Title: Epstein Files, CIA Asset Recruitments, Worst Spies & More I Going Deeper with JK - DEEP FOCUS
Show: The Deep Focus Show
Date: 2026-02-03
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reYWaZFl3kA
Duration: 1735

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[00:02] Hi everybody, I'm John Kuryaku and welcome back to another episode of Deep Focus. Deep Focus Q&A, my favorite part. So, first of all, thank you for watching. Thank you for liking and subscribing and talking about it. We're doing really well. That's thanks to you. Please continue to do that and tell your friends and family about the show. I'd appreciate it. Uh this is my this is my favorite part of the show as I've said a thousand times or the Q&As's. So please keep them coming. I'm very happy to take

[00:33] uh whatever you want to throw at me. So I'm going to start today with Isaiah. He says, "Hey John, I would love to hear your thoughts on the new releases on the Epstein files and Trump's name getting mentioned over a thousand times. And I love your content. Keep it up and good luck on the presidential pardon." So thank you for that. Um, I've been thinking about this all weekend since the Justice Department began to drop the second trunch or the third trunch, depending on how you count it, uh, of three million documents. 3

[01:04] million documents. Um, the deputy attorney general said over the weekend on both Fox News and CNN that there will be no prosecutions coming out of these three million documents. Even though they clearly show crimes against children, the statute of limitations apparently has expired, which is terrible. With that said, um it it seems that the victims are still able to file civil suits against the estate of Jeffrey Epstein. That's uh

[01:37] that's not much solace. Uh yeah, Donald Trump was mentioned more than a thousand times. No surprise there. He and Jeffrey Epstein were close friends at one time. Um, you can say the same thing about Bill Clinton, about Bill Gates, about former Prince uh, Andrew. I don't think that the scandal is how many times somebody is is mentioned. I think the scandal is in crimes and what uh what

[02:08] these documents reveal. For example, uh Lord Mandlesson, the uh the senior Labor Party leader in uh in the UK, resigned over this past weekend because he denied and denied and denied over and over again that he had anything to do with Jeffrey Epstein, and not only was he a regular at Jeffrey Epstein's island, he was a friend of Jeffrey Epstein's and the Justice Department released a photograph of him with a 16-year-old. He's in his underwear.

[02:40] They're both looking at a uh laptop computer and clearly the camera that took the picture was hidden because he would never allow himself to be tak have a picture of himself taken in in his underwear with an underage girl. So over the weekend he resigned from the Labor Party and he resigned from the House of Lords. Maybe that's some solace. This is a guy who um is ruined now. personally. No one's ever going to speak to him again. Socially, he's he's an outcast

[03:12] now. And you know, he's not a young guy. When when he dies, his whole obituary is going to be about this, that he was a pervert. So, I'm disappointed that there aren't that there aren't going to be prosecutions. Uh, but the least we can do is get the information out there and let people see the truth in in broad daylight. and thank you for your comments about my pardon. Rammy Alhanali says, "Hey John, I fell in love with your story and I believe justice will prevail. You will get that

[03:44] pardon sooner or later. Thank you. I am Lebanese and I've always heard about how Beirut is an espionage playground. Why is that? Have you been? I'd love to hear a story. Also, the USA is building the biggest embassy in Lebanon and that's pretty weird since Lebanon is a tiny country. Is that its CIA headquarters in the Middle East? Should we be worried? Lots of great questions there. So, let's begin with the with the first one. Um, Beirut is an espionage playground. Why is that? The answer is yes. Beirut has

[04:16] always been an espionage playground. Not so much in recent years as in the 1950s,60s and the first half of the 1970s. And it's because Beirut was the Paris of the Middle East. Beirut was the banking center of the Middle East. And so the CIA was there, the KGB was there, the Israelis were there, but more secretly the French ran the place. Everybody was there. Everybody. And so it was very much like, you know, Vienna

