Kind: captions
Language: en
the United States has
1,770 nuclear weapons deployed meaning
those weapons could launch in as little
as 60 seconds and up to a couple minutes
some of them on the bombers might take
an hour or so Russia has
1,674 deployed nuclear weapons same
scenario their weapon systems are on par
with
ours that's not to mention the 12,500
nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear
armed Nations the sucking up into the
nuclear stem 300 mph winds you're
talking about people miles out getting
sucked up into that stem when you see
the mushroom cloud Lex that would be
people 30 40 mile wide mushroom cloud
blocking out the Sun and that speaks
nothing of the radiation poisoning that
follows in addition to the launch on
warning concept there's this other
insane concept called sole presidential
Authority and you might think in a
democracy that's impossible right you
can't just start a war well you can just
start a nuclear war if you're the
commanderin-chief the president of the
United States in fact you're the only
one who can do that we are one
misunderstanding one miscalculation away
from nuclear Armageddon no matter how
nuclear war starts it ends with everyone
dead the following is a conversation
with Annie Jacobson an investigative
journalist polit surprise finalist and
author of several amazing books on war
weapons government secrecy and National
Security including the books titled Area
51 Operation Paperclip the pentagon's
brain phenomena surprise kill vanish and
her new book nuclear
war this is Alex Freedman podcast to
support it please check out our sponsors
in the description and now dear friends
here's Annie
Jacobson let's start with a an immensely
dark topic nuclear war how many people
would a nuclear war between the United
States and Russia kill so I'm coming
back at you with a very dark answer and
a very big
number and that number is 5 billion
people you go second by second minute by
minute hour by hour what would
happen if the nuclear war
started so uh there's a lot of angles
from which I would love to talk to you
about this at first how would the deaths
happen in the short term and the long
term so to start off the reason I wrote
the book is so that readers like you
could see in appalling detail just how
horrific nuclear war would be and as you
said second by second minute by wi
minute the book covers nuclear launch to
nuclear winter I purposely don't get
into the politics that lead up to that
or the National Security Maneuvers or
the posturing or of that I just want
people to know nuclear war is insane and
every Source I interviewed for this book
from Secretary of Defense you know all
retired nuclear subforce commander
stratcom commander FEMA director except
on and on and on nuclear weapons
Engineers they all shared with me the
common denominator that nuclear war is
insane you know first million then tens
of millions then hundreds of millions of
people will die in the first 72 minutes
of a nuclear war and then comes nuclear
wi winter where the billions happen from
starvation and so the shock power of all
of this is
meant for each and every one of us to
say wait what this actually exists
behind the veil of National Security and
I don't know you know most people do not
think about nuclear war on a daily basis
and yet hundreds of thousands of people
in the nuclear command and control are
at the ready in the event it happens but
it doesn't take too many people to start
one in the words of Richard Garwin who
was the nuclear weapons engineer who
drew the plans for the ivy Mike
thermonuclear bomb the first
thermonuclear bomb ever exploded
1952 Garwin shared with me his opinion
that all it takes is one nistic madman
with a nuclear Arsenal to start a
nuclear war and that's how I begin the
scenario what are the different ways it
could start like literally who presses a
button and what does it take to press a
button so the way it starts is in space
meaning the US defense department has a
early warning
system and the system in space is called
cbers a constellation of satellites that
is keeping an eye on all of America's
enemies so that the moment an ICBM
launches the satellite in space and I'm
talking about on10th of the way to the
Moon that's how powerful these
satellites are in
geosync they see the hot rod rocket
exhaust on the
ICBM in a fraction of a second after it
launches a fraction of a
second and so there begins this
horrifying
policy called launch on warning right
and that's the US Counterattack
meaning the reason that the United
States is so ferociously watching for a
nuclear launch somewhere around the
globe is so that
the nuclear command and control system
in the US can move into action to
immediately make a Counter Strike
because we have that policy launch on
warning which is exactly like it says it
means the United States will not wait to
absorb a nuclear attack it will launch
nuclear weapons in response
before the bomb actually hits so the
president as part of the launch on
warning policy has 6
minutes I guess can't launch for 6
minutes but at 6 Minute mark from that
first
warning the president
can launch and that was one of the most
remarkable details to really nail down
for this book when I was reporting this
book and talking to Secretary of
defenses for example who are the people
who advise the president on this matter
right you say to yourself wait a minute
how could that possibly be and so let's
unpack that right so in addition to the
launch on warning concept there's this
other insane concept called sole
presidential Authority and you might
think in a democracy that's impossible
right you can't just start a war well
you can just start a nuclear war if
you're the commander-in-chief the
president of the United States in fact
you're the only one who can do that and
we can get into later why that exists I
was able to get the origin story of that
concept from Los Alamos they
Declassified it for the book um but the
idea behind that is that nuclear war
will unfold so fast only one person can
be in charge the president he asks
permission of no one not the Secretary
of Defense not the chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff not the US Congress so
built into that is this extraordinary
speed you talk about the six-minute
window and some people say oh that's
ridiculous how do we know that
six-minute window well here's the best
sort of you know hitting the nail on the
head statement I can give you which is
in President Reagan's Memoirs he refers
to this six-minute window and he says he
he calls it irrational which it is he
says how can anyone make a decision to
launch nuclear weapons based on a blip
on a radar scope his
words to unleash Armageddon and yet that
is the reality behind nuclear war just
imagine sitting there one
person because a president is a human
being sitting there just got the warning
that Russia
launched you have six
minutes you know I I meditate on my
immortality every day and here you would
be sitting and meditating contemplating
not just your own mortality but the
mortality of all the people you know
loved ones just imagining like what what
would be going through my head is all
the people I know in
love like personally and knowing that
there'll be no more most likely and if
they somehow
survive they will be suffering and will
eventually
die I guess the question that kept
coming up is how do we stop this is it
inevitable that it's going to be
escalated to a full-on nuclear war that
destroys everything and it seems like it
it will be it's inevitable in the
position of the president it's almost
inevitable that they have to respond I
mean one of the things I found shocking
was how little apparently most
presidents know about the responsibility
that literally lays at their feet right
so you may think through this six-minute
window I may think through this
six-minute window but what I learned
like for example former Secretary of
Defense Leon Panetta was really helpful
in explaining this to me because before
he was SEF he served as the um director
of the
CIA and before that he was the white
house chief of staff and so he has seen
these different roles that have been so
close to the president but he explained
to me that when he was the white house
chief of staff for President
Clinton he noticed how President Clinton
didn't want to ever really deal with the
nuclear issue because he had so many
other issues to deal with um and that
only when Panetta became Secretary of
Defense he told me did he really realize
the weight of all of this because he
knew he would be the person that the
president president would turn
to were he to be notified of a nuclear
attack and by the way it's the launch on
warning it's that it's the the ballistic
missile seen from Outer Space by the
satellite and then there also must be a
second confirmation from a ground radar
system but in that process which is just
a couple minutes everyone is getting
ready to notify the president and one of
the first people that gets notified by
noad or by stratcom or by nro these
different parties that all see the early
warning data one of the first peoples
that's notified is the Secretary of
Defense as well as the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff because those two
together are going to brief the
president about you know sir you have
six minutes to
decide and that's where you realize the
immediacy of all of this is so counter
to Imagining the
scenario and again all the presidents
come into office I have learned
understanding the idea that of
deterrence this idea that we have these
massive arsenals of nuclear weapons
pointed at one another ready to launch
so that we never have nuclear war but
what we're talking about now is what if
we did what if we did and what you've
raised is like
this really spooky eerie subtext of the
world right now
because many of the nuclear armed
nations are in direct conflict with
other nations and for the first time in
decades nuclear threats are actually
coming out of the
mouths of leaders this is
shocking so deterrence the polite
implied assumption is that nobody will
launch and if they did we would launch
back and everybody would be dead but
that assumption falls apart completely
the whole philosophy of it falls apart
once the first launch happens absolutely
then you have six minutes to decide wait
a minute are we going to hit back and
kill everybody on Earth or do we turn
the other cheek in the most horrific way
possible well when when nuclear war
started there's no like battle for New
York or battle for Moscow it's just
literally it you know it was called in
the Cold War push button War fair but in
essence that is that is what it is let's
get some numbers on the table if you
don't mind right because when you're
saying like wait a minute we're just
hoping that it holds right let's just
talk about Russia and the US the
arsenals that are literally pointed at
one another right now right so the
United States has one
1,770 nuclear weapons deployed meaning
those weapons could launch in as little
as 60 seconds and up to a couple minutes
some of them on the bombers might take
an hour or so Russia has
1,674 deployed nuclear weapons same
scenario their weapon systems are on par
with
ours that's not to mention the 12,5 00
nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear
armed Nations but when you think about
those kind of arsenals of just between
the United States and Russia you real
and you realize everything can be
launched in seconds and minutes then you
realize the madness of Matt that this
idea that no one would launch because it
would assure everyone's destruction yes
but what if someone did and in my
interviews with scores of top tier
National Security advisers people who
advise the president people who are
responsible for these decisions if they
had to be made every single one of them
said it could happen they didn't say
this would never
happen and so the
idea is worth thinking about
because I believe that it pulls back the
veil on
on a fundamental security that if
someone were to use a tactical nuclear
weapon oh well it's just an
escalation it's far more than
that so to you the use of a tactical
nuclear weapon maybe you can draw the
line between a tactical and a strategic
nuclear weapon that could be a catalyst
like that's a very difficult thing to
walk back from oh my God almost
certainly and again any every person in
the National Security environment tells
we we'll agree with that right certainly
on the American side um strategic
weapons those are like big Weapons
Systems the America has a nuclear Triad
we have our icbms which are The Silo
based missiles that have a nuclear
warhead in the nose cone and they can
get from one continent to the other in
roughly 30 minutes then we have our
bombers b52s and b2s that are nuclear
capable um those take travel time to get
to another continent those can also be
recalled the icbms cannot be recalled or
redirected once launched that one is a
particularly terrifying one so land
launched missiles Rockets with a warhead
can't be recalled cannot be recalled or
redirected and speaking of how little
the presidents generally know as we were
talking a moment ago President Reagan in
198 3 gave a press conference where he
misstated that submarine launched
ballistic missiles could be recalled
they cannot be recalled so that gives
you here's the guy in charge of the
Arsenal if it has to get let loose and
he doesn't even know that they cannot be
recalled so this is the kind of
misinformation and disinformation and
and you know un Secretary General
Antonio gutterz recently said when he
was talking about the conflicts Rising
around the world he said We Are One
misunderstanding one miscalculation away
from nuclear
Armageddon so just to sort of Linger on
the previous point of tactical nukes so
you're describing strategic nukes land
launched bombers submarine launched what
are tactical nukes so that's the Triad
right and we have the Triad and Russia
has the Triad
tactical nuclear weapons are smaller
Warheads that were designed to be used
in battle and that is what Russia is
sort of threatening to use right now
that is this idea that you would you
know make a decision on the battlefield
in an operational environment to use a
tactical nuclear weapon you're just sort
of upping the ante but the problem is
that all treaties are based on this idea
of no nuclear use right you cannot cross
that line and so the what would happen
if the line is crossed is so devastating
to even
consider I think that the conversation
is well worth having among everyone you
know that is in a power of
position how as you know the UN
Secretary General said this is madness
right this is madness we must come back
from the brink we are at the
brink uh can we talk about some other
numbers so you mentioned the number of
Warhead so land launched how long does
it take to
travel across the
ocean from the United States to to
Russia from Russia to the United States
from China to the United States uh how
approximately how long when I was
writing an earlier book on DARPA the the
Pentagon science agency
um I went to a
library down in San Diego called the gel
library to look at herb York's papers
herb York was the first Chief scientist
for the Pentagon for DARPA then called
arpa and I had been trying to get the
number from the various agencies that be
to answer your like what is the exact
number and how do we know it and like
does it change and you know as
technology advances does that number
reduce all these kinds of questions and
no one will answer that question on an
official level and so much to my
surprise I found the answer in herb
York's like Dusty Archive of papers and
this is information that was jealously
guarded I mean it didn't it was not it's
not necessarily classified but it
certainly wasn't out there and I felt
like wow herb York left these behind for
someone like me to find right and what
the process of he wanted to know the
answer to your question and as the guy
in charge of it all so he hired this
group of scientists who then and still
are in many ways like the Pent the
Supermen scientists of the Pentagon and
they're called the Jason scientists many
conspiracies about them abound I
interviewed their founder and have
interviewed many of them but they
whittled the number down to seconds
okay specifically for her York and it
goes like this cuz this is where my jaw
dropped and I went wow okay so 26
minutes and 40 seconds from a Launchpad
in the Soviet Union to the east coast
and it happens in three phases very
simple and interesting to remember
because then suddenly all of this makes
more sense boost phase midcourse phase
and then terminal phase okay boost Phase
5 minutes that's when the rocket
launches so you just imagine a rocket
going off the Launchpad and the fire
beneath it again that's why the
satellites can see it okay now it's
becoming visual now it makes sense to me
right five minutes and that's where the
rocket can be tracked and then Imagine
Learning wait a minute after 5 minutes
the rocket can no longer be seen from
space the satellite can only see the hot
rocket exhaust then the missile enters
its midc phase 20 20 minutes and that's
the ballistic part of it where it's kind
of flying up at between 500 and 700
miles above the Earth and moving very
fast and with the Earth until it gets
very close to its Target and the last
100 seconds are terminal phase it's
where the Warhead reenters the
atmosphere and
detonates 26 minutes and 40 seconds now
in my scenario I open with North Korea
launching a one Megaton nuclear warhead
at Washington DC that's the nealis
madman maneuver that's the bolt out of
the blue attack that everyone in
Washington will tell you they're afraid
of and North
Korea is a little has a little bit
different geography and so I had MIT
Professor ameritus Ted postal do the
math 33 3 minutes from a Launchpad in
Pyongyang to the east coast of the
United States you get the idea it's
about 30 minutes but hopefully now that
allows readers to suddenly see all this
as a real you you almost see it as you
know as poetry as terrible as that may
sound you can visualize it and suddenly
it makes sense and I think the sense
making part of it is really what I'm
after in this book because a want people
to understand on the the one hand it's
incredibly simple it's just the people
that have made it so complicated but
it's one of those things that can change
all of world history in a matter of
minutes we just don't as a human
civilization have experience with
that
but it doesn't mean it'll never happen
it can happen just like that I mean I
think what you're after and I couldn't
