Title: Reveals Terrifying CIA Technology
Show: John Kiriakou Podcast
Date: 2026-05-25
URL: https://youtu.be/csLkVGSYwYU
Duration: 67:00

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[00:00] No record. There's no trace of it. Completely anonymous. You don't have to show any ID or anything. So, that's how they transfer drug money. That's how terrorist groups finance themselves. But the Dubaians have a have a beat on it. So, that's you were there to educate them on that? >> No, I was there to ask them how the heck do you do this? >> Oh. Yeah, and they were like, "Well, there are a lot of threats that take place at the same time.

[00:31] Yeah, like we can beat you on the soles of your feet with a baseball bat or you can give us copies of your ledger every day at the end of the work day. >> [cough] >> The Middle East. Your choice. Your choice, that's right. So, the you had the US sorted out the hawala problem at this time because I would assume that terrorists were using it in the US? >> and they continue to use it. The The US

[01:03] Hawalas are easy enough to infiltrate. Um, any FBI agent can go to this Arabic bakery and they probably already have gone to the Arabic bakery in Bethesda, Maryland and said, "Look, you know, we're going to [ __ ] you up or you're going to give us access to your books." It's The US government is far more worried about uh cryptocurrency. Mhm. Yeah, that's why, you know, doing my taxes this most recent uh iteration, they asked me quick and asked me three different times if I had bought or sold crypto.

[01:33] Like, how many Why three times? It's because they're so worried about terrorist financing and money laundering. Like, have you bought or sold crypto? Are you sure you haven't bought or sold crypto? Maybe you forgot. You want to think about it a minute. Have you bought or sold crypto? I'm like, "No, I don't have any crypto." But they're very worried about it. Well, what I was going to ask is because the way the way the blockchain and I don't know much about it, but the way it's written so to speak, they don't they don't have any ends. They don't?

[02:03] Legitimately, they do not have any ends. No. And that's why the likes of Coinbase just open their books to the to the government. Cuz they don't want to be implicated in terrorist financing and money laundering. Mhm. So, um to come back to the Mossad >> Mhm. I told this for for people that listened to the had a historian Rick Rick Spence. He's a He's You know Rick Spence? Um so, for people that heard me tell the story on that podcast, sorry about that, but I want to get John's take on it and you'll hear why. So, um there was a

[02:36] This was a a documentary that was that came out of Israel. So, it was all on the up and up. And there was a Mossad officer that told the story about um they recruited an asset who, let's say he was like some sort of, you know, goat herder or something in, I believe, let's I think it was Syria. And so, they recruit the guy and eventually the Palestinians come to the guy and they wanted to recruit him because his he was in close proximity to the Israeli border. >> Sure. Um again, I don't know if it was Syria, but whatever, let's just say it was. So, the Palestinians come to him

[03:09] and then he goes and tells uh the Mossad and they're like, "Hey, I got approached by these guys. They want to know about some either border setup or movement of the IDF." And what the Mossad said is, "Okay, give me the information because let's just assume what you can see, they can see. And it's all out there. Build a relationship give me the information." Gives it to them. So, then they come back to him and they say, "Okay, we want you to find a spot in the border wall for us to cross into Israel." Oh boy. So, he goes to the Mossad and he tells them this and they say, "Okay, let's let's go find a spot in the border wall together. And then

[03:39] when they come through, there'll be a warm welcome waiting for them." So, they pick the spot. He goes and tells the Palestinians and they say, "Okay, great. Thanks." The night before the operation, they tell him they say, "Oh yeah, and by the way, as an insurance policy, you're coming with us." >> Oh, [ __ ] >> tells the Mossad this. And they said, "Well, if you If you say no, they'll get spooked, and they'll either you'll blow your cover, or they'll kill you." Mhm. So, go with them, and when you cross the border, hit the deck, and we have ways to make sure that you don't get shot.

[04:11] And essentially, that was all [ __ ] And the way that the Mossad officer described it was sacrificing a pawn off the chessboard. And so, I don't say that to illustrate the fact that, "Oh my god, the Mossad is so bad." Like, intelligence is is a dirty game. I think we're all well aware of that. But, the point What I got from that is why the hell would they be saying this? Number one, to to speak to the ruthlessness of the Mossad, sure. The mystique, I think that that is beneficial to an intelligence agency. But, >> a Palestinian,

[04:41] >> That's what I'm saying. Why would you want to work with any agency? >> Yeah. Do they burn assets like that? Oh, I'm sure that they do. I'm sure that they do. But, that's in no no other no other intelligence service would would have sent somebody sent a recruited asset to his death like that. That doesn't make any sense. But, the Israelis are not like anybody else. They're not. It's just another Palestinian to them. So, what's an example operationally like that that you could think of when you're

[05:11] like, "The Israelis are different"? In almost everything that the Israelis do. When I was The first time I went on Piers Morgan, I debated a former director of the Mossad. And the guy just couldn't stop chuckling all through the I mean, it was ridiculous. I said things like, "The Israelis spy on the United States." "Oh, no, no, not since Jonathan Pollard." And I said, "Well, Jonathan Pollard was

[05:42] caught in 1985, and you were spying on the United States in 1998, you know, or 2004. No comment. It's like, what what is that? We would never We're not permitted to spy on the Israelis. We're not permitted. The the potential for blowback is is outrageous. Can you imagine if we spied on the Israelis and got caught? Every member of Congress would be demanding the CIA director's head. Do

[06:13] you think that we really don't spy on the Israelis? That was verboten when I was there. I was surprised to hear you say that in that interview because I figured it's this gentleman's game, so to speak. >> Mhm. With most other places, post-9/11, you know, we developed the Five Eyes and we don't spy on each other in the Five Eyes. Uh the Five Eyes being US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. You know, we literally sit next to each other in each other's headquarters. I remember when George Tenet ordered us to open the files, he said, and he meant literally open the files. And so we've

[06:45] had this Five Eyes relationship ever since. And of course, we have very, very close relationships with other countries. Not a ton, but a lot. But the Israelis are special. Yeah, we do not spy on the Israelis. What about the Brits? Like I don't know why. Do they have a reputation of being I don't want to Not ruthless necessarily, but what What was your experience with the Brits? >> The The Brits are very good at what they do. And the One of the reasons why they're very good Well, there are

[07:16] several reasons. One, because they're everywhere, right? Most of these countries were colonies of the UK at one time or another. But they're also very good because they have only a fraction of the bureaucracy that we do. If we have an idea for an operation or for a covert action program, we have to go through 6 months and a dozen layers of permissions, you know, lawyers from this office and lawyers from that office. The Brits want to do something, they just say, "Hey, we're going to do this." And then they go out and do it. I remember a boss of mine in in counterterrorism just

[07:47] saying, "I I was on my way out to London. We were doing a joint operation." And he said, "Boy, I I wish we were like the Brits. If they want to do something, a week later they're doing it." And I mentioned that to the Brits one time. And my counterpart said, "Yeah, but we wish we had your budget." Mhm. And I said, "Yeah, you guys can never touch our budget. Nobody can." Um this is completely unrelated, but I don't know why I thought of this. Didn't

[08:17] you do an op uh with Billy Waugh? Oh, yeah. Yeah. In the Emirates. Again, you'd say what that was? I cannot, unfortunately. It was It was We did two things. We were there to do some training classes. But we were there for a sensitive electronic kind of thing. But Billy was Billy was bonafide American hero. Truly. A real hero.

