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- [00:00]
A
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B
When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant, you keep production lines moving and quality on track because there is no room for slowdowns. With Grainger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place. So nothing gets in the way of getting the job done. Call 1-800-GRAINGER, click grainger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. MSW Media. Spy Talk a podcast at the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy, national security and military operations.
- [01:20]
C
Hi there, I'm Jeff Stein.
- [01:22]
D
I'm Michael Zigoff.
- [01:23]
E
And I'm Karen Greenberg.
- [01:25]
C
Welcome to another edition of the Spy Talk podcast. Well again, week is full of intelligence oriented, security oriented news. There are coup rumors wafting through the cafes of Moscow according to multiple reports. And to that end we're going to have Sean Wisbetzer, a long time Russia specialist at the CIA as our our guest today to talk about that and his book Tradecraft, Tactics and Dirty Tricks, Russian Intelligence and Putin's Secret War. But meanwhile, Cash Patel's back in the news with another report from the Atlantic saying he he has branded bourbon that he's handing out. I don't think that President Trump's gonna particularly like that new reporting. I noted also that TN another evidence that Dni Tulsi Gabbard is not part of the mix on the Iran war, which is, you know, the war we have right now. She's, she was off in Israel last week touring a multination operations center outside of Gaza. There was no report in the Israeli media that she met with the head of Mossad, the outgoing head of Mossad or the incoming head of Mossad.
- [02:45]
D
I mean, can I just say on that, like why would the Mossad bother to meet with Tulsi Gabbard in the midst of this war? I mean, with Iran? I mean she obviously has no input into it at all. She wasn't at the key meetings when the War was decided. So I assume they just figured it would be a waste of time.
- [03:08]
C
Absolutely. I'll just drop this in. A friend told me this week that they had heard a top former intelligence official and the first Trump administration who I can't identify would give away my source anyway. This former top intelligence official in the first Trump administration was saying to someone else that Tulsi Gabbard and Cash Patel will soon be gone. So for what it's worth, just that's not particularly novel. And one other thing we want to talk about this week. Section 702, that surveillance law kicked down the road again. 45 day extension of it while Congress wrangles over renewing it. Karen, let's talk about that first.
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E
Yeah, let's talk about 702, which seems to be a story that goes on and on every week.
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D
Spy Talk Special.
- [04:01]
E
Exactly. But what Senator Wyden has done is to say that there was an opinion in issued by the FISA court, the classified court that oversees FISA matters, foreign intelligence, surveillance matters, and 702, which was called attention to abuses that were done by the FBI in terms of what it is using 702 surveillance and collection for. And he was asking for this to be made public.
- [04:32]
C
Now, I reasonable request.
- [04:35]
E
Well, it's a reasonable request, but it's. For years a number of top officials who have had access to seeing things from FISA, about 702 have sounded the alarm to say, look, if you knew what they were doing, you would not believe this. I mean, it is true that Wyden is in the spotlight on this now, the Wyden Siren, I think it's called, but it's been for years, them saying, look, you just need to know what's going on. So this is the most public iteration of it we've seen in a while and we'll see what happens.
- [05:05]
C
Yeah. A member of the House House Intelligence, Jason Crow, also went on TV this past weekend.
- [05:10]
E
Yes, he did.
- [05:11]
C
And said there are a lot abuse is going on. People need to know about it.
- [05:15]
D
Karen, did, did one specify that it was FBI abuses that was part of this FISA court ruling? Because I, you know, the letter that he sent, he sent a letter, a cla, to John Radcliffe, Director of the CIA that didn't give any details about what it is was in this classified.
- [05:38]
E
Yeah, I don't, I don't know. I don't, I don't know what he's targeting. Whether it's NSA would, you know, make sense whether with something.
- [05:46]
D
But he sends the letter to Radcliffe, if it's about the same thing, we don't know.
- [05:52]
C
Wyden, he said the public needs to know about a secret court opinion that found fault with the Trump administration's use of data collected by the National Security Agency.
- [06:06]
E
Yeah. The nsa.
- [06:07]
C
So.
- [06:08]
E
Well, but that doesn't mean if it's collected by the nsa, just to riff on this, if it's collected by the nsa, the question is who's doing the queries that are the subject of so much about the warrant requirement, et cetera. So the idea that it would involve law enforcement and other others in the intelligence community, you know, is illogical.
- [06:27]
D
You know, I would assume that the intelligence committees, House and Senate have all been briefed about this. And I haven't seen significant defections among Intelligence Committee members who might have supported 702 extensions in the past and now don't. So, yeah, who knows what, what should we make of that?
- [06:54]
C
Yeah. And you know, you can't have a lot of confidence in the FBI's use of 702 under his present leadership. Mike, pick up on the present leadership of Cash Patel's problems and what the FBI is doing in response.