agree more with is
like why is why is
this fundamentally
annihilating system a system of mass
genocide as John rubel you know in the
book refers to it why is it still
exist you know we've had 75 years since
there have been two superpowers with the
nuclear bomb um so that threat has been
there for 75 years and we have managed
to stay alive one of the reasons why so
many of the sources in the book agreed
to talk to me people who had not
previously gone on the record about all
of this was because they are now
approaching the end of their lives they
spent their lives dedicated to
preventing nuclear World War II MH and
they'll be the first people to tell you
we're closer to this as a reality than
ever before and so on the bright the
only bright side of any of this is that
like the answer lies most definitely in
communication so there's a million other
questions here uh I think the details
are fascinating and important to
understand so one you also say uh
nuclear submarines you mentioned about
30 minutes 20 26 33 minutes but with uh
nuclear submarines that number can be
much much lower so how long does it take
for a warhead to missile to reach the
east coast of the United States from a
submarine just when you thought it was
really bad yeah and then you kind of
realize about the submarines I mean the
submarines are what are called second
strike capacity right and you know it
was descri submarines were described to
me this way they are as dangerous to
civilization and let me say a nuclear
armed nuclear powered submarine is as
dangerous to civilization as an asteroid
okay they are un stoppable they are
unlocatable the former Chief of the
nuclear submarine forces Admiral Michael
Connor told me it's easier to find a
grapefruit sized object in space than a
submarine Under the Sea okay so these
things are like hell
machines and they're moving around
throughout the oceans ours Russia's
China's maybe North Korea constantly and
we now know they're sneaking up to the
east and west coast of the United States
within a couple hundred miles how do we
know that why do we know that well I
found a document inside of a budget um
that the defense department was going to
Congress for more money recently and
showed maps of precisely where these
submarines how close they were getting
to the Eastern Seaboard so wait wait
wait so nuclear subs are getting within
200 miles couple hundred miles yes they
weren't precise on the number but when
you look at the map yep and that's when
you're talking about under 10 minutes
from launch to to strike undetectable
and they're undetectable the the map
making is done after the fact because of
a lot of underwater surveillance systems
that we have you know but in real time
you cannot find a a nuclear submarine
and you know just the way a submarine
launches goes 150 ft below the surface
to launch its ballistic missile I mean
it comes out of the missile tube and
with enough thrust that the the
thrusters the boo they ignite outside
the water and then they move into boost
and so the technology involved is just
stunning and shocking and again
trillions of dollars spent so that we
never have a nuclear war but my God what
if we
did as you right they're called the
handmade of the
Apocalypse what a terrifying label I
mean
uh you want one of the things you also
write about so for the land launched
ones they're presumably
underground so the silos how long does
it take to go from like pressing the
button to them emerging from underground
for launch and is is that part
detectable or it's only the the heat so
what's interesting about the silos
America has 4 00 silos right we've had
more um but we have 400 and they're
underground and they're called Minutemen
right after the Revolutionary War Heroes
but the sort of joke in Washington is
they're not called Minutemen for nothing
because they can launch in one minute
yeah right so the president orders the
launch of the icbms ICBM stands for
intercontinental ballistic missile he
orders the launch and they launch 60
seconds later and then they take 30 some
odd minutes to get to where they're
going the submarines take about 14 or 15
minutes from the presidential from the
launch command to actually launching and
that has to do I surmise with the
location of the submarine its depth some
of these things are so highly classified
and others other details are shockingly
available if you look deep enough or if
you ask enough question questions and
you can go from one document to the next
to the next and really find these
answers not to ask top secret questions
but uh to what degree do you think the
Russians know the locations of the silos
in the US and vice versa Lex you can you
and I can find the location of every
Silo right now they're all there and
before they were there on on you know
Google they were there in maps because
we're a democracy and we make these
things known Okay now what's tricky is
that Russia and North Korea rely upon
what are called Road Mobile launchers
right so Russia has a lot of underground
silos you know all of the scenario takes
you through these different facilities
that really do exist and they're all
sourced with how many weapons they have
and their launch procedures and whatnot
but in addition to having um underground
silos they have Road Mobile launchers
and that means you just have one of
these giant icbms on a 22
axle truck that can move stealthily
around the country so that it can't be
targeted by the US defense department we
don't have those in America because
presumably the average you know American
isn't going to go for like the ICBM Road
Mobile Launcher driving down the street
in your town or city um which is why the
defense department will justify we need
the second strike capacity capability
the uh submarines right because you know
the I mean the wonky stuff that is worth
looking into as a if you really dig the
book and are like wait a minute it's all
footnoted where you can learn more about
how these systems have changed over time
um and why more than anything it's very
difficult to get out of this catch22
conundrum that you know we need nuclear
weapons to keep us safe that is the real
Enigma
because the other guys have them right
and the other guys have sort of more
Sinister ways of of using them or at
least that's what the nomenclature out
of the Pentagon will always be when
anyone tries to say we just need to
really think about full disarmament
you've written about intelligence
agencies how good are the intelligence
agencies on this how much does CIA know
about the the Russian uh the Russian
launch sites and capability
and command and control procedures and
all this and vice versa I mean all of
this because it's decades old is really
well known if you go to the Federation
of American scientists they have a team
led by a guy called Hans Christensen who
runs What's called the nuclear notebook
and he and his team every year are
keeping track of this number of warheads
on these number of weapon systems and
because of the treaties the different
signatories to the treat all report
these numbers and of course the
different intelligence Community people
are keeping track of what's being you
know revealed honestly and and reported
with transparency and what is being
hidden the real issue is the new systems
that Russia is working on right now um
and that will lead us you know we are
kind of moving into an era whereby the
the threat of actually having new weapon
systems that are nuclear capable is very
real because of the escalating tensions
around the world and that's where the
CIA would guess is doing most of its
work right now so most of your research
is kind of looking at the the older
versions of the system and presumably
there's potentially secret development
of new ones hopefully which violates
treaties so yes that is where the
intelligence agencies but you know at a
point it's Overkill literally and
figuratively right people are up in arms
about these Hypersonic weapons well we
have a Hypersonic weapons program you
know Falcon Google blackswift right this
is loeds doing um you know we're
DARPA exists to create the vast weapon
systems of the future that is its job it
has been doing that since its Creation
in
1957 I would never believe that we
aren't ahead of everyone
call me you know over informed or naive
one or the other uh that would be my
position because DARPA works from the
chicken or the egg scenario you know
that like once once you learn about
something once you learn Russia's
created this you know Typhoon Submarine
which may or may not you know be viable
it's too late if you don't already have
one we probably talk about Dara a little
bit uh one of the things that makes me
sad about locki many things makes me sad
about locked um but one of the things is
because it's very top secret you can't
show off all the incredible engineering
going going on there the other thing
that's more philosophical DARPA also is
that war seems to stimulate most of our
not most but a large percent of our
exciting Innovation and engineering and
so but that's also the pragmatic fact of
life on Earth is that uh the risk of
Annihilation is is a great motivator for
for for Innovation for engineering and
so on but yes I would not discount uh
the United States in its ability to
build the weapons of the future nuclear
included again
terrifying can you tell me about the
nuclear football as it's called I think
Americans are familiar with the football
at least anyone who sort of you know
follows National Security Concepts
because it's a Satchel it's a leather
satchel that is always with a military
aid in Secret Service nomenclature
that's the mill Aid and he's trailing
around the president 247 365 days a year
and also the vice president by the way
with the ability to launch nuclear war
in that six-minute window all the time
okay um that is also called the football
and it's always with the president to
report this part of the book I
interviewed a lot of people in the
Secret Service that are with the
president and talk about this and the
director of The Secret Service a guy
called Lou merletti told me a story that
I just really found fascinating um he
was also in charge of the president's
detail President Clinton This was um
before he was director of The Secret
Service and he told me the story about
how he said the football is with the
president at all times S period okay
they were traveling to Syria and Clinton
was meeting with President Assad and
they got into an
elevator uh Clinton and the Secret
Service team and one of Assad's guys was
like no you know like about the mill Aid
and Lou said it was like a standoff
because there was no way they were not
going to have the president with his
football in an
elevator and it kind of sums up for me
anyways you you realize what goes into
every single one of these decisions you
realize the massive system of systems
behind every item you might just see in
in passing and glancing on the news as
you see the M Aid carrying that Satchel
well what's in that Satchel I really dug
into that to report this book what is in
that s okay so well okay first of all
that is you know people are say it's
incredibly classified I mean people talk
about UFOs it's incredibly I mean come
on guys that is nothing burger right you
want to know what's really classified
what's in that football right what's in
that Satchel but the peed presidential
emergency action directives right those
have never been leaked no one knows what
they are what we do know from one of the
mill AIDS who spoke on the record a guy
called Buzz Patterson he just describes
the president's orders right so if a
nuclear war has begun if the president
has been told there are nuclear missiles
one or more coming at the United States
you have to launch in a Counterattack
right the red clock is ticking you have
to get the blue in Impact clock ticking
um he needs to look at this list to
decide what targets to strike and what
weapon systems to use and that is what
is on according to Buzz Patterson a
piece of like sort of laminated plastic
he described it like a Denny's menu mhm
and from that
menu the president chooses targets and
chooses weapon
systems and it's probably super old
school like all uh top secret systems
are because they have to be tested over
and over and over and over and over yes
and it's non-digital non-digital it
might literally be a menu from hell
right and there's a meanwhile I learned
this only in reporting the book um there
is a identical black book inside the
stratcom bunker in Nebraska okay so let
me three command bunkers are involved
when when nuclear war begins right
there's the bunker beneath the Pentagon
which is called the National military
command center okay mhm then there is
the bunker beneath Cheyenne Mountain
which everyone has you know or many
people have heard of because it's been
made famous in movies right that is a
very real bunker and then there is a
third bunker which people are not so
familiar with which is the bunker
beneath strategic command in
Nebraska and so it's described to me
this way the Pentagon bunker is the
Beating Heart the Cheyenne Mountain
bunker is the
brains and the stratcom bunker is the
muscle
the stratcom commander will receive word
from the president launch orders and
then directs the
150,000 people beneath him what to do
okay from the bunker in Strat beneath
stratcom that's before he run you know
he gets the orders then he has to run
out of the building and jump onto a
What's called the Doomsday plane we'll
get into that in a minute let me just
finish the I mean but again this is
right these are the details this is like
these are the systematic sequential
details that happen in seconds and
minutes and Reporting them I never
ceased to be amazed by what a system it
is you know a a follows B you know just
it's just numerical right yeah but as we
discussed this procedure each individual
person that follows that procedure might
lose the big picture of the whole thing
I mean especially when you
realize what what is happening y that
almost out of fear you just follow the
steps y or okay so imagine this imagine
being the president you got that six
minute wi you have to you're looking at
your list of strike options you're being
briefed by your chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff and your SAA and this
other really spooky detail in the
stratcom
bunker in addition to the Nuclear Strike
advisor who can answer very specific
questions if the president's like wait a
minute why are we striking that not that
there's also a weather officer and this
is the kind of human detail that kept me
up at night because that weather officer
is in charge of explaining to the
president really fast how many people
are going to die and how many people
are going to die in minutes weeks months
and years from radiation
Fallout because a lot of that has to do
with the weather system
yes yes and so these kinds of the
humanness you know balanced out with the
mechanization of it all MH
is it's just really grotesque
so the uh doomsday plane from stratcom
what's that where's it going it's on
it okay ready it's going to fly in
circles that's where it's going it's
flying in circles around the United
States of
America so that nuclear weapons can be
launched from the
air after the ground systems are taken
out by the incoming icbms or the
incoming
submarine launch ballistic missiles this
has been in play since the
50s this is these These are the
contingency plans for when nuclear war
happens so again going back to this
absurd Paradox nuclear war will never
happen you know Mutual assured
destruction that is why deterrence will
hold well I found a talk that the deputy
director of stratcom gave to a very
close nit group where he said yes
deterrence will hold but if it fails
everything
unravels and think about that word
unravels right and the unraveling is you
know the Doomsday plane launches the
stratcom commander jumps in he's in that
plane he's flying around the United
States and uh he's making decisions
because the pentagon's been taken
out at 911 by the way Bush was in the
Doomsday plane and uh bush had to make
decisions quickly but not so quickly not
as quickly as he would have need to have
done if there's a nuclear launch I mean
six
minutes it's basically happens in three
acts there's the first 24 minutes the
next 24 minutes and the last 24 minutes
and that is the reality of nuclear
weapons what is the Interceptor
capabilities of the United States how
many nuclear missiles can be
stopped I was at a dinner party with a
very informed person right like somebody
who really you know should have known
this and I this is when I was
considering writing and Reporting this
book and he said to me oh Annie that
would never happen because of our
powerful Interceptor system okay well
he's wrong let me tell you about our
powerful Interceptor system first of all
we have 44 Interceptor missiles total
period full stop let me repeat
44 okay earlier we were talking about
Russia's
1,670 deployed nuclear weapons how are
they how are those 44 Interceptor
missiles going to work right um and they
also have a success rate of around 50%
so they work 50% of the time there are
40 of them in Alaska and there four of
them at Vandenberg Air Force Base in
Santa Barbara okay and they are
responsible at about 9 minutes into the
scenario right after the ICBM has
finished that five- minute boost phase
we talked about now it's in midcourse
phase and the ground radar systems have
identified yes this is an incoming ICBM
MH and now the Interceptor missiles have
to launch right it's essentially
shooting a missile with a missile inside
the Interceptor which is just a big
giant rocket in its nose cone it has
what's called a the apply named EXO
atmospheric kill vehicle okay there's no
explosives in that thing it's literally
just going to take out the Warhead
ideally with Force
so one of them is going like you know
March 20 and the I mean the the speeds
at which these two moving objects
hurdling through space are going is
astonishing and the fact that that
interception is even possible is really
remarkable but it's only possible 50% of
the time is it possible that we only
know about 44 but there could be a lot
more no impossible that I would be
willing to bet and how well tested are
these interceptors well that's where we
get the success rate that's around 50%
because of the test right and actually
the Interceptor program is are you ready
for this it's on strategic pause right
right now meaning the Interceptor
missiles are there but developing them
and making them more effective is on
strategic pause because they can't be