[08:47] Yeah, I mean, if people aren't that aren't familiar, he was uh he was former I mean, [ __ ] man. He was one of the uh the Vietnam SF guys. He was a Green Beret. And then he was he served at the CIA for like 40 years or something. Yeah, he was in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. And to the best of my recollection, had 17 Purple Hearts. He had a He had a personalized license plate that said 17 hits. And I said, "Billy, that's that's a joke, right?" And he said, "No, it's not a joke. I got 17 Purple Hearts." I said, "That has to

[09:19] be like Guinness Book of World Records kind of thing." And he says He had a terrible, terrible, filthy mouth. And he's like, "Nah, there's some sorry-ass son of a [ __ ] from North Carolina got 18." But he used to He used to tell stories, too. Like he told told this story once about about being shot down behind North Korean lines. And he would forget that he had told me the story. And so he would tell it over and over and over. And then the final time that he that he told me the story,

[09:50] he was naked, first of all. Secondly, um he he came upon a cow in a pasture and he slit the cow's uh artery and drank the blood um for nourishment because he was starving. I go, "That was in Apocalypse Now. >> [laughter] >> That wasn't you. That was from Apocalypse Now." And he's like, "Ah, it still makes for a good story." Oh, that's great. He was a good guy. Was Was he uh Did he even have ground branch back then or was

[10:21] he just a contractor or Yeah, he was just a contractor. He was a contractor and he was fearless. I mean, when I knew him, he was already well into his 70s. And, you know, died in his 90s. Never had children. His He was deeply in love with his wife, but she had died of cancer. So he was alone. And then 9/11 hit. And what else is there to live for? He's got no kids. Bought a house in It was like uh Yeah, friendly friendly's town or

[10:52] or Sunshineville or It had some stupid made-up name in Florida. Um I can't remember the name of it. And he had a niece who lived in Las Vegas and she she ghost wrote his autobiography. And I was glad somebody did cuz his stories, whether or not they were a little embellished, his stories are an important part of modern American history. And there really needed to be a written record of them. Yeah. Niceville. Niceville. That's the >> Something American.

[11:22] >> Yeah. Niceville, Florida. Were you at the agency when they stood up the GRS program? No, I had already gone. I had already gone, but I was dating a woman at the time whose soon-to-be ex-husband was in GRS, and she said, "My husband's a GRS officer." I said, "What's GRS?" She looked at me kind of funny, and she told me, and I said, "Oh, [ __ ] They've made it official?" So, what was it before they made it official? >> It was just like, "Hey, you doing anything for the next week? We're going to need for you to do this thing. Don't

[11:54] tell anybody." Yeah, now it's an office. But, wasn't it wasn't it stood up to be like security for case officers? Mm, security for leaders more than case Well, no, that's not true. Security for case officers, yes, especially as it related to operating in the green zone in Baghdad. That That's where most of them were doing their work. Cuz the green zone was easily infiltrated. Yeah, moving from point A to point B, you took your life in your hands every time. Those guys

[12:24] I mean, you have to be a brave son of a gun to to do a job like that. I mean, you can say about a lot of different agency jobs, "Oh, that job's not for everybody." That job? You really have to be fearless. You really do. Cuz your your job is literally to throw your body in front of the other guy so the other guy doesn't get killed and can complete the meeting. Yeah, thankless. I can't remember who it was. It was

[12:54] somebody who was in GRS was talking about Yemen and how Yemen was like a spy craft playground. >> I've been to Yemen five times. In your prior life? >> Mhm. In what context? Each time was for a different thing. Um, the first time I went it was kind of funny. Um, the first time I went, there were two Yemens. Right? There was the Republic of Yemen, North Yemen, and then the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, which was a Soviet satellite state. And um things were looking really good the

[13:25] first time I went. The two Yemens in the process of merging and becoming one unified Yemen. People were literally dancing in the streets. This uh I I went that first time from Jeddah. I was I was in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and uh two friends of mine were stationed in in Sana'a. And so they said, "Hey, you know, the prophet's birthday is Monday, so it's a 3-day weekend. You want to come down to to Yemen? We'll hang out." I said, "Yeah, I'd never been to Yemen." So I just flew down. We had a great time.

[13:55] Second time I went, this one unified Yemen thing, it's not working out the way they thought it was. And so there weren't really any benefits, and the North Yemenis were trying to dominate the South Yemenis, and it just wasn't good. The third time I went, they're launching Scud missiles at each other, right? And then the it was the first civil war, and then the North defeated the South. And then the vice president, um Ali Abdullah Saleh, uh he was a South Yemeni. He fled to South

[14:25] fled to Oman to save himself. And the fourth time I went, it was it was grim. Where it wasn't safe to stay anywhere except the Marriott, which had 30-ft blast walls all around it. The last time I went, I was with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And we were just getting ready to close the embassy and evacuate everybody. So I go there. I'm staying at the Marriott,

[14:57] and security is crazy heavy. It's actually kind of funny. I I alluded to this in a Senate report that I wrote. Um but I I had never seen security like this anywhere. And there are these guys right outside the lobby of the hotel, and they've got machine guns, like obviously, like, you know, MAC-9s, MAC-10s, and they're speaking English, American English. And I said to the to the boab, the the

[15:28] doorman, I said uh "Men who know who who's here?" And he goes "V VIP." Like that. I said V VIP who? Mrs. Clinton? He goes "No, it's a man." I said uh "Is it uh Mr. Cheney?" Or no, it wasn't Cheney, it was Biden. He was vice president at the time. Uh Biden? And he says "No." I said "Who is it?" He goes "I don't know." So then I hear um "The package is

[15:59] moving. The package is moving." So I'm just standing there. And then here comes the V VIP and he looks at me and he goes "Hello, John." And I said "Hello, Steve." Cappas, the deputy director of CIA. And he gets in his limo and I go "What, no ride for me?" >> [laughter] >> And he drives away like a six-car convoy. I had to wait for my, you know, one poorly armored 10-year-old Volkswagen to come and pick me up. It was so rude. Anyway,

[16:30] I was on the CIA [ __ ] list by then. >> Yeah. So um the reason why it was so bad, just a couple of days before I arrived, a group of well, about a week before I arrived, a group of of six South Korean diplomats had arrived to talk to the Yemeni government about a development project. And on the road from the airport to the hotel, they were ambushed by Al-Qaeda and they were all assassinated. And so a few days after that, the South Korean government sent a group of South

[17:00] Korean intelligence officers to investigate the terrorist attack. And they were ambushed on the road to the hotel and they were all assassinated. The Koreans just shut the embassy down and evacuated everybody. It's it's grim. It really is. And there's no hope in sight. Yeah, I remember hearing about there was a I mean obviously a lot of terror going on in Yemen but wasn't there um I want to say it was some I think it was the Saudi intelligence head that almost got killed by the guy with the bomb up his ass.