- [07:12]
D
Right, right.
- [07:12]
C
Latest regulatory reports on Cash Patel.
- [07:16]
D
Yeah. So here's the most troubling part of this week's news about Kash Patel. So last week or the week before, he sues the Atlantic magazine and its reporter Sarah Fitzpatrick over their story that Patel has been drinking a lot, has been incommunicado at key times and concerned that he was not in a state, a sober enough state to be FBI director, at least at certain times.
- [07:53]
C
And this follows on all the earlier reporting about his misuse of the plane, flying his girlfriend around, going to hockey games, showing up.
- [08:01]
D
Okay, but here's the here, here's to me, the worst of it. Patel files a lawsuit, civil suit. Then this week we learn that the FBI is conducting a wide ranging investigation into the sources for the reporter Sarah Fitzpatrick. Now, needless to say, none of what she reported involved classified information, which is the usual trigger for FBI's in FBI investigations into journalist sources. Right. So what it seems to be is he's using the FBI as his sort of, you know, to short for discovery purposes for his private lawsuit that, you know, if he can get the FBI to identify the. He doesn't have to go through the extensive discovery process that a civil lawsuit does. It's hard to see what the potential crime here is if it doesn't involve classified information.
- [09:05]
E
There's also, did you see what's happened with her since this so he's ramping up his activities. What she has reported, Sarah Fitzpatrick has reported is that all of a sudden she's being flooded with information from other people who want to tell her to broaden her story, to give her more information. So it's sort of a counter. So okay, you want to investigate. Well, look what I, I just, I'm all of a sudden the recipient of a tremendous amount of information. Where is this going to go?
- [09:34]
C
Well, we could see more firings of FBI agents suspected of leaking but you know, by the, by the tone of her stories, it sounds like she's got the cash. Patel can't trust anybody around him. I mean there's a, this reporting is pretty close to the bottom and worth
- [09:52]
D
noting that the Washington Post reporter Hannah N. Its home was raided by the FBI and it was devices were seized this week won the Pulitzer Prize for reporting. So yeah, I think that was a nice retort to what the FBI was up to.
- [10:11]
C
So back to Tulsi Gabbard for a moment. So she's in Israel while the Iran war is raging and I wonder what the intelligence chiefs of both sides, Iran and America are telling their leaders. I mean Trump's position on Iran, Iran seems to change by the minute or the hour and the same with the Iranians now. So you got to wonder what's going on at the top of the U. S Intelligence DNI Gabbard is out of it. We don't hear much from CIA. Anybody got a clue where U. S Intelligence is on this war?
- [10:47]
D
I think the U. S Intelligence community is as clueless as everybody else about what's going first of all about what the to play is in Iran at the moment. You know, who's in charge, what role is it? Purely the irgc, the hardliners. And yet the foreign minister is flying to Pakistan and well, flying to China and engaged with the Pakistanis on this supposed, you know, one page framework for a deal. This is fast moving but I think, you know, as far as I can tell, nobody has a firm idea about whether the Iranians are going to play ball or not and let Trump get out of the, this crisis that he's
- [11:38]
C
yeah, much less having a clear strategy of what we're doing. It's, it's a big black box for everybody right now. Anyway, with that, let's get on to Sean Wisquer. Wischester was not only a career officer in the CIA's Clandestine Service with expertise in Russian operations, he's long been a dedicated linguist with a BA In Russian language and Literature from the University of North Carolina. He also holds a degree in Strategic Military Studies from the Air War College. So I can't think of a better guest to have on today then Sean to talk about the coup rumors that are sweeping Moscow and what's going on with Vladimir Putin. So without further ado, here's Sean
- [12:25]
E
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- [12:54]
B
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- [13:23]
F
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- [14:29]
C
Sean Wischer welcome to Spy Talk. What a timely appearance. It's not only to talk about your book, but lots going on in Moscow. We hear rumors of coups, fear of Ukrainian drone strikes breaking up the victory parade in Moscow, that there are very, very few officials in comparison to previous years are going to show up because of security concerns. We hear, we've seen reports of a really bad mood nationally. Disenchantment was with Putin. What do you make of all this? And, and what do you make of these coup with all this coup talk and, and where does your specialty, the Russian intelligence services, where what kind of role are they playing now and do they remain loyal to Vladimir Putin?
- [15:22]
G
Well, first of all, Jeff, honored to be on with you. Listen to you and Mike for many, many years, Karen, you as well, listening to you on the pod. So it's an honor to be on Spy Talk and certainly appreciate all the work you do in the public service you provide focusing on important issues.
- [15:38]
C
Thanks.
