07:40.840
it's just the stories were ridiculous.
Couldn't do anything, and then one

953
01:07:40.960 --> 01:07:45.239
day, well backup on a second. So I wrote one of these.

954
01:07:45.639 --> 01:07:48.960
I wrote this novel. One of
the guys on the team had gone to

955
01:07:49.079 --> 01:07:55.239
law school with a guy named let's
called Joe. He's gone in law school

956
01:07:55.239 --> 01:08:00.320
with a guy named Joe. Joe
had moved to Hollywood and he was trying

957
01:08:00.320 --> 01:08:02.679
to make it as a screenwriter.
My buddy said, I'll introduce you guys,

958
01:08:02.719 --> 01:08:05.239
maybe you can turn a novel and
a screenplay. He did. We

959
01:08:05.360 --> 01:08:12.719
tried. He introduced me to another
guy who will call him Pete. His

960
01:08:12.800 --> 01:08:15.480
name is Pete. He's a big
movie director at the time. He wasn't

961
01:08:15.480 --> 01:08:18.159
at the time he was an unemployed
actor, and then they introduced me to

962
01:08:18.279 --> 01:08:23.640
this person and that person, and
it was this who's who of household names

963
01:08:24.159 --> 01:08:29.760
who were just getting started. Tayleyoni
and Jason Patrick, Christy Turlington, this

964
01:08:29.840 --> 01:08:31.760
guy Terry Quinn, this New York
City firefighter, Terry Quinn is one of

965
01:08:31.760 --> 01:08:34.520
the most remarkable guys you ever met
in your life. He would have Cindy

966
01:08:34.560 --> 01:08:39.279
Crawford would come up to the firehouse
and cook dinner and they and he had

967
01:08:39.520 --> 01:08:42.640
one of the hottest clubs in New
York. He's a prince of the city.

968
01:08:42.640 --> 01:08:45.359
And everybody, Eric Roberts and Vince
Vaughn, I mean, anybody that

969
01:08:45.479 --> 01:08:49.720
was big in those days all came
through that circle. And they all started

970
01:08:49.720 --> 01:08:55.600
out with this guy in the FBI
who had a forty five and was,

971
01:08:56.159 --> 01:08:59.760
you know, flying around the world
doing all this weird shite. So somehow

972
01:09:00.199 --> 01:09:02.520
it all came together where I was
on the hostage rescue team. I had

973
01:09:02.520 --> 01:09:05.479
written a book that took me to
Hollywood, and all of a sudden,

974
01:09:05.520 --> 01:09:10.439
I'm hanging out with people at the
time who were just trying to make it

975
01:09:10.479 --> 01:09:15.359
and now they're all huge stars,
including one who I met at the Mercer

976
01:09:15.439 --> 01:09:18.239
hotel. So I mean everybody as
a clubhouse, right, we had a

977
01:09:18.239 --> 01:09:20.960
clubhouse in la and a clubhouse in
New York. The clubhouse in New York

978
01:09:21.000 --> 01:09:25.159
at that time was the Mercer Hotel
when it opened. For those who don't

979
01:09:25.199 --> 01:09:30.239
know, SOHO in the late nineties
was kind of a hellhole, right,

980
01:09:30.239 --> 01:09:32.359
it was. The Gougenheim was there. He had Lucky Strike and Finelli Bob

981
01:09:32.399 --> 01:09:36.600
the bartender at Finelli's right. And
but for those who don't know, the

982
01:09:36.960 --> 01:09:43.920
Mercer Hotel was Andre Blaje opened this
really swine hotel and you had to be

983
01:09:43.960 --> 01:09:46.199
somebody to stay there. And I
got to stay there because all my friends

984
01:09:46.199 --> 01:09:48.439
were somebody, right. I was
just a mutt. I was an idiot.

985
01:09:49.199 --> 01:09:51.520
And so one day I go up. I had just come back from

986
01:09:51.600 --> 01:09:55.640
Yemen. I'd just done a gig
in Yemen, which I'd like to talk

987
01:09:55.640 --> 01:10:00.000
about, and so I go up, and I think we would go up

988
01:10:00.199 --> 01:10:01.800
have these fascinating dinners. I was
up one dinner and one night it was

989
01:10:02.079 --> 01:10:08.119
lou Reid and Henry Kissinger at this
Turkish restaurant. I mean, you never

990
01:10:08.199 --> 01:10:11.479
knew who was going to show up. It was wild and it was you

991
01:10:11.520 --> 01:10:15.079
know, it was three years or
something. It was a long So anyway,

992
01:10:16.039 --> 01:10:18.680
I go to the Mersey Hotel,
just got back from Yemen. It's

993
01:10:18.680 --> 01:10:21.960
almost Christmas. I go, what
do we doing tonight? Big dinner party.

994
01:10:23.039 --> 01:10:26.600
He says, no, we're playing
cards, and I said, whatever,

995
01:10:26.600 --> 01:10:29.159
We go up. We're having a
card game. All the boys coming

996
01:10:29.199 --> 01:10:32.239
in. One guy, you know, meeting all these guys. One of

997
01:10:32.279 --> 01:10:36.000
the guys's Red Pitt, one of
the greatest guys in the world. All

998
01:10:36.039 --> 01:10:40.880
the ship that you see, you
know, the pikey look, and you

999
01:10:40.920 --> 01:10:43.239
know, the tongue and his teeth
and stuff like that. He's just a

1000
01:10:43.279 --> 01:10:46.439
guy. He's just a fucking incredible
actor, but just a guy. If

1001
01:10:46.439 --> 01:10:51.439
he was sitting here now, he'd
be like whatever. Anyway, in that

1002
01:10:51.560 --> 01:10:56.600
card game, I ended up winning
eight thousand dollars in cash I didn't even

1003
01:10:56.640 --> 01:11:00.479
have. I had a two kids, a government job, a mortgage.

1004
01:11:01.399 --> 01:11:03.840
I don't even think I had the
money for the buy in. I went

1005
01:11:03.960 --> 01:11:12.199
eight thousand dollars and the next morning
I sell my first book and I get

1006
01:11:12.239 --> 01:11:15.960
an agent. I get The whole
thing came together just like that, so

1007
01:11:15.960 --> 01:11:18.760
I couldn't get arrested selling the novel
that I meet all these guys in Hollywood

1008
01:11:19.039 --> 01:11:23.640
have this insane three or four or
five years and then I saw my first

1009
01:11:23.640 --> 01:11:27.560
book at a card game with Brad
Pitt and uh and then everything changed,

1010
01:11:27.640 --> 01:11:30.279
everything everything, And that's what would
the you know, your decision over.

1011
01:11:30.479 --> 01:11:33.399
Yeah. So so I did not
retire from the FBI. Have to be

1012
01:11:33.520 --> 01:11:38.720
quite yet fifty and twenty, and
I think I was. I think I

1013
01:11:38.720 --> 01:11:45.920
had eighteen years in government service because
I was so amidst all this Hollywood partying

1014
01:11:45.960 --> 01:11:47.319
and shin digs. I mean,
what was the the Yemen job that you

1015
01:11:47.359 --> 01:11:51.199
went hit on? In between this
one particular job was the cold the coal

1016
01:11:51.279 --> 01:11:56.479
bombing? And I'll say this just
because you know we talk about Ruby Ridge

1017
01:11:56.520 --> 01:11:58.960
and Waco. Oh what I was
going to say, The reason I started

1018
01:11:59.039 --> 01:12:01.479
up talking about this book is the
FBI said you can write this book.

1019
01:12:01.520 --> 01:12:04.359
And I've got to go back in
time and say, people have said,

1020
01:12:04.359 --> 01:12:06.520
well, why would you write a
book about HRT? Why would you write

1021
01:12:06.520 --> 01:12:10.960
a book about the FBI? And
the reality is that I've not talked about

1022
01:12:11.039 --> 01:12:15.720
much in public, But the reality
is that the FBI was us Right,

1023
01:12:15.079 --> 01:12:18.399
you say they did this, and
that's bullshit. The FBI at the time

1024
01:12:18.520 --> 01:12:21.760
was the three of us. Literally, I mean it's guys. I knew

1025
01:12:21.760 --> 01:12:26.600
everybody right, and these guys,
this group of friends, these group of

1026
01:12:26.600 --> 01:12:30.960
people that I was the new decided
it would be a good idea to support

1027
01:12:30.960 --> 01:12:38.000
a book that wrote in realistic terms
and honest ways about the good parts of

1028
01:12:38.039 --> 01:12:42.000
the FBI coming out of Waco and
coming out of Ruby Ridge and looking at

1029
01:12:42.439 --> 01:12:46.119
something that was a positive way where
a small town kid from New Hampshire grows

1030
01:12:46.199 --> 01:12:51.880
up, joins the FBI and has
all these experiences. So when Cold Zero

1031
01:12:51.960 --> 01:12:58.600
came out, it was fully one
hundred percent sponsored and backed by the Federal

1032
01:12:58.600 --> 01:13:05.720
burb of Investigation, meaning specific individuals
at headquarters who supported this to the point

1033
01:13:05.720 --> 01:13:11.560
where they even brought Brian Williams and
NBC News and all these other entities down

1034
01:13:11.560 --> 01:13:14.840
to go through the shooting house.
They rolled out the red carpet to try

1035
01:13:14.880 --> 01:13:16.800
to support the book when it came
out. So I've not talked about that

1036
01:13:16.880 --> 01:13:20.039
in great length, but I didn't. I didn't do just the book just

1037
01:13:20.159 --> 01:13:30.000
for those reasons. It was a
fully supported public relations support from the FBI.

1038
01:13:30.520 --> 01:13:33.920
So the book came out, and
the book was scheduled to be released

1039
01:13:34.199 --> 01:13:38.840
on September twelfth, two thousand and
one. So, like I said,

1040
01:13:38.880 --> 01:13:40.760
you can't write a book and stay
in the FBI. So I had to

1041
01:13:40.760 --> 01:13:44.239
resign. So I said, Okay, the book's coming out on September twelfth,

1042
01:13:45.279 --> 01:13:48.800
So I put in my resignation and
I was in London the two weeks

1043
01:13:48.800 --> 01:13:53.119
before nine to eleven. I flew
back to the United States on September tenth.

1044
01:13:53.279 --> 01:13:56.600
I got back at midnight September tenth, two thousand and one, on

1045
01:13:56.680 --> 01:14:02.239
a seven forty seven, sitting right
behind the upper deck, right behind the

1046
01:14:01.960 --> 01:14:05.760
cat the cockpit, and the door
was opened. In those days in two

1047
01:14:05.800 --> 01:14:10.680
thousand and one September tenth, two
thousand and one, you could go and

1048
01:14:10.760 --> 01:14:15.000
sit A first class passenger could sit
in a jump seat on the flight deck

1049
01:14:15.319 --> 01:14:19.279
behind the captain of a seven forty
seven landing at Dullas Airport YEA. And

1050
01:14:19.319 --> 01:14:25.199
I was sitting in my seat holding
a wood handle serrated edge state knife,

1051
01:14:25.640 --> 01:14:28.880
looking at the back of the captain's
head, thinking this is unseat. The

1052
01:14:29.079 --> 01:14:32.680
saying right and terrors, I mean, hijacking was already a thing. So

1053
01:14:32.720 --> 01:14:35.479
that I got home, got a
few hours sleep, and went into my

1054
01:14:35.520 --> 01:14:42.760
office at the Critical Incident Response Group
on September eleventh, sign to sign your

1055
01:14:42.760 --> 01:14:45.560
papers, basically saying goodbye everybodek And
I was supposed to go to New York

1056
01:14:45.800 --> 01:14:50.359
that afternoon to do Larry King Live
because that was part of the press junket.

1057
01:14:50.720 --> 01:14:56.039
And September twelfth and next morning was
my first book signing at the Borders

1058
01:14:56.479 --> 01:15:00.399
at the South Tower Mall at the
South Tower of the World Trade Center the

1059
01:15:00.520 --> 01:15:04.359
next morning. So then I have
the exact same experience you and everybody else

1060
01:15:04.399 --> 01:15:09.000
had. Sit in my desk.
I had three televisions in my office talking

1061
01:15:09.000 --> 01:15:11.920
to the guys about how we got
to do something about state knives and seven

1062
01:15:12.000 --> 01:15:15.560
forty seven. Somebody goes, holy
shit, look at that, and we

1063
01:15:15.600 --> 01:15:19.039
all had the exact same experience at
the same time. So now I've got

1064
01:15:19.039 --> 01:15:24.640
to leave the FBI on September eleventh, which feels kind of like what you

1065
01:15:24.640 --> 01:15:27.479
would expect, you know, made
me want to throw up. It was

1066
01:15:27.760 --> 01:15:31.479
it was. It was a horrible
moment. And then going to New York.

1067
01:15:31.520 --> 01:15:33.399
I did go to New York,
and then you see the smoke coming

1068
01:15:33.479 --> 01:15:42.000
up from the towers, and so
I guess we can move on to something

1069
01:15:42.000 --> 01:15:45.920
else. But questions before we get
to the next stage the Yemen. Oh,

1070
01:15:45.960 --> 01:15:49.760
the Yemen. I'm sorry, so
Yemen. That particularly Yemen trip was

1071
01:15:49.760 --> 01:15:57.359
the USS coal bombing. And because
the FBI investigates terrorist acts, Remember what

1072
01:15:57.399 --> 01:16:01.199
I was saying, that terrorism want
to mary enterprise American citizens. Someone in

1073
01:16:01.199 --> 01:16:04.920
the federal government decided that it was
the purview of the FBI, not NCIS

1074
01:16:05.079 --> 01:16:08.960
or other organizations. But I want
to bring it up for this reason because

1075
01:16:09.199 --> 01:16:13.520
we talked now after the two longest
wars in American history, and all the

1076
01:16:13.560 --> 01:16:16.439
things that we should have learned since
two thousand and one in Afghanistan and Iraq,

1077
01:16:17.079 --> 01:16:21.039
and I went and I just got
to point this picture. We the

1078
01:16:21.079 --> 01:16:27.079
FBI flew a component on A there's
probably a C five. I guess whatever.

1079
01:16:27.119 --> 01:16:29.760
I think I went over on A. I might have gone over on

1080
01:16:29.800 --> 01:16:36.840
a different hot but went into land
still Germany Ramstein and interviewed some of the

1081
01:16:36.880 --> 01:16:41.319
sailors had been blown up. And
I wrote about it in the book and

1082
01:16:41.800 --> 01:16:45.520
about what it was like to watch
that skiff run out toward the USS coal

1083
01:16:45.880 --> 01:16:50.960
with a guy in a bow waving
and smiling and then detonating the bomb and

1084
01:16:50.960 --> 01:16:54.359
blowing everybody up. And I'm talking
to this guy and his face is half

1085
01:16:54.359 --> 01:16:58.479
blown off and he's all fucked up, and he was courageous, he was

1086
01:16:58.600 --> 01:17:01.119
composed, and all we wanted to
do is give us information so we could

1087
01:17:01.159 --> 01:17:06.000
find them. Cut on another plane
flew into aid and Yemen. When we

1088
01:17:06.039 --> 01:17:11.600
flew into aid and Yemen, the
Yemeni military locked on us with surface to

1089
01:17:11.640 --> 01:17:15.760
air missile radar. We did a
combat spiral, you know, we bit

1090
01:17:15.800 --> 01:17:20.119
on those things there. Unpleasant landings
right, and slammed down on the runway

1091
01:17:20.920 --> 01:17:25.840
and promptly sit there for four hours
on the plane because the many military came

1092
01:17:25.840 --> 01:17:30.439
out and circled the plane with belt
fed machine guns and wouldn't let us off

1093
01:17:30.479 --> 01:17:34.760
the plane. Eventually somebody prevailed.
We got off and they took us to

1094
01:17:34.760 --> 01:17:41.199
the Aidan hotel and then they surrounded
the hotel with guys with machine guns.

1095
01:17:41.359 --> 01:17:44.920
But it was not tell them that
you were coming. Well, they did

1096
01:17:45.039 --> 01:17:47.119
tell them we were coming. But
okay, we're getting there, and there's

1097
01:17:47.119 --> 01:17:49.479
a point in this whole story,
the point in the story. Well,

1098
01:17:49.800 --> 01:17:54.159
so now we get in the hotel, we being I don't know what it

1099
01:17:54.199 --> 01:17:58.159
was, maybe two hundred FBI agents
or something like that, and but we

1100
01:17:58.199 --> 01:18:02.199
can't leave. But this I bring
this up because this is how so many

1101
01:18:02.239 --> 01:18:06.359
operations I've worked on in my life
went before we got it all figured out.

1102
01:18:06.399 --> 01:18:10.680
I mean, we did things in
those two wars that got threings straightened

1103
01:18:10.680 --> 01:18:12.920
out. In those days, it
was not. And here's where we're going.

1104
01:18:13.399 --> 01:18:17.319
So in Yemen, they chew the
ship called cotton, right, they

1105
01:18:17.399 --> 01:18:20.119
call it mirror there, but it's
cotton. It's the same thing, and

1106
01:18:20.479 --> 01:18:24.239
uh, you know, it turns
your mouth all arms and you get all

1107
01:18:24.239 --> 01:18:29.279
fucked up. And these guys had
they had I don't know that. I

1108
01:18:29.319 --> 01:18:31.279
think they had. Mostly they had
pkms, and I think they had some

1109
01:18:31.359 --> 01:18:36.239
douscas to some dshk heavies and most
of their stuff was Russian, including the

1110
01:18:36.239 --> 01:18:41.479
anti aircraft stuff was rushing. So
we get in, We go in the

1111
01:18:41.479 --> 01:18:44.359
hotel and you go in there's a
little bit of a lobby. There was

1112
01:18:44.399 --> 01:18:47.319
a bar. Now it's a dry
country, but they had a bar and

1113
01:18:47.359 --> 01:18:53.439
then cafeteria, and the Yemenes had
decided to let the bad guys in,

1114
01:18:54.039 --> 01:18:57.399
so but they wouldn't let us out. So we're in there and we all

1115
01:18:57.479 --> 01:19:01.239
got M four's and forty fives and
they've all got a K forty seven's and

1116
01:19:01.279 --> 01:19:05.560
beards, and we're sitting and we're
having breakfast together. So there's a table

1117
01:19:05.600 --> 01:19:11.439
of us and a table of them, and you know you're ready to go,

1118
01:19:11.600 --> 01:19:13.520
and they're ready to go. And
it was like that day after a

1119
01:19:13.640 --> 01:19:15.760
day, and they could come and
go all day want and it was the

1120
01:19:15.760 --> 01:19:17.039
same people. You could look out
and you could see the coal, you

1121
01:19:17.039 --> 01:19:23.239
could see the ship with a hole
in it. So this is where the

1122
01:19:23.239 --> 01:19:26.560
story's going. So I want to
tell the whole story. But one of

1123
01:19:26.560 --> 01:19:29.560
the weirdest gigs I ever played,
they had had a bar in there,

1124
01:19:30.119 --> 01:19:34.039
and the head of the hotel had
gone to the Cornell School of Hotel Operations,

1125
01:19:34.159 --> 01:19:40.159
or I mean American. I went
in there one one night and there

1126
01:19:40.199 --> 01:19:43.680
was a band playing. Now granted
there's nobody there, but there's a nine

1127
01:19:43.680 --> 01:19:46.920
piece band playing and I see a
guitar leaning it up on an amplifier,

1128
01:19:46.960 --> 01:19:48.720
and I'd like to play guitar,
And I said, hey, I think

1129
01:19:48.760 --> 01:19:53.079
they'd let me sit in. So
I go up on the stage and my

1130
01:19:53.119 --> 01:19:55.640
buddies are mortified, Right, what
the fuck are you talking about. You're

1131
01:19:55.640 --> 01:19:58.800
not going to go up and play
guitar in a band? But I did,

1132
01:19:59.399 --> 01:20:02.560
and so we play Proud Mary keeps
On, or we played some like,

1133
01:20:02.600 --> 01:20:05.279
you know, many music, and
then they played Proud Mary. And

1134
01:20:05.319 --> 01:20:08.279
then this guy looks at me.
Didn't speak a word of English, and

1135
01:20:08.279 --> 01:20:13.640
he goes Hotel California, and I'll
go, I know that one didn't speak

1136
01:20:13.640 --> 01:20:17.680
any English whatsoever. We start the
intro and he's and he starts singing on

1137
01:20:17.840 --> 01:20:21.920
the dog does it in my hair. We're playing and ripping it up,

1138
01:20:23.079 --> 01:20:27.079
and here come two Russian belly dancers
who were doing a little hooking on the

1139
01:20:27.119 --> 01:20:30.239
side in the hotel. And I'm
standing on stage and I'm look out and

1140
01:20:30.239 --> 01:20:32.079
here's a bunch of my it's like
four or five guys at a table over

1141
01:20:32.119 --> 01:20:36.119
here with them fours. And here's
a table over here with a bunch of

1142
01:20:36.119 --> 01:20:41.960
guys with beards in a K forty
seven's And I'm playing Hotel California with two

1143
01:20:42.039 --> 01:20:45.760
Russian hooker belly dancers and a bunch
of guys who don't speak English. And

1144
01:20:45.800 --> 01:20:49.720
I'm thinking, man, this is
great, you know, yeah, yeah,

1145
01:20:50.279 --> 01:20:53.319
Jack Murphy, And I'm gonna tell
him this story. You can't make

1146
01:20:53.359 --> 01:20:57.199
it up. And I'm thinking this
is awesome. So I go back.

1147
01:20:58.439 --> 01:21:00.399
Everybody takes off. I go back. Oh, I had the m force

1148
01:21:00.479 --> 01:21:04.600
slung around my back and walk down
our stage, go to the elevator,

1149
01:21:04.680 --> 01:21:09.880
and we had the sixth floor.
The entire entity had the sixth floor,

1150
01:21:09.920 --> 01:21:12.840
so we'd get we were hot sheeting
bed so you get eight hours in a

1151
01:21:12.880 --> 01:21:17.079
bunk and then you'd sleep. Yeah, unpleasant way to get your rest.

1152
01:21:17.119 --> 01:21:21.359
But so I walk up, take
the elevator to the sixth floor and it

1153
01:21:21.399 --> 01:21:27.600
opens up in the hallways kind of
a why two hallways like why wings and

1154
01:21:27.640 --> 01:21:31.279
there is a Marine Corps fast team
there with a sixty behind sandbags pointed at

1155
01:21:31.279 --> 01:21:34.840
the elevated door. So it's like
for me, you know, it's twenty

1156
01:21:34.840 --> 01:21:39.359
feet away, and you get an
eighteen year old kid staring at you at

1157
01:21:39.359 --> 01:21:42.479
one o'clock in the morning after I've
been drinking two borgan playing with the house

1158
01:21:42.520 --> 01:21:45.840
band. We're going to Sigon.
We're going to Sigon, right, and

1159
01:21:45.880 --> 01:21:46.960
I'm and I just smile and say, hey, guys, you know,

1160
01:21:47.119 --> 01:21:50.359
can I get your coffee or whatever. So the bunks were all down this

1161
01:21:50.399 --> 01:21:54.880
wing. The other wing was all
the different entity, so their hotel rooms.

1162
01:21:54.880 --> 01:21:59.239
So it's FBI, CIA, d
I A NCIS. It was just

1163
01:21:59.399 --> 01:22:02.720
alphabet soup all the different offices.
And then at the end they had moved

1164
01:22:02.720 --> 01:22:09.560
the embassy from Snaw down to the
hotel, and the ambassador's name was Barbara

1165
01:22:09.600 --> 01:22:14.840
Bodine and she had come down,
so she was running all in country operations

1166
01:22:14.880 --> 01:22:18.640
from that hallway in that hotel.
And I get off and I still have

1167
01:22:18.760 --> 01:22:20.880
this. I was looking at it
the other day. I get off the

1168
01:22:20.920 --> 01:22:24.399
elevator and I'm walking down the hall
just to see what's going on, you

1169
01:22:24.399 --> 01:22:30.319
know, like you hang it out
in the command center. And it hands

1170
01:22:30.319 --> 01:22:32.800
me a piece of paper and it
says, I can't remember the exact words,

1171
01:22:32.800 --> 01:22:38.159
but it says something like, uh, we have received information that the

1172
01:22:38.279 --> 01:22:41.399
element that blew up the coal is
coming this way with a band full of

1173
01:22:41.399 --> 01:22:44.600
explore. They're gonna blow us up, right, And I go, uh

1174
01:22:44.800 --> 01:22:47.720
oh, And it says, you
know, destroy this or something like you're

1175
01:22:47.720 --> 01:22:51.159
not supposed to say, because yeah, yeah, exactly, because the whole

1176
01:22:51.159 --> 01:22:55.920
fucking thing was was wired right.
They told us everything was video and audio.

1177
01:22:56.000 --> 01:23:00.439
It was a fuck show. Ulous. So the the FBI program was

1178
01:23:00.520 --> 01:23:02.880
run by a guy named John O'Neill. John O'Neill, contrary to what Richard

1179
01:23:02.880 --> 01:23:05.680
Clark or any of these other guys
say nothing against Richard Clark. I liked

1180
01:23:05.680 --> 01:23:09.479
the guy. But what these guys
say. John O'Neill was the guy that

1181
01:23:09.560 --> 01:23:14.039
knew terrorism. He ran the what
at the time was called the UBL Task

1182
01:23:14.079 --> 01:23:16.159
Force Sama bin Lad Task Force in
New York Field office. And he was

1183
01:23:16.159 --> 01:23:20.760
the guy. Right. We would
go and support of him, but he

1184
01:23:20.880 --> 01:23:28.039
was the guy, so he was
running the investigation. Barbara Bodine despised him,

1185
01:23:28.079 --> 01:23:31.119
and anybody knows John O'Neill, A
lot of people despised him, or

1186
01:23:31.159 --> 01:23:34.199
a lot of people loved him too, right, but they were big personalities

1187
01:23:34.439 --> 01:23:39.960
and they hated each other, and
he would call her it was it was

1188
01:23:40.079 --> 01:23:43.760
ugly, right. So once the
word got out that they were coming to

1189
01:23:43.760 --> 01:23:47.840
blow us up, the US government
didn't want to have two hundred and more

1190
01:23:47.920 --> 01:23:50.800
FBI agents getting blown up at a
hotel to go with a coal bomb.

1191
01:23:50.840 --> 01:23:55.439
Here, it looks bad on TV, right, looks bad. If if

1192
01:23:55.439 --> 01:23:59.640
you're me, you know it's whatever. So so here's the way it goes

1193
01:23:59.680 --> 01:24:02.960
from here. And this is so
many operations I've been involved with the exact

1194
01:24:03.000 --> 01:24:08.239
same way. So John O'Neill says, fuck this, you're not going to

1195
01:24:08.359 --> 01:24:13.760
kill any FBI agent's on my watch. He calls the National Security Council.

1196
01:24:14.239 --> 01:24:17.600
The National Security Council calls the Pentagon. The Pentagon says, yeah, we'll

1197
01:24:17.640 --> 01:24:23.680
go get those guys. But they
locked on our C five with a surface

1198
01:24:23.680 --> 01:24:26.119
to air missile radar. When they
come in, tell them to turn that

1199
01:24:26.159 --> 01:24:30.439
shit off. Barbara Bodine says,
I'm not telling them to turn what to

1200
01:24:30.439 --> 01:24:35.960
do with their missile radar. And
in a hallway at the Aiden Hotel,

1201
01:24:36.720 --> 01:24:42.239
under the circumstances that I described,
you've got the Department of Justice at war

1202
01:24:42.359 --> 01:24:45.840
with the Department of Defense at war
with the Department of State, with Barbara

1203
01:24:45.840 --> 01:24:49.239
Bodine, the ambassador who is the
queen of the country, that's her country,

1204
01:24:49.600 --> 01:24:53.199
and John O'Neill, who was the
king of all that he surveyed.

1205
01:24:53.439 --> 01:24:58.680
He was a big personality, screaming
you mother, screaming all these insults.

1206
01:24:59.159 --> 01:25:02.279
And I was into mediary and I
was the guy two New Yorkers fighting over

1207
01:25:02.319 --> 01:25:08.840
a parking right and I'm standing there
and I'm trying. So I would talk

1208
01:25:08.880 --> 01:25:11.680
to her. Then I would talk
to him, and then the CIA would

1209
01:25:11.680 --> 01:25:13.479
come up and say you got to
do this, and the d I A

1210
01:25:13.640 --> 01:25:16.159
and the MCIs is pissed off because
it's you know, there were sailors that

1211
01:25:16.159 --> 01:25:23.359
were killed in the thing, and
it was absolutely insane. It was mayhem.

1212
01:25:23.399 --> 01:25:28.199
So eventually they ended up they being
somebody I don't even know who it

1213
01:25:28.239 --> 01:25:30.720
was, eventually ended up putting on
us. In a little bit of a

1214
01:25:30.760 --> 01:25:33.560
convoy. We drove out to the
port at in the dark. We got

1215
01:25:33.560 --> 01:25:38.840
on a fifth a couple of amphibious
landing vehicles, and we go out over

1216
01:25:38.880 --> 01:25:43.720
the horizon pitch black, and I'll
never forget it. You guys do this

1217
01:25:43.760 --> 01:25:45.000
all the time, a lot of
your years ago. You know what's so

1218
01:25:45.039 --> 01:25:49.640
big about that? But I had
never seen the nose of a naval ship

1219
01:25:49.920 --> 01:25:53.760
open up. It was the I
think it was a Duluth, the USS

1220
01:25:53.840 --> 01:25:57.319
Duluth. It was a helicopter carrier. And I remember, I don't even

1221
01:25:57.319 --> 01:25:59.720
know where we're going, right,
I got an M four and I'm going

1222
01:25:59.800 --> 01:26:02.479
to and I'm with a bunch of
people. I don't even know whether we

1223
01:26:02.520 --> 01:26:04.680
could have been going to Africa for
all I knew. I didn't know where

1224
01:26:04.680 --> 01:26:08.520
we're going. And I look,
somebody goes holy shit, and I look

1225
01:26:08.560 --> 01:26:11.520
up and it was just like a
James Bond movie where the front the nose

1226
01:26:11.600 --> 01:26:15.199
of the ship opened up and we
drive these amphibious vehicles up in the ship

1227
01:26:15.479 --> 01:26:18.840
and then the nose comes down and
then the red lights come on, and

1228
01:26:19.000 --> 01:26:21.840
you know, and then white lights
and stuff like that. And we hung

1229
01:26:21.880 --> 01:26:26.920
around there for I don't know,
we floated around for a couple of weeks

1230
01:26:26.920 --> 01:26:30.520
maybe, But I saw them when
they came up with the ship that sunk

1231
01:26:30.560 --> 01:26:34.119
down underneath the coal, lifted it
up and floated it back to the States.

1232
01:26:34.159 --> 01:26:39.960
But so that particularly Yemen mission was
interesting in a lot of ways.

1233
01:26:40.000 --> 01:26:44.199
It was tragic in obvious ways,
but it was interesting other ways, primarily

1234
01:26:44.239 --> 01:26:48.279
because everybody who thinks that what we
do for a living is all one lockstep,

1235
01:26:48.399 --> 01:26:53.960
smooth operation, it's it's never that. It's just in my experience,

1236
01:26:54.479 --> 01:27:00.359
Yeah, it was the clusterfuck every
time. Why did you going in that

1237
01:27:00.520 --> 01:27:04.439
the Yemen military, the Yemeny military, the government was willing to be so

1238
01:27:04.520 --> 01:27:10.000
hostile towards you, And what was
the US's responses to that? Response to

1239
01:27:10.039 --> 01:27:12.880
that? Given it, you guys
were there to do an investigation and you

1240
01:27:12.880 --> 01:27:18.359
couldn't do it right. I think
my personal perspective was I did so many

1241
01:27:18.399 --> 01:27:20.920
of them in so many places.
I just didn't give a shit. I

1242
01:27:20.960 --> 01:27:25.520
just assumed whenever I showed up someplace, we can talk about classifications, and

1243
01:27:25.560 --> 01:27:29.199
we can talk about whatever. But
my world was so bizarre that, you

1244
01:27:29.199 --> 01:27:31.079
know, I would show up for
dinner with Madonna, and then I would

1245
01:27:31.119 --> 01:27:35.399
show up in Yemen watching a fist
fight between the ambassador and the head of

1246
01:27:35.399 --> 01:27:39.600
the FBI. Yeah, it was. Everything was so bizarre. I didn't

1247
01:27:39.840 --> 01:27:42.880
I never wanted to know anything.
I just wanted to do what I could

1248
01:27:42.920 --> 01:27:45.159
do. Yeah. I just wanted
to do my little part, yeah,

1249
01:27:45.520 --> 01:27:48.600
and then go on to whatever the
next, whatever next was. So I

1250
01:27:48.640 --> 01:27:53.960
wonder if you ever crossed paths with
Gary Harrington. He had some interesting Yemen

1251
01:27:54.079 --> 01:27:57.359
stories about that time. I'm sure
I did. I had. I still

1252
01:27:57.399 --> 01:28:01.199
have a pass to the embassy in
Sanah, so I probably at some point

1253
01:28:01.239 --> 01:28:05.479
did. That's the other thing.
You know, I'm already taking too much

1254
01:28:05.479 --> 01:28:11.600
time. But we haven't got the
classifications or names yet. Which is I

1255
01:28:11.640 --> 01:28:15.000
mean, we've talked about everything I
didn't want to talk about so far,

1256
01:28:15.159 --> 01:28:17.399
but the really crazy shit. You
keep asking me these questions and I want

1257
01:28:17.439 --> 01:28:19.840
to tell you the answer, But
I've got to make sense of him somehow.

1258
01:28:20.520 --> 01:28:25.800
The thing about HRT at that time
was we were involved in everything,

1259
01:28:26.199 --> 01:28:28.760
right, it didn't matter what you
were. So people, can we just

1260
01:28:28.760 --> 01:28:32.560
go to classifications? Absolutely so classifications
as you guys well know, you get

1261
01:28:32.600 --> 01:28:36.000
into these gigs and you get a
t SSCI, right, that's that's basic.

1262
01:28:36.680 --> 01:28:41.760
There's only three real classifications. Right. And but when you get in

1263
01:28:41.840 --> 01:28:45.239
that, if you get in various
programs, you get read into different permissions,

1264
01:28:45.439 --> 01:28:47.159
and some of them could be very
broad, like Q. Right,

1265
01:28:47.319 --> 01:28:55.479
Q is DOE because Department of Energy
needed help moving, locating, dealing with

1266
01:28:55.600 --> 01:28:58.720
nukes in various ways. That was
our gig, right, So you got

1267
01:28:58.720 --> 01:29:01.319
to get QUE, and I say, I bring up Q. For this

1268
01:29:01.359 --> 01:29:05.399
reason. When I got Q,
you could say Q and you could say

1269
01:29:05.439 --> 01:29:10.359
Clarence. If you said Q clearance
in the same in that combination, it

1270
01:29:10.399 --> 01:29:14.439
was a felony, right, So
I go, well, why do I

1271
01:29:14.479 --> 01:29:15.560
want that? Right? I don't
want to. I don't want to.

1272
01:29:15.960 --> 01:29:17.840
Why do I give a shit?
I don't want to do this, Clarence.

1273
01:29:17.840 --> 01:29:20.319
You get into this weird position where
you can't say what your job is,

1274
01:29:20.399 --> 01:29:23.920
your own colleagues, you can't talk
to anybody. Yeah, which is

1275
01:29:24.119 --> 01:29:28.720
which is going back to Germany in
a second. So it's okay with Q

1276
01:29:28.920 --> 01:29:30.159
because that's one thing. But then
you get ready in on a on a

1277
01:29:30.239 --> 01:29:36.720
specific like all these parts, a
special access program that is one thing.

1278
01:29:38.720 --> 01:29:41.840
Here's one one example. I don't
know what I can say about this,

1279
01:29:42.319 --> 01:29:46.399
but I was involved in this one
thing that you could research it and google

1280
01:29:46.439 --> 01:29:50.439
it and you could find little bits
and pieces about that involve I'll just say

1281
01:29:50.439 --> 01:29:56.039
that it involves Osama bin Laden in
Sudan when he came out of Sudan in

1282
01:29:56.119 --> 01:29:59.199
ninety six, when he went to
Afghanistan. There was an aspect and I

1283
01:29:59.319 --> 01:30:02.840
almost say anything about it, but
it was it had a had a special

1284
01:30:02.840 --> 01:30:09.760
access handle, right, And I
was watching some Billy WASH's book. He

1285
01:30:09.840 --> 01:30:12.760
talks about it. Oh he does
well at the Hunt for Bin Laden and

1286
01:30:12.800 --> 01:30:15.479
Sudan. Does he name that program? I don't, I don't, probably

1287
01:30:15.520 --> 01:30:18.079
not, but Hunt Thing the Jackal
is his book he talks about being there.

1288
01:30:18.359 --> 01:30:23.920
So let's just say hypothetically I was
somehow involved in that. I was

1289
01:30:23.920 --> 01:30:26.560
watching back in the day when I
was doing a lot of TV. I

1290
01:30:26.640 --> 01:30:29.119
see this guy come on and I've
never seen him before, and he's doing

1291
01:30:29.760 --> 01:30:32.239
MSNBC or Fox. He's one of
those things. And he's getting up there

1292
01:30:32.279 --> 01:30:35.039
his first time on TV, and
he goes, yeah, blah blah blah,

1293
01:30:35.079 --> 01:30:39.079
and he spits out that fucking name, that specific thing, and I

1294
01:30:39.119 --> 01:30:42.399
almost choked on my brought worst or
whatever the hell I was doing at the

1295
01:30:42.399 --> 01:30:45.159
time, and I thought, I
can't believe he just said that on national

1296
01:30:45.199 --> 01:30:51.399
television. And then I realized at
that time how impossible it is to keep

1297
01:30:51.439 --> 01:30:56.199
track of secrets because there are so
many of them. I mean, when

1298
01:30:56.239 --> 01:31:00.880
I think about how many programs I've
been involved, like darper projects or specific

1299
01:31:00.920 --> 01:31:06.239
missions, were specific programs that are
that are like like some of those things

1300
01:31:06.239 --> 01:31:11.520
only last for a day or a
week or a month, and some of

1301
01:31:11.520 --> 01:31:15.479
them lasts longer. But anyway,
classifications. While I was on HRT and

1302
01:31:15.520 --> 01:31:20.359
then afterwards after I left, that
became a huge pain in the ask because

1303
01:31:20.399 --> 01:31:24.680
every time you get one, it's
more it's more ways to fuck up.

