Speaker 1: Ah Beat Force. If it doesn't work, you're just not
Speaker 1: using enough. You're listening to Software a Gradio, Special Operations,
Speaker 1: Military news and straight Talk with the guys and the
Speaker 1: Community Software Radio on Time on Target. I am so
Speaker 1: excited for this episode. Robert Bear is back on with
Speaker 1: us for the first time and I think four years.
Speaker 1: But before we get into it, this show is brought
Speaker 1: to you by Create Club, a club four men by
Speaker 1: men of gear handpicked by Special Operations military veterans. Visit
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Speaker 1: coupon code software off any gearbox. Sign up today Bob
Speaker 1: Bear coming on with us, one of the most respected
Speaker 1: CIA c I A case officer out there from seventies
Speaker 1: six to nine seven. But before we get to that interview,
Speaker 1: I guess the big news today is that this is
Speaker 1: not any surprise to people, but as was heavily speculated
Speaker 1: on Joe Biden is officially running for president in and
Speaker 1: it's gonna shake things up. It's gonna make things interesting.
Speaker 1: As you kind of noted as we're prepping for this show,
Speaker 1: the feedback from at least the I guess you would
Speaker 1: say progressive or woke based on Twitter, is like they're
Speaker 1: not happy about this guy running. They want someone that
Speaker 1: they see as more progressive. Yeah. You know, when I
Speaker 1: was on Brian Kill Me the show just before coming
Speaker 1: over here to do our own podcast, and which really quick,
Speaker 1: I should have told you to go because I was
Speaker 1: just around there. I should have told you to go to, uh,
Speaker 1: Try Tip at at the Rockfeller Center. Bill then you've
Speaker 1: been there with me, But I've been going there every
Speaker 1: morning that a year now because it's like the best
Speaker 1: breakfast spreado ever. And now I'm addicted to that and
Speaker 1: it's right by there. But an okay, I'll go there
Speaker 1: next to any of you were ever in New York City,
Speaker 1: go to try To They're not a sponsor, but Try
Speaker 1: Tips breakfast burritos are like out of this world. The
Speaker 1: phil In host Mary Barry Walter, Yeah, she she asked me,
Speaker 1: She's like, you know, what do you do you think
Speaker 1: that there's um going to be an attraction to so
Speaker 1: called democratic socialism with millennials, Like do you think that's
Speaker 1: going to speak to the population, Like no, like these
Speaker 1: like the the woke uh mentality, the whole ideology that's
Speaker 1: like a it's a Twitter phenomena. It's not real life.
Speaker 1: And yeah, millennials, I mean young people are going to
Speaker 1: be much more liberal than older people. Like we've seen
Speaker 1: that demographic shift. You know, that's just a constant thing. Um.
Speaker 1: But I mean democratic socialism is just communism with fucking
Speaker 1: clowns and balloons. So it's like, I mean, these millennials
Speaker 1: are gonna grow up. They're gonna have to pay taxes
Speaker 1: and be gainfully employed. And as that happens, they're going
Speaker 1: to become more con servative or if not saying, they're
Speaker 1: gonna become Republicans, but they're gonna drift towards the center
Speaker 1: because this stuff just doesn't I mean, it doesn't resonate
Speaker 1: with mainstream society. I mean, they they may become, you know,
Speaker 1: continuing to be idealistic though, because there have been a
Speaker 1: ton of surveys done on you younger people in general,
Speaker 1: and things like freedom of speech and they don't value
Speaker 1: is the same older generations. They do believe in, you know,
Speaker 1: the government cracking down on what they call hate speech,
Speaker 1: and you know that goes again. They believe in subjective reality.
Speaker 1: They think what I feel is what's true. You know,
Speaker 1: they will tell you, I know my truths, which is
Speaker 1: horrifying to me, Like, yeah, no, that's not what we're
Speaker 1: talking about here. You know, you don't get to have
Speaker 1: your own little world to live in, and you become
Speaker 1: the arbiter of what is true and what is not.