made more effective right people have
these fantasies that uh we have a system
like the Iron Dome and they see this in
current events and they're like oh our
interceptors would do that it's just
simply not true why why can't an Iron
Dome like system be constructed for
nuclear warheads we have systems I write
about called the Thad system which is
groundbased and then the Eis system
which is on you know vessels and these
are great at shooting down some in you
know some Rockets but they they they can
only shoot them sort of one at a time
you cannot shoot the motherload as it's
coming in those are the smaller systems
right the tactical nuclear weapons and
by the way our systems are all deployed
overseas and our egis systems are all
out at Sea and again reporting that I
was like wait what you know you have to
really hunker down are we sure about
this people really don't want to believe
this it's an actual fact after 911
Congress considered putting and you know
egis missiles and maybe even Thad
systems along the west coast of the
United States to specifically deal with
the threats against nuclear armed North
Korea but it hasn't done so yet and
again you have to ask yourself wait a
minute this is insanity you know one
nuclear weapon Gets By any of these
systems and it's full out nuclear
warfare
so that's not the solution more nuclear
weapons is not the
solution I'm looking for a hopeful thing
here about North Korea uh how many
deployed nuclear warheads does North
Korea have so does the current system
with as we described it uh the
interceptors and so on have a hope
against the North Korean attack the one
that you mentioned people are worried
about so they North Korea has 50 let's
say 50 nuclear weapons right now some
NOS put it at more than a 100 it's it's
impossible to know because North Korea's
nuclear weapons program has no
transparency they're the only nuclear
armed nation that doesn't announce when
they do a ballistic missile test
everyone else does no one wants to start
a nuclear war by accident right so if
Russia's going to launch an ICBM they
tell us if we're going to launch one and
I'm I'm talking test runs here you know
with the dummy Warhead we we tell them
not North Korea that's a fact okay so
we're constantly up against the fear of
North Korea in the scenario I have the
incoming North Korean one Megaton you
know weapon coming in and the
Interceptor system tries to shoot it
down so there there's not enough time
and this by the way I ran through by all
you know generals from the Pentagon who
run these scenarios for no red right and
confirmed all of this as fact this is
not this is this is this is the
situation right so in the scenario I
have the nuclear ICBM coming in the
Interceptor missiles try to shoot down
the Warhead the capability is is not
like what's called Shoot you know and
look they can't there's not enough time
to go like and we're going to try to get
it we missed it okay let's go for
another one so you have to
go right so in my scenario we fire off
four which is about what I was told with
one to four because you're worried about
the next one that's going to come in
you're going to use up 10% of your
missile force of your Interceptor force
on one and all four Miss and that's
totally
plausible
right uh How likely are mistakes
accidents false alarms taken as real all
this kind of stuff in this picture so
like you've we've kind of assumed the
detection works
correctly How likely is it possible like
anywhere you you described this long
chain of events that can happen how
possible is it just to make a mistake a
stupid human mistake along the way there
have been at least six known like
absolute like like oh my God close calls
how how thank God this happened type
scenarios one was described to me with
an actual personal participant secretary
former Secretary of Defense Bill Perry
right and he described what happened to
him in
1979 he was not yet Secretary of Defense
he was the deputy director of research
and Engineering which is like a big job
at the Pentagon and it was the the the
night watch fell on him essentially
right and he gets this call in the
middle of the night he's told that
Russia has
launched not just icbms but submarine
launch ballistic missiles are coming at
the United States and he is about to
notify the president that the six-minute
window has to begin when he learns it
was a mistake the mistake was that there
was a training tape with a nuclear war
scenario right we haven't even begun to
talk about the nuclear war scenarios at
the Pentagon runs an actual VHS training
tape had been incorrectly insert it into
a system at the Pentagon and so this
nuclear launch showed up at that bunker
beneath the Pentagon and at the bunker
beneath stratcom because they're
connected as being real and then it was
like oh whoops it's actually a
simulation test tape and Perry described
to me what that was like the Paw in his
spirit and his mind and his heart when
he realized I'm about to have to tell
the president that he needs to launch
nuclear weapons and he learned just in
the neck of time that it was it was an
error and that's one of five examples
can you speak to maybe um is there any
more color to the feelings he was
feeling like what's your sense and given
all the experts you've talked to
what what can be said about the seconds
that one feels uh once finding out that
a launch has happened even if that
information is a is false information
for me personally that's the only
firsthand story that I ever heard
because it's so rare and it's so unique
and most people in the National Security
system at least in the past have been
loathed to talk about any of this right
it's like the sacred oath it's Taboo
it's taboo to go against um the system
of systems that is you know making sure
nuclear war never happens Bill Perry was
one of the first people who did this and
a lot of it I believe at least in my
lengthy conversations with him over we
had a lot of Zoom calls over covid when
I began reporting this and he had a lot
to do with me feeling like I could write
this book from a
human point of view and not just from
the mechanized systems because and I
only lightly touch upon this because
it's such a fast sweeping scenario but
Perry for example spent his whole life
dedicated to building weapons of war
only later in life to realize this is
madness and he shared with me that it
was that idea about one's grandchildren
inheriting these nuclear arsenals and
the lack of you know
wisdom that comes with their or origin
stories right when you're involved in it
in the ground up
apparently it
has perhaps you're a different kind of
Steward of these systems than if you
just inherit them and they are you know
pages in a manual mhm people forget you
mentioned the kind of nuclear war
scenarios that the Pentagon runs I'd
love to what do you know about those I
mean again they are very classified
right I mean it was interesting coming
across information levels of
classification I didn't even know
existed like ECI for example is
exceptionally controlled information
right um but the Pentagon War nuclear
war gaming scenarios they're almost all
still classified one of them was
Declassified recently if you can call it
that I show an image of it in the book
and it's just basically
like almost all almost entirely redact
and then like there'll be a date you
know or it'll say like phase one um and
that one was called proud profit but
what was incredible about the
declassification process of that is it
allowed allowed a couple of people who
were there to talk about it okay and
that's why we have that information and
I write about proud profit in the book
because it was super significant in many
ways one it was happening right in 1983
there was an it was an insane moment in
nuclear Arsenal there were
60,000 nuclear weapons right now there's
12,500 so we've come a long way baby
right in terms of disarmament but there
were 60,000 and by the way that was not
the ultimate High the ultimate high was
70,000 okay this is insane and Ronald
Reagan was President and he orders this
war game called proud profit and um you
know this everyone everyone that
mattered was involved they were running
the war game scenarios and what we
learned learn from his
declassification is that no matter how
nuclear war starts there was a bunch of
different scenarios with you know NATO
involved without NATO with the all
different scenarios no matter how
nuclear war starts it ends in
Armageddon it ends with everyone
Deb I mean this is shocking when you
think
about that coupled with the idea that
all that has been done in the 40 mod
years s is okay this let's just really
lean in even harder to
this theoretical phenomena of deterrence
because that's all it is it's just a
statement Lex like deterrence will
hold okay well what if it
doesn't well we know from proud profit
what happens if it
doesn't so almost always so there's no
mechanisms in the human mind and the
human soul that stops IT in the in the
governments they've created it just keep
the procedure escalates always I mean
here's a crazy nomenclature jargon thing
for you ready escalate to deescalate
that's what comes out of it think about
what what I just said escalate to
deescalate okay so someone strikes you
with a nuclear weapon you're going to
escalate it right General heighton
recently said he was stratcom commander
you know if he was sort of saber
rattling with North Korea during Co and
he said they need to know if if they
launch one nuclear weapon we launch one
if they launch two we launch two but
it's actually more than that they launch
one we launch 80 yeah okay that's called
escalate to deescalate like pound the
you know what out of them to get them to
stop but I mean there
is to make a case for that there is a
reason to the
madness because you want to threaten
this gigantic response but when it comes
to it the seconds before there is still
a probability that you'll pull back
which brings us to the most
terrifying facts that I learned in all
of that and that has to do
with errors right not just not errors of
like we spoke about a minute ago with an
you know simulation test tape I'm
talking about if one new one madman one
nealis Mad Men were to launch a nuclear
weapon as I as I write in the scenario
um and we needed to escalate to
deescalate we needed to send nuclear
weapons at let's say North Korea as I do
in my scenario well what is completely
unknown to 98% of the planet is
that not only do the Russians have a
very flawed satellite system so that
they cannot interpret what is happening
properly but there is a Absol absolutely
existential flaw on the system which
Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta
confirmed with me which is that our
icbms do not have enough
range if they're if we launch a
Counterattack against say North Korea
our icbms must fly over
Russia they must fly over Russia so
imagine saying oh no no these 82 you
know Warheads that are going to actually
hit the strike the northern Korean
Peninsula are not coming for you Russia
our adversary right now that we're sort
of saber rattling with just trust
us and that is where nuclear war unfolds
into Armageddon and that hole in
National Security is shocking and as
Panetta told me no one wants to discuss
it and if one nuclear
weapon uh does does reach its Target I
presume communication breaks down
completely or like there's a high risk
of breakdown of communication well let's
back up we are both presumptuous to
assume that communication could even
happen prior to and let me give you a
very specific example during the Ukraine
war
okay if perhaps you remember I think it
was in November of
2022 news reports erroneous ly stated
that a Russian rocket a Russian missile
had hit Poland a NATO country right it
turned out to be a mistake but for
several hours this was actually the
information that was all over the news
breaking news
Okay 36 hours later the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark
Millie gave a press conference and
talked about this and admitted that he
could not reach his Russian counterpart
during those 36 hours he could not reach
him how are you going to not have an
absolute Armageddon like
furer with nuclear weapons in the air if
people can't get on the
phone during a ground
war I I'd like to believe that there's
people in major
Nations that don't give a damn about the
of politics and can always just
pick up the phone sort of very close to
the top but not at the very top and just
cut through the of it in
situations like this I hope that's true
I doubt it is and let me tell you why
most and you neither you nor I are
political from what I gather right so I
just write about podus President of the
United States I don't you have no idea
what my politics are because they
shouldn't matter no one should be for
nuclear war or no one should be for
nuclear you know National insecurity yes
you want to have a strong Nation but
once you get into politics then you're
talking about Copans and the more a
political leader
becomes divisive becomes pmic it the
more his platform is predicated on
hating the other side either within his
own country or with enemy alleged enemy
Nations the more you surround yourself
as we see in the current day with sick
ofans with people who will tell you not
only what they think you want to hear
but what will help them to hold on to
power so you don't have wise decision
makers long gone are the days where we
had presidents who had advisors on both
sides of the aisle that's really
important because you want to you want
to have differing opinions but as Things
become more vious both here in the
United States and in nuclear armed
Nations all bets are off at whether your
advisers are going to give you good
advice who are the people around the
president of the United States that give
advice in this six-minute window how
many of them just to maybe you could
speak to the detail of that but also to
the spirit of the way they see the world
how many of them are warmongers how many
of them are kind of big picture peace
Humanity type of thinkers well again
we're talking about that six-minute
window so it's not exactly like you can
let me put a pot of coffee on and really
tell me what you think and we can
strategize here right you have your SEF
and your chairman maybe the vice
chairman and okay we haven't even begun
to talk about the fact that at the same
time these advisers also have an Inc a
parallel concern and that's called
continuity of government okay so while
they're trying to advise on the nucle
Counter Strike in response to the
incoming nuclear missile they have to be
thinking how are we going to keep the
government functioning when the missiles
start hitting when the bombs start going
off and that is about getting yourself
out of the Pentagon let's say getting
yourself to one of these nuclear bunkers
that I write about at length in the book
so how much can you ask of a human right
because it comes down to a human the
Secretary of Defense is a
human um and and imagine that job while
trying to advise the president and then
there's also a really interesting term
which I learned about called jamming the
president which is often understood in
Washington that the military advisers
would we don't know if this is legit
we've never seen it put to the test but
jamming the president means the military
advisers are going to push for a really
aggressive Counterattack immediately MH
and again you're the president who's not
really been paying attention to this
because he has many other things to deal
with speed is not conducive to wisdom
can you speak to the jamming the
president so your senses the advisers
would by default be pushing for
aggressive Counterattack that is a term
in sort of the National Security nuclear
command and control historical
documentation that many of the people
that you might call the more doish type
people are you know worried about that
the more hawkish people are going to the
military advisers right are going to are
going to be jamming the president to
make these decisions about which targets
not if which targets the argument would
be about which targets not about if yes
I I hope that even the
warmongers would uh at this moment
because what underlies the idea of you
wanting to go to war it's it's power
it's like wanting to destroy the enemy
and be the the big kid on the Block but
with nuclear war it just feels like that
falls
apart do do you think warmongers
actually believe they can win a nuclear
war well you've raised a really
important question that we look to the
historical record for that answer right
because astonishingly all of this began
like when when Russia first got the bomb
in
1949 the powers that be and I write
about them in the book is in a setup to
the first you know for the for the
moment of launch right like it's called
how we got here right and you see and I
cite you know Declassified documents
from some of these
early um meetings where nuclear war
plans were being laid out and absolutely
back in the 1950s the the generals and
the Admirals that were running the
nuclear command and control system
believed that we could fight and win a
nuclear war despite hundreds of millions
of people dying this was the prevailing
thought and only over time did did the
did the kind of concept come into play
that no we can we can never have a
nuclear war it's the famous gorbachov
and Reagan joint statement a nuclear war
cannot be won and must never be fought
but before that many
people believed that it could be won and
they were preparing for that not to be
political and not to be
aist but do uh cognitive abilities and
all that kind of stuff come into play
here so if so much is riding on the
president is there
tests that are conducted is there
regular training procedures on the
president that you're aware of do you
know I don't think that has anything to
do with agism I think it has to do with
I think it's an Earnest question a
really powerful one and if people were
to ask that question of themselves or
their sort of you know dinner party
guest or their family around the dinner
table guest you might come to a real
good conclusion about how bad our
political system is and how bad our
presidential candidates are because why
on Earth there be two candidates one of
whom has cognitive problems and the
other of whom has judgment problems um
these are the two biggest issues with a
nuclear launch judgment and cognition
and so where's the you know
youngish um
thoughtful forward-looking
wise
dedicated civil servant running for
president I know know that sounds you
know Fantastical but I wish it weren't