[17:30] >> Yeah, that was uh the sha- that was Prince Muhammad bin Nayef. But wasn't that directed by uh the American guy in Yemen all on Awlaki or whatever the hell his name was? That was the rumor. I never believed that to be the case because Awlaki was more of a propagandist than he wasn't operational in any way. You know, I met him. Yeah, in fact I was the only CIA officer. Well, here here's what happened. I'm in Arabic training in 1993.

[18:02] And our in the CIA language school and the the instructor says, "We're going to go out on a field trip today. We're going to go to Falls Church, Virginia and that's where all the Arabs live. So, we're going to go to um the Quran store. There's a there's a store in the strip mall in Falls Church that just sells Qurans. And apparently they do perfectly fine for themselves. So, we're going to go to the Quran store, then we're going to go to the Arabic grocery store, and then we're going to go to the shish kebab restaurant, but you can't speak English.

[18:33] And then after lunch, we're going to go to the mosque. There's a gigantic mosque on uh Route 7 in Falls Church. We're going to go to the mosque and we're going to talk about Islam, but you can't speak English. We're like, "Cool." And we had done this a couple times. We went to the zoo to learn the names of the animals in English and then we had you know we did all different kinds of field trips. So, we go go do this thing and we learn the the word for you know fava beans and we learn the word for newspaper and

[19:04] we're trying to talk to the shopkeepers. We order lunch in Arabic. And then we go to the the mosque. Well, Anwar al-Awlaki was the Imam of the mosque. And 8 years later that's where the 9/11 hijackers prayed the night before 9/11. Anwar al-Awlaki was born in um New Mexico. He was Yemeni. His father was the Yemeni ambassador to the United States who went back to Yemen to become the Minister of Agriculture.

[19:34] Solidly pro-American. Anwar was born in New Mexico, raised as an American spoke English without any kind of accent. Just spoke English like you and I speak English. But self-radicalized during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. And then joined al-Qaeda before 9/11, in like '98 or '99. So after 9/11, I just I mentioned offhandedly one day

[20:07] "Oh, al-Awlaki? I met him." People like, "What?" I said, "Yeah. And in my Arabic class, we went to the mosque. And he gave us a tour of the mosque, and we had a Q&A, and then he gave us tea, and next thing I know, security's down. Like, "We need to go over this from the beginning." Cuz everybody else had left the agency by then. All the other students had moved on to other careers, and the the instructor had retired, and I was the only one left who had actually met al-Awlaki. I'm like, "Guys, it was one

[20:38] afternoon. I don't know what I can tell you that's going to be of any operational value." But then I did go to Yemen. And um funny thing, you know, I have this relationship with the FBI, right? So I go I go to Yemen. And nobody in the CIA would speak to me. I was with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. So I go to see the FBI, the Legat, the Legal Attaché. So I walk in, and I I knock on the door, and I said, "Hey." And the guy says, "Ah, John Kiriakou, born August 9th, 1964, Sharon,

[21:10] Pennsylvania. Graduated from New Castle High School, New Castle, Pennsylvania. Bachelor's degree in Middle Eastern Studies, Master's in Legislative Affairs from George Washington University." I go, "Very funny. Very funny." He says, "You're going to do me a favor." And I said, "Really? What favor's that?" He said, "You're going to go back to your Congressional Committee, and you're going to get me funding for two more slots out here." And I said, "Really? What's in it for me?" He says, "I'll give you a classified briefing."

[21:40] I said, "Okay, I'll take that deal." So, I I did get him slots for two more FBI agents, but in the course of that conversation, I said, "So, what do you do? Sit here and play with your balls, or you out looking for Anwar al-Awlaki?" And he said, "Al-Awlaki, I know when al-Awlaki blows a fart," he says. He said, "I know al-Awlaki's location to within 3 ft, 24 hours a day." And I said, "Why don't you take him out?" He said, "Well, that's

[22:11] that's the other side of the hall's job." And then, sure enough, couple months later, they blow him to a thousand pieces. Uh Who was the classified briefing on? Al-Awlaki. Oh, okay. Yeah. I don't know. Uh well, actually, speaking of uh like the Saudis, uh didn't We didn't cover this last time, but didn't Abu Zubaydah's diary have the names and phone numbers of three of them? Three princes. >> But then, something weird happened to them?

[22:42] We went to the Saudis, and we said, "Look, there there are three princes in Abu Zubaydah's address book with their personal cell phone numbers. You need to take care of this, or we're going to take care of it. And you're not going to like the way we do it." Next thing you know, like magic, one of them dies on the operating table while getting bariatric bypass surgery. One is killed in a one-car accident on the Riyadh to Jeddah highway. And one of them goes camping in the desert and dies of thirst.

[23:14] Mhm. And then they said, "Listen, you know, we wanted to help you out with those three princes, but they they don't exist anymore." So, were the Saudis friends? In that context, I would argue that they weren't because that means that none of those guys are available for interrogation. Ah. It was better to murder their own relatives than to allow them to be interrogated by the CIA. Probably because they had information up

[23:47] there that the Saudis didn't want >> Mhm. the CIA to find out. Mhm. I've been in relatively close touch recently with Abu Zubaydah's attorneys. Um I asked one if he would agree to sit for my podcast, and he immediately said yes. So, we had a long conversation about Abu Zubaydah. And at the end of it, we'd stopped recording and I said, "Would you do me a favor? Would you tell Abu Zubaydah" They don't call him Abu Zubaydah, they call him Zayn. Zayn al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn

[24:17] is his actual name. I just by force of habit I call him Abu Zubaydah. So, I said, "Would you tell him that I send my best. I'm sorry for what our country did to him. I know that he's innocent and that he should be released. And I hope he is someday." And the attorney says, "Actually, he has a message for you. I told him I was going to talk to you today." He goes, "He says first, his recollection of the night you caught him is different from yours." >> [laughter]

[24:47] >> I said, "Undoubtedly, it is different." Um but that's okay. His recollection is probably I stood up and I told them, you know. Anyway, um he says uh the night that you blew the whistle on the torture program, a friendly guard at Guantanamo went to his cell and said, "A CIA man went public today about what happened to you." And he said it was the first time he had experienced a sensation of hope.

