Title: S1E1 What Makes THIS Spy Tick
Show: John Kiriakou's Dead Drop
Date: 2025-10-10
URL: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/68e695c6d798804c9e4bbd13/e/68e86481658c65a3e9ac13f8/media.mp3
Duration: 1:03:22

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[01:04] He doesn't have a great poker face. I Would like to play cards with Bruno Fernandez You can listen to the Guardian football weekly wherever you get your podcasts. Hopefully see you soon a cast helps creators launch grow and monetize their podcast everywhere a cast calm This podcast it's a cast in touchstone production. I'm John Curio

[01:46] And I want to welcome you to a brand new podcast Dead drop as it's subtitle says is going to be about what makes a spy or spies in general tick The first spy we're going to talk about is well, it's me What makes this spy tick? Like a lot of podcasters I make several different podcasts That's one of the great things about podcasting one can do multiple podcasts that speak to different audiences And I talk about this subject spying in my other podcasts

[02:18] But the way we're going to handle the subject in this podcast It's along the same lines of describing or should I say telling the story of how this spy ticks? For the record, I'd call myself a former spy, but no one who ever spied for a living is ever truly a former spy I don't mean that I subscribe to that false and infuriating slogan Once CIA always CIA I really really hate that because it's intellectually lazy and it's simply not true

[02:50] What I mean is you never lose the tradecraft skills that the CIA teaches you you always look for surveillance You always question whether you're being developed by a foreign intelligence officer You always wonder whether the FBI is looking at you for whatever reason Most importantly this podcast is going to tell you how I tick as a human being That's always been a core element of spying the human element Though popular culture might imagine spies lurking silently in the shadows wearing trench coats

[03:20] A good spy is actually a people person The more they can relate to people and get people to relate to them The more people they'll be able to spy on or recruit as spies in essence As I think you'll come to appreciate from listening to or watching this podcast Spies and storytellers have a lot in common Probably more than you realized so let's get started Looking back at my family's story and how it produced me Maybe it's not that shocking that spying and I found each other

[03:51] Tap a vein in my family and you're just as likely to get an interesting story as you are to get blood All four of my grandparents came from the island of Rhodes, which is a very important part of modern Greece but for 450 years was under the Turkish Ottoman yoke We were the slaves of the Turks starting in 1456 and not liberated until 1917 in 1917 when the Ottomans pulled out the Italians moved in and we were an Italian colony

[04:28] Rhodes didn't join Greece formally until 1947 and So when I went through the process of trying to get my own Greek citizenship it was tough because the Turks didn't allow us to keep records and then the Italians kept such good records that When I went to the Greek Embassy to apply they told me I had a stronger case for Italian citizenship My grandparents when they immigrated to the United States my father's parents in 1931 my mother's parents in 1934

[04:58] They came on Italian passports, which I still have Told at the Greek consul. I'm not Italian None of us are ethnically Italian were all Greeks and I happen to be the keeper of the family Genealogy, I'm the only one who's ever been interested in it And so I had hundreds and hundreds of documents that my grandmother gave me and in those documents We found two that were important one was a receipt for

[05:30] for a hundred olive trees that my grandfather bought in 1930 indicating that He owned land in Rhodes and he intended to remain Why would you plant olive trees that are gonna live for 500 years if you don't intend to remain? The second was a document that the Italian army gave my grandmother Giving her permission to teach Italian soldiers how to speak Greek and the Greeks Said good enough your Greek and so I got my Greek citizenship and citizenship for all five of my children

[06:08] But it goes back farther than that I did 23 and me like so many Americans did about 10 years ago In 23 and me as in ancestry They tell you that you have DNA relatives is what they call it So I'm going through the DNA relatives and who do I see but the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Pittsburgh I send him a message through 23 and me and I said your eminence

[06:39] It says in 23 and me that you and I are related fourth cousins It said do you have any idea how we could be related? He must have been on 23 and me when I sent him the email. He responded Immediately and he said I don't know but if it helps I'm from the island of Gios, but my family originally came from the island of Patmos and I said ah My family's from the island of Rhodes But my grandmother said that on my grandfather's side

[07:10] We came from the island of Patmos and he said well, let's try to figure this out My last name is not really Kiriakur It's actually Christo Dulu which means servant of Christ Kiriakos means Charles Kiriakou means the son of Charles as it so happened My great great grandfather was arrested for stealing a potato He was starving and he stole a potato and he got caught and they took him to court and they said what is your name?