so that's one of the things you should
really think about when voting for
president is uh this scenario that we've
been describing these six minutes
imagine the man or woman sitting there 6
minutes waiting for the pot of
coffee but I think about that issue
with with any with any War right I mean
prior to writing nuclear war a
scenario I previously wrote six books
on Military and intelligence programs
designed to prevent nuclear war and I
believe the president as
commanderin-chief
should be of the highest character
possible because the the programs the
wars that's that we have fought since
World War II have all been you know how
many octogenarian sources have I
interviewed I'm talking about Nobel
laurates and weapons designer and spy
pilots and engineers in general they've
all said to me with great pride you know
we prevented World War II nuclear World
War II right and that but that idea that
the commanderin-chief and everyone in
the in within the National Security
apparatus should be making really good
decisions about about war it's the
oldest cliche in the world that you know
the the wars are fought by the young
kids and that is it's not a cliche it's
true and so the character part about the
President should be in play whether
we're thinking about nuclear war or any
war in my
opinion well uh I agree with you first
of all but it feels like when nuclear
war one person becomes like
exponentially more important with uh
regular War the decision to go to war or
not
advisers start mattering more there's
judgment issues you could start to make
Arguments
for um sort of more leeway in terms of
what kind of people we elect it seems
like with nuclear war there's no leeway
it's like one person can uh resist this
uh uh the jamming the president Force
the the war mongers the use like uh all
the calculation involved considering
what are the errors the mistakes the
missiles flying over Russia the full
dynamics of the geopolitics going on in
the world consider all of humanity the
history of humanity the future of
humanity the your loved all all of it
just loaded in to make decision then it
becomes much more important that your
cognitive abilities are strong and your
judgment
abilities
against against powerful wise people
just as a human being are strong so I
think that's something to really really
consider when you vote for president but
to which degree is it really on the
president versus to the people advising
oh no it's on the president the
president has to make the call and that
six-minute window happens so fast I mean
the president is going to be being moved
for part of that time the secret service
is going to be you know up against up
against stratcom stratcom saying we need
launch you know we need the launch
orders in the secret service is going to
be saying we need to move the president
so it's not as much that he's delegating
the issues it's more like the issue is
being postpone because there is only one
issue for the president to say these
targets you know for him to choose from
the Denny's like menu okay this is what
we're going to go with and then this
astonishing thing happens the president
pulls you know takes out his wallet he
has a card in it that's colloquially
called the biscuit and that card with
the codes matches up an item in the the
briefcase in the in the
football that then is received by an
officer underneath the bunk underneath
the Pentagon in that bunker it's a call
and response Lex it's like you know
Alpha Zeta and right that's it and that
then back so that the individual in the
bunker realizes they are getting the
command from the president and then that
order is passed to
stratcom and stratcom the commander of
stratcom and I interviewed a former
commander of stratcom commander of
stratcom then follows orders which is he
delivers the launch orders to the
nuclear
Triad and what's done is
done what would you do if you were the
commander of stratcom in that situation
what would you do cuz I I like my gut
react right now if you just thrw me in
there I would refuse orders okay so good
question I asked that exact question to
one of my very helpful sources on the
book Dr Glenn mcdu who is at Los Alamos
and who for a while was the classified M
they have a a museum that's classified
within the lab and he was the historian
in charge of it right so he's a nuclear
weapons engineer he worked on Star Wars
during the Reagan Era and and he does a
lot having to do with the history of Los
Alamos and the by the way the
Oppenheimer movie really cuz I've
reported on nuclear weapons for you know
12 years now and Oppenheimer movie had a
very to me positive impact on Los Al's
transparency with people like me they
had a real willingness to share
information I think before perhaps they
were on their heels feeling they needed
to be on the defensive but now they're
much more forthcoming they were super
helpful I can tell you the origin story
of the football which they Declassified
for the book but uh I asked this
question to Dr Glenn McDuff right like
in a different manner I said is there a
chance that the stratcom commander would
defy orders and he
said Annie you have a better chance
winning
Powerball why do you think what's his
intuition behind that you don't wind up
as stratcom Commander unless you are
someone who follows
orders you follow orders you don't think
there's a deep Humanity there that
because his his intuition is about
everything we know so far but this
situation has never happened in the
history of Earth well this is Trick and
all right so you're raising a really
tricky interesting conundrum here
because during Co
when President Trump and the leader of
North Korea were kind of locked
in various relationships with one
another good bad threatening
non-threatening friendly just bananas
you might say like not presidential
Behavior if you were someone watching
C-SPAN like I do nerding out on what
stratcom was actually saying about all
this you noticed that com commanders
were speaking out publicly to
Congress more so than ever I had ever
seen before and this issue came up would
you defy presidential orders so the
caveat I would say to mcduff's answer of
easier to win win the power ball right
um is
that if the commander of stratcom
interpreted the president's Behavior to
to
be unreliable to
be non-presidential
then dot dot dot but now you're into
some really radical
territory well I
mean
fundamentally it feels like just looking
at all the presidents of the United
States in my lifetime it feels like none
of them are qualified for this 6 minutes
so like I could
see uh you know I I could I could see as
being the commander of a track being
like this guy like basically respecting
no president I I know you're supposed to
commander-in-chief but in this
situation saying like I mean everybody
Bush Obama Trump Biden if I was a
commander of St would be like this what
does this guy know about any of this um
it I would defy orders I mean in this
situation when the the the the the
future of human civilization hangs in
the balance I mean
it to be the person that says yes launch
it's no matter what I just can't see a
human being on Earth being able to do
that in the United States of America
that's a hell of a decision like this is
it it well but now you've raised a great
important you know present essentially
because what you're saying is people be
aware right be aware of like why you're
voting or why certain individuals are
being escalated to even being able to
run for president what does that mean
why are people in America not more
involved as Citizens do we have a
responsibility for that because you've
opened up the door for people to
understand okay the ultimate thing is
the is the nuclear launch decision so if
a person can't be trusted with that you
know everything spiral everything unre
Noels from there also I want to look up
who's the commander of stratom
now um speaking of which you've
interviewed a lot of experts for this
book is there uh some commonalities
about the way you've talked about this a
little bit but in in the way they see
this whole situation what what like
scares them the most
about uh this whole system and uh the
whole possibility of nuclear war I first
first learned about nuclear weapons from
a guy called Al odonnell who appears in
my earlier books because I interviewed
him for over a period of four and a half
years because he was an engineer who
actually wired nuclear bombs in the
1950s he was a member of the Manhattan
Project in 1946 worked on operation
Crossroads the first explosions of
nuclear bombs after the war ended after
World War War I ended and went on to arm
wire and fire 186 out of the 200 some
odd atmospheric nuclear tests that the
United States did before this was banned
and so I learned from him the power of
these weapons right and I learned from
him this very almost nationalistic idea
about how important it was to have
nuclear weapons and while I learned a
lot about his human side I also saw saw
the side of him that was very cold war
Warrior right and then so he was kind of
the first and then I don't know there
have been a hundred people that have
been directly involved in nuclear
weapons along the way Billy wall who was
my subject of my main my main sort of
central figure in a book I wrote about
the cia's paramilitary called surprise
kill vanish and W Halo jumped um a
tactical nuclear weapon into the Nevada
test site with a small team almost
unknown to anyone right only recently
Declassified and so his position was
like tactical nuclear weapons may end up
being used so I'm trying to speak here
to the scope of different people I have
interviewed over over the years right
and what has happened is as as we're as
I've gotten closer to the present day
you know in
there seems to be a growing movement
from some of these cold Warriors off the
position of nuclear weapons make us
great and strong
toward something must be done to reduce
this
threat how much do you
know uh in the same way that you know
about the United States how much do you
know about the Russian side maybe the
Chinese side uh India and Pakistan that
all of this like what how their thinking
differs perhaps yes well for that you
you want to go to The Experts right so
in for Russia for
example um there's a guy called pavle
podvig who is probably the West's top
expert on Russian nuclear
forces he works in parallel with the UN
he also studied in Moscow and he
interviewed so my information comes from
him right like you do all the footwork
to know what questions to ask and then
you take the very specific questions to
him and I learned from him about how the
Russian command and control goes down
and it's very similar to ours because
America and Russia have been at sort of
nuclear dueling with one another um for
75 years now and so everything we have
they have right with the exception of we
have a great satellite system and they
have a super flawed one there's just
called Tundra and even um pav podvig
admitted that there are serious flaws in
tundra uh the Russian satellite system
for example can mistake sunlight for
Flames can mistake clouds for a nuclear
launch this is a fact okay and um you
know what was interesting in
interviewing him was also this recent
very very dangerous shift in nuclear
Russian nuclear policy which is this
many Russian experts will tell you that
Russia has always maintained that it
never had a launch on warning policy now
I don't know if I believe that's true
but I'm just telling you what they say
and this is coming from the generals the
Cold War generals in Soviet Russia
saying oh no no no we would wait they
were kind of playing the noble Warrior
we would wait to absorb a nuclear attack
until we launched okay so many Americans
you know experts will tell you that
that's just posturing in propaganda but
that was their official position and
that changed just two years ago when
Putin gave a speech and he said that
their position had changed that they
will no longer wait to absorb an attack
that they once they
learn of how did he phrase it he called
it like the the the trajectory of the
missiles right which is a way of of S
talking about parody the same way we see
the missile coming over in midc with
Putin made that same statement and said
we would launch what do you know of the
way Putin thinks about nuclear weapons
and nuclear war is it just something to
allude to in a speech or do you think he
contemplates the possibilities of
nuclear
war I don't know but if I had to guess
it would go like this I would look at
his background and he comes from the
intelligence world right so my
experience in
interviewing oldtimers who spent decades
working for the CIA or even nro or
NSA I know the way they think from
having spent hundreds of hours
interviewing them right and then I know
the way that you know military men think
and it's very different right so Putin's
not a military person per se he's an
intelligence officer so what con would
concern concern me there if I had to
guess about his mindset has to do with
paranoia right most Intelligence
Officers must have a degree of healthy
paranoia or they're going to wind up
dead right and so that's not a great
quality to have you would be more
trigger happy perhaps so you're more you
would be more prone to respond to
erroneous signals and and you'd be
suspicious and you can see that now
there's a such a you know
incredible distrust and and and sort of
real conflict
between Russia between its leader and
NATO between its leader and all of the
West and then that is fueled by his
closest
advisers um kind of you know seem they
seem to be from the statements they have
made that I've read in Translation they
seem to be fostering that same idea that
you know NATO really has it in for
Russia the America really has it in and
that is so dangerous and disheartening
and perhaps makes it less likely that
the president would pick up the phone
and talk to the other president and or
that the close advisors near the
president would make that happen you
were talking about the procedure with
the football is there any concern for
cyber attacks for sort of security
concerns of uh every level here false
signals errors uh shutting down the the
channels of communication through cyber
attacks all that kind of stuff so to
answer those questions I interviewed a
number of people but most specifically
General tohill who was Obama's cyber
Chief and he was actually America's
first cyber
Chief and the nuclear command and
control system and really the
Triad functions on a on analog systems
they it functions on Old School Systems
if there's not digital interface you
can't hack into it right so most of the
issues that I raise in the book have to
do with what happens to cyber after a
nuclear attack attack right what happens
to cyber in the minutes after um a bomb
a nuclear weapon strikes America and how
that
impacts the ability for people to
communicate with one another and that's
when
chaos takes
control well let let's talk about it uh
so God
forbid if a nuclear weapon reaches its
Target what
happens what uh perhaps you could say
what you think would be the first Target
hit would it be the
Pentagon I was told by many people I
interviewed that the biggest fear in
Washington DC is what's called a bolt
outof the blue attack that's an unwarned
nuclear attack against Washington DC the
target would be the Pentagon and that's
what I begin the scenario with you know
and I reported in graphic horrifying
detail what happens because I don't know
what's worse me writing that all out or
the fact that it's all
documented by the defense department I
mean they have been documenting the
effect of nuclear weapons on people and
animals and things since the earliest
days of the Cold War and all of the
details I pull are from these documents
like the effects of nuclear weapons
um and again this document was the
original information the original data
in this document come from hoshima
Nagasaki right it was all classified and
then it was built upon by those 200 some
OD atmospheric nuclear weapons test we
did um and you know we're talking about
like millimeters and inches we're
talking about the defense department
knowing that oh 7 and2 miles out the
upholstery on cars will spontaneously
combust the pine needles will catch on
fire they will start more fires you know
you have all kinds of mayam and Cha
chaos happening um based on reported
facts from
observations and this is really shocking
and grotesque at the same time so one
Warhead reaches the Pentagon everybody
in the Pentagon
perishes
180 million degrees the fireball on a
one Megaton nuclear weapon is 19
football fields of fire think about that
nothing
remains nothing remains and there's then
a radius
where people die immediately and then
there's people that are dead when found
and then there's uh people that will die
slowly yes the Centric rings and again
Rings defined by defense scientists but
before that you know the bomb goes off
then there's this blast wave that's like
several hundred miles an hour pushing
out like a bulldozer knocking everything
down Bridges buildings I mean you can
read FEMA uh manuals about what the
rubble will be like you're talking about
30 ft deep Rubble as the buildings go
over six 7 8 10 miles
out that speaks nothing of the mega
fires that will then ensue so once all
these people die and third degree
radiation Burns Burns did you even know
there was such a thing as fourth degree
radiation Burns right we're talking
about the wind ripping the skin off
people's faces many miles out um and
then you have a me a sucking action
right everyone is or many people are
familiar with what the nuclear mushroom
cloud looks like and its
stem is actually creates and again this
is from you know physicists who advis
the defense department on this the
sucking up into the nuclear stem 300 M
hour winds you're talking about people
miles out getting sucked up into that
stem when you see the mushroom cloud Lex
that is in a nuclear war that would be
people those are like the remnants of
people and of things in the cloud 30 40
mile wide mushroom
cloud blocking out the Sun and that
speaks nothing of the radiation
poisoning that follows and then the
power grid goes
out basically everything we rely on in
terms of uh systems in our way of life
goes up out you write quote those who
somehow managed to escape death by the
initial blast shock wave and Firestorm
suddenly realize an Insidious truth
about nuclear war that they're entirely
on their own here begins a quote fight
for food and
water I mean that is
um a wakeup call on top of a wakeup call
that we go back to a kind of primitive
fight for survival each on their