1304
01:31:24.760 --> 01:31:28.319
Yeah, right, yeah, And
here's where So I end up on another

1305
01:31:28.359 --> 01:31:31.680
gig, and I was doing something
in Germany and we were on the economy,

1306
01:31:31.720 --> 01:31:34.600
so I think we were working in
Ramstein, but we were living in

1307
01:31:34.600 --> 01:31:39.359
one of those little towns one of
those little villages around there, and uh

1308
01:31:39.840 --> 01:31:43.479
I was in It was the end
of the day. It's probably eleven o'clock

1309
01:31:43.520 --> 01:31:46.239
at night, and we're in one
of those little rath skullers drinking beer and

1310
01:31:46.279 --> 01:31:51.880
we had these two NSA guys who
in my experience were most often staff sergeants

1311
01:31:51.960 --> 01:31:58.079
in the in the Air Force right
there cover because official cover. Yeah,

1312
01:31:58.079 --> 01:32:00.239
they're administered by the Air Force.
Yeah, or were they actual Air Force?

1313
01:32:00.520 --> 01:32:03.680
A lot of time, yeah,
a lot of times you might actually

1314
01:32:03.720 --> 01:32:08.560
be yeah, exactly, Yeah,
it wasn't necessarily come yeah, and uh

1315
01:32:08.600 --> 01:32:12.640
I got to when one of the
thing to go back to in a minute.

1316
01:32:12.680 --> 01:32:15.720
But so anyways, so it's eleven
o'clock at night on a Thursday night,

1317
01:32:15.880 --> 01:32:18.359
having a couple of beers with the
boys, because you know, you're

1318
01:32:18.359 --> 01:32:24.079
not on twenty four hours a day
forever, and uh so these guys came

1319
01:32:24.159 --> 01:32:27.399
up. I knew who they were. I knew they were somehow involved with

1320
01:32:27.520 --> 01:32:29.880
us, but they were in a
different side of things. But I basically

1321
01:32:29.960 --> 01:32:31.880
knew what they were. It wasn't
a skiff, but it was a secure

1322
01:32:31.880 --> 01:32:34.119
comms thing that they were doing.
So they go up and they go,

1323
01:32:34.279 --> 01:32:38.960
sir, we need to talk to
somebody who has this, and they set

1324
01:32:39.000 --> 01:32:43.479
it out loud in a bar,
and my first reaction is, where's the

1325
01:32:43.520 --> 01:32:45.720
camera? Yeah, my first reaction
is that they were setting me upright,

1326
01:32:45.880 --> 01:32:49.000
because even when you're in something,
they'll still run ups on you just to

1327
01:32:49.000 --> 01:32:53.479
fuck with you, to make sure
that you're credible. So I'm sitting in

1328
01:32:53.479 --> 01:32:57.199
this bar and and I just had
this weird moment where I thought to myself,

1329
01:32:57.239 --> 01:32:59.319
what do I do? I mean, do I dim these poor kids

1330
01:32:59.319 --> 01:33:01.640
out? Because just trying to they're
trying to find somebody that they can pass

1331
01:33:01.680 --> 01:33:06.239
the COLMS traffic, you know,
for whatever else. But you just you

1332
01:33:06.359 --> 01:33:12.199
end up in those things all the
time where you never I personally, in

1333
01:33:12.319 --> 01:33:16.560
my experience, running across all of
those different things, I wouldn't know if

1334
01:33:16.560 --> 01:33:20.239
you were part of the gig,
or if you were on the gig just

1335
01:33:20.359 --> 01:33:24.680
to test me because you wanted to
get me off the gig. And it

1336
01:33:24.760 --> 01:33:29.640
just became insanely confusing. I've heard
that so many times that in those little

1337
01:33:29.680 --> 01:33:33.479
like that world of SAPs, that
it becomes kind of like cutthroat because like

1338
01:33:33.560 --> 01:33:38.000
as far as like being being read
onto all of these programs, some people

1339
01:33:38.039 --> 01:33:41.560
perceive that its power, and there's
always someone who wants to fuck you off

1340
01:33:41.560 --> 01:33:44.680
of the program so that they can
have it right. Well, plus there's

1341
01:33:44.720 --> 01:33:48.000
guys, and all they do.
Their entire job is just to go in

1342
01:33:48.039 --> 01:33:51.439
and try to find guys to to
wash them out. Yeah, that's all

1343
01:33:51.439 --> 01:33:59.680
they's It's like the internal affairs offer, but not just not just investigating,

1344
01:33:59.760 --> 01:34:01.560
but actually offering bribes to see what
you just do. That's exactly right.

1345
01:34:01.600 --> 01:34:06.760
Their entire job is a control officer, is to find vulnerabilities in the program.

1346
01:34:08.039 --> 01:34:10.920
So now I'm in Gramstein, Germany, getting ready for a real gig,

1347
01:34:11.560 --> 01:34:14.600
sitting there talking to my buddies,
and these two staff sergeants come up

1348
01:34:14.800 --> 01:34:16.920
and they either stepped on their dick
in a really bad way or they're stepping

1349
01:34:16.920 --> 01:34:19.119
on my dick in a really bad
way. And I had no clue as

1350
01:34:19.199 --> 01:34:23.840
to what it was. So those
become a big, big problem, became

1351
01:34:23.880 --> 01:34:30.479
a problem with me, names and
programs because just two quick examples, maybe

1352
01:34:30.479 --> 01:34:32.439
we're going off track here, No, okay, it's your track, So

1353
01:34:32.520 --> 01:34:35.920
there is true. I mean,
I know we're doing this thing, but

1354
01:34:36.119 --> 01:34:40.279
you know, we don't whiskey and
cigars and this guy's talking right, But

1355
01:34:40.600 --> 01:34:44.680
so anyways, the first one I
used to work, I used to go

1356
01:34:44.680 --> 01:34:46.319
to the farm a lot, not
the farm in the Hampshire, but can't

1357
01:34:46.359 --> 01:34:50.159
Perry. And because they you know, at the time, in the early

1358
01:34:50.239 --> 01:34:55.399
days of HRT, there was a
killhouse at Fort Bragg, there was one

1359
01:34:55.720 --> 01:35:00.640
at Little Creek, there's one at
HRT. And they had one a very

1360
01:35:00.760 --> 01:35:03.199
very crude one. I think it
was made out of canvas at Camp Perry.

1361
01:35:03.239 --> 01:35:08.119
But they had that track and you
can shoot and use any kind of

1362
01:35:08.119 --> 01:35:10.880
explosions you want on the track,
and we would use that so we would

1363
01:35:11.960 --> 01:35:15.479
just circle around. Everybody would oh
and we had the air the aircraft fuselages

1364
01:35:15.479 --> 01:35:20.680
at Davis month and for practice and
CCP on planes. So one of the

1365
01:35:20.680 --> 01:35:26.880
first times I go down to Camp
Perry and we're running. Uh we were

1366
01:35:26.920 --> 01:35:31.760
doing these. We used to wrap
axles with decord or flexi linear and blow

1367
01:35:31.800 --> 01:35:34.880
the wheels so that you could stop
somebody if you're like doing some kind of

1368
01:35:34.920 --> 01:35:40.119
an interdiction, right and uh,
so we're out. It's hot July or

1369
01:35:40.119 --> 01:35:45.680
August and Virginia. We're covered in
spawling and you know, a mess,

1370
01:35:45.840 --> 01:35:47.039
but you got to eat lunch.
So we go up to the cafeteria,

1371
01:35:47.199 --> 01:35:50.279
and you go into the cafeteria like
any of the cafeteria at the farm,

1372
01:35:50.319 --> 01:35:55.039
and were standing in line, and
we were all were in no Max flight

1373
01:35:55.079 --> 01:35:59.439
suits tied around our waist, and
you would never tell anybody who you were,

1374
01:35:59.560 --> 01:36:01.880
right, never. They told us
not to say anything to anybody.

1375
01:36:02.319 --> 01:36:05.119
And so we're standing in line and
there's these two chicks in front of us,

1376
01:36:05.279 --> 01:36:09.039
and they're looking and they're talking,
and they're looking and they're talking.

1377
01:36:09.319 --> 01:36:12.640
And this buddy in my Charlie,
was a real good looking guy, and

1378
01:36:13.279 --> 01:36:15.119
so I just figured they were hitting
on him or something. So finally they

1379
01:36:15.119 --> 01:36:19.159
turned to him and they go,
who are you guys anyway? And you

1380
01:36:19.199 --> 01:36:24.760
know, they're wearing their Royal Robin's
cargo pants and a Polo shirt, and

1381
01:36:24.880 --> 01:36:27.319
Charlie doesn't know what to say,
so it looks at him. He goes,

1382
01:36:27.960 --> 01:36:31.640
we're with the Justice Department. She
goes good cover, and you know,

1383
01:36:31.680 --> 01:36:39.479
it goes through. And I realized
sometime around that time that nobody is

1384
01:36:39.520 --> 01:36:42.800
anybody. I mean, I would
tell somebody on this, and somebody would

1385
01:36:42.800 --> 01:36:45.159
tell that we did a thing one
time. I don't I'm sure somebody,

1386
01:36:45.279 --> 01:36:47.399
maybe somebody who would watching this say
or were part of it. But we

1387
01:36:47.439 --> 01:36:53.880
got ready to do a hit one
time in a Caribbean island through a d

1388
01:36:53.960 --> 01:36:58.479
E A referral. So d EA
had found some violent gang that was doing

1389
01:36:58.520 --> 01:37:00.960
some drug thing. I have been
Saint Thomas, Saint Croix was, I

1390
01:37:00.960 --> 01:37:02.920
mean, you guys were down in
Puerto Rico a lot too. Back in

1391
01:37:02.920 --> 01:37:08.079
the Yeah, we were everywhere.
I mean just traveled. I think some

1392
01:37:08.119 --> 01:37:10.760
of those years we were on the
road three three twenty days a year.

1393
01:37:11.560 --> 01:37:15.359
It was constantly gone. So anyways, but it was it was a delta

1394
01:37:15.479 --> 01:37:20.439
app up. It was a delta
like some some kind of a training thing.

1395
01:37:20.479 --> 01:37:25.000
It wasn't a real thing, but
we almost went down on a d

1396
01:37:25.079 --> 01:37:30.800
E A referral to shoot it out
with Delta on Saint Thomas or Saint Croix

1397
01:37:30.159 --> 01:37:33.960
because we just didn't have the comms
in those days. Someone didn't deconflict it.

1398
01:37:34.600 --> 01:37:36.800
Yeah, I don't even think they
knew it. They didn't even have

1399
01:37:36.840 --> 01:37:42.039
that term rights, right, It
was just you just didn't have There were

1400
01:37:42.079 --> 01:37:45.520
no colms. There was just it
was a very very very different world of

1401
01:37:45.600 --> 01:37:48.000
those days. So talk to us
about you know, getting into all this

1402
01:37:48.279 --> 01:37:53.760
uh this murky world. Tell us
about you know, September twelfth, and

1403
01:37:53.800 --> 01:37:59.239
you know, driving down the street
Langley and the pah So for whatever reason,

1404
01:37:59.359 --> 01:38:00.079
and by the way, do you
want to drink? Do you want?

1405
01:38:00.119 --> 01:38:03.239
I think it's time? Do you
do you like rocks? I don't

1406
01:38:03.239 --> 01:38:06.079
care whatever you got, No,
we have just pour something in that one

1407
01:38:06.159 --> 01:38:12.399
right there would be fabulous for anybody
doesn't know what's going on. I purposely

1408
01:38:12.439 --> 01:38:15.920
did not want anything to drink for
a certain amount of time with you hooligans,

1409
01:38:15.960 --> 01:38:19.000
Like, there's no point in adding
alcohol to one of these conversations,

1410
01:38:20.680 --> 01:38:24.960
okay, which is what we're known
by known for by the like. I've

1411
01:38:24.960 --> 01:38:27.920
watched it a million times. Yeah, I watch all your shows. Thank

1412
01:38:27.960 --> 01:38:30.319
you, and I'm a huge fan. I think you guys do a remarkable

1413
01:38:30.359 --> 01:38:35.279
thing for America to give people an
idea. You bring people in in their

1414
01:38:35.319 --> 01:38:41.079
own words, they tell what they've
gone through. My experience is probably only

1415
01:38:41.159 --> 01:38:45.039
my experience. Everybody I've ever worked, will you know that's not the way

1416
01:38:45.039 --> 01:38:46.680
I remember it, But that's you
know. The beauty is you bring in

1417
01:38:47.399 --> 01:38:54.840
everybody. But the thing is we
wouldn't be here without people like you coming

1418
01:38:54.880 --> 01:38:58.680
in and willing to share your stories. I think you know we are humble

1419
01:38:58.800 --> 01:39:02.920
paupers in the presence of people like
you. I mean, okay, let

1420
01:39:02.960 --> 01:39:06.399
me just back up a second.
Let's suggest something. If people really know

1421
01:39:06.439 --> 01:39:11.800
what you guys did and do and
are, I'm the humble popper and it's

1422
01:39:12.039 --> 01:39:15.840
I'm an inteloper. I shouldn't even
be here. No, I mean every

1423
01:39:15.840 --> 01:39:18.279
guy we have on here, no
matter like how girls, how heroic they

1424
01:39:18.319 --> 01:39:21.600
were, and girl, it always
always plays like, oh man, you

1425
01:39:21.680 --> 01:39:25.039
have some like real heroes on there. Yeah, I don't think I should

1426
01:39:25.039 --> 01:39:27.520
be on there. And I'm like, yeah, like Dave said, I'm

1427
01:39:27.560 --> 01:39:30.600
like I was like a arranger and
a green beret for like a short period

1428
01:39:30.640 --> 01:39:33.199
of time and a little microscopic slice
of history. And I mean, I'm

1429
01:39:33.239 --> 01:39:36.000
just flattered to that these people give
me the time of day, and I

1430
01:39:36.079 --> 01:39:41.279
like done this dragon, so like
everybody's cooler than me. I've just seen

1431
01:39:41.359 --> 01:39:44.079
so many guys come on this show, and there's no point in going through

1432
01:39:44.079 --> 01:39:53.039
the names, but that are just
absolute. They're remarkable human beings, extraordinary

1433
01:39:53.119 --> 01:39:57.319
patriots, and I want to know
what they did and how they did it

1434
01:39:57.359 --> 01:40:00.479
in a respectful way. I Mean, nobody's in here telling secrets and and

1435
01:40:00.560 --> 01:40:02.880
blowing various things. Nobody's getting anybody
in trouble or anybody hurt. But if

1436
01:40:02.920 --> 01:40:08.479
you don't record history, yeah,
then you're gonna do it to repeat.

1437
01:40:08.640 --> 01:40:11.439
Yeah, how can you be How
can you turn around and say, hey,

1438
01:40:11.479 --> 01:40:15.119
the American public doesn't understand what we
do as rangers or FBI agents or

1439
01:40:15.159 --> 01:40:18.520
seals or whatever the hell it is
if you don't talk about it at all,

1440
01:40:18.560 --> 01:40:21.039
if you just maintain that like wall
of secrecy, then yeah, of

1441
01:40:21.079 --> 01:40:25.840
course the public has a total misunderstanding
of yeah, you know what these groups

1442
01:40:25.840 --> 01:40:28.439
do. And also, like you
say, it's it's not just pr but

1443
01:40:28.520 --> 01:40:30.680
it's history, it's I mean,
you know, I think Jack was fortunate

1444
01:40:30.720 --> 01:40:34.239
enough to get a lot of interviews
with you know, the some of the

1445
01:40:34.279 --> 01:40:41.079
last living OSS guys A while ago
OSS guys. Not No, I thought

1446
01:40:41.079 --> 01:40:44.479
you had a few interviews. I
mean, I've interviewed some people from way

1447
01:40:44.520 --> 01:40:48.039
back in the day, mostly mostly
starting with the Vietnam era. But I

1448
01:40:48.079 --> 01:40:50.399
mean, I mean, yeah,
I've been very fortunate to interview like a

1449
01:40:50.399 --> 01:40:54.720
lot of the ogs who like stood
up Blue Light and Delta, like there's

1450
01:40:54.760 --> 01:40:58.239
a red imagine if we could you
know, get you know, like the

1451
01:40:58.279 --> 01:41:00.680
OSS on interviews, or if we
had guys from War one, if you

1452
01:41:00.720 --> 01:41:05.079
know so much what we learned from
history is written by historians and not the

1453
01:41:05.119 --> 01:41:10.800
actual people who so tell us.
But anyway, you retire and drive down

1454
01:41:10.800 --> 01:41:15.119
the street with your resign. Thank
you, David. Anybody who listened to

1455
01:41:15.159 --> 01:41:17.880
this thing, every detail, they'll
say, that's not right, right,

1456
01:41:17.920 --> 01:41:20.279
No, you resign. I want
to make sure that I that I say

1457
01:41:20.319 --> 01:41:25.600
that I resigned for sixteen years,
but I did right card game with Brad

1458
01:41:25.600 --> 01:41:30.399
Pitt September twelfth. I wake up
at the Mercall Hotel and I go,

1459
01:41:30.920 --> 01:41:33.000
fuck, what do I do now? Right? We're going to war like

1460
01:41:33.079 --> 01:41:38.920
the world's on fire, and you
just left the job that would would have

1461
01:41:38.920 --> 01:41:42.760
put you there. Yea. And
not only that, but John O'Neill,

1462
01:41:43.159 --> 01:41:47.239
who had done within Yemen, came
back to the United States, gotting a

1463
01:41:47.279 --> 01:41:51.199
piss and match with the Bureau and
retired. He took a job and you

1464
01:41:51.239 --> 01:41:54.840
may know the story, but John
O'Neill was the head of the UBL Task

1465
01:41:54.880 --> 01:41:57.319
Force, who was the number one
guy in my opinion, in my opinion,

1466
01:41:57.399 --> 01:42:00.159
in the United States government when it
came to al Qaeda, big personality,

1467
01:42:00.239 --> 01:42:03.319
whatever you want to say, about
John. He left the FBI and

1468
01:42:03.359 --> 01:42:08.039
he took a new job as director
of security at the World Trade Centers.

1469
01:42:08.239 --> 01:42:11.600
In September eleventh, with his first
day on the job, and he died

1470
01:42:12.399 --> 01:42:16.560
in the attacks. So any sack
of shit that tells me some conspiracy theory

1471
01:42:16.720 --> 01:42:20.680
about nine to eleven and we knew
this and we don't it makes my blood

1472
01:42:20.720 --> 01:42:27.079
boil. Yeah, I mean,
September twelfth, I've got to figure out

1473
01:42:27.079 --> 01:42:30.720
a way back into the war.
And it just so happened that I had

1474
01:42:30.720 --> 01:42:39.079
spent a good deal of my time
in other government agencies because we collaborate,

1475
01:42:39.279 --> 01:42:41.239
right, So you could be in
the FBI and you could work with other

1476
01:42:41.279 --> 01:42:45.680
agencies, one of which was the
CIA. So I said, okay,

1477
01:42:45.680 --> 01:42:48.840
I got an idea. So when
I sold my first book in those days,

1478
01:42:48.840 --> 01:42:51.600
if he sold the book, you
gotta you know, publishing a book

1479
01:42:51.640 --> 01:42:54.760
is one thing, selling this another
thing altogether. You got to get on

1480
01:42:54.800 --> 01:42:57.640
all the shows like this show.
Right back in the day it was the

1481
01:42:57.680 --> 01:43:01.159
Today Show, Oprah or whatever the
case was. So back then, if

1482
01:43:01.159 --> 01:43:06.239
you got if you published a book
and a magazine exerpted you a book,

1483
01:43:06.279 --> 01:43:11.119
that was a huge deal. At
the time, there was Esquire, Vanity,

1484
01:43:11.159 --> 01:43:15.840
Fair, Playboy, Maxim. There
weren't many time, Yeah, because

1485
01:43:15.840 --> 01:43:19.039
I still read Time. I don't
know, But I mean to have your

1486
01:43:19.039 --> 01:43:23.039
book reviewed or feature magazine, yeah, I mean if they review it,

1487
01:43:23.079 --> 01:43:26.359
that's good. I mean if they
review it favorably, that exp They actually

1488
01:43:26.399 --> 01:43:29.760
took chapters and they published them in
the magazine, which was a big deal

1489
01:43:29.800 --> 01:43:34.279
at the time, GQ magazine.
As absurd as that sounds, and as

1490
01:43:34.359 --> 01:43:38.920
much shit as that caused me with
everybody that I knew, you know,

1491
01:43:39.000 --> 01:43:42.720
you don't want to be right,
it was. It was awful, but

1492
01:43:42.840 --> 01:43:45.439
at the same time it was good. It really helped, and the bureau

1493
01:43:45.520 --> 01:43:48.000
supported that. Like as your author
was perfect as yes, as a former

1494
01:43:48.039 --> 01:43:51.640
action guy. It was horrible,
and I showed you right. They put

1495
01:43:51.640 --> 01:43:55.319
me on the inside cover. I
showed you the picture and I was like

1496
01:43:55.399 --> 01:43:58.199
in a jungle and I had this
shirt on and too much shit in my

1497
01:43:58.279 --> 01:44:00.720
hair. It was just it was
a glam shot me and you were a

1498
01:44:00.760 --> 01:44:03.079
sex bomb in that photo. I'm
gonna hang that up on the wall here.

1499
01:44:03.319 --> 01:44:09.520
It was horrified, but it happened. The good news was the guy

1500
01:44:09.560 --> 01:44:13.560
that ran GQ magazine is a guy
named Art Cooper and Art Cooper had a

1501
01:44:13.600 --> 01:44:16.800
kung fu grip. I mean he
was among guys who were camouflage, Tidy

1502
01:44:16.840 --> 01:44:23.359
Whitey's, Mark Wahlburg models and stuff
like that. Among magazine publishers. He

1503
01:44:23.439 --> 01:44:28.560
was a stud, a remarkable guy. I loved him. And so anyways,

1504
01:44:28.560 --> 01:44:31.640
he invited me over to his office. I'm sitting in his office,

1505
01:44:31.640 --> 01:44:34.760
had his incredible bar chain, smoking
cigarettes, and he goes, hey,

1506
01:44:34.960 --> 01:44:39.279
you want to go to go to
Afghanistan and find Bin Laden. And I

1507
01:44:39.319 --> 01:44:42.960
thought to myself, And now this
was like a month after so this is

1508
01:44:43.000 --> 01:44:45.319
maybe the first week in October after
nine eleven. And I thought to myself,

1509
01:44:45.680 --> 01:44:48.520
yes, I do, so I
go. I know just what to

1510
01:44:48.560 --> 01:44:50.800
do. So I went down.
I went home. That was in New

1511
01:44:50.880 --> 01:44:56.199
York. I went back to I
was living still in Virginia, and I

1512
01:44:56.239 --> 01:44:59.319
got my car and I drove out
to Langley. And I told you this

1513
01:44:59.359 --> 01:45:02.479
story before, but this is what
a moron I am. So let's say

1514
01:45:02.560 --> 01:45:06.439
that I had a pass. I
had a haul pass at Langley, right,

1515
01:45:08.359 --> 01:45:12.159
and then there's one primary entrance what
is it one twenty three, one

1516
01:45:12.239 --> 01:45:15.800
twenty three, I think, right
into the main gate. Yeah, and

1517
01:45:15.840 --> 01:45:18.960
the main gate there's two lanes going
in. There's a guard shack on the

1518
01:45:19.039 --> 01:45:21.920
right, and then if you're a
visitor, you just go around back,

1519
01:45:21.960 --> 01:45:26.079
you park your car and you go
in and you sign in and you go

1520
01:45:26.119 --> 01:45:30.600
in. Right. So I at
the time, I had a portion nine

1521
01:45:30.640 --> 01:45:34.079
eleven, and so I'm hauling ass
up there, and I've got my sniper

1522
01:45:34.119 --> 01:45:38.159
partner on a cell phone, one
of those no keias like it had the

1523
01:45:38.680 --> 01:45:41.279
black and white screens, you know. Yeah, and I've got I've got

1524
01:45:41.279 --> 01:45:44.399
the top down, yeah, and
I've got I was listening to Ludicrous.

1525
01:45:44.399 --> 01:45:46.720
I'll never forget it. I've got
don't ask me why, but I had

1526
01:45:46.800 --> 01:45:50.600
Ludicrous pumping. I had this big
subwarfer in there, and my partner,

1527
01:45:50.600 --> 01:45:55.079
sniper partner, and is given me
incredible amounts of shit. You you know

1528
01:45:55.640 --> 01:45:59.279
about the GQ things saying everybody hates
me and you know, kids show my

1529
01:45:59.279 --> 01:46:01.479
face there anymore. But we have
a tea time, we're playing golf that

1530
01:46:01.560 --> 01:46:03.960
Saturday. Yeah, he's just fucking
with you though, right he was,

1531
01:46:04.000 --> 01:46:06.079
because he's a great guy. Yeah, I'm sure there was a lot of

1532
01:46:06.079 --> 01:46:11.640
concentation. Yeah, And and then
I've got Art Cooper. You know,

1533
01:46:11.640 --> 01:46:13.920
back in those days, you have
a little car phone right on, like

1534
01:46:13.960 --> 01:46:16.079
a little it's like a landline,
but it was in your car. Yeah,

1535
01:46:16.119 --> 01:46:19.399
right, So I've got one on
each ear and they're yelling at me,

1536
01:46:19.640 --> 01:46:21.800
and I'm feeling happy because I got
a war back. I gotta find

1537
01:46:21.800 --> 01:46:25.640
a way to back into the war
on terrorism. I got a press pass

1538
01:46:26.039 --> 01:46:30.680
to Afghanistan and GQ is sending you
there as a journalist. Right, Conde

1539
01:46:30.720 --> 01:46:35.199
Nast is going to pay my first
class air, fair and reasonable expenses to

1540
01:46:35.279 --> 01:46:42.279
go find bin laden check. So
I roll up one hundred and ten miles

1541
01:46:42.279 --> 01:46:44.920
an hour, pull off the exit, I go through the gate the way

1542
01:46:44.960 --> 01:46:47.439
I've always gone through the gate.
I get to the gate and I realize

1543
01:46:47.479 --> 01:46:53.359
I don't have a pass anymore.
I'm out. I go fuck hit the

1544
01:46:53.359 --> 01:46:58.439
brake and or I hit the clutch, and they're very close together on that

1545
01:46:58.520 --> 01:47:01.600
car, and I locked up the
tire, shift into reverse, back up,

1546
01:47:01.640 --> 01:47:05.079
go around back park to go in, and go in like a visitor,

1547
01:47:05.600 --> 01:47:09.640
and I'm looking in the rear view
mirror and here comes a swat team

1548
01:47:10.359 --> 01:47:14.560
MP five's leveled at my head.
They surround the car, you know,

1549
01:47:14.640 --> 01:47:19.239
doing a felony car stop on me
at the main gate. The CIA headquarters

1550
01:47:20.159 --> 01:47:26.479
and because you know, I wasn't
thinking, but anyway, I knew the

1551
01:47:26.560 --> 01:47:30.680
guys and it all worked out just
fine. I go in and this woman,

1552
01:47:30.760 --> 01:47:32.880
I know, this, this friend
of mine. A hero. This

1553
01:47:32.920 --> 01:47:38.079
woman, she should be on your
show. She's absolutely crazy. She's a

1554
01:47:38.600 --> 01:47:43.079
She was a colonel in the army
who had two high speed parachute failures,

1555
01:47:43.359 --> 01:47:45.239
one of which put a steel plate
in her head. Is titanium plate in

1556
01:47:45.239 --> 01:47:51.600
her head, and she would get
vertigo real bad in certain situations. And

1557
01:47:51.640 --> 01:47:58.680
you guys probably know there's there are
certain configurations at Langley that I've never seen

1558
01:47:58.720 --> 01:48:00.720
them printed anywhere, so I'm not
going to say what they were, but

1559
01:48:00.800 --> 01:48:04.680
this, you know what I'm talking
about. The there's place as you walk

1560
01:48:05.279 --> 01:48:12.920
in Langley that are really weird geographically
geometrically like they look similar. Anyway,

1561
01:48:12.960 --> 01:48:15.840
the point of the story was she
the only way she could get through these

1562
01:48:15.840 --> 01:48:18.640
places in the building was to walk
with their hands closed with their eyes closed

1563
01:48:18.640 --> 01:48:24.520
on the walls. So we'd have
to walk down the hallways so that she

1564
01:48:24.520 --> 01:48:27.119
wouldn't pass out and throw up because
of the steel plate in her head.

1565
01:48:27.159 --> 01:48:30.520
She was incredible. Anyway. The
point of the story is she'd set up

1566
01:48:30.520 --> 01:48:34.319
on lunch. So we go into
they have three I think there's three administrative

1567
01:48:34.319 --> 01:48:36.520
dining rooms there. It's like a
d R one, two and three or

1568
01:48:36.520 --> 01:48:40.960
something like that. But anyways,
so we go not to the cafeteria at

1569
01:48:41.039 --> 01:48:44.640
Langley, but go to one of
the big wig dining rooms with a linen

1570
01:48:44.720 --> 01:48:46.560
table cloth. I'm looking out into
the you know, over the Potomac through

1571
01:48:46.600 --> 01:48:50.760
the woods, and I'm thinking,
man, I've arrived. Yeah this is

1572
01:48:51.279 --> 01:48:58.880
I haven't got to the Madonna story. Yeah that's a fucking hysterical story.

1573
01:48:59.079 --> 01:49:01.520
But see, I shouldn't have done
this even yet. So anyways, we

1574
01:49:01.560 --> 01:49:05.000
go in and I go, so
these two guys she's with me, and

1575
01:49:05.079 --> 01:49:08.560
these two guys I do not know, but I know who they are.

1576
01:49:09.159 --> 01:49:14.399
And so we're eating broccoli and sir
waying tips or whatever else, and I

1577
01:49:14.840 --> 01:49:16.760
say, here's my plan, and
I remember very clearly. The guy looks

1578
01:49:16.800 --> 01:49:20.439
at me and he's nodding his head, and he goes, maybe you have

1579
01:49:20.520 --> 01:49:24.439
forgotten a couple or haven't thought about
a couple of things. One, the

1580
01:49:24.479 --> 01:49:30.159
United States government has sixteen intelligence agency
and B fifty two bombers, five brands

1581
01:49:30.159 --> 01:49:33.800
of the military, and B fifty
two bombers. He said, the CIA

1582
01:49:34.000 --> 01:49:42.840
gathers intelligence for clients that include the
White House, the FBI chases thieves.

1583
01:49:43.840 --> 01:49:46.239
And I go, well, I
guess you put me in my place,

1584
01:49:47.319 --> 01:49:50.880
but you know how we are,
right, which is not what I was

1585
01:49:50.880 --> 01:49:55.680
really thinking. And I said,
well, yeah, I get that interesting,

1586
01:49:55.720 --> 01:49:58.079
but maybe you haven't thought about this. And I went over the plan

1587
01:49:58.159 --> 01:50:00.319
again and his buddy goes, wow, okay, that makes great sense.

1588
01:50:00.800 --> 01:50:03.319
So he pulled out a car and
he wrote down a number and he said,

1589
01:50:03.359 --> 01:50:05.600
go see this guy right now.
I'll tell him you're calling. So

1590
01:50:05.640 --> 01:50:09.319
I got in my car. I
drove from the Pentagon and I went into

1591
01:50:09.359 --> 01:50:12.960
the Pentagon and there's some guy.
I have no idea what he was,

1592
01:50:13.000 --> 01:50:15.600
but I only remember this. He
had this heavy, heavy Boston accent.

1593
01:50:15.640 --> 01:50:17.760
And I grew up in the Hampshire, right, so I know Boston accents.

1594
01:50:18.079 --> 01:50:21.760
So he's I walk in there and
he's got on a like this shitty

1595
01:50:21.840 --> 01:50:27.159
look at nit tie, like with
a square nittie, and he's got on

1596
01:50:27.199 --> 01:50:30.119
his shirt, his shirt sleeves rolled
up, and he's got three watches on

1597
01:50:30.159 --> 01:50:34.720
his arm. And I go,
hey, how you doing? I said,

1598
01:50:34.960 --> 01:50:43.039
you from Boston and he said,
no, he goes talking. Anyways,

1599
01:50:44.199 --> 01:50:45.720
he was. I still have no
idea who he was. I assume

1600
01:50:45.760 --> 01:50:50.039
he was some aspect of d Ia, but you know, I still don't

1601
01:50:50.039 --> 01:50:54.600
know who he was. But he
put the whole thing together, and so

1602
01:50:54.640 --> 01:50:58.479
I flew to London. I flew
to at the time you could go through

1603
01:50:58.520 --> 01:51:01.319
his you could come through his beck
Stand and you could come down to Jikistan,

1604
01:51:01.399 --> 01:51:04.000
which was a very very long overland
drive and it was dangerous, but

1605
01:51:04.159 --> 01:51:06.880
each had plus is a honus.
But it was Bekistan. At the time,

1606
01:51:08.199 --> 01:51:11.840
Victoria Tenzing had put together the MBED
program. So they were putting guys

1607
01:51:11.840 --> 01:51:16.159
like Carldo Rivera and what's her name? Who is that chick with the blond

1608
01:51:16.279 --> 01:51:21.720
here? I'm sorry that was unkind, not that she was incredibly famous and

1609
01:51:23.000 --> 01:51:28.600
very Ashley Danfield. Oh she was
huge. Yeah. Anyway, these guys

1610
01:51:28.600 --> 01:51:32.479
were getting all the great slots.
So I decided to go into Islamabad and

1611
01:51:32.520 --> 01:51:36.239
then go north through the Kibra Pass. But when I got there, they

1612
01:51:36.239 --> 01:51:40.479
were killing everybody that was coming through
the Kibra Pass, so I couldn't get

1613
01:51:40.520 --> 01:51:42.760
there. So what do you do. The first thing you do is you

1614
01:51:42.800 --> 01:51:45.520
go to the embassy. Right,
So I checked into the hotel and everybody

1615
01:51:45.600 --> 01:51:48.960
was there and all the Western news
outlets were there at the hotel. So

1616
01:51:49.000 --> 01:51:53.479
I go to the embassy. I've
got a meeting at the embassy, and

1617
01:51:53.520 --> 01:51:58.439
we all know who's at the embassy
and put the whole thing together. And

1618
01:51:58.439 --> 01:52:01.039
I remember I walked in there.
Can I tell the story, Yeah,

1619
01:52:01.840 --> 01:52:06.039
it's a I tried not to swear
in this thing, but I gotta tell

1620
01:52:06.079 --> 01:52:11.159
this. Oh, you can swear
like this is there's we're an adult channel.

1621
01:52:11.199 --> 01:52:14.560
So well, I'll just tell nobody
under or at the age of eighteen

1622
01:52:14.640 --> 01:52:18.640
or sixteen or whatever. So my
partner and I don't know how to describe

1623
01:52:18.680 --> 01:52:20.880
this guy, but this guy was
before he joined the FBI, he was

1624
01:52:20.880 --> 01:52:25.600
a controller for a company in San
Diego. It's a very very, very

1625
01:52:25.640 --> 01:52:30.439
smart fucking guy. And he had
a solid gold rolex. I don't know

1626
01:52:30.479 --> 01:52:33.319
what model was, like a date
jest or something, but solid gold,

1627
01:52:33.479 --> 01:52:39.479
which he wore on HRT and every
most of the guys on HRT. Some

1628
01:52:39.560 --> 01:52:42.720
of the guys on HRT had Rolexes, but they weren't solid gold, right,

1629
01:52:42.720 --> 01:52:46.960
there was like a sub or,
right, and so, but he

1630
01:52:47.039 --> 01:52:51.079
was an incredible guy. And he
was unbelievable with a rifle. I mean

1631
01:52:51.079 --> 01:52:56.359
he was just incredible. So great
guy. So my partner. So the

1632
01:52:56.399 --> 01:52:59.880
point of the story is this.
So his somebody he had worked with was

1633
01:53:00.199 --> 01:53:03.680
now working in the league at in
Islamabad, and he'd set up a meeting.

1634
01:53:03.720 --> 01:53:11.079
So I go in to see him
and this your guys. And so

1635
01:53:11.119 --> 01:53:13.920
I go into this office and it's
got all the GSA furniture and he goes,

1636
01:53:13.960 --> 01:53:15.439
hey, what's going on? He
goes, how do you know?

1637
01:53:15.640 --> 01:53:16.800
I said, how do you know? Buck? And he said, well,

1638
01:53:16.840 --> 01:53:21.000
they were they were agents together in
San Diego and they played together on

1639
01:53:21.039 --> 01:53:26.000
a softball team and the softball team
was called my dick is so hard,

1640
01:53:26.039 --> 01:53:29.039
I don't have enough skin left to
close my eyes. And I said,

1641
01:53:29.479 --> 01:53:33.479
I look kind of men a goal? What who would even think of something

1642
01:53:33.520 --> 01:53:38.039
like that? And why would you
say it to me? In the league

1643
01:53:38.079 --> 01:53:42.399
at in Islama? Bade you know. It was just such weird things happening.