[07:41] He said Marcos mark Marcos what he said Marcos to Kiriakou mark the son of Charles And they wrote mark Kiriakou and he never fixed it. He was not literate which would explain it So our family name is actually Christo Dulu. I Said to the Archbishop our family name really is Christo Dulu and my grandmother used to tell me this story That we were descended from a very wealthy man who was very very religious and he owned a lot of land on

[08:13] The island of Patmos and he traded the land in the 17th century to the emperor in Constantinople and In exchange the emperor gave him the cave where st. John received the book of Revelation and he said wait a minute You're talking about st. Christodulos. I'm descended from St. Christodulos he said that would account for the name Christo Dulu the sons of Christodulos

[08:44] And I said, you know funny thing my wife is descended from Jesse James and she's been bragging about it I'd rather be descended from a saint I have pictures of most of my great grandparents and they're all wearing Turkish what are called vrakas Turkish vrakas that they were forced to wear by the Turkish occupation forces Their religion was not impacted for a couple of reasons First and foremost the Ottoman government was tolerant of non-Muslims so long as they paid their taxes

[09:15] You had to pay a tax to the Ottomans if you weren't Muslim, but still wanted to live in the Empire Though tolerant the Ottomans were harsh nonetheless on the Greeks under their rule. Lucky us Sure, you could remain Christian, but you were not permitted to speak Greek and you were not permitted to teach your children Greek Ironically, that's why the Greek Orthodox Church survived They forced us to teach our children Greek in caves or in stables

[09:45] Where the Turks weren't searching on my mother's side I come from a long line of Greek Orthodox priests are our name my mother's Mother's maiden name was Papa Demetrio. It means Demetrius the priest James the priest It's because we came from a long line of priests There was one my great great grandfather on my mother's mother's side who was a priest and I found his death record in The Greek Orthodox Church in our little village in southern Rhodes and it says that he was killed by a shark while he was sponge diving

[10:22] My grandmother said that's not true the Turks killed him and Threw his body into the sea and when it finally washed up sharks had taken bites out of it But she said he was murdered because he would not stop teaching children how to speak Greek. I Took genealogy very very seriously. I was also very close to my paternal grandparents my father's father Dropped out of school in third grade to work in the fields. He was one of 19 children

[10:58] My great grandfather couldn't keep his hands off my great grandmother 19 children and how do you feed 19 children when your slaves of the Turks? They worked the fields in the first decade or two of the 20th century the Greek economy was in a state of utter shambles We had just fought this absolutely disastrous war with the Kamalists Turks upon the fall of the Ottoman Empire two million Greeks were expelled from Turkey 150,000 Turks were expelled from Greece the Turks called it the great population transfer of 1920 the Greeks call it the catastrophe of

[11:34] 1920 there simply wasn't enough food There weren't enough jobs and the Greek government had an active policy of encouraging young men to just get out Go to America Canada Australia Britain just get out It was a threat get out or starve to death and so my grandfather left in 1920 he had two brothers living in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, so he went to Canonsburg This is a town about 20 miles south of Pittsburgh, and he went to work for US Steel as a slab cutter

[12:06] He did that for 10 years from 1920 to 1930 think about how that move From rural Greece. He told me once that he never saw an automobile Until he went to Piraeus the port of Athens to get on the SS semi-stoke lease to take this Month-long ship ride in steerage to the United States He had never seen an automobile before he lived on a farm on this

[12:38] Semi-tropical island with ancient ruins all over the place and all of a sudden he's in Pittsburgh in 1920 working in the steel mill And living with 10 Greek guys in this giant group house He did that for 10 years and he was able to save $20,000 which in today's Money is worth about 250,000 that he saved in 10 years the idea being that he had no intention of staying in America He was gonna go back to Greece and buy a farm

[13:41] Marrying his daughter my grandmother's father gave my grandfather a bed and two pillows copper pots and pans cow two goats and Two icons one of st. John the Baptist and one of the Virgin Mary Well, my grandfather Returned in 1930 to marry my grandmother part of the dowry. He got two plots of land one was worthless Why because it was beachfront and you can't plant crops beachfront