- [15:38]
G
So I, I think there's a few different things going on, Jeff, and I think that some of the media reporting, I've seen some of the various journal and newspaper reporting. There is a bit of, I think wishful thinking, an undertone of wishful thinking of what's going on. Let's cover what I think is the easiest thing first, which is the not having a large military to spray on what the Russians call Dvyatova Maya or Dien Povia the victory day celebrations for World War II. Listen, the Russians are well aware they cannot guarantee their, even their Moscow air defense sector anymore. So this has been building for a couple of a few years now since the start of the invasion. Every year the larger and larger drone and one way attack UAV swarms on both sides are taking place. So I think finally the Russians have the realization, you know what, we can't guarantee any equipment we put on, on, on the victory day celebrations. And what do they traditionally do? Of course, Jeff, back to Soviet times, they like to display some primo equipment. Right. They like to bring out missiles. Yeah. Bring out some cool missiles. Bring out some, some of the more modern tanks, you know, T80 tank or T72 modified tanks or you know, the newer versions of some of their BMP3s with modifications. So I think the realization is, you know, geez, we don't want to look really bad on national and international TV if the Ukrainians decide to attack legitimate military targets, military vehicles in Red Square. So I think that's, that's what's at play there.
- [17:13]
C
There's even, I saw one report and it came out of Ukrainian sources. So you know, take it with a grain of salt. But there's fear that, that Putin will even stage a so called, this is very oh Quran in conspiracy circles, a false flag attack. In other words, he will, he will mount some kind of attack on the parade and blame it on the Ukrainians. Have you heard that? And what do you think about that?
- [17:40]
G
Yeah, there's a lot of, there's a lot of rumors flying right now. You know, there's, there's all sorts of talk, there has been for months, Jeff, about, you know, is there a possibility of Putin being overthrown or the possibility of coups, attempted coups? What's going to happen after the war? I myself write a column for the Cipher Brief a few months ago. I wrote a, wrote a column after Putin after the war when it looked like ceasefire was going to happen. You know, what's the succession scenarios look like? The bottom line, I believe, Jeff, is that the security service are still in, firmly in control of Russia, the FSB in particular and its sister services. I think that any discussion of Putin being replaced or any real discussion of coups or overthrowing him or, or popular dissent against him, I think that's all fantasy for the most part. I do think what you touched on is much more likely, which is that the security services themselves, Putin and his siloviki and his, his organ, they've lost, as they're called, the organs of power, putting out myths of potential coups and subversion and what the Russians called diversia, you know, diversion in society. Doesn't that of course give the, the perfect pretext for an even harder crackdown on the Russian people? So I think that's a much more likely scenario of what's happening right now.
- [18:57]
C
So they wouldn't need to actually stage a false flag, just, just amp up the rumors themselves. Yeah, to say to, to justify even harder crackdown.
- [19:09]
G
Well, this is an old Soviet tactic, you know, Jeff, this goes back to Stalinist times. You know, look at, look. And Putin is a hardcore old style checkist, you know, the term from the Cheka, the original, you know, Committee for the Defense of the Revolution after World War II that became the later NKVD and KGB. You know, for 30 years, Stalin was an expert at this, always talking about, hey, we got another wave of sabotage happening against, you know, myself and the leadership. We need to protect you. So we're going to have to crack down. Thank God for the security services. This is a old, old tactic of, of the Czechistian. Putin's one of them. So I, I tend to believe that whatever temporary defections, you see people falling out of favor close to the leadership, that happens in all these autocratic societies. There was a alleged defection that happened a couple weeks ago. A lower level, but still a, still a figure somewhere In I think deputy head of some type of tax ministry. You know, whether he actually defected or not, I think that the security services will play on all those sorts of things for an even firmer crackdown country like Russia. Four years at war now, Jeff, the FSB and the other security services have only tightened their control and their chokehold on the Russian people these past four years.
- [20:24]
D
You know, Sean, I'm glad you brought up the checkist roots of Putin's crackdown because one of the things that really startled me column the other day, Vladimir Karamurza, one of the premier Russian dissidents and opponents of Putin, pointed out that Putin recently renamed the FSB academy after Felix Durzinski, the original head of the Cheka under Vladimir Lenin, the notorious head of the architect of what was known as the Red Terror, which I think hundreds of thousands of people were executed. What did you make of that move of Putin at this Putin, former KGB agent of course, resurrecting the ghost of Felix Dzerzynski and putting in, putting his name on a prominent fsb?