Speaker 1: Like sorry, pal um that as you were you were
Speaker 1: telling me before we start recording, like they're gonna lose
Speaker 1: this election because they're trying to throw Biden under the bus.
Speaker 1: He is the only chance they have to def Trump.
Speaker 1: So I've I think I've referenced this rant several times
Speaker 1: on here, but it was just one of the truest
Speaker 1: things I heard. I am a Ben Shapiro fan, and
Speaker 1: and what he said and he's talked about this is
Speaker 1: that the only way to stand out in this field,
Speaker 1: because it's gonna end up being a field of like
Speaker 1: twenty people or something of everybody. I mean, I'm sure
Speaker 1: I don't know if someone like Andrew Yang is gonna
Speaker 1: get in the debates, but I think it's gonna be
Speaker 1: a ton of people and the only way to stand
Speaker 1: out is to out left the rest of the people.
Speaker 1: You got, Yeah, you're not gonna stand out being the moderate.
Speaker 1: And he's like, they could win this election if they
Speaker 1: could just not sound crazy, and they can't help themselves.
Speaker 1: And so the latest example of this, and this sounds
Speaker 1: almost like crazy fake news stuff, but you can go
Speaker 1: out there, this is actually happening. Um. They asked Bernie
Speaker 1: Sanders about voting rights for phlones, which is something he's
Speaker 1: been an advocate for, and they asked him, you know,
Speaker 1: all felons is include rapists and does include someone as
Speaker 1: horrific as you know and I of the Boston marathon bomber.
Speaker 1: And he believes that, yes, he should have his right
Speaker 1: to vote, you know, reinstilled. And then you know a
Speaker 1: candidate who's looked at his less radical than Bernie Sanders,
Speaker 1: I would say Kamala Harris. She did a town hall
Speaker 1: I believe it was with Don Lemon and asked her
Speaker 1: about you know, he said that Bernie Sanders has recently
Speaker 1: said that we need to reinstill voting rights for felons,
Speaker 1: including people as radical as the Boston Marathon bomber. And
Speaker 1: she started saying, I've been a federal federal prosecutor, and
Speaker 1: I've worked hard on this issue, and I do believe
Speaker 1: like those among us, you know, in these situations should
Speaker 1: be able to have the right to vote at a
Speaker 1: certain point when they've you know, paid their dues to society,
Speaker 1: you know. Don Lemon said, but does this include someone
Speaker 1: as radical as as the Boston marathon bomber, And she said,
Speaker 1: it's something we need to scull. I mean, if they've
Speaker 1: paid their dues to society and have been released from prison,
Speaker 1: I mean I can see this. I could see that
Speaker 1: too the process. But he he flatted ast her, even
Speaker 1: the Boston Marathon bomber, And she said, yeah, we need
Speaker 1: to discuss this, and like Tim mcve should he be
Speaker 1: able to vote, you know, if he was alive. But
Speaker 1: but here's, uh, here's what I don't get and why
Speaker 1: they're tackling this issue. It makes no sense to me
Speaker 1: because essentially, a an election is you know, popularity contest,
Speaker 1: and you're supposed to, whether on the right of the left,
Speaker 1: you're supposed to champion issues that America could get behind
Speaker 1: and kind of hide those more radical views unless you know,
Speaker 1: in the primary either running to the left to get
Speaker 1: that Democrat base. But I could tell you I hang
Speaker 1: out with plenty of New York you know, progressives, They
Speaker 1: wagble themselves and all different types of people. I don't
Speaker 1: know anyone who's champion, honestly for the Boston Arathon bomber
Speaker 1: to have the right to vote. I have never met
Speaker 1: anyone who said that this is what we need. All
Speaker 1: that that woke Twitter subculture is just that. Like, I
Speaker 1: don't know if those people would advocate for this. I
Speaker 1: don't know if they I mean, like you know b
Speaker 1: K said when he came on here, He's like, man,
Speaker 1: half of them don't even believe that ship themselves. They
Speaker 1: just say it because they're trying to get little hearts
Speaker 1: and and they're getting that little like adrenaline high off
Speaker 1: of it. It's crazy, man. But I actually do think
Speaker 1: Kamala Harris is a serious Uh is a serious Uh?