[14:11] My cousins own it now and it is a multi multi million dollar plot My dad and his sister sold it to cousins in 1991 and they got rich beyond their wildest dreams The other one was was a farm halfway up the mountain that overlooks the village my grandfather went back married my grandmother bought a hundred olive trees to plant on his land and then received a letter from his brother in Canonsburg saying the Congress is going to pass a new law

[14:42] Making it much harder to become an American citizen my grandfather got his citizenship in the 20s But he said if you want your wife to be American you need to come back right now He literally walked out of the field left his tools abandoned his trees collected my grandmother Took her to Athens Got her an American visa which is funny because when I worked in the American Embassy 80 years later They had a framed visa on the wall from 1930 1940 and I said oh I can beat you

[15:20] I have my grandmother's visa from 1930. They said are you kidding me? I gave them a copy. They framed it and put it in the consulate. So they got on a ship called the MN Saturnia Ironically, it was the ship that brought all four of my grandparents to America backwards and forwards. We collect memorabilia from the Saturnia I've got like a place setting. I have a menu It ended up becoming a troop transport ship during the Second World War and then it was scuttled off the coast of Taiwan in the 70s I have the whole history of the ship that brought them to America

[15:51] So they arrived in Canonsburg in February of 1931 My grandfather really wanted to be a farmer not a steelworker He opened a greengrocer and in 1933 Moved from Canonsburg to Feral, Pennsylvania where I was born or my father was born My aunt was born first in 1932 then my father was born interestingly enough on the kitchen table in Feral 1934 and then my grandfather went back to the mill and worked in the mill until 1964 opened up another grocery store in 64 and worked there in

[16:25] 69 or 70 but he and I were very close. I'm named after my grandfather. He's John Chris Kiriakou I'm John Chris Kiriakou, which is a Greek Orthodox tradition. I Remember sitting on his lap and just hearing the story of the world He would talk about the first trip to America the second trip to America. My grandfather was a fierce Republican not in the American political context, but he was a fierce Anti-royalist he did not believe in royalty Royal families interestingly enough my grandmother was a staunch royalist. There was a royal family that was imposed on Greece

[17:02] They were Danish they ended up being expelled I should add my father's side of the family were from two villages in the far north of the island of Rhodes So the capital is in the northern tip. It's called Rhodes City. It's been populated since 550 BC It's an old place There's a walled city that the crusaders built from which they launched the third and fourth crusades called Ipalia Polly the old city and there's a 30-foot wall around it very historic and very beautiful

[17:33] We're from the first two villages outside the wall city My mother's family is from the southern most inhabited point on the island. It's a village called Katavia There's literally nothing down there, but farms on her side of the family They were farmers and sponge divers and priests sponges were treasured back then because We hadn't yet figured out how to make synthetic sponges, right synthetic sponges are made out of chemicals and Science hadn't hadn't advanced that far. So everybody in the world needs a sponge

[18:08] Whether it's to clean yourself or your floor or your sink or whatever Most of these sponges at the time a lot of them come from the Philippines today But almost all the sponges a hundred years ago were from Greece and not just from Greece from the islands of Rhodes and Calimnos So my family was involved in sponge diving you'd go offshore A couple of hundred yards dive down you learn how to hold your breath for two minutes at a time like abalone divers It's the same thing you have to know how to cut them so that they regenerate and you don't decimate the population

[18:42] It's an animal it's a living thing you cut off the part that grows back Almost like a lizard's tail and then it just regenerates and grows again And then you sell them all over the world on my mother's mother's side of the family We had originated in Anatolia along the Black Sea. It's an area that today is called Trebzon the Turks During Ottoman times would massacre Greek populations just like they did with the Armenians and the Syrians and the Syriaks And anybody they didn't like we were from a very heavily Greek area along the Black Sea

[19:17] And we were able to escape that Turkish massacre and make our way to Rhodes Which at the time of course was also Turkish, but they at least weren't killing people there They went to the southernmost tip of the island because it was unpopulated and it wasn't worth the Turks Trouble to go all the way down there just to kill a handful of Greeks That's why you'll find villages at the very tops of mountains where it's too far from the sea to fish It's too high up and too rocky to farm. So why would you go up there? You go up there so the Turks don't kill you

