Title: John Kiriakou: \"Be Scared\" — Why Palantir Should Terrify You
Show: Jack Neel
Date: 2026-06-30
URL: https://youtube.com/watch?v=XKU0XvJl21g
Duration: 1:08:27

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[00:00] This is all public. Uh so, the government once had a DARPA program called LifeLog built to track every email, every photo, every location, every purchase a person made all in one place. They killed it on February 4th, 2004. The next day, Mark Zuckerberg filed the LLC for TheFacebook Incorporated. Scale 1 to 10, how much of a coincidence is that?

[00:30] >> You know, a one or two. Um you know, there are some people, I'm not one of them, maybe you're not one of them, who are constantly thinking about how to monetize literally everything. >> Mhm. >> They also have very deep connections in government. Well, we've known since Tom Drake went public uh in 2002 that NSA is intercepting every phone call, every text message, every email. Okay.

[01:00] Why not go farther than that and intercept everything else? If DARPA was doing it, he knew DARPA was doing it because he has contracts in government, sensitive contracts, and he knows that they dropped it. Why not pick it up and figure out how to monetize it? I believe that's what happened. >> Have you ever worked for Facebook? >> Mhm. But, a guy that I worked with, my first job at headquarters after I got back from Athens,

[01:31] guy had been chief of a gigantic station. So, he was well up there in the senior intelligence service. He resigned, and uh we were like, "What? What do you mean you resigned?" He's like, "You guys." He goes, "This thing, this Facebook thing." And I had like vaguely heard of it. He said, "They made me an offer that was ridiculous." >> [laughter] >> And then I never saw him again. So, there are a lot of senior CIA, FBI, NSA people that went to

[02:03] Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and LinkedIn and everywhere else. >> Open AI recently. >> Open AI. Will Hurd. I don't know if you've ever heard of Will Hurd. >> He was the former director of NSA? >> No. [clears throat] Will was I mentored Will at the CIA. He was a junior case officer, had a gift for for for convincing people to commit espionage, a gift. Fun guy, sweet guy, really smart, funny.

[02:34] He's half black, half white. Decided to resign from the CIA to run for Congress in a Supreme Court-mandated majority Hispanic district. And he won three times. The races were close, but I'll tell you, Will and I disagreed like had serious disagreements on politics. >> Mhm. >> But the guy is as honest as the day is long. He ran for president for about a minute and then dropped out in 20

[03:06] Well, yeah, 2024. And gave up his congressional seat to run for president and ended up being on the board of Open AI. So, yeah, he he authored multiple cybersecurity bills in Congress. >> Parts of which were classified? >> So, he keeps one foot in the game and one foot in business. I'm not sure what he's doing. I know

[03:37] he's making more money than he can count. And uh I think is also indicative of or an example of the two worlds coming together. Keep in mind also that in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, the CIA got a waiver from Congress to open a venture capital arm called In-Q-Tel. Like how they're able to how this is legal,

[04:07] I have no idea. But their very first investment, $1,500,000 was to Palantir. And now Palantir is a multi-billion dollar company. It's involved in cutting-edge technology, almost all of which is classified. A lot of people got very rich going into Palantir and similar high-tech {slash} cyber organizations. There's another company called Abraxas

[04:39] Corporation. Abraxas was formed in the '90s by a bunch of guys that I used to work for. And they set it up as a tax pass-through. They didn't expect or intend to make any money. They just wanted a place where they could hang out and drink coffee and smoke cigars and talk about what great former CIA officers they were. And then they started putting in for CIA contracts. Since they're friends with everybody who is making the contracting decisions, they started getting um contracts, and the millions turned into tens and then hundreds of millions

[05:10] and then billions, and now everybody's rich beyond his wildest dreams. On the Palantir portion, why does Palantir scare you? Because there's no oversight of it. We don't really know what Palantir does. It's all secret. It's more than secret, it's top secret. It's more than top secret, it's top secret compartmentalized. So, >> are the top secret compartmentalized? Break that down for me. >> Yeah. So, there are many levels above

[05:41] top secret. They're they're compartments. For For when you join the CIA, everybody gets a TS/SCI TK Gamma clearance. So, it's top secret, special intelligence, which is NSA, talent, keyhole, gamma. Those are three compartments that everybody gets. So, let's say most everybody in the military has a TS/SCI. Top secret sensitive compartment and information. Or SI, special intelligence. So, if NSA

[06:14] just pick some phone call out of the air, you're cleared to see it. If it is sensitive, it's going to be talent keyhole. So, the military guy's not going to see it. You get to see it. If it's gamma, somebody with a special clearance gets to see it. So, maybe I'll see it, but you won't see it because maybe maybe it's an intercept of a phone call from some world leader, right?

[06:45] And then, as another example, when I got back from Pakistan, I was promoted to be executive assistant to the CIA's Deputy Director for Operations. And in that position, you see literally everything that is happening around the world. I had um TS/SCI SI TK Gamma. And then I added six more compartments on top of that. So, in fact, there was one morning

[07:15] I was briefing the Deputy Director, the Associate Deputy Director, and all of the Associate Directors for counterterrorism, proliferation, counterintelligence, budgets. So, I said, "We have a very important cable. It's part of my normal morning briefing. We have a very important cable in the such and such compartment." And the Deputy Director says, "Stop. You and I are the only ones cleared for

[07:46] that." And I was like, "Oh my god, I'm so sorry." And he says, "Just give me the hard copy." So, I gave it to him. And I said, "None of the Associate Deputy Directors for Operations are cleared for the compartment?" And he said, "No. They don't have a need to know." >> I want to ask so badly what is the degree that like someone like a Tulsi Gabbard has. But >> Well, that's a great question. Tulsi Gabbard is supposed to have everything of everything. She's the Director

[08:19] of National Intelligence. So, she's the overall Director of all 18 intelligence agencies in the US government. Most countries have one or two. We have 18. >> But it's it's a four-year term, right? >> No. >> So, you can be in that position for >> You can be So long as you serve at the pleasure of the President is the language that they use. So, you can be there for a day. You can be in there for 8 years or for 20 years if the President decides you're doing a great job. >> Mhm. >> The truth is

[08:51] >> [snorts] >> until very recently, the DNI was really in charge only of uh budgets. That's it. And even then, not really. Because because most of the intelligence agencies in government are agencies within the Pentagon. NSA belongs to Pentagon, Army Intelligence, Navy Intelligence, Marine Corps Intelligence, Air Force Intelligence, Coast Guard Intelligence. They're all Pentagon. So, they're part of the Pentagon budget.