1644
01:53:43.079 --> 01:53:45.960
And and I look over and on
his desk he had that book,

1645
01:53:46.199 --> 01:53:54.439
the first book, and he had
a copy of GQ magazine opened to the

1646
01:53:55.840 --> 01:54:00.279
and it said that part of it
said has on license to kill? No

1647
01:54:00.800 --> 01:54:05.039
has the ability to kill and the
license to do so, and he had

1648
01:54:05.119 --> 01:54:12.000
highlighted it with a yellow magic marker. Oh my god, I am the

1649
01:54:12.000 --> 01:54:16.760
world's biggest moron. Absolute fool.
So anyways, the point in the whole

1650
01:54:16.800 --> 01:54:20.720
story is that the agency guy says, you know, this country is a

1651
01:54:20.800 --> 01:54:24.680
dry country. You're gonna need some
leverage. I'll be right back. So

1652
01:54:24.720 --> 01:54:27.840
he goes and he gets me two
bottles of Johnny Walker black, which in

1653
01:54:28.319 --> 01:54:31.600
Islamabad, I'm sure you know it
is the goal. Yeah, So because

1654
01:54:31.640 --> 01:54:34.079
I had to get a multiple entry
piece or whatever. So I get my

1655
01:54:34.119 --> 01:54:38.680
two bottles of Johnny Walker and I
go back to the hotel. And there

1656
01:54:38.680 --> 01:54:41.600
were two bars in Islamabad. One
was at that hotel, one was at

1657
01:54:41.640 --> 01:54:45.640
the other hotel, the other Western
hotel. So here's the point of the

1658
01:54:45.640 --> 01:54:50.680
story. So I've just I've got
this buddy of mine who is ah he

1659
01:54:50.720 --> 01:54:54.479
has a very very famous girlfriend.
I told you who he was, who

1660
01:54:54.560 --> 01:54:57.720
his girlfriend was, right, and
he's got it. He's a very he's

1661
01:54:57.760 --> 01:55:00.439
a I don't know how to describe
this guy. He's there because he's my

1662
01:55:00.479 --> 01:55:04.399
buddy and he's taking photographs for GQ
magazine because he's a really great photographer.

1663
01:55:04.640 --> 01:55:10.399
But he's also a bad, bad
dude. I mean he's fearless and he's

1664
01:55:10.399 --> 01:55:13.800
good anywhere you want to go.
So we go back to the hotel and

1665
01:55:13.880 --> 01:55:16.319
he's an extremely worldly guy. So
we go down to the basement. He

1666
01:55:16.319 --> 01:55:19.439
gets in about three fit fights trying
to find a drink. We go into

1667
01:55:19.479 --> 01:55:24.239
basement as a bar, and you've
got to sign in a testing that you're

1668
01:55:24.279 --> 01:55:28.319
not Muslim in order to own to
buy a drink, right, So he

1669
01:55:28.359 --> 01:55:31.720
says, fuck these guys. So
he signs in as our buddy, the

1670
01:55:31.720 --> 01:55:36.319
movie director. He would always call
himself Elbolaggio, like his undercover name when

1671
01:55:36.319 --> 01:55:40.680
he's going to a UFC fight,
and he checks into the Four Seasons,

1672
01:55:40.720 --> 01:55:45.000
right, So he signs in as
El Bolaggio and I signed in as Team

1673
01:55:45.079 --> 01:55:48.319
Rope Header. We'll get to story
something that's like one of my cover identities.

1674
01:55:48.319 --> 01:55:51.760
Says that I was a cowboy,
you know. And so we signed

1675
01:55:51.760 --> 01:55:55.920
into this book and we go into
the bar. Were the only two guys

1676
01:55:55.960 --> 01:55:59.479
in the bar, and they have
this stuff is called I think it's called

1677
01:55:59.560 --> 01:56:04.319
Murray. You are are ee Gin
vodka whiskey beer all on the same manufacturer

1678
01:56:04.359 --> 01:56:09.600
and it's manufactured by Pakistani's even though
it's a dry country. Oh interesting,

1679
01:56:09.640 --> 01:56:15.560
So you can't buy any booze in
Pakistan except the booze they make, which

1680
01:56:15.560 --> 01:56:18.399
I still have not figured out.
So we're sitting at the bar and Joe

1681
01:56:18.560 --> 01:56:24.039
says, get any women around here, and I said, Joe, come

1682
01:56:24.079 --> 01:56:26.600
on, man, relax, you
know we've got a job to do.

1683
01:56:27.520 --> 01:56:30.560
He goes, shut up with let
me work. So he ends up it's

1684
01:56:30.960 --> 01:56:35.840
Ramadan. He ends up negotiating one
of the bottles of Johnny Walker black for

1685
01:56:35.920 --> 01:56:42.760
like the bartender sister and like four
of her best friends. And Joe cut

1686
01:56:42.760 --> 01:56:46.560
this shit out. You know it's
ridiculous. But now eleven o'clock or twelve

1687
01:56:46.560 --> 01:56:49.560
o'clock at night, we've had six
or seven beers. The guy comes walking

1688
01:56:49.600 --> 01:56:54.319
in. This is all the same
day. Arrive, check in, go

1689
01:56:54.359 --> 01:56:58.479
to the embassy, get the booze. Joe's trying to trade it during Ramadan.

1690
01:56:59.000 --> 01:57:01.039
And it's now almost night and I
haven't slept for three days. And

1691
01:57:01.079 --> 01:57:05.880
a guy comes in, taps me
on the shoulder and he goes mister Christopher

1692
01:57:05.960 --> 01:57:10.560
or something like that, and hands
me a piece of paper and walks away.

1693
01:57:11.079 --> 01:57:15.720
And just like a bad movie,
it says meet at this address.

1694
01:57:15.880 --> 01:57:20.640
The fuck is this? So we
go upstairs, walk outside, get directions,

1695
01:57:20.800 --> 01:57:27.600
walk four blocks and we're standing midnight
in Islamabad on a street corner and

1696
01:57:27.640 --> 01:57:30.159
a car pulls up, a sedan
like a Toyota Corolla, and the and

1697
01:57:30.239 --> 01:57:33.840
the guy basically says get in the
car. And I'm thinking to myself,

1698
01:57:34.119 --> 01:57:36.800
We're not getting in the car.
Yeah, And then I think to myself,

1699
01:57:38.000 --> 01:57:39.720
well, how do they know who
we are and what are we doing

1700
01:57:39.760 --> 01:57:43.560
here? Maybe maybe we should get
in a car. But my point is,

1701
01:57:43.880 --> 01:57:45.279
this is in the from the embassy
bar, right, This is no,

1702
01:57:45.279 --> 01:57:47.960
no, no, no, this
is in the hotel hotel bar okay,

1703
01:57:48.600 --> 01:57:55.399
with no other Westerners, zero other
people. So the point of the

1704
01:57:55.439 --> 01:58:00.880
story is I'm going from being part
of an organization that, through my clearances

1705
01:58:00.920 --> 01:58:03.520
and through my covers and through all
this insane shit I did around the world,

1706
01:58:03.880 --> 01:58:08.279
all this stuff was great as long
as you trust your backstop. Right,

1707
01:58:08.479 --> 01:58:12.119
you know who gave you the cover, and you know who's the Blockbuster

1708
01:58:12.279 --> 01:58:16.079
video card and somebody else's kid and
your credit card age. Yes, you

1709
01:58:16.119 --> 01:58:18.399
know it's all backstop, and it's
all right, and you know the people

1710
01:58:18.399 --> 01:58:24.159
you're interacting with have that code like
having Ramstein and if they say something that's

1711
01:58:24.199 --> 01:58:29.000
yeah, you know, it all
makes sense. There's a transition where that's

1712
01:58:29.560 --> 01:58:32.560
I realize I'm not in that world
anymore. Right now, I'm just the

1713
01:58:32.640 --> 01:58:35.640
moron who's decided he's trying to do
this by himself. Right. Oh,

1714
01:58:35.680 --> 01:58:39.479
I forgot to tell you there's nobody
coming for you. Okay, Yeah,

1715
01:58:39.600 --> 01:58:41.720
I forgot to tell you. When
he gave me the two bottles of Johnny

1716
01:58:41.720 --> 01:58:44.319
Walker black, he said, listen, dude, he said, I don't

1717
01:58:45.000 --> 01:58:48.359
He said, I don't know what
they told you. But there's no we're

1718
01:58:48.359 --> 01:58:51.359
not giving you a blood hit,
and we're not giving you a phone number

1719
01:58:51.359 --> 01:58:54.960
to call in West Virginia for Xville. You're on your own. There's no

1720
01:58:55.039 --> 01:58:58.279
CRRAF, nobody's coming to get you. You can go on your own.

1721
01:58:58.279 --> 01:59:00.800
We're not going to stop you,
but you need to know nobody's coming to

1722
01:59:00.800 --> 01:59:02.439
get you. And I go,
okay, that was it. So then

1723
01:59:02.439 --> 01:59:05.800
I end up in this car.
We drove outside, like on the other

1724
01:59:05.800 --> 01:59:10.279
side of the mountains, outside of
his Lamabad, and we end up by

1725
01:59:10.319 --> 01:59:12.880
this time it's probably one o'clock in
the morning, and we end up pulling

1726
01:59:12.880 --> 01:59:16.600
into a polo club. It's it
looks like a country club and you know

1727
01:59:16.680 --> 01:59:20.720
and oh cricket. Yeah. Yeah. So one o'clock in the morning,

1728
01:59:20.800 --> 01:59:27.119
pulled into this country club and there's
three protos parked in a you know,

1729
01:59:27.159 --> 01:59:30.039
in a dirt lot. So we
walk in this building and a guy points

1730
01:59:30.039 --> 01:59:32.000
to Joe and says, you sit
over there. And I walk in and

1731
01:59:32.039 --> 01:59:34.840
I walk in and there's this guy
and he's wearing I forget what the hat

1732
01:59:34.920 --> 01:59:38.880
is called, but you know,
different tribes who were different types of hats,

1733
01:59:38.880 --> 01:59:41.159
and he's wearing a specific hat that
meant something. I just don't remember

1734
01:59:41.159 --> 01:59:44.880
what it was. And he and
he points down. I sit down at

1735
01:59:44.920 --> 01:59:47.800
the table. Guy brings tea,
thinking, okay, this is going pretty

1736
01:59:47.840 --> 01:59:55.640
well, and he goes is he
goes, do they call people team rope

1737
01:59:55.680 --> 02:00:00.000
heaters in Northern Virginia? And I
and he and I looked down and he's

1738
02:00:00.000 --> 02:00:05.199
got a copy of my passport on
the table and he knows that I just

1739
02:00:05.199 --> 02:00:10.359
signed in to the bar as Team
roll Petter and he's telling me he knows

1740
02:00:10.359 --> 02:00:13.000
where I'm from. You it was
I, SI guess right. So we

1741
02:00:13.079 --> 02:00:20.279
had a stern talking too, and
then they were incredible in how they set

1742
02:00:20.359 --> 02:00:25.079
up and interact fixers and everything else, and so Joe's sitting there like,

1743
02:00:25.439 --> 02:00:28.880
so the girls are like now now. When he said in northern Virginia though,

1744
02:00:29.079 --> 02:00:34.079
was was because you were there under
very real journalists to cover. Yes,

1745
02:00:34.279 --> 02:00:38.359
right, you were there as a
journalist, yes, with with the

1746
02:00:38.399 --> 02:00:43.479
proper backstops, because that was the
real thing. Correct. Did did they

1747
02:00:43.640 --> 02:00:46.399
know? Why did he say northern
Virginia then, because the CIA is in

1748
02:00:46.439 --> 02:00:49.880
Northern Virginia, right, But did
did did they know? Like, were

1749
02:00:49.880 --> 02:00:53.000
you able to talk your way out
of that and say I'm just here as

1750
02:00:53.000 --> 02:00:56.119
a journalists? There was no there
was no talking. I don't know that

1751
02:00:56.159 --> 02:00:58.359
I said anything. Yeah, you
know, I think I had my tea

1752
02:00:58.439 --> 02:01:02.199
and I nodded, and he just
basically said, you know, we're on

1753
02:01:02.920 --> 02:01:08.079
He said something like I think he
said, Miss Shariff, you should recall

1754
02:01:08.119 --> 02:01:13.159
that Miss Shariff came to power through
force. I think he said we're a

1755
02:01:13.279 --> 02:01:16.520
very old country, or he said
we're a very new country and a very

1756
02:01:16.560 --> 02:01:18.920
old part of the world. That's
exactly what he said. We're a very

1757
02:01:18.920 --> 02:01:23.239
new country and a very old part
of the world. And then he said

1758
02:01:23.279 --> 02:01:27.920
something about Miss Shariff. But he
was just basically telling me, don't suck

1759
02:01:27.960 --> 02:01:30.079
around. Yeah, don't wuck around. We're on it right. Yeah,

1760
02:01:30.119 --> 02:01:32.239
as it turns out, I mean, I found this out after the fact

1761
02:01:32.800 --> 02:01:36.640
that in anybody that was involved in
that from the CIA side, or from

1762
02:01:36.640 --> 02:01:40.520
the FBI side, or from the
military side, or for anything else at

1763
02:01:40.560 --> 02:01:43.680
that time, no matter what your
gig was, and I know this now

1764
02:01:43.720 --> 02:01:45.479
after the fact, no matter what
your gig was at that time, there

1765
02:01:45.560 --> 02:01:48.840
was ship going on that you did
not know about. Unequivocally. I don't

1766
02:01:48.840 --> 02:01:51.039
care who you are or what you
say. I know you've had those guys

1767
02:01:51.079 --> 02:01:57.359
on the show. I'm huge fans
of enormous respect that there was, no

1768
02:01:57.359 --> 02:01:59.479
matter who you were, there ship
going on you didn't know, but you

1769
02:01:59.479 --> 02:02:03.319
weren't read on. Yeah, And
my thing was very specific, so to

1770
02:02:03.399 --> 02:02:09.680
be, because there's not about the
stories. The bottom line was I was

1771
02:02:09.720 --> 02:02:15.000
supposed to go first to Peshawar and
then because the the Kibra pass was closed

1772
02:02:15.000 --> 02:02:23.760
down and my job was to go
to Deer in a Northwest Frontier province,

1773
02:02:24.840 --> 02:02:34.800
and I met a cleric who took
us to an overland route to rat to

1774
02:02:34.880 --> 02:02:39.239
the north, a real fucking off
grade place, and there there is a

1775
02:02:39.359 --> 02:02:45.399
very there's a there's a story that
you guys may know about where what was

1776
02:02:45.439 --> 02:02:49.319
the name of that fucking town outside
of Deer I can't even remember now,

1777
02:02:49.359 --> 02:02:56.520
But there was another town that something
happened at that time with a military operation

1778
02:02:56.680 --> 02:03:01.960
that crossed over with some people,
which there are there are references to it.

1779
02:03:01.560 --> 02:03:05.039
I don't know what it was,
but I know they were there there.

1780
02:03:05.199 --> 02:03:06.840
Yeah, I mean, there are
a couple of different things. I

1781
02:03:06.840 --> 02:03:10.079
mean, it could have been a
rator. There's like some stuff where like

1782
02:03:10.119 --> 02:03:12.439
drones went down and stuff had to
be recovered. No, no, this

1783
02:03:12.520 --> 02:03:15.479
was a transport of people across.
But I don't want to get into that

1784
02:03:15.479 --> 02:03:17.439
because I don't know what it was. I don't want to say anything.

1785
02:03:17.479 --> 02:03:21.039
And I know something happened and I
was there. Are you talking about when

1786
02:03:21.039 --> 02:03:25.079
they brought the al Kada guys from
Afghanistan and the Pakistan? Yes, yeah,

1787
02:03:25.319 --> 02:03:30.359
Miller talks about that when Okay,
So anyways, it was at that

1788
02:03:30.399 --> 02:03:38.239
time at that place and so,
but it was a specific it was a

1789
02:03:38.279 --> 02:03:43.479
specific mula who was taking people from
Pakistan over and he went in like the

1790
02:03:43.760 --> 02:03:45.840
legend, not the legend, but
the roomor at the time, was he

1791
02:03:45.880 --> 02:03:47.239
took thirteen thousand people over when he
came back with five. You know,

1792
02:03:47.239 --> 02:03:49.479
it was one of those stories,
who knows what the numbers were. But

1793
02:03:49.640 --> 02:03:57.079
he was a problem. So the
my my my hypothetically speaking, my intention

1794
02:03:57.199 --> 02:04:00.600
was not to try to stop him, but to try to get an idea

1795
02:04:00.760 --> 02:04:04.399
of who these people were and where
they were coming from. Right. So,

1796
02:04:04.439 --> 02:04:09.399
anyways, the point of the story
is spent time there and then went

1797
02:04:09.880 --> 02:04:14.600
very very unpleasant time there, then
went back to his Lama Bod where I

1798
02:04:14.640 --> 02:04:18.800
got really bad dysentery. Flew to
Quetta and the south drove from Quetta to

1799
02:04:18.840 --> 02:04:27.319
spend Baldock crossing over at the West
Trauma crossing going up to Condahar when the

1800
02:04:27.359 --> 02:04:30.279
fighting moves south, and that's uh, that's the last story there. And

1801
02:04:30.319 --> 02:04:33.399
here it is. We get there, sick as a dog. I'd been

1802
02:04:33.439 --> 02:04:38.199
in a in a like a safe
house, huddled around a tot, a

1803
02:04:38.319 --> 02:04:43.199
floor, a hole in the floor, delirious for three days with fever.

1804
02:04:43.960 --> 02:04:45.880
And I get in the back of
yet another Toyota Corolla and we make our

1805
02:04:45.920 --> 02:04:50.199
way over and uh, and get
to the border crossing and anybody that spending

1806
02:04:50.239 --> 02:04:54.279
that border cross and there's nothing there. It's like talcum powder. You know,

1807
02:04:54.319 --> 02:04:56.720
it's like the whole south of moon
dust, the moon dust, right,

1808
02:04:56.760 --> 02:04:59.960
everybody knows the moon dust. So
but there were the refugees will come

1809
02:05:00.119 --> 02:05:03.199
across and a lot of the guys
that were getting in the fighting, we're

1810
02:05:03.199 --> 02:05:08.359
coming across the border too to try
to get help in in uh in Quetta,

1811
02:05:08.479 --> 02:05:10.800
right, it was just like three
hours away. So anyways, the

1812
02:05:10.840 --> 02:05:15.319
point I mean, Quitta is the
port's town in ports city in Pakistan.

1813
02:05:15.439 --> 02:05:17.560
Right, it's not a port,
it's inland, but it's a it's a

1814
02:05:17.640 --> 02:05:25.039
it's a huge transport facility. And
uh, I don't even remember landing there.

1815
02:05:25.039 --> 02:05:29.840
But so but I'll just end the
story here about how how how the

1816
02:05:29.840 --> 02:05:32.159
thing worked out. So then at
that point had been there quite a long

1817
02:05:32.159 --> 02:05:34.399
time. We killed two different guys
with cars. I mean, we hit

1818
02:05:34.920 --> 02:05:39.840
two different guys with cars. And
there's a lot I'm not telling you about,

1819
02:05:40.920 --> 02:05:44.279
a lot that I'm not telling you
about. But we got this uh,

1820
02:05:44.520 --> 02:05:45.239
like I was telling you before,
we pull into this thing, and

1821
02:05:45.239 --> 02:05:48.439
it's now seven o'clock at night,
it's dark, it's Ramadan, so you

1822
02:05:48.479 --> 02:05:55.039
can't eat. I'm sick. The
driver uh stops at the Sindom block building.

1823
02:05:55.279 --> 02:05:58.319
You can see the border, and
uh, we're supposed to meet a

1824
02:05:58.319 --> 02:06:01.079
guy named Zeke, a warlord name
or Zeke that I don't want to say

1825
02:06:01.079 --> 02:06:08.359
world. He was a you know
what I mean he was he was a

1826
02:06:08.399 --> 02:06:11.680
local leader. Yes, he was
a local an influence. He was an

1827
02:06:11.720 --> 02:06:14.680
influencer. Yeah, he was not
a fixer. He was the fix.

1828
02:06:14.920 --> 02:06:16.600
Right. This is a real fucking
deal, right, But we're three days

1829
02:06:16.680 --> 02:06:21.039
late. So we pulled into this
send the block building. Stop the story

1830
02:06:21.079 --> 02:06:24.840
here. So Joe and I get
out of the car and we walk in

1831
02:06:24.960 --> 02:06:28.560
and the driver is kind of our
translator, fix or whatever else. And

1832
02:06:29.680 --> 02:06:34.239
walk inside and there are like three
four tables off to the to the right

1833
02:06:34.239 --> 02:06:40.720
hand side. Everybody has an ak
and a beard and show walk committees.

1834
02:06:40.800 --> 02:06:44.319
But we're dressed local too, right, But I look like a diamond and

1835
02:06:44.359 --> 02:06:46.560
a goats ass. I mean,
I looked like a complete utter idiot and

1836
02:06:46.680 --> 02:06:51.239
Joe. And Joe looks very plausible
because he's got a beard, he's swarth,

1837
02:06:51.279 --> 02:06:56.239
he's like savit guy, and he's
got a camera, so he looks

1838
02:06:56.279 --> 02:07:00.520
plausible as a journalist. So we
go over to the side to order some

1839
02:07:00.600 --> 02:07:05.199
tea and there's nobody there, but
on the wall was a framed, not

1840
02:07:05.239 --> 02:07:09.199
a framed, a big poster like
you'd have behind like I had behind my

1841
02:07:09.199 --> 02:07:12.319
bed when I was a little kid. And it was Clint Eastwood from the

1842
02:07:12.359 --> 02:07:17.239
Dirty Harry movies with a forty four
magnum pointing it like most people have seen

1843
02:07:17.279 --> 02:07:19.279
that poster. Yeah, And I
look at Joe and I go, what

1844
02:07:19.319 --> 02:07:25.319
the what's he doing in you know, the on the border crossing into Afghanistan?

1845
02:07:25.600 --> 02:07:28.680
And right next to him was an
eight by ten glossy of Assama bin

1846
02:07:28.760 --> 02:07:32.000
laden with it with an ak car
being pointing it at Clint Eastwood's head,

1847
02:07:32.239 --> 02:07:35.600
and I go, you can't make
this ship up. It was just absurd.

1848
02:07:35.880 --> 02:07:39.920
So we walk over and sit down
in a corner, sweats dripping off

1849
02:07:39.920 --> 02:07:43.439
my face. I look over.
They're all staring at us, and all

1850
02:07:43.439 --> 02:07:45.279
of a sudden, one of these
guys stands up. And Joe had a

1851
02:07:45.279 --> 02:07:49.279
casting company, was a casting director
in Hollywood, but he said it looked

1852
02:07:49.319 --> 02:07:53.479
like Cat Stevens on crack, and
it did. He was mangy, it

1853
02:07:53.520 --> 02:07:57.600
looked like he had rabies. And
the guy picks up his ak in his

1854
02:07:57.680 --> 02:08:01.720
hand and a chair and so it's
I'd say, it's a big room,

1855
02:08:01.760 --> 02:08:05.479
so probably twenty twenty five feet from
that pot of tables to where we were

1856
02:08:05.520 --> 02:08:09.159
sitting. He brings a chair in
the middle of the room. There's nothing

1857
02:08:09.199 --> 02:08:11.920
there, it's just open space in
middle room, puts his chair down and

1858
02:08:13.039 --> 02:08:16.000
goes like this like he's eaves dropping, like he's listening to us. And

1859
02:08:16.039 --> 02:08:20.319
I go, look at the what's
going on with this guy? What an

1860
02:08:20.359 --> 02:08:24.359
idiot? And uh. Then he
picks up his chair and he walks the

1861
02:08:24.399 --> 02:08:26.880
rest of the way to the table, puts his chair down with his knee

1862
02:08:26.920 --> 02:08:31.079
touching Joe and says, who are
you guys? Kind of like that,

1863
02:08:31.279 --> 02:08:33.359
I mean, not much of an
accent. And Joe thinks about it for

1864
02:08:33.359 --> 02:08:39.560
a minute and he goes, suis
journal least Joe doesn't speak French. I

1865
02:08:39.600 --> 02:08:43.239
always say that he like he has
occasional dinners at tour Dargan. He has

1866
02:08:43.319 --> 02:08:48.199
reef Ghosh hair. Right, he's
wearing a proud of jacket right right,

1867
02:08:48.199 --> 02:08:52.800
And I go, oh fuck,
and uh, and I say, you

1868
02:08:52.840 --> 02:08:58.039
know, I don't feel like I
mean, yeah, he goes, you're

1869
02:08:58.119 --> 02:09:00.760
French, and I said maybe.
Joe said weird, but I couldn't tell

1870
02:09:00.760 --> 02:09:03.600
because all the blood shunted into my
Nutsack couldn't hear anything, right, And

1871
02:09:05.079 --> 02:09:09.720
so so I go, We're we're
dead now for sure? Yeah, right,

1872
02:09:09.720 --> 02:09:13.439
because he doesn't speak French. This
guy, I'm sorry, this guy

1873
02:09:13.479 --> 02:09:16.920
spoke French. He spoke English and
he spoke French and he was one of

1874
02:09:16.960 --> 02:09:20.359
them. So I go, who
would have thought that? Yeah? So

1875
02:09:20.680 --> 02:09:24.439
I go, okay, Well we're
gonna die. I know we're gonna die.

1876
02:09:24.119 --> 02:09:28.479
And the only thing I've got is
a fighting chance in this thing is

1877
02:09:28.840 --> 02:09:33.199
if I can get in those guys
and get one of those ak's they're shooting

1878
02:09:33.199 --> 02:09:35.760
at each other, and maybe I'll
get some of them. But it came

1879
02:09:35.800 --> 02:09:39.920
to that. You know, every
time you get in a fistfight and there's

1880
02:09:39.960 --> 02:09:43.720
that moment just before the first punch
lands and you know it's on. It's

1881
02:09:43.760 --> 02:09:46.760
just nobody's bleeding yet, right,
We're there, right, So I go,

1882
02:09:46.840 --> 02:09:50.560
okay, I just say anything that
Joe, I stood up, Cass

1883
02:09:50.560 --> 02:09:52.319
Steven's on Crack is still sitting there, and get up, walk across the

1884
02:09:52.439 --> 02:09:56.640
room. As I'm walking straight at
him and they're all staring at me,

1885
02:09:56.760 --> 02:10:01.000
and I'm delirious, sweats pouring off
me, trying to close the distance.

1886
02:10:01.039 --> 02:10:05.119
Because they've got the weapon exactly right, because I don't, you know,

1887
02:10:05.159 --> 02:10:07.399
the Danny Pearl thing. I didn't
want my head shopped up, right,

1888
02:10:07.479 --> 02:10:09.560
I said, I'll die. I
don't want to die get my head cut

1889
02:10:09.640 --> 02:10:13.600
right. It's a ship way to
go. Yeah. So I go by

1890
02:10:13.640 --> 02:10:16.199
the door and I forget to say, this door was literally shit, you

1891
02:10:16.279 --> 02:10:22.159
not had like a swinging swinging doors
with a couple of movers broke out.

1892
02:10:22.319 --> 02:10:26.039
So I look out and I see
in the parking lot there was one bulb

1893
02:10:26.079 --> 02:10:31.000
over a gas pump and the car's
gone. The driver's gone, so the

1894
02:10:31.039 --> 02:10:33.199
part the parking lot's empty. So
it's not just me and Joe in this

1895
02:10:33.279 --> 02:10:37.399
room with these guys. And I
go all right, and then you know,

1896
02:10:37.520 --> 02:10:39.560
you put together a five paragraph order
and I'm thinking, you know,

1897
02:10:39.600 --> 02:10:43.439
it's three hours back, and it's
it's I'm doing math, and the math

1898
02:10:43.560 --> 02:10:48.279
sucks flapping, flapping, I'll flapping
and I know I'm flapping, but I'm

1899
02:10:48.279 --> 02:10:52.600
too sick to care because I think
I've really got one shot at this thing,

1900
02:10:52.039 --> 02:10:54.399
and fucking I mean, if I'm
gonna die, it's not gonna get

1901
02:10:54.439 --> 02:10:58.279
my head shopped on, not getting
on my knees, not getting my knees

1902
02:10:58.399 --> 02:11:01.119
right. So anyways, I walk
up to the table and these guys are

1903
02:11:01.119 --> 02:11:03.159
looking at me, and I don't
know what they're thinking, but they got

1904
02:11:03.159 --> 02:11:05.079
these looks on your face, like
who is this fucking retard? And I

1905
02:11:05.079 --> 02:11:09.159
get up to the table and one
of the aks was on the table and

1906
02:11:09.199 --> 02:11:13.520
it was had the boltop you know
the flip switches down right. So I'm

1907
02:11:13.560 --> 02:11:15.560
thinking, I don't have to do
anything. I just got to grab it

1908
02:11:15.560 --> 02:11:18.840
and pull a trigger. And so
the guy looks up at me, who

1909
02:11:18.920 --> 02:11:22.960
I kind of thought was the leader, and he puts his hand on his

1910
02:11:24.520 --> 02:11:26.520
like his finger on the pistol grip, and he looks at me and he

1911
02:11:26.520 --> 02:11:33.399
goes. And then two guys stand
up and they go and watch and walk

1912
02:11:33.439 --> 02:11:39.920
over to the door. And I
go, oh, I mean, what

1913
02:11:39.960 --> 02:11:43.039
am I gonna do now? So
I walk back to the table. I

1914
02:11:43.079 --> 02:11:46.640
get back to the table and cast
Stevens is standing there and picks up his

1915
02:11:46.720 --> 02:11:48.439
chair and he walks back. And
Joe looks up at me and he goes,

1916
02:11:48.640 --> 02:11:52.880
he's gone his knee. The driver. I go, yep, he

1917
02:11:52.960 --> 02:11:56.880
goes, wit. I gotta tell
you, the spy ship's getting pretty fucking

1918
02:11:56.880 --> 02:12:01.560
old. It was the only thing
he said the month we were there or

1919
02:12:01.560 --> 02:12:03.920
whatever, five weeks were there,
the only thing he said, and all

1920
02:12:03.960 --> 02:12:07.880
the ship that we've been through,
and and I always said, the first

1921
02:12:09.000 --> 02:12:16.600
rule of not letting people know you're
in the intelligence community is not making obvious

1922
02:12:16.720 --> 02:12:22.279
lies about not being an intelligence community. You know. So anyways, obviously

1923
02:12:22.319 --> 02:12:28.159
I survived. And but that was
This is one of those like programs that

1924
02:12:28.760 --> 02:12:33.680
some weirdo and some sub office somewhere
authorized in those fearful days after nine to

1925
02:12:33.720 --> 02:12:37.800
eleven that never ever, ever would
have gotten approved. Otherwise, if the

1926
02:12:37.880 --> 02:12:41.800
Pentagon hadn't just had a hole blown
in it, there's no way somebody would

1927
02:12:41.800 --> 02:12:46.119
have signed off on this. I
don't think anybody did sign sign off on

1928
02:12:46.600 --> 02:12:50.199
Let's see. I think somebody said. The guys I had lunch with said

1929
02:12:50.800 --> 02:12:52.600
okay, I get it, but
I don't want anything to do with it.

1930
02:12:52.640 --> 02:12:56.680
Go see this guy. And I
went to see that guy, and

1931
02:12:56.760 --> 02:13:00.960
I think he thought I came from
there, didn't know how. Yeah,

1932
02:13:01.039 --> 02:13:03.600
hooked this guy up. We got
up. Yeah, we got him.

1933
02:13:03.640 --> 02:13:05.079
We got him. And he didn't
have to hook up ship because I got

1934
02:13:05.079 --> 02:13:09.600
myself there. All he had to
do was put together the pieces it's like

1935
02:13:09.640 --> 02:13:13.359
I'm hiking the Appalachian Trail, people
a stage in food as I go home,

1936
02:13:13.560 --> 02:13:16.520
right, So the fixers and the
places to stay and guns, I

1937
02:13:16.520 --> 02:13:20.239
mean, that's another thing when you
do things like that. If you've got

1938
02:13:20.279 --> 02:13:24.439
a gun, you're only two things. In a situation like that, you're

1939
02:13:24.439 --> 02:13:28.720
either media or you're not right.
And if you've got a gun, you're

1940
02:13:28.760 --> 02:13:31.159
not you're not media right, right, And there's times when a gun would

1941
02:13:31.159 --> 02:13:35.479
help you fight in a situation maybe
like that, probably not, but you

1942
02:13:35.479 --> 02:13:37.880
know, two or three guys at
a roadblock or something like when I went

1943
02:13:37.880 --> 02:13:46.159
to someone right there. But the
but in that situation. The point I

1944
02:13:46.159 --> 02:13:50.920
think in this whole story is that
was the first time I realized that I

1945
02:13:50.960 --> 02:13:56.880
could build a world around what I
knew of your world. I knew what

1946
02:13:56.920 --> 02:14:03.239
you guys agency Special Worse is Delta
Seal Team six, all the agencies,

1947
02:14:03.359 --> 02:14:07.000
all the teams, all the countries. And at this point I'd probably been

1948
02:14:07.079 --> 02:14:11.319
to I'd say at least forty five
or fifty countries doing different things. Yeah,

1949
02:14:11.359 --> 02:14:15.800
and I knew what I could get
away with, and I knew how

1950
02:14:15.800 --> 02:14:18.920
to work around those different things.
And then it goes back to Uncle Harold

1951
02:14:18.479 --> 02:14:24.880
paying the CIA a million dollars building
his own private enterprise, and that that's

1952
02:14:24.920 --> 02:14:28.079
really what it became. Yeah,
a month after I got out of SO

1953
02:14:28.079 --> 02:14:31.279
so Joe, because we haven't really
talked about it. You know, you

1954
02:14:31.279 --> 02:14:37.720
mentioned Joe was with you and that
he was the photographer. Had he had

1955
02:14:37.880 --> 02:14:41.920
an intel background or or was he
just you just kind of brought him on

1956
02:14:43.079 --> 02:14:46.960
and I just brought him on.
Joe had no background in anything, but

1957
02:14:46.000 --> 02:14:50.039
he had spent a great deal of
time at HRT, So had Al Balagio.

1958
02:14:50.119 --> 02:14:52.199
So my director friend. Those guys
were there and they knew that world.

1959
02:14:54.720 --> 02:14:56.319
Sorry, well, probably want to
turn it off anyways. But no,

1960
02:14:56.359 --> 02:15:01.039
no, no, he was.
I mean he's a remarkable guy.

1961
02:15:01.560 --> 02:15:03.079
He can tell his own story,
he can write his own five books,

1962
02:15:03.079 --> 02:15:05.920
he can. I mean, his
life is so fucking aile it makes me

1963
02:15:05.960 --> 02:15:13.079
look like an amateur hour. But
he was that guy that could survive in

1964
02:15:13.119 --> 02:15:16.479
any situation. And there were there
are a lot of others. I mean,

1965
02:15:16.520 --> 02:15:20.399
there's some other stories that through this, like Misadventure, you sort of

1966
02:15:20.439 --> 02:15:24.119
realized that you could create like an
intelligence platform. That's it, and and

1967
02:15:24.479 --> 02:15:26.960
here's where it goes. I figured
a way to make money off it.

1968
02:15:26.760 --> 02:15:33.479
I figured out a way not to
because you can. What people don't realize

1969
02:15:33.479 --> 02:15:37.039
about the intelligence community, in my
in my opinion, in my experience,

1970
02:15:37.279 --> 02:15:43.079
based on my twenty something thirty something
years in that world overtly and obliquely,

1971
02:15:43.760 --> 02:15:48.720
is that, uh, it comes
It all comes down to tasking. There

1972
02:15:48.840 --> 02:15:54.199
is benign intelligence, human intelligence gathering
that gives nobody heartburn, right, like

1973
02:15:54.279 --> 02:15:58.479
National Resources Right, Yeah, like
n R. If you're working an NAR

1974
02:15:58.600 --> 02:16:05.520
thing, you can an intelligence agency
can gather information from somebody who is not

1975
02:16:05.600 --> 02:16:07.479
otherwise involved in the game in any
way. They don't have any training,

1976
02:16:07.520 --> 02:16:11.039
they don't have anything. They just
fly on a regular basis to Indian and

1977
02:16:11.399 --> 02:16:13.479
come back. You have a meeting
and you feel like a patriot and you

1978
02:16:13.479 --> 02:16:16.960
get some information. Right, there's
that aspect. The moment you turn to

1979
02:16:18.039 --> 02:16:22.079
tasking, bells go off, it's
espionage. It's espionage. Right. As

1980
02:16:22.079 --> 02:16:24.319
soon as they tell you to do
something, right, and it could be

1981
02:16:24.319 --> 02:16:28.119
any day now, there's eighteen intelligence
agencies. As soon as you do something.

1982
02:16:28.560 --> 02:16:33.120
It all comes down to tasking.
What I realized early in the game,

1983
02:16:33.319 --> 02:16:35.600
and I'm talking October two thousand and
one, was that there is a

1984
02:16:35.799 --> 02:16:39.079
line in between. If you know
it well enough, if you know the

1985
02:16:39.120 --> 02:16:43.479
system and you know the players,
and you know how everybody works what they

1986
02:16:43.520 --> 02:16:48.360
want, you can be a patriot. You can have a hell of a

1987
02:16:48.360 --> 02:16:50.840
time, and you can make a
little money. And does that does that

1988
02:16:50.920 --> 02:16:58.920
come from knowing what the taskings would
be, knowing the requirements so you don't

1989
02:16:58.959 --> 02:17:01.959
need to be tasked. You can
say, hey, I'm either you say

1990
02:17:03.000 --> 02:17:05.799
it or you just do it,
but I'm going to get this information.

1991
02:17:05.280 --> 02:17:09.520
But nobody's ever tasched you on it. That's correct. But I knew the

1992
02:17:09.520 --> 02:17:15.719
task so when i'm when I presented
a plan, it did not need to

1993
02:17:15.719 --> 02:17:18.959
be signed off on by anyone.
It was plausible and it provided benefit to

1994
02:17:20.000 --> 02:17:24.079
someone without any downside whatsoever. I
mean, if I died, if I

1995
02:17:24.159 --> 02:17:28.079
had gotten my head cut off and
said of Danny Pearl in Lahore and I've

1996
02:17:28.639 --> 02:17:31.280
been there are many plenty of times, yeah, and it could have happened.

1997
02:17:31.280 --> 02:17:33.760
When I went out to the polo
club, that could have happened.

1998
02:17:33.799 --> 02:17:35.639
I'm just a lucky fuck. That's
all I canna say. But if you

1999
02:17:35.760 --> 02:17:41.399
know and listen, there are probably
people watching this right now who are CIA

2000
02:17:41.479 --> 02:17:45.920
case officers, operations officers at b
I Agents, Delta Force operated Seal Team

2001
02:17:45.959 --> 02:17:50.120
six guys. They've all got stories
on the side, They've got everybody's got

2002
02:17:50.120 --> 02:17:52.040
a story where they were a little
bit off to the side, and you

2003
02:17:52.079 --> 02:17:54.399
know that, right, and there
are all things that don't make sense.