Speaker 1: What's the candidates for a president? Why is she saying that?
Speaker 1: Why this is not gonna win you votes? I don't
Speaker 1: I don't get why she would agree with a statement
Speaker 1: like that. They all want to one up each other,
Speaker 1: and you know it's gonna it's gonna turn into like
Speaker 1: like Hugo Chavez and I'll be like, if you vote
Speaker 1: for me, you will get free milk and eggs, you know,
Speaker 1: like all kinds of ship. Ye, it's just gonna get
Speaker 1: more and more goofy as as time goes on. So
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, personally, I really do think for
Speaker 1: a statement like that to both of them throw a
Speaker 1: punch of the week. I don't know anybody who wants
Speaker 1: to see someone who took the lives of innocent people
Speaker 1: just trying to run a marathon and somehow that person
Speaker 1: who's given the right to vote saying you're absolutely right
Speaker 1: Ian that like, this is not pragmatic politics, Like they
Speaker 1: are not thinking about what they need to do to
Speaker 1: get the votes to win the election, and they're thinking
Speaker 1: about like, oh, this is gonna get you know, this
Speaker 1: is like the next Twitter hashtag. It's like, No, that's
Speaker 1: not how you win an election, bro, It's not how
Speaker 1: it's done. Although I'll come from the other side on here.
Speaker 1: You know, in a heated primary, people have thought Donald
Speaker 1: Trump was saying too crazy of stuff to win his
Speaker 1: primary and and the people who did sound pragmatic, you
Speaker 1: know that Jeb Bushes of the world. They got pushed out.
Speaker 1: They did not catch on. So and I think that
Speaker 1: probably does play into the thought process. They think they're
Speaker 1: going to run a social media election like like AOC.
Speaker 1: You know, I think they all wish they were like
Speaker 1: her right now and they had that kind of like
Speaker 1: massive social media following. Yeah. Uh, I don't know how
Speaker 1: much we can get to here because we have emails,
Speaker 1: and I know you gotta get going here. We have
Speaker 1: a very long email that I won't read the whole
Speaker 1: thing about, but he Uh, this guy Mike, who's a
Speaker 1: veteran US military veteran living in Israel, basically commented on
Speaker 1: us talking about um net and Yahoo and the election.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna be able to get to the whole
Speaker 1: thing because just very long, and we have women a
Speaker 1: time today. But my friend Avery sent me this article
Speaker 1: that I thought was really interesting um from the Times
Speaker 1: of Israel, if you want to check it out, called
Speaker 1: the kids are all right wing Why Israel's younger voters
Speaker 1: are more conservative And the interesting thing about this article
Speaker 1: is it's kind of like the antithesis of what we
Speaker 1: just talked about it because this article shows polling and
Speaker 1: people eighteen to twenty four overwhelmingly are for Net and
Speaker 1: Yahoo over the more liberal candidates. And I say candidates
Speaker 1: because Israel has all these different parties of people running.
Speaker 1: And uh, it's a long article, but here I'll read
Speaker 1: this little excerpt here that might bring some understanding to
Speaker 1: why this is. Young Israelis grew up during the Second
Speaker 1: into Fatah, which saw hundreds of Israelis killed in suicide bombings.
Speaker 1: The aftermath of the two thousand five disengagement from Gaza,
Speaker 1: which occurred when the group was between four to twenty
Speaker 1: years old, has led many young Jewish Israelies to resent
Speaker 1: any leader who is willing to see any more land
Speaker 1: currently under under Israeli control. Since some of this group
Speaker 1: have served in the army, successive wars and Gaza have
Speaker 1: only hardened that perception. Uh. This is a quote from
Speaker 1: I don't I'd have to read back to see who
Speaker 1: this guy is. Herman. He says they were born after
Speaker 1: the Oslo process started, they were exposed to the bloodshed
Speaker 1: during the Second into Fata. They're coming right after military service.