[09:22] So, the DNI is in charge of intelligence, but no, actually no. The State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research reports to the State Department. They sit in the State Department. There's an Assistant Secretary for Intelligence and Research. So, the DNI doesn't even really control that. >> How often would you say Trump gets asked something and someone says, "That's classified"? >> I would really hope that that would never happen. I will tell you though that there were times in my career

[09:54] where something would happen. Not a lot of times, two or three. Something would happen and either the station chief or the DDO, Deputy Director for Operations, would say, "You know, let's not put that in writing." And so, there was no written record of it. I'll give you an example. I worked a case where we recruited this guy. He was incredibly dangerous. Um he was a career criminal, a heroin

[10:26] addict. But he did this really cool thing for us. And so, we paid him very handsomely. And I said to him, "Don't spend all the money in one place because it's going to raise eyebrows and people are going to think you're probably taking, you know, CIA money." And he said, "I'm going to use it to marry my girlfriend." I said, "Oh, that's terrific. That's a great idea. Congratulations." Couple of weeks later,

[10:57] I work my normal day. I get home. I turn on the news. I see the guy on the news. He's in cuffs. He just shot his girlfriend's father. It turned out he went to ask the old man's permission to marry his daughter. And the guy's like, "I'm not marrying I'm not letting my only daughter marry a a heroin-addicted career criminal." And the guy just shot him in the face.

[11:27] And he got arrested. I called the station chief and I I was like "Are you watching the news?" He's like, "No." I said, "AB Grasshopper, I'm just making that up. There is no such thing as AB Grasshopper. AB Grasshopper just shot his girlfriend's father in the face. He killed him. It's on the news." He's like, "Oh my god. We have to inform Congress." So, I said, "Okay, I just got home. I'm going to get back in the car and go straight back to work." I get back to work. He gets to work and

[11:57] he's like, "You know, on second thought, let's not put that in writing." I said, "Are you sure? Like, the rules are pretty clear. You got a recruited asset who's just committed a cold-blooded murder." He's like, "They They wouldn't understand the nature of our relationship with the guy." I was like, "You're the boss." So, I didn't put it in writing. I'd assume that's rare, though. I would hope it's rare. Like I say, it

[12:28] only happened to me one or two times and I had kind of a career that was out there. Another program that you've talked about quite extensively, so I'll ask about it in a different way. Project Mockingbird, the CIA paid journalist, news anchors maybe, to report on what they wanted them to or change stories, something along those lines. I can't remember the exact details, but if you had an unlimited budget and were running

[12:58] Project Mockingbird right now, where would you make sure you put that money? Oh, overseas. It should be patently illegal to propagandize the American people. It was until Barack Obama changed his mind in 20 15. Oh, so that's recent. Oh, yeah. It's recent. You know, since since 1975, we haven't been allowed to We I say we like I'm

[13:29] still there. The CIA has not been allowed to recruit journalists. Uh American journalists. So, the Church Committee was appalled that the CIA was was running this thing, Project Mockingbird. And the Church Committee made it illegal to to do that, to to recruit American journalists. It is perfectly legal. It is actually encouraged for you to

[14:01] recruit foreign journalists. With the idea being that you pay these guys a handsome wage, and they're going to plant pro-American stories. And also, they're going to tell you what it has ended up on the cutting room floor that might be important for, you know, the CIA analysts or for an operation that might be ongoing or whatever. The first time the CIA ever did this was in the Italian election of 1949. It

[14:31] was the very first covert action operation. The CIA spent $150,000 to bribe Italian journalists because the Communist Party was ahead in the polls. And they bribed these journalists to write articles that were in support of the conservative um Christian Democratic Party. And the Christian Democrats won by a whisker. So, the CIA essentially stole the 1949 Italian elections. The CIA then began recruiting journalists all around the world.

[15:02] Mockingbird was different in that it was geared toward recruiting American journalists. Well, it it was illegal to propagandize the American people. Americans weren't even allowed to listen to the Voice of America. I I you could if you had a shortwave radio, you could hear it, but it's propaganda. It's pro-American propaganda. It's a government's own radio voice. Until 2015,

[15:32] in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2016, that was rescinded, and it was rescinded for the worst reason. Have you ever heard of Radio TV Marti? Mhm. So, in the '70s, the um what became known as the Broadcasting Board of Governors created a radio and TV station, Radio Marti and TV Marti, to beam anti-communist propaganda at Cuba. So, Radio Marti

[16:04] was broadcast from a plane. I actually went up in the plane at in 2011 when I was with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and they just fly back and forth in international airspace between Florida and Cuba, and they broadcast Radio Marti. Radio Marti is mostly baseball games in Spanish. The Cubans love baseball even more than we do. And so, they everybody tunes into the baseball game. Sometimes the Cuban government will jam the frequency, um

[16:34] but most people listen to it just for the sports coverage. TV Marti is almost always jammed. You can watch it in the waiting room at the American Embassy when you're waiting for your visa, and it's you know, Miami Cubans yelling about communism and silly stuff like that. So, nobody watches it. Well, in the early aughts, um it was picked up by the Dish Network.