own and by the way those details were
given to me by Obama's FEMA director
Craig Fugate who was in charge of um so
FEMA is the agency in America that plans
for nuclear war okay and what fug Fugate
said to me was you know Annie we plan
for asteroid strikes these are called
Low probability but High consequence
events and FEMA is the organization that
you know when there's a hurricane or an
earthquake or a flood FEMA steps in and
they do what's called population
protection planning right they take care
of people and what Fugate told me is
after a nuclear strike after a bolt out
of the blue attack he used those terms
there is no population protection
everyone's dead right and he means that
metaphorically but also kind of more
literally because he just said at that
point you you just hope that you stalked
Pedialite what do you think happens to
humans like how does uh human nature
manifest itself in such conditions do
you think like brutality will come out
like people
will just for survival will steal will
murder
will I can't imagine that not happening
I think that's why people love
post-apocalyptic television shows and
films because they see that and then of
course there's always one great
charismatic person who's trying to
restore morality and these are great
narratives that people like to tell
themselves in the world of science
fiction but what we're dealing with is
science fact in this scenario and it is
meant to terrify people into realizing
wait a minute this is a conversation
that absolutely should be have had while
it can still be had because the
realities when you have the direct a
FEMA telling you this it's a real wakeup
call and by the way Craig Fugate was
so transparently human with me and I
quote him directly in the book but he
spoke about you asked me earlier about
like what would be going through the
president's mind and we don't know I
don't know but Craig Fugate told me what
would be going through his mind and he
said along the lines I'm paraphrasing
like it's almost something you couldn't
even comprehend you would just it would
just like ruin you you know his words
are really powerful and of course the
FEMA director in the scenario is
notified in that first window while the
launch you know while the ballistic
missile is on its way and no one in
America yet knows and I have the FEMA
director pull over to the side of the
road and jump in a helicopter that's
sent for him to take him to the bunker
that FEMA goes to which is called Mount
weather and so he's aware that Fugate
was aware that as FEMA director you
would likely be taken to a safe place
however many hours you're going to be
safe um or days or maybe weeks or maybe
months but as I also learned from the
Cyber people I interviewed that you know
there's a complete fallacy that these
military bases can continue functioning
they run on diesel fuel and when the
fuel stops pumping there's no more
generators electricity's
gone uh uh
communication lines are all
gone the food
supply all of it the all the supply
chains is
gone um it's terrifying and that's just
in the first few days first few
hours uh in part five you describe the
24 months and Beyond after this first
hour we've been talking about so what
happens to Earth what happens to humans
MH if a full-on nuclear war happens
MH so for
that I was super privileged to talk to
Professor Brian tun who is one of the
original five authors of the nuclear
winter
Theory and the that theory was developed
in was published in 19 in the early
1980s one of Professor tun's professors
was Carl Sean who was of the most famous
author of the nuclear winter Theory and
you know there were all kinds of
controversies about it when it came out
including the defense department saying
it was Soviet propaganda which it wasn't
and what the nuclear winter author
authors conceded back in the 80s was
that their modeling was just the best it
could be based on what they had at the
time and so now Flash Forward to where
we are in 20 24 and talking to Professor
ton who's been working on this issue for
all these decades since he shared with
me how the climate models today with the
systems we have the computer systems
reveal that actually nuclear winter is
worse right so to answer your
questions the bombs stopped falling in
my scenario 72 minutes after they first
launch the bomb stopped falling and then
then the mega fires begin each nuclear
weapon will have according to the
defense department a mega fire that will
burn between 300 square miles so a th000
weapons 1500 weapons think about those
mega fires everything is burning Forest
cities pyro think about the pyrro toxins
in all the cities you know highrise is
burning and all of this soot gets lofted
into the air according to tune
some
300 billion pounds of soot and what
happens it blocks out the Sun and
without Sun we have nuclear winter we
have a situation whereby ice sheets
form you're talking about bodies of
water in places like Iowa being frozen
for 10 years the temperature drops
temperature
plummets right right and there are all
kinds of papers that have been written
about this using modern calcul you know
systems and the numbers vary but the
bottom line is agriculture fails mhm
Foods obviously uh
dies uh so the agriculture system
completely shuts down so the food
sources shut down so there's no food
there's no sun temperature drops
completely no
electricity and we haven't even even
spoken of radiation poisoning because
you know the radiation poisoning kills
many people in the aftermath of the
nuclear the nuclear exchange but after
the nuclear freeze ends after nuclear
winter you know after the Sun starts to
come back let's say 8 nine 10 years um
now you have no ozone layer or you have
a severely depleted ozone layer and so
the sun's rays are now poisonous so you
have people living underground and you
have this great thawing and with that
great thawing comes pathogens and plague
and you have this you know system where
the small-bodied animals the insects and
whatnot begin reproducing really fast
and the larger body animals like you and
me begin to go extinct Professor ton
said it to me this way you know he said
66 million years ago an asteroid hit
Earth killed all the dinosaurs and wiped
out
70% of the species and nuclear war would
likely do the same and so here we are
talking about this because there is a
difference there's nothing you can do
about an asteroid but there is something
you can do about a nuclear
war do you think it's possible that some
humans will survive all of this so if we
look I mean how long would it
be uh would it be decades would it be
centuries
before the you start to
have Earth starts to have the capacity
to grow food
again Carl Sean talked about that in his
this amazing book that he wrote with two
scientist colleagues called the cold in
the dark and they and they have there's
a bunch of essays about exactly this
right like how what would happen and how
how long would it take it's really
interesting it's dated you know it's
from the 80s but man is it shocking and
you think about that where okay so Men
return to sort of the worst most base
versions of themselves civilization is
on right meaning you know Civil Society
there's no rule of law it's just fend
for yourself there's you know people
fighting over what little resources
there are man returns to a hunter
gatherer State and to really think about
this idea I looked at uh the oldest
known archaeological site in the world
in Turkey which is called gockley tapy
and it's really fascinating to me
because I interviewed one of the two
archaeologists who first found this site
in the early
90s and the lead archaeologist was a a
guy named clous Schmidt and Michael
morch was the young graduate student who
was with him and Mora's description of
like coming AC upon this like rumored to
be site there was something called a
wishing tree on the site which I just
found so human and perfect that it was
this magical place and it was locatable
because there was a wishing tree on a
hill and it's where people went to wish
and to Hope that their wishes came true
I mean how human is that right and that
is where beneath the wishing tree kind
of like in the shadow of the wishing
tree there was a t which is a hill um
and beneath that there is the oldest
known civilization in the world 12,000
years ago a group of hunter gatherers
built this site why we don't know but I
imagined when through Mora's
descriptions of coming upon like you
know he tripped on a rock he told me
right he tripped over a stone that
turned out to be the the top part of a
12,000 yearold sculpted man giant pillar
right and he talked about coming upon
that and then no one knows really what
gobec Lee was for and that makes my mind
try and answer your o the question you
asked me internally right just as like a
human who's here on Earth for the amount
of time I'm here like if if there were a
nuclear war what would it be like what
what would it be like when someone in
the future some would we become
archaeologist one day would civilization
rebuild would we develop computers who
knows it's interesting to think about I
hope we never have to what would we
remember about this time right it is
terrifying to think that most of it will
be
forgotten everything we kind of assume
will not be forgotten we think maybe
some of the technological developments
will be forgotten but we assume like
some of History won't be forgotten but
realistically especially the US
descending into primitive
survival probably everything since the
Industrial Age will be forgotten like
everything maybe some religious ideas
will persist some stories and myths will
persist but like all the wisdom we've
gathered higher level sort of
technological wisdom would be gone
like that's terrifying to think about
and like maybe even as you touch on the
very facts of nuclear war might be
forgotten like the lessons of nuclear
war might be forgotten that there are
these weapons sort of the obvious
elephant in the room would be one of the
things that's completely forgotten or
become so vague in the recollection of
humans that
our understanding will uh change it's
almost as if a god descended on Earth
and destroyed everything maybe that's
how it will persist sort of like
mythological interpretation of what
nuclear weapons are that's terrifying
because then it it could repeat again
mhm but I think for me the idea of
the what is buried becomes very
interesting and very human and the and
in a strange way way optimistic and
positive because if you can visualize
that wishing tree and I have a picture
of it in the book from one of the
archaeologists who work on that right
you you think what were they wishing
what were they wishing for right and
then you think of your own self what do
I wish for in this world right because
you know I do think all
things come from what happens you know
metaphorically around the dinner table
right like what people put there eyes on
becomes interesting and expanse what
people talk about um and ultimately when
you think about the long Arc of time and
human civilization it does kind of make
you want to communicate more with your
enemies with your
adversaries and you know I think about
the quote what Einstein is said to have
said which is that he was
asked what weapons World War three would
be fought with and he
said I don't know but I know that World
War 4 will be fought with sticks and
stones let me ask you about the great
filter when you look
up into our galaxy into our
universe look up at the
sky do you think uh there's other alien
civilizations that are contending with
some similar question questions and
perhaps the reason we have not
definitively seen alien civilizations is
because the others have failed to find a
solution to this great filter something
like nuclear
weapons I'm not sure I'm going have to
think about that
question but what I what does come to
mind is an answer that was given to me
similarly right but
by a man by Ed Mitchell who went to the
moon right um and he was the sixth man
to walk on the
moon and so his opinion I think might
count a little more than mine on that
subject because his lens is so much
greater right and Mitchell
was vilified when he got back from the
Moon because it became known that he
believed in
things like extrasensory
perception and this kind of
mystical metaphysical way of looking at
the world and he he really suffered from
that I mean he was ridiculed and he lost
a lot of his career and his friends but
what he said to me in our
interview about his trip
home from the
Moon answers that great filter question
I think in an in a way I might want to
adopt right which is which is this that
he said
that as they were returning from the
Moon to
Earth he looked down at the Earth and
and I'm paraphrasing him I write all
this in in phenomena an earlier book but
he the paraphrasing is that he looked
down from the earth and he and it was
1971 and he thought about all the
conflict going on down below
particularly the Vietnam War where many
of his friends were and then he looked
behind him into the great vast
Galaxy and he had a moment he says that
was like an epiphany like not a
near-death experience but a sort of near
life experience right where he believed
that the human consciousness which is
where so much of this thoughtfulness
about metaphysics
and uh ESP perhaps come from Mitchell's
theory was that human consciousness the
the way to understand it was had
something to do with realizing that
man's inner life and man's outer life
are deeply connected in the same way
that man is connected to the
Galaxy and he said it much more
eloquently but you kind of get the idea
that and I think it's why humans have
always always love to look up right um
that that there's more there and it's a
bit like the wish it's like it's like
the big version of the wishing tree you
know what do I wish for for myself and
what is maybe perhaps the the
realignment of thinking for those of us
in search of Happiness right and rather
instead of war
is
um you know what does it mean to have a
conscience to have
Consciousness what does it mean to be a
thinking person what does it mean to be
on this Earth to Born to be born to live
to die and then there is legacy and so
all of those
ideas
are I think Foster the kind of
conversation that would that deescalate
conflict yeah so in some deep way so the
mysteries of what's out there when we
look out to the
Stars uh are the same
Mysteries that uh we find in when trying
to understand the human
mind and they're they're coupled in some
way for me thinking about alien
civilizations out there is really the
same kind of
question which is what what are we what
is this what what are we doing here how
do we come
here why does it seem to be so magical
and beautiful and Powerful now where is
it
going because it feels like we're
really perhaps for the first time in
history are in a moment where we can
destroy ourselves and so naturally you
ask well where's others like
us is is it perhaps are we
inevitably going to a place where we'll
destroy ourselves is it basically
inevitable that we destroy ourselves we
become too
powerful and not insufficiently wise to
know what to do with that
power but like you said probably the
answers to that are in here we don't
need to look out
there I'd love to ask you about the
extra sensory uh perception you've
written like you said the book phenomena
on the secret history of the US
government's investigations into
extrasensory perception and
psychokinesis uh what are some of the
more interesting extrasensory abilities
that were explored by the government and
maybe just in general espb what is it
what what do you know of it the book was
so interesting to report because I spend
so much time dealing with like
mechanized systems machines war machines
and yet the military and intelligence
were and continue to be incredibly
interesting Ed in the human mind in
Consciousness and so you know if one is
called hard science this what we're
talking about now is called squishy
science right and it was really
interesting to delve into that world it
just couldn't be farther from from
weapons and war or could it right and
then I really began thinking well before
Science and Technology sort of the
supernatural
ruled the world you know the Oracle of
Deli in Greece exists for the you know
pre before the common error rulers to go
and beg to learn from the powers that be
what was going to happen right so
all ESP programs I think pull from that
origin story right the the leaders
desire to know um and so I really found
it amazing that many people think these
systems or rather these programs started
in the 70s I learned they actually began
right after World War I and that was
because and here you know in my
reporting I find all things sort of
always Circle back to the Third Reich to
the Nazis the Nazis had a massive uh
occult program an ESP program uh
psychokinesis program astrology both
Hitler and himler were deeply interested
in these occult Concepts and after I
learned from records at the National
Archives that after the war um you know
the S half of everything went to the
Soviet Union and I'm talking about the
Trove of Nazi documents from which the
superpowers were then going to learn to
fight future Wars and half of them went
to the United States and so we got this
uh Trove of documents about all of this
and the Soviets got the other and so it
off a kind of psychic arms race which in
a weird way paralleled the nuclear arms
race which we've been talking about in
as much that it led one side to
constantly wonder what the other side
had have they been able to find anything
interesting in this uh squishy science
analysis of trying to uh see how the
human mind could be used as a
weapon the CIA most definitely
believed from from my reading of the
documents that there was something very
legit shall we say about ESP it couldn't
it was uncontrollable it was unreliable
but nonetheless it existed and the and
being the intelligence agency that they
are they cared less about why it worked
they just wanted to know how they could
use it um and then it got into all kinds
of elements of placebo effect and this
you know and you know when the military
stepped in and got involved in the
programs that was a complete disaster in
my opinion because the military needs to
control everything in a mechanized
systematic way and so they started for
example teaching people to be psychic
which is a really really really bad idea
I mean um and you know Flash Forward to
where we are today these programs still
exists there's a Navy program which is
working on based on a lot of data that
came back from uh the war on terror with