[25:17] That was December 2007. And he says he wanted me to tell you he hopes that the two of you can have dinner someday as free men. I said, "Tell him I send my best and I'll pray for that." Wouldn't hold my breath on that one. No. You know, one of the sad things about that as a postscript is he was weeks from being released at the end of the Biden administration. They had They had made the decision to release him. They were in negotiations with different

[25:48] countries to take him. They couldn't find a country that would agree to take him. And then Trump won. And so he's not going anywhere. All right. So Did uh So I'll just I'll I made some notes uh throughout that um we can come back to. So um I forget what it was. When Did they ever teach you Oh, right. Worst case uh as a CIA officer, right? You pitch a You pitch an agent. He flips the table over

[26:19] and says, "I'm going to report you." Other worst case is, you know, you're operating abroad. You are brought in by the authorities of that country or, you know, God forbid a terrorist organization or something. Did they teach you guys um counter-interrogation or SERE? Not SERE. But counter-interrogation techniques, yeah. You know, we even have coffee mugs with the admit nothing, deny everything, make counter-accusations. Uh If you're If you're overseas and you're under official cover, all you have to say is, "Look, diplomatic immunity. Call the

[26:49] American Embassy." That's it. Done. I'm not saying another word. Call the American embassy. If you're kidnapped by a terrorist organization, that's an entirely different issue. You know, Bill Buckley, the CIA learned so many lessons, painful, terrible lessons with the kidnapping of Bill Buckley in 1984. Bill Buckley was the CIA station chief in Beirut and was was kidnapped by um elements of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. They kidnapped him in the parking garage of his apartment building.

[27:21] And um they knew that he had a tracker, a tracking device in his belt buckle. So, the first thing they did is they just took the belt off of him and threw it out the car window. And so, we didn't have any idea where he was. About a month later, the American embassy in Athens receives a VHS tape showing Buckley being tortured. And he's begging the agency to help him. And then um another like six months pass or four months, whatever it

[27:52] is. It's out there in in the media. Uh the American embassy in Rome receives a video tape. And he's like just hanging from a hook and there's snot coming out of his mouth and he's mumbling something that you can't understand. And then we had a source tell us that they just executed him after a while. And um we were able to get his body back. And then the people who kidnapped him from from Pidge, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, no longer exist.

[28:23] So, we took care of them and then got the body back. And he's buried at Arlington Cemetery. Now, I go every once in a while. I live walking distance from Arlington Cemetery. So, I go see the the CIA station chief from Athens and go see Buckley and um Mike Spann and people like that. So, uh we learned a lot of lessons there. Yeah. Did you know Mike Spann? Yeah, sure. Wasn't he of the Ground Branch guys that was uh the immediately in in Drawbreaker on the ground? >> Yeah. We we worked 10 ft away from each other.

[28:56] We're in the same that bullpen area. Yeah, good guy, nice guy, good family man. Yeah. Looking back at what happened to him, I can only imagine the panic that must have set in. He was He was at Lashkar-e-Taiba I'm sorry um He was at uh Oh [ __ ] I forget the name of the fort in northern Afghanistan. We had just caught um

[29:27] John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban, and uh The name's going to come to me. And there was an uprising among all these Taliban and Al-Qaeda prisoners we had caught, and Mike and a couple of other guys were were soon overwhelmed. They ended up just opening fire on these guys, and they ran out of bullets, and then he was stomped to death. That's how he died. They stomped him to death. Mhm. >> [clears throat] >> Like deliberately by >> Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

[29:57] I can only imagine the panic. What was the name of that fort? I can't remember anymore. But he he died a hero's death. Man, the absolute balls on those guys. >> Mhm. And that was what? Before the end of September, right? Or the very beginning of October? >> beginning, I think of October. No, that's not right, because the uprising was to the best of my recollection on

[30:28] the on the 30th of November, maybe? I think it was the 30th of November 2001. Yeah. And so um again, another thing we didn't talk about is uh your we didn't really get into your time with with Carey, but I think there was one funny story that you didn't tell here that involved the CIA and well, funny's maybe the wrong word choice, but the with the whole Dasht-e Leili thing.

[31:01] Dasht-e Leili? Yeah. So, on November 30th and December 1st of 2001, 2,000 Taliban soldiers gave up en masse to the Northern Alliance at Dasht-e Leili in northern Afghanistan. And the Northern Alliance came to us and said, "We can't hold 2,000 prisoners. What should we do?" And we told them to put them in trucks, truck them out into the desert, and

[31:32] let's just hold them there out in the desert until we can divide them up and send them to jails around the country. So, General Abdul Rashid Dostum, who's like the greatest traitor in the history of of Afghanistan, he's he's with the Northern Alliance, then he's with the Taliban, then he's with the Northern Alliance again, then he's with the Taliban again, and he's just a just a traitor of of the worst ilk. And um he was in charge of these prisoners. So,

[32:05] they trucked these 2,000 people jammed into containers out into the desert. And one of the 16 survivors told us that when they opened the trucks, the bodies fell out like sardines from a can because nobody had punched air holes in the trucks, and there was no food or water. And so, almost all 2,000 of them suffocated. We always believed Dostum did it on purpose

[32:35] because he was that kind of a psychopath. So, Barack Obama promised during the 2008 campaign to investigate the what's what's now called the Dasht-e Leili massacre. And he said, you know, if I'm elected president, I'm going to order the National Security Council to begin this investigation, blah blah blah. Never happened. Cuz the agency got to him right away. Anyway, 2009, I find myself as the senior investigator on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And a human rights activist, quite a prominent, important, well-known human rights

[33:05] activist calls me and says he needs to see me privately, like secretly. So, we meet in a darkened, unused classroom at Johns Hopkins University. I go. I say, "What's up?" And he says, "You know the Dasht-e Leili massacre?" I said, "Of course." He said, "I've got a a witness who has just come forward. He was 12 at the time, but he was behind a rock when they were opening the trucks. We used to call

[33:35] it the box up. So, he he had witnessed the sort of unveiling of the of the containers. And there were two guys there wearing blue jeans and black shirts and speaking English. And I said, "Well, I mean, who's in Dasht-e Leili, Afghanistan on December the 1st, 2001, wearing a black T-shirt and blue jeans and speaking English?" So, this kid had become an American citizen. He had held this inside all these years.