[19:53] That's why you go up there And so they all became farmers my mother's father's side of the family were farmers Very large family another dozen or so kids, but the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 wiped out most of them That's when my grandfather decided this isn't for him He worked in order to save money to come to America. He married my grandmother in the village My grandmother was 14. My grandfather was 18. They got married. They got on the ship the immense attorney

[20:23] They ended up in Weirton, West Virginia where my grandfather worked in the mill And then they moved to war in Ohio where both my grandmother and grandfather worked in the mill My grandparents on my dad's side were wildly different from my grandparents on my mother's side On my dad's side there was nothing in life more important than education For two reasons number one because my grandfather didn't have one he could barely read and write But my grandmother my grandmother was different. This is my father's mother

[20:54] She was the oldest of four. It was girl girl girl boy But the boy my great-uncle George died when he was 17 from tuberculosis So there were just three girls in the family and my great-grandfather god bless him Wanted his daughters to succeed in life. So he insisted that all of them have a skill My grandmother being the oldest he sent her to school and she learned how to speak English Turkish and Italian In addition to greek, I have a picture of my grandmother

[21:27] teaching in the one and only school in roads in 1927 There's a picture of her with all these little kids. The building still exists I've been to it. I've taken a picture of it. So she was educated and was able to teach foreign languages Her sisters became dress makers Which was an important skill back then because clothes weren't made in bulk And then on my mom's side my grandmother and grandfather had nine children Eight of them lived to adulthood But education was never important

[22:00] Of the the eight that lived my mother was the only one that got an education and that was only at the insistence of my father Summertime and the living is easy. Am I right, John? That is one of the best parts of summer allen living really does feel easier You're about to travel good thing. You've got a couple of quince pieces going with you They are as relaxed and comfortable as I want to feel That's why whether i'm traveling or staying at home I reach for the same quince go anywhere pieces again and again quince focuses on well made essential

[22:33] They're the t-shirt I reach for first every time in all seriousness. I just bought another one today They're my favorite t-shirts too And when the ocean breeze kicks in at night as it does here in la a quince lightweight cotton sweater Is sublime and perfect for travel too, which these days has all kinds of new challenges that impact how you pack So versatility really matters. You got to pack smart like a spy That's why a pair of quince's 100 percent european linen pants and a couple of linen shirts are coming with me

[23:04] They're breathable and easy to throw on sometimes. I add a t-shirt underneath for a whole other look They're the summer upgrade anyone's rotation needs starting at just 34 dollars. That's not a typo No, it's not everything at quince is priced 50 to 80 less than similar brands They work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middleman So you're paying for exceptional quality not for brand markup ethical factories matter They matter to me and quince now has all kinds of other essentials beyond clothing essentials for travel home

[29:59] He went to my mother's father and said i'd like to get to know your daughter My mom used to say that her dad told her if you don't marry him, i'll kill you My dad's mother was not so happy about the arrangement She said my mother later related Which means my son has a mound of diplomas That family has nothing but she was greek. She was orthodox and she was from the same island So that wedding was a go my parents were married for 42 years when my dad died

[30:34] My parents were So deeply in love with each other. It was a model That i always aspired to and could never accomplish myself. They were the perfect match for each other I was born in charon pennsylvania. We lived in ferrell, but ferrell is such a small place ferrell had about 5 000 people at the time It didn't have a hospital. So i was born in charon pennsylvania Two years later we moved to newcastle pennsylvania and that's i consider newcastle to be my hometown because that's where i grew up

[31:08] From two to 18 newcastle had a good 40 000. It's down to about 20 or less than 20 Because look, you know western pennsylvania rust belt Yeah, nobody wants to live there, but it was a great place to grow up It really was i remember my parents taking us downtown at christmas time to go shopping and there were shops Now it's just there's a homeless shelter and some projects and that's it I remember the beginning of the end I was in junior high school and the youngstown sheet and tube closed

[31:40] And kids were crying in the hallway that day Because their dads had all been thrown out of work and by the end of the school year Half of them had moved gone to florida california Anywhere where there was industry And the town just died That was the end of it 1977 i was in eighth grade I was working later on for our congressman. It was the summer of 1982 The congressman asked me to go to j&l steel to pick up a campaign donation