[04:48] or Geneva or London in that it was a spy center. That began to change, of course, with the start of the Lebanese civil war in the mid1 1970s, and it's it's much less so. Frankly, it's hard to get in and out of Beirut. Uh the airport is unreliable. Uh MEA, Middle East Airways, is unreliable. Uh there have been even times where the landing lights don't work and they have to cancel all incoming and outgoing flights. I have not been to Beirut, but

[05:19] I'm happy to say I'm going in three weeks. Uh it's going to be fun. I've never been. I want to walk the Cornesh. I want to I want to try the excellent restaurants and I'm going to see some friends there in a few weeks. I'll let you know how that goes. The USA is building the biggest embassy in Lebanon and that's pretty weird. Yes, it is. Lebanon is a tiny country. Um it is not the CIA headquarters in the Middle East. U not by a long shot anymore. It could have been once upon a time, but those

[05:50] times have changed. Uh but it's big for the reason that it needs to be big because it needs to be fortified. You know, the US embassy in Beirut was uh was blown into rubble in 1983. At the same time uh or within a couple of weeks of the uh Marine Corps barracks, uh hundreds of of Americans died. Uh there have been multiple bombings at the US embassy. Lots of CIA people died. And so if you really want

[06:21] to seriously fortify a building, you have to do it like big, like an entire city block kind of big. That's how you protect what is deeper inside. Um, should you be worried? No, I don't think so. Not anymore. Not anymore. In 1975 or 1982 or 1993, I would have given you a different answer, but I think not anymore. Goose says, "John, what country has the most incompetent spies?" [laughter]

[06:54] I have to say that I laughed out loud when I read this for the first time. Wow. Where do you even begin? I have um I don't want to offend anybody, but the Iranian intelligence service is terrible. It's just terrible. It's it's deeply infiltrated mostly by the Israelis. Um they get caught a lot of times when they're doing operations.

[07:25] Uh every member of the of the military leadership was killed in this last goround with Israel and almost all of their top level uh nuclear scientists were killed in this last goround with Israel. It's like what are these people doing all day long? They're not protecting their country. So Iran is one. Another one is uh I I happened to uh find myself in Djibouti one time. Little tiny country on the Horn of Africa. Nice folks, totally

[07:56] incompetent, but they don't really have any natural enemies, so it doesn't really matter. They need to protect themselves from spillover from the Yemen war and the Houthis and this constant fighting between Eratria and uh and uh Ethiopia, but uh they don't have much going on. Uh you know, you could say that about a lot of countries around the world, mostly small countries or poor countries. Um poor countries have the toughest time with uh with training and creating

[08:28] competent spies. They just don't have the wherewithal to do it. And so they'll ask for the CIA to train them, the Mossad to train them, the Chinese to train them, the French to train them, whatever it happens to be. You can go to the Sahel, too. I mean, look at places like Nishair and Chad and Moritania and places like that. Absolutely terrible, terrible um spy services. Just awful to the point where their countries are falling apart. So there there are a lot of them out

[08:59] there. I want to take a break and uh give you a message from our sp one of our sponsors. So look around any major city after dark and you'll notice something different. The lights are off. The offices are empty. Right now one in five commercial buildings in America is vacant. Nearly a trillion dollars in real estate loans come due this year. If those buildings stay empty, banks are going to take a hit. And those same banks are the ones who hold your savings and your retirement accounts. Well, there's a new

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[10:03] gold053 to request that free copy. Santma says, "Hi John, I have two questions. Are you ever concerned about voicing criticism of the president and his policies while you're awaiting your pardon?" Number one. And number two, you mentioned that in order to recruit an asset, you often involve your wife, kids, etc. When you had to be to befriend someone and become that close to them, did it bother you or impact your wife and kids when you later had to