[34:07] Approached him and said, "Look, I don't know if this is important, but this is what I saw." So, I went to Kerry and I said, "I met with this human rights activist, whom he knew. And uh I said, you know, the president did say he was going to reopen the case and get to the bottom of Dasht-e Leili." Kerry says, "Okay, write a letter to the agency. Ask if there were agency personnel on the ground. So, I write a letter. And uh we auto pen it, you know, John Kerry, chairman.

[34:38] Like 6 weeks pass. And a colleague of mine walks in and he says, "Hey, uh you got a response from the agency to your letter." I said, "I just checked my mail an hour ago. I didn't see any response from the agency." He said they classified it top secret, so it's downstairs in the vault. And at the time, I only had a secret clearance. I said, "Well, what did it say?" And he said, uh "Says go [ __ ] yourself." I was like, "Oh, okay. So, that's how they want to play it." So, I was going to go guns blazing, right? Call the Washington Post, tell

[35:10] the story, and then Kerry calls me. He's like, "Stop. Stop." I said, "Come on now." I said, "The president specifically said he wanted us to get to the bottom of Dasht-e Leili." And Kerry says, "Yeah, and now he doesn't." So, did the agency know that it was you on his staff? >> Absolutely. 100% yes. >> [laughter] >> Go [ __ ] yourself. I was like, "All right. All right." I can call the post, too.

[35:41] >> [laughter] >> Yeah. Um anything else stand out from your time with Kerry that you don't typically talk about? I was so excited to work for John Kerry and he turned out to be a coward. Just a mainstream nobody. All he ever talked about was how desperately he wanted to be Secretary of State and how he got ripped off and Hillary Clinton stole his job from him. There were only two times when I ever gave John Kerry unsolicited advice.

[36:12] Once. It's a little bit of a story. We have time? >> yeah. So, he asked me to write him a speech. He had a speech writer, but on stuff that was like really specific to the Middle East, I did it. So, he's going to give a speech at like the Smithsonian Institution or Council on Foreign Relations, something I I don't remember anymore. This is 2009. Let me back up, actually.

[36:43] So, in in 2008, I had my own little business. And Mack McLarty, who had been Bill Clinton's chief of staff at the White House, Mack very generously offered me an office and a part-time secretary in McLarty Associates. Back then it was Kissinger McLarty. I I was very I was very indebted to him. He was very kind to me. So, one of the guys on the board of directors of McLarty was Governor Bill Richardson, Congressman Bill Richardson, Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson, Ambassador to

[37:15] the United Nations Bill Richardson. And Bill and I loved each other. I even voted for him for president in 2008 after he quit race. And I told him, "Bill, I still voted for you." Anyway, anyway, um we really got along. And so, he he comes into my office. Let me think of the date. It was like January of 2008. January, December 2007, something like

[37:45] that. And he says to me, it was Ja- it was No, it wasn't. It was February of 2008. He says, "Hey, do you have a minute?" I said, "Of course." He said, "Something crazy happened over the weekend." He said, "I invited Obama to my house to watch the Super Bowl. Super Bowl's like first Sunday in February now. And um he said, "At halftime, we went for a walk. He put his arm around me and he said, 'Bill,

[38:16] if you can endorse me and you bring the Hispanic vote, Secretary of State.' I said, 'You going to do it?" He goes, "Of course I'm going to do it." I said, "Awesome." He goes, "I want you to be my deputy chief of staff." I said, "Done. I'll take it." He He is chief of staff from when he was governor, really sweet guy. He was going to be chief of staff. I said, "I'm in. I'll take it." So, the months are passing, like, "Oh my god, I I can't believe and Obama's going to win and Richardson's going to be going to be Secretary of State and I'm

[38:47] going to be ambassador to Greece or, you know, it's going to be awesome." November comes, Obama wins. So, the day after the election, I go into the office and I said, I go like this, I go, "Mr. Secretary, congratulations." He goes, "Man, I am so excited. I can't even sleep. I'm so excited." Couple of weeks later, I'm in the shower and I had a radio in my in my, you know, bathroom, sitting on the on the sink. And I'm listening to the news station in

[39:18] DC, WTOP, and they said, "Former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson has been tapped by President-elect Obama to be Secretary of Commerce." And I was like, "What?" So, I get dressed. I go into the office and I go, "Mr. Secretary, congratulations." He goes like this, he goes, "What the [ __ ] do I know about commerce? Tell me. What the [ __ ] do I know about commerce?" And I said, "No, no, no. We can make something out of this." >> [laughter] >> I go, "There's the foreign commercial

[39:48] service. I said, "There's the international trade representative. We can turn this into something. You do it for the first term and then Secretary of State in the second term." He goes, "I'm so mad, I could explode." Couple of more weeks pass, same thing, I'm in the shower. I got the news on and they said, "Former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson has withdrawn his nomination to be Secretary of Commerce." I was like, "Fuck." So, I go in the office and he said, "I just couldn't do it. I just couldn't do

[40:19] it." He said, "I honestly have zero interest in trade. Nothing." I said, "No, that's cool. I'll figure something out." Then, I get hired by Kerry. So, I write the speech with him. One of the things about Kerry I always hated is he thinks he's smarter than everybody else in the room. And so, you've got this very carefully scripted speech for him to write and he'll just start winging it and meandering all over the place and his sentences have no verbs in them and you

[40:50] don't know what the heck he's talking about or what the point is and then he can't remember where he left off and he's like looking at the different sheets of paper. I hated when he would do that. So, I think it was at the Smithsonian we must have been. And he's reading the speech, he's giving the speech, you know, the Middle East, the peace process and all this stuff. And then he says, "You know, I was supposed to be the Secretary of State." And I thought, "Oh, no. Oh, no." And he says, "I invited President Obama to my house for Christmas."

[41:23] So, this is like four five weeks before Richardson. And he said, "Uh they're sitting there having a having a little drink and Obama says, 'John, if you endorse me and you can bring the Kennedy family along, Secretary of State.' So, Kerry, nobody remembers this, Kerry was the first senator to endorse Obama and a week later the whole Kennedy family endorses Obama. It was a big deal because Kerry was close to the to the

[41:55] Clintons and both Kerry and and Hillary were on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee together. And he says, "But, uh you know, that's Washington politics. I got screwed." So, afterwards I said, "Senator, you can't say in public that you were you were supposed to be Secretary of State." I said, "Bill Richardson tells exactly the same story." I said, "Obama promised half a dozen people in Washington that they would be Secretary of State." He promised uh what's-his-face that that died at the

[42:25] at the State Department. I forget his name now. The special negotiator for Yugoslavia. Anyway, he's promising everybody they're going to be Secretary of State. That was the one time. He goes, "I know, I'm still bitter. I can't help it." The other time, I get a call from the Lebanese ambassador. And he's like, "What's your boss's problem?" I said, "Well, now what did he do?" He says, "He gave an interview and he keeps calling Bashar al-Assad my dear friend Bashar al-Assad." I said, "I I'll talk to him."