[17:04] And the way the Dish Network broadcasts, there's this little tiny sliver right along the coast of southwestern Florida where if your dish is like just right, you can pick it up. But it's illegal to propagandize the American people. And so the Obama administration said, "You know what? Rather than make the Dish Network change their frequency or whatever, let's just make it legal to propagandize Americans." And so in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2016,

[17:35] they make it legal to propagandize Americans. And so now you're if you're on that little strip of coast of southwestern Florida, you can watch TV Marti. Not that anybody would want to, but it also gives the government the right to essentially recruit American journalists again. And I'll give you another example. I have a friend who is an absolutely fantastic investigative journalist, Jason Leopold. He's now at Bloomberg. Jason is the king of the Freedom of Information Act.

[18:06] He was once called by the Pentagon spokesman during the Bush administration, he was called a FOIA terrorist because he has filed more Freedom of Information Act requests than any other person on Earth. So he told me he's actually the guy who broke the Hillary Clinton email story. Right? So he told me that he was bored one week between Christmas and New Year's. And he has this masterful way of doing this. The Freedom of Information Act says that

[18:38] when you file the request, the government has 60 days to respond. Okay, I filed a request in 2015. I'm still waiting for the response. They never respond. So on day 61, you have to file a lawsuit against them. And they always lose. And they always have to pay your legal fees. But nobody thinks to do it, and people are too busy. I'm too busy, and I don't really care at the end of the day. It was about one guy who was a science fiction writer. So anyway, Jason has an attorney on staff. Not

[19:08] staff, on on retainer. And every time he files a FOIA request on day 61, they sue. They sue the CIA every time. So, he said he's bored one Christmas and he files a Freedom of Information Act request for all communications between the CIA and all reporters over the previous year. Day 61, he sues. He wins. The judge orders the CIA to release the

[19:39] information and to pay his legal which is the way it always is. And he says he got back this mountain of emails between the CIA's Office of Public Affairs and journalists from all around the world. He said there were a couple that were especially interesting. >> What year was this? >> This was 20 11, 12. He said one of them was an exchange between the CIA and Ken Dilanian of NBC

[20:09] News. Ken Dilanian is the chief national security correspondent for NBC News and MS Now. Ken Dilanian was writing articles and sending them to the CIA for clearance before sending them to his own editor. So, the CIA could say, "Yeah, take that line out. You might want to change this paragraph. Don't say that. Say this instead. That's propaganda." They're propagandizing the American

[20:40] people. I don't want to know what the CIA's official line is. I want the news. The other thing he found was there was this young hungry independent journalist who actually had stumbled onto a real story. And he wrote up the story, he sent it to the CIA, "Please comment. I'm going to post it, you know, the next day." And they wrote back and they said, "So help us God if you publish this, you will never be invited to the CIA Christmas party ever again, and we will never give

[21:11] you any background information. And so he killed his own story. So you don't need to recruit American journalists anymore. They do it for free. Some of them do it just cuz they want to be, you know, insiders with the guys. Some do it because they're afraid. So you don't need to recruit them anymore. >> That's an interesting one. I guess I don't know why I'm even thinking about defending the

[21:42] original position of it, but just the only thing that would make sense to me is if the foreign people are trying to get our journalist, then we might as well try to get our journalist, too, to kind of balance that out. Like did Do you think that's fair or >> would be an FBI program. >> Right. That's That's what's strange to me is the overlap of those two things. >> forbidden from operating domestically, unless it's overt. Certainly, the CIA has offices all around the country. Uh it's called National Resources Division.

[22:13] But their job is, let's say you're the CEO of a company, and you go to China, and you're negotiating with these Chinese government people. The CIA is going to call you and say, "Hey Jack, we know you went to China recently. Do you mind if we come by the office and ask you a couple of questions about these Chinese people you were dealing with? You know, tell us about their personalities, or do you know anything about their backgrounds?" And because you're a patriotic American, you say, "Of course, come on over." And then they go and they write everything down. That's overt. There's nothing secret about that.

[22:44] Um but otherwise, they're not allowed to operate on on American soil. >> Hm. >> That's up to the FBI. >> Maybe I haven't been looking for it, but I feel like I haven't seen as much about the FBI as I have the CIA. >> No, you're right. >> What's with that? >> Yeah, it's funny. I think because so much of what the CIA does is secret, people's imaginations kind of start working. And

[23:14] they're more likely to go down a rabbit hole on the CIA than the FBI. I think that's what it is. People are always intrigued by what they're not supposed to know. And so they want to get to the bottom of things. >> Which do you think is the more interesting rabbit hole? >> Within the CIA? >> The Just between the CIA and the FBI. >> Mhm, counterintelligence, definitely. Definitely. Both the CIA and the FBI have gigantic counterintelligence

[23:47] organizations. In the CIA, it's the Well, now it's It's Well, at the time that that I was there, it was called the Counterintelligence Center, CIC. >> Mhm. >> Its job is to find moles inside the CIA. It's the most highly classified work that's done. Period. The FBI has what's called the National Security Division.

[24:18] And their job is also to look for moles. And there are There are more people in government working for foreign governments than than you might think. It wasn't just Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen, two traitors working for the Russians. Both of whom were the chief of counterintelligence for Russian operations, by the way. The Chinese are all over us, you know? The mayor of Arcadia was just arrested for being an unregistered agent

[24:49] of the Chinese government and planting pro-Chinese propaganda in Arcadia's newspaper. What's up with that? Um another one is all these Chinese PhD students that are getting degrees in in the hard sciences here. And then they say, "Oh, we love it so much here. We're going to get green cards. We're going to get American citizenship. We're going to apply for jobs at DARPA." Come on. Come on. They do it all the time.

[25:22] >> They pay extra for the universities, so [snorts] >> They pay full price. >> Yeah, there's some incentive there. >> there is. >> You said Epstein was likely an asset for Mossad. Based on what you actually know about how the CIA and intelligence agencies work, is it more likely that Epstein was an asset for an intelligence agency or that the intelligence agencies were working for him? >> Mhm. I hadn't thought of it like that.