- [21:27]
G
Yeah, Mike, I think it, I think it shows that gloves are off for the Russian security services. No more pretense. We're going back to old style. 100 years ago, what Lenin said to famous Iron Felix Dzerzhinsky can't have revolution without terror. You know, we have to terrorize the people in order to keep them in line. I think Putin's always believed in that. But immediately after Yeltsin, when he first came to power, you know, he was, he was concerned for his own well being and, and his establishment of this new regime. The seal of a key the KGB Veter that surround him. But now you see that in time of war, all pretenses are off. You know, the FSB academy now is again the Dzerzhinski Academy. Remember, the FSB never moved out of the Lubyanka prison, the former prison, the former site of countless thousands of of Russians and other Soviet peoples killed in that building, imprisoned, tortured in the Lubyanka. It's always been FSB headquarters. Right. So Iron Felix, the statue used to stand in front of the Lubyanka. Now it's going to stand, you know, also in front of the FSB academy.
- [22:27]
D
So it was taken down. Was it taken down under Putin?
- [22:31]
G
No, I think it was under Yeltsin way back after the collapse of the Soviet Union. And then the Russians knew, you know, Iron Felix, this was a sign of all the repression of Soviet times. The, you know, the nkvd, the kgb, those purges, you Talked about, Mike, that killed millions of their people. Of course, millions of people died in Stalin's purges, carried out by the Cheka and later the ogpu, nkvd, kgb. And so there was a rejection of that, of course. The first chairman of the KGB under Yeltsin was a. Was a gentleman named Bakat and Bakatan. His vow was to drive a stake into the heart of the kgb, to destroy the KGB forever, because he had suffered as a dissident. But that didn't last very long. KGB and the Czech east, you're very resilient. Within a few years, the FSB was on the rise again. And when Putin came to power, former director of the FSB himself, you know, these are. These are his guys. These are his attack dogs. I always say the term Praetorian Guard is too kind, too much of an honorific for the fsb. These are his attack dogs. These are ruthless thugs that killed the likes of journalists. Annapolitkovsky himself, the politician killed Navalny. And so I think it's a sign of the times, Mike, you know, when they put the statue back up and they're saying to the fsb, this is our guy, Iron Felix. He's the emblem of how we want to rule, terrorizing our people, just like you said, can't have revolution without terror. So in a time of war, remember, this is. These are the old messages they're bringing back. Can't have counter revolution back then. Can't have any potential coups or sabotage or subversion from the west or anybody else to the great czar of Vladimir Putin. So it's a telling, telling thing that they have Iron Felix going back up, you know, with Dzerzhinsky Academy now.
- [24:12]
E
So can I ask a question that's focused less on internal Russia than Russia and the world? And you mentioned the war, of course, which is that throughout your book, you highlight sort of ways in which all these different measures that you talked about, in which there are vulnerabilities within the Russian services. Right. That there's a sense of incompetence, a deterioration of whatever kind of expertise there was in the past. So how do you square this, you know, internal. You know, this. This internal hold that they have and sort of the incompetence that you describe, particularly when it comes to the rest of the world and the way in which they are trying to counter the United States and other, you know, countries.
- [24:58]
G
Thank you, Karen. It's a. Yeah, I appreciate it. You're an astute reader of the book, of course. I note a lot of Their failures, you know, incompetence at times, you know, corruption, certainly corruption. Throughout my book, I mentioned the many examples of corruption that Russian intelligence officers that I was privileged to work with that were portraying Russia for the good of the west and for themselves to have a new life eventually in the west, and defectors and others. So they're not 10ft tall, they're fallible. They have weaknesses. We've capitalized on those in the past and we can here in the future. We always will. At the same time, though, Karen, they're a formidable adversary. Why? There's no accountability. Remember, in the Russian system, though, the FSB, GRU, the SVR, all three services, FSB being the internal service, GRU being the military service, now also called the GU, and the SVR under Putin, SVR is the foreign intelligence service. For the past 25 years, this has been a heyday for them. They get everything they want and need all of their resources. Even when the war, the war they largely prognosticated wrongly. They told Putin it would be a quick war, they would win it quickly. The FSB had a huge role in the planning for the war, as I point out in chapter 10 of my book. But there's no accountability. There's never going to be a Ukraine commission in Russia. So all they get is more resources, more money to waste for more corruption. But they're fiercely loyal for the most part, particularly the FSP and all the services. They're fiercely loyal to Putin because they're completely beholden, Tim, for all of their wealth, all that corruption, the lives that they lead, the leadership who send their sons and daughters largely abroad to study those siloviki in that inner circle, you know, they're. They're beholden to Putin completely. All of their wealth, all their power, all of their influence of them and their families. So I think there's both at play. Yes, Karen, a lot of weaknesses, a lot of corruption, a lot of incompetence. At the same time, they can't go wrong. And it's in the state that's been at war for four years, those security services are only being strengthened, unfortunately. So we have to be on guard.