2004
02:17:54.520 --> 02:17:58.959
What I found a way to do
and did it for a very long time

2005
02:18:00.000 --> 02:18:05.280
time, was to work in between
those things. It's very smart because it's

2006
02:18:05.360 --> 02:18:11.239
very because again it's like, hey, especially when you're getting the journalistic top

2007
02:18:11.280 --> 02:18:15.719
cover, when you're like, hey, I'm going to be doing this thing.

2008
02:18:16.520 --> 02:18:20.600
I'm going here, I'm going to
talk to these people. I don't

2009
02:18:20.639 --> 02:18:24.239
want any task, but I'm curious. I'm curious, like what what types

2010
02:18:24.280 --> 02:18:28.239
of things you guys are interested in
this area that I'm gonna be It was

2011
02:18:28.280 --> 02:18:31.159
kind of it was not even that
it was that idea. Yeah, when

2012
02:18:31.159 --> 02:18:35.319
I when I first introduced my plan, I'm not going to talk about what

2013
02:18:35.360 --> 02:18:37.840
I actually did or how I actually
did it, but I think it was

2014
02:18:37.879 --> 02:18:45.319
clever, yeah, and I think
it benefited in significant ways. Is if

2015
02:18:45.319 --> 02:18:48.719
you're in the intelligence community, like
you had a very minimum needle waver to

2016
02:18:48.840 --> 02:18:56.280
use journalistic cover, like that's like
one of it's like using uh, it's

2017
02:18:56.319 --> 02:19:00.000
like using red cross as cover,
like if there are things that are members

2018
02:19:00.040 --> 02:19:05.239
of the clergy. Yeah, journalists, it's just not yeah, it's not.

2019
02:19:05.319 --> 02:19:07.120
Well, I got bad news for
you, gentlemen. That's where this

2020
02:19:07.159 --> 02:19:13.040
goes. Well, So the curious
thing is, I don't remember seeing any

2021
02:19:13.120 --> 02:19:16.000
articles written by Chris Whitcomb. Yeah. Were they out there? Oh fu

2022
02:19:16.159 --> 02:19:20.399
yeah, yeah, I wrote.
I wrote. I wrote for the New

2023
02:19:20.479 --> 02:19:22.959
York Times. I had an op
ed contract with the New York Times.

2024
02:19:24.360 --> 02:19:26.600
I wrote about all aspects of this
stuff. From New York Times. I

2025
02:19:26.639 --> 02:19:31.280
wrote about I wrote for like the
Sunday Magazine section. I wrote for fious

2026
02:19:31.280 --> 02:19:33.479
things, but I wrote. I
think I wrote six six different articles for

2027
02:19:33.520 --> 02:19:37.399
GQ. But that whole thing was
it was a horrible article because it was

2028
02:19:37.799 --> 02:19:41.040
I got back, like editors and
writers. I'm a writer who does all

2029
02:19:41.079 --> 02:19:45.719
these things, but writing is important
to me. And I got back and

2030
02:19:46.319 --> 02:19:50.680
Art Cooper assigned this editor. And
I'm not going to make statements about men,

2031
02:19:50.840 --> 02:19:52.520
females, uh, you know whatever. Else. All I can say

2032
02:19:52.559 --> 02:19:58.559
is this editor was trying to make
sense of my article, the subtext of

2033
02:19:58.559 --> 02:20:01.159
what you and I are talking about
right now. How And she left after

2034
02:20:01.200 --> 02:20:03.319
I got to piss and match with
her, she left and went to Red

2035
02:20:03.319 --> 02:20:09.200
Book Magazine and started editing cookbook recipes. Right, so you take a cookbook

2036
02:20:09.239 --> 02:20:13.680
recipe editor from Red Book Magazine trying
to make sense of me and all the

2037
02:20:13.680 --> 02:20:15.760
ship that I did, right,
Yeah, the articles written it. I

2038
02:20:15.760 --> 02:20:18.399
mean, it's got pictures of me
wearing all the vocal garb, like that

2039
02:20:18.440 --> 02:20:22.000
picture that I sent you with the
whatever the fucked up head the head gear

2040
02:20:22.559 --> 02:20:24.799
that was one of those things up
there. And there's like there's this one

2041
02:20:24.799 --> 02:20:28.799
place where I was sleeping in a
in a goat shed, and you know,

2042
02:20:28.840 --> 02:20:31.799
there was this anyway, just to
wrap the story up, this guy

2043
02:20:33.040 --> 02:20:37.920
Zeke came in after the whole thing
happened when I almost tried to get in

2044
02:20:37.959 --> 02:20:43.799
the gunfight in the corner. He
came in, and those were his guys,

2045
02:20:43.559 --> 02:20:50.040
And what I had manufactured to be
great drama in life in reality was

2046
02:20:50.280 --> 02:20:54.879
his guys watching over us. Oh. I just didn't realize it. Yeah,

2047
02:20:54.879 --> 02:20:58.920
you know, and then and I
was okay from that point on.

2048
02:20:58.000 --> 02:21:01.440
I mean, I was okay because
the other elements, but it wasn't.

2049
02:21:01.479 --> 02:21:05.200
Those guys were not the threat that
I thought, even though it was a

2050
02:21:05.280 --> 02:21:11.239
legitimate concern, you know. So, yeah, that's a pretty wild ride.

2051
02:21:11.040 --> 02:21:15.120
Well it hasn't even started yet,
man, I mean that was just

2052
02:21:15.319 --> 02:21:18.040
that was the dry run. That
was like the fucking that was you.

2053
02:21:18.319 --> 02:21:24.319
That was proof of concept. That
Yeah, that's all concept. When you

2054
02:21:24.440 --> 02:21:26.399
when you came back to the debrief, you like, how did that work?

2055
02:21:28.680 --> 02:21:31.360
What can I say about that?
I came back to the States and

2056
02:21:31.520 --> 02:21:35.280
I had to present I had to
write an article for GQ magazine. I

2057
02:21:35.319 --> 02:21:39.040
know that sounds absurd, but I
did. And the first thing we did

2058
02:21:39.879 --> 02:21:46.159
was go to la I mean it
literally flew from Okay, we shouldn't tell

2059
02:21:46.200 --> 02:21:48.559
all these things. But so the
thing about Joe is, Joe was the

2060
02:21:48.600 --> 02:21:54.159
first guy I ever knew that had
an American Express Black Card. Remember when

2061
02:21:54.159 --> 02:21:56.799
those first came out, there was
invitation only. Yeah, right, you

2062
02:21:56.799 --> 02:21:58.879
couldn't get one. If you wanted
one, you didn't have a chance they

2063
02:22:00.040 --> 02:22:03.000
would call you up and invite you. Joe was one of the first guys

2064
02:22:03.040 --> 02:22:05.040
I ever knew that had a black
card, and he had a cell phone

2065
02:22:05.079 --> 02:22:09.000
with overseas coverage. The black card
meant you had a concierge, right,

2066
02:22:09.000 --> 02:22:15.079
so you'd call a number and he'd
go mister Joe and he'd say, I

2067
02:22:15.079 --> 02:22:20.040
need a vegetarian restaurant and her rot
and you know in in some like some

2068
02:22:20.120 --> 02:22:24.319
Acacia t or something like right,
and uh, because you know, I

2069
02:22:24.520 --> 02:22:26.680
told you he had just come from
Madonna's wedding and his girlfriend was like this

2070
02:22:26.959 --> 02:22:31.559
household name right. So anyways,
we get on a plane. Uh fuck

2071
02:22:33.079 --> 02:22:35.600
one more. We're gonna have to
cut this thing off pretty quick because I'm

2072
02:22:35.600 --> 02:22:39.920
gonna have another Scotch and it's gonna
go south. So anyways, just to

2073
02:22:39.920 --> 02:22:45.840
close up the Afghanistan story, we
go back to he found. He calls

2074
02:22:45.879 --> 02:22:50.719
his concierge and he gets us two
tickets on a seven forty seven one hundred,

2075
02:22:50.399 --> 02:22:56.680
one hundred out of Islamabad Airport and
uh, we take off. Now,

2076
02:22:56.799 --> 02:23:01.479
I haven't taken a shower in a
month. I'm not exaggerating. I

2077
02:23:01.479 --> 02:23:05.319
mean I looked like I mean it
was. It was. This whole thing

2078
02:23:05.680 --> 02:23:09.200
was much worse than I'm letting on. It was much worse. I'm just

2079
02:23:09.360 --> 02:23:13.040
I don't want to make the whole
thing about one story. But so anyways,

2080
02:23:13.239 --> 02:23:16.079
he would always say at claridges and
for those who don't spend a lot

2081
02:23:16.120 --> 02:23:18.239
of time in London. Clarridges is
one of the great hotels on Earth.

2082
02:23:18.559 --> 02:23:24.040
I mean, it's the bar and
Joe the bartender, he know, he

2083
02:23:24.120 --> 02:23:28.440
knew everybody, you know, mister
so and so and uh So we go

2084
02:23:28.600 --> 02:23:31.319
there and let's say, I went, I'm not gonna tell you all those

2085
02:23:31.319 --> 02:23:35.719
stories. But so we go back
from London after a stay at Claridges,

2086
02:23:35.840 --> 02:23:39.799
take a shower and get regrouped,
fly to La and he sets up a

2087
02:23:39.840 --> 02:23:45.840
dinner with this U with all these
actresses in uh this place called the Buffalo

2088
02:23:45.879 --> 02:23:48.959
Club, which in Santa Monica,
California. It was a it was kind

2089
02:23:48.959 --> 02:23:52.440
of a secret restaurant in those days, but put together by Tony Jerkovic,

2090
02:23:52.719 --> 02:23:58.600
who created Miami Vice and he was
one of the biggest television producers of the

2091
02:23:58.680 --> 02:24:01.719
nine. He's huge guy, and
he started this a little restaurant. No

2092
02:24:01.799 --> 02:24:05.680
Son Buffalo, New York. No, No, he was from Buffalo and

2093
02:24:05.639 --> 02:24:09.959
New he called at the Buffalo Club. But it was on Olympic Boulevard in

2094
02:24:09.000 --> 02:24:13.040
Santa Monica, California, back when
that was still a shithole. So there

2095
02:24:13.079 --> 02:24:18.600
was this little, hidden, secret
restaurant in Santa Monica that you could only

2096
02:24:18.639 --> 02:24:22.719
get into if you knew where it
was if you knew somebody, it was

2097
02:24:22.200 --> 02:24:26.719
one of those secret places. Yeah, regular people can't go. So but

2098
02:24:26.719 --> 02:24:31.479
we had our own table, right, I mean like permanently. So we

2099
02:24:31.559 --> 02:24:33.840
go in there. I'm just trying
to wrap up the story. So we

2100
02:24:33.879 --> 02:24:37.719
go in. We're eventually going back
to Langley, eventually going back to the

2101
02:24:37.760 --> 02:24:41.079
CIA. So we fly to Clarridges
and we have this big time in London.

2102
02:24:41.360 --> 02:24:46.520
Then we fly to la and he
puts all these actresses together because he's

2103
02:24:46.559 --> 02:24:52.159
a casting director and I mean some
really household names. So we have it.

2104
02:24:52.200 --> 02:24:54.840
We have a nice dinner and we're
telling stories. And he was a

2105
02:24:54.920 --> 02:24:58.799
ladies man, as I may have
mentioned. And one of the ladies was

2106
02:24:58.840 --> 02:25:03.319
a bartender at the Buffalo Club who
we had a liaison with in the Men

2107
02:25:03.479 --> 02:25:09.760
and the Gentleman's restroom the previous night. Good conversation, last room, good

2108
02:25:09.760 --> 02:25:15.479
conversation, intellectual. Yeah, And
so he had gone to a private event

2109
02:25:15.600 --> 02:25:18.479
in a garden out behind the place
while we're having a conversation. So we're

2110
02:25:18.479 --> 02:25:22.479
having this meeting. We're having a
dinner in a booth at the Buffalo Club

2111
02:25:22.840 --> 02:25:26.040
with all these actresses and I'm trying
to tell this story to them, and

2112
02:25:26.079 --> 02:25:30.200
they keep saying, wit cut to
the chase, was you know, how

2113
02:25:30.239 --> 02:25:33.079
the fuck did you escape? And
you know whatever. So anyways, the

2114
02:25:33.079 --> 02:25:35.520
point of the story is Joe goes
back and he gets a piss and match

2115
02:25:35.559 --> 02:25:39.479
with the bouncer, who was a
large man, a pretty boy, like

2116
02:25:39.520 --> 02:25:43.319
a Hollywood bouncer. You know,
they're like one minute they're in a runway

2117
02:25:43.360 --> 02:25:46.840
show, in the next minute doing
a UFC fight, right, And so

2118
02:25:46.959 --> 02:25:52.120
I'm we're holding court and it's fairly
late. We've had a couple of cocktails,

2119
02:25:52.719 --> 02:25:56.040
and I'll never forget it. I
see Joe coming around the corner and

2120
02:25:56.040 --> 02:26:00.799
he's walking straight at me. And
Joe would always start the fights and then

2121
02:26:00.840 --> 02:26:05.879
point to me. And we all
like to fight, right, some of

2122
02:26:05.959 --> 02:26:11.319
us like to fight a lot.
So he comes comes walking straight at me,

2123
02:26:11.399 --> 02:26:13.799
goes, wait, we got a
problem, and I go, I'm

2124
02:26:13.840 --> 02:26:16.760
sure we do. So we walked
to the front. Now, the Buffalo

2125
02:26:16.799 --> 02:26:22.799
Club is a is an elegant,
little hole in the wall restaurant and there's

2126
02:26:22.840 --> 02:26:26.479
a little tiny bar in the front, maybe four seats, and you would

2127
02:26:26.520 --> 02:26:31.079
walk in off the street and you
get a table. Right, So we

2128
02:26:31.200 --> 02:26:33.600
walk up at this by this by
the time we get up there, the

2129
02:26:33.920 --> 02:26:37.799
bouncer has come around the corner from
the garden party out back who wouldn't let

2130
02:26:37.840 --> 02:26:41.920
him see the woman that he had
interesting liaison with. And I look at

2131
02:26:41.920 --> 02:26:45.479
this fucking guy and he's so big. I mean, I'm not a shrimp,

2132
02:26:45.600 --> 02:26:48.360
right, I'm a fairly good sized
guy, and this guy was huge.

2133
02:26:50.120 --> 02:26:52.799
And he was so big Joe's maybe
like five ten. He was so

2134
02:26:52.879 --> 02:26:56.040
big that Joe had to jump up
in the air like he's trying to dunk

2135
02:26:56.079 --> 02:27:00.600
a basketball, just to punch him
in the mouth. And he locked him.

2136
02:27:00.680 --> 02:27:03.120
I still remember, you know that
sound. And he clocks this guy,

2137
02:27:03.479 --> 02:27:07.360
and the guy just looks at him, like, what are you an

2138
02:27:07.399 --> 02:27:13.479
idiot? And then he looks at
me and I don't want anything to do

2139
02:27:13.520 --> 02:27:16.159
with any of it, right,
But it's on, right, So it

2140
02:27:16.200 --> 02:27:20.280
goes to the floor and it's on, and you know, it's two on

2141
02:27:20.280 --> 02:27:24.719
one and we're losing, and it
it's not pretty. So all of a

2142
02:27:24.760 --> 02:27:26.879
sudden, I hear somebody start yelling, yelling, yelling, and I look

2143
02:27:26.959 --> 02:27:31.159
up and it's Tony Jerkovic, who
is the biggest producer and the biggest TV

2144
02:27:31.280 --> 02:27:37.239
producer in Hollywood, Miami fis and
I mean, like analyst shows and he

2145
02:27:37.319 --> 02:27:39.440
goes, Joe, you're out of
here, and nobody fights in the buffalo

2146
02:27:39.440 --> 02:27:43.000
called you're a band, You're band, full of life, and Joe goes,

2147
02:27:43.200 --> 02:27:45.440
you can't ban me. I built
this place. He goes, you

2148
02:27:45.440 --> 02:27:48.760
didn't build fucking anything. You're out
of here. So then we're out in

2149
02:27:48.799 --> 02:27:50.639
the sidewalk, sitting on the sidewalk, you know, trying to get a

2150
02:27:50.719 --> 02:27:54.040
ride home, and all the weight
and the famous actresses are all gone because

2151
02:27:54.079 --> 02:27:58.120
I think we're a bunch of morons. So then I got on a plane

2152
02:27:58.120 --> 02:28:01.639
and I fly back to Langley with
all the film of all the things we

2153
02:28:01.719 --> 02:28:05.280
haven't you know, I mean there's
things you gather, yeah, visually.

2154
02:28:05.399 --> 02:28:09.040
Yeah. And so I took,
you know, a couple of things for

2155
02:28:09.079 --> 02:28:13.479
GQ, for the photographs for the
magazine article, and they kept all the

2156
02:28:13.520 --> 02:28:16.920
other film. They kept all the
film, and he was furious about he's

2157
02:28:16.959 --> 02:28:20.680
furious to this day, he's furious
that they kept all this film. But

2158
02:28:20.719 --> 02:28:24.040
then the only thing that was interesting
there is that sometime after that, I

2159
02:28:24.079 --> 02:28:28.719
did a like a group debriefing,
a lecture. I did a lecture at

2160
02:28:30.159 --> 02:28:33.000
this you know, a lecture Hall, and I was. I was shocked.

2161
02:28:33.000 --> 02:28:37.319
To this day, I'm shocked at
how many people came. I was

2162
02:28:37.479 --> 02:28:39.319
really, really, very very surprised. To this day. I don't know

2163
02:28:39.319 --> 02:28:41.559
why that many people came to the
lecture because it seems like they would have

2164
02:28:41.559 --> 02:28:46.159
known that stuff. So anyways,
that that was the That was the my

2165
02:28:46.719 --> 02:28:52.559
transition from the FBI into the world
in October and November of two thousand and

2166
02:28:52.559 --> 02:28:54.799
one. So that's your first trip, and then you know, things continue

2167
02:28:54.840 --> 02:28:58.959
to pop off. Of course,
two thousand and three happens the invasion of

2168
02:28:58.959 --> 02:29:03.719
Iraq. Yeah, how how does
this thing progress? Okay, you build

2169
02:29:03.719 --> 02:29:07.120
this as you build this capability slash
business. I mean because it is a

2170
02:29:07.159 --> 02:29:11.479
business now at this point it is
a business. But I didn't think of

2171
02:29:11.520 --> 02:29:16.719
it as a business. I thought
of it. There's a disconnect in my

2172
02:29:16.799 --> 02:29:20.559
mind. This is like old school
like French jet birds that like go into

2173
02:29:20.600 --> 02:29:22.879
the private sector after World Wars.
I mean, it's a little bit of

2174
02:29:22.920 --> 02:29:26.719
like it was. It's a little
bit of like Dewey Claridge like setting up

2175
02:29:26.360 --> 02:29:30.200
Yeah, you know, I'll tell
you what it was. It was a

2176
02:29:30.239 --> 02:29:35.680
moron who didn't know any better.
I just thought I can do anything I

2177
02:29:35.719 --> 02:29:39.319
want in the world. Hold my
beer. Yeah, and I did.

2178
02:29:39.879 --> 02:29:43.639
I did. So I moved to
New York. I didn't move New York.

2179
02:29:43.879 --> 02:29:46.920
I built or I got a place
in New York on the Upper West

2180
02:29:46.959 --> 02:29:50.120
Side, and I went to work
for NBC. So I worked for MSNBC

2181
02:29:52.040 --> 02:29:54.200
NBC so I did. I did
the Today Show. I don't know how

2182
02:29:54.319 --> 02:29:58.319
endless times did the Today Show.
Matt and Iron k I've got the best

2183
02:29:58.399 --> 02:30:01.120
Katie kirks Or in the history of
the world. But I don't forget to

2184
02:30:01.159 --> 02:30:05.280
that. So get us there walking, We'll walk us in. Maybe we'll

2185
02:30:05.319 --> 02:30:09.799
maybe we'll save that for a bonus
segment. Oh my god, we got

2186
02:30:09.799 --> 02:30:13.399
a lot for the bonus segment.
Yeah, we just wasted two hours talking

2187
02:30:13.399 --> 02:30:16.840
about Waco and Ruby Rich and we
apologize for that. No, no,

2188
02:30:16.920 --> 02:30:20.159
but nobody knows the stories. I
mean. So yeah, anyways, Okay,

2189
02:30:20.239 --> 02:30:24.559
So I come back and here's where
we go from there. The last

2190
02:30:24.639 --> 02:30:28.959
thing that I built in the FBI
before I left was called the Strategic Information

2191
02:30:28.120 --> 02:30:35.120
Management Office, Critical Incident Response Group, Negotiators profile is hostage rescue team logistics.

2192
02:30:35.559 --> 02:30:39.680
All the different agencies whenever we went
to a crisis. The biggest problem

2193
02:30:39.680 --> 02:30:43.360
was controlling information, which is the
media, and what do we know about

2194
02:30:43.360 --> 02:30:46.239
the situation, how do we want
to control the information which is the lifeblood

2195
02:30:46.239 --> 02:30:50.879
of any crisis. Information is And
it can become like I don't I don't

2196
02:30:50.879 --> 02:30:54.760
know precisely what you're talking about,
of course, but like it can become

2197
02:30:54.799 --> 02:31:00.879
an issue like if the press is
recording the operator's staging to go in and

2198
02:31:01.000 --> 02:31:03.319
well here's a perfect example. Uh, Puerto Rico spent a lot of time

2199
02:31:03.319 --> 02:31:07.799
in Puerto Rico. There's an island
called viz Vicz. There's a bomb site

2200
02:31:07.799 --> 02:31:11.280
for the navy, and the people
of Vics didn't like that. Right,

2201
02:31:11.319 --> 02:31:16.959
You're you're blowing up all these like
endangered birds and some non gelatinous foremennifference and

2202
02:31:16.200 --> 02:31:20.120
it's like all this all this ship
that you get, right, it's crazy.

2203
02:31:20.159 --> 02:31:24.040
So we fly in what's the helicopter
with the chinook with chok? Yeah,

2204
02:31:24.079 --> 02:31:26.840
so I remember we fly in,
We do this big assault into the

2205
02:31:26.879 --> 02:31:30.479
island and we're on the chinook and
I get off and off the back and

2206
02:31:30.879 --> 02:31:33.520
it was the island had all the
soil was kind of flinty. So maybe

2207
02:31:33.520 --> 02:31:37.000
you guys have seen that. You
see it in a rock in Afghanistan or

2208
02:31:37.040 --> 02:31:39.959
in a rock. It's a dust
stop. Yeah. No, it lights

2209
02:31:41.040 --> 02:31:43.239
the light, the lights the end
of the blades on. Yeah, so

2210
02:31:43.280 --> 02:31:48.360
you get yeah, it's beautiful.
Yeah, it's beautiful. So get the

2211
02:31:48.360 --> 02:31:50.280
whole thing. We couldn't land because
it was dust. The point of the

2212
02:31:50.360 --> 02:31:54.479
story is there was this one op
just as an example, in Vicks Island.

2213
02:31:54.799 --> 02:31:58.600
We fly into Vicks and they had
these I think there were two s

2214
02:31:58.719 --> 02:32:03.239
cong They had some protesters, and
the protesters were on the beach and they

2215
02:32:03.280 --> 02:32:07.879
said, we want you to come
and arrest us on national television. So

2216
02:32:07.920 --> 02:32:11.639
they called NBC, ABC, CBS, everybody came down there with the camera

2217
02:32:11.680 --> 02:32:15.920
crews and they were saying, we
are going to watch the next Waco.

2218
02:32:16.639 --> 02:32:20.159
We're gonna watch these guys come in. And they had sling shots and spark

2219
02:32:20.239 --> 02:32:24.000
plugs. Right, I mean,
I get an M four and a bag

2220
02:32:24.040 --> 02:32:30.159
of grenades, right, and they've
got sling shots with spark plugs and to

2221
02:32:30.440 --> 02:32:33.479
United States congressmen. So all that's
going to happen is they shoot us with

2222
02:32:33.520 --> 02:32:39.440
a sling shot and somebody does something
stupid and the FBI is back twenty years

2223
02:32:39.559 --> 02:32:43.239
right, So I said, wait
a minute, let's relax you a little

2224
02:32:43.280 --> 02:32:46.280
bit. We know what they want, we know how they plan to do

2225
02:32:46.360 --> 02:32:50.319
it. All we've got to do
is walk down there, get all the

2226
02:32:50.399 --> 02:32:52.600
media together, and say, come
with me. We want you to record

2227
02:32:52.639 --> 02:32:56.760
everything that we're going to do.
So we went up to them and said,

2228
02:32:56.719 --> 02:33:01.200
the SWAT guys were pissed. All
the the San Juan Swat guys will

2229
02:33:01.200 --> 02:33:03.600
piss Fuck these guys. We're gonna
we're gonna make an example of them.

2230
02:33:03.639 --> 02:33:07.559
And I said, maybe it's not
the way it's gonna go down. De

2231
02:33:07.680 --> 02:33:11.879
squads and police force you down,
no foster, no solid public, no.

2232
02:33:11.920 --> 02:33:15.440
But I listen, you know,
I didn't have anything to prove.

2233
02:33:15.440 --> 02:33:20.000
I'd already been through wake up.
But I did not want another debacle for

2234
02:33:20.120 --> 02:33:22.879
me or for the FBI. I
love the FBI, I believe in the

2235
02:33:22.879 --> 02:33:26.680
FBI, at least in those days. I didn't want that to happen.

2236
02:33:26.680 --> 02:33:28.040
So I said, look, let's
do this. Let's just think about this.

2237
02:33:28.399 --> 02:33:31.280
Let's walk down. We'll bring the
media with us. I'll go up

2238
02:33:31.319 --> 02:33:35.000
to whoever it was at the time, you know, all the famous people,

2239
02:33:35.559 --> 02:33:37.319
And I said, we go up. So we walked up to them,

2240
02:33:37.319 --> 02:33:41.040
and I said to the to the
two congressmen and the people with the

2241
02:33:41.079 --> 02:33:43.440
sling shots and the and the spark
plugs. I said, these are flex

2242
02:33:43.479 --> 02:33:48.040
cuffs. We're gonna put them on
you and we're gonna walk you out of

2243
02:33:48.040 --> 02:33:50.120
here. And they said, no, you're not. Whatever else, So

2244
02:33:50.879 --> 02:33:54.760
I put the flex cuts. All
they wanted to do is beyond national news.

2245
02:33:54.040 --> 02:33:56.719
So we put the flex cuffs on
them, but didn't tighten them up

2246
02:33:58.159 --> 02:34:01.680
so if they dropped their hands they
would fall down on the ground. So

2247
02:34:01.520 --> 02:34:05.120
we put the flex custs because that's
what they wanted. But then they realized

2248
02:34:05.159 --> 02:34:09.879
they looked like complete morons because they
I mean it looked like a blacksmith,

2249
02:34:09.040 --> 02:34:13.319
like a wizard's apron, you know, hanging off their wrists. And it

2250
02:34:13.360 --> 02:34:18.920
diffused the situation. There was no
fight, nobody got hurt, nobody caused

2251
02:34:18.959 --> 02:34:24.159
any problems whatsoever. All the media
had no story to write at all.

2252
02:34:26.319 --> 02:34:28.120
Then I found a deuce and a
half someplace. It was like a bomb

2253
02:34:28.120 --> 02:34:31.840
target, and got it running,
drove it up, put all their ship

2254
02:34:31.920 --> 02:34:33.079
in the back, and drove it
back to the airport and away they went.

2255
02:34:33.120 --> 02:34:41.040
And it was no story whatsoever.
So realizing that nothing really matters unless

2256
02:34:41.040 --> 02:34:43.959
it appears on the news right or
in those days, right now with social

2257
02:34:43.000 --> 02:34:46.280
media with their else right or your
show, but back in those days,

2258
02:34:46.280 --> 02:34:50.399
and that changed the show. So
this lightning boat goes back to the seventh

2259
02:34:50.399 --> 02:34:54.559
floor of FBI headquarters saying, wait
a minute, you did what you know,

2260
02:34:56.079 --> 02:34:58.280
but it was a different way of
thinking, and all of a sudden,

2261
02:35:01.879 --> 02:35:05.399
these are awesome, thank you,
They're good, are very fantastic,

2262
02:35:05.399 --> 02:35:07.719
They're really tasty. So that was
a paradigm shift in the way we looked

2263
02:35:07.760 --> 02:35:13.319
at things. Yeah, but it
came through the Strategic Information Information Management Office.

2264
02:35:13.319 --> 02:35:18.799
And here's where it gets a little
weird. Perhaps during my time I

2265
02:35:18.840 --> 02:35:28.479
may have come across the fourth psychological
Operations element and perhaps they are the craziest

2266
02:35:28.479 --> 02:35:31.479
motherfuckers I've ever met my entire life. And I'll say this. When you

2267
02:35:31.559 --> 02:35:35.280
join the FBI, you go through
sixteen weeks or academy. It might be

2268
02:35:35.319 --> 02:35:39.319
eighteen weeks. Now, you go
through the farm, you go through you

2269
02:35:39.319 --> 02:35:41.719
know, it's different because the CIA
training case officer training is a little bit

2270
02:35:41.719 --> 02:35:46.680
different. It's a little fragmented,
right, But you go through operator training

2271
02:35:46.719 --> 02:35:50.200
school, you go through any program
that you guys have been through, and

2272
02:35:50.280 --> 02:35:56.000
they have a timeline, it's usually
not that long. Psy Ops basic school

2273
02:35:56.120 --> 02:36:01.600
is forty three weeks, yeah,
four three weeks away from your family,

2274
02:36:01.639 --> 02:36:05.000
away from any There are some true
believers in that outfit, and there's some

2275
02:36:05.280 --> 02:36:09.360
wild outfits. In my personal opinion, in my personal experience, I think

2276
02:36:09.360 --> 02:36:13.239
I've worked with everybody around the world. We haven't got to it yet,

2277
02:36:13.239 --> 02:36:16.399
but I've worked with everybody. Is
rarely is the Turks, the South Africans,

2278
02:36:16.479 --> 02:36:20.479
the anybody. I don't give a
shit who you're talking about. I've

2279
02:36:20.479 --> 02:36:24.719
worked with all of those intelligence organizations
up until about a year and a half

2280
02:36:24.719 --> 02:36:30.799
ago. In my opinion, those
Psycho those psy OPS guys are some squirrels.

2281
02:36:31.200 --> 02:36:33.239
I mean, there's some one of
the Psyops guys. The Army Psyops

2282
02:36:33.280 --> 02:36:37.760
guys are like widely misunderstood and even
derided. You have the letter for Chris

2283
02:36:39.440 --> 02:36:43.920
Oh, it's right here, and
even derided in the Special Operations community,

2284
02:36:43.959 --> 02:36:48.399
and a lot of people I think
don't really understand what they do. A

2285
02:36:48.399 --> 02:36:50.360
lot of them. There are a
lot of CIA details that they work.

2286
02:36:50.399 --> 02:36:56.280
A lot of people don't get that. And if you know those guys through

2287
02:36:56.280 --> 02:36:58.120
what they're you know most people think
of it just as pamphlet drops, but

2288
02:36:58.159 --> 02:37:01.440
there's a lot of other stuff going
on, and they are and they are

2289
02:37:01.600 --> 02:37:07.879
so controlled, like psyops in the
military in particular, are so controlled because

2290
02:37:09.000 --> 02:37:13.719
it would be like you would be
like shooting around from a sniper rifle and

2291
02:37:13.760 --> 02:37:18.440
then an atomic blast going off as
a results. Yeah, they're literre like

2292
02:37:18.520 --> 02:37:22.559
left and right limits. And another
thing they do is that a lot of

2293
02:37:22.559 --> 02:37:28.760
people don't realize this, even produce
films anti extremist films around the world that

2294
02:37:28.840 --> 02:37:33.239
show up in places like Indonesia,
Kurdistan else that's one of their critical languages

2295
02:37:33.239 --> 02:37:35.760
when you join. They have a
certain number of critical languages. Indonesia is

2296
02:37:35.760 --> 02:37:41.600
one of those languages. And I'll
say this the based on my experience,

2297
02:37:43.239 --> 02:37:48.479
and I don't know shit compared to
I know what I don't know. They

2298
02:37:48.479 --> 02:37:54.120
have white, gray, and black
categories of operations. Right, white is

2299
02:37:54.200 --> 02:37:58.719
the pamphlet drops, gray is the
movies. The black shit is when you

2300
02:37:58.760 --> 02:38:05.079
don't know where it's coming from.
In my opinion, that's some of the

2301
02:38:05.120 --> 02:38:09.639
wildest shit that I've done in my
life, that aspect of it, and

2302
02:38:11.280 --> 02:38:13.120
some of it's weird. So anyways, the point of the story is that

2303
02:38:13.559 --> 02:38:16.959
I put this all together and I
said, look, what we really want

2304
02:38:18.000 --> 02:38:22.920
as a government is to protect Americans. We're patriots. We believe in what

2305
02:38:22.959 --> 02:38:24.680
we do, and we believe that
is good, and we believe that good

2306
02:38:24.760 --> 02:38:28.879
is going to make America whole so
that our kids can go to sleep at

2307
02:38:28.959 --> 02:38:33.799
night. That's why we all serve
and die if that's what it takes,

2308
02:38:33.879 --> 02:38:41.440
right, I found a way I
felt that I could contribute. In terms

2309
02:38:41.600 --> 02:38:46.159
of information management, It's not new. I mean we've been doing that.

2310
02:38:46.200 --> 02:38:48.799
Propaganda's been around forever, not always
well, but not always well. But

2311
02:38:48.959 --> 02:38:54.719
look, and it's not even government. It's a public relations advertising. It's

2312
02:38:54.760 --> 02:38:58.840
advertising, it's marketing. It is
human being. It is trying to manipulate

2313
02:38:58.920 --> 02:39:01.520
human beings to do what you want
them to do right right, And it's

2314
02:39:01.600 --> 02:39:05.079
not it's not even done best by
government. It's done best by corporations because

2315
02:39:05.079 --> 02:39:09.360
they make money. I mean,
look at bud Light, the debacle they

2316
02:39:09.399 --> 02:39:13.520
went through. That was a simple
mistake that cost billions of dollars and everybody

2317
02:39:13.559 --> 02:39:18.159
knows that example. They even went
back in history, any government, kingdom,

2318
02:39:18.920 --> 02:39:24.879
any populace who thought that their ruler
was ordained by God or part of

2319
02:39:24.920 --> 02:39:30.399
some historic lineage. They were sold, right, they were SOLDI sold the

2320
02:39:30.399 --> 02:39:33.559
bill of sale. You know,
it's yeah, it's it's good marketing.

2321
02:39:33.760 --> 02:39:37.440
It's good marketing. But I think
everything in life comes down to objective and

2322
02:39:37.479 --> 02:39:41.840
you've got to believe. I believe
a certain subset of things about human beings,

2323
02:39:41.959 --> 02:39:46.079
and when it comes right down to
it, they are as old as

2324
02:39:46.159 --> 02:39:48.520
human beings and it's never changed.
Human beings do what's in their own best

2325
02:39:48.559 --> 02:39:54.399
interest. It might be Mother Teresa
helping people in the ghettos of Calcutta,

2326
02:39:54.719 --> 02:39:58.040
it might be a politician running for
office. Human beings do what's in their

2327
02:39:58.040 --> 02:40:03.399
best interests. There is an underlying
sense of truth. That truth is objective,

2328
02:40:03.799 --> 02:40:09.799
and it is different to people that
right now in America, you're right

2329
02:40:09.879 --> 02:40:11.680
or leftter. You believe Joe Biden
is the truth, you believe Donald Trump

2330
02:40:11.719 --> 02:40:16.040
is the truth. And it's about
split down the middle, and you believe

2331
02:40:18.760 --> 02:40:22.280
in the truth, and that is
your obligation, your duty to try and

2332
02:40:24.440 --> 02:40:26.120
sway opinions on that. Right.
So, whether it's trying to sell a

2333
02:40:26.239 --> 02:40:31.319
used car or whether you're trying to
make, you know, a political debacle

2334
02:40:31.360 --> 02:40:33.959
seem good. So I look at
all those things and said, Okay,

2335
02:40:35.120 --> 02:40:39.319
let's put those together, and let's
say that we understand certain things through math.

2336
02:40:39.360 --> 02:40:43.120
I love math, right, so
we all know the algorithm. Google

2337
02:40:43.159 --> 02:40:46.319
came up with the algorithm that's changed
the world. And it can tell you

2338
02:40:46.319 --> 02:40:50.159
what you want to listen to on
Spotify. It can tell you the tea

2339
02:40:50.280 --> 02:40:54.520
house mostly, the team house mostly, it tell what ads you want to

2340
02:40:54.559 --> 02:40:56.399
see. All of those things.
But it's not about the math. It

2341
02:40:56.520 --> 02:41:01.440
is not about the underlying reality.
Is about understanding human beings. Humans are

2342
02:41:01.559 --> 02:41:05.399
so fucking simple. I used to
do party tricks. I got to dinner

2343
02:41:05.399 --> 02:41:09.840
party, and I would and I
would leave the room, and or you

2344
02:41:09.840 --> 02:41:13.440
would leave the room, and then
we would all get together and you would

2345
02:41:13.440 --> 02:41:15.559
tell me what you want me to
get him to do when he comes back,

2346
02:41:16.120 --> 02:41:18.719
and you'd come back and sit at
the table, and I would get

2347
02:41:18.719 --> 02:41:20.559
you to do what the table told
me to get you to do. Or

2348
02:41:20.719 --> 02:41:26.000
detection of deception. It's it's very
very simple. But we've gotten to a

2349
02:41:26.040 --> 02:41:31.399
point in American culture where we can
do that very very well. It's not

2350
02:41:31.440 --> 02:41:33.920
just about math anymore. It's not
just algorithms. It's more complicated than that.