[10:33] cut ties with them? Or maybe you didn't need to cut ties and are still friends with some of them. You seem like a soft-hearted guy, especially when it comes to relationships. And I imagine this being a difficult part of the job. You can say that again. Let me answer your first question first. Am I ever concerned about voicing criticism of the president and his policies while you're awaiting your pardon? Yes. I am not anti-Trump. I think Donald Trump has done a lot of things that I would have done if I were president or

[11:04] that I would like to see any president do. I'm not sure that I agree with his his way of doing things a lot of times, but I think every president should be given the benefit of the doubt. I think Donald Trump really does want to do what he thinks is the right thing to do. Um, keep in mind it was Barack Obama who ruined my life, not Donald Trump. Donald Trump is giving me a fair shake. And while I may disagree with, for example,

[11:35] um what's happening in in Minneapolis, it's not Donald Trump who put me in prison. It's not Donald Trump who wrecked my family and took my pension and took my freedom. It was Barack Obama and the Democrats around him. So, um, I think Donald Trump is is smart enough and insightful enough to see the difference there between, you know, John criticizing a policy that he disagree with that he disagrees with and

[12:07] um and criticizing Donald Trump. It's not criticism of Donald Trump. Uh, so the second question, my wife, my kids. Yeah, this this is a hard part of the job. My first wife was extremely reticent to get involved in these kinds of things. She hated it. She hated that I worked at the CIA. She hated it even more that I went into um operations. Um she she hated it even more deeply that I went into counterterrorism operations. And

[12:38] then when I would come home and say, "Hey, listen. We're going to invite, you know, the Chinese second secretary over to dinner." She'd be like, "You have got to be kidding me. she would do it, but she hated it. Um, and then when it was time to cut off contact, she's perfectly happy to do that. My second wife was a senior CIA officer. She was far more into it because she understood

[13:09] the, you know, the way things were going to play out. And so if I needed to if I needed to, you know, invite the you I'm making this up. If I needed to invite the Syrian ambassador or the deputy ambassador to to lunch along with his wife, she was all in. And uh and it was much easier when I decided to take things clandestine to tell her, "Thank you. You did your part for the American people. I'm going to take it from here."

[13:41] um that that was that was easier. But you know, I'll tell you, I recruited nine people over the course of my career. That's a lot. That's more than most people get in a 30-year career. Nine people. I'm going to say of the nine, seven of them I would be friends with today. And I will add that on two occasions well after I left the

[14:13] agency, I reached out to two of them to say hello. One of them hugged me and started crying. The other one, his son answered the phone and when I asked for his dad, he said, "Oh, I'm so sorry. My father passed away two years ago." And I said, "Oh, my name is." And then I told him the name that I had been using with his father and he said, "Oh my gosh." He said, "My father talked about you." He said he he really liked you and valued

[14:45] your friendship. You know, I remember in with in the second guy uh in my last meeting with the second guy, I told him, you know, man, in in another world, you and I, we would be brothers. And he said, "What are you talking about? I consider you a brother now." So yeah, you you really do get close to people and you know, I'm a human being. I I don't want to just be so coldblooded that I just walk away from these these friendships. When I'm developing a a a friendship, it's actually a real

[15:15] friendship most of the time. Now, if you're a member of the Abu Nidal organization and you just assassinated the, you know, Turkish ambassador, no, we're we're not going to be friends. I'm going to continue to develop you and I'm going to treat you nicely and spend money on you and try to recruit you, but no, you and I aren't going to be friends with these others. Yeah, it was tough. That's a good question. Thank you. Kvet says, "Hey, John. All your videos have me wondering. If the CIA recruits so many assets, how

[15:46] many people in our government or people with intelligence do you think have been recruited?" Thanks so much. Love your stories. Thank you. Um, almost none is the answer because we generally don't recruit Americans. Um, when you recruit an American, you have to get special permission from the director of the CIA. It has to be for a very narrowly defined operation for a finite period of time. For example, if you're a businessman and you happen to have joint citizenship with, you know, Mexico or