[25:58] I hadn't really thought of it like that. With this most recent tranche of documents, it solidified my belief that at the very least he was working for Mossad. What we learned in this And you know what, let me explain that. I've explained it in other in other podcasts, but if you're a foreign intelligence service and you want to know what the most important people in the country are thinking, the the multi-billionaire businessmen, the former presidents, the

[26:30] number six in line to the British throne, etc. You're not going to recruit those people. They don't want or need your money. They're not going to tell you what you want to know. So, you do the next best thing and you recruit a person with ready access to them. And if they've got a weakness, like we've heard, for example, Bill Gates has. Um even better. So, you recruit somebody like Jeffrey Epstein. Keep in mind, we don't have any idea the source of his money.

[27:02] No idea at all. I talked to a a former journalist for the uh New York Post. And she said the first time Jeffrey Epstein ever popped up in her career was in the 1990s. He had agreed to finance the purchase of the newspaper The New York Sun. And her editor at the post said "Figure out who this guy Epstein is. We

[27:33] don't have anybody We don't have any information about him in our files." So, she said she called him and asked for an interview. He hung up on her. She called other rich people around town. They were like, "We've never heard of this guy." This is in the This is like the 1997, '96, whatever it was. She couldn't find anything. And so, finally, in the article, she told me she wrote um that the deal was backed by financial mystery man Jeffrey Epstein.

[28:03] And then she forgot about him until he got in trouble and was in the papers for that reason. So, could the money have come from a foreign intelligence service? Of course, it could have. Could it have come from Les Wexner? Certainly, it could have. Or from the the Rothschild family? Of course. But we don't know for sure. Um we know from this latest tranche of documents that Epstein was working on behalf of the Israelis. But he was probably working on behalf of the

[28:35] CIA as well, the FBI, MI5 and MI6 in the UK, the Germans, we think. And he had tried repeatedly to get in front of Vladimir Putin. To the point where the Russians offered him a meeting with Putin and two other officials, and he said, "No, it has to be just Putin." They said, "Forget it." And so, he never met with Putin. So, I think he was more likely more likely than being uh an access agent

[29:07] that he was an intelligence broker. Somebody who collects intelligence and then sells it to different intelligence sources, intelligence, rather, agencies. >> Would you say the wealthiest people in the world do that occupation? >> Yeah, sure. Some of them. Look at Ghislaine Maxwell and her family. Her father had all the money in the world, and he was an avowed, acknowledged Israeli spy. Um >> But, do they start off in intelligence,

[29:37] typically? >> No. No, they're brought in, typically. Although, I will tell you that a lot of them have a very deep um interest in intelligence. When I was at the CIA I was married to another uh another senior CIA officer. We got invited to dinner at the five-story Park Avenue home

[30:08] of a Fortune 50 CEO. And I was like, "Why in blazes would this guy want to have dinner with me?" So, we went to dinner. And it was perfect in every respect. He had this staff of like 12 just standing there like to be your personal slave for the whole dinner. And at the end of it, he walked us out. And um and I thanked him. I shook his hand, and I said, "I've got to ask you

[30:39] why did you want to have dinner with us. And he says, "Every CIA officer probably wishes he was a billionaire. I can tell you every billionaire wishes he was a CIA officer." And I thought, "Huh, you learn something new every day." He just wanted to hear stories, you know, lay out a couple of ideas of his own.

[31:10] >> Mhm. >> The money after a while it's not so important to them. They start thinking back about all the things that they could have done, something that was more exciting. >> Have you ever spied on a secret society? >> No. I actually get that question a lot. >> Really? >> Yeah. I have a good friend who's an investigative journalist, but she's an she's an independent investigative journalist making a handsome living for herself, but she kind of tends toward conspiracy >> theories?

[31:42] >> And I always try to make her back down, and then she always proves that she was right and I was wrong. Drives me crazy. So, for the last couple of years, she's been all about the Masons. And I'm like, "Will you leave the Masons alone? I know a couple of Masons, and all they do is raise money for scholarships. That's it. It's just a bunch of old men that get together once a month and play poker and raise money for scholarships."

[32:12] And then and then she starts developing some information that I'm like, "Ooh, really? Really?" And then she'll lay it out. And then she goes deep into the histories of some of these organizations. They were all founded by the same circle of people, you know, on Wall Street or in the immediate aftermath of World War I. And then I have to admit that, "Okay, there may be something to it. But no, I never had to try to infiltrate a secret society.

[32:42] On the contrary, there were a lot of guys at the agency who were members of secret societies. I'll I'll tell you one funny aside. I happen to be Greek Orthodox. And I went to There's one There's a peninsula in northern Greece called Mount Athos. Uh Ayion Oros, the Holy Mountain. And it's the home of 32 monasteries.

[33:13] Uh it's the only place in the European Union that is exempt from European Union laws. And no women are permitted there. They even remove female animals that they capture. So, I went there. And I went to the first monastery. You're allowed to go for 4 days and 3 nights. You have to get a special visa from the Ministry of Religious Affairs or whatever it's called. So, I went I wanted to see the the place, check it out. So, I get my visa, I go.

[33:43] And uh as soon as you get to the first monastery, this priest comes out and says, "Have you had confession today?" I said I said, "No, I just got here." "Okay, confession." I'm like, "Okay." Well, in Greek Orthodox churches in America, you just sit there and you tell the priest, "I did this, I did that, I did the other thing." And he says, "Okay, you're forgiven. You know, go about your business." It's different in Greece. They read a list of sins. And it starts with murder. "Have you

[34:14] committed murder?" I'm like, "No." "Rape?" "No." "Robbery?" "No." And I'm thinking, "What's he doing?" So, he says, "I have to read the list of sins." I said, "Oh, okay." So, he's reading this whole list. I'm like, "No, no, no, no." At the end he says, "Are you a member of any secret societies?" And I said, "No." Well, I'm a member of a fraternity. And he says, "Is it secret?" I said, "Well, we've got a silly, you know, secret handshake." He said, "That's a sin." I said, "Come

[34:45] on, Father." I said, "The archbishop's a member." And he says, "Then the archbishop needs to go to confession." So, I'm like, "Okay, I'm a member of secret society." Want to join the CIA, they asked me, "Are you a member of any secret societies?" And I said, "No." But then they specifically asked me, "Are you a member of any fraternities?" >> Mhm. >> And I said, "Yeah, I'm a member of this fraternity." "We never heard of that one." I said, "It's just a bunch of guys. We play poker once a month. We order pizzas, and then we throw in, you

[35:15] know, $100 for for scholarships for poor children." And they're like, "Oh, okay. All right." And then they left it. And I wonder if there was more to it now in retrospect. You know, what were they getting at? Did they want me to be a member of a secret society? I don't know. >> Those people that were, were they when they joined? >> Yeah. Yeah, because they have these like degrees, right? So, they're like, you know, 60th degree, whatever.