2351
02:41:33.959 --> 02:41:41.239
But I first learned that from fourth
I use that and built that,

2352
02:41:41.319 --> 02:41:46.319
and then I took that private when
I when I went which is which is

2353
02:41:46.440 --> 02:41:50.680
where we go from here? So
what was that intercedition? The intersection is

2354
02:41:50.719 --> 02:41:54.000
media the intersection, and here's how
it and here's how it goes wrong.

2355
02:41:56.719 --> 02:41:58.280
I was one of many many people. People let me go back and they'll

2356
02:41:58.280 --> 02:42:03.000
say, what's he talking? I'll
say, what I'm talking about is Victoria

2357
02:42:03.000 --> 02:42:05.159
Tenzingg. That was a name,
right, the woman the Flak of the

2358
02:42:05.159 --> 02:42:07.959
Pentagon who came up with the MBED
program, which was an enormously effective way

2359
02:42:09.479 --> 02:42:13.520
of mixing reporters with the people who
were keeping them alive while they were getting

2360
02:42:13.559 --> 02:42:16.360
a story. It's a brilliant idea. She's a brilliant woman. You get

2361
02:42:16.360 --> 02:42:22.319
the reporters to start relating to the
soldiers Stockholm syndrome by proxy. It's a

2362
02:42:22.559 --> 02:42:26.799
very very simple human construct. There's
a brilliant idea. I have enormous respect

2363
02:42:26.840 --> 02:42:28.280
for that woman and what she's done. Whether you believe in what she did

2364
02:42:28.360 --> 02:42:31.639
or not, it was a very
effective model, right that works in a

2365
02:42:31.639 --> 02:42:39.760
private sector or not. Then you
go to you look at what happened after

2366
02:42:39.840 --> 02:42:43.520
nine eleven with Fox News, Rupert
Murdoch was brilliant in the sense that he

2367
02:42:43.520 --> 02:42:48.639
said, I am going to ride
nationalist, patriotic pride to a billion dollar

2368
02:42:48.719 --> 02:42:52.639
pay day. You can hate Robert
Rupert Murdoch, but what he did was

2369
02:42:52.639 --> 02:42:56.639
brilliant. And here's here's what I'll
Shortly after nine eleven, I'm gonna say

2370
02:42:56.680 --> 02:43:01.440
two thousand and three, maybe I
had worked at for NBC. So I

2371
02:43:01.479 --> 02:43:05.920
was doing daily I was on MSNBC
every day all day. I was on

2372
02:43:05.959 --> 02:43:11.760
The Today Show, Meet the Press, Nightly News, all of those shows,

2373
02:43:11.159 --> 02:43:15.879
and CNBC, of all people,
CNBC came to me and said,

2374
02:43:15.879 --> 02:43:20.280
hey, at the time that the
talent coordinator at a at NBC was a

2375
02:43:20.280 --> 02:43:22.479
woman named Elaine. I'm not gonna
say her last name, but she was

2376
02:43:22.000 --> 02:43:26.639
a brilliant woman. I thought the
world of her. She hired all the

2377
02:43:26.959 --> 02:43:31.120
everybody from Matt lower to whoever,
and she said, Okay, we're gonna

2378
02:43:31.120 --> 02:43:33.440
do a show on CNBC. I
don't know why. It's called Checkpoint CNBC.

2379
02:43:33.600 --> 02:43:37.600
It's every day at six o'clock and
I was going to co host it

2380
02:43:37.639 --> 02:43:41.479
with Martha McCallum, who was now
at Fox News. Right. She didn't

2381
02:43:41.479 --> 02:43:43.360
know I was a co host.
I think she thought I was just in

2382
02:43:43.799 --> 02:43:46.840
some goofball sitting next to her every
day, which I probably was. So

2383
02:43:46.920 --> 02:43:52.680
I had I had a daily news
show on CNBC where we would interview basically

2384
02:43:52.719 --> 02:43:58.559
this but on cable news. So
I did that. So again, I

2385
02:43:58.879 --> 02:44:03.040
can't say how I did this because
I don't want to get anybody in trouble.

2386
02:44:03.479 --> 02:44:05.520
But let's say again that I understood
the mechanism of the FBI, I

2387
02:44:05.559 --> 02:44:09.719
understood the mechanism of the Defense Department, and I understood the mechanism of the

2388
02:44:09.760 --> 02:44:13.159
CIA. And I knew people at
all of those organizations, and I knew

2389
02:44:13.200 --> 02:44:16.520
what they did, how they did
it, and what they wanted to achieve.

2390
02:44:16.239 --> 02:44:20.959
That makes sense, Yeah, it's
a fairer. So I called him

2391
02:44:20.040 --> 02:44:24.520
up and I said, I now
not only am on TV every day on

2392
02:44:24.559 --> 02:44:28.239
all these other shows, but now
I have a daily format that I can

2393
02:44:28.280 --> 02:44:33.639
help shape opinion of what's going on
in the world of terror, the global

2394
02:44:33.639 --> 02:44:37.000
War on Terror, but the world
of military operations. And it was a

2395
02:44:37.000 --> 02:44:41.040
big problem because they were because George
Bush declared mission accomplished. Remember on the

2396
02:44:41.120 --> 02:44:46.840
Rialship, it started to slide very
bad. Is this related to the military

2397
02:44:46.840 --> 02:44:50.920
analysts program? There was no program. This was me This was no program.

2398
02:44:52.319 --> 02:44:58.079
I mean, it's very simple from
a world that we all know very

2399
02:44:58.079 --> 02:45:01.079
well, which is regimented, like
nothing happens without a piece of paper.

2400
02:45:01.159 --> 02:45:05.399
Not this is me saying I'm going
to do this. It's not about tasking.

2401
02:45:05.440 --> 02:45:07.479
Remember we always got back to tasking. You do not have to task

2402
02:45:07.600 --> 02:45:11.559
me. I'm telling you what I
want to do, and I will do

2403
02:45:11.600 --> 02:45:18.120
this if you give me X and
X as a phone call. So I

2404
02:45:18.159 --> 02:45:24.200
remember very clearly numerous conversations over the
course this went on for two or three

2405
02:45:24.280 --> 02:45:28.399
years. Right, So when something
happens, you need to wait, Like

2406
02:45:28.440 --> 02:45:31.319
here's a perfect example. This is
not in affairs. There was a there

2407
02:45:31.360 --> 02:45:35.639
was a story that came out with
the Secret Service had a bunch of guys

2408
02:45:35.639 --> 02:45:39.000
in South America I think it was
Columbia, right, and they got a

2409
02:45:39.040 --> 02:45:41.319
little jam. Right. So when
I went on and this, I didn't

2410
02:45:41.360 --> 02:45:43.479
call the Secret Service, I didn't
call anybody, but I said, I

2411
02:45:43.520 --> 02:45:46.719
know a lot of Secret Service agents. I love those motherfuckers, and I

2412
02:45:46.840 --> 02:45:50.159
love what they do and how they
do. It's such a hard job.

2413
02:45:50.239 --> 02:45:56.399
It's a thankless, brutal, endlessly
difficult job. And there's some really really

2414
02:45:56.440 --> 02:45:58.799
great patriots and so I went on
and I said, what you don't know

2415
02:46:00.120 --> 02:46:01.879
is X, Y, and Z, and I said it as loudly as

2416
02:46:01.920 --> 02:46:05.520
I could, as often as I
could, and it went away. I'm

2417
02:46:05.559 --> 02:46:07.920
not saying it went away just because
of me, but I did my part.

2418
02:46:09.159 --> 02:46:11.639
They didn't have a program where they
would trying to manipulate the media.

2419
02:46:11.840 --> 02:46:16.680
I was in the media and I
knew that how to manipulate opinion, and

2420
02:46:16.719 --> 02:46:20.799
I did it. So that was
an example. But there are a lot

2421
02:46:20.799 --> 02:46:24.879
of agencies, and I know a
lot of people at those agents. I

2422
02:46:24.920 --> 02:46:28.040
mean, I know this is like
a murky world that we're describing here about.

2423
02:46:28.079 --> 02:46:30.920
I mean, are you just going
on television and giving your opinion,

2424
02:46:30.959 --> 02:46:35.399
your expert opinion as a former law
enforcement official, or are they giving you

2425
02:46:35.479 --> 02:46:39.040
talking points and telling you what to
say, because those are two very different

2426
02:46:39.040 --> 02:46:48.319
things. Yeah. So I started
doing all these shows and one day I

2427
02:46:48.399 --> 02:46:54.600
got a call and I know I
didn't answer to your question. I'm fully

2428
02:46:54.600 --> 02:46:56.799
aware I didn't answer your question.
And I got a call from this guy

2429
02:46:58.079 --> 02:47:00.719
and he says, hey, I
gotta you know you and fantastic, and

2430
02:47:00.719 --> 02:47:03.799
I get a little story for you. Story is the USG just rolled up

2431
02:47:05.600 --> 02:47:07.840
some I have Bin Laden's son.
You may remember that story. You might

2432
02:47:07.840 --> 02:47:11.239
have been part of that up.
I don't know. And I said,

2433
02:47:11.239 --> 02:47:16.159
okay, you want me to go
out with this And they said, we're

2434
02:47:16.200 --> 02:47:20.120
not saying that, but I'm telling
you what just happened. And it's going

2435
02:47:20.159 --> 02:47:22.840
to be this, this, and
this, and the president is going to

2436
02:47:22.879 --> 02:47:26.000
make an announcement. And I said, okay, So the way a TV

2437
02:47:26.040 --> 02:47:30.920
show works is this the way TV
shows work that I worked in work this

2438
02:47:30.959 --> 02:47:35.200
way you get you go in.
I would get on a bus or car

2439
02:47:35.239 --> 02:47:37.200
service. At first, I'll get
in a car from my apartment in Upper

2440
02:47:37.239 --> 02:47:43.040
West Side, New York. I
would go to CNBC a c NBC World

2441
02:47:43.040 --> 02:47:45.760
headquarters, and I would sit at
my desk. I had a desk right

2442
02:47:45.799 --> 02:47:50.280
next to Joe Kernan, and I
mean literally we're adjoining and all the people

2443
02:47:50.319 --> 02:47:52.319
that you see there, you just
I mean you work with them every day,

2444
02:47:52.319 --> 02:47:56.079
the personalities, but there's really great
people and very smart, very smart.

2445
02:47:56.559 --> 02:48:00.959
So I go on and oh,
so you go into this office from

2446
02:48:00.959 --> 02:48:03.600
my show see at Checkpoint CNBC and
you sit in the producer's office with ten

2447
02:48:03.639 --> 02:48:07.079
people, and they go, what
are we going to do today? And

2448
02:48:07.159 --> 02:48:09.879
somebody would go, well, what's
the New York Times doing? And you

2449
02:48:09.959 --> 02:48:11.120
check the New York Times, what's
the Post doing? And check the Post.

2450
02:48:11.280 --> 02:48:13.920
Then ultimately they would say, what's
Fox doing, because that's all that

2451
02:48:13.920 --> 02:48:18.120
mattered, because they had all the
ratings. You want to generate ratings so

2452
02:48:18.200 --> 02:48:20.680
you can sell advertising, so that
you make money, so that you do

2453
02:48:20.760 --> 02:48:24.639
what's in your own best interest,
which is build your career. Right.

2454
02:48:24.920 --> 02:48:30.200
That's all people need to understand about
the media is that it's all about money.

2455
02:48:30.360 --> 02:48:35.719
It's the product is news. The
product or the result is money.

2456
02:48:35.840 --> 02:48:39.639
That's I mean, that's the only
reason they're not doing it to keep you

2457
02:48:39.719 --> 02:48:43.360
informed. They're doing it for bigger
bank. Listen, I remember Columbia Business

2458
02:48:43.399 --> 02:48:48.719
School, I mean Columbia Journalism School. Columbia Journalism School used to be the

2459
02:48:48.840 --> 02:48:52.760
arbiter you want to I didn't go
to Columbia Journalism school, but but you

2460
02:48:52.840 --> 02:48:56.040
know, yeah, I'm just saying, yeah, the Columbia guy. Yeah

2461
02:48:56.120 --> 02:48:58.879
right, I'm just saying that there
was a day when the Fourth Estate would

2462
02:49:00.200 --> 02:49:05.440
find stories about Watergate that would splash
presidents. I was thirteen years old when

2463
02:49:05.520 --> 02:49:07.440
Nixon resigned. I remember that very
very well. Those days are gone,

2464
02:49:07.639 --> 02:49:11.920
Yeah, the poolishers. If you
do a list poolishers have been received in

2465
02:49:11.000 --> 02:49:16.040
journalism in the last five years,
it is it is a debacle, is

2466
02:49:16.040 --> 02:49:20.239
a disgrace, right, And a
lot of them were like are for stuff

2467
02:49:20.239 --> 02:49:22.280
that has since been debunked or all
of them? Yeah, I mean,

2468
02:49:24.559 --> 02:49:26.559
excuse me, I'm sorry, not
all of them. Many of them have

2469
02:49:26.639 --> 02:49:31.559
become shameful, but they're not taking
them back. My point is this that

2470
02:49:31.600 --> 02:49:33.040
we'd have a meeting in the morning, we put together a story based on

2471
02:49:33.079 --> 02:49:37.040
what other people were doing, and
it would feed itself because ultimately, you're

2472
02:49:37.040 --> 02:49:41.200
trying to make a show that people
watch, so that you record the ratings

2473
02:49:41.559 --> 02:49:48.239
for advertisers who pay, who make
money for all the people involved. That's

2474
02:49:48.280 --> 02:49:50.959
the whole point, and that's the
way a show would happen every day.

2475
02:49:50.959 --> 02:49:54.200
So we'd go in and we put
together a show. Ultimately I'd end up

2476
02:49:54.559 --> 02:49:58.079
in front of a camera, reading
a teleprompter and doing some kind of a

2477
02:49:58.079 --> 02:50:01.799
story about that. And I did
a lot of them, like I flew

2478
02:50:01.840 --> 02:50:03.799
in a in the back of a
what has a backseat? And at fifteen

2479
02:50:05.520 --> 02:50:11.040
fourteen fourteens do and I think I
have sixteen I think it was sixteen.

2480
02:50:11.079 --> 02:50:13.879
I can't remember. I get,
we need to get we need to ask

2481
02:50:13.920 --> 02:50:18.000
Alexon. Yeah, yeah, but
yeah I did. I did a million

2482
02:50:18.040 --> 02:50:20.399
story. These weren't stories that I
said at a desk and with a teleprompter.

2483
02:50:20.479 --> 02:50:24.440
I was going out like like I
went to Guantanamo Bay, right,

2484
02:50:24.479 --> 02:50:28.719
I went to GITMO. Now I
knew everybody. I knew. I knew

2485
02:50:30.120 --> 02:50:33.719
people at GITMO that we're doing the
investigations. I didn't say anything, but

2486
02:50:33.079 --> 02:50:37.200
there was. I spent two years
at the FBI Academy after HRT, where

2487
02:50:37.200 --> 02:50:41.399
I taught interrogation. At the FBI
Academy, I was pretty good at it

2488
02:50:41.239 --> 02:50:46.959
and uh and I taught interrogation to
various other agencies, including the CIA,

2489
02:50:48.479 --> 02:50:52.159
which called it elicitation. Prior to
enhanced interrogation, the CIA used to call

2490
02:50:52.239 --> 02:51:00.200
interrogation elicitation and they had some funky
ways of you say what you want about

2491
02:51:00.200 --> 02:51:05.840
interrogation. The FBI interrogates people and
puts them in jail for life. It's

2492
02:51:05.920 --> 02:51:09.319
hard to get somebody to say,
yes, I committed this crime, knowing

2493
02:51:09.360 --> 02:51:11.799
that if I say it, I'm
going to jail for life. That's difficult.

2494
02:51:11.040 --> 02:51:15.360
They're very, very good at what
they do. They're very it's a

2495
02:51:15.399 --> 02:51:18.120
difficult art form, and they're very
good at it. The CIA didn't have

2496
02:51:18.159 --> 02:51:20.440
that consequence part of nine to eleven. You know, it was a very

2497
02:51:20.520 --> 02:51:22.920
very different thing entirely. But anyway, the point of the story is that

2498
02:51:24.280 --> 02:51:31.040
going into media and having a platform
where I was on television every day in

2499
02:51:31.079 --> 02:51:35.840
different media, and what I said
mattered to a certain extent, where I

2500
02:51:35.959 --> 02:51:43.000
could do this. I would go
on TV and I would specifically and intentionally

2501
02:51:43.079 --> 02:51:46.840
say X, because I would sit
back and wait for you to go on

2502
02:51:46.920 --> 02:51:52.040
TV and say X, and then
you would go on TV and say X.

2503
02:51:52.520 --> 02:51:58.399
Because human beings are extremely predictable and
they will follow what benefits somebody else.

2504
02:51:58.440 --> 02:52:01.719
And I'll say this, if you
look at society today, you look

2505
02:52:01.760 --> 02:52:05.399
at misinformation and disinformation. Those terms
did not exist six months ago, a

2506
02:52:05.440 --> 02:52:11.239
year ago, didn't exist. Somebody
made those terms up to exemplify something they

2507
02:52:11.280 --> 02:52:13.559
didn't believe in. Once you come
up with a word that people can get

2508
02:52:13.600 --> 02:52:16.959
behind, or you can look in
any aspect of sidy like like right now,

2509
02:52:18.440 --> 02:52:20.559
one of the big phrases is unpack. Let's unpack this, right,

2510
02:52:20.719 --> 02:52:24.159
That'll be a big thing for a
while. It used to be cool beans

2511
02:52:24.719 --> 02:52:31.000
or sort of burnt your cookie.
Cookie. Yeah, there's always something and

2512
02:52:31.040 --> 02:52:35.639
you can follow that path through culture, right, like this song, the

2513
02:52:35.680 --> 02:52:37.799
song the guy just came out with
Richmond North of Richmond. Yeah, that

2514
02:52:37.920 --> 02:52:43.200
lit fire. Everybody in the world
had to be part of that, because

2515
02:52:43.200 --> 02:52:46.879
that's the way it is. Masks
for coronavirus. There are predictable behaviors.

2516
02:52:46.559 --> 02:52:48.680
You can call it whatever you want, to collective, somebconscious, you can

2517
02:52:48.719 --> 02:52:54.719
call it whatever you want. Human
behavior is incredibly simple to predict and if

2518
02:52:54.760 --> 02:52:56.200
you can predict it, you can
shape it. And if you can shape

2519
02:52:56.239 --> 02:53:01.040
it, you can benefit whatever program
you want. Right, But to what

2520
02:53:01.200 --> 02:53:03.120
end? I mean, what what
is it? What end? That's what?

2521
02:53:05.760 --> 02:53:09.879
Right? And the problem what we
believe about the world is that I

2522
02:53:09.879 --> 02:53:13.639
don't hold a single belief that I
think is wrong. Otherwise I wouldn't believe

2523
02:53:13.680 --> 02:53:20.159
it. Right. So but but
what I'm saying though is right. But

2524
02:53:20.239 --> 02:53:22.959
what I'm saying, though, is
that whatever I believe, I believe fervently.

2525
02:53:24.440 --> 02:53:28.920
Otherwise, you know, I because
I don't think I'm dumb. No

2526
02:53:28.040 --> 02:53:33.799
human being, no human being thinks
they're dumb and that the ideas they hold

2527
02:53:33.799 --> 02:53:37.959
are wrong. So once we make
an emotional decision or get behind an idea,

2528
02:53:37.280 --> 02:53:43.879
we hold on to that idea with
tenacity. Yes, but what a

2529
02:53:43.879 --> 02:53:50.000
lot of people don't realize is how
simple the mechanism. Yeah, people are

2530
02:53:50.079 --> 02:53:52.879
dumb. I mean, well,
well, I don't people are impression Yeah.

2531
02:53:52.879 --> 02:53:54.280
I don't think people are dumb.
I think people are pretty dumb.

2532
02:53:54.319 --> 02:53:58.639
I just people are impressionable. I
think that it's been shown that people make

2533
02:54:00.000 --> 02:54:03.479
emotional decisions in the middle of the
logical structures to support that decision. But

2534
02:54:03.520 --> 02:54:07.440
we're all saying the same thing,
just using different words. But but but

2535
02:54:07.520 --> 02:54:11.159
I don't think what I'm saying is
I know how to shape it. Yeah,

2536
02:54:11.200 --> 02:54:15.600
and but again, what what is
it we're trying to shape? What

2537
02:54:15.680 --> 02:54:18.559
is the end? Whatever? You're
objective and who? But you had a

2538
02:54:18.559 --> 02:54:22.920
specific objective? Yes, I did, because my objectives was what I perceived

2539
02:54:22.959 --> 02:54:28.159
to be patriotic obligation to make the
world a better place for people that I

2540
02:54:28.200 --> 02:54:31.479
loved and cared about. I wanted
your children, my children, people that

2541
02:54:31.559 --> 02:54:35.239
I love to be safe in a
world that, for a long time was

2542
02:54:35.239 --> 02:54:39.360
pretty fucking scary. That was my
personal opinion. I'm not saying it was

2543
02:54:39.440 --> 02:54:43.040
right or wrong. I'm just saying
that's what I believe to be the case.

2544
02:54:43.440 --> 02:54:45.920
And I think a lot of people
joined the military, joined the law

2545
02:54:46.000 --> 02:54:50.120
enforcement, joined the cause because they
believed, for a long time, from

2546
02:54:50.120 --> 02:54:54.840
two thousand and one, maybe ten
years, believe that we were vulnerable,

2547
02:54:54.920 --> 02:54:58.920
believe that the United States needed people
were scared. People were scared. They

2548
02:55:00.440 --> 02:55:07.319
people people join Antifa and the you
know and and they you know the problem

2549
02:55:07.559 --> 02:55:16.239
like they believe, like they have. They are every every bit as certain

2550
02:55:16.799 --> 02:55:22.440
in their beliefs that they're making a
better world. Right again, whether it's

2551
02:55:22.440 --> 02:55:28.680
Antifa or Proud Boys or whomever,
they believe that they are making the world

2552
02:55:28.680 --> 02:55:31.360
a better place. Yes, based
on I don't want even want to say

2553
02:55:31.440 --> 02:55:37.399
facts. I want to say based
on their filters and perception of what is

2554
02:55:37.479 --> 02:55:39.719
wrong in the world. True,
but that perception, excuse me. The

2555
02:55:39.719 --> 02:55:43.360
mechanism, in my opinion, that
mechanism is exactly the same for every human

2556
02:55:43.360 --> 02:55:46.559
being. Right. There's just there's
a part of your mind. And my

2557
02:55:46.600 --> 02:55:50.959
wife's a PhD in psychology. I'm
not, but she knows what that place

2558
02:55:52.000 --> 02:55:54.079
in your brain is called. There's
a place in your brain just like the

2559
02:55:54.120 --> 02:55:58.280
mammalian reflects fight or flight. Some
people fight, some people flight. There's

2560
02:55:58.280 --> 02:56:01.520
a part in your brain where you
say I am right and I want to

2561
02:56:01.680 --> 02:56:03.840
I want the world to be right. So you could be. It could

2562
02:56:03.840 --> 02:56:09.280
be a missionary and a religion.
It could be a you know, Russia

2563
02:56:09.360 --> 02:56:11.440
as a monolithic, monolithic threat to
the United States. Could be what we

2564
02:56:11.440 --> 02:56:15.559
feel about China, could be all
those six It doesn't matter. The mechanism

2565
02:56:15.719 --> 02:56:20.040
is exactly the same in the human
mind. It just takes a different direction.

2566
02:56:20.120 --> 02:56:22.920
It look like wrestling. When I
was a kid, I loved wrestling.

2567
02:56:22.600 --> 02:56:28.520
So you see Hulk Hogan stand up
against Randy man Savage over Miss Elizabeth.

2568
02:56:28.520 --> 02:56:31.920
Remember that that big that terrible,
terrible time in American history. Yeah

2569
02:56:33.000 --> 02:56:35.840
right, Yeah, it doesn't matter
if you were behind Hulk Hogan or if

2570
02:56:35.840 --> 02:56:39.000
you were behind Randy Macho man Savage. And I know this is absurd,

2571
02:56:39.280 --> 02:56:43.639
but a metaphor is a metaphor,
right, it doesn't matter. It's bud

2572
02:56:43.719 --> 02:56:48.799
light taste great less filling. My
point is this that human beings have the

2573
02:56:48.000 --> 02:56:52.920
same exact mechanism. You're a Yankees
fan, you're a Red Sox fan.

2574
02:56:52.879 --> 02:56:58.840
Human beings need a monolithic threat to
align themselves against right, and always have

2575
02:56:58.000 --> 02:57:01.959
since the beginning of time, always
will when you understand that, and you

2576
02:57:03.079 --> 02:57:09.040
understand that you want to shape how
that picks aside that can be incredibly yeah.

2577
02:57:09.200 --> 02:57:11.399
Powerful, It's that idea that we
all want to belong to something,

2578
02:57:11.520 --> 02:57:15.639
and in order to belong we have
to other. So it doesn't matter if

2579
02:57:15.680 --> 02:57:18.440
it's the chess and Checkers club.
Oh I'm in the chess club. Look

2580
02:57:18.440 --> 02:57:22.159
at those fuckers in the checkers you
know, checkers club. Or if it's

2581
02:57:22.200 --> 02:57:26.879
you know, America verse China.
And again I'm not breaking I'm not I

2582
02:57:26.920 --> 02:57:31.799
believe that American is a beacon of
light and has been. Yes, but

2583
02:57:31.840 --> 02:57:33.360
there are probably people in China think
that too, But but we don't.

2584
02:57:33.440 --> 02:57:37.680
We don't have wagers in torture camps, so fuck them. But but the

2585
02:57:37.719 --> 02:57:41.680
thing is is that and and you
know, like I know, one of

2586
02:57:41.719 --> 02:57:46.200
the parts of the brain is like
the reticular activating system or reticular activation activating

2587
02:57:46.239 --> 02:57:52.440
system, which is it allows us
to see we see in the world,

2588
02:57:54.440 --> 02:57:56.879
like if I have a jeep,
all of a sudden, I see everybody

2589
02:57:56.959 --> 02:58:01.159
driving a jeep because that's sort of
oh look, even though there aren't any

2590
02:58:01.159 --> 02:58:03.239
more jeeps on the road now.
But if I'm for Trump, or if

2591
02:58:03.280 --> 02:58:07.879
I'm for Biden. I'm only going
to see the ship that supports yes,

2592
02:58:07.319 --> 02:58:13.280
like it just my brain filters it. I see the stuff that supports my

2593
02:58:13.440 --> 02:58:16.079
views. But both sides are doing
the exact same thing. They just drive

2594
02:58:16.079 --> 02:58:20.000
different conclusions. Right when you understand
that you can be more effective at it.

2595
02:58:20.040 --> 02:58:22.719
And we're coming up on that now, we're coming up on in a

2596
02:58:22.760 --> 02:58:28.319
presidential election, and it's say what
you want. People talk obliquely about a

2597
02:58:28.360 --> 02:58:33.840
culture war. I think war is
not an is not an understatement. I

2598
02:58:33.879 --> 02:58:39.040
think it is a very significant time
in American history, at least in my

2599
02:58:39.120 --> 02:58:43.440
life. I lived through the sixties, I lived through the Nixon resignation.

2600
02:58:43.479 --> 02:58:46.479
I've lived through some tumultuous times in
the United States. In a history of

2601
02:58:46.559 --> 02:58:50.000
United States, I think right now
is a very difficult one. Yeah,

2602
02:58:50.040 --> 02:58:54.079
but we all believe the same way. We all believe the same way about

2603
02:58:54.120 --> 02:59:01.639
different things. In my opinion now
having been in the media and and understanding

2604
02:59:01.680 --> 02:59:07.280
how to form these opinions, because
do you see this as a political divide

2605
02:59:07.959 --> 02:59:11.680
or that the politicians are utilizing this
divide because they already have sort of the

2606
02:59:11.760 --> 02:59:16.399
party right, if we were like
the Republicans and the Democrats, the GOP

2607
02:59:16.559 --> 02:59:20.280
and the dncales say, aren't that
different in the sense that they eat at

2608
02:59:20.319 --> 02:59:24.959
the same places, they send their
kids the same schools. Is this Do

2609
02:59:26.000 --> 02:59:31.040
you feel as though this is a
mechanism they use? I don't. I

2610
02:59:31.079 --> 02:59:33.399
strongly believe there is no they.
Okay, I really believe there's no they.

2611
02:59:33.440 --> 02:59:37.319
I talk to people all the time
and they'll say I believe this,

2612
02:59:37.360 --> 02:59:39.000
and I'll say, well, why
do you think that? And I said,

2613
02:59:39.040 --> 02:59:41.120
because they say this, they say
that, I go, who is

2614
02:59:41.159 --> 02:59:46.680
they? Nobody can ever define they
right, because it's more uncomfortable to say

2615
02:59:46.680 --> 02:59:52.639
it's us, it's us right,
there's there's just there is no I could

2616
02:59:52.760 --> 02:59:56.639
never get four FBI agents to decide
where they were going to go for lunch.

2617
02:59:58.239 --> 03:00:01.680
So putting together a conspiracy where everybody
has this secret cabal and they're putting

2618
03:00:01.719 --> 03:00:05.040
together these nefarious beliefs, it's really
hard to put together. Now, I

2619
03:00:05.079 --> 03:00:09.479
did that myself, but that was
one human being moving a message because I

2620
03:00:09.559 --> 03:00:13.159
understood things. And granted, I
mean I've been talking for a long time.

2621
03:00:13.799 --> 03:00:20.079
Uh, it's it's more complex than
than than what I've said thus far.

2622
03:00:20.319 --> 03:00:28.079
But but I believe this, very
very strongly, that human beings believe

2623
03:00:28.200 --> 03:00:31.200
that they're doing good and and I
don't even I think even Ted Bundy,

2624
03:00:31.319 --> 03:00:35.200
in his own fucked up way,
thought it's good that I'm gonna eat this

2625
03:00:35.200 --> 03:00:37.399
guy, right, I mean that's
what we do it, No, I

2626
03:00:37.680 --> 03:00:43.559
really do. Yeah, I mean
I think human beings. I did this

2627
03:00:43.559 --> 03:00:46.600
this thing for HBO called Police and
Thieves where I went to. The idea

2628
03:00:46.680 --> 03:00:48.319
was, I was going to take
you as a viewer, and I was

2629
03:00:48.319 --> 03:00:50.959
going to go around the world to
places where I've done bad things, like

2630
03:00:52.000 --> 03:00:56.959
Indonesia, Detachment eighty eight and uh, this group the hung La in Columbia,

2631
03:00:56.079 --> 03:00:58.360
right, yeah, the crazy eighty
eights, Yeah, crazy eights.

2632
03:00:58.399 --> 03:01:03.559
But so I I went to Columbia
and back to bow Guitar right from the

2633
03:01:03.559 --> 03:01:05.520
old days in the old world,
and got two guys together, two guys

2634
03:01:05.600 --> 03:01:11.600
named El Diablo, right one.
El Diablo was in this. I don't

2635
03:01:11.639 --> 03:01:15.200
even know how to describe these guys. They were an entity. They were

2636
03:01:16.840 --> 03:01:22.479
a US government backed gorilla entity.
They lived in this villa up on a

2637
03:01:22.559 --> 03:01:28.600
hill overlooking Bow Guitar, and they
had a weight room, a bunch of

2638
03:01:28.639 --> 03:01:33.000
chickens, some pit bulls, and
a really great bar. And all they

2639
03:01:33.000 --> 03:01:35.200
did was fly out and kill people, right, and I worked with them.

2640
03:01:35.200 --> 03:01:39.559
So I went back and I found
a guy named El Diablo and we

2641
03:01:39.600 --> 03:01:43.079
started talking about killing people and death
and what it's like. Then I went

2642
03:01:43.159 --> 03:01:48.000
into the favelas, which nobody fucking
goes into the favelas, and I found

2643
03:01:48.000 --> 03:01:52.200
a guy that was supposed to be
the bad guy and his name was El

2644
03:01:52.280 --> 03:01:56.959
Diablo. Right, So I've got
an El Diablo who was supposed to be

2645
03:01:56.040 --> 03:02:00.920
the worst of humanity, and I've
got an ld Blow who is supposed to

2646
03:02:00.959 --> 03:02:05.719
be the beacon of hope for society. And it was like talking to the

2647
03:02:05.760 --> 03:02:11.239
same guys. They were both great
guys, and to a certain part of

2648
03:02:11.319 --> 03:02:15.200
humanity, they were both scary as
fuck, you know. So, I

2649
03:02:15.239 --> 03:02:16.840
guess what I'm trying to say for
people trying to make sense of my point

2650
03:02:16.920 --> 03:02:22.200
is this that human beings since the
beginning of time have been very predictable.

2651
03:02:22.239 --> 03:02:26.159
I mean, let's just say hypothetically
that you believe in Adam and Eve,

2652
03:02:26.600 --> 03:02:33.520
Right, Adam and Eve and Cain
and Abel, there was a murderer,

2653
03:02:33.879 --> 03:02:37.600
a victim, a woman who might
have might not have banged a snake,

2654
03:02:37.920 --> 03:02:43.000
and a guy who got reminded these
naked, right, and it's got to

2655
03:02:43.040 --> 03:02:46.200
wear fig leaf. Right. I'm
saying that if you take the first four

2656
03:02:46.280 --> 03:02:52.319
people hypothetically, you know, a
foundation of two primary religions in the world,

2657
03:02:52.840 --> 03:02:54.360
and you look at the first four
people, they had some issues.

2658
03:02:54.600 --> 03:02:58.559
Yeah right, I don't think we've
ever made that much of her recovery.

2659
03:02:58.760 --> 03:03:03.760
So we do the best we can
to raise our kids with right and wrong,

2660
03:03:03.959 --> 03:03:05.920
to love each other, to be
kind to other human beings. And

2661
03:03:07.000 --> 03:03:09.200
you know what, if we think
they take a step across the line,

2662
03:03:09.879 --> 03:03:13.760
We're going to shoot him in the
head with the two two three. You

2663
03:03:13.760 --> 03:03:16.600
know, it's are we right or
the Chinese right, of the Russians right

2664
03:03:16.639 --> 03:03:20.120
of the Colombians right, or the
we haven't got to Somalia. All the

2665
03:03:20.120 --> 03:03:24.520
time I've spent I've seen. I
was in Kosovo during the war. In

2666
03:03:24.600 --> 03:03:28.399
Kosovo and I walk across the bridge
and there's this old man. I'm an

2667
03:03:28.399 --> 03:03:31.239
old man, but he was like
older than me, and he's crying,

2668
03:03:33.159 --> 03:03:35.440
and through the interpreter go up to
him and say, what's you know,

2669
03:03:35.440 --> 03:03:39.360
what's the problem. And he pulls
his pants down, and the bad guys

2670
03:03:39.360 --> 03:03:43.319
said, cut off his pecker.
Here's an old man just walking down the

2671
03:03:43.360 --> 03:03:46.799
street and they pulled his pants down. They cut off his pecker. I

2672
03:03:46.920 --> 03:03:52.559
go up in the mountains and I
found it looks like the sound of music.

2673
03:03:52.600 --> 03:03:54.239
It's terroll and some of the most
beautiful places you ever seen in your

2674
03:03:54.239 --> 03:03:58.239
life. Chalets and the sound of
music, Julie Andrews singing, and it

2675
03:03:58.280 --> 03:04:01.920
was fucking beautiful. Right. These
guys came in. They killed eight members

2676
03:04:01.959 --> 03:04:05.319
of a family, and they stuffed
them down the well to ruin the water,

2677
03:04:05.760 --> 03:04:09.200
so when the family came back,
they couldn't drink the water. I

2678
03:04:09.280 --> 03:04:15.000
go to Somalia, and I've had
all the experiences that people have in Somalia

2679
03:04:15.079 --> 03:04:20.000
which are unpleasant. I go to
Indonesia. I lived in in East team

2680
03:04:20.079 --> 03:04:22.680
Or. I had a company in
East team Or. I lived there for

2681
03:04:22.680 --> 03:04:30.559
seven years. I got two guards
outside my office, like my primary guys,

2682
03:04:30.600 --> 03:04:33.319
my close quarter guys, the guys
who protected me. One of them

2683
03:04:33.360 --> 03:04:35.879
chops off the other guy's head with
a machete, Like from me to that

2684
03:04:35.959 --> 03:04:39.319
wall. It doesn't matter if you're
black, white, yellow, red,

2685
03:04:39.479 --> 03:04:45.120
whatever, it doesn't matter. Human
beings do a lot of really bad stuff

2686
03:04:45.159 --> 03:04:48.319
to each other. Yeah, but
we're also capable of love. YEA so

2687
03:04:48.520 --> 03:04:50.600
how do you find the line between
the two and how do you end up

2688
03:04:50.639 --> 03:04:54.879
in our world trying to make sense
of it so that we can protect.

2689
03:04:54.520 --> 03:05:01.280
So how does all of this evolve? I mean, you're a media personality

2690
03:05:01.399 --> 03:05:07.959
that you're saying that you're not receiving
taskings but guidance perhaps, and that evolves

2691
03:05:07.000 --> 03:05:11.799
in you're you know, you're building
this intelligence platform. You said you're all

2692
03:05:11.799 --> 03:05:15.040
over the world with I mean,
how does how does this sort of evolve

2693
03:05:15.079 --> 03:05:18.040
over the years as the world in
terror progressive? I wouldn't say it was

2694
03:05:18.399 --> 03:05:24.200
that I built an intelligence platform.
I think there's a there's you know,

2695
03:05:24.239 --> 03:05:28.840
there's a selfish aspect of it.
And you know, backup on a second,

2696
03:05:30.280 --> 03:05:33.840
you know I did. I've done
a couple podcasts by accident. Mike

2697
03:05:33.239 --> 03:05:39.079
Glover, who I met whatever,
I did his talk to him, And

2698
03:05:39.120 --> 03:05:41.120
when I talked to him, it
was an entirely different thing. I didn't

2699
03:05:41.159 --> 03:05:43.479
talk about any of these things.
We just talked about it was like a

2700
03:05:43.559 --> 03:05:46.760
historic thing. Right. He's a
remarkable guy, an incredible patriot, an

2701
03:05:46.840 --> 03:05:52.440
entrepreneur, remarkable in a million ways. And then my daughter somehow called up

2702
03:05:52.520 --> 03:05:56.520
Andy Stump and said whatever, and
he said, Hey, come on out.