Speaker 1: And then it says a war generation. Yeah, so for
Speaker 1: the further quote here from an ACUD spokesman, which is
Speaker 1: not YAHUS party. People who grew up in the middle
Speaker 1: of the Alaxa into Fata don't trust the Palestinians, don't
Speaker 1: believe in peace. They really want to be there for
Speaker 1: want there to be peace, but there is no partner.
Speaker 1: For younger religious Zionist voters. In particular, the disengagement, which
Speaker 1: displaced some eight thousand Jewish settlers settlers was considered an
Speaker 1: absolutely devastating moment that they vowed never to return to.
Speaker 1: The general narrative is we gave up this land. They
Speaker 1: sent rockets in return. The national religious religious have considered
Speaker 1: it a national trauma. Ever since then. Uh, there's been
Speaker 1: no peace process, no handshakes, no agreements, any negotiations, have
Speaker 1: been zero expectation negotiations. But along with the children of
Speaker 1: the conflict, this cohort is shaped by their religiosity. A
Speaker 1: larger percentage of young Israelis are Haredi Haredi Orthodox. I
Speaker 1: actually don't know how to protest that, uh, and religious
Speaker 1: Zionist UH more so than previous generations, and religious Jewish
Speaker 1: Israelies tend to be more right wing. So I just
Speaker 1: thought this was interesting because it's very different from America
Speaker 1: where eighteen to twenty four they would overwhelmingly vote for
Speaker 1: whoever the left wing candidate is. And and well, I
Speaker 1: mean not to make apples and oranges comparison, but another
Speaker 1: way to think about that is what we've done in
Speaker 1: America that we are um on a permanent war footing. Um.
Speaker 1: You're talking about how you have this generation of young
Speaker 1: people who Israel has always been at war right their
Speaker 1: entire life. They're they're they're they're in a security uh state. Um.
Speaker 1: And that's one of my fears about the of the
Speaker 1: war on Terror and that it has no end in sight,
Speaker 1: that like now you have kids who just grow up
Speaker 1: and you don't have to propagandize them and convince them
Speaker 1: to go to war or that the war is bad
Speaker 1: or good or anything. It's like it's just there and
Speaker 1: it's always there. It's a it's a paradigm. It's a
Speaker 1: new way of living and being an American that it's
Speaker 1: always there in the background. Yeah. All right, And before
Speaker 1: we get to Bob Bar, one last thing. We have
Speaker 1: a voice memo from our friend Jean Forignsworth and everybody
Speaker 1: loves hearing from Kin, so I feel like I might
Speaker 1: as well get to that, and we haven't done one
Speaker 1: in a while, and I know that you sent a
Speaker 1: review copy of the books. That's what this gets into.
Speaker 1: Let's hear it. Greetings makes terror usn retired. It looks
Speaker 1: like a very exciting time come up for soft Rim.
Speaker 1: Lots of good things seem to be happening. Really had
Speaker 1: been enjoying Jack's book. I'm halfway through it, freaking kick ass.
Speaker 1: He's a smuggling into Syria now. It was really really
Speaker 1: interested in reading The high Speed Chase in mosl definitely
Speaker 1: puts a person right in the cab of that freaking humby. Amazing,
Speaker 1: really good book. Congratulations Jack open does is as well
Speaker 1: as is written and eon ion, I always say wrong
Speaker 1: and I apologize, but it's been good listening to you.
Speaker 1: You think you've done a hell of a good job.
Speaker 1: And I'm sure you'll be missed by the Soft Frip folks,
Speaker 1: And good luck and your next chapter in your life.
Speaker 1: May you all continue to have fair winds and falling
Speaker 1: sees Gino Jean's voice memo quality there is like better
Speaker 1: than usual. I don't know what he's using, but it
Speaker 1: sounds good. But no it's so appreciated. Always love hearing
Speaker 1: from Gene Fornsworth. No, I love hearing from Gene, and
Speaker 1: thank you so much for reading the book. Um, it's interesting.