- [26:55]
E
So does the United States appreciate this? Do they? Do they? How does the United States separate from you, the United States assess the Russian intelligence and security services? Do you think that we understand it the way you do, or do you think there's a need to understand it more broadly and not dismiss it, knowing about the corruption, the failures, a number of levels that you point to?
- [27:18]
G
Well, it's a Very good question, Karen. It gives me a chance to also say my views are my own, don't represent CIA nor the US Government. I will say, and I stated in the book, for most vast majority of my career, you know, we had a good beat on the Russian government on its security services. We had them penetrated by, by the types of agents that are, that I talk about in my book. CIA has a long history of that with the Russians and the Soviet services. We've had a lot of success because our ideal, our message resonates. We went out American freedom, democracy. Those Russian intelligence officers, they want that for their children. Eventually so many of them defect and they come over to our side. And that applies by the way, that the Chinese as well, we're talking about Russia today. But so yes, our message wins out in general, I believe that, that we've prevailed for the most part against them. But I will also say this for the 30 some years of my career, Karen, we weren't paying enough attention most of the time to Russia. Why we were 20 years of war. We were engaged in a war. I deployed like many other CIA veterans like myself, we deployed the war zones. You know, we had to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan. If you were anybody within CIA or the intelligence community agencies in that time, if you were a manager, a senior officer, you better have served in the war zones. And we all did. And as a service, you know, think about where was Russia ranked in our unclassified national security priorities, national security strategies for most of the past 25, 30 years? Barely top 10, right? Barely top 10. Even when they invaded Georgia, even when in 2014 they went into Donbas in Crimea. We still had the war on terror, we still had the Iraq war, we had proliferation and we rightly have China right up the list too. So unfortunately, I think that Putin, for a vast majority of his, his reign in power, he's gotten a pass. He hasn't had enough focus and enough attention on, on his crimes, on his planning, on his plotting and scheming like we see come to the fore now with Ukraine, a full scale invasion, the largest since World War II.
- [29:12]
C
So yeah, I have a question, Sean, about what we should be doing, but we have to step away for just a second. Okay, we're back. You are not only the author and expert on Russian security services, as you mentioned in passing, you worked for the CIA for a long time on Russia in the operations division. Can you say what CIA should be doing or could be doing? Should we keep hands off? I'm not talking about recruiting spies that Goes on continuously. But. But should we be taking active measures in Russia to help the deterioration, to coin a phrase?
- [30:01]
G
Yeah, yeah, I. So I, you know, Jeff, it's a good question. I already said my views are mine alone. I've been encouraged by some of the open campaigning. CIA has been doing both with Russia and China. Open advertising commercials on the Internet. I think it's a very smart idea.
- [30:18]
C
Hey, give us, give us an example of some of them.
- [30:20]
G
Yeah, there's a commercial. CIA. This is not the first one they put out. A recent one. They did one several years ago. They're putting it out on YouTube. It's in Russian. And one of the latest ones shows a Russian intelligence officer, I think it is, saying, you know, contemplating the Ukraine war and the suffering and the disaster, you know, 1 million casualties. And he's sort of asking himself, in Russia, it's very well done. You know, what's it all been about?
- [30:44]
C
These are sort of like little soap operas that the CIA has been putting out, you know, dramatizing a Russian intelligence officer upset about Ukraine, etc.
- [30:56]
G
Well, I'm thinking about inviting them. Right. Working with us. And why not? It's a, it's a, It's a salient point, a salient message, one that should appeal to many Russians right now. You know, Jeff, one of the only places I see some freedom of press in Russia I comment on is I listen to the, I listen and watch the Russian blogosphere. I do some reading on there regularly. I'm a, I'm a fluent Russian speaker, and they're often taken down very quickly. But you have these military veterans, you have intelligence veterans that get on their blogosphere here and they comment on some of the military disasters, whatever the latest disasters that happens. And so, you know, there's discontent. You know, there's some segments of society that are upset. I still believe the FSB has a tight chokehold on any possible descent, but we should take advantage of those willing to help us, willing to potentially build a new life for themselves. Some of them are listening to us right now. You have a new life awaiting you in the west, in the United States, like you read about and can read about in my book. Many have done that and have been been rewarded for it. And we value them and we value their expertise in the United States. So I'm, I'm confident my former agencies on top of that, CIA, I'm confident the intelligence community is on. On top of trying to capitalize on those very real opportunities right now.
- [32:06]
D
So I have a couple of questions about your about events that occurred while you were at the CIA, but just to sort of, you know, put you in where you were at various times. Were you in Russia House, the CIA sort of unit that dealt with all things Russia?
- [32:26]
G
So CIA doesn't like me to comment on any time periods or specific instances. But of course, in my book, I think I state on a number of occasions, yes, I worked in Russia House. I was in Russian operations throughout my career. Few times.