[35:48] And it takes you a lifetime to get up to that position. >> On your past relationships, uh do you think Angry Birds led to your divorce? >> No. I think Angry Birds was a convenient excuse for divorce. You know, in defense of Angry Birds and my obsession with Angry Birds, I'm proud to say I have not missed a single day in almost 9 years.

[36:19] I'm coming right up on 9 years of Angry Birds every single day. I freaking >> 3,000 yet? >> Uh I'm 2,800. I can show you on my phone. Today 2,879. Something like that. >> Wait, is it the original Angry Birds? >> No, it's Angry Birds 2. >> Mhm. >> I love the original. >> What's your favorite bird? >> Angry Birds 2 is better. >> [gasps] >> You know, it's hard to say what my favorite bird is. Um, I always love the black one cuz he explodes. But, um, but there are a couple of new

[36:50] ones. One that sucks everything up and then spits it out. That's a good one. And the latest one that spins around and knocks stuff down. Very powerful bird. So, I'm I'm devoting all my new feathers to him so I can get him up. I I'm I'm obsessive in the respect that I need for all my birds to be exactly the same level. And so, um, I'll focus just on this specific bird. >> Do you know what you're ranked in the world? >> Um, it's it's high up there.

[37:22] Yeah. I'm I'm at the point where I'm not ranked by stars anymore. I'm in the like senior global senior league. >> [laughter] >> That was the most interesting thing I saw when I started seeing you talking about Angry Birds. I was like, I haven't played that game in a while. I I hope they sponsor this guy >> I [laughter] You know what? I should probably say something. I love it. I love it. >> it. >> Angry Birds did not lead to my divorce. I woke up I wake up an hour earlier than

[37:53] I need to every day just so I can play Angry Birds for the first hour. I don't even get out of bed. As soon as I wake up, I put my glasses on, I pick up my phone, I go to Angry Birds, and it takes me an hour to do all the daily games. Um, that was just an excuse that a former spouse used to try to justify, you know, the current situation. >> Yeah, that's some that's some [ __ ] My wife and I, we we have arguments, of course, like any couple, but uh, uh

[38:25] she does not talk about me playing. I I play this game called Clash Royale. It's kind of like Clash of Clans. Have you heard of this one? Do you play it? >> No. >> Hm. >> But it looks good. I actually downloaded it and I never started it. >> You got to get into it. It's It's like chess, but there's a little more luck involved, so you don't have to you can have an excuse for losing, pretty much, you know what I mean? Um but you've been married and divorced twice. >> Twice. >> Do you ever wonder if the CIA played a role in anyone's divorce?

[38:55] >> The CIA played a role in my divorce. I apologize that by court order I'm not at liberty to explain that, but the CIA had an active role in my divorce. >> What did you say to your wife the night before you went to prison? >> I apologize. I I probably shouldn't say. >> Hm. >> Yeah, I shouldn't say. That was a That was a terrible night. I barely slept a wink.

[39:26] Cuz you know, the there there's We all have this natural fear of the unknown. And I didn't know what I was getting into. At my sentencing, my attorneys asked that I be sent to a minimum security work camp. And at the minimum security camps, there are no fences, no bars on the windows, the doors are unlocked, you're free to just come and go as you please. You're just on your honor not to abscond. >> Hm. >> And most of those guys work in town at the university. There's

[39:57] a small university. And um you know, they're janitors or what have you. Um the judge asked the Justice Department if they had any objection. They said no objection. The judge says minimum security work camp. So I got to the prison. And um I went to the camp, knocked on the door. It's weird unless they just take you into custody and ship you to a prison, they send you a letter and they say, "Report to this prison on this day at

[40:27] this time." And you just drive up there and knock on the door and turn yourself in. So, I knock on the door. I said, "I'm I'm John Kiriakou. I'm here to turn myself in." The guy says, "Oh, you got to go across the street to the actual prison. Then they put you through the metal detector and then they walk you back over here." I said, "Okay, great." So, I go across the street, knock on the door. I'm John Kiriakou. I'm here to turn myself in. He puts me through the metal detector and then starts leading me around to the back of the prison and I said, "No, no.

[41:00] I'm at the camp across the street." And he goes, "Ha. Not according to my paperwork, you're not." And I was like, "Take it easy. Don't say anything. They'll put you in solitary." I didn't say a word. So, it took me 4 days to get access to a phone and I called my lead attorney and I said, "Hey, they put me in the actual prison with the mafia dons and the drug kingpins and the pedophiles." I said, "What do I do?"

[41:31] He's like, "Oh my god." He said, "Buddy, we could uh file a motion, but it'll be 2 years before we get a hearing and you'll be home by then." He said, "I'm sorry. You're going to have to tough it out." I was like, "Dang it." I said, "Okay. I'm trained for this. I've lived in way worse places than this. I can do it." And so, I did it. I used my CIA training to keep myself safe and at the very top of the social heap.

[42:02] >> Why do you think no one ever made you disappear? >> I'm not sure. >> [laughter] >> But I I I have a I have a I have a theory. I have a theory that that I'm so high profile that it would just be too obvious what happened.