certain soldiers knowing you know wait
don't walk down that path there is an
IED there and they call this the spidey
sense and they actually have a program
that that works from this so these
things never go away they kind of circle
around in terms of you know being made
fun of and then taken seriously and a
little of this and of that um my biggest
takeaway from writing that book was a a
quote that I that I referenced in the
beginning which is the the Thomas
theorem and it says if men Define
situations as real they are real in
their
consequences yeah I mean Placebo as
you've mentioned is a fascinating
concept uh by the way a short plug I
started listening to it Andrew huberman
just released a uh podcast on Placebo
the placebo effect does he know the
origin story of placebo well we have to
ask him are you ready for this
CIA okay and not only that I can tell
you that Doctor Henry beer M Harvard I
think he was also at MIT for a bit um he
came up with that term and you might
even say for the
CIA does that trouble you that so much
of this is coming from the CIA first you
mean the placebo concept or the placebo
concept but a lot of the sort of
uh scientific
investigations listen I have such mixed
feelings about the CIA as one should I
think you should have mixed feelings
about anything that you cover as a
reporter or as a human because and maybe
change that from mixed to you know
conflicting right because there are
there are really positive elements of
every organization within the federal
government I mean my first learning
about the CIA came from the work I did
on the Area 51 book about their aerial
reconnaissance programs which were set
up again to prevent World War III right
nuclear World War I it was this idea
that information was King the U2 spy
pain was developed out at are at Area 51
and I interviewed hervey Stockman the
first man to fly over the Soviet Union
in a U2 gathered all this intelligence
prevented Wars later I wrote a book
about the cia's paramilitary mhm
surprise kill vanish so like just when I
was thinking wow the CIA is doing all
this amazing you know non-kinetic
activity with aerial reconnaissance then
you learn about their kill programs and
that's a whole different set of issues
it turns out as you write in that book
that the CIA assassinates people
sometimes and we'll talk about it uh but
anyway like you said conflicting
feelings mhm I mean I work with sources
to report my books and
so put yourself in my shoes right I
interview for dozens or hundreds of
hours my primary
sources in the case of of the surprise K
vanish book I traveled with Billy wall
the longest serving CIA operator back to
the scene of the crime you know back to
the battle we went to Hanoi we went to
Havana um and you really get to know
someone and that's when I say
conflicting you know I work with sources
on uh a real trust basis right and
sometimes people will tell me things
they'll say Annie this is this is off
the record this is for you to know about
me on deep background because I want you
to know who I am and that's powerful and
they a lot of times it's personal right
it's personal it's about their personal
life and they don't want that and and it
it isn't appropo to what I'm writing
about but but I need to know that and
that's where it gets conflicted because
you in a good way because you realize
where we're all such creatures of our
personal lives right so you have a
professional life where your National
Security are in your hands I don't know
what that is like I wonder if you could
just speak to that you've interviewed so
many powerful people so many Fascinating
People and as you've spoken about trust
is fundamental to that so they open up
and really show you into their
world what does it take to do
that I
think
willingness we were talking about trust
earlier like you have to trust that
there's I have to trust that there's a
reason I find myself in a certain
situation right otherwise it would just
be a constant you know doubt Paradox
right why am am I here what am I doing
um and so I trust that I'm going to
learn something of value and so I'm
willing to listen I really am willing to
listen right um because and so far it's
always
proven you know my the expectations I
might have going into something are
dwarfed by the outcome because people
are so interesting and because because
the people that I interview because I
write about war and weapons and National
Security and government secrets and the
people I interview are at the heart of
all of this I mean they are really
capable people
intellectually brilliant physically
capable they go so far out on the limb
to do their jobs and by the way the
reason they're talking to me is because
they're still alive and so many of their
colleagues are dead so it gives them
also a wisdom about
you know life about sacrifice not in
cliche sort of nationalistic jingoistic
terms whatsoever I'm talking like
real real what is their real truth you
know when I went to Vietnam with Billy
w i mean so much of it was the details
are just you know every detail right I
mean starting with the fact that he he
showed up at my house with a giant
suitcase and a bunch of
clothes you know dry cleaning pressed
clothes in plastic hangers carrying them
I'm like Billy we're going to Vietnam
and we're going back into the jungle to
find the Oscar rate battle site like
what are you what are you carrying right
and he got really mad at me did not like
anyone correcting him and I got my
husband on the job like Kevin you got to
sort this out right and what transpired
was that Billy W had never never taken a
trip for personal reasons he operated I
think in 62 countries every single time
for the CIA and it would go like this
Billy go to there and get to there right
and that's what he would do and when he
arrived they whatever he needed he would
just get you know it's not a fashion
trip right so he had no idea how to pack
for an overseas trip this was like oh my
God how can you not have the hugest
smile on your face going into this I
with a guy who's 89 years old he's got
eight bullet you know he's got he's had
eight Purple Hearts from Vietnam right I
mean he operated against Osama Bin Laden
10 years before 911 he went after Bin
Laden in Afghanistan when he was 72 and
he went after Gaddafi during the Arab
Spring when he was 82 and now here he is
with me going to Hanoi you know um the
details those human details but the the
my husband repacked his bag and uh with
you know like got him a proper suitcase
that was carryable and small and didn't
have the hangers you know he wasn't
trailing the hangers but it was the it
was the trip home in the taxi that I got
this really big reveal
um Billy reached into that small
suitcase my husband had given him and
pulled out a rolled up American
flag and he had taken this flag cuz I
had tried to help him pack and he
wouldn't let me and I just thought it
was like an old guy being starborn but
he didn't want me to see that he was
bringing an American flag to Vietnam
which is not legal MH and he wanted to
bring that flag and take it around
everywhere with him as he explained to
me later to honor all of his friends who
died there 50 years ago and then when
the trip was finished he gave me that
flag and it's in my office and that's
the kind of relationship that you can
develop with people as a reporter if
you're willing to go the extra mile with
them to trust them that they'll tell you
things of value and to me something like
that is as of value as as any you know
secret mission I'm able to get
Declassified because we are a nation of
people and probably there's a bunch of
human details that you can't possibly
Express in words things left unspoken
but you saw in the silence exchange
between the two of you the sadness the
the maybe you could see in his face
looking back at memories of uh the
people he's lost all that kind of stuff
all that kind of
stuff uh you mentioned you wrote a book
on Area
51 for people who don't know you've
written a lot about security the
military Secrets all this kind of stuff
so Area 51 is one of the
legendary centers of all of these kinds
of topics so high level first versus
what is Area
51 as you understand it as you've
written
about the lore and the
reality I think everybody wants to know
about Area 51 because it kind of it's
like this American Enigma you know it's
like to some people it's the shangra LA
of uh you know tested Aerospace programs
right and to others it's the place of
captured aliens right and everything in
between I had the great Fortune of
interview in
75 people who lived and worked at that
base for extended periods of time uh
mostly leading up to the 9s because
everything since then is classified
right so things get Declassified after
decades not everything but some and that
allows you to piece together stories so
you talked to a lot of people that work
there um what can you describe as the
sort of the history of technological
development that went on there I mean
Area 51 is huge by the way and it's you
know it's a secret it's a top secret
military facility inside a top secret
military facility inside the Nevada test
and training range which is this massive
not secret facility right so you're just
talking about layers talk about peeling
the onion in reverse and it began as a
place to test the U2 spy plane um and
literally the CIA set up shop there to
build this plane away away from the
public eye and then that led to another
um Espionage platform called the a12
oxcart which is you know anyone who's
seen the X-Men movies knows about the
SR71 but be and that's a two-seater
right and before that that there was the
a12 oxcart and that was the cia's
stealth Mach 3 spy plane you know think
about that in the early 1960s it's
astonishing uh and I interviewed the
pilots who flew it um what did they say
about it my God I mean you know look I I
describe in detail in Area 51 but also
the the amazing thing Lex about that was
that and you know I just look back on
that with such fondness this is like in
2009 when I was reporting that and all
many of the guys who were in their 80s
and 90s were World War II Heroes like
serious World War II Heroes like Colonel
Slater who was the commander of Area 51
he flew the U2 on the what the missions
called the black cat missions over China
in the early
1960s to see about their lnor nuclear
facility right so all of these things
tie in when you're reporting on Military
um and intelligence programs but that
these guys had been World War II Heroes
and then were given this cushy job out
at Area 51 you know and it just came
with all these perks Colonel Slater told
me this one perk I just love so much
they all had a hankering for lobster one
day right and here they are in the
middle of the desert Nevada and they
have these really fast planes you know
and they literally called like they
arranged they didn't take the the ox
card out for that one but they they they
would they got some lobsters from
Massachusetts like delivered to them in
like record time they didn't even need
to put them on Ice you know and again
those are the these details where you're
like thank God at least for me thank God
I got these details these guys are all
passed now yeah so there's there's a lot
of incredible technological work going
on there so the legend the lore like you
said aliens mhm were there ever aliens
in Area 51 as you understand it so I've
interviewed hundreds of people that
worked there in the well not just at
Area 51 but in all the different
National Security and Military
Intelligence and intelligence programs
and I have I personally have no reason
to believe that aliens have ever visited
Earth that's just me personally visited
Earth period I I I have no information
to that that causes me to conclude
that's the case now with that said many
of the primary players in this present
day you know there are aliens Among Us
narrative are in my phenomena book I
continue to communicate with a lot of
these people I'm talking about
astrophysicists um who fundamentally
believe that there are aliens Among Us
right um so we beg to differ on that
issue but for you in terms of doing
research on uh government agencies that
do top secret military work I mean they
would
know right so you have interviewed a lot
of people that have at every layer of
the
onion you don't have a you don't you
don't see evidence or um a reason to
believe that there was ever aliens or
UFOs captured from out of this world
that is correct and and even perhaps
more important and perhaps this colors
my thinking but I am uniquely familiar
with disinformation programs put forth
by the CIA or the agency as it's called
by insiders right and I've known and
I've learned firsthand about these
program or rather learned from firsthand
participants in strategic deception
campaigns that the CIA has engaged in
beginning with Area 51 you know the idea
that all these
reports of this U2 spy plane this giant
long wind long winged aircraft flying
70,000 feet up people didn't think
airplanes could fly that high and it's
you know the sun shining off of it it
looked like a UFO and all the reports
coming in and the CIA opened up a a UFO
disinformation campaign office headed by
again guy named Toto ureno you know
specifically for this reason now does
that mean that every UFO sighting in the
world is has been a U2 no but I come
from it from that lane of thinking and
there are so many strategic deception
campaigns and as I look over the Decades
of how these same UFO stor
and again this is just my opinion based
on my reporting this narrative that
keeps reoccurring it seems to me like a
very large catchall to keep the Public's
attention on that not on that so so to
you like sexy stories like
UFOs are going to be leveraged by the
CIA for strategic deception 100% I mean
Google Paul benowitz I'm always amazed
that Paul benoit's story is not more
widely spoken of um and I think that's
because people there's like the sort of
ethologists or the people who are like
absolutely convinced that that aliens
are among us um and I use that term
loosely but you know what I mean and
then there's the quote unquote Skeptics
and the Skeptics tend to be sort of like
self-righteous and I would never want to
be self-righteous so I'm not a skeptic
I'm just you know agnostic I suppose but
Google Paul benitz and you can learn the
story of that man who thought he saw a
UFO in the 70s early 80s and the Air
Force because the Air Force intelligence
Community Works hand in glove with CIA a
lot and some of the other intelligence
agencies of course they're 17 not just
the CIA and um they destroyed Paul
benoits they sent him to a mental
institution by pulling a massive
strategic deception campaign against him
because they didn't want him to know
about the technology that he was seeing
at Kirkland Air Force Bas so look that
up and then you go oh my God and you
know to my eye you can apply any of
these other names substitute in Paul
benoits or any of the current
individuals you know who really become
convinced of X Y or Z when in fact there
is a strategic deception campaign going
on yeah there's uh a lot of incentive
for the CIA and other intelligence
agencies
to get you to look the other way on
whatever whatever is
happening plus from a uh enemy
perspective Whenever two nations are at
War to try to create hysteria in the
other but then you have the Thomas
theorem that becomes applicable there
too if men Define situations as real
they are real in their consequences
right so this idea of like UFOs and
we're being lied to
it becomes real to many people and then
that creates a whole subset of problems
to the point where things are spiraling
out of control and there is no there is
no Center anymore right so a lot of
people that are briefed on programs
maybe don't even aren't even aware of
their position within a greater
campaign or I'm wrong and there are
aliens Among Us
right so you know you I appreciate you
the possibility of uh acknowledging that
you might be wrong uh from everything
you know about the US government if
there was an alien spacecraft like what
do you think would happen would they be
able to hold on to those secrets for you
know
decades uh like would they want to hold
on to those
Secrets like what would they do what's
your
sense I I can't
imagine
that kind of exciting situation not
becoming public information right and
the counter to that is this right which
is this is a very strong argument for
why this is a big strategic deception
campaign right think about
the defense department and the air think
about how jealously they guard its
airspace
right I mean you had a Chinese balloon
flying over in the whole World Went
Crazy right it was front page news so
the fact that the one element or a
couple people in the defense department
have made this statement we've lost
control of our
airspace over this this UFO alleged UFO
craft that they can't explain I don't
buy that at all zero of course it's
possible that you know it is alien
spacecraft if it is that and they
operate under
a very different set of technological
capabilities in theory in my interviews
with jacqu valet who is the kind of
Grandfather of all euphology and he's
such an interesting person and has such
a really unique origin story about how
he came into all of this and he's such a
scientist right and he is profoundly
dedicated to this issue and stands
completely on the opposite end of the
spectrum from me and knows a lot more
and has studied this for decades more
but what he said to me is the most
interesting thing which is that it's not
a military problem it's an intelligence
problem because jacqu believes that this
is some kind of intelligence right which
really the closest I can do to wrapping
my head around that takes me to
Consciousness right the idea of what is
consciousness and I think that's where
it becomes very interesting I think the
government is hiding bodies and crafts
is is very Paul benoits read it Google
it into it right yeah
uh yeah I I think this kind of flying
saucer thing is a is a a trivialization
of what kind of if there's alien
civilizations out there trivialization
that's a great word trivialization
that's I agree with you I tend to
believe that there is like a very large
number of alien civilizations out there
and I I believe we we would have trouble
comprehending what that even looks like
or they to visit I I tend to believe
they are already here or have visited
and we're too dumb to understand what
that even means and they certainly would
not appear as
um as uh flying objects that defy
gravity for brief moments of time on low
resolution video um I tend to have