[32:10] So i went to the office of the president of j&l steel and he was just sitting there in his office in blue jeans And i said working hard or hardly working right which is what adult said back then And he said We haven't had an order in two months I don't think we can keep this going I actually sat and talked with him that day about it and he said you know We're the only steel plant in the world that produces seamless steel Japanese steel when they make a tube Imagine a sewer pipe. It's riveted. They produce it as a flat piece of steel

[32:45] They put it on a spool. They make it round and then they rivet it closed He said let's say that costs a thousand dollars our tube is seamless. There is no riveting. It'll never go bad But there's as a thousand ours is five thousand Which one is the city gonna buy which is any city gonna buy the japanese put us out of business I remember at the county fair back then the county fair and farm show was a big deal when i was growing up They would always have like a Toyota that they bought for a hundred dollars from the junkyard and for a dollar a whack

[33:20] You could take a sledgehammer to it and there was a line. You could just bash this japanese car I remember one of my earliest memories was talking to my uncle sonny my mom's oldest brother It was 1972 and i said uncle sonny who you gonna vote for he said i'm gonna vote for wallace and i said wallace Why would you vote for wallace because he's like truman i said So he says truman taught the japsa thing or two and i was like wow i still remember that 1972 but that was the attitude in western pennsylvania and eastern ohio

[33:52] Anything japanese was bad and by god if you bought a japanese car somebody was gonna set it on fire As much as i enjoyed growing up in new cast of pennsylvania as much as i loved that my entire extended family was within 20 minutes drive I knew i had to get out. I knew there was no future for me there I begged my parents to move to the washington dc area I I moved to washington to go to college the week after i turned 18 and i never went back Before i leave home entirely in high school. I was a good student history and current events were my forte

[34:27] That's probably why i got into debating. I saw that i had a real facility for it But while it was important to be able to win and debate on the merits of my argument There was something even more fundamental that i liked about debating I once read a story about james madison who wrote a bill for the house of representatives to consider and then led the debate in opposition to his own bill And i said now that is a guy who can debate

[34:57] with equal fervor To be able to argue both sides of an issue. I said that's for me I always believed even when i was a kid That everybody's opinion is worthy of being listened to You may not like the opinion. You may think it's a stupid opinion, but it's worthy of discussion And i always felt that reasonable people can agree to disagree on an issue I have this group of best friends, right? Shout out to gary sanco, russ coletta, guy cabellus and david mcracken

[35:31] david unfortunately passed away When we were uh 48 years old Two of us were republicans two of us were democrats and one was an independent and none of it ever mattered Because we love each other We're all in each other's weddings. We're godfather to each other's kids and politics never ever mattered It wasn't until i went to college that i realized geez people take politics seriously So i decided that i i really wanted to understand both sides of these issues And so i joined the debate team

[36:02] And realized that i was actually best at this subgenre of debate called contemporaneous speaking improv That was actually harder than debate, but it it taught me how to give speech You walk into a room There are three judges at a table and they say your topic is whether or not to open a military base in the united arab emirates Go you have five minutes and man you best know about

[36:34] The conversation taking place between our two governments about opening a base in united arab emirates, and i'm talking about in 1980 But taught me to be quick on my feet To be well informed i read constantly constantly in fact when i joined the cia so many years later I was developing a very sensitive source And he was very highly placed where it was too dangerous to meet with him In the country where i had originally met him And so i got a cable from headquarters saying bring him to washington and we'll meet him in washington

[37:09] I put him up at the ritz carlton in tyson's corner virginia I went to headquarters picked up my boss and his deputy and another case officer We went to the ritz carlton and i introduced the source to the three But you don't want to just jump into business. You want to make chit chat small talk so The guy's like hey, I saw this uh Soccer match between team a and teams b the other day and i said oh my god I said did you see their striker? he made this kick and

[37:41] Of course only the source knew what i was talking about. He's like oh my god It was the greatest kick i've ever seen in my life And then he says i haven't been in america in 30 years I would love to see a broadway show. He said there's this show right now called whatever I had just read a review of the show in the washington post and i said oh Listen to this and i told him about the show And i said and while you're up there You may want to go to some obscure museum

[38:12] They have this wonderful show that just started and it's going to be open for only the next uh the next four weeks And then he said what about this sport you have here baseball? And i said well, you know, we're trying to get a team in washington. I'm a pittsburgh pirates fan But if you're up for it, i'm happy to drive you to baltimore. They've got this guy cal ripkin. He's setting a record Afterwards we finished our meeting. We went back to Headquarters and my boss says how the fuck are you able to speak authoritatively?