- [32:39]
D
Two questions. One is, goes back to 2015 and the White House, the Obama White House, was having a international conference on terrorism, and they invited a delegation from Russia. Much to the White House's surprise. The guy who showed up to lead the Russian delegation was Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the fsb then and now. And while he was here, he gets invited to the CIA for a meeting with John Brennan on the seventh floor in his office. One of your former colleagues who I interviewed for my book Rush Roulette, told me he was the translator for that meeting, but he was strongly opposed to it, that he said it was sending the wrong message. The European Union had actually sanctioned Portnikov over the annexation of Crimea. And he said just having him there was a victory for Bortnikov and Putin itself. Were you. Did you have visibility into that? And did you. And if so, did you share Steve Hall's concerns about Brennan meeting with Bortnikov on the seventh floor of the CIA?
- [34:06]
G
Well, I can't comment on what I was doing in 2015. CIA wouldn't want me to comment on that. I will say this I would tend to agree with if that was Steve Hall. You're saying Steve hall said that. I would tend to agree with Steve that and giving. Giving that prestige, whether it's now then, or at any point to a senior Russian official like Bordnikov to meet with a senior American official in our intelligence community back home. That's played as a win for them, of course. That's played as a prestige win for them. At the same time, though, Mike, as Steve and other senior CIA officers are well aware, what we call liaison or meetings between senior levels of our intelligence services, that happens all the time with CIA and services around the world. Now, I think what. What's changed with Russia, of course, is, you know, the atrocities being committed in the Ukraine war and, and they started in 2014, of course, continued even more so many thousands of times over in Ukraine. Then I think we have to give pause and we have to say, well, are we going to. At what level are we going to continue to allow them to use Prestige, interaction that, that concerns things like, you know, meetings of presidents too. There were many that felt at the summit in Alaska. Does it give Putin a win just by appearing with our president? Not, you know, I'm not a policy person so I'm not an expert to comment on those. I do know. I do know though that liaison happens all the time. We need to keep up the ability to talk with services. I also know for the most part with the Russians, as my colleagues know, they don't take it seriously. It's a zero sum game. They don't cooperate with CIA and FBI. For the most part we're considered enemy number one, the glovnik, the main adversary, the main enemy. And as I relate in the book, Mike, as you know, you read the book, you know, the Russians don't prioritize counterterrorism, they don't prioritize counter proliferation. Working with liaison and international partnerships the way we do, that's our strength, our relationships. So I think they're quite cynical about it. Yeah.
- [35:55]
D
One other question I have that overlapped with your tenure. Eleven years later, 2016, President Obama orders the intelligence community assessment overseen by Brennan about Russia's interference in the 2016 election. Now as you. That has been, continues to be a subject of controversy and there is supposedly this FBI Justice Department investigation into the intelligence community assessment that's ongoing as we speak into Brennan and others. Did you have a role in the ica?
- [36:34]
G
I have no comment on where I was then or whether I had a role or not. Can't, can't comment on that. CIA wouldn't want me to. What I'll say, I said in the book on active measures. I believe the DNI report is factual. I believe the SSCI report that that came out from the 2016 election that Marco Rubio was also a member of and he signed off on. I believe that there was Russian meddling social media trolls from the intelligence services that they did it. I believe that the goal was an attack on our democracy, fundamentally an attack on our elections so that Americans don't trust the system. System. I believe that's much more of the overriding goal and aim of the Russian intelligence services. Not just with the United States, but they did the same thing with Brexit in the UK in 2016. I cite that in my book. I cite the UK Commission that reported on that and they're still doing it. You see that in Hungary they're constantly attacking elections. I believe that any incidental benefit for or against any one individual candidate. However, Mike, I don't believe that was the overarching goal of their attack and what the Russians plan to do with the election. I believe what their, what their goal was, which was achieved to some degree. Unfortunately. We're still talking about Venezuelan potential Venezuelan voting machines being infiltrated. Former Attorney General Barr said, that's his words, excuse me, didn't happen. But yet we have Americans still, years and years later still talking about can't trust election machines, can't trust the states. We can trust our systems. They've worked. We have very responsible state election officials carrying it out. It's in the interest of the Russian government and for Putin for Americans to not trust free and fair elections that you can go to the voting machine and put your vote in. That's what they believe in Russia. That's their cynical view. That's what they want.
- [38:18]
D
Let me just follow up with one point of that. One source of the controversy is the claim by the current dni, Tulsi Gabbard and her people that the intelligence analysis was flawed. And the, the assertion that the Russian meddling was done because Putin was trying to favor Donald Trump was thinly sourced and disputed by some high level CIA folks. On that question of whether or not the ICA was accurate about its assertion that Putin decided he wanted to help Trump and that was the reason for the Russian meddling. I'm not. You, you said something that suggested you may have some questions about that as well. So I just want to clear that up.