humility about all this kind of stuff
but I think radical humility is required
to even like open your eyes to what an
alien intelligence would actually look
like and it I to me it's beyond military
lications it's like the basic human
question of like what is even this thing
like you mentioned Consciousness that's
going on like where does this come from
why is it so powerful is it unique in
the universe I tend to believe not uh of
course I hang out a bunch with with
other folks like Elon who believe we are
alone but I think that
belief just like you
said has power because it actually
manifests itself itself in uh in reality
so if you believe that we're alone in
this universe that's a great motivator
to build rockets and become
multiplanetary and save ourselves
especially in the case of nuclear war uh
because otherwise whatever this Special
Sauce this this flame of Consciousness
will go out if we destroy ourselves on
this Earth and uh for people like Elon
it's too high of a probability that we
destroy ourselves on Earth not to try to
become multiplanetary in your book on
Area 51 you propose an explanation that
I think some people have criticized at
the very
end uh that this might have been a
disinformation campaign from I guess
Stalin that the Roswell incident was a
remotely piloted plane with a quote
grotesque child siiz Aviator just
looking back at all that now years later
um what's the probability that it's true
what's the probability it's
not so you know I've never I've never
revealed who that source is yes did you
know that want me to tell you with the
source yeah okay who's the
source so before I say anything on that
let me let me let me speak to the the
question that you asked right
so you asked me what's the probability
that that is still standing as an
idea 14 12 13 14 years later right so I
continued to work with that source for
years afterwards we talked about this
look I mean his whole
family knew it was him and I knew his
family because I was an integral part of
you know I was at his house met all his
kids
grandkids and and we should say the
source is the main expert advisor behind
the story that it was maybe you can
explain what the story is that you're
report in the book that it was uh
disinformation okay campaign created by
Stalin to cause Mass hysteria in the
United States the very kind that we've
been speaking about with the CIA and so
on yes predicated on the on The
Narrative of the War of the Worlds right
and the War of the Worlds when it was a
radio program in the United States made
people go crazy oh my God we're being
invaded by aliens well the government
was always interested in this story and
Joseph Stalin was too we know that from
Declassified documents right and so the
source told me that the the the reason
for this program and that the real
Roswell crash remains where in fact it
was a a black propaganda hoax
infiltrated you know or rather
predicated at this idea that you were
going to overwhelm America's early
warning air defense system caus Mayhem
and maybe be able to attack the United
States that was the plan and Stalin was
also messing with the United States
messing with Truman who sort of you know
turned his back on him right at Potsdam
and so um this idea idea was and the
reason that the source was important and
unlike you know a lot of people I saw I
I saw this I saw that I learned that was
according to the
source once it was once it was
determined that this was a hoax and that
Stalin was able to get a craft over the
United States and it crashed and it had
you know people inside of it they were
people that
were sort of deformed and meant
surgically altered to look like
aliens the United States government
decided that it needed to know what on
Earth that was all about and if it was
possible for us to have the same program
this according to the source right and
so it sounds Preposterous and if it was
just someone saying I you might say well
it's ridiculous tell me and get them
onto another subject but the difference
was is this Source who is very
well-placed and friends with all of the
other 75
people you know told me this as a
confession right a real tearful
confession because what he said is he
was involved in the American program to
do the same thing and people died
because there were human experiments
that went on and I I write about this in
the last 12 pages of Area 51 it was
explosive you know Revelation and I felt
very confident in writing this because
the source wanted it written why because
he said I'm dedicated to my country I
know about being committed to National
Security and this kind of thing must
never happen and if you give people too
much power they will take advantage of
it and he wanted it on the record and
his wife of 60 years did not know until
after the book published nor did his
children okay so after the book
published I was called to his house and
sat there with his family and they said
tell us this isn't true and he said it
is true
right now that source is Al odonnell who
is the nuclear weapons engineer who
armed wired and fired
186 nuclear
weapons okay so if you want to talk
about someone you're the first person
I've told that on on the record but it's
kind of about
time
wow well I uh you received a lot of
criticism over this story and it
confused me why because
it's give in the context of everything
you've described with the CIA and other
intelligence
agencies it is reasonable that such a
action would be
taken and the source is extraordinarily
credible right if you all if you wanted
to take the position well that person
isn't very reliable then you have to ask
yourself why did they have top secret
clearances that are higher than any in
the the United States whatsoever because
he was responsible for arming nuclear
bombs he was called the trigger man and
by the way he told me that I could tell
the world who he was there's a lot of
details that are really dark uh
involving that program and when is it
appropriate right well it feels
appropriate now first of all because you
and I have been talking for several
hours so this is what is a truly a long
form conversation and it's the outcome
of you know a very long time of my
reporting and also being judicious
about what you know closing the loop on
that right because I do think it's
important for people to know that
sources
um have
Revelations and like you said the
programs both on the Soviet side and the
American side uh conflicting I think is
the the term we used
previously U ethically morally
on all fronts
uh um people have done some horrible
things in the name of
security in your book surprise kill
vanish you write about the
CIA and the uh so-called president's
third
option it turns out so first of all
First Option being
diplomacy and uh second option being War
so when diplomacy is inadequate and war
is a terrible idea would go to the third
option and uh this third option is about
covert action and and it's about
assassination so how much of that does
the CIA
do that is open to debate we know from
the historical record that the CIA was
heavily involved in assassination during
the Cold War that's non-negotiable you
know even the names of the programs that
were assigned to perform assassinations
are fascinating and now Declassified
like Eisenhower's for example was the
health alteration
committee well at least they have a
sense of humor to this dark topic you
know then the more modern names are
targeted killing right executive action
targeted killing right I mean drone
striking is essentially
assassination and you know people jump
up and down and say that's not true well
spent quite a long time interviewing the
cia's lead Council John Rizzo he died
recently but Rizzo was very forthcoming
with me of course never sharing
classified information but going up to
the edge of what can legally be known
Rizzo was thrown under the bus by sort
of the general public for he was the
Fall Guy for the torture campaign the
CIA calls it enhanced
interrogation and so Rizzo had this long
career you know he began working under
the Carter Administration right and was
responsible for the torture memos was
responsible for legally making sure the
president's ass was covered um and then
got thrown under the bus and so he was
very forthcoming not in a bitter way but
in a very Earnest way about a lot of how
these programs are made to be legal
because if the president of the United
States says they're legal they're legal
executive order 1233 3 you know it says
we don't assassinate but it can be
overwritten by another order that's
straight out of Rizzo's mouth right um
also really important to keep in mind is
that the military operates under what's
called title 50 it's part of the
national security code that gives like
sort of you know rules and Etc how you
must behave in a war theater well the
CIA is under no such rules it operates
under what's called title 50 and you
know it's interesting to me as a
reporter cuz before I wrote the book and
reported openly about title 50 it was
not really discussed and now you even
see operators themselves on podcast
talking about title 50 which is kind of
great because it's like the cat's out of
the bag guys that's what it's called and
that's how it works it means what we say
goes can you elaborate on what title 50
so it basically says assassination is
allowed it says what the president wants
the president gets right and so I mean
the best example ex Le is the killing of
Bin Laden right we were not at war with
Pakistan so title 50 doesn't apply you
can't have a military operation in a
country you're not at war with I mean
the lines my God now they've really
blurred but even then they were a little
more honored right and so what do you do
well Leon Panetta was the CIA director
um and you work out a scenario whereby
the seals and by the way it wasn't the
seal it was there was rotational on that
um killer capture Mission which was
really just a kill Mission seals were
practicing Delta was practicing and
special activities division was
practicing they were all practicing at a
secret facility in North Carolina right
and it was just like you know they're
ready to till they get the go order and
it just happened to be the seals okay so
the seals operate under title 10 so they
had to get what I call sheep dip because
that's what the Insiders call it right
and that is a term that comes from
interestingly Area 51 the U2 Pilots were
Air Force pilots they needed to be sheep
dipped over to the CIA so they could do
things that defied the law okay so you
can see how these all entwine and you
become more and more informed and you go
aha right so that's how title 50 worked
so the night of that mission it was a
CIA Mission because the CIA is allowed
to go into Pakistan and kill someone and
the military can't that's fascinating so
people talk about the Navy Seals doing
it but it's really legally speaking to
get the permission to do it within the
whole legal framework of the United
States it was the CIA and if you look at
their uniforms that they were wearing
and now that you know this you'll see
there's no nomenclature on them there's
no right so those are they're just meant
to be completely untraceable were that
were they to be shot down and captured
it's like wait who are these guys oh a
bunch of Rogue guys okay and this goes
back the origin story of all that is in
Vietnam with Mac V so and these
crossborder operations that I Chronicle
in Surprise kill vanish which still
amaze me to this day right I mean SOG
missions they called it suicide on the
ground because that's what it was and
these guys had no
identifiable nothing I mean they they
were essentially in pajamas right even
their weapons were specially designed by
the CIA to have no serial numbers no
nothing so if they were captured and
they became p ps I don't know who these
guys
are what do you think and how much do
they think uh at the highest levels of
power about the ethics of
assassination and and about
the role of that in geopolitics and
military operations
like to you maybe also does
assassination makes sense as a as a good
as a good methodology of War I mean
again I try to remain agnostic on the
policy part of it and just report the
operators's perspective right because
this is what people do and this is what
people are asked to do um and it and it
it depends on the individual I mean
Billy W went on a lot of those missions
I mean the the saying is like Oh Billy W
he killed more people than cancer right
uh did Billy W ever tell me about direct
assassinations no because they're all
classified right did he tell me about
some failed ones yes I'll give you an
example was really interesting um he
would he would show me these power
points that were just fantastic you know
late in his life he was constantly being
asked to go up to Fort Bragg and lecture
to the young soldiers and everybody
loved him you know and he would um he
would drive all night to get there and
he would create these Powerpoints and
then he would show me the Powerpoints
and he would um all unclassified but at
one point when Hugo Chavez was in power
Billy W was kind of asked that's how it
works of like if you had to think about
doing something what would it look like
let's just say hypothetically so he took
me through this PowerPoint that never
happened whereby he and a group of
operators agency operators were going to
Halo jump in to the palace and grab
Chavez and probably kill him because he
wouldn't allow himself to be captured
and uh you know what Billy and by the
way Halo jumping for those of listeners
who don't know high altitude low opening
right so you jump out of an aircraft and
you go down like a pencil until you're
really low to the deck like 1,000 fet
you pull your parachute cord and that
way you're not picked up on radar and
you're also not traceable when you get
to the ground because it's so fast Billy
W took the second HALO jump in history
into a war theater in La during the
Vietnam war right so he's like this
famous Halo jumper right so he he and
the team were going to go in grab shavez
and and he said to me a very interesting
thing that was kind of a one moment in
time where I saw a different side of
Billy W where he
said I'm so glad we didn't do that even
though I really wanted to at the time
because can you know can you imagine
that country's problems where it is now
can you imagine how we would have been
blamed and it was like an interesting
rare moment for Billy W to comment on
the bigger picture that you're asking me
about right yeah I think pretty much The
Operators I know they just stick to the
mission so on the technical difficulty
of those missions just your big sense
how hard is it to do to
assassinate uh to assassinate a Target
on the soil of that
Nation I suppose that just depends right
I here's another insightful Bill thing
Billy wall said to me and I'm answering
the question around because I don't know
because again you know I never had
anyone say to me here's how it went down
right because you can't that would be
first of all those are classified so I'm
never going to receive classified
information I did hear a lot about
reconnaissance missions when people
would be in charge of you have to be
able to what's called make book on the
target before right and making book on
the target means um photographing them
to really then that gets run up the
chain of command to make sure this is
really EOD mugia we're about to kill
right um but I once asked Billy when I
was trying to get the question you know
and he wouldn't answer it and I said so
there's another person in my book named
Rick pra who's also like a legendary
agency Guy and um and so you know he's
like 20 years younger than Billy and I
said um Billy if you and Rick had to
kill each other like who would win right
I was trying to imagine this like
hypothetical like how would that work
who would win right and I I posed the
question to each of them yeah right and
and of course
each of them said me right but Billy
then I went back to them and they and I
Billy said let me tell you how I would
win okay right and he said I'd cheat mhm
I'd show up before the duel and I'd kill
him yeah there such such a uh like uh
you know I have a lot of friends who in
Navy Seals it's such a guy conversation
uh well you would be amazed at what the
women do let me just tell you that women
are part of the special activities
division
Vision a big part of it can you comment
on that I can women can get a hell of a
lot closer to a
Target and I mean that literally the
Special Operations do you mean is this
part of the CIA the special activities
division now it's called the special
Activity Center um but originally that's
the that's the umbrella agency that has
the different paramilitary organizations
under it right so the most lethal one is
Brown Branch um and that's what I
reported on in Surprise kill vanish and
its Origins go way back to the Guerilla
Warfare core that was started uh in 1947
for the president so women are
also uh a part of the alleged
assassination
absolutely and you're saying they can at
times be more
effective let me just going to leave
that pause there the reason I ask of how
difficult the assassinations are you
know with Bin Laden it took a long time
so I guess the
reconnaissance the intelligence for
finding the
target I imagine with mad maybe this C
now the leadership of Hamas the military
branch of
Hamas is much wanted from an
assassination perspective so to me as an
outside Observer it's seems like it's
more difficult than you would imagine
mhm mhm but perhaps that's the
intelligence aspect of it not the actual
assassination of locating the person
well I think most it's because mostly
from what I understand it's a really
it's a really dirty game and people are
covering for people right and I'll give
I'll give you the example of Billy wall
and imod mugia if I may right so imod
mugia was the most Wanted terrorist in
the world before Bin Laden you know
hezbollah's chief of
operations and he was wanted by every
and you know mad John down but no one
could find him he was missing for 20
years there wasn't even a photograph of
him and then he resurfaced and of all
places he resurfaced in Saudi Arabia
okay so what that's when I say it's a
dirty game right Hezbollah Iran
Hezbollah Iran enemies with Saudi
Arabia why on Earth was mod mugia in
Saudi Arabia well that's where he was
there was a Navy SEAL who was doing
reconnaissance on him this is according
to Billy W and this is around 2005 so
Billy's in his 80s at this point right
late 70s 80s
and he gets word that the seal who's
been tracking mugia to get photographs
of him to give the photographs to mad