2703
03:05:56.559 --> 03:05:58.920
So I flew out to Missoula and
I talked to him, and I

2704
03:05:58.959 --> 03:06:01.600
didn't go very well because I had
taken my sons to a war zone,

2705
03:06:01.639 --> 03:06:07.319
and in each team wars, it
was another thing altogether. But I guess

2706
03:06:07.360 --> 03:06:09.000
what I'm trying to say is I've
talked to a couple of people about these,

2707
03:06:09.280 --> 03:06:13.479
about various things, but I've never
gotten to I mean, I've way

2708
03:06:13.520 --> 03:06:20.600
way over outstayed my welcome here.
Look you have not well, we don't

2709
03:06:20.639 --> 03:06:22.879
want to keep you. Nobody's gonna
want No, it's not me, guys.

2710
03:06:22.879 --> 03:06:24.959
I'll sit in and drink scotch with
you all night. But we haven't

2711
03:06:24.959 --> 03:06:26.799
even got to the to the heavy
ship at all. But what I'm going

2712
03:06:26.840 --> 03:06:33.680
to say is this that I spent
in the evolution of my process went from

2713
03:06:33.680 --> 03:06:39.399
two thousand and one to about two
thousand and six. Somewhere in that line,

2714
03:06:39.520 --> 03:06:43.840
I went from saying I'm a patriot
going to go to Afghanistan and try

2715
03:06:43.879 --> 03:06:48.120
to contribute to the global war on
terror in a way that is maybe maybe

2716
03:06:48.120 --> 03:06:54.719
it's creative, certainly productive, and
that people think is good people in organizations.

2717
03:06:56.239 --> 03:07:01.159
I think it is helpful, But
then I end up more and more

2718
03:07:01.360 --> 03:07:05.520
with dinner with Madonna and card games
with Brad Pitt and and dinners with with

2719
03:07:05.559 --> 03:07:09.040
all of these other household names who
are remarkable in their own way. I

2720
03:07:09.040 --> 03:07:13.440
mean, they're they're incredible, but
the world is exactly the same that the

2721
03:07:13.479 --> 03:07:20.040
difference between getting a Q. Clarence
and getting dinner with Madonna is there is

2722
03:07:20.079 --> 03:07:22.920
no difference. Right, You've got
it. You've you've got to learn certain

2723
03:07:22.959 --> 03:07:28.040
behaviors. You've got to keep your
mouth shut in certain situations, obviously not

2724
03:07:28.120 --> 03:07:33.360
this one. And you've got to
think on your feet in creative ways because

2725
03:07:33.399 --> 03:07:37.440
they live in a world that is
completely closed off from the reality that we

2726
03:07:37.520 --> 03:07:41.840
see. It's not their fault.
You just can't be one of those people

2727
03:07:41.200 --> 03:07:45.040
and think you're going to have a
normal life because you walk out in you

2728
03:07:45.040 --> 03:07:48.079
know, you go to Soho for
dinner at Indosheen and you know you get

2729
03:07:48.719 --> 03:07:52.280
one out indoshing. But you know
what I mean, whatever, nobody or

2730
03:07:52.319 --> 03:07:56.879
whatever. Yeah, it used to
be Rayos. Now you can buy Yeah

2731
03:07:56.959 --> 03:07:58.479
it used to you know what's so
fucking funny In the day it was Rayos,

2732
03:07:58.520 --> 03:08:01.639
right, there was six tables,
right, right, I know,

2733
03:08:01.280 --> 03:08:05.959
an eight month wait list. Yeah, you know when in those days when

2734
03:08:05.959 --> 03:08:09.799
I was in that world there,
I would never wait in line for anywhere

2735
03:08:09.799 --> 03:08:11.840
if I couldn't get in. Somehow
I want nothing to do with it.

2736
03:08:11.879 --> 03:08:15.920
But Rayo's was kind of the spot
that was kill the last place. And

2737
03:08:16.000 --> 03:08:20.239
now you can buy Rayo's sauce at
fucking price, Chopper. Yeah, you

2738
03:08:20.280 --> 03:08:24.280
know the world's change, so time
the war is dragging on here. I

2739
03:08:24.360 --> 03:08:28.000
mean, walk us into the heavy
shit since you brought it up. Okay,

2740
03:08:28.840 --> 03:08:31.280
the heavy shit is that in two
thousand five, I had written three

2741
03:08:31.319 --> 03:08:39.040
books and my my ultimate world was
to make it as a writer, have

2742
03:08:39.120 --> 03:08:41.479
a decent life. Was a writer. I hated TV. I hated TV

2743
03:08:41.600 --> 03:08:45.479
from the day I started. I
hated the makeup. I hated the falseness,

2744
03:08:45.479 --> 03:08:46.920
the lights come on, you talk, you go back. I hated

2745
03:08:48.000 --> 03:08:54.879
everything about it. I think it's
a scuzzy, vapid in human I'm not

2746
03:08:54.920 --> 03:09:00.239
a fan of television in the old
school, right network TV into case will

2747
03:09:00.280 --> 03:09:05.639
news. The only thing that saved
us as a species is podcast like This

2748
03:09:05.680 --> 03:09:09.239
Week can talk long form and actually
give people something to talk about. They

2749
03:09:09.319 --> 03:09:13.520
might hate me, they might find
it's fascinating, but at least they have

2750
03:09:13.719 --> 03:09:18.600
a legitimate position based on a long
conversation. So as two thousand and five

2751
03:09:18.120 --> 03:09:24.719
I wrote my third book, everything
was great. I wrote a fourth book

2752
03:09:24.559 --> 03:09:33.920
and it eight shit and basically my
publisher dropped me. And here's why.

2753
03:09:33.200 --> 03:09:35.959
I don't know, here's why,
but here's what went wrong. I think

2754
03:09:37.360 --> 03:09:41.079
when I was in the FBI,
I could write about things that were non

2755
03:09:41.120 --> 03:09:46.840
classified Cold zero, I wrote,
I could write fictional accounts of things that

2756
03:09:46.879 --> 03:09:50.639
were classified. Most of the stuff
I did was classified. So I said,

2757
03:09:50.639 --> 03:09:52.520
okay, I'm going to tell those
stories. So I wrote a novel

2758
03:09:52.559 --> 03:09:56.000
called Black, which is Black Operations, and I wrote the sequel, which

2759
03:09:56.040 --> 03:10:01.159
was called White, was like clever
thing on words. White. I said,

2760
03:10:01.440 --> 03:10:05.559
I'm gonna talk about things that I've
done on the classified side. I'm

2761
03:10:05.559 --> 03:10:09.399
gonna fictionalize them. As long as
they're in the public domain, it's okay.

2762
03:10:09.520 --> 03:10:13.120
So I wrote about like a sonic
cannon that I developed with DARPA,

2763
03:10:13.200 --> 03:10:16.399
a project which is now used in
SWAT teams. Right, you can get

2764
03:10:16.680 --> 03:10:20.159
riot control with sound, right,
or maybe even the maybe even the Havana

2765
03:10:20.239 --> 03:10:24.120
syndrome. The agency guys that you
know that head brain stuff. So I

2766
03:10:24.120 --> 03:10:33.120
wrote a novel about that one thing
I stepped over the line is the most

2767
03:10:33.159 --> 03:10:37.639
bizarre things that I've ever been associated
with. Even more than PSYOPS is FEMA,

2768
03:10:39.399 --> 03:10:41.799
the Continuity Government plan. Right.
People talk about all these classics,

2769
03:10:43.920 --> 03:10:46.959
they talk about all this FEMA has
got some fucked up shit going on.

2770
03:10:48.719 --> 03:10:50.440
No, I'm dead. I mean, you guys probably know what I'm talking

2771
03:10:50.440 --> 03:10:56.719
about. I actually don't. Outside
of like all the Oh my god,

2772
03:10:56.360 --> 03:11:05.559
let's let's unpack that. I unpacked
it one time and it ruined my life.

2773
03:11:05.719 --> 03:11:09.000
I'm not going to pack unpack it
again, but I'll tell you the

2774
03:11:09.000 --> 03:11:13.360
basics of what happened. So let's
say, hypothetically speaking, that you'd googled

2775
03:11:13.479 --> 03:11:16.319
Mount Weather, right. Mount Weather
used to be a really secret place.

2776
03:11:16.680 --> 03:11:20.559
It's not. It's not that secret
anymore. I mean you can google it,

2777
03:11:20.680 --> 03:11:22.639
right. I only talk about shit
that you can that's in the public

2778
03:11:22.639 --> 03:11:28.920
domain only. So I got this
wild hair, and I was I was

2779
03:11:28.959 --> 03:11:31.159
writing a book in the New York
Public Library, the Rose Reading Room in

2780
03:11:31.159 --> 03:11:33.559
the New York Public one of my
favorite indoor spaces, and I said,

2781
03:11:33.600 --> 03:11:39.760
you know what, Mount Weather is
a crazy place and I can't write about

2782
03:11:39.799 --> 03:11:43.920
it. But if I go out
there and I look at it, and

2783
03:11:43.959 --> 03:11:46.639
I see it. Whatever I can
write about it, right, So I

2784
03:11:46.680 --> 03:11:50.399
go, okay, cool. So
I take the train to DC, I

2785
03:11:50.440 --> 03:11:52.520
get in the car, and I
drive out to Mount Weather. For people

2786
03:11:52.520 --> 03:11:58.559
who don't know, you can google
it right. Mount mount Weather is where

2787
03:11:58.600 --> 03:12:01.600
Cheney went on nine to eleven,
right after nine to eleven. It's a

2788
03:12:01.639 --> 03:12:07.920
government evacuation. It is. It
is a secure location. But that's really

2789
03:12:07.920 --> 03:12:09.639
not what it's about. I mean, that's really not why I'm Mount Weather

2790
03:12:09.719 --> 03:12:15.559
exists and there are all these names
for it like site this and aspect are,

2791
03:12:15.639 --> 03:12:18.360
and they've got all these fucking it's
a bunker where the government can consul

2792
03:12:18.680 --> 03:12:22.840
Mountain, like like Norad or whatever. Yeah, yeah, it's yes,

2793
03:12:22.959 --> 03:12:26.520
it's like Norad, right, but
it's you can you can get some stuff

2794
03:12:26.520 --> 03:12:28.559
on Google. So I said,
okay, listen, I've been there a

2795
03:12:28.559 --> 03:12:31.799
bunch of times, usually in a
helicopter, but I know how to get

2796
03:12:31.799 --> 03:12:35.360
there. I'm gonna jump in my
car and I'm gonna drive out there.

2797
03:12:35.680 --> 03:12:41.520
So this is this is hysterical,
but it's true, you know, in

2798
03:12:41.600 --> 03:12:43.840
all these risks. So I drive
up there, and you drive up this

2799
03:12:43.879 --> 03:12:46.159
dirt road, I mean you'll literally
drive up dirt like a gravel road and

2800
03:12:46.159 --> 03:12:50.079
you get to the top of this
mountain and you when you get close,

2801
03:12:50.120 --> 03:12:54.440
there's all this chain link fence and
on one side is chain link fence and

2802
03:12:54.479 --> 03:12:56.959
a certain type of the insulation.
On the other side is a whole different

2803
03:12:56.959 --> 03:13:03.600
fucking game, like doors and weird
access points. Right. So I drive

2804
03:13:03.719 --> 03:13:07.520
up to where it. I know
the entrance. I've never dreined there,

2805
03:13:07.559 --> 03:13:11.159
but I've flown in there. So
I get up there and there's a guardhouse.

2806
03:13:11.200 --> 03:13:15.479
I mean it's literally now this is
two thousand, I think two thousand

2807
03:13:15.520 --> 03:13:16.559
and four, so it's only three
years after nine to eleven. We've got

2808
03:13:16.600 --> 03:13:20.280
two wars going on. We've invaded
a rock. It was a hot time,

2809
03:13:20.399 --> 03:13:22.159
right, So if you are one
of the most secretive installations in the

2810
03:13:22.239 --> 03:13:26.159
United States, you would think it
would be kind of locked down, kind

2811
03:13:26.200 --> 03:13:30.000
of heavy. That's what I was
thinking. So I drive up and I

2812
03:13:30.000 --> 03:13:33.159
shouldn't be laughing. Maybe I should
be laughing. This is what happened.

2813
03:13:33.559 --> 03:13:39.639
So I drive up in this rent
a car and there's the guard check or

2814
03:13:39.680 --> 03:13:45.680
the chain link fence ends and there
is a turn off and there's a guardhouse.

2815
03:13:46.159 --> 03:13:50.200
But the guardhouse looks like a guardhouse
at like a the neighborhood pool,

2816
03:13:50.559 --> 03:13:54.159
right. I mean, it's just
this like an eight by eight little guardhouse.

2817
03:13:54.440 --> 03:14:00.200
And there's a woman there who is
wearing a two tone polyester in a

2818
03:14:00.280 --> 03:14:03.959
form light brown and brown like you
would see in a sheriff's department anywhere else,

2819
03:14:03.079 --> 03:14:07.200
right, only only worse. And
she's got a couple badges and whatever.

2820
03:14:07.760 --> 03:14:09.239
So I pull up and I'm looking
over there, and I know what's

2821
03:14:09.239 --> 03:14:13.559
over there because I've been there,
but I can't write about it because it's

2822
03:14:13.559 --> 03:14:18.719
secret, right right, Like there's
like I can say this because I said

2823
03:14:18.719 --> 03:14:22.319
this in the book, but I
can say this because I think it's it's

2824
03:14:22.319 --> 03:14:24.799
online. There's a house and it's
not really a house. It's a it's

2825
03:14:24.840 --> 03:14:30.280
a house to cover a ventilation shaft
from satellites. So if you look down

2826
03:14:30.600 --> 03:14:33.120
from Sputnik or whatever the fucking rests
are flying these days, it looks like

2827
03:14:33.120 --> 03:14:37.280
a house, but it's you know, it's it's a The whole thing is

2828
03:14:37.319 --> 03:14:41.920
fake, right, It's it reminds
me of the house and resident evils,

2829
03:14:41.000 --> 03:14:48.520
right right, Yeah. So I
drive in and I go up to the

2830
03:14:48.520 --> 03:14:50.520
gate. Excuse me. I go
up to the guardhouse and I go,

2831
03:14:50.600 --> 03:14:52.959
hey, how are you doing?
And this woman looks at me and she

2832
03:14:54.040 --> 03:14:58.639
said, sure, good. Did
you forget your idea again? And U

2833
03:15:00.360 --> 03:15:03.239
if I had said yes, maybe
it's good to see I forgot my id

2834
03:15:03.360 --> 03:15:05.799
I could have driven in and just
wandered around right, and I knew where

2835
03:15:05.840 --> 03:15:11.280
to go. And I said,
well, no, not really. I

2836
03:15:11.280 --> 03:15:13.799
said, I'm a novelist and I'm
writing a book, and I know that

2837
03:15:13.799 --> 03:15:16.719
if I come out and I can
see this, then it's legal for me

2838
03:15:16.760 --> 03:15:20.280
to write about it. And it
looked like she looked like I pulled a

2839
03:15:20.360 --> 03:15:24.760
gun, a big gun. She
shit herself, and maybe she'll watch this

2840
03:15:24.799 --> 03:15:28.840
and goes, I remember that asshole, And so she stepped back, kind

2841
03:15:28.879 --> 03:15:31.680
of staggered back, and I think
she pressed a butt. She did something.

2842
03:15:31.879 --> 03:15:37.879
I forget something, And literally it
was like like a bad movie.

2843
03:15:37.959 --> 03:15:43.120
It was that fast. There's two
suburbans, blacked out suburbans pulled in behind

2844
03:15:43.159 --> 03:15:46.079
me, out of nowhere, and
they get out of the car. They

2845
03:15:46.159 --> 03:15:50.719
walk up and then they motioned,
I don't think anybody ever said anything to

2846
03:15:50.719 --> 03:15:52.399
me. I don't think they said
a word. And they took me to

2847
03:15:52.520 --> 03:15:54.520
a like a trailer house, you
know, you go to a construction site.

2848
03:15:54.520 --> 03:15:58.479
They get a temporary building. It's
got that fucked up looking siding,

2849
03:15:58.639 --> 03:16:03.559
the white pebbles side never you know. And I go in there and they

2850
03:16:03.000 --> 03:16:05.319
asked me for my idea. I
gave him my id. I knew the

2851
03:16:05.319 --> 03:16:11.040
game, so I was being professional
and nobody ever said a word to me.

2852
03:16:11.639 --> 03:16:15.600
And when I asked a couple of
questions, they handed me a business

2853
03:16:15.639 --> 03:16:18.879
card of a number to call,
and I said, okay, thank you

2854
03:16:18.920 --> 03:16:22.639
very much, and I left.
So the story is not about that.

2855
03:16:22.239 --> 03:16:26.840
The story is that I was a
complete nutter fucking moron, and I wrote

2856
03:16:26.840 --> 03:16:31.799
about it in a novel in that
book right there, white right, And

2857
03:16:33.040 --> 03:16:37.000
in my experience, I don't about
yours. In my experience, there is

2858
03:16:37.040 --> 03:16:41.319
a line, and when you step
over that line, somebody who doesn't look

2859
03:16:41.360 --> 03:16:48.719
like anybody is going to tap you
on the shoulder and say no. And

2860
03:16:48.840 --> 03:16:54.319
somebody tapped me on the shoulder real
fucking hard, and that was the enemy.

2861
03:16:56.280 --> 03:16:58.799
That was the end of it.
So that was the end of your

2862
03:16:58.280 --> 03:17:03.920
writing career, writing career, or
you're I would think your intelligence business was

2863
03:17:03.959 --> 03:17:09.120
over, but no, because no
it wasn't. Because my my intelligence business

2864
03:17:09.200 --> 03:17:11.559
was okay. But they didn't want
to write no more. I'll tell you

2865
03:17:11.559 --> 03:17:16.200
where it goes. That was the
end of my That was the end of

2866
03:17:16.280 --> 03:17:20.840
my writing career because all of a
sudden, I was writing about something that

2867
03:17:20.879 --> 03:17:24.399
I stepped over the line. I
didn't know that I stepped over the line.

2868
03:17:24.440 --> 03:17:28.879
I did not do it intelligence.
Well, yeah, that's the thing

2869
03:17:28.879 --> 03:17:31.280
with a lot of people in the
intelligence communities. You don't you don't know

2870
03:17:31.000 --> 03:17:35.559
where that well, you don't know, like I don't know what mechanism,

2871
03:17:35.680 --> 03:17:39.959
like what their publication review board is
like. But we've talked to people on

2872
03:17:41.040 --> 03:17:46.239
here, like with the CIA and
with the CIA, apparently even if you

2873
03:17:46.280 --> 03:17:50.399
write a book, if you know, one of our prior CIA guests had

2874
03:17:50.479 --> 03:17:56.159
written a book on fiction, a
fantasy novel that had nothing to do with

2875
03:17:56.200 --> 03:18:01.120
the CIA and no details was over
technically there's still was supposed to send that

2876
03:18:01.200 --> 03:18:05.680
in and get it. Yeah.
Yeah, like allowed to write a single

2877
03:18:05.719 --> 03:18:09.799
thing. But let's sort of like
unpack that a little bit. That the

2878
03:18:09.879 --> 03:18:13.879
continuity of Government program, Like for
people who are watching this have no idea

2879
03:18:13.879 --> 03:18:18.280
what we're talking about the continuity of
government protocol is that if we as a

2880
03:18:18.319 --> 03:18:22.680
country suffered at nine to eleven,
and if somebody had gone into the Capitol

2881
03:18:22.719 --> 03:18:28.520
Building and incapacitated the elected government of
the United States. We as a country

2882
03:18:28.840 --> 03:18:33.959
need a way to move forward under
the provisions of the Constitution in order to

2883
03:18:35.440 --> 03:18:39.840
remain it was. It was designed
for nuclear war. It was designed for

2884
03:18:39.200 --> 03:18:43.879
has other yes, but nuclear war. That's another thing I want to talk

2885
03:18:43.879 --> 03:18:46.959
about real quick, Okay. It
was designed for nuclear war because nuclear war

2886
03:18:46.159 --> 03:18:50.239
used to be the end all.
Yeah, right, it used to be.

2887
03:18:50.680 --> 03:18:56.000
When is the last time you have
heard anyone in a public forum talking

2888
03:18:56.000 --> 03:19:01.600
in real terms about nuclear war?
I mean, like like elected officials,

2889
03:19:01.639 --> 03:19:05.079
like in anybody. I mean,
when's the last time anybody talked about North

2890
03:19:05.159 --> 03:19:07.680
Korea being a threat, or about
Russia being a threat, or about about

2891
03:19:07.760 --> 03:19:11.840
China being a threat. Nobody's been
talking about it, but I will say

2892
03:19:11.879 --> 03:19:18.159
that it and like about what rain
Like New York came out with their first

2893
03:19:18.239 --> 03:19:22.200
one day, Yeah, one day, and you know what, that was

2894
03:19:22.520 --> 03:19:31.360
a way way, way low appointed
official making a colossal fucking mistake. The

2895
03:19:31.399 --> 03:19:35.479
world has changed. I mean,
I'm not gonna I'm not going to qualify

2896
03:19:35.559 --> 03:19:37.159
this or come up with any of
the provisions, but I am going to

2897
03:19:37.200 --> 03:19:43.719
say unequivocally that what we look at
as a government, as a threat has

2898
03:19:43.879 --> 03:19:48.520
changed in terms of what we tell
the public. And this is not me

2899
03:19:48.559 --> 03:19:52.200
talking. This is me saying,
if you're watching this thing, look at

2900
03:19:52.239 --> 03:19:54.159
it. Look at it in the
terms. When is the last time you

2901
03:19:54.239 --> 03:20:00.440
heard anybody talking about blowing up the
North Stream pipeline? Right? When is

2902
03:20:00.440 --> 03:20:07.159
the last time you've heard anybody talking
about North Korea launching missiles with nuclear weapons?

2903
03:20:07.879 --> 03:20:16.040
The conversation has changed in fundamental ways
in the last eight to twelve months.

2904
03:20:16.440 --> 03:20:18.799
I'm not saying what it is.
I'm not saying that. I am

2905
03:20:18.799 --> 03:20:28.319
saying that we as a country look
in different terms at threats and seems like

2906
03:20:28.360 --> 03:20:31.799
people would ask why, dude,
So as a country, as a populist,

2907
03:20:31.840 --> 03:20:35.280
you're not saying the politicians or the
administration or anybody else. You're saying

2908
03:20:37.120 --> 03:20:41.319
that the populace responds to the threats. I'll ask you. Are you saying

2909
03:20:41.319 --> 03:20:48.440
that the the the populace response to
the threats that the media tells them are

2910
03:20:48.520 --> 03:20:54.600
threats. I'm saying that the conversation
has changed, and I can't tell you

2911
03:20:54.639 --> 03:20:58.120
why, but I can tell you
what I used to do right, and

2912
03:20:58.159 --> 03:21:01.840
I can tell you that we're better
at it now. Than I was then,

2913
03:21:01.120 --> 03:21:07.040
right, Well, I mean in
the media. I mean Tucker Carlson

2914
03:21:07.120 --> 03:21:09.760
was in the media this week talking
about We're going to have a nuclear war

2915
03:21:09.799 --> 03:21:11.280
with Russia. But he's not in
the media anymore. He got fired.

2916
03:21:11.360 --> 03:21:15.239
He's in the media. Yeah,
in the media. Look, I mean,

2917
03:21:15.319 --> 03:21:16.959
yeah, he's You could argue that
he's bigger than he was. I

2918
03:21:16.959 --> 03:21:20.280
mean Tucker Carlson. Yeah, whatever
you feel about it. I mean,

2919
03:21:20.360 --> 03:21:24.479
I think there's a lot of talk
about war. That's but again, you're

2920
03:21:24.479 --> 03:21:30.639
talking about Tucker Carlson, somebody who
is not in in mainstream He is not

2921
03:21:30.760 --> 03:21:37.360
on a corporate owned network news.
I mean, to your point, right

2922
03:21:37.479 --> 03:21:41.639
after the war in Ukraine started,
or a few months after, New York

2923
03:21:41.719 --> 03:21:46.639
came out with the first sort of
like public service announcement for nuclear war,

2924
03:21:46.840 --> 03:21:50.799
there's nuclear threat, and then it
disappeared like immediately it was an accident.

2925
03:21:50.920 --> 03:21:56.600
Somebody very low in a total pole
made a colossal mistake and it evaporated very

2926
03:21:56.639 --> 03:21:58.079
quick, and someone in the media
decided to pick up on it, and

2927
03:21:58.079 --> 03:22:01.959
if they had maybe that it would
listen. You know, I've just used

2928
03:22:01.959 --> 03:22:05.440
as an example, and I don't
know the answer. I'm not I don't

2929
03:22:05.440 --> 03:22:09.000
really have a position. But I
remember very clearly the way the system worked.

2930
03:22:09.200 --> 03:22:15.319
When I was on television every day
for five years, almost six years.

2931
03:22:16.000 --> 03:22:20.280
I knew all the people involved.
I knew Jim Mikolschewski, I knew

2932
03:22:20.840 --> 03:22:26.280
Pete Williams, I knew Jim Stewart. I knew all of those guys.

2933
03:22:26.639 --> 03:22:30.159
You know, I didn't know them
all well, but I knew some of

2934
03:22:30.200 --> 03:22:33.559
them well, and I knew how
they worked. So do you have If

2935
03:22:33.559 --> 03:22:37.319
you're the Pentagon correspondent, you have
an office at the Pentagon, and you

2936
03:22:37.360 --> 03:22:39.520
go in and you want to feed
a story every day because that's your job,

2937
03:22:39.600 --> 03:22:41.920
right You get paid a certain amount
of money. So you go up

2938
03:22:41.959 --> 03:22:43.319
and you talk to whoever the flag
is that the Pentagon, You say I

2939
03:22:43.399 --> 03:22:46.799
need a story today, and they
would come up with something. They turn

2940
03:22:46.879 --> 03:22:50.719
to spig Off and they turn to
spig it Off. That's exactly the way

2941
03:22:50.760 --> 03:22:54.159
it works at every agency. And
if you're a reporter, you know,

2942
03:22:54.239 --> 03:22:56.879
on day one you're looking for a
Pulitzer Prize. Three days later, you're

2943
03:22:56.920 --> 03:23:01.159
just trying to feed your kids.
You're trying to put food on the table.

2944
03:23:01.440 --> 03:23:03.360
It's just a job. It's just
a job, and If you do

2945
03:23:03.440 --> 03:23:07.120
it properly, you can keep your
job and you can work and you can

2946
03:23:07.159 --> 03:23:11.159
get promoted or whatever else. If
you do it improperly, you fucked.

2947
03:23:11.399 --> 03:23:13.159
And that's the way the system works. I was a reporter and I got

2948
03:23:13.159 --> 03:23:18.520
my information that way. I controlled
the information two reporters, and I knew

2949
03:23:18.559 --> 03:23:22.200
the information that way. And when
you say properly or improperly, do you

2950
03:23:22.239 --> 03:23:26.440
mean if they're a great investigative journalists
or do you mean if they follow their

2951
03:23:26.479 --> 03:23:33.639
marching orders. Seymour Hirsh is a
great investigative reporter. And half the people

2952
03:23:33.760 --> 03:23:39.159
if you said Seymour Hursh's named half
the people to one hundred people, fifty

2953
03:23:39.200 --> 03:23:46.479
of them would probably say complete crackpot. Fifty of them would probably say genius,

2954
03:23:46.319 --> 03:23:50.799
hero of the American information system.
Right. I don't think there is

2955
03:23:50.840 --> 03:23:56.040
a way for an investigative journalist to
do their job today in an effective way.

2956
03:23:56.079 --> 03:24:00.680
And I will say, look at
and this is not a political thing.

2957
03:24:00.680 --> 03:24:03.159
I'm not saying if I'm a Trump
guy or Biden guy, whatever else,

2958
03:24:03.159 --> 03:24:05.879
it doesn't matter. But if you
look at the hatchet job that was

2959
03:24:07.440 --> 03:24:13.239
the Russia investigation and where that came
from and the people that won Pulitzer prizes

2960
03:24:13.319 --> 03:24:18.600
from that complete utter fraud, not
intentional. I'm not saying these reporters woke

2961
03:24:18.680 --> 03:24:20.760
up and said I'm gonna commit fraud. I'm not saying that at all.

2962
03:24:20.920 --> 03:24:28.680
But I'm saying those stories are proven
through investigation not to be accurate and falsified.

2963
03:24:28.319 --> 03:24:31.479
Do you think that's a problem with
people in government who are providing guidance

2964
03:24:33.120 --> 03:24:35.879
everybody in government is trying to get
I'll go back to what I said before.

2965
03:24:37.040 --> 03:24:39.319
Human beings act in their own best
interest. If you are a patriot,

2966
03:24:41.600 --> 03:24:46.399
administration journalists are following what is in
their best career interests. Human beings

2967
03:24:46.399 --> 03:24:48.079
do what's in their own best interests. It's not bad. I'm not saying

2968
03:24:48.079 --> 03:24:52.079
it's bad, but I'm saying,
if you wake up in your what's your

2969
03:24:52.120 --> 03:24:56.360
named Korean Jompierre the Yeah, If
you wake up in the morning, what

2970
03:24:56.520 --> 03:25:01.200
is your job? It is to
say Bidenomics work? And you know,

2971
03:25:01.399 --> 03:25:03.920
Joe Biden is not this, and
he is this, and it's you know

2972
03:25:03.959 --> 03:25:07.000
whatever. That's her job, and
that's their thing. If you are on

2973
03:25:07.040 --> 03:25:11.280
the Trump side and you wake up
every morning, you're trying to do the

2974
03:25:11.319 --> 03:25:13.959
exact same thing. And I'll go
back to what I said before, The

2975
03:25:15.079 --> 03:25:20.639
human mind is the same. How
you decide to exercise that process is different.

2976
03:25:20.879 --> 03:25:26.879
So in my opinion, based on
my experiences, I did my best

2977
03:25:28.200 --> 03:25:31.559
to influence opinion based on what I
thought was right as what I perceived myself

2978
03:25:31.559 --> 03:25:37.040
to be a patriot and a good
father and you know, in a loving

2979
03:25:37.079 --> 03:25:41.000
human being and a good person.
Right, I mean, I'll shoot you

2980
03:25:41.000 --> 03:25:45.360
in the head. But if I'm
going to try and do something for humanity,

2981
03:25:46.079 --> 03:25:50.479
and I ain't gonna do it right. So my point is that I

2982
03:25:50.559 --> 03:25:56.639
went real deep in that process,
right, And I think now looking at

2983
03:25:56.639 --> 03:26:01.079
what's going on right now, I
think people really think it out, Like

2984
03:26:01.079 --> 03:26:03.639
like maybe I came up with some
ideas, but now it's a whole different

2985
03:26:05.799 --> 03:26:09.079
Really, they've perfected it. And
like even two thousand and eight, two

2986
03:26:09.120 --> 03:26:11.200
thousand and eight, in my opinion, will never happen again. I have

2987
03:26:11.280 --> 03:26:16.840
friends, very very wealthy friends,
billionaires, and I'll ask them about it.

2988
03:26:16.440 --> 03:26:20.360
I don't want to get into this, but I know people who were

2989
03:26:20.799 --> 03:26:24.040
in the left seat with a hand
on the stick in two thousand and eight

2990
03:26:24.799 --> 03:26:26.959
shearson the splash of the economy,
right, And I know where they are

2991
03:26:28.000 --> 03:26:31.520
now and they did not suffer,
right, I mean, I know them

2992
03:26:31.559 --> 03:26:33.799
personally, like hanging out and have
dinner tomorrow, right, And and I'll

2993
03:26:33.799 --> 03:26:39.000
look at it and say, two
thousand and eight helped the financial world perfect

2994
03:26:39.559 --> 03:26:45.879
what they fucked up in two thousand
and eight, and politicians have now perfected

2995
03:26:46.440 --> 03:26:48.280
things that they fucked up in the
past. Yeah, So yeah, I

2996
03:26:48.360 --> 03:26:52.399
just I just think right now,
and maybe this conversation is getting over sideways,

2997
03:26:52.959 --> 03:26:56.920
but what it came to in my
life experience was that I found a

2998
03:26:56.959 --> 03:27:03.479
way to work as an individual doing
what I thought was best in a world.

2999
03:27:03.520 --> 03:27:07.520
I understood what you guys understand very
well, which is the mechanism of

3000
03:27:07.639 --> 03:27:13.159
organization. I understood in my own
mind. I understood the CIA and the

3001
03:27:13.239 --> 03:27:16.760
d i A and the NSA and
the FBI and the Army, Navy,

3002
03:27:16.799 --> 03:27:22.159
Airforce, Marines. In my own
way. I understood those things, and

3003
03:27:22.200 --> 03:27:28.360
I knew how I learned how to
work between them in effective ways. And

3004
03:27:28.559 --> 03:27:31.079
we haven't even gotten to I mean, right now, we're at two thousand

3005
03:27:31.120 --> 03:27:33.719
and one, right, But I
mean, isn't isn't part of the problem

3006
03:27:33.760 --> 03:27:39.799
though, that these journalists are being
fed stories, and these stories are being

3007
03:27:39.920 --> 03:27:43.719
placed by the intelligence communition in major
papers. I know it's the way it

3008
03:27:43.879 --> 03:27:48.000
Isn't that a problem? And it's
a problem in the sense that these journalists

3009
03:27:48.000 --> 03:27:52.879
published these stories, these editors published
these stories, but they don't understand the

3010
03:27:52.040 --> 03:27:58.360
backroom politics that are going on inside
these offices at Langley at DD that those

3011
03:27:58.360 --> 03:28:03.040
stories are being given them for reasons
they do not comprehend in any sense.

3012
03:28:03.360 --> 03:28:05.239
I don't think that people do.
Here's the thing. Let's say that the

3013
03:28:05.280 --> 03:28:11.000
three of us are the cabal,
right, and we're gonna like the Wizard

3014
03:28:11.040 --> 03:28:13.520
of Oz at wheels and levers,
and we're shaping all this opinion. Right.

3015
03:28:15.000 --> 03:28:16.879
We're going to do this for a
certain amount of time, and we're

3016
03:28:16.920 --> 03:28:18.159
gonna move on to the next job. We're gonna do a great job for

3017
03:28:18.200 --> 03:28:22.479
two years, and we're gonna get
promoted. We're going to get a new

3018
03:28:22.200 --> 03:28:26.000
special access program Moniker, and we're
going to get read into a new permission.

3019
03:28:26.040 --> 03:28:28.920
We're gonna get promoted. We're gonna
go on to the next thing.

3020
03:28:30.959 --> 03:28:35.879
There's nothing behind that. It's the
problem. My experience in life is that

3021
03:28:35.920 --> 03:28:41.000
there is other than a continuity of
government plan, which is genius, in

3022
03:28:41.040 --> 03:28:46.000
my opinion, is brilliant. There
is no fucking way to run the world

3023
03:28:46.000 --> 03:28:52.159
with politicians. Politicians come and go. Right now, we have Mitch McConnell

3024
03:28:52.159 --> 03:28:56.239
and the Senate who freezes up,
cannot form a sentence. He is the

3025
03:28:56.280 --> 03:29:01.680
majority leader minority leader in the Senate
United States Senate. He came out former

3026
03:29:01.760 --> 03:29:05.079
sentence. The doctor just yesterday declared
him. Find it's all good, never

3027
03:29:05.079 --> 03:29:07.879
mind, go home, don't care
about it. On the other side,

3028
03:29:07.360 --> 03:29:13.520
you've got Diane Fine, who is
exactly might might be a little bit worse

3029
03:29:13.559 --> 03:29:18.840
off. You've got Fetterman. I
was flying out here, right, I'm

3030
03:29:18.879 --> 03:29:20.559
so fucking excited you guys brought me
out here. I appreciate it that I

3031
03:29:20.559 --> 03:29:26.280
flew out here, big thing in
the airport, showing this Fetterman on the

3032
03:29:26.319 --> 03:29:31.799
cover of Time magazine as a testament
to man's ability to overcome depression. And

3033
03:29:31.840 --> 03:29:35.079
I'm thinking to myself, maybe you
know, thank God, you wish the

3034
03:29:35.120 --> 03:29:41.000
guy the best. It's all great, But should Diane find Stein and Fetterman

3035
03:29:41.079 --> 03:29:46.040
be members of the United States Senate
with their various issues, and should Mitch

3036
03:29:46.120 --> 03:29:50.319
McConnell, and what's this guy Santos
who is out of control on the Republican

3037
03:29:50.360 --> 03:29:56.319
side. It doesn't matter. You've
got the same issues on the Republican military,

3038
03:29:56.920 --> 03:30:01.239
everything everything. Yeah, judging either
and I'm saying it doesn't. And

3039
03:30:03.079 --> 03:30:07.959
the American people. I think this
is the the the the challenge that the

3040
03:30:09.000 --> 03:30:13.239
American populace face with social media,
because like we've had political parties in the

3041
03:30:13.280 --> 03:30:16.079
past, we've had this political divide
and and whatnot. But I think that

3042
03:30:16.360 --> 03:30:20.120
it in days gone by. And
I could be fantasizing, because you know,

3043
03:30:20.239 --> 03:30:24.399
I wasn't alive in the fifties,
but I believe that there was always

3044
03:30:24.440 --> 03:30:28.520
a healthy distrust of the government where
yeah, we want our guy to do

3045
03:30:28.559 --> 03:30:31.680
be this, or we want our
you know guy to be that. But

3046
03:30:31.879 --> 03:30:39.200
now it's almost as if we don't
we will allow our side, whoever our

3047
03:30:39.239 --> 03:30:43.959
side is, to get away with
anything as long as it's our side and

3048
03:30:45.200 --> 03:30:50.799
justifies the means. Ye. Meanwhile, meanwhile, all the politicians are voting

3049
03:30:50.879 --> 03:30:56.440
to remove you know, insider trading
restrictions on themselves. Meanwhile, they're extending

3050
03:30:56.479 --> 03:31:01.680
the Patriot Act every year, every
year, and it's I don't think I

3051
03:31:01.680 --> 03:31:07.639
don't think it all seems like a
tool. I don't know that they're so

3052
03:31:07.760 --> 03:31:13.280
all in so nefarious as to you
know, be conducting this big op against

3053
03:31:13.319 --> 03:31:16.639
the human But people want power.
Like you said, people do what's in

3054
03:31:16.680 --> 03:31:20.799
their best interest. And if politicians
can make eleven million dollars from you know,

3055
03:31:20.840 --> 03:31:24.399
buying Nvidia after they pass a bill, then they're going to do that.