[42:33] I'm not blind. I saw what happened to Charlie Kirk. Um so I've taken, you know, steps to protect myself, certainly. And I get death threats like a lot of other people do. Um and I take them seriously. But um you know, this is one of the reasons one of the two reasons why I really want and need a presidential pardon. I've applied for one. But uh in addition to losing my federal pension, which I really really would

[43:04] like to have back, I want my guns back. I need to protect myself. And so, you know, when people write me emails saying I can't wait to see your brains splattered out in front of and then they give me my home address, I have to take that seriously. >> Right. >> So, I don't know. I think that it's a combination of things. I think I'm too high profile that I would be missed. And to tell you the truth,

[43:36] all of my detractors are either dead or retired. I have a a young friend who's at the CIA now. I I try to advise a lot of young people who apply for the CIA. I'm a realist. I know the CIA is not going anywhere. And so, you know, if there's going to be change, it has to be change that comes from the inside. So I'm I'm proud to say that there are six people who have been students in college

[44:07] classes that I've taught, who have successfully applied at the CIA. They've gotten in. One of them told me a couple of weeks ago that she was in a uh counterintelligence class. And there was a slide that said, "The Insider Threat." And it had a picture of me. And she said, "Everybody in the class started to boo." And the instructor said, "Are you booing him or you booing the slide?"

[44:38] And they said, "The slide. He's not an insider threat. He was the whistleblower. It was the agency that was the threat." And she said that in the next running of the class, they took the slide out. So, I think that they probably thought that prosecuting me would silence me forever. And in fact, my ex-wife said to me one time, "Boy, if they thought this was going to silence you, they didn't know you at all."

[45:09] And I said, "No. They've given me, you know, a reason for being. Now, this is going to be my thing. This is going to be my life. Civil rights, civil liberties, and human rights." And it has. It's been my life. Mhm. Yeah, I'll tell you what. If they had called me after my initial ABC News interview, in which I blew the whistle, and if they had said, "Dog gone you. You

[45:40] need to shut the [ __ ] up." I probably would have said, "I'm sorry. You're right. I'll drop it." And that would have been the end of it. But no, they had to be dicks about it. >> [laughter] >> And they had to prosecute me. And so now, look what happened. John Brennan was the one who insisted that I be prosecuted and go to prison. And now he's going to be prosecuted and he's going to go to prison. Mhm. >> When you think about your work,

[46:11] the missions you've done, some of the more emotional visceral things you've seen, is there any one person or one face that you see in your sleep? >> Yeah, I mean, it may sound cliche at this point, but but it's Abu Zubaydah. Abu Zubaydah, the night that we captured Abu Zubaydah, my entire life changed. The entire course of the rest of my life changed. This was the highest level

[46:42] terrorist up until that point that we had ever captured. And he just turned out to be not the guy we thought he was. Part of the problem was we didn't know. We believed he was the number three in Al-Qaeda. We didn't know that he had a cousin who went by the same name, Abu Zubaydah. Abu Zubaydah's real name is um Zayn al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn. He just goes by Abu Zubaydah. And his cousin went by Abu Zubaydah.

[47:13] So, we're getting these reports, Abu Zubaydah's planning an attack in Amman. Okay, we better inform the Jordanians. Abu Zubaydah's planning an attack in Charlotte. Like, Charlotte? How did he get to Charlotte? Abu Zubaydah's planning an attack in Riyadh. Abu Zubaydah's in Billings, Montana, planning an attack. We're like, "Oh my god, this guy's a terrorist Superman." There were two of them. So, the one that we were after, he was a bad guy. He had founded Al-Qaeda's two training camps in southern Afghanistan. He had

[47:44] founded the House of Martyrs, Al-Qaeda's safe house in Peshawar, Pakistan. He was a logistician for Al-Qaeda. If you wanted to get into Afghanistan and fight the Americans, he would get you in, smuggle you in. If you wanted to leave and go home, you're tired of the fight, he would get you a fake passport, get you home. But, he was not the Superman that we thought he was. He was not the number three in Al-Qaeda. He was never even in Al-Qaeda. And we tortured this guy to within an

[48:17] inch of his life. To the point where there's a footnote in the Senate torture report saying that Abu Zubaydah will never be released. He will never have access to the outside world, ever. And when he dies at Guantanamo, we'll cremate his body and throw the ashes into the Caribbean as if he never existed. That's not the American way. If this guy was really who we said he

[48:48] was, charge him with a crime and make him defend himself. But, we can't charge him with the crime because we tortured him. And so, literally nothing of what he said is we're able are we able to use in court. None of it's admissible in court. Um I was the first CIA officer, former CIA officer, to call for his release.

[49:18] I did it um on the BBC in 2015. And now I'm in touch with his attorneys. Wanting to know how I can help because he should be released. Even if he's guilty. He has done 24 years in the worst possible prison conditions, having been tortured almost to death. Even if he's guilty of crimes, he's done his time. Let him go.

[49:50] >> This could be a dumb question. What's the Arabic word for terrorist? Well, we always just use jihadi, which isn't really terrorist, it's struggler. But do they call us terrorist? Probably. Probably in relation to our Israel-Palestine policy. Mhm. Yeah. Have you spoke to him? No. No, and I've not written to him either

[50:21] because he's not permitted to have access to the outside world. It's almost impossible even for his own attorneys to meet with him. They can only meet with him in the presence of either a CIA officer or a Pentagon official or both. Mhm. Even he drew he's an accomplished artist. The night that we captured him, we also confiscated his diary. Um, that's a whole different topic, but in the diary were his sketches and drawings. He's a gifted artist, gifted.

[50:53] I remember leafing through it that night thinking, "Wow, this guy's really talented." So, he drew pictures of his own torture and the things that they did to him. And the CIA classified all the pictures top secret. So, nobody's ever seen them. What would you guess would be the worst one? Well, did you know the the conventional wisdom is the worst one is waterboarding. And certainly it's horrible, but but I

[51:24] didn't think it was the worst. I thought there were two that were worse. We never killed anybody by waterboarding them. His heart stopped at one point and we revived him so he could be tortured more. But there were two techniques that I always believed were worse than waterboarding. One was the cold cell where we would chain a prisoner to an eye-bolt in the ceiling. So he couldn't sit or lay or get comfortable in any way.