and CIA so they can do a joint operation
to kill him which they did with a car
bomb in Damascus that's the the end of
the story right but how we got there was
we needed you know the CIA needed
confirmation you can't kill the wrong
person so the seal panicked according to
Billy W and was just like I'm out of
here this is too dangerous and I do not
want to wind up in a Saudi prison so who
do you send in Billy wall right he shows
up he's there for 24 hours he finds he
knows where mugia lives from the seal he
positions himself in a cafe across the
street which is run by sudin men and of
course W speaks some sudin because he
operated in Sudan right and he's
shooting the with him by his own
words he had the most foul mouth it was
just absolutely delightful to listen to
and then in between him and Mia's house
is a dumpster and Billy W being Billy W
who will go to any length to do the job
decides to conduct reconnaissance from
inside the dumpster M and that is where
he is when he takes the picture
of EOD mugia living so comfortably in
Saudi that mugia according to Billy came
out of his apartment building with dry
cleaner plastic bag hangers over his
shoulder that's how comfortable he lived
there it was his
neighborhood click click click Billy W
takes the photographs runs them to the
CIA headquarters in Saudi at the embassy
oh my God it's mugia get get the hell
out of here he gets to the airport he
leaves those photographs get sent to the
agency and then they do the operation
with mad and M is dead now that the
truth about that being a co- CIA mission
was not reported for many years after
the fact it was originally mad took
credit as the CIA often likes to just
give other people credit they just want
the job
done well speaking of mad what in your
understanding of all the intelligence
agencies what are the strengths and
weaknesses of of the different
intelligence agencies out there CIA
mad
MI6 um svr and FSB and the Chinese
intelligence all this kind of stuff is
there some interesting differences
insights that you have from all your
studying of CIA that's a really
interesting question
I I don't know and here's why is because
I've never interviewed any intelligence
off officer with those other agencies
right I've interviewed a couple people
with Shin bat in in Israel but um until
you until I speak to an actual Source
whose job it was I don't know and so the
information that I'm getting is based on
perception of others which one would
think would be deeply clouded by the
idea that America's the greatest right
right
right right we're better than them you
know yes uh well actually the
fascinating thing is because you've
spoken to a lot of people about they say
how do you know they're telling the
truth like how do you and this actually
probably applies generally to your uh
interviews with very secretive people
how do you get past the like
well that's just like multiple sourcing
right so so you find the story out and
then you have to you go to the National
Archives and you find the operation and
then you learn all about this and then
you interview other people who were
there and you put the story together to
the best of your ability and you make
very specific choices with you know
quote so and so said end quote said so
and so right and all very rarely do I
report on a single source as I did in
the end of Area 51 and then it says
essentially look th look dear reader
this is what the source told me I have
no way of corroborating it this is legit
and here it is so that's a an area to
make your reader comfortable with the
information that they're being given and
then in all of my books whether there
are three or 400 Pages there's always a
100 pages of notes at the end so you can
see all the sourcing and you can begin
to get an understanding of how
journalism in the National Security
World works works and also great
opportunity for me to say I'm often
standing on the shoulders of journalists
before me who did an incredible job
digging into something and being able to
report what they knew often the books
are 10 20 30 years old and so much more
has come to light since and I also would
just like to say that I I appreciate
that you said great question I don't
know uh not enough people say I don't
know and that's a sign of a great
journalist uh but speaking about things
you might not know
about uh let me ask you about something
going
on
currently uh so recently Alexi naly uh
died in prison perhaps was killed in
prison uh what's your sense from looking
at it do you think he died of natural
causes in prison uh do you think it's
possible he was
assassinated uh Russia
Ukraine mad
CIA um Whoever has interest in this
particular warh for that I look directly
to the historical record right having
written about Russian assassination
campaigns and programs since the
earliest days of the Cold War right and
Russia has a long history of
assassinating murdering
dissidents and in Surprise Kil vanish I
tell the story of an actual KGB assassin
named kov who knocked on the
door of his of the man he was assigned
to kill and and by the way this all
comes from a book that kov wrote later
right because he defected to the United
States he knocks on the door and the guy
answers the door and instead of killing
him he has like this moment of conscious
of Crisis or crisis of conscience and
says like I can't kill you even though
that's what I'm supposed to do and then
sits down with the guy and together
decides okay we're going to defect you
know we're going to we're going to let
the Western intelligence agencies know
what we're doing here and the CIA got
involved but Russian Assassins were able
to poison kov with ponum um what happens
to him is insane and it's a miracle he
didn't die but he doesn't and then he
defects to the west and he writes these
books and he tells lots of incredible
secrets about the Russian assassination
programs and their poison labs and
they're really really really interesting
and so to answer that question I mean to
my eye of course I don't know but it
certainly looks like Russia is acting in
the same vein that it has always acted
taking care of dissidents that go
against Mother Russia so in the in the
style of KGB
assassinations
uh is there something you can comment
on about the ways that KGB operates
versus the CIA when we look at the
history of the two organizations the
cold
war after World War II and leading up to
today m i mean my feeling on that is
always
that there's a thread
somewhere in every in in Declassified
documentation about these programs of
America
working to maintain a
semblance of democratic ideals however
surprising that may be right in other
words always trying
to I don't want to say fight fair
because you know killing people isn't
fair but um versus a certain
ruthlessness a real
Sinister totalitarian type ruthlessness
certainly from Soviet
Russia I'm far less familiar with
modern-day Russian assassination
activities although we certainly know on
the record you know that they exist some
people have done great reporting on that
um but there seems to be a kind
of almost a sadism about the Russian
program prams that I personally have not
seen in the American programs what about
on the surveillance side it seems like
America is pretty good at surveill Mass
surveillance or at least has been
revealed through NSA and all this kind
of uh reporting and leaks and
whistleblowers um can you comment to the
degree to how much surveillance is done
by the US government internally and
externally
if you'd ask me five years ago I would
had a very different answer right
because all right first of all you can't
they're looking for a needle in the hay
stack they're looking for the bin Laden
and they can't find the needle in the
hay stack but they continue to create
the hay stack and and Survey the hay
stack so right okay so but the real
problem what has happened and I write
about this in my book first platoon
which is about a group of young soldiers
who goes to Afghanistan and unwittingly
becomes part of the defense
Department's biome efforts to capture
Biometrics on 85% of the population of
Afghanistan okay which by the way China
then emulated in their own biometric
surveillance program right and I think
this is a a terrible idea but what is
happened these biometric systems that
have been created and Biometrics are of
course fingerprints
facial images DNA and Iris scans that
allow you to tag TR track and locate
people okay and what has happened in the
5 years since this question was first
you know on everybody's Minds about NSA
surveillance is that the civilian sector
companies have essentially done all the
defense Department's biometric
surveillance job for them by all of us
sharing our facially recognizable images
on Instagram and Facebook and everywhere
else X um by sharing information by
writing up narratives about ourselves um
this information has become part of the
database five years ago when I was
reporting first platoon I was
interviewing the police chief of El
Segundo which is kind of like on the
outskirts of La it's right near the
airport and why it's important is
because it's like defense contractor
Haven okay so they have like you know
massive surveillance and chief whan when
I posed this question to him he said to
me Annie let me show you something and
he had Clearwater AI the the rec the
recognition software on his phone and
this was still when it was like quasi
not supposed to have to have that for
law enforcement and he said I want you
to go down the block and I want you to
just turn the corner and come back
toward me right which I did and he just
didn't even hold up his phone he just
kind of his looked like his hand was and
his phone was on me and he went back
down it was like tiniest movement mhm
and when I came back to him he went like
this and he showed me there I was
everything about me everything about me
facts and figures and all images and he
knew who I was before I even got to
him so is that a good thing or a bad
thing I mean we could have another
three-hour conversation about that alone
so you're saying more and more you don't
need an
Ansa where we're giving over the data
ourselves yeah
uh publicly or semi- publicly yeah
during the war on terror people were
just like insense to learn that there is
a drone that's flying at something like
20,000 ft it's called Argus is right and
it could it can
capture the it's not a license plate
it's like it can basically capture like
what's written on a golf ball from
177,000 Ft 20,000 ft up okay and people
went crazy over this
like oh my God it's big brother well
one of the lead Engineers on that Pat
bilin is someone I talk to regularly
because we talk about surveillance a lot
because he thinks about it a lot because
he has kids now and he is has given so
much thoughtful you know really thinks
about this issue because he believes
just like you stated that what we are
turning over about ourselves actually
exceeds anything that Argus is could do
from above because we're doing it
willfully and so what it's doing is it's
creating an ability for if someone wants
to know about you if someone let's say
in government wants to know about Lex
Reedman they can find out everything
about you and then that gets used for
tagging
tracking and ultimately you know in the
in the war theater it was called Fine
fix finish what do you think the Finish
is in that
statement it's not pleasant it's called
a drone strike yeah find find them with
the biometric fix him meaning fix his
position we know he's moving in a car
that's him that's him finish him call it
in drone strike boom if we could uh
return to nuclear
war you've briefly mentioned that a lot
of things go back to the third
Rank and
Hitler if we go back to World War II we
look at Hiroshima and Nagasaki the
dropping of the two
bombs I would love to get your opinion
on whether we should or should have done
that and also to get your opinion on
what would have happened if Hitler and
Germany built the bomb first do you
think it was possible he could have
built the bomb
first in my
researching Third Reich weapons for
Operation Paperclip because of course we
got a lot of those scientists after is
another great book in a terrifyingly
complicated operation yes uh um when you
know at what point do the ends justify
the means right um but in looking at
those programs and we acquired Hitler's
favorite weapons designers um and I'm
talking about weapons of mass
destruction like chemical weapons and
biological weapons but of course America
was ahead in the nuclear program and an
interesting detail reading Albert
Spear's Memoirs was um spear referring
to a conversation he had with Hitler
where Hitler said said no I don't want
to do that that's Jewish
science and so because of Hitler's own
racial ethnic pre prejudices they didn't
develop the bomb right as far as should
we have dropped the bombs on
Hiroshima you know I've interviewed all
kinds of people with different opinions
most of them that it ended the war um
the best interview and most meaningful
perhaps that I ever did was with Alo
Donnell who was a participant in the
Battle of okanawa which was like this
insane just to read stories about
okanawa it makes your hair stand on end
and odonnell like so many others was
slated
to invade Mainland
Japan to his almost certain death right
so somebody like that it makes sense
right from the get-go why he would be
pro- nuclear weapons it saved his own
personal life and it saved everyone that
he knew that he was fighting with and it
ended the war do you think it sent a
signal like without that we wouldn't
have known perhaps about the power of
the weapons
so in the long Arc of that history 70
years
plus it it is it is the reason why
deterrence has worked so far
yes that's an interesting thought my
thought goes to this idea that like of
more right that everybody always wants
more it's a very dangerous it's like
more power literally not just figure
more power right and what what is more
confounding to me
beyond the fact that we dropped to
atomic bombs on Hiroshima Nagasaki and
the war ended is that this decision was
then made to develop the thermonuclear
bomb a force that is such it's the
degree of magnitude of that power is
mindboggling I mean even projects within
the Manhattan Project defined
thermonuclear weapon the thermonuclear
weapon as the evil thing like it was
evil it's a it's a weapon of genocide
Atomic weapons d destroy
cities um
thermonuclear weapons destroy
civilizations you open the book with a
Churchill quote the story of the human
race is war except for brief and
precarious interludes there has never
been peace in the world and before
history began murderous Strife was
Universal and
unending do you think there will always
be
War do you think that there's some deep
human way in which we're tending to this
kind of global war
eternally well the optimistic answer of
that would be that we could evolve
beyond that right because certainly if
we look at our and
ancestors um they had not developed
their
Consciousness as
far as we have to be able to build the
tools that we have and so the hopeful
answer is we will evolve Beyond this
kind of Brute Force kill the other guy
attitude certainly you know these are
questions that will become more obvious
over time I just want to play my little
part in this world that I live in as the
Storyteller who brings information to
people so that they
can have these kind of
questions with themselves with their
friends with their families and I think
in asking that very question you're what
you're really saying is why don't
we evolve Beyond War
fighting it is very possible and you
your book is such a stark and Powerful
reminder that human civilization as we
know it ends in this
Century it's a
um it's a good motivator to get our
together but aren't you really saying
human civilization could end not it
ends could end could
end but the power of our weapons is
growing
rapidly so as they say it's time to come
back from the brink right and it's time
to have that discussion while we're
still talking and uh you know there's
another complexity sneaking up into the
picture in the form of artificial
intelligence and in the in cyber War but
also in Hot War the use of autonomous
weapons all of it starts becoming super
complicated
as we delegate some of these uh
decisions about war including nuclear
war to more and more autonomy and
artificial intelligence systems it's
going to be a very interesting Century
do you just to zoom out a little bit
hope that we become a multiplanetary
species I'm all for
adventure uh and I too while am for
adventure I'm all for
backups in all forms so I I hope that
humans start a civilization on Mars and
Beyond out in space and if you zoom out
on across all of it what gives you
hope about human civilization about this
whole thing we have going on here I mean
I am a fundamentally optimistic person I
must have come out of the shoot that way
because I just am right even though I
write about really Grim things I I get
inspired by them because I do always
believe in evolution right I also have
like the greatest family ever two kids
Jet and Finley shout out to them they're
Lex Freedman fans you know um and uh and
my husband and you know so what inspires
me is like this idea of Legacy I think
that you always want to have your eye on
being a good example to the best that
you can and so and passing on what you
know and believing kind of in the Next
Generation and again again that's a
sentiment echoed by all these cold
Warriors I've been talking to because
they also share that um that idea that
wow look at what we have done as a
civilization and look where we're going
whether it's interplanet exoplanetary
travel or
AI um it's just that the the human
factor of like the desire to fight the
desire to have
conflict needs to be Recon figured
because with all these new technologies
that we have the Peril is growing at an
accelerating Pace perhaps faster than
the average human can keep up with well
Annie thank you for being a wonderful
example of a great journalist a great
writer a great human being and I'm a big
fan of yours it's a huge honor to meet
you to talk with you today so thank you
so much for talking today thank you for
having me thank you for listening to
this conversation with Annie Jacobson to
support this podcast please check out
our sponsors in the description and now
let me leave you some words from John F
Kennedy the very word secrecy is
repugnant in a free and open society and
we are as a people inherently and
historically opposed to secret societies
the secret Oaths and to secret
proceedings thank you for listening and
hope to see you next next
time