3056
03:31:24.559 --> 03:31:28.959
Yeah, listen, go say what
I said before. People do what's

3057
03:31:28.959 --> 03:31:31.040
in their investors. It's not a
bad thing. It's just if you understand

3058
03:31:31.040 --> 03:31:33.280
that you can keep your Yeah,
you know, I mean you can sell

3059
03:31:33.319 --> 03:31:37.680
them a refrigerator, sell them a
car, Yeah, get on a podcasting

3060
03:31:37.760 --> 03:31:41.840
run for president. I mean you
can. You can sell them, you

3061
03:31:41.879 --> 03:31:46.520
know, a congressional bill that restricts
their fears and so anything else you want

3062
03:31:46.520 --> 03:31:52.120
to get into any any more heavy
show to have come. I want to

3063
03:31:52.239 --> 03:31:58.440
keep it keeps because you talked about
the tap on the shoulder and how that

3064
03:31:58.600 --> 03:32:01.319
ended your career, as can you
and you talk about that a little bit

3065
03:32:01.360 --> 03:32:03.040
more. I don't know how to
say it because I'm not sure I truly

3066
03:32:03.120 --> 03:32:09.239
understand it to this day, but
I can say that I had a moment

3067
03:32:09.559 --> 03:32:15.920
after Mount Weather where I was advised
that I wasn't as smart as I thought

3068
03:32:15.920 --> 03:32:18.520
I was, that I was not
as clever as I thought I was and

3069
03:32:18.639 --> 03:32:24.280
that. But the problem was when
I when I had that moment, I

3070
03:32:24.319 --> 03:32:28.120
felt really badly because I really truly
wanted to do the right thing right,

3071
03:32:28.159 --> 03:32:33.399
and I really truly thought that I
was doing the right thing, and I

3072
03:32:33.479 --> 03:32:39.760
was told by this entity I was, I was the information was conveyed by

3073
03:32:39.799 --> 03:32:41.920
the entity that that was not accurate, that I didn't really know what the

3074
03:32:41.959 --> 03:32:46.440
fuck was going on, and I
had stepped over the line, and that

3075
03:32:46.520 --> 03:32:48.399
was it. That was over.
Did you feel as though you had barely

3076
03:32:48.440 --> 03:32:54.399
avoided jail time? No, I
don't think. But how did they I

3077
03:32:54.399 --> 03:32:56.159
don't think I've ever been It's never
been a jail issue as far as I'm

3078
03:32:56.159 --> 03:33:00.159
concerned. It was never an over
at issue. It was never something they

3079
03:33:00.159 --> 03:33:01.840
could jail me for. How did
they kill your career as a novelist?

3080
03:33:01.920 --> 03:33:13.280
Though? If you write books,
great, if you can publish books better.

3081
03:33:13.000 --> 03:33:16.000
But if you publish books, you
got to sell books, right.

3082
03:33:16.239 --> 03:33:18.440
I mean I got a certain amount
of money for that book, and I

3083
03:33:18.479 --> 03:33:20.399
got a certain amount of money for
that book. And I got a certain

3084
03:33:20.399 --> 03:33:24.200
amount of money for that book.
I would not have gotten that amount of

3085
03:33:24.239 --> 03:33:28.399
money for another book. Because they
put the word out that you were persona

3086
03:33:28.479 --> 03:33:33.239
non grata. I don't think it's
a word. I don't know the answers.

3087
03:33:33.280 --> 03:33:37.079
I don't know, but I can
tell you what happened. I don't

3088
03:33:37.120 --> 03:33:41.000
know the mechanism, but I know
how that. I know the mechanism,

3089
03:33:41.040 --> 03:33:43.600
but I don't know how it happened. In my money, like, I

3090
03:33:43.639 --> 03:33:48.040
know one person who writes novels and
he had to clear his books both through

3091
03:33:48.120 --> 03:33:54.920
d D and CIA, and the
mechanism they used was, you know,

3092
03:33:54.040 --> 03:33:58.079
DD has the first purview or as
a CIA has a second, and then

3093
03:33:58.079 --> 03:34:01.760
I say no, CIA has to
have it. And so they basically found

3094
03:34:01.760 --> 03:34:05.079
a way to fuck him because both
entities were saying we have to have the

3095
03:34:05.120 --> 03:34:07.520
first look. Yes, and that's
the way they essentially shut him down and

3096
03:34:07.520 --> 03:34:11.959
stop him for listening. The mechanism
is way stronger than I think. I'm

3097
03:34:11.000 --> 03:34:16.360
clever, like I'm a moron in
certain ways. I mean, I got

3098
03:34:16.399 --> 03:34:22.000
a couple of things up my sleeve, but it all comes down to objective.

3099
03:34:22.559 --> 03:34:24.639
In two thousand and six, if
I had wanted to write another book

3100
03:34:24.639 --> 03:34:28.079
and publish another book, I would
have had a zero chance. And I

3101
03:34:28.159 --> 03:34:35.680
had everything. My agent at the
time was one of the I would argue

3102
03:34:35.760 --> 03:34:39.479
that I don't want to exaggerate,
because I would argue that she was probably

3103
03:34:39.879 --> 03:34:45.719
one of the top three agents in
the world because of her position at the

3104
03:34:45.719 --> 03:34:50.440
time. My publisher at the time, my first agent. Excuse me,

3105
03:34:50.600 --> 03:34:56.280
my first editor is now the or
until recently, the publisher of all of

3106
03:34:56.879 --> 03:35:01.200
time warned books, I mean these
people, you didn't get any better.

3107
03:35:01.520 --> 03:35:05.239
I got, I got the fun
I got the Illuminati. Yes, listen,

3108
03:35:05.600 --> 03:35:09.319
I'm not saying how I sold a
book after winning eight thousand dollars in

3109
03:35:09.319 --> 03:35:11.879
a card game with Brad Pitt,
But I got fucking everything. I got

3110
03:35:11.959 --> 03:35:16.280
the lunch at four Seasons, I
got the GQ excerpts, I got the

3111
03:35:16.319 --> 03:35:20.520
agent and the book. These guys, Robin Webstone, two with the great

3112
03:35:20.520 --> 03:35:24.280
fucking guys in my life. I'm
incredibly grateful to them, how they helped

3113
03:35:24.280 --> 03:35:28.319
me out. I got everything,
the whole fucking Enchilada, and somehow I

3114
03:35:28.360 --> 03:35:33.920
blew it and how I'm not entirely
sure the mecham and I'm not entirely sure

3115
03:35:35.239 --> 03:35:37.680
what. Who did? What?
How said? I can tell you what

3116
03:35:37.760 --> 03:35:43.120
happened. So anyways, I went
to Somalia and I did this fucking insane

3117
03:35:43.159 --> 03:35:46.120
gig and Samalia, and I got
stuck at K fifty, you know,

3118
03:35:46.159 --> 03:35:52.200
the second best airport in mogid Issue
with no with no passport and no money

3119
03:35:52.280 --> 03:35:56.440
and no technical How the fuck do
you not have a passport? They took

3120
03:35:56.479 --> 03:36:01.959
it. I mean, I mean, listen a lot of I've I've heard

3121
03:36:01.959 --> 03:36:07.639
guys on here talk about Samalia.
I might argue, I would always argue

3122
03:36:07.719 --> 03:36:13.280
that that that I'm the only person. I'm the only American that ever fought

3123
03:36:13.280 --> 03:36:18.520
his way into mobid Issue. I
think that's accurate. Like, I know,

3124
03:36:22.120 --> 03:36:24.840
we haven't got there yet. In
two thousand and six, I came.

3125
03:36:24.000 --> 03:36:28.479
I just I said, I'm fucking
done. I was. My life

3126
03:36:28.520 --> 03:36:31.399
was over. My New York life
was over. TV was over, books

3127
03:36:31.440 --> 03:36:33.520
were over. I was over.
I was a speaker's bureau. It was

3128
03:36:33.559 --> 03:36:37.799
over. I was literally I was
a dead man to the world in two

3129
03:36:37.840 --> 03:36:41.239
thousand and six, and I said, all right, I got an idea.

3130
03:36:41.639 --> 03:36:45.319
I'm gonna go to Samalia. The
US government has stood up the Transitional

3131
03:36:45.319 --> 03:36:48.639
Federal Government from put it together in
Nairobi. The biggest problem in two thousand

3132
03:36:48.639 --> 03:36:54.840
and six was bad guys were going
from Iraq and Afghanistan into the Saudi Peninsula

3133
03:36:54.879 --> 03:36:58.079
down through Saudi into Yemen, and
it's I think it's like twenty two miles

3134
03:36:58.079 --> 03:37:05.079
from uh in a skiff from Somalia
from Yemen. It's a short, it's

3135
03:37:05.440 --> 03:37:07.639
it's I mean, you could do
it in a fucking robot, right and

3136
03:37:07.680 --> 03:37:11.000
once you get into Somalia, you're
fucking you're free. Right after ninth,

3137
03:37:11.040 --> 03:37:15.600
after the black Hawk down, there
was nobody there, I mean, there

3138
03:37:15.639 --> 03:37:20.959
was nobody there. So the US
government put together Transitional Federal Government. They

3139
03:37:20.000 --> 03:37:22.360
sent him into Nairobi. They built
him. There's a lot of guys from

3140
03:37:22.360 --> 03:37:28.920
Minnesota did d asper right, the
Somali's well educated, successful businessmen who had

3141
03:37:28.920 --> 03:37:33.479
been fucked out of by warlords,
out of all their money. So the

3142
03:37:33.559 --> 03:37:37.559
US government sponsored it, the United
Nations backed it. They all got together

3143
03:37:37.600 --> 03:37:41.719
and buy do with Somalia in February, like February twenty six of two thousand

3144
03:37:41.719 --> 03:37:43.520
and six, and I said,
you know what, here's here's the last

3145
03:37:43.520 --> 03:37:46.920
story, because you guys gotta get
rid of me. It's fun way too

3146
03:37:46.920 --> 03:37:48.559
fucking long. And we got questions
for you too, all right. So

3147
03:37:48.559 --> 03:37:52.000
so I mean we haven't even got
to the fucking we're bringing you back,

3148
03:37:52.280 --> 03:37:56.079
just you know, no, I
mean, oh what, no, I'd

3149
03:37:56.079 --> 03:37:58.920
love to yeah, but I'm just
saying people, there's no fucking way any

3150
03:38:00.040 --> 03:38:01.360
he's going to listen to me anymore. But we haven't even got to the

3151
03:38:01.360 --> 03:38:03.760
great Ship yet. But anyway,
So the point of the story is I

3152
03:38:03.799 --> 03:38:07.360
came over this idea and I said, I gotta figure out. I knew

3153
03:38:07.399 --> 03:38:09.719
all these guys, right, a
lot of guys that we haven't got to

3154
03:38:09.799 --> 03:38:13.920
yet, five eyes, guys like
Australians and Brits, and we haven't even

3155
03:38:13.959 --> 03:38:16.239
got to them yet. But so
I came up with this idea. You

3156
03:38:16.239 --> 03:38:22.239
gotta hear this idea. So I
go, all right, I'm fucked in

3157
03:38:22.280 --> 03:38:26.440
New York, right, I'm fucked
in DC, I'm fucked in America.

3158
03:38:26.479 --> 03:38:28.840
What am I going to do now? Because the people who really matter,

3159
03:38:30.120 --> 03:38:35.120
I've decided they put the the fucking
fit print you thumb. Yeah, yeah,

3160
03:38:35.520 --> 03:38:39.200
you have the scarlet letter now the
scarlet let. Yeah. So I

3161
03:38:39.239 --> 03:38:43.079
go, okay, So I knew
that the USG was going to stand up

3162
03:38:43.120 --> 03:38:48.959
the Transitional Federal Government in baidoas Samalia
because Mogu was too hot. It's like

3163
03:38:48.000 --> 03:38:54.120
this fifteenth Transitional Government. Yeah,
yeah, fifteenth exactly right. So The

3164
03:38:54.159 --> 03:38:58.079
idea is that the bad guys were
coming across Saudi Peninsula. They were going

3165
03:38:58.079 --> 03:39:01.639
across the streets at I'm in into
Somali Land, then into Somalia once you

3166
03:39:01.639 --> 03:39:05.760
were in your off grid, because
after nine to eleven, we had very,

3167
03:39:05.920 --> 03:39:09.840
very very meager resources in Somalia.
Right. I know you've had guys

3168
03:39:09.840 --> 03:39:13.520
on here, they've talked about it, but nobody's going to come on here

3169
03:39:13.520 --> 03:39:16.120
and say we knew what was going
on in Somalia. Nobody. So I

3170
03:39:16.159 --> 03:39:20.000
said, okay, So I got
I got my shots up to date,

3171
03:39:20.520 --> 03:39:24.200
and I flew into Nairobi. Right. I love Nairobi. I'm a big

3172
03:39:24.239 --> 03:39:28.319
fan of Nairobi. So I always
stay at the six eighty Hotel because that's

3173
03:39:28.360 --> 03:39:33.959
where all the spooks in Nairobi.
They in East Africa. They all stay

3174
03:39:33.000 --> 03:39:37.719
at that ship hole. It's on
Kenyatta Boulevard and it's it's a fucking hysterical

3175
03:39:37.760 --> 03:39:41.959
place you gotta go at all time. So there's only two clubs I ever

3176
03:39:43.000 --> 03:39:46.719
really wanted to join in my life. One was Hell's Angels and two was

3177
03:39:46.760 --> 03:39:52.840
the East Africa Flyers Club at Wilson
Airport, which is the civilian side of

3178
03:39:52.920 --> 03:39:56.000
Nairobi. Airport. Right, So
Bluebird Air flies all the cought flights.

3179
03:39:56.000 --> 03:40:00.719
They've got a bunch of king Air
five hundreds and they fly all the Cot.

3180
03:40:01.040 --> 03:40:03.319
And you know COT's got a shelf
life was like eight hours. Oh

3181
03:40:03.360 --> 03:40:05.479
I didn't know that. Yeah,
it's like eight hours. So you fly

3182
03:40:05.520 --> 03:40:09.360
it up. They would cut My
dealer never tells me how well your dealers

3183
03:40:09.360 --> 03:40:15.719
would tell you. So so I
go, look, I'm a huge Hemingway

3184
03:40:15.799 --> 03:40:18.200
nut. Right, I'm all my
life. I'm my Hemingway night. So

3185
03:40:18.239 --> 03:40:22.760
I go, okay, Hemingway had
this big thing in Kenya. So I

3186
03:40:22.840 --> 03:40:26.799
fly anyways, I fly in.
I gotta tell you this one quick story.

3187
03:40:28.040 --> 03:40:30.920
So I fly in, and I've
got this guy and his name is

3188
03:40:31.000 --> 03:40:37.360
for Raw for Raw. Back up
at the time, in two thousand and

3189
03:40:37.360 --> 03:40:39.879
six, I bought a house in
the Hampshire. Right, a couple issues

3190
03:40:39.280 --> 03:40:43.600
move the family into Hampshire and this
great place. So I'm watching black Hawk

3191
03:40:43.879 --> 03:40:52.200
Down. Black Hawk Down's got this
great scene where for Raw? Now,

3192
03:40:52.200 --> 03:40:56.520
what's his name? Not for our
Indeed, Osman Aliato. Osman Aliato is

3193
03:40:56.559 --> 03:41:01.079
in the in the Baccara arms market
reading you, I say today, right,

3194
03:41:01.200 --> 03:41:03.600
go back to black Hawk Down.
And all of a sudden he goes,

3195
03:41:03.760 --> 03:41:07.079
he walks over to a prado.
He gets in this prodo and he's

3196
03:41:07.159 --> 03:41:09.360
driving out of town. He's right
a red dirt road through Somali. Right,

3197
03:41:09.360 --> 03:41:13.959
it was actually in Morocco, but
Ridley Scott shot in Morocco. So

3198
03:41:13.120 --> 03:41:18.000
he's driving down the road and a
fucking black Hawk comes down and a couple

3199
03:41:18.000 --> 03:41:20.280
of Delta guys tag him with like
an I think it was like an M

3200
03:41:20.280 --> 03:41:24.760
fourteen saw it off or something.
Yeah, And they tag the engine thing

3201
03:41:24.760 --> 03:41:28.000
and there's oil on the thing.
And I'm in Hampshire and I'm watching this

3202
03:41:28.040 --> 03:41:31.879
with my sons, Mick and Jake. Bad motherfuckers, these two guys.

3203
03:41:33.440 --> 03:41:37.719
And so they so Mico's dad will
will a three o eight break an engine

3204
03:41:37.719 --> 03:41:39.280
block? And I said, no, no, sir, no sir.

3205
03:41:39.399 --> 03:41:43.840
But it's a movie, right.
So the black Hawk lands, the prado

3206
03:41:43.959 --> 03:41:46.799
comes to a stop. They kidnap
Osman Aliato and they take him to Sam

3207
03:41:46.879 --> 03:41:52.520
Shephard, right, and Sam Shepard
goes to him and and he goes,

3208
03:41:52.959 --> 03:41:56.760
you bunch of Arkansas white boys,
you come in here thinks this is your

3209
03:41:56.760 --> 03:42:00.319
war. This is not your war. You know that it was a great

3210
03:42:00.319 --> 03:42:03.680
scene, right, and Ozma Aliato
is uh, you know, he's a

3211
03:42:03.760 --> 03:42:07.120
great act right. I forget his
name, but the whole thing. So

3212
03:42:07.239 --> 03:42:11.680
anyways, we will watch this movie. Let's say it's a Wednesday night.

3213
03:42:13.680 --> 03:42:22.159
Forty eight hours later. I'm in
the Westlands in Nairobi, right, and

3214
03:42:22.200 --> 03:42:24.000
I'm meeting with this guy for Raw, and I've got a plan, one

3215
03:42:24.000 --> 03:42:28.639
of my plans, one of my
famous plans. Right, So I'm talking

3216
03:42:28.680 --> 03:42:35.760
to Ozma. I'm talking to this
guy for Raw. Was a lieutenant under

3217
03:42:37.639 --> 03:42:41.520
what was that guy's name. Who's
the guy for Rah? Now? Yeah?

3218
03:42:43.639 --> 03:42:48.079
Under indeed? Okay, So he
was in the Somali Army, a

3219
03:42:48.200 --> 03:42:56.440
lieutenant under add and knew him very
well, and he went to Syria and

3220
03:42:56.559 --> 03:43:03.040
received intelligence training from the muhabor Rat. It's in fucking in Syria, right,

3221
03:43:03.399 --> 03:43:07.959
he's my guy, so I hire
him and this guy for Raz the

3222
03:43:07.000 --> 03:43:11.920
ship. He was a linguist,
so he spoke English, he spoke Somali,

3223
03:43:13.079 --> 03:43:20.399
he spoke all those clicking languages like
uh like the Swahili. But I

3224
03:43:20.399 --> 03:43:24.959
mean, this guy was shit.
This guy was such a bad dude.

3225
03:43:24.239 --> 03:43:28.639
So we're sitting in the Westlands and
we're putting this plan together. So I'm

3226
03:43:28.680 --> 03:43:31.840
getting ready to go into Somalia and
I and I hear somebody yelling witcom.

3227
03:43:33.479 --> 03:43:37.680
The Westlands is like a shopping mall
with a bunch of outdoor cafes and stuff.

3228
03:43:37.719 --> 03:43:41.399
So having a cup of coffee,
and uh, I hear somebody owned

3229
03:43:41.399 --> 03:43:43.879
witcom witcom, And I look up
and here comes a guy from HRT.

3230
03:43:46.360 --> 03:43:48.200
This guy, I'll say, his
name is Ricky. Right, he's a

3231
03:43:48.200 --> 03:43:52.319
man of color, and Ricky everybody
loved Ricky. He was an incredible guy.

3232
03:43:52.399 --> 03:43:58.920
Big, big, jacked up guys
like two sixty doing like two hundred

3233
03:43:58.920 --> 03:44:03.280
and fifty milligrams of susting on every
three days, wearing his little sister's medium

3234
03:44:03.280 --> 03:44:07.719
sized tea, and I mean,
he's jacked hiss shit. And he comes

3235
03:44:07.799 --> 03:44:09.040
up and I go, Ricky,
what the fuck are you doing here?

3236
03:44:09.159 --> 03:44:11.719
Right? And he goes, oh, you know whatever. He had left

3237
03:44:11.760 --> 03:44:16.920
the bureau when he'd gone to work
for Triple Canopy or whatever else. So

3238
03:44:16.000 --> 03:44:18.399
he was working in country. But
he's got a place in Nairobe. He

3239
03:44:18.399 --> 03:44:20.479
moved his family in to n Iirobe, so we can go back and forth.

3240
03:44:20.840 --> 03:44:24.000
So he comes up and then this
guy comes up and he goes.

3241
03:44:24.319 --> 03:44:26.639
This guy comes up and he's got
oh, he's wearing a he's wearing a

3242
03:44:26.680 --> 03:44:33.079
Big Johnson T shirt, Big Johnson, remember that Big Johnson stupid Yeah,

3243
03:44:33.120 --> 03:44:35.520
it was a goofy T shirt company
and a bing golf advise, a big

3244
03:44:35.600 --> 03:44:39.479
golf eiser with no no fucking top
on it, just a visor. And

3245
03:44:39.520 --> 03:44:43.440
he's wearing bud shorts, beauty t
shorts. You know, they got a

3246
03:44:43.479 --> 03:44:48.479
buckle in the front, and they
got they got fucking fanny packs on with

3247
03:44:48.840 --> 03:44:52.479
you know, with the pack meyer
grip showing out of the fanny packs whatever.

3248
03:44:52.559 --> 03:44:54.639
And there's other guys with him,
and he's got this this handlebar like

3249
03:44:54.760 --> 03:45:00.799
village people mustache, and he's got
a list he's gotta fuck listen. So

3250
03:45:00.879 --> 03:45:03.079
these guys come up and I go, Ricky, what the fuck's going on?

3251
03:45:03.159 --> 03:45:05.200
Man? And so he looks and
he goes, what are you doing

3252
03:45:05.239 --> 03:45:07.959
here? And I said, you
know, business, And he looks at

3253
03:45:09.000 --> 03:45:13.120
Farrah and I go, this is
John you know he works for Google or

3254
03:45:13.159 --> 03:45:16.079
you know whatever else. So we
have that moment. And then the guy

3255
03:45:16.120 --> 03:45:22.520
with a lispez athla you know,
and whatever. It was one of those

3256
03:45:22.520 --> 03:45:26.680
moments. So I went to the
store and I bought a bunch of tampons

3257
03:45:26.719 --> 03:45:33.239
and duct tape because I wouldn't carry
they didn't have like that. Gel.

3258
03:45:33.799 --> 03:45:37.680
Tampons are easy, right, right, so I'd carry duct tape and tampons.

3259
03:45:37.760 --> 03:45:41.360
Yeah, we're talking about wound managed
wound manage, right, Because if

3260
03:45:41.360 --> 03:45:43.520
I'm going in and I get shot, there's no hospitals of smat. So

3261
03:45:43.559 --> 03:45:50.200
then I ran at hundred seventy two
b Assessna and I fly in and long

3262
03:45:50.280 --> 03:45:54.440
story short, next next time we
talk, I get stuck there, I

3263
03:45:54.479 --> 03:45:58.719
get stuck. The idea is this, Somalia has a translational federal government.

3264
03:45:58.239 --> 03:46:05.559
A government needs GDP. GDP Somalia
has the longest coastline in Africa, meaning

3265
03:46:05.639 --> 03:46:09.760
they have the longest legitimate fishing grounds
in the Indian Ocean, which is rich.

3266
03:46:11.040 --> 03:46:15.879
The Chinese want it. So if
I can sell the coastline of Africa

3267
03:46:16.399 --> 03:46:22.399
in grids to China, that's money
for the transitional federal government to stand up

3268
03:46:22.639 --> 03:46:26.360
and run with GDP in Somalia.
Right. The idea is the US government

3269
03:46:26.399 --> 03:46:33.200
wants a government that can tamp down
the warlords, find the bad guys,

3270
03:46:33.559 --> 03:46:37.159
and get a toe hold in Africa. Were dreamcasting here? Yeah? No,

3271
03:46:37.159 --> 03:46:39.719
no, this is real shit.
So well, yeah, you're right,

3272
03:46:39.760 --> 03:46:46.159
it's mcast. But I thought it
was real shit because I'm delusional fifteen

3273
03:46:46.200 --> 03:46:52.440
times times, sev seventeen times.
Not saying that your plans dreamcasting. I

3274
03:46:52.040 --> 03:47:01.520
think the government's dream That's what's dreamcasting. That's exactly right. Yeah, that

3275
03:47:01.959 --> 03:47:03.639
the face ringing or whatever. Yeah, but you know I always said,

3276
03:47:03.639 --> 03:47:07.399
fuck it, I'm gonna give it
a try. Yeah, So I fly.

3277
03:47:07.719 --> 03:47:11.959
So it was like seven thousand dollars
or something like that to hire this

3278
03:47:13.000 --> 03:47:18.719
plane to fly from Nairobi from Wilson, you know, like the Wilson Flyers

3279
03:47:18.719 --> 03:47:22.200
Club where Hemingway used to drink.
Right. For me, it was all

3280
03:47:22.200 --> 03:47:26.840
about Hemingway. But I just want
to be Hemingway. So listen, seriously,

3281
03:47:26.079 --> 03:47:30.360
it gets better. So I go, fuck it. So I fly

3282
03:47:30.760 --> 03:47:33.079
into buy Doa. For those who
have not been to buy Doa, it's

3283
03:47:33.079 --> 03:47:37.840
a ship stain on the world.
There's nothing there. It's been fucking blown

3284
03:47:37.879 --> 03:47:41.840
to the ground and everybody. So
the first thing I did was hire a

3285
03:47:41.680 --> 03:47:46.000
technical. Right, so I've got
like, I got like two I think

3286
03:47:46.040 --> 03:47:48.479
I had two P two p k
ms. I had an M sixty.

3287
03:47:48.639 --> 03:47:52.239
What's that go for a day?
To hire a technical? Five hundred bucks.

3288
03:47:52.120 --> 03:47:56.760
That's outstanding. That's new teamhouse floor
right there. If you want five

3289
03:47:56.840 --> 03:47:58.840
hundred bucks. If you want to
know how much you get a technical,

3290
03:47:58.879 --> 03:48:00.680
well, no, that was two
thousands six. I don't know what it

3291
03:48:00.719 --> 03:48:03.000
is now. Two thousand and six. A technical was five hundred dollars a

3292
03:48:03.079 --> 03:48:05.360
day you get. I think I
had two pm p k ms. I

3293
03:48:05.399 --> 03:48:09.360
think I had. I know I
had one M sixty because it caused me

3294
03:48:09.440 --> 03:48:11.399
a lot of grief because I'm thinking, where does an M sixty come from?

3295
03:48:11.479 --> 03:48:16.239
Right? Right? That really bothers
right? Yeah, So I had

3296
03:48:16.280 --> 03:48:20.239
the M sixty and then and I
had there's like a technical mark that you

3297
03:48:20.399 --> 03:48:26.000
isn't like avis technicals or something like
how do you hire a technical when you

3298
03:48:28.040 --> 03:48:31.440
I'll tell you where. A tall, skinny white boy goes to Buidoa,

3299
03:48:31.559 --> 03:48:35.159
Somalia with a shutload of money in
their sock. Yeah, technicals up here

3300
03:48:35.200 --> 03:48:39.959
out of nowhere, fucking magic here
out of nowhere. Yeah they were standing

3301
03:48:41.239 --> 03:48:45.040
when I get there. Somalia really
might be one of my favorite places on

3302
03:48:45.040 --> 03:48:48.280
Earth, just because it's like a
last type of thing. Like they've got

3303
03:48:48.280 --> 03:48:50.600
different classes of people and I know
we're getting to the end. The people

3304
03:48:50.760 --> 03:48:54.360
got to go home. But but
different classes of people. And they had

3305
03:48:54.360 --> 03:48:58.639
this one class of people that were
kind of like gypsies, fortune tellers,

3306
03:48:58.680 --> 03:49:01.440
and they would cast spells. Right, so I could go to them and

3307
03:49:01.520 --> 03:49:05.280
say, I'm going to pay you
a certain amount of money and you can

3308
03:49:05.360 --> 03:49:09.920
cast a spell on such and such
a person. But the same people would

3309
03:49:09.920 --> 03:49:13.799
have the genital mutilation. So they
have like a fourteen year old girl selling

3310
03:49:13.879 --> 03:49:20.200
Chinese watches and ambulance to cast a
spell when the village senior was cutting off

3311
03:49:20.200 --> 03:49:24.959
for oh, with a broken piece
of glass from a bottle. Yeah,

3312
03:49:26.000 --> 03:49:30.600
I mean, it's fucking bizarre somalia. Yeah, it's it's it's it's primal.

3313
03:49:30.879 --> 03:49:37.719
So anyways, the idea was to
the issue was pirates, right,

3314
03:49:37.920 --> 03:49:39.920
the pirates. The only reason the
Chinese wouldn't buy the fishing rights is because

3315
03:49:39.920 --> 03:49:43.120
of the pirates. But you had
to Naval task force in Jibouti. So

3316
03:49:43.200 --> 03:49:50.440
if I could put together the whole
package, then the an aspect of the

3317
03:49:50.440 --> 03:49:56.440
intelligence community I'm not gonna say,
which would work with the naval task force

3318
03:49:56.639 --> 03:50:00.639
to tamp down to patrol the coastline
closer, to shut down piracy, to

3319
03:50:00.680 --> 03:50:05.399
sell the fishing rights to the Chinese
to produce GDP, to stand up a

3320
03:50:05.479 --> 03:50:11.799
federal government and give the USG a
decent go at fighting terrorism. Yeah,

3321
03:50:11.879 --> 03:50:15.719
that was the idea. Didn't go
well, it didn't go well. No,

3322
03:50:15.719 --> 03:50:18.559
no, So i read on one
seventy two and I fly in and

3323
03:50:18.600 --> 03:50:22.000
I land in, buy Doah,
and I've got a certain amount of money,

3324
03:50:22.040 --> 03:50:26.000
and they ain't no ATMs, there's
no credit cards. Right, there's

3325
03:50:26.040 --> 03:50:28.920
nothing. Right. You get a
certain amount of money today, you've got

3326
03:50:28.000 --> 03:50:33.239
five hundred bucks. Tomorrow you're dead, right, dead right. I got

3327
03:50:33.280 --> 03:50:37.920
to that point. So I didn't
like where I was in my own right

3328
03:50:39.280 --> 03:50:43.479
because you know, it was untenable. But the government didn't like it because

3329
03:50:43.559 --> 03:50:50.319
all of a sudden, the government
this me gets kidnapped by El Shabab and

3330
03:50:50.479 --> 03:50:54.360
tortured to death. It does not
look good for the transitional federal government.

3331
03:50:54.719 --> 03:50:58.440
So all of a sudden it went
within a very short period of time,

3332
03:50:58.559 --> 03:51:03.159
meaning like an hour, they realized
that I was there. They being else.

3333
03:51:03.280 --> 03:51:07.319
Bob realized I was there, and
they were coming up to get me

3334
03:51:07.479 --> 03:51:13.079
because I had great value to them. An intelligence component of the United States

3335
03:51:13.159 --> 03:51:20.040
government was trying to put together various
interests to work a stabilization program for the

3336
03:51:20.040 --> 03:51:28.079
transitional federal government. And I was
a big fucking problem. So I ended

3337
03:51:28.159 --> 03:51:31.920
up in a space between the wall
of a mosque. I mean, and

3338
03:51:31.959 --> 03:51:35.840
that's saying stuff because a mosque and
BIOISIMALI is not really much, right,

3339
03:51:37.040 --> 03:51:39.719
It's like a loud speaker and a
fucking remains of a broken vall of that's

3340
03:51:39.760 --> 03:51:43.520
been chopped up with RPGs, right, And I'm hiding in this thing.

3341
03:51:43.520 --> 03:51:46.879
There was this little piece of corrugated
tin, and they give me two bottles

3342
03:51:46.879 --> 03:51:50.799
of Nestly water, because you find
Nestli water anywhere you go, right anywhere

3343
03:51:50.799 --> 03:51:54.600
in the world. Thank God that
this really nice guy. This guy,

3344
03:51:54.040 --> 03:51:56.559
I've got pictures of all this.
I'll show you these pictures after we're done

3345
03:51:56.559 --> 03:52:01.719
here. But this guy that was
there was a guy that had started like

3346
03:52:01.760 --> 03:52:07.799
a bed breakfast for the government,
except a bed and breakfast was a pile

3347
03:52:07.840 --> 03:52:11.600
of rubble with like some blue paint, right, And he had he had

3348
03:52:11.600 --> 03:52:16.959
survived various wars, but he took
a fucking hard frag to the face,

3349
03:52:16.280 --> 03:52:20.639
so he had I mean, he
was gnarly to look at. He had

3350
03:52:20.680 --> 03:52:24.719
a real problem of his face.
And so anyways, I got stuck between

3351
03:52:24.120 --> 03:52:28.680
under this piece of corrugated ten And
then finally I was running out of money

3352
03:52:28.680 --> 03:52:31.399
and I said, I gotta make
a run for it. I mean it

3353
03:52:31.440 --> 03:52:35.559
was it's a long walk back to
Nairobi, so my only choice was to

3354
03:52:35.600 --> 03:52:37.680
go to Mogue because it was the
only Oh I'm sorry, I forgot to

3355
03:52:37.680 --> 03:52:43.680
say. Every day the King Air. The plan was that an intelligence community,

3356
03:52:43.040 --> 03:52:54.040
an intelligence component would fly Bluebird Air
would fly King Air five hundreds caught

3357
03:52:54.079 --> 03:52:58.639
flights in the morning that was eight
hours. Then an intelligence capability would hire

3358
03:52:58.680 --> 03:53:01.280
them for the second and third shifts
and they would just fly the planes around,

3359
03:53:01.559 --> 03:53:05.719
moving guns and warlords and trying to
put the whole thing together right.

3360
03:53:07.600 --> 03:53:13.000
They decided they didn't have room for
me, so I would get up every

3361
03:53:13.000 --> 03:53:16.159
morning with my technical and I would
go to the Baidoa Airport, which is

3362
03:53:16.159 --> 03:53:20.879
nothing but a dirt strip with a
pilot rubble there. It was like one

3363
03:53:20.239 --> 03:53:24.719
tree and we'd go out there and
all the technicals would line up to go

3364
03:53:24.760 --> 03:53:28.799
out and get the cot because that
was the only money. The plane would

3365
03:53:28.879 --> 03:53:31.799
land. They'd throw off the bales
a cot. The guys would run up,

3366
03:53:31.799 --> 03:53:35.600
grab their ship and go sell it. I'd go up to the plane.

3367
03:53:35.600 --> 03:53:37.559
The pilot would come out and say, fuck you white man, go

3368
03:53:37.639 --> 03:53:41.799
away, and the plane would fly
away. And that's a ship feeling.

3369
03:53:41.360 --> 03:53:45.159
Now I've got five hundred dollars less, five hundred dollars less, five hundred

3370
03:53:45.159 --> 03:53:48.120
dollars less. My socks getting empty, right, So finally I had no

3371
03:53:48.200 --> 03:53:50.639
place to go. I got one
day left, so I said, I'm

3372
03:53:50.639 --> 03:53:54.079
going to make a run for it
to Mogadishu. I didn't know how far

3373
03:53:54.120 --> 03:53:56.040
it was to Mugidissue. I didn't
know what was there. When I got

3374
03:53:56.079 --> 03:54:01.760
there, go to the Modishu airport, which was closed due to you go

3375
03:54:01.840 --> 03:54:03.319
to check points. You know,
you get hung up at checkpoints with a

3376
03:54:03.479 --> 03:54:07.000
like a twelve year old with a
AK forty seven yea and my technical.

3377
03:54:07.079 --> 03:54:11.040
So I'm in a Toyota Corolla.
The technical would try to catch up.

3378
03:54:11.440 --> 03:54:15.120
They would scream at each other.
They yelled at like the twelve year old

3379
03:54:15.239 --> 03:54:18.879
doesn't care if I go through or
not. But oh, I forget to

3380
03:54:18.959 --> 03:54:22.120
tell you. Osman Aliato, the
guy from black Hawk down, I met

3381
03:54:22.200 --> 03:54:26.760
him like. So I'd go from
the Hampshire to night to Nairobi and then

3382
03:54:26.799 --> 03:54:28.760
into Baidah, and I'm in this
warehouse. I got a fucking picture of

3383
03:54:28.840 --> 03:54:35.360
him with me, and he's stayed
in there. Not in a fucking montage

3384
03:54:35.360 --> 03:54:39.280
walking suit with short sleeves and epaulets. He's got on a fucking suit from

3385
03:54:39.280 --> 03:54:41.920
Herodge and he's wearing Aramis cologne,
right, And I'm in this warehouse with

3386
03:54:43.000 --> 03:54:46.680
him. It's one hundred and four
degrees and I'm going, what the fuck?

3387
03:54:46.000 --> 03:54:50.760
And I'm shaking his hand Osman Aliato, the guy from black Hawk down,

3388
03:54:50.799 --> 03:54:52.479
I'm going, what the fuck is
going on here? But anyway,

3389
03:54:52.520 --> 03:54:56.040
the point of the story is that
I eventually ended up in Mogue. They

3390
03:54:56.079 --> 03:55:01.200
shot out. They shot out the
window of the to Corolla, which is

3391
03:55:01.239 --> 03:55:05.000
a problem because then they could see
me right ahead right head reflective windows.