[38:43] On literally every issue that came out of that man's mouth I never really thought about it that way. I read a lot. I said a lot Another thing you should know about me is that i'm a polyglot. I have a facility with foreign languages The first time I went to saudi arabia My boss said to me listen, we need for you to go to saudi arabia for three months. We want you to do x y and z But you don't speak arabic. So you might struggle But i said now i have a facility for languages. I speak english. I speak greek

[39:15] I can pick up arabic. He goes you're not going to pick up arabic. There was no such thing as the internet back then So I live in arlington, virginia. There's a neighborhood in arlington called roslin There used to be the roslin school of languages I called them and I said how much just to teach me the arabic alphabet. They said oh $200 so I went for like three saturdays and I learned the arabic alphabet So when I finally got to saudi arabia, you know one of the things about the saudi's they only did this because they're assholes The minister of transportation was a member of the royal family

[39:48] He went to ucla graduated from ucla and when he went back to saudi arabia to become the minister of transportation at the ripe old age of You know 23 He said well when I lived in los angeles the signs aren't in arabic So why should we have signs in english in saudi arabia? Just in the diplomatic quarter where all the english speakers are he made all the street signs only arabic Just to screw us I knew the the alphabet so I could Sound out sharia abdel aziz abdel aziz abdel aziz abdel aziz

[40:21] And if I can sound out street signs then I could sound out menus in restaurants And then I could write my own name and so finally after I went back to headquarters I worked for another Two years in that office and then they said Do you want to take a year off and learn to speak arabic fluently and I said done So I applied for a job. It was a cia rotation to the state department So legit on the level state department job as the head of the economic section in quick question

[40:55] When was the last time a display ad changed your mind? Now think about the last time a friend told you about something they loved different feeling right? That's how podcast advertising works a host who's built real trust with their audience Talks about your brand in their own words in their own voice. It doesn't interrupt the experience It's part of it with a cast you can access the world's largest podcast marketplace Choose the right shows the right audiences the right format then watch the data tell you it worked You're not buying impressions. You're buying influence

[41:28] Learn more by visiting a cast comm slash advertise Manama Bahrain the american embassy in manama Bahrain I went to full-time complete immersion arabic language training And came out of it speaking Fluent arabic in fact up until that point. I was the only person who came out of the first year Speaking fluent arabic most people needed the second year at the state department language school in tunas

[42:02] And then when I got to Bahrain The ambassador said to me one day. He said your arabic is excellent. It's better than mine. I said, oh, thank you I said I figured out it's a very mathematical Language he said your arabic is so great. He said would you would you consider being my translator? And I said certainly we went to have a meeting one day with the minister of what's called alqaf and islamic affairs Alqaf is it's the plural of wak Which is a charity Islamic charity And he didn't speak a single word of english and we came out of it and as we were leaving

[42:37] He said to me young man your arabic is excellent And I said, oh, thank you your highness. I appreciate that Nobody had ever really said that to me before especially not in arab. It worked out well For better or for worse Ah, but i'm getting ahead of myself the languages and the history and the politics I ended up studying My whole career path sprang from one particular moment When I was nine years old I told my parents that when I grew up I wanted to be a spy

[43:11] And they thought that was cute and so for christmas that year they bought me walkie talkies and they bought me a little Box that had disappearing ink and a little code reader Well, I was serious And so when I was 16 I told my dad. I still remember the conversation We were driving down old plank road as we were passing frazier's pond and he was adamant that I get a degree in Some sort of science. I said, but dad i'm not interested in science. I want to be a spy in the middle east

[43:46] And he said why? After all these years Can't you just get this out of your system? And I said no I want to be a spy You know, there were james bond movies on tv and there were Comedies get smart and I just thought it was so cool I really believed I was going to be james bond and in a lot of ways. I was we all were I had a very Good idea of what spies did and later on in my career Well into my career. I was the executive assistant to deputy director of operations