- [39:12]
G
Well, I'll state again, I've said this repeatedly on the record. I believe that the overarching goal of the election attacks was not for or against any one individual candidate. It was against the system. As you're probably well aware, Mike, if you go into the details of some of that DNI and other reports, you know, there's parts of the reports that, that where the Russians believe that President Trump was going to lose. There's, there's pieces of the reporting that state that very clearly that that was part of also the Russians, you know, calculations, oh, we don't know who might win. There's all sorts of, you know, conjecture over what they, but I, I know fundamentally from working with them and what I detail in my book about active measures historically is their attack is more fundamentally against our democracy. I also believe that the continual infighting in our government at the most senior level over, over what may what some categorize as a hoax or not a hoax, I believe that only benefits our adversary. I believe it's just, it's just creating ambiguity, disunion among our own population, which the Russians are applauding. It's more of a win for them, more of a victory for them. It's a reason why I try to stay very apolitical in terms of my stances on this. I state what I know and what I know for the record, and that's that they're attacking our democracy. I'll leave it at that.
- [40:22]
C
That going back to Russia today, there was a report in the Wall Street Journal said the cafes of Moscow are awash and coup rumors. And it's often said that people think a revolution is impossible until it happens. Nobody thought the Bolsheviks could overthrow the czars, and. But there it was. Nobody thought the Soviet Union would collapse, but then it did. Would you be surprised if there was a coup attempt against the government and Putin in particular right now?
- [40:55]
G
Yeah, I would be very surprised. I don't mind going on the record on this one. I hope I'm wrong. If two weeks from now or a month from now, you'd be willing to have me back, and there is some type of. I'd be thrilled to be wrong, Jeff, but listen again. Well, was it.
- [41:07]
D
What was Prigozhin doing?
- [41:09]
G
Let's talk about Prigozhi. I'm writing a piece right now. I'm hoping to get out and in some. Some. Some media somewhere or another. I've already written an article. I'm clearing it with CIA right now. Now, about this issue, I think the Prigozhin mutiny was misunderstood. Okay. We have to understand, Prigozhin, I believe, never fundamentally planned to overthrow the Putin, the entire regime. What was Prigozhin shouting when he was marching towards Moscow? Remember, he was saying shyguirazimov. That's who he was shouting at. The Minister of Defense and the Chief of the General Staff because his soldiers were dying at the front because they weren't getting ammunition. How did he manage to get on the road to Moscow? He went through Rostov Oblast. I happen to study there as a student. I know the geography well. He went through Rostov. He went through commanders that he had fought with in Ukraine who absent orders from Moscow because it happened very quickly. They're not going to kill fellow Russians. Now, Mike, if he had gotten to and Jeff, if he had gotten to Moscow and the ring road outside of Moscow, he would have came up against Russia units, units numbering hundreds of thousands, fiercely loyal to Putin. Putin, he'd come against the fsb, elite units of Alpha and Dimple, if they needed to, Special operations teams. He'd come up against the FSO the protective service, numbering somewhere around 30 to 40,000, fiercely loyal to Putin. The Prigozhin mutiny had absolutely zero chance of ever succeeding in overthrowing Putin. But I think it's misunderstood in the west. His goal was really close. He got within a few hundred miles of Moscow. He didn't really get that close to overthrowing Putin at all. He did make a lot of headlines. And what did Putin do? From the Textbook of Autocrats, 101. He said, Everything's okay. Let me just talk to the captains involved with the mutiny, summon them to Moscow without Prigozhin FSB thugs lining the room. If you remember how that went down on tv, they all swore new oath of fealty to the master ruler. Prigozhin was told, you're gonna be okay, it's all right. And a few months later, he and his lieutenants die when their plane falls out of the sky. Putin's been at this a long time. He's been getting straight A's in the dictators 101 course for 25 years. He's way ahead of us. He's playing 3D chess. So I don't believe there's any chance of any type of a coup or uprising overthrown him. I think the rumors probably serve him during a crackdown, even tighter crackdown with the Russian people.
- [43:23]
D
And yet, and yet Katherine Belton, longtime Russia watcher, has a front page piece in the Washington Post today, Thursday, highlighting this guy, Ilya Got Remeslo, who was a longtime Kremlin propagandist close to Putin, who then began criticizing the Ukraine war, gets thrown in a psychiatric hospital for a month. An old Soviet tactic to deal with dissenters. And that was. But then is released and he's out there criticizing Putin left and right right now and the Ukraine war. That's, you know, that seems to be a sign of an insider who is turning against the leader.