[42:58] So, I said, "Senator, I said, 'The Lebanese ambassador called me. And you have to stop calling Bashar al-Assad my dear friend.'" And he's like, "Well, he is my dear friend." And I said, "Be that as it may, he's a genocidal maniac who just wipes out entire swaths of his population." And he goes, "Well, you know, we rode motorcycles together down to the Golan Heights and and we exchanged you know, a kind of a a relationship." I said, "I I I get it. He's probably a lovely guy,

[43:30] but he's he's a genocidal dictator." He's like, "All right, all right. Tell the Lebanese get off my back." So, it's like, dude, what are you doing? Another thing about Kerry, I I've said this a couple times, but I think it's important enough to repeat. When he first called me to offer me this job, I didn't know this job existed. So, he calls me and he says, and I had never met him, but I was friendly with people who Actually, I won't I won't give names, but I was

[44:00] friendly with two guys that he served in Vietnam with. And they both said, "Hey, you should talk to John Kiriakou." So, he called me, and he said, "The Senate Foreign Relations Committee used to have an investigative function, but it was it was zeroed out in 1972, and I'm going to bring it back, and I want to do hard-hitting investigations." And I said, "That sounds like my sweet spot." So, he said, "Why don't you come up, we'll have a chat, we can see if we're a fit for one another." I said, "Great." I put on a suit, I go up to his office.

[44:31] You walk into his office, he was in the the Russell Senate Office Building, the historic office building with the 15-ft ceilings. Literally from the floor to the ceiling were framed pictures of him with every world leader who matters, from Gorbachev to the Dalai Lama to the Pope to everybody. I was like, "Okay, kind of narcissistic, but all right, he's a senator and a presidential candidate, and you know, big war hero."

[45:01] I didn't even care about that. But you walk into the office, and immediately next to the door there was a small credenza. It had three things on it. First, it had a framed picture of him with John Lennon, and they're like in this weird embrace making funny faces and like doing noogies, right? Very cool. John Lennon, right? Beatle, very cool. On the other side of the credenza was a picture of him with Peter, Paul, and Mary, the the folk group from the '60s. And he was close to them, he gave the eulogy at Mary Travers' funeral. I get it, they're all from Massachusetts.

[45:32] But in the middle was a shadow box, and in it had his Silver Star, um his Bronze Stars, and his Purple Heart. Well, in 1972, he famously threw his medals over the White House fence to protest the Vietnam War. It was national news that this hero just came back from Vietnam, testified before for Senate Armed Services Committee, and in an act of defiance,

[46:03] threw his medals at Richard Nixon, you know, over the White House fence. So, we agreed I'm going to do the job. It's going to be fun. He wants me to investigate this, that, and the other thing. I walk out. The the staff director of Foreign Relations Committee was a member of the Kennedy family. So, we're walking out and that was really my connection. I knew him. And he said, "So, it went well?" And I

[46:33] said, "Yeah, it went well. I'm I'm going to take the job." But I said, "I got to ask you, what's up with the medals?" I mean, everybody in America knows he threw his medals over the White House fence. He goes, "The medals. He didn't throw the medals over the White House fence. He went to the PX and bought copies of the medals and threw the copies over the White House fence. He goes, "Those medals are the most important thing in his life. He would never have thrown his medals over the fence." I said, "The entire John Kerry mystique

[47:04] is based on that one act of defiance." He goes, "Yeah, well, welcome to Washington." You would think maybe you'd leave the medals at home in a shadow box? >> Exactly. >> Not in the office for everyone to see? You know, he he was really very cold in a in a patrician, Yankee, New England kind of way. He had a Christmas party at his house that year. It was Christmas of '09. He lived in this rare single-family home in Georgetown

[47:36] that he later sold for 12 and 1/2 million dollars. Georgetown doesn't have more than a small handful of single-family homes. But he wouldn't allow anybody in the house. It's December in Washington. It's 20°. So, it has a side yard surrounded by a brick wall. Um and he just rented these these propane heaters. So, we're all standing out there. And um and he says,

[48:07] "Well, we have a special guest that's going to come to the party tonight." We're all like, you know, this, trying to keep warm cuz these heaters aren't doing the trick. And then and then Joe Biden comes. He was vice president at the time. So, Biden comes and Biden was exactly the opposite of Kerry. Biden's standing at the at the entrance to the backyard of the side yard. HE GOES, "HEY!" LIKE THIS. EVERYBODY'S LIKE, "HEY, MR. Vice President. Good to see you." So, he comes down

[48:38] and um starts shaking hands with everybody one at a time. Great eye contact. Uh "Hi, Joe Biden. Tell me your name again." You know, that kind of thing. I said, "Mr. Vice President, we've met a number of times. You probably don't remember me. I'm from Newcastle, Pennsylvania, and my dad was best friends with Angelo Sands." He goes, "Angelo Sands from seventh grade?" And I said, "Yeah, your best friend from seventh grade." He says, "I do remember you. We talked about Angelo's a taxi driver in Las Vegas now." I said, "That's right. He is a taxi driver. Great memory." I said, "That conversation was 15 years ago."

[49:10] And then he says to the guy next to me, "I remember you. I don't like you." And he looks at Kerry and he Kerry just is like, like, "I don't like him either." And they walk away. I said to the guy, "What the fuck?" He said, "Biden has hated me since I told him in a memo that we should pull out of Afghanistan." And I said, "Sweethearts these guys are." And he's like, "Yeah, well, what are you going to do?" Washington, D.C. Every man for himself.

[49:42] Harry Truman once said, "If you want a friend in Washington, buy a dog." There it is. Did Do any other occurrences? We talked about We talked about your um uh your meeting with Bill Clinton. But Biden, did you have any other like funny occurrences like that with any like prominent world leaders or Oh, yeah, a couple. Yeah, the Prime Minister of the Prime Minister of Bahrain did not like me not even a little bit.

[50:16] So, I was the human rights officer for the embassy. And I took him to the woodshed. And you know, I mean, in a perfect world, it would have jeopardized arm sales unless they would clean up their act. So, he had like surveillance on me. I found a bug in my house. It was bad. So, Admiral Crowe, who who had been the um Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, comes to Bahrain. And they drew my name out of the hat, so I was going to be Admiral Crowe's control

[50:47] officer. Control officer arranges all the meetings, arranges the transportation, serves as the note taker in the meetings. So, we go to see His Majesty the Emir. And the Emir was just the sweetest sweetest old guy you could ever encounter. And we finished the meeting. And um and we get up to walk out of the Emir's diwan, his his meeting room. And as we get to the elevators, a private elevator that goes straight from the Emir's garage into the diwan.