[44:19] He used to have this mantra He would say it almost every day the job of the cia is to recruit spies to steal secrets and to analyze those secrets To provide the best informed analysis to the policymaker I knew when I was 16, that's what the cia did and I knew that that's what I wanted to do Like every high school senior you have to start thinking about colleges I knew with 1000 certainty That I only wanted to go to george washington university in washington dc

[44:54] I knew I wanted a major in middle eastern studies and there were only three Schools in america that offered the major at the time Brigham young I didn't want to go to school at brigham young obviously the other one was rutgers I had zero interest in going to school in new jersey And then the other was george washington university, which was literally two blocks from the white house talk about being in the center of the Action it's two blocks from the white house in one direction two blocks from the state department in another direction And it's a 10 minute subway ride to capitol hill

[45:24] I said this is the place for me And my dad finally accepted the fact that i'm not going to go to pittsburgh university of pittsburgh I'm going to go to washington I took out loans. I got a half tuition scholarship because my grades were really good My aunt had no children and she helped me as well and so I went to gw I was one of only four people in the middle eastern studies program of the other three one was my roommate freshman year None of them really had any interest in the middle east

[45:56] Their interest was israel they all happened to be jewish And they all just thought it would be really great and really easy One ended up selling commercial real estate one became an investment advisor at like Bear sterns And the other one uh got a phd and became a college professor None of them ever did anything with those degrees I took it seriously But I immediately saw that their weaknesses in this program It was a new program How in the world can you have a middle eastern studies program that does not mandate a class in islam

[46:31] Or in judaism for that matter or in oil economics Zoroastrianism So I went to the dean because i'm an idiot and I thought I was and here's an 18-year-old freshman He's gonna have an impact and I said dean you know, I'd really like to take these classes on islam and oil and and he's like Yeah, we don't have any of those What kind of degree program is this and he said to me and this was really a big deal He said but we do have this thing called the consortium of dc universities So if there's a class that you want to take that we don't offer

[47:05] But they have it at georgetown Or american or whatever You can take it and get credit for it This is where the world gets very small They didn't offer arabic At gw how in blazes. Can you have a middle eastern studies program that doesn't offer arabic? well Georgetown had air of it I go up to georgetown and I said I'd like to take the arabic class the guy says We started two weeks before gw. You can't you're already so far behind you can't make it up can't do it

[47:36] I thought well now what am I gonna do the only class they would let me take language class They'd let me take a gw was russian and they don't speak russian in the middle east But they speak greek they speak greek in cyprus and in israel and in alexandria egypt So I went to see the greek professor at georgetown Who happened to be the dean of the school of languages and linguistic dr. James the latest I went to his office and I said dr. Latis. You don't know me. I'm not even a student here I go to gw but consortium blah blah blah. He said can't do it. We started two weeks ago. You're so far behind

[48:11] I said I speak greek already though. He said yeah, let me hear it And he said something gonna be in greek and I answer him and he answers me and I answer him and he says your greek is Parable I said what I couldn't speak the greek all my life. He said you talk in this weird 1930s era island slang He said where are your people from from roads? When did they come here? 1931 and 1934 he said exactly You're gonna have to start in the beginner class

[55:17] diseased and travel weary roosevelt arrived in yalta He was so tired that all he wanted to do was go to bed But stalin insisted that the meetings begin immediately and so just to go to bed He gave up poland That was so fascinating to me that something as simple as being tired and wanting to go to bed Resulted in poland falling behind the iron curtain And a big reason why that happened was because of the information and human insights that stalin spies provided to him

[55:52] I was hooked Partway through the class doctor post Gives us an assignment for a paper and he tells us i want you to Shadow your bosses for a week and then write a psychological profile of your bosses now I was the only person in the legislative affairs program who did not work for a member of congress everybody in the class Almost everybody worked for a house member one guy worked for a senator from tennessee And I was the only one that wasn't on capitol hill to tell you the truth

[56:22] I was a little bit afraid of my boss at the ufcw. He was a mean angry old school Union organizer he had had his back broken by scabs during a strike He used to wear this absolutely grizzly harness just to keep his body from breaking again And he was just a mean guy Halfway through the week we had an argument and it got ugly and I called him a racist Which he was he hated black people which I never understood half the labor movement is black people