Speaker 1: He's actually the second person today to bring up that
Speaker 1: chase scene was in a Striker armored vehicle, and um,
Speaker 1: we were chasing after a opal like a sedan and
Speaker 1: miss tool that supposedly had a high level target. I'm
Speaker 1: sure it was the guy we were looking for, because
Speaker 1: he took off at a high rate of speed once
Speaker 1: he saw us. And um, the private driving the Striker,
Speaker 1: it's like a twenty three ton armored vehicle. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's fucking huge. He just like floors it and he's
Speaker 1: like twisting winding streets of missoul I don't know how
Speaker 1: fast he got, is going like seventy miles an hour
Speaker 1: or something. Just like there's a huge it's a it's
Speaker 1: a fucking tank basically, And um, it's like I'm there
Speaker 1: in the hatch outside the vehicle, you know, and I'm
Speaker 1: just like getting rocked back and forth, back and forth
Speaker 1: as he's cutting around these corners. And it's like most people,
Speaker 1: I think, it's like the average American just has no
Speaker 1: idea what it's like to have your life be completely
Speaker 1: in the hands of an eighteen year old private driving
Speaker 1: a twenty three ton armored vehicle in a high speed chase.
Speaker 1: There's like, oh my god, but an insane Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: but um no, thank you, Jean. I'm glad you're enjoying
Speaker 1: the book. Let me know what you think of it.
Speaker 1: How do you finish now that I'm wondering, like, how
Speaker 1: do you sleep after a night of after that like
Speaker 1: like a baby? Really an Egyptian cotton sheets, my friend,
Speaker 1: I'm just wondering, it's good to be alive. Well, uh,
Speaker 1: we have we have Bob Beart standing by. I'm so
Speaker 1: excited to have him on. One of the most respected
Speaker 1: guys you'll hear from the c I A. UM, so
Speaker 1: much history there, so let's get right into it. Joining
Speaker 1: us back on the podcast for the first time in
Speaker 1: a very long time. Um. The last time Robert bart
Speaker 1: was on uh was with the release of The Perfect
Speaker 1: Kill twenty one Laws for Assassins, which is still the
Speaker 1: latest book but it's been out for a while. But
Speaker 1: glad to have back on the show. Author and former
Speaker 1: CIA case officer from nineteen seventy six to seven, Robert
Speaker 1: Bart very excited to speak with you. It's great to
Speaker 1: be back after all this time. So this is the
Speaker 1: first time you've been on with Jack Murphy. But I
Speaker 1: got to speak with you. And when I called you
Speaker 1: and and seeing a if you're up for doing this again,
Speaker 1: I was wondering what we could get into. And we
Speaker 1: got into a discussion about basically people and intelligence and
Speaker 1: even people in special operations working with hostile powers, and
Speaker 1: I figured, yeah, it's a great topic. Yeah, and we've
Speaker 1: brought it up here on the podcast a number of
Speaker 1: times in regards to Yemen, the UA, China even Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean the market out there is bad. I mean,
Speaker 1: if if you're retiring from the military and you're not
Speaker 1: a general, you got to take work as it comes along.
Speaker 1: That in the in the Central Intelligence Agency for people
Speaker 1: who are retiring, oh absolutely. I mean, if you retire,
Speaker 1: let's say it as an s I S. You still
Speaker 1: can't afford to put your kids through college, you know,
Speaker 1: if you've got a couple of kids, it just it
Speaker 1: just doesn't make it. Or or you look at the
Speaker 1: Washington area, it's just the prices are out of control.