- [44:12]
C
I wouldn't get too close to a window if I were him.
- [44:16]
G
I'm with Jeff on that one. Unfortunately, Mike, this fits a pattern. There's also the Newsweek piece out this week, I think, I don't know. Mike had said editors wrote it. I don't know if, if you might have known who wrote it, but I was reading both pieces. I do think, honestly, respectfully, to Ms. Belton and the other piece, the piece in Newsweek, and a friend of mine wrote a piece in the, for the Moscow Times too. I, I think it's a lot of, there's a lot of wishful thinking in there, really. So what, what might Be happening with Remislaw. What is. What's Putin done? Repeatedly, he throws somebody in jail, throws him in prison, and then he lets them go temporarily. It's a sign of, again, the czar, the autocrat. Well, I'm gonna pardon this person temporarily. Let them go for a little bit bit. Invariably, what ends up happening go. Yeah, they fall out of a window or they're arrested again and they're eventually killed. Unfortunately, that's what happened. He let Navalny go. Navalny came back heroically to say heroically. He came back, was immediately in prison. He was allowed to live in prison. Many people say. Why was he allowed. Allowed to stay alive? Putin, I think it's part of Putin like, to likes playing the autocrat, the tsar. Well, maybe I'm allowing temporary reprieve. And then he kills them anyway. So if I was Remus low, Sadly, Jeff, like you said, I would be staying away from windows.
- [45:29]
C
And I would say that with the big victory parade coming up, we're all on pins and needles. It might be the most watched victory parade in many years, and maybe even Putin himself is on pins and needles.
- [45:44]
E
You know, one of the things that's underlying your book is that the readers, us, the United States, and more, doesn't quite understand what we need to understand about what the Russian intelligence services are and what they propose. And the other thing that comes across is that you said here again, which is that Russia sees us as the number one entity in its headlights. Right. I want to know, do we see Russia as the number one entity in our headlights? And number two, did you write your book to try to call attention to something that you think the United. United States, and I don't mean the populace, I mean the intelligence services and the national security community writ large, need to pay more attention to. And just.
- [46:32]
C
Thank you.
- [46:33]
E
How do you see that?
- [46:33]
G
Yeah. Karen, thank you. I love, love it.
- [46:35]
F
Love.
- [46:35]
G
Another final question about my book. That is why I wrote the book. I wrote the book to raise awareness, to expose the Russian services for the evil that they do in the world, trying to thwart democracy around the world. It's written as, you know, 10 chapters on different aspects of their trade and their craft. Craft as an expose to say to us and our allies, you know, this is what they're up to. This is what they've been doing for generations. They are a formidable adversary. They're weakened by their corruption. They're weakened by incompetence at times, but they're focused with. With a singular focus on the United States as the glovni Prativnik as the main enemy. So we need to be on guard or we need to be more watchful. And I think, unfortunately, for many, many years, many administrations on the left, right, Dems and Republicans, we've been played for suckers by Putin and by his regime. He's taken advantage of our wishful thinking that we could collaborate with them, work on the war on terror. Karen, I'll leave it as this. You read the book. You know that Russian intelligence officer told me as a young CIA officer, he said, billy, he said, you are the main enemy. You, you were the main enemy. You are the main enemy. You always will be the main enemy of Russia. Russia. For us, the United States comes first. That should be a warning to Americans. They're always coming at us. We're always their focus, even when we're distracted by other things. Thank you.
- [47:50]
C
Thanks again, Sean, for coming on at this very timely moment. I urge listeners to get a hold of Sean's book, Tradecraft, Tactics and Dirty Tricks, Russian Intelligence and Putin's Secret War.
- [48:03]
D
Thanks.
- [48:04]
G
Thank you. It was an honor. Thank you very much.
- [48:06]
E
Thanks, Sean. ON
- [48:09]
C
and that's it for this week's Spy Talk. Be sure to check out our complete podcast archive on Apple or wherever you get your podcast. And if you haven't already, do Check out the SpyTalk Co news site on Substack where we offer steady diet of scoops and original analyses from the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy and military operations. Just Google Spy Talk Talk. You'll quickly find your way there. This edition of the Spy Talk podcast was smoothly produced as always by Kanai and expertly edited by Molly Hawkey for MSW Media. That's it. See you around. I'm Jeff Stein.
- [48:48]
D
I'm Michael Isikoff.
- [48:49]
E
I'm Karen Greenberg.
- [48:50]
C
Thanks for listening.
- [48:52]
B
For more original reporting and insights like this, subscribe to SpyTalk Co on substance and follow us on Twitter Talkspy. If you enjoyed our podcast, subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Msw media.
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A
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