[56:53] I called him a racist He got so angry that he balled up his fists and he set a stance and I put up my hands because I thought to myself And I remember this very clearly. I thought oh man you went too far this time I put up my hands to shield myself from the blow his face getting red He says my penis is bigger than yours And I said what and he goes my penis is bigger than yours And I said you know what your nuts and I quit and I walked out and I went back to my apartment Started banging out this paper now remember we've been learning

[57:26] Psychology through this whole class. It's not just john told this story and wrote the paper It's dozens of footnotes and I'm citing famed Psychological studies and I concluded that he was a sociopath with psychopathic and likely violent tendencies I submit the paper a week later. I get it back. I got an a and in the margin Dr. Post wrote please see me after class. So I go up to him after class. I said Dr. Post you wanted to see me He said come to my office now the class was on like the sixth floor

[57:58] And his office, you know how little teeny tiny academic offices was on the second floor So I go down there and he says close the door. So I closed the door And he says look I'm not really a professor here I'm a CIA officer under cover as a professor here And I'm looking for people who might fit into the CIA's culture I think you would fit into the CIA's culture Would you like to be a CIA officer?

[58:30] As I hope you heard in this first episode of Dead Drop Though I've told my story many many times before this telling of it will go far far deeper The word I have in my head is granular That's one of the other great things about podcasts. There are just so many In Dead Drop, I'll be able to take you as completely inside a spy's mind as you want That's yet another great thing about telling my story via this podcast Spying is about relationships

[59:01] So is podcasting there really is no one between you and me Me telling my story and you listening to it. And if you want to tell me how you felt about what you just heard Well, you can tell me directly via a comment And you better believe I'll read it. I'm a spy after all. I always want to get my stories right We'll also sprinkle in some interviews and surprises And we're going to ask an interesting question about the business. I don't think anyone's ever asked before Did former spy and author John Le Carré invent the modern spy?

[59:35] We hope you enjoy Dead Drop and become a regular listener. Hey, now that you know where the Drop box is You might as well take advantage. Who knows what secrets you'll learn Till next time I'm John Kiriakou Dead Drop is written by John Kiriakou and Alan Katz Costard and Touchdown Productions produced the podcast and John Kiriakou, Alan Katz and Nick Mechanic are the executive producers

[1:00:05] This podcast it's a costard and touchstone production Looking back at my family's story and how it produced me Maybe it's not that shocking that spying and I found each other Tap a vein in my family and you're just as likely to get an interesting story as you are to get blood

[1:00:38] First and foremost the ottoman government was tolerant of non-muslims so long as they paid their taxes You had to pay a tax to the ottomans if you weren't muslim But still wanted to live in the empire though tolerant the ottomans were harsh nonetheless on the greeks under their rule Lucky us a cast powers the world's best podcast Here's a show that we recommend a photographer in texas earns an extra

[1:01:11] $47,000 a year shooting star wars cosplay portraits a teacher in mariland turns her woodworking hobby into a five figure side income Without leaving the classroom and a couple in pennsylvania will rent you backyard chickens for the season So you can try the egg laying life without commitment My name is chris gillabow. I'm the host of side hustle school I share these kinds of stories every single day in detail with full transparency about the numbers The point isn't just to inspire you it's to show you what's possible Proof that ordinary people are quietly building extra income in surprising ways

[1:01:43] Including a few ideas you can borrow less than 10 minutes a day every day Subscribe or follow side hustle school wherever you get your podcasts or find us directly at side hustle school dot com A cast helps creators launch grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere A cast dot com Before I leave home entirely in high school I was a good student history and current events were my forte

[1:02:16] That's probably why I got into debating I saw that I had a real facility for it But while it was important to be able to win a debate on the merits of my argument There was something even more fundamental that I liked about debating Another thing you should know about me is that i'm a polyglot. I have a facility with foreign languages Ah, but i'm getting ahead of myself The languages and the history and the politics I ended up studying my whole career path sprang from one particular moment

[1:02:51] Roosevelt at that time was suffering from multiple physical ailments He had polio which had paralyzed him from the waist down He had hypertension and cardiovascular disease He also had anemia chronic bronchitis and possibly even an essential tremor Ironically after the yalta conference all three leaders there rosevelt churchell and stalin would go on to have strokes So diseased and travel weary rosevelt arrived in yalta

[1:03:22] And a big reason why that happened was because of the information and human insights that stalin spies provided to him