[51:18] The elevator opens and the Prime Minister walks out with the Minister of Interior. Now, the Minister of Interior is the guy I'm actually taking the woodshed. The Minister of Interior was also a prince who was the Prime Minister's son-in-law. Right? So, so I said, "Oh, I said, Admiral Crowe, this is His Highness uh Emir I'm sorry Prince Khalifa Al Khalifa. He's the the Prime Minister. And uh this is His Highness, you know,

[51:50] minister I forget what the minister's name was. He was married to the prime minister's daughter. And uh the prime minister shakes his hand, and then I said, as I always said, it's such a pleasure to see you again, Your Highness. And I shook his hand, and he wouldn't let my hand go. And he's smiling at me, and the handshake becomes more like deliberate, like he will not let my hand go. And so, we're just standing there looking at each other. And he says, I have my eye on you, Kyriacou. And I said, yes, Your

[52:21] Highness, I would expect nothing less. And then I took my hand back. We got in the elevator, and Admiral Crowe looks at me, and the ambassador says, what the hell was that all about? And I said, last week, they beat to death a 15-year-old boy for marching in a pro-democracy democracy demonstration. And I've been talking to human rights attorneys and saying I'm going to write this up for the human rights report, and they don't like it. And I'm bitching about [clears throat] it at parties, and they have my house bugged, and they're listening to me [ __ ] about it at my

[52:51] wife or to my wife. And I think that they just think that that's somehow is intimidating. It's not. Well, when I left the country a year later, the emir and the prime minister would always give gifts to to the officers leaving. We can never accept the gifts. So, it's usually a Rolex, usually. When the ambassador left, they they gave him a cigar box, and it he's like, oh, cigars. And he opened it up in front We always had to open the gifts in in the presence of a witness, right? Cuz then you have to send the whole thing in the

[53:22] diplomatic pouch to the Treasury Department, cuz you can't keep anything worth more than $25. So, he opens the box, and it's $50,000 in cash. And the ambassador's like, I'm not touching it. So, the uh the DCM, the deputy chief of mission, and the head of public affairs counted it like with the wit- the rest of us as witnesses, and then we just boxed it back up and sent it to Treasury. So, I was the only one, the only one who didn't get a Rolex when we left. >> [laughter]

[53:53] >> I thought you would have gotten to keep it anyway. Yeah, I could have kept it anyway, but you know. So, yeah, let's let's end it on a little bit of a different note. So, one of the main comments on any YouTube video that you're a part of is like how good of a storyteller you are. >> Oh, thank you. Uh raconteur raconteur is the words that a lot of people use, but let's see if I can monetize that. Yeah, right. Um but anyway, so what how would you how would you recommend to people to become more articulate, become a better storyteller, and just like speak well in general? How can people get better at that?

[54:24] That's a great question. Um I'll answer it by beginning with a story. >> [laughter] >> My brother My brother and I went out one time. We were like in college, I guess. We went out something happened. I don't remember what. And we got home, and my mom said, "Oh, so how was it? How was your afternoon?" I said, "Oh, listen to this." And I told her what happened. My brother goes, "That's not what happened." I said, "That's exactly what happened." He goes, "Yeah, but it wasn't as interesting as that." And I said,

[54:55] "It's not my fault that you can't tell an interesting story." Um I had a station chief. Oh, wait, he wasn't my station chief. He was a buddy of mine who was a station chief. And he asked me to do an operation on his behalf because it was too dangerous for him. And I didn't live in that country, so I would just go back and forth to do the operation. And then I would go directly from the meeting to the airport and fly back to the United States. So, I would do the reporting cables from headquarters and then send them out to

[55:26] the field to him. And he called me one day and he said, "I so love your cables because I feel when I'm reading them like I'm standing in the room watching it go down." And I said, "Man, that's the biggest compliment anybody's ever paid me." I I just enjoy telling stories. I think everybody has great stories. And this is why I've written this most recent series of books. I I have the series books coming out soon on on cemeteries and historic graves. I've one

[55:56] on the mafia graves of New York City, for example, because everybody's got a story to tell. You don't have to be famous. You don't have to be, you know, special in any way. Everybody has a story. And so, I enjoy telling those stories. There's no real trick to it, to tell you the truth. Just recount it as you recall it. I try to be linear. I try to do it I try to recount the story in the order in which it happened. I I find that to be helpful. But there's otherwise no real trick to

[56:28] it. So, it sounds like storytelling is is kind of [clears throat] like innate. But as far as it is one thing to be articulate in my position when I ask a a quick and ideally direct question, but when you're talking for 6 hours and there's there's no ums, there's no ahs. I say like a lot, which is bad. There's none of that. >> you know. Yeah, but that one I feel is acceptable. So, that specifically is there something like it is it reading? Is it like is it doing the speaking as

[57:00] far as repetitions? Like how can people build that up? >> I had a uh speech teacher in 10th grade, Dr. uh Dr. Scarvel. He was my dad's best friend growing up. In fact, he had a glass eye. He and my dad, when they were 9 years old, went hunting for squirrels in Farrell, Pennsylvania. And Dr. Scarvel tripped on a log and dropped the the BB gun and it went off and it shot his eye out. And so, my dad like carried him to the

[57:30] nearest house. So, when I went to the class, he's like, "Are you Chris Kiriakou's son?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "You know, he was my best friend growing up." He was one of the toughest teachers I ever had, and it was just speech and debate. And so, we started off with little things like reading passages from a book, and I knew I won him over. I still think about this sometimes. He says, "Find a 5-minute passage from a book and present it as a talk. Right? You can read it. You don't have

[58:01] to memorize it, but present it." To get us into the habit of not saying um uh well uh mm. So, all these girls went before us, the boys, and they're like, "This book is about love. This book is about family." It's like, ay ay ay. I read a passage from um from Midnight Express, the book Midnight Express, about being

[58:31] beaten in a Turkish prison. The whole thing was about this beating that uh I forget his name now, uh got at the hands of these Turkish jailers. And he stood up and just started doing the slow clap like this, and he's like, "That That is what I wanted to hear." Brad Davis. So, um that that class that year taught me not to stumble over my words.

