SpyCast
SpyCast, the official podcast of the International Spy Museum, is a journey into the shadows of international espionage. Each week, host Sasha Ingber brings you the latest insights and intriguing tales from spies, secret agents, and covert communicators, with a focus on how this secret world reaches us all in our everyday lives. Tune in to discover the critical role intelligence has played throughout history and today. Brought to you from Airwave, Goat Rodeo, and the International Spy Museum.
The Spy Museum does not endorse, approve, or support the opinions stated by guest speakers. Statements made by speakers do not represent the position or opinion of the International Spy Museum.
551
Author Debriefing: The Hundred-Year Marathon: C...
For more than forty years, the United States has played an indispensable role helping the Chinese government build a booming economy, develop its scientific and military capabilities, and take its place on the world stage, in the belief that China’s ri...
42 min
552
Defending a Spy: An Interview with Espionage At...
What do Aldrich Ames, Robert Hanssen, and Ana Montes have in common? Two things: they all spied against the United States, and they all had Plato Cacheris as their lawyer. SPY Historian Vince Houghton and Executive Director Peter Earnest sat down with ...
28 min
553
Author Debriefing | Iran-Contra: Reagan’s Scand...
Through exhaustive use of declassified documents, previously unavailable investigative materials, and wide-ranging interviews, Malcolm Byrne explores what made the Iran-Contra scandal possible and meticulously relates how it unfolded—including clarifyi...
67 min
554
Drones: Past, Present, and Future: An Interview...
Guest host Dr. Chris Moran of Warwick University (UK) sat down with his colleague, Dr. Trevor McCrisken, for a SpyCast on the role of drones in modern surveillance, warfighting, and counterterrorism. McCrisken, whose biography can be found here, discus...
38 min
555
Inside the Stasi Archives: An Interview with Dr...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sat down with historian Doug Selvage to discuss the archives of the East German Ministry of State Security, the Stasi. Dr. Selvage, Project Director in the Office of the Federal Commissioner for the Stasi Records in Berlin,...
39 min
556
Spies, Policymakers, and Nuclear Weapons: An In...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sat down with historian Gregg Herken to discuss his new book The Georgetown Set: Friends and Rivals in Cold War Washington. Herken, the professor emeritus of modern American diplomatic history at the University of Californi...
26 min
557
Spies, Policymakers, and Nuclear Weapons: An In...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton continues his conversation with historian Gregg Herken, focusing on his previous four books on US nuclear policy. Brotherhood of the Bomb, Cardinal Choices, Counsels of War, and The Winning Weapon redefined the ways histori...
31 min
558
Can a Drone Read Your Email? : An Interview wit...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sat down with Mike Tassey and Rich Perkins, creators of the Wireless Aerial Surveillance Platform, a state-of-the-art cyber drone. Mike and Rich built their unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) in their garage using off-the-shelf ...
27 min
559
From Bletchley to Bond: An Interview with Journ...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sat down with British author and journalist Sinclair McKay for a two-part SpyCast. In Part 1, Vince and Sinclair discuss the role played by the codebreakers at Bletchley Park in the Allied victory in the Second World War. T...
29 min
560
From Bletchley to Bond: An Interview with Journ...
Half of the world’s population has seen a James Bond movie. The historical and cultural impact of this franchise’s 23 (and counting) films is unrivaled by anything else in contemporary pop culture. SPY Historian Vince Houghton is joined by British jour...
29 min
561
Author Debriefing: The Catcher Was a Spy: The M...
Moe Berg—the major league baseball player, OSS operative and legendary linguist—was one of the most remarkable secret agents ever deployed by the US. Whether authorized by the government as an atomic spy or choosing to surreptitiously film Tokyo of hi...
58 min
562
Author Debriefing: Good Hunting, An American Sp...
Jack Devine is one of the legendary spymasters of our time. He was in Chile when Allende fell; he ran Charlie Wilson’s war in Afghanistan; he had too much to do with Iran-Contra for his own taste, though he tried to stop it; he caught Pablo Escobar in ...
67 min
563
Author Debriefing: Double Agent, The First Hero...
Leading up to the US entry into WWII, Germany set up a sophisticated and productive espionage ring, which effectively utilized well-placed German Americans in the States. They were able to infiltrate key military and industrial facilities, and succeede...
48 min
564
Tinker, Tailor, Shortstop, Spy: An Interview wi...
Baseball has been played in the United States since the mid-19th Century, and from the very beginning teams were trying to gain a competitive edge against their rivals. In many cases, this involved stealing signs – the messages passed from coaches to p...
25 min
565
Terrorists, Double Agents, and European Dominat...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sat down with Paul Cruickshank and Tim Lister of CNN to discuss their new book Agent Storm: My Life Inside Al Qaeda and the CIA. The book, which they co-wrote with terrorist-turned-double-agent Morten Storm, traces an impro...
23 min
566
Terrorists, Double Agents, and European Dominat...
Join SPY Historian Vince Houghton as he continues his conversation with Paul Cruickshank and Tim Lister of CNN. Both men share their expertise on ISIS and the threat of Islamic Jihadism, and Tim, who has traveled to Ukraine on four different occasions ...
29 min
567
Author Debriefing: Spies, Patriots, and Traitor...
Nathan Hale and Benedict Arnold may be the most famous spies of the American Revolution, but they were hardly alone. George Washington’s use of spy networks and wider intelligence efforts were critical to the fight for independence. In Spies, Patriots,...
53 min
568
Election Espionage: An Interview with NBC Chief...
SPY Historian Dr. Vince Houghton sat down with NBC News Political Director and Chief White House Correspondent Chuck Todd to discuss the growing role of intelligence tradecraft in American election politics.Todd, the host of MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown, ...
29 min
569
The Birth of British Intelligence Coordination:...
SPY Historian Vince Houghton in joined by Dr. Michael Goodman of King’s College in London. Dr. Goodman is the official historian for the British Joint Intelligence Committee, and in that role he has published the book The Official History of the Joint ...
48 min
570
Author Debriefing: The Zhivago Affair: The Krem...
Travel back to a time when literature had the power to influence the world. Washington Post national security correspondent and former bureau chief in Moscow, Peter Finn tells the dramatic first account of how a forbidden book in the Soviet Union beca...
47 min
571
Author Debriefing: The Good Spy: The Life and D...
Pulitzer Prize- winning biographer Kai Bird gives the inside story of his compelling portrait of the remarkable life and death of one of the most important operatives in CIA history, Robert Ames. Through Bird’s personal connection to Ames’ family, he g...
57 min
572
The Beginnings of US Overhead Reconnaissance
The development of overhead reconnaissance technology is one of the most important – if not the most important – advances in the history of intelligence. Policymakers today use IMINT from spy planes and satellites in their daily assessments of global t...
50 min
573
Spy in the Sky - The KH-9 Hexagon
SPY Historian Vince Houghton sits down with engineer Phil Pressel to discuss his role in developing the KH-9 Hexagon spy satellite. The Hexagon, which was the last US spy satellite to use film, was declassified in 2011, allowing Pressel to write his bo...
40 min
574
Peter Earnest: My Life in the CIA
Former SPY Historian Mark Stout sat down with SPY Executive Director Peter Earnest to discuss Peter’s CIA career. After his recruitment and espionage training at the Farm, Peter’s entry into the world of spying came at an important turning point in the...
34 min
575
The Future of Intelligence
The world sends 3 million emails every second. How do Western intelligence agencies cope with such massive amounts of data? The Spy Museum's Executive Director Peter Earnest sits down to discuss the future of intelligence with historian Richard Aldrich...
30 min