[16:18] whatever, and you are dual citizenship is what I mean, and you're going to go to, let's say, and I'm making this up. This is not a real scenario, but you you go to North Korea to look at, you know, opening a a factory there. We're going to want to recruit you so that you can come back and tell us, you know, this is who I met. this is what he was like, this is what he said. This is what I saw. This is what I experienced. That's going to be, you know, valuable in the greater scheme of things. But in terms of people being recruited and then

[16:49] going into government, I never encountered one in my entire career. A bigger question though is foreign nationals that we recruit that then later go into their government. Yes, that happens frequently to the point where sometimes they find themselves becoming prime minister or president of that country. I'm going to leave that

[17:21] there. Official Vanise, California says, "Hi, John. I have a weird one. What's your take on German intelligence? It's by numbers the second after CIA. Is it any good?" Actually, it's very good with one exception. I'm going to tell you about the German intelligence service is huge. Um, and it's uh and it's very competent. I worked with the Germans a number of times. Good officers, solid, terrific training. Um, they don't have the foreign languages that some other

[17:52] intelligence services have, but that's okay because frankly the CIA doesn't have a lot of foreign languages, but the Germans were very good. except with a source code named Curveball. You may have heard of Curveball. So during the run-up to the Iraq war, the Germans came to us and said, "Listen, we have this new source. His name is Curveball. His code name is Curveball. And he's given us the kitchen sink on Iraq. He's

[18:23] even telling us where the weapons of mass destruction are." We were like, "Oh my god, we want to talk to him." I was the I was the deputy director's executive assistant at the time. So, I was intimately involved in these conversations with the Germans. We said, "We we got to talk to him." They said, "Absolutely not. He's so sensitive. You can't talk to him. You can ask questions. Send us the questions. We'll ask him and then we'll send you the answers in a cable."

[18:53] We didn't like that, but we did it. And so we started sending questions and his information was so good that it was not believable. And I remember the deputy director saying, "Do you believe this guy?" And I said, "No, I don't actually. It's too perfect. It's too good." Well, we went to war based on some of Curveball's information. We I say we went to war because we weren't the only ones receiving the cables. The White

[19:25] House was receiving the cables, too. And they were going directly to Dick Cheney and to his office. And Cheney said, "The Iraqis have weapons of mass destruction. We know that definitively because this highly placed source being run by the Germans named Curveball told us so. And we went to war." And it turned out that Curveball was just some Kurdish refugee. He was a he was a dishwasher in a German

[19:57] restaurant and he would just read the paper every day. He would take notes to himself about what the Americans wanted to hear and then he just kind of volunteered to the German intelligence service hoping that the CIA would be so pleased with the information that they would give him American citizenship. 60 Minutes broke the story eventually, but uh Curveball played us like fools thanks both to Dick Cheney and the

[20:28] German intelligence service because the Germans never bothered to vet him. They never polygraphed the guy. They never tested him operationally. They just took every word he said and they treated it as if it was coming from the mouth of God and sending it to the CIA. People lost their lives because of curveball. Well, folks, I want to talk to you about something that really matters to me, and that is medical freedom and being able to make your own health care decisions.

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[21:58] number 10 to get 10% off your order. That's allfamilyfarm pharmacy.com/jo promo code John10. Okay, Eddie K, thanks for the five bucks, Eddie. He says, "John, I have tried asking this to multiple spooky people and cannot get an answer. When a person like you shows or knows things, how do you know when you're able to talk about those things? Is it a time frame? Do you get an email, a phone call, a letter in the mail, carrier pigeon?" That is an excellent

[22:29] question. So, at the CIA, they have this this office called um the publications review board. Anytime I write something, whether it's a book or an article or a letter to the editor of Home and Garden magazine, I have to send that to the CIA's publications review board and they have to clear it. Now, 90% of the time, they'll clear it in a couple of hours. If uh if it's a longish article, it