3392
03:55:05.920 --> 03:55:09.040
And so I get to the airport
and I see that there was whatever that

3393
03:55:09.040 --> 03:55:13.280
plane from dB Cooper, the one
with the stairs that come down like a

3394
03:55:13.360 --> 03:55:16.879
DC tannery and I can see it. So have you guys been to Swelling?

3395
03:55:18.280 --> 03:55:22.000
No? Okay, So so mog
you know, got Mogadishu Airport right,

3396
03:55:22.680 --> 03:55:26.079
uh main airport, And then about
I have like twenty five miles south

3397
03:55:26.280 --> 03:55:31.360
is this place called K fifty And
K fifty is an old Russian airstrip and

3398
03:55:31.360 --> 03:55:35.840
it's literally a red dirt strip and
a bunch of shrub brush, and then

3399
03:55:35.920 --> 03:55:41.639
a couple of tents and piles of
rubble and fifty guys with machine guns who

3400
03:55:41.760 --> 03:55:46.760
all want to know what this fucking
retard me. You can't say retarding this

3401
03:55:46.879 --> 03:55:50.719
guy? Whatever this me? You're
a fender yourself, yea, he goes.

3402
03:55:50.920 --> 03:55:54.200
And so they're all looking at me, and I'm going and the only

3403
03:55:54.239 --> 03:55:56.600
reason and I know, I'm looking
at them, and they're looking at me,

3404
03:55:56.639 --> 03:56:00.200
and I'm thinking, the only reason
I'm alive is because the Agency is

3405
03:56:00.319 --> 03:56:03.680
making deals with all these guys trying
to put together what turned out to be

3406
03:56:03.719 --> 03:56:07.040
the Second Battle of Mogadishue, and
they're all looking, going, can we

3407
03:56:07.120 --> 03:56:09.719
take him? Can you take him? Nobody knew who I was there with,

3408
03:56:09.120 --> 03:56:13.399
and that's what saved my life.
So anyways, the guy came out,

3409
03:56:13.399 --> 03:56:15.440
Oh, they didn't want to cut
off the money tap, Well,

3410
03:56:15.440 --> 03:56:18.680
they didn't know who I was there, right, right, So it's like

3411
03:56:18.879 --> 03:56:22.600
your crew didn't want to take a
chance you steal me, but I had,

3412
03:56:22.639 --> 03:56:26.399
But the agency was paying you,
and then the agents are going to

3413
03:56:26.440 --> 03:56:30.319
pay you to kill you, right, So I think it was confusion.

3414
03:56:30.600 --> 03:56:33.719
It was it. So anyways,
the point of story is that so I

3415
03:56:33.079 --> 03:56:35.479
said, you know, I gotta
get on that plane. It was a

3416
03:56:35.559 --> 03:56:39.239
charter plane. It was not a
scheduled flight. There were there were no

3417
03:56:39.280 --> 03:56:43.440
planes and mogad issue that day zero, but there was this one plane.

3418
03:56:43.799 --> 03:56:46.440
And I still have the ticket,
but it's not a ticket, but I

3419
03:56:46.440 --> 03:56:48.040
still have the handwritten thing. But
anyways, the part of the stories that

3420
03:56:48.079 --> 03:56:50.840
came out and they said how much
money do you have? And I had

3421
03:56:50.840 --> 03:56:54.000
six hundred bucks left, My technicals
gone, the car's gone, I'm all

3422
03:56:54.040 --> 03:56:58.280
by myself. So they took I
gave him six hundred bucks. They came

3423
03:56:58.280 --> 03:57:00.399
out, they searched me, They
went through all my ship. They stole

3424
03:57:00.440 --> 03:57:05.639
the duct tape, like they left
the tampons. But oh well, that's

3425
03:57:05.680 --> 03:57:09.440
another story. But I had some
guys with some real health issues. So

3426
03:57:09.479 --> 03:57:11.280
they search, They search your stuff
just to make sure that you had nothing

3427
03:57:11.319 --> 03:57:15.159
else of value. No money,
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, I

3428
03:57:15.159 --> 03:57:18.319
mean I I was wearing a nice
watch. But they do we have questions

3429
03:57:18.319 --> 03:57:24.719
for Chris. We do should probably
roll in the Chris were we are like,

3430
03:57:24.799 --> 03:57:28.639
we guys, I know this is
way the fuck it happens. It

3431
03:57:28.680 --> 03:57:31.959
happens sometimes. Everybody who watched this
show knows I'm a talker, like I'll

3432
03:57:33.000 --> 03:57:37.239
go all night like Jackson one who's
good about keeping us like on the rails.

3433
03:57:39.440 --> 03:57:43.879
But the other thing is is is
we just like we want you back

3434
03:57:43.879 --> 03:57:46.000
and want to hear Yeah, we
can do it against all of this.

3435
03:57:46.040 --> 03:57:50.040
Well, the crazy shit we haven't
got to you know. It's just that's

3436
03:57:50.079 --> 03:57:52.559
why I've been trying to get to
crazy shit for like four hours. Well

3437
03:57:52.559 --> 03:57:54.719
this is the start of the crazy. But it's all been good though.

3438
03:57:54.760 --> 03:57:58.840
It's okay. The crazy shit we
haven't got to you yet. Is I

3439
03:57:58.879 --> 03:58:03.520
moved to Asia after Somalia because I
needed a war that I could survive.

3440
03:58:05.079 --> 03:58:09.239
Was just madness? Just shut up? Have you back next time and we'll

3441
03:58:09.239 --> 03:58:13.200
talk about that. We'll talk about
South East Team or was madness? I

3442
03:58:13.280 --> 03:58:22.639
was called key to Belong Keita Belong
is number one ghost because I was the

3443
03:58:22.719 --> 03:58:28.440
number one ghost. I was number
one ghost man Casper but not so friendly,

3444
03:58:28.520 --> 03:58:33.520
right, I was not friendly?
Jackson? Thank you so much.

3445
03:58:35.479 --> 03:58:39.559
How much A Black and White was
based on your overseas hr keats. Did

3446
03:58:39.600 --> 03:58:43.559
you prefer domestic opts or renditions?
And why Also, we need another Waller

3447
03:58:43.600 --> 03:58:46.200
novel. That's a really nice guy. I don't know who he is,

3448
03:58:46.239 --> 03:58:50.120
but I mean anybody even knows.
First of all, Waller is a real

3449
03:58:50.159 --> 03:58:52.159
guy. He was an NSA guy, great guy, a great friend,

3450
03:58:52.200 --> 03:58:56.680
and that's why I used his name. But they were one percent, uh,

3451
03:58:56.440 --> 03:59:00.639
I shouldn't say one hundred sent They
were very literally really based on my

3452
03:59:00.639 --> 03:59:03.760
life. Harold Janine Uncle Harold that
I grew up with was the industrialist,

3453
03:59:03.879 --> 03:59:11.000
the kind of the protagonist guy that
was based on his life. And Black

3454
03:59:11.120 --> 03:59:16.319
was stories that I couldn't tell when
culture, why do you think? Why

3455
03:59:16.319 --> 03:59:22.760
do you think like you didn't get
the tap on black and white but you

3456
03:59:22.799 --> 03:59:24.440
did on your fourth book. No, I got it on white. Oh

3457
03:59:24.440 --> 03:59:28.360
you got it. I didn't get
a tap on black because it was you

3458
03:59:28.399 --> 03:59:31.440
know, it's not a big problem. I stepped on some dicks of white.

3459
03:59:33.399 --> 03:59:37.920
Jackson, thanks again. What was
the hardest part of selection? And

3460
03:59:37.920 --> 03:59:43.200
an ots n ots is a new
operated training school. I don't think there

3461
03:59:43.239 --> 03:59:48.799
was anything hard hard about them.
It was I've never been really good at

3462
03:59:48.799 --> 03:59:54.879
anything athletic except violence. I mean, I'm I was like a C lacrosse

3463
03:59:54.920 --> 03:59:58.280
player and a C football player.
And a C. I was never really

3464
03:59:58.280 --> 04:00:01.479
get anything. I just had endurance. You know, you guys know Q

3465
04:00:01.719 --> 04:00:05.200
course or the long walk. It
doesn't matter what you go through, it's

3466
04:00:05.280 --> 04:00:16.079
endurance if you just can shut off
pain. Yeah, that's it, Jackson.

3467
04:00:16.120 --> 04:00:18.879
Thanks again, we have some part
of yours outside. It sounds like,

3468
04:00:18.840 --> 04:00:22.920
as an early plank owner of the
team, what has impressed you most

3469
04:00:22.000 --> 04:00:26.879
about the team today and the direction
they have taken since you left. I

3470
04:00:26.879 --> 04:00:31.280
could not make HRT today. They
would hand me my fucking bus ticket in

3471
04:00:31.280 --> 04:00:35.399
a banana sandwich and say, what
you know, leave me alone there there.

3472
04:00:35.719 --> 04:00:39.959
They've evolved in ways that are remarkable
on so many levels. I almost

3473
04:00:39.959 --> 04:00:43.680
feel embarrassed that I, you know, I get to meet you guys because

3474
04:00:43.719 --> 04:00:46.799
I was on HRT. But I'm
just you know, there's so much better.

3475
04:00:46.959 --> 04:00:52.239
But I think that's true of of
I think anybody that was part of

3476
04:00:52.239 --> 04:00:56.680
any force prior to the GWAK,
you know, and looking back, because

3477
04:00:56.079 --> 04:01:03.040
the training technology has changed, you
know, just technology has changed, knowledge

3478
04:01:03.079 --> 04:01:05.079
has changed. I mean all of
these units are doing things. Yeah,

3479
04:01:05.479 --> 04:01:11.000
I mean Jack's ranger of Italian experience
and who the rangers were then was way

3480
04:01:11.319 --> 04:01:16.440
different and way better than what it
was not. The Rangers weren't great when

3481
04:01:16.440 --> 04:01:18.520
I was there, but they didn't
have that Giott experience. So I think

3482
04:01:18.559 --> 04:01:22.319
that's different than it is today.
I think that's true of anywhere you look

3483
04:01:22.360 --> 04:01:24.840
well. Have enormous respect for these
guys. And I just hate this,

3484
04:01:24.000 --> 04:01:26.799
you know, I don't I don't
want to step on there. You know

3485
04:01:26.840 --> 04:01:31.639
whatever, Marco, thank you very
much. Have you ever worked with Army

3486
04:01:31.719 --> 04:01:35.159
CID and if so, what was
your honest opinion of the agents? I

3487
04:01:35.200 --> 04:01:39.639
love CID and I'll tell you Randy
Mullins and Willy rawl I worked at Fort

3488
04:01:39.680 --> 04:01:41.520
Leonard Wooden, Missouri with those two
guys. They were both wore on officers.

3489
04:01:41.520 --> 04:01:48.159
Willy Rowl ran the entire operation and
I they had shitty suits. They

3490
04:01:48.200 --> 04:01:54.799
were Polyesta suits like ninety nine dollars. And Randy Mullins, I love the

3491
04:01:54.840 --> 04:02:00.360
guy. Randy Mullins had a car
like his main personally owned vehicle, and

3492
04:02:00.360 --> 04:02:03.520
he had a bumper sticker that said, this is not an abandoned car,

3493
04:02:03.559 --> 04:02:07.239
please don't tell it was in forty
seven coats of bondo. They made no

3494
04:02:07.399 --> 04:02:13.319
money and they were true patriots.
I love those guys, so I loved

3495
04:02:13.680 --> 04:02:18.639
my experience with cid IS as some
of the greatest people that I've ever worked

3496
04:02:18.680 --> 04:02:24.479
with, dedicated, capable and great
guys. Uh, Lewis asked us,

3497
04:02:24.479 --> 04:02:28.239
thank you very much. What lessons
do you learn an HRT UH that the

3498
04:02:28.319 --> 04:02:39.319
general public could benefit from knowing?
Oh my god, great question. The

3499
04:02:39.399 --> 04:02:43.159
short answers, I don't know.
I don't know that I have a huge

3500
04:02:43.319 --> 04:02:46.040
that I have a great opinion of
the general public. To be honest with

3501
04:02:46.159 --> 04:02:50.319
him, I mean, I'm not
really a humanist and I and I've lived

3502
04:02:50.319 --> 04:03:00.680
a really fucking weird life. And
HRT Delta, Marco, Seal Teams,

3503
04:03:01.319 --> 04:03:05.079
Rangers, special Operations, the Marshals, the Bore Attack. I mean,

3504
04:03:05.319 --> 04:03:07.440
I could talk for hours and hours
about all the great people I've met working

3505
04:03:07.440 --> 04:03:13.840
for different organizations that have devoted themselves
to a greater good. I don't see

3506
04:03:13.879 --> 04:03:18.120
that in general, you know,
in general population, I think you try

3507
04:03:18.200 --> 04:03:22.559
hard, you do the best you
can to be a good human being,

3508
04:03:22.239 --> 04:03:28.559
and uh and you hope it works
in my opinion, cat Chaser, thank

3509
04:03:28.600 --> 04:03:33.840
you very much for the cat sticker
RS. Thank you very much. Thank

3510
04:03:33.879 --> 04:03:39.479
you for mentioning John O'Neill thought provoking
conversation. John O'Neill is an American hero,

3511
04:03:39.280 --> 04:03:43.719
gave his life to gave it his
life to the fight on al Qaeda,

3512
04:03:43.959 --> 04:03:46.840
and it's just bizarrely ironic that they
killed him. Yeah, I mean

3513
04:03:48.239 --> 04:03:52.959
it's crazy. He fought his entire
life against al Qada and he died in

3514
04:03:52.520 --> 04:03:56.680
the World Trade Center bombings. It's
crazy, Kay, Jam, thank you

3515
04:03:56.760 --> 04:04:01.000
so much, echoing the rust and
peace for John O'Neill, shout out,

3516
04:04:01.280 --> 04:04:07.719
thank you for the unique kend or
Chris, And there's an asterisk on unique.

3517
04:04:07.719 --> 04:04:11.719
I don't know if there's something I
gotta say to anybody that's still hanging

3518
04:04:11.760 --> 04:04:13.879
on here. I apologize for the
rambling. I mean, I've got sorry.

3519
04:04:15.360 --> 04:04:20.520
The problem with my life is it's
it's so widely unwieldy and and it's

3520
04:04:20.600 --> 04:04:26.200
hard picking a couple of things to
talk. Chris again, just you and

3521
04:04:26.239 --> 04:04:30.120
me here. I'm a rambler too, so I'm right there with you.

3522
04:04:30.120 --> 04:04:33.200
You don't have to apologize for a
thing. There's so many fucking stories that

3523
04:04:33.600 --> 04:04:35.040
I don't know how to get there. We'll do it again next time,

3524
04:04:35.120 --> 04:04:39.479
and we we'll hit up all the
other sidebars. Okay, damn, thank

3525
04:04:39.520 --> 04:04:41.079
you so much. It can be
another three and a half hour show like

3526
04:04:41.159 --> 04:04:46.120
I'm down come back to discuss the
topic of propaganda. Pre uh pre whiskeyed

3527
04:04:46.479 --> 04:04:50.079
in the meantime, about to send
Jack and David minimum fifty questions I have

3528
04:04:50.239 --> 04:04:56.559
for you on the topic. Uh
slant like the is that's that's the hours

3529
04:04:56.639 --> 04:05:01.719
true right Slante st Yeah. Thanks
Mohammed Sabanni. Just for the record,

3530
04:05:01.719 --> 04:05:07.520
whoever wrote that half Irish got the
shamrock on my sleeve Mohammed uh Sabanni,

3531
04:05:07.799 --> 04:05:11.799
thank you very much. Thank you
for the sticker. I think we got

3532
04:05:11.840 --> 04:05:15.040
a couple more after that. Thank
you for the sticker. So one of

3533
04:05:15.079 --> 04:05:18.840
the things people can do instead of
making comment is they just put a sticker,

3534
04:05:18.000 --> 04:05:24.399
which is like a little like I'll
show you right here. It's just

3535
04:05:24.479 --> 04:05:28.760
that it's just somebody like donating without
really having a comment, but just like

3536
04:05:28.840 --> 04:05:33.479
being generated. Very generous for us, helping us like buy booze and pay

3537
04:05:33.520 --> 04:05:45.479
the rent. Uh. I want
to get this right, do daf fuck

3538
04:05:45.559 --> 04:05:50.520
down anyway? Thank you very much, teamhouse killing as usual. Thanks Fellas

3539
04:05:50.639 --> 04:05:54.280
dog Point, Thank you. What
do you think made you attract to a

3540
04:05:54.319 --> 04:05:58.520
life adventure? Were you looking for
inspiration for writing at first or was it

3541
04:05:58.600 --> 04:06:03.079
something more personal? Great? Great, great, friging question. It was

3542
04:06:03.280 --> 04:06:07.000
personal looking for a life adventure.
I was two things. One, I

3543
04:06:07.479 --> 04:06:13.520
wanted to be Hemmingway by A.
Curtz going up the heart of darkness.

3544
04:06:13.559 --> 04:06:18.280
Ye, so you know, as
a writer, those things are important to

3545
04:06:18.319 --> 04:06:20.319
me. And I just happened to
be born into a place where there's nothing

3546
04:06:20.319 --> 04:06:22.879
else to do. I mean,
from the time I was a little tiny

3547
04:06:22.959 --> 04:06:26.040
kid. I mean it's like five
years old. I would go in away

3548
04:06:26.120 --> 04:06:28.399
in the morning, and I would
come back if I was hungry. So

3549
04:06:28.440 --> 04:06:33.319
I lived my entire life in the
mountains. I mean, did you were

3550
04:06:33.639 --> 04:06:39.440
when you were doing that? Were
you were you there as an outdoorsman,

3551
04:06:39.680 --> 04:06:46.399
sort of a naturalist enjoying what you
were or were there fantasies around what you

3552
04:06:46.440 --> 04:06:52.079
were doing? Both? Great question. Both. I had my mind tends.

3553
04:06:52.319 --> 04:06:56.159
I'm a romanticist to a certain extent. I wanted to be uh.

3554
04:06:58.399 --> 04:07:01.239
I literally wanted to be a under
Stemon Way. I mean he lived a

3555
04:07:01.319 --> 04:07:07.159
life of extraordinary adventure other than smoking
a shotgun in Cortlin, Idaho, July

3556
04:07:07.239 --> 04:07:09.479
third, nine sixty two. Other
than that, I kind of dug his

3557
04:07:09.520 --> 04:07:13.799
whole thing. I had shitty taste
in women, you know, But like

3558
04:07:13.840 --> 04:07:18.040
when I was my junior in high
school. I drove from from Hannover to

3559
04:07:18.079 --> 04:07:24.639
Hampshire to Key West, Florida to
drink in a titty bar across the street

3560
04:07:26.040 --> 04:07:28.799
from where he wrote The Snows of
Killamancharo. Right, I mean, I

3561
04:07:28.840 --> 04:07:33.479
mean, who does that when you're
fucking seventeen years old? Yeah? I

3562
04:07:33.559 --> 04:07:35.520
was into it. I was way
into it. I wanted the life of

3563
04:07:35.559 --> 04:07:39.399
adventure. I wanted to go out
and break and heal at the broken places.

3564
04:07:39.600 --> 04:07:41.600
Yeah. I wanted to go home
and write it all back. It's

3565
04:07:41.639 --> 04:07:46.520
fantastic. It's it's interesting too,
because there was a whole generation, not

3566
04:07:46.559 --> 04:07:52.239
even a generation because obviously him like
I don't want to say necessarily Caroact,

3567
04:07:52.319 --> 04:07:56.959
but Andrew Thompson, but but Jack
Jack London. Yeah, like like there,

3568
04:07:56.239 --> 04:08:01.879
I guess it's worthy. Yeah.
They they saw the world. They

3569
04:08:01.920 --> 04:08:05.639
saw the world. It's it's hard
to see the world that way anymore.

3570
04:08:05.799 --> 04:08:09.360
Yeah. People were people forget now, you know. I've told a lot

3571
04:08:09.360 --> 04:08:13.040
of stories about things. They were
before the internet. They were before cell

3572
04:08:13.040 --> 04:08:18.360
phones the way we see him now. When I first went to Morocco in

3573
04:08:18.600 --> 04:08:24.920
nineteen eighty, it was dangerous,
right, and that was just Morocco.

3574
04:08:24.000 --> 04:08:26.959
I mean, now you go there
and you have dates and take a photo

3575
04:08:28.000 --> 04:08:31.360
tour of the rolling Stones and go
surfing. Right, I did go surfing

3576
04:08:31.399 --> 04:08:35.319
here. But but in those days
it was a very different world. There

3577
04:08:35.639 --> 04:08:46.040
there were no uh snapchat h shuffle
dance videos, you know, overlooking Mogadishu

3578
04:08:46.159 --> 04:08:52.479
Airport with a bunch of like gluten
free chefs who were you know what I'm

3579
04:08:52.479 --> 04:08:54.719
saying. We live in a different
world now. In those days, adventure

3580
04:08:54.760 --> 04:08:58.440
meant something right, because if you
fucked up, you were dead. Right.

3581
04:08:58.879 --> 04:09:01.520
Look look what I was gonna say, go back to Somalia real quick.

3582
04:09:01.799 --> 04:09:03.159
Two guys in my crew. One
guy had just really fucked up cut

3583
04:09:03.200 --> 04:09:07.399
on his hand and I was trying
to debride with a little bit of iodine.

3584
04:09:07.559 --> 04:09:11.440
The other guy maybe sixteen years old, seventeen years old, and he

3585
04:09:11.520 --> 04:09:15.559
was he was laughing at the guy
with a cut on his hand, and

3586
04:09:15.559 --> 04:09:18.040
I go, what are you laughing
at? I mean, you know,

3587
04:09:18.840 --> 04:09:22.520
through a translator, he pulls up
his leg he had Beatu pants on.

3588
04:09:22.959 --> 04:09:26.120
Pulls up his leg and he had
what looked like a rubber band around his

3589
04:09:26.200 --> 04:09:33.840
leg and bones like his fucking tib
fib bones to his boot, there was

3590
04:09:33.879 --> 04:09:39.639
no flesh. He got hit with
a grenade and the flesh died and atrophied,

3591
04:09:39.239 --> 04:09:41.719
and and they were going to cut
off his leg, and he said,

3592
04:09:41.760 --> 04:09:45.959
no, I'm leaving this life with
this leg one way or another.

3593
04:09:46.239 --> 04:09:52.600
So somehow, because the world is
weird, somehow his leg had healed around

3594
04:09:52.639 --> 04:09:56.479
the bone and he was walking around
on two fucking bones like a pig.

3595
04:09:56.239 --> 04:10:00.520
So anyway, the point of the
story is, you know, a lot

3596
04:10:00.520 --> 04:10:03.360
of the stuff that I did in
my life, there was no there was

3597
04:10:03.399 --> 04:10:05.479
no backstop. You know, it
was just it was simple. It was

3598
04:10:05.520 --> 04:10:09.360
analog. It was not a digital
world. Do you do you think that

3599
04:10:09.639 --> 04:10:13.079
like, I mean, obviously we
still have space, we still have the

3600
04:10:13.079 --> 04:10:16.200
ocean, But do you feel like, especially with the Internet and with like

3601
04:10:16.280 --> 04:10:20.239
Wikipedia, like you know, if
you've never been to the you know,

3602
04:10:20.280 --> 04:10:22.959
to the Nile or to the Amazon
or whatever, like you can just kind

3603
04:10:22.959 --> 04:10:26.079
of look at all up, you
know, see travel videos on YouTube or

3604
04:10:26.120 --> 04:10:28.000
whatever, do you feel like it's
removed some of the mystery and some of

3605
04:10:28.000 --> 04:10:31.719
the towns in life. Percent Look, you know, I we haven't got

3606
04:10:31.719 --> 04:10:35.920
to this point yet, but I've
I've been to I don't know what the

3607
04:10:35.000 --> 04:10:39.959
numbers, but I'm guessing it's like
eighty countries every continent except Antarctica. And

3608
04:10:41.399 --> 04:10:43.479
I've been a lot of places.
But you go to the you go to

3609
04:10:43.520 --> 04:10:48.719
the Istanbul airport, there's two,
not one. There's two fucking Krispy Kreme

3610
04:10:48.760 --> 04:10:54.639
donut shops in the Istanbul airport,
right, I mean Istanbul is the like

3611
04:10:54.680 --> 04:10:58.799
the center of the Silk Road.
It's like the center of commerce for the

3612
04:10:58.840 --> 04:11:03.079
world. And it's two. I
mean, maybe it's right that there's two

3613
04:11:03.159 --> 04:11:07.159
Krispy Kreme donuts. I'm just saying
that they that world's gone right, it's

3614
04:11:07.319 --> 04:11:11.920
right. The world of discovery and
exploration, it's hard, man. You

3615
04:11:11.000 --> 04:11:20.120
gotta go deep in the ocean or
far into outer space. Yeah, uh,

3616
04:11:20.319 --> 04:11:24.479
Mohammed's SAPANI thank you very much.
Someone's coming to take that ghost title

3617
04:11:24.559 --> 04:11:28.520
one day, you Patriot drinks on
me when I see you, gentlemen cheers.

3618
04:11:28.040 --> 04:11:33.239
As a young businessman, how should
I best fun and shape new politicians

3619
04:11:33.719 --> 04:11:41.520
and crush the socialist left? Jesus. My daughter Chelsea, who I love

3620
04:11:41.600 --> 04:11:45.639
dearly, said Dad, No matter
what, don't mention these fucking things.

3621
04:11:45.920 --> 04:11:50.520
Right. One of them was politics. I'm not gonna say and that's fair,

3622
04:11:50.559 --> 04:11:54.280
and we we generally like we try
to avoid that on our show.

3623
04:11:54.479 --> 04:12:01.479
But let's say it's not the socialist
last or the the capitalists. Right.

3624
04:12:01.000 --> 04:12:07.440
Let's say, as a young business
person, how would somebody going up go

3625
04:12:07.520 --> 04:12:11.760
about buying politicians? Well, you
buy them. You know, it's just

3626
04:12:11.799 --> 04:12:16.559
a campaign contribution. That's pretty simple. Yeah. I mean, you know,

3627
04:12:16.000 --> 04:12:20.680
I've got a great buddy in Hartford, Connecticut, and I'm I love

3628
04:12:20.719 --> 04:12:24.840
this guy. And he paid a
little here, and he paid a little

3629
04:12:24.879 --> 04:12:26.840
there and found out he shouldn't have. You know, he did it honestly,

3630
04:12:28.479 --> 04:12:31.920
he did it righteously. It's hard, man, it's really fregetting hard

3631
04:12:31.920 --> 04:12:39.079
getting all the rules right. So
great question. I love the entrepreneurial spirit.

3632
04:12:39.879 --> 04:12:43.799
I don't know. I don't know
how you buy them. Our our

3633
04:12:43.879 --> 04:12:50.079
audience outside love, they love you. I've kept you here is so freaking

3634
04:12:50.200 --> 04:12:52.840
late. Nobody loves me. I
think it's we got to wrap it up

3635
04:12:52.879 --> 04:12:56.639
for you, poor guys. I
think it's just a way of wait.

3636
04:12:56.879 --> 04:13:01.159
One last question ye hey, do
you have you checked patron? He's asleep?

3637
04:13:01.239 --> 04:13:07.280
Yeas one last questionnaire? Uh,
Gene, Kylie, thank you very

3638
04:13:07.319 --> 04:13:11.319
much. Will the current focus on
white nationalism leads to results similar to those

3639
04:13:11.360 --> 04:13:16.840
in the nineteen nineties. Great another, I mean, some really brilliant questions,

3640
04:13:16.840 --> 04:13:18.239
and it's really cool to know that
your audience, we have the smartest,

3641
04:13:20.239 --> 04:13:24.040
the incredibly smart people. Right.
My position is this that I think

3642
04:13:24.079 --> 04:13:28.959
that the white nationalist you know,
I didn't make up that phrase, but

3643
04:13:30.040 --> 04:13:33.719
that phrase, in what it common
means, commonly means in the nineteen nineties,

3644
04:13:33.040 --> 04:13:37.719
had a basis in the Turner Diaries, and it had a basis in

3645
04:13:37.760 --> 04:13:43.440
the Zionist occupational government. It had
a certain legitimacy, and somebody has come

3646
04:13:43.559 --> 04:13:48.399
up with a way to re manufacture
that. I don't think because you vote

3647
04:13:48.399 --> 04:13:52.920
for Trump and this is not politics, that you are automatically a white anything,

3648
04:13:52.120 --> 04:13:56.040
right, Right, I mean I
watch YouTube and I watch black people

3649
04:13:56.079 --> 04:14:00.000
and brown people, and red people
and yellow people and various colors. Would

3650
04:14:00.120 --> 04:14:03.120
or else that like Biden and like
Trump, that the world is changing and

3651
04:14:03.200 --> 04:14:07.319
it's not just because you're a person
of a particular color you have a particular

3652
04:14:07.360 --> 04:14:13.159
affiliation. It's not that way anymore. So saying okay, I'll lend on

3653
04:14:13.239 --> 04:14:16.319
this. My mother is a piece
of work, all right. My mother

3654
04:14:16.399 --> 04:14:20.719
is a piece of work. My
mother called me up one day and she

3655
04:14:20.840 --> 04:14:24.239
said she was in a rant about
something. She is way left, she's

3656
04:14:24.319 --> 04:14:28.000
on a rant something. And she
said, she said, all those racist

3657
04:14:28.600 --> 04:14:35.559
gun carrying military people. And I
said, whoa, whoa, whoa,

3658
04:14:35.559 --> 04:14:39.319
whoa, who wo Mom, what
the fuck are you talking about? What

3659
04:14:39.520 --> 04:14:45.040
about a military person would be anything. I mean, I know military people

3660
04:14:45.040 --> 04:14:46.559
that are left, right and in
between. It's not a political issue.

3661
04:14:46.600 --> 04:14:50.200
You join the military because you're a
hero, because you believe in the greater

3662
04:14:50.280 --> 04:14:54.200
good of humanity, in my opinion. And I said, what are you

3663
04:14:54.200 --> 04:14:54.799
talking about? And she said,
well, you know, it's all the

3664
04:14:54.840 --> 04:14:58.799
same thing, these right wingers.
If they like guns, they hate this

3665
04:15:00.159 --> 04:15:03.079
right and I and I thought to
myself, oh my god, I've known

3666
04:15:03.079 --> 04:15:07.520
this woman all my life. There's
some really sideways thinking out there. So

3667
04:15:07.959 --> 04:15:13.639
anyway, I don't think white nationalism
these days is anything. I think it

3668
04:15:13.760 --> 04:15:18.920
is a they're usurping a term that
meant something thirty years ago. Yeah,

3669
04:15:18.920 --> 04:15:22.799
well, there's something to distinguish between
nationalism and white nationalisms. Exactly. What

3670
04:15:22.959 --> 04:15:28.000
is the nationalist? Because you love
you a country, because you believe in

3671
04:15:28.120 --> 04:15:31.040
what makes this a great place to
live. Right, I've been a lot

3672
04:15:31.079 --> 04:15:35.520
of places. I've been to,
some good places and some shitty places.

3673
04:15:35.799 --> 04:15:39.360
I don't know of a place that
I wish I lived other than the United

3674
04:15:39.360 --> 04:15:50.120
States, right right, we have
a remarkable constitution that guarantees freedoms that we

3675
04:15:50.159 --> 04:15:54.799
should be proud of and enjoy,
in my opinion, and protect, and

3676
04:15:54.840 --> 04:16:00.360
a lot of people die to protect
those rights. Right now, I'm right

3677
04:16:00.399 --> 04:16:03.559
there with him. I mean,
obviously we're not perfect, because the country

3678
04:16:03.639 --> 04:16:08.079
is just humans, and humans are
never perfect, but the Constitution ensures that

3679
04:16:10.200 --> 04:16:15.120
we're as close to that as we
can be. I wish i'd did that.

3680
04:16:15.559 --> 04:16:26.239
I agree. Check if you knew
John O'Neill, Alice Huffon, but

3681
04:16:26.239 --> 04:16:30.959
you pretty much. O gotta say
thank you for asking that question. When

3682
04:16:30.000 --> 04:16:33.639
I go down on the list of
people I've known in my life the benefited

3683
04:16:33.639 --> 04:16:38.639
America who were heroes and do it
who did extraordinary thing, Alice Font would

3684
04:16:38.639 --> 04:16:44.639
be at the top of the list. Alison I met in Yemen, who

3685
04:16:44.680 --> 04:16:49.559
was a junior FBI agent who was
working his way up, and he is

3686
04:16:51.120 --> 04:16:56.559
one incredible guy. If you could
get Alice Font on this show, it

3687
04:16:56.600 --> 04:17:00.879
would be remarkable. For are you
still in touch with him? Help us?

3688
04:17:00.040 --> 04:17:03.799
I'm not because he left the FBI, he went to the New York

3689
04:17:03.280 --> 04:17:08.159
he worked for some aspects of the
NYPD and there he built a terrorism aspect

3690
04:17:08.159 --> 04:17:17.799
within uh in New York. But
I mean Alice Safon is is he's a

3691
04:17:17.840 --> 04:17:22.040
hero. It's easy to bandon that
round. Like anybody serves in the military

3692
04:17:22.079 --> 04:17:26.600
as a hero, maybe Alice Safon's
hero. I mean he almost you know,

3693
04:17:26.639 --> 04:17:34.120
he lived or died to protect Americans, and and he came from you

3694
04:17:34.159 --> 04:17:37.840
know, a different route than a
lot of people would. So anyway,

3695
04:17:37.879 --> 04:17:41.639
all this spot was an FBI agent
who worked counter terrorism, and he worked

3696
04:17:41.680 --> 04:17:48.719
ebl and he was who worked with
John O'Neill. And that is it.

3697
04:17:48.040 --> 04:17:56.280
And all right, well we killed
something. We will we will, We'll

3698
04:17:56.280 --> 04:18:00.360
do it again. Name we can
do it quick right now if if you

3699
04:18:00.399 --> 04:18:03.959
know, Jack can go home and
and uh, Chris and I'll sit here

3700
04:18:04.440 --> 04:18:11.040
d drink and talk. We get
drunk all night. No, No,

3701
04:18:11.079 --> 04:18:14.200
I mean we should do it a
second episode at some point. But I

3702
04:18:14.200 --> 04:18:15.639
mean, this was this is a
good time. Man. I'm glad that

3703
04:18:15.639 --> 04:18:21.079
we have also wide ranging conversations.
I will say, the really great stuff

3704
04:18:21.079 --> 04:18:25.520
we haven't got to yet. Seven
years in Asia in Indonesia and where it

3705
04:18:25.559 --> 04:18:26.959
goes after that. We'll do it
next time, We do it next time.

3706
04:18:27.000 --> 04:18:36.040
Yeah, all right, guys.
So also, uh we have cold

3707
04:18:36.159 --> 04:18:38.280
zero No no, no, those
are ancient. I don't want to matter.

3708
04:18:38.440 --> 04:18:42.319
It doesn't matter. I get zero
out of those books. I don't

3709
04:18:42.319 --> 04:18:47.280
make any money, no nothing.
I just you know, in the publishing

3710
04:18:47.319 --> 04:18:48.879
industry, they say, if you
out earn your advance, you didn't get

3711
04:18:48.920 --> 04:18:52.920
a big enough advance. Right,
So yeah, I read. I read

3712
04:18:52.000 --> 04:18:55.959
these two. I read both.
I brought those books for you guys.

3713
04:18:56.159 --> 04:18:59.239
Put on your shelf, score your
literary guys. And because it tortures me

3714
04:18:59.360 --> 04:19:03.479
that I have to, you gotta
put that next to we'll put it right

3715
04:19:03.520 --> 04:19:07.360
next to know heroes. But anyway, if you guys want to know more

3716
04:19:07.360 --> 04:19:11.719
about Chris, if you you know, I want to see, yeah,

3717
04:19:11.760 --> 04:19:15.040
the old Chris a book that Yeah, I mean, there's a Chris of

3718
04:19:15.120 --> 04:19:18.559
his time. But there's another one
coming now. The new one is Crazy,

3719
04:19:19.000 --> 04:19:22.799
the book that's coming out now.
I just finished it. I submitted

3720
04:19:22.840 --> 04:19:26.680
it to Random House. It's called
Anonymous Mail, and it is very specific

3721
04:19:26.760 --> 04:19:30.000
details about the stories, some of
the stories I've told and the stories that

3722
04:19:30.040 --> 04:19:33.319
I have not told Yet it's about
what happens to a person in our world

3723
04:19:33.719 --> 04:19:37.920
that falls too deeply into it,
the anonymous male aspect of it, and

3724
04:19:38.440 --> 04:19:41.079
and and how you come back out
of it, because you know, I

3725
04:19:41.200 --> 04:19:45.879
went through what everybody does, the
suicide and you know, all of those

3726
04:19:45.920 --> 04:19:52.000
things. I feel like I have
some perspectives on that. But the new

3727
04:19:52.040 --> 04:19:53.879
book is about that probably six months
all right, we'll talk about that.

3728
04:19:55.040 --> 04:19:59.639
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, But
honestly, Uh, if you want to

3729
04:20:00.040 --> 04:20:07.280
read a book uh that gets somebody
canceled by the US government, that got

3730
04:20:07.360 --> 04:20:11.200
me canceled by the US government,
read White. And if you want to

3731
04:20:11.399 --> 04:20:17.319
understand why, better read Black.
And if you want to know what type

3732
04:20:17.360 --> 04:20:22.760
of person writes a book like books
like these, read Cold Zero and they're

3733
04:20:22.760 --> 04:20:30.280
all antiques like me. All right, guys, Uh, thank you,

3734
04:20:30.680 --> 04:20:33.639
thank you everyone for joining us.
Man. Well, well we'll do this

3735
04:20:33.760 --> 04:20:37.280
again with Chris and we'll see all
of you guys again next Friday. So

3736
04:20:37.479 --> 04:20:41.760
thank you for joining us. Thank
you for something shorter, maybe