[51:55] And strip him naked. And chill the cell to 50° F. And then every hour a CIA officer would go in the cell and throw ice water on him. We killed people with that. With hypothermia, we killed them. We weren't authorized to kill people in these sessions. We get these cables like, uh Ibn Shaykh al-Libi unfortunately didn't make it through the night. He was in the cold cell. What do we do? Uh you dig a hole and bury him.

[52:25] That's awful. But that's what we did. The other technique was sleep deprivation. >> [gasps] >> People don't think that sleep deprivation is any big deal. You know, again you're chained to that eye-bolt in the ceiling and you've got these industrial strength lights right on you. And then you've got, you know, death metal on a loop at a volume of 10 24/7. We know from the American Psychological Association that people begin to lose their minds at day seven with no sleep.

[52:57] Day seven, they begin to die at day nine because your organs start to fail. The CIA was authorized to keep people awake for 12 days. 12 days. We murdered people with that. Murdered from lack of sleep. >> Have you ever met anyone that you suspect enjoyed torture? >> Yes, I have. I've met a number of people over the years who enjoyed torture. One of them ended

[53:28] up becoming the director of the CIA. Gina Haspel was a senior counterterrorism official who flew out to the secret site just to sit in on on session because it got her rocks off. In the hall we used to call her Bloody Gina. Bloody Gina, can you imagine? Being a woman known through your career as Bloody Gina because you're such a psychopath that you enjoy watching other people be tortured and humiliated. What kind of

[53:59] person is that? So yeah, there were others that they would come out of these sessions like energized. Like, "Whoa!" You know, "USA!" That's not normal. That's just not normal. But there were a lot of people like that. >> What's the comment section of a ex-CIA officer look like? >> You know, normally people are wonderful. They really are, normally.

[54:30] And then every once in a while I'll just get an [ __ ] And I'm like, "Guy, it's my [ __ ] page. You can't come on here and say I'm a traitor and I need to be put to death." And so I block people almost every day. >> Really? >> Yeah, I have to. If you want to engage in debate and disagree with me, awesome. I look forward to it. But don't say that you know, you're going to spread my brains on the sidewalk, for example.

[55:00] We're not We're not going to have that conversation. I do get a lot of uh I can't possibly answer all the DMs. I can't. Like hundreds a day in addition to the hundreds of emails. And most of them are Most of them are people who just are they're in need of psychiatric intervention. Yeah, there are a lot of people like that out there. >> You get a lot of Cameo requests, too. >> Oh my god. >> you broke the record on Cameo.

[55:34] >> Five years ago my brother-in-law bought my sister a cameo. >> Hm. She watches the Real Housewives of something or other. >> And and she loved it. So, I was like vaguely aware in the back of my mind there's this thing called Cameo and it's fun. So, within like a day of my explosion on TikTok, uh Cameo reached out and said, "Hey, have you ever heard of Cameo?" I said, "Oh, yes, my sister had this Cameo from my brother-in-law. Would you like to do it?" I said, "Yeah, yeah, sure. Why

[56:05] not?" And I said to my sister, "I make $400 for an op-ed. If I could make $400 a month to replace the op-ed, hey, that would be good, right?" The first month I was on Cameo, I broke the all-time record for the number of Cameos >> [laughter] >> How much do you charge? It's really cheap, right? >> I charged 90 I charged $49 and then they told me to raise it to 99, but the algorithm changes the price every 15 minutes depending on how busy you are,

[56:37] how many requests you're getting. So, I don't think it's ever actually been at 99, even though that's what I have it set at. Right now, as we're sitting here speaking, I will tell you real quickly, it is 159. >> Oh, got you. >> Yeah. >> Huh. Yeah, I mean, but I'm sure you you do a lot. Like most people like they just charge $10,000 or 5,000 and then they just do like if it hits, but like you want to do a

[57:08] lot of I think you like it a lot. >> I enjoy it so much. The CEO of Cameo, who's an awesome guy, Steven. Steven flew to DC to take me to dinner that first night and they gave me this Cameo jacket that I wear every day. And it it's just so much fun, but they told me in the beginning most Cameos are between like 60 seconds and 90 seconds. I can't possibly do one so short. So, mine are like between 3 minutes and 4 minutes. >> [laughter] >> And there are people

[57:40] like in the top 10 that I'm not competing with, but comparing with. So, I looked at some of them. They're they're rappers and reality TV stars and stuff like that. And some of them like their average cameo is 15 seconds, 20 seconds. But then they have like 2.3 stars out of five. And I have 4.98 stars out of five because they'll do cameos like in the backseat of the car at night. So, it's just completely black and you can't see and

[58:12] you know, people are spending hard-earned money. And they're asking mostly for Well, about 50% of them are birthday wishes and tell me a story. But the others are asking for advice or pep talks. And I'll tell you one thing that's really been touching to me is three or four times a week somebody will message me or email me and say that I said something or I messaged them and I talked them out

[58:44] of committing su- which is just mind-blowing to me. You know, it's funny we we get so wrapped up in our own lives. We don't really think about other people's suffering. And um you know, if somebody reaches out and says Let me back up. I've got a a friend. Every time we'd have a conversation

[59:18] he would say, "I'm going to kill myself. I'm going to kill myself." And I'd say, "Dude, you've been telling me for years that you're going to kill yourself. You're not going to kill yourself. Then he got in trouble. He decided, "Okay, he's going to do it. He's going to kill himself." He drives to a Walmart because he doesn't want to mess up his mom's house. He has a gun. He puts the gun in his mouth just as an off-duty ATF agent is pulling into the parking lot to do his grocery shopping. Sees him with a gun,

[59:50] pulls his gun, "Drop the gun! Drop the gun!" Arrests him. Now, my buddy had a felony conviction at some point years and years ago. They got him for felon with a gun. Mandatory minimum 5 years. So, he calls me one night. I get this call from from a a jail in Wyoming. I was like, "What? Who in the world would be calling me from a jail?" So, I'm intrigued enough. I answer the call. It's him. I said, "What the [ __ ] are you