[59:02] If you need a filler, allow silence to be the filler. There's nothing wrong with that. You don't have to say uh well um let me see uh People hate that. So, just let silence fill the fill the time. It doesn't It's not going to harm you in any way. And then, he's the one who encouraged me to go into competitive debate, and I ended up doing really well in that. That's where you have to think It Mine was contemporaneous debate. So, you had to think quickly on your feet. Like

[59:33] you you pull a topic out of a hat, you have 5 minutes to prepare. And then you go on and just start fighting. So, that got me used to answering questions without any real preparation. And that lasted all through high school. I I really credit him with uh making me the speaker that I became. Well, yeah, dude, that'll do it. You know, if you're It's like if you They say uh one of one of the guys that I I watch about um like how to get

[1:00:04] better at shooting. Mhm. And [clears throat] uh basically they the the premise is like you you push it as hard as you can in training. And like everybody wants to leave the range with a fist-sized group. But you don't learn anything from that. You just know that that's how good you can shoot. So, it's like How do you You want to learn how to drive 130 miles an hour? What do you do? You drive 200 miles an hour. So, that you're comfortable in a podcast when you've been in debates already. That is exactly right. Anything today that I didn't ask you about that uh that you've thought of or is top of mind or that you want to talk to people about? Dude, you have great questions all the

[1:00:36] time. All the time. That's why I so enjoy coming on this show. It's a great conversation. I appreciate it. Thank you. If you'll let me to uh pitch a couple things that I have going on. Oh, yeah. I'm very proud to have two podcasts. One is called DeProgram. It's with Ted Rall and John Kiriakou. Uh we're going every day starting next week at 5:00 on YouTube. And uh it's it's far more of a of a news show. But it's light at the same time. Ted

[1:01:06] is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist um editorial cartoonist. And then I have another one called Deep Focus with John Kiriakou. It's much more in the weeds, in-depth news stuff. I have great guests. I've been very fortunate so far. I have uh See here, and I'm doing it saying um I have Roger Waters next week from Pink Floyd. Roger's been one of the most outspoken supporters of Palestinian human rights and I'm proud to call the man a friend. You know, little secret about Roger Waters?

[1:01:37] He anonymously paid off my second mortgage when I went to prison. Anonymously. It was years before I found out that Roger did it. Like magic, we get this letter from the bank saying somebody had paid off our second mortgage. So, my wife and kids didn't lose the house. Wow. Mhm. Yeah. One of the founders of Pink Floyd and a giant in my mind. Mhm. Talk about generous. I had never met the man.

[1:02:08] But he followed my case, thought I did the right thing and put his money where his mouth was. All right, so deep program, deep focus, and then the books as well. A lot of books. Uh I've written eight books. The eighth was supposed to The eighth was supposed to be out weeks ago. I'm yelling at my publisher right now. Uh but I've got Well, some The first The first one is out of print now. It was What was the name of my first book? >> Uh The Reluctant Spy. >> Spy, thank you. The Reluctant Spy, my

[1:02:39] secret life [laughter] in the CIA I can bang these things I don't sleep very much. So, I bang these things out. The Reluctant Spy, my secret life in the in the CIA's war on terror. I actually made number five on the New York Times best sellers list with that. >> good book. >> Thank you. Thank you. And the second one was doing time like a spy, how the CIA taught me to survive and thrive in prison. I won two literary awards for that book. >> Really? I won the PEN First Amendment Award, uh which is one of the big four with the PEN/Faulkner, the Pulitzer, and the Edgar Allan Poe.

[1:03:10] And I won the Forward Reviews Memoir of the Year. And then I did The Convenient Terrorist, uh Abu Zubaydah and The Weird Wonderland of America's Secret Prisons. Then I got a whole bunch of books commissioned. I did The CIA Insider's Guide to the Iran Crisis, The CIA Insider's Guide to Surveillance and Surveillance Detection, The CIA Insider's Guide to Lying and Lie Detection, and The CIA Insider's Guide to Disappearing and Living Off the Grid.

[1:03:41] And then I decided to start writing books for myself, so I wrote one called Remains of the Day, the the The Remains of the Day, The Definitive Guide to Washington D.C.'s Historic Cemeteries, which was supposed to be out weeks ago. It's coming soon, but the editorial board liked it so much they commissioned four more. They wanted The next one I'm halfway done with. It's called Whispers in the Dirt, um the definitive guide to New York City's mob graves,

[1:04:12] then the historic cemeteries of Chicago, the country western graves of Nashville, and the graves of America's most notorious serial killers. So, I'm trying to pump them out as fast as I can. Nice. I love it, dude. I know I know The Reluctant Spy, I've seen a lot of my comments that it's tough for people to get. >> Yeah, I I don't know why Random House doesn't just do a second run. It sucks cuz that's a really good one, too. >> it's funny, too. The first two books were translated into both Spanish and Greek. They made number one, both of them, on

[1:04:43] the Athens bestsellers list. And then just two weeks ago I got another check from the Greek publisher that it's going to a second printing. So, they're still buying it in Greek. I don't know why nobody cares in the United States. You can't even find it on eBay anymore. It's like $100, $200. It's nuts. Just keep your eyes peeled for it, folks. Maybe you might find one, but uh [ __ ] dude. This is uh God, every time I I get to see you, I have so much fun. And like >> have a blast.

[1:05:13] >> And I know people enjoy it. So, dude, like I could sit here and talk to you for 6 hours. >> I appreciate it. We'll have to have you back. But, um >> Love it. Yeah, and and I just want to say I wasn't planning on it, but we were talking about a bit about it off camera, and I just feel like speaking to your character because, um like dude, you you changed my life like with that very first interview. >> And I'll I'll keep this short, but dude, like when when you and I met, I didn't have a following. I didn't have a podcast. I didn't even have a [ __ ] YouTube channel. Nothing. And what did you do but you drove here 4 hours from DC. You sat with me for 7 hours and

[1:05:45] drove four back without so much as asking like, "Hey, what's your following? What's your exposure?" Yeah. And like, dude, I met you at the Danny Jones podcast in Tampa. And we had such a good conversation, especially at the airport on the way back. >> Yeah. That when you asked me, I said I'd be delighted to do it. And then, actually, you changed my life because that interview that you and I did was so long and so extensive that it came to the attention of a speakers bureau in London

[1:06:15] that then signed me for an around-the-world speaking tour >> [laughter] >> that we're going to pick up again in January. So, good for us. >> Dude, you deserve it. >> You deserve success. >> Thank you. And again, man, like I had I had no following and almost we're coming up on 2 years later. We're we're coming up on 300,000 subscribers on the channel, and like things have been incredible. So, and again, this show would be nothing without the guest. Yeah. But, dude, just just thank you. I felt the need to say that on camera.

[1:06:45] >> mine. Thanks. You're the man. Um I'll see you again soon. I'm looking forward to it. What's up, guys? Thank you so much for taking the time to watch the interview. If you got anything out of this video at all, please like the video, leave me a comment, tell me what you thought of the video, uh tell me who you'd like to see on the show. I really appreciate the support. It goes a long way on these platforms, as you guys know. Most importantly, I have some excellent interviews coming up in the future that I'm really, really excited about. So, please subscribe to the channel so you don't miss any of them. But, that's it.

[1:07:16] Thank you for your support. I really appreciate it and hope to see you again soon.