[23:01] might take 24 hours. If it's a book, well, when I was on the outs and everybody at the CIA in the leadership hated me, it took me nine months to write my first book and 22 months to get it cleared. My last five books at least more than that. My last six books um cleared in the matter of of days. The issue is much of what I talk about is either ancient history because I left the CIA 21 years ago or it is

[23:32] based on open- source information. I'm not a I'm I'm allowed to have positions. I'm allowed to make my own analysis. Um, but I don't have access to classified information. Uh, and so they can't stop me from saying something. And uh otherwise there is a mandatory declassification law in the United States. It's 35 years that something has to be declassified after 35 years unless there is a compelling national security

[24:04] reason to keep it classified and that is that it reveals sources and methods that it reveals the identity of a source or it has something to do with NSA. Otherwise, we can do what we want. Not a federal officer says, "John, you are a true American hero." Thank you. Thank you again for exposing the post 911 US government for what they were. I was wondering what your thoughts were on the torture report movie with Adam Driver.

[24:35] Did you think it was accurate as to what really happened and the process you took to expose the truth? Also, would you ever do an interview with Ed Snowden or Julian Assange if given the chance? And what would you ask them? Well, I am proud to say that I was the script adviser on the movie The Report that was with Adam Driver about the torture report and it was 100% true to the report. It really was true. Um

[25:06] the writer um of the film is an Academy Award-winning A-list writer. uh he went to lengths to make sure that everything he wrote in that movie was exactly the way it played out um as the report was being written. So yeah, he he did he did a service to contemporary history. Um would I ever do an interview with Ed Snowden or Julian Assange? Absolutely

[25:37] yes. And I have asked them both. Uh Ed is much tougher to get in touch with. He, you know, is married, has two kids. He's a Russian citizen now. He works a nine hour 8 hour day every day. He's a little tough to get in touch with. Um Julian, I've I've asked a couple of times. Uh the truth is Julian um is uh seeking to be signed by a speaker bureau and he's he's looking to make a a handsome living

[26:10] and um that doesn't include uh talking to podcasters even though we're friends. Uh but that's okay. You know, God bless. I I hope he is able to make a a a good handsome living. God knows he's paid the price for it. Um, Septile says, "And thanks for the 299. Loved you on Diary of a CEO. What is the Greek foreign intelligence service known for? Are they skilled? Is it mainly mitigating the Turkey risk?" It's Turkey, Turkey, Turkey, all the

[26:41] time. Turkey, and a little bit terrorism, counterterrorism. Um, the Greek intelligence service is different now than it was 20 years ago. Well, no. Uh, 26 years ago when I was in Greece, u, and I I'll go back to the 90s. In the '9s, the the Greeks the Greeks recruited a Greek American named Steven Lis. And, uh, Steven Lawless gave them top secret NSA information on Turkey. Uh, still that is espionage. And Steven Lis

[27:14] was caught and he was convicted of espionage and he did decades in prison. when he got out of prison, he was given Greek citizenship. He moved to Greece and he's something of a hero in Greece. He lives in a little village in the center of the country. Uh but the Greeks learned a lesson there and they stopped spying on Americans just as a matter of policy. So, you know, Greece's only real enemy, the true enemy is Turkey. And um

[27:45] and the Turks are a clear and present military danger. And so 95% of what the Greeks do is uh to try to mitigate that Turkish threat. Uh are they skilled? They're very skilled. Um they were good when I was there 26 years ago. Not great, but good. Now they're really, really good. Not because they continue to be trained by us, but now they're trained by the Israelis and um and

[28:15] they've been quick learners. So, thanks for taking the time to uh to think of those questions and to put them in the chat. I encourage you to please continue coming up with questions and putting them in the chat. I want to thank you again for subscribing. You're really you're really making this fun and worthwhile and exciting and I I love hitting refresh every day to see how many subscribers we have. It's all very exciting. Thanks for doing that and uh we'll see you next time on Deep Focus. Bye-bye.