[1:00:20] doing in a jail in Wyoming?" And he tells me, "I was going to kill myself and I went to the Walmart parking lot." So, I find him a lawyer. The lawyer gets him out on bail. He had a son with his girlfriend and um she was just so appalled that he had gotten himself into trouble again. She wouldn't let him see the the child. So, he's depressed and he's calling me every day, "I'm going to kill myself." I said, "James, you're not going to kill yourself. You're going to pick your pick yourself up by the bootstraps and you're going to

[1:00:51] fight this thing." And then he called me one day. And he said, "Hey, I got bad news. My sister lit off a firecracker and she blew three fingers off." I was like, "Oh my god, that's terrible news." "Oh, she was in surgery for like 14 hours and they attached her fingers back." I said, "Oh my god, what a terrible thing." Two days later, she calls me. And I said, "Hey, how are your fingers doing?" And she said, "The fingers are fine. I got to tell you, James killed himself last night." And I was like, "What? I just talked

[1:01:22] him. 2 days ago, he sounded great." And she said he sounded great because he finally made the decision to do it. And he was at peace with himself. But she said the reason I'm calling is he left a note. And he said, "Please tell John that I said I was sorry." And the reason why I'm still so mad about this have you ever heard of the folk singer Pete Seeger? Pete is one of the giants of 20th century American history. And and one of my idols and role models.

[1:01:56] "This land is your land." Pete made that uh famous. It's Woody Guthrie song. But anyway, Pete wrote dozens of songs that you know every word to. He told me one time a story about Phil Ochs, who was also a gigantic folk singer of the '60s and '70s. Pete said he was finishing up a concert at a at a folk club in uh in Greenwich Village one night, and he had to literally run to Grand Central Station to get the last train of the

[1:02:28] night back to Beacon, New York, which is where he lived. And as he's packing up his guitar one of the waitresses said, "Pete, Phil Ochs is on the phone for you." And he grabs the phone, he said, "Phil, I can't talk right now. I got to run to catch the last train to Beacon. Call me tomorrow." and hung up. And Phil Ochs killed himself. And he said, "That selfish prick will never know how many people he hurt by taking his own life that night." And I never understood that anger

[1:02:58] until my friend James killed himself. And I'm furious with him 5 years after he did it. Like, doggone you. Why didn't you call me? Yeah. Well, anyway, >> Cuz you answered so many times. >> So many times. I went on Facebook and I said, "My friend James killed himself last night." And I said, "Please call somebody. Call me if you're thinking of killing yourself." And three of my Facebook friends called me that night.

[1:03:29] I had no idea so many people were suffering. No idea. So, you know, I think we always have to be we have to remind ourselves to be more aware of the feelings of others and not be so wrapped up in our own lives. It's easy to be wrapped up in your own life, but we really have to be cognizant of what other people are suffering through. Right. >> This is how I think I cannot function unless you are. >> You're absolutely right. >> John, you've spent

[1:04:00] a good majority of your life serving America. Not just the country, but our people. You've exposed a dark part of the system when you thought that we've gone too far. Many agreed. Even when it cost you everything. If every interview, every Tik Tok, every book you've written, every cameo was erased from the face of the earth, >> [gasps] >> what is the one story from your life that you would want to leave with the world? >> Oh, that's an easy one. Thank you.

[1:04:32] That I told the truth. If we don't have the truth, we don't have anything. We really don't. The truth always has a way of coming out. Sometimes it takes a long time, years, decades, but the truth always comes out. And we should want to be on the right side of it. If there's one thing that my children can be proud of, it's that I told the truth. I have lots of faults just like every other human,

[1:05:03] but at least I want to be known for telling the truth. And one more. Aside from the truth or maybe on that vein, what's the best piece of advice someone has given you? >> When I was in college, somebody told me that Senator Jennings Randolph of West Virginia was listed in the Washington D.C. telephone book.

[1:05:36] And I looked and there he was. And I called him. And I said, "Senator Randolph, you don't know me. I'm a student at George Washington University. And I just wanted to thank you for your 50 years of service to our country." Going back to Franklin Roosevelt, he was elected in the election of 1934, this senator. And he said, "Why, thank you, young man." And he said, "May I offer you some advice?" And I said, "Senator, anything

[1:06:07] you have to say, I'd love to hear it." And he said, "Always do the right thing. This city is too full of people who are willing to do the expedient thing." And I said, "I'm going to write that down." And he says, "You have a good night." And he hung up. And I've always remembered it. I actually did write it down and I stuck it inside a book, which I still have. >> Right. >> Mhm. And you know, it's funny. I was a

[1:06:37] little bit starstruck at the time. But as I've aged and I've accumulated, you know, life events of my own, I realized that just those few words were really, really important. It's It's so much easier to do what's expedient. It's easier to do what might make us a little bit of money. And you come to realize life's not about the money. You know, we're all going to end up in the ground someday.

[1:07:07] I I read something that was very depressing in the Washington Post the other day. It said, "We all die two deaths. We die when we take our last breath, and we die when our name is spoken for the last time." Well, I don't want my name spoken for a last time. I want to be remembered for something. And what I want is to be remembered as someone who told the truth. Beautiful.

[1:07:39] >> [sighs] >> Well, everyone, uh this has been your guest, John Kiriakou. >> Mhm. >> John, is there anything uh any platforms you want to shout out specifically? >> for asking. Yeah, I'm on I'm on Instagram, Facebook, and and X, and uh and LinkedIn. But, I'm launching a new um podcast in July on YouTube. If you go to realjohnkiriakou, I'd really appreciate it if you would subscribe so that when

[1:08:10] we hit the ground running the first week of July, you're on and you don't miss a an episode. >> Number one podcast in the world, I hope. >> Uh I hope so. >> This is the Jack Ryan podcast. I appreciate you coming on, man. >> Thank you so much for the invitation.