Speaker 1: And um, I see people over and over again leaving
Speaker 1: you and short of retirement, simply to move on and
Speaker 1: make some money to you know, pay you know, not
Speaker 1: to get rich, but you know, pay for expenses of
Speaker 1: living in an urban area. Is that even like a
Speaker 1: problem for espionage as far as you know, guys flip
Speaker 1: into the other side. I mean, it makes them vulnerable
Speaker 1: to that sort of elicitation, doesn't it. Well, we've seen
Speaker 1: the case with UA. These people from the National Security
Speaker 1: Agents contractors went there and and provided some hacking tools
Speaker 1: which undoubtedly were used to track to Shogi and and
Speaker 1: get into his text and email. And there's no evidence
Speaker 1: that they participated in his murder. But it's our tools
Speaker 1: that that are being carried out at the n s
Speaker 1: A or the CIA that are ending up being used
Speaker 1: for bad purposes. And there's one in particular, isn't it
Speaker 1: all Larry Sanchez, a former CIA officer who is over
Speaker 1: in the U a A. Doing a lot of advising
Speaker 1: with him. Yeah, it's it's Sanchez, but it's also Morrel,
Speaker 1: former acting CIA direct Michael Morrell negotiated. Yeah, he was
Speaker 1: Mike Morrell. He was acting director and then he got
Speaker 1: out and he helped negotiate the deal with Dine Corps
Speaker 1: in Saudi Arabia to provide the services for the Royal
Speaker 1: court for you know, UM spec ops and things like that,
Speaker 1: and the revolving the revolving door has never gone away.
Speaker 1: And all these people when they come out have a
Speaker 1: you know, experience and knowledge that are very useful foreign countries.
Speaker 1: But once you give them that knowledge, you can't account
Speaker 1: for what they do with it. That was the conversation
Speaker 1: I had with a number of people after the the
Speaker 1: various American Special Operations veterans, including Dale com Stock, that
Speaker 1: whole story and when they were working in Aiden under
Speaker 1: the auspices of the Emirati military um that the UAE
Speaker 1: is really desperate for capabilities. They want the capabilities of
Speaker 1: Jay Sock of the Central Intelligence Agency, but they don't
Speaker 1: necessarily have the maturity to know what to do with
Speaker 1: those capabilities. Well, it's a one man rule there, that's
Speaker 1: the problem. It's like Saudi Arabia and both leaders de
Speaker 1: facto leaders are you know, they're they're playing around with
Speaker 1: international law, violating it more like but it's um and
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's what this president doesn't seem to
Speaker 1: care that Saudi Arabia, the crown prince chopped up a
Speaker 1: Washington Post columnist. I mean, it's just, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's sort of like Russia. We've just all moved on.
Speaker 1: That's the new rules, and if you want to, if
Speaker 1: you want to, you know, they're just there are no
Speaker 1: more rules anymore. That's what I'm trying to say. It's
Speaker 1: interesting that, I mean, former American officials, whether military or
Speaker 1: from the intelligence community, going over there. I mean, I
Speaker 1: know that if I were to go overseas and provide
Speaker 1: military training to certain countries and certain people, that would
Speaker 1: be a violation of EARS, which doesn't it just doesn't
Speaker 1: just cover arms trafficking, it also covers military training. I wonder.
Speaker 1: I mean, we haven't really seen anyone prosecuted, though I
Speaker 1: don't think we will either. Like those guys in Haiti,
Speaker 1: I knew one of them. They go there hired by
Speaker 1: the President in what could be considered a lethal operation
Speaker 1: because they were carrying weapons in port of Prince uh
Speaker 1: and they were going to take delivery of some money
Speaker 1: and transport it out of the country. As it turned out,
Speaker 1: it was illegal. It wasn't the President's money. Now they
Speaker 1: think they were working for a sovereign state, But in
Speaker 1: fact it was more complicated than that. And those guys,
Speaker 1: none of them is There's been no indictments against him,
Speaker 1: So are the guys in Yemen. I mean, you can
Speaker 1: go there and carry out legal operations and the Department
Speaker 1: of Justice is going to be low to prosecute you. Well,
Speaker 1: who who were they working for if not for the
Speaker 1: Haitian government. You're saying it was more a privately it
Speaker 1: was a private embezzlement scheme. Well, yeah, it sounded like
Speaker 1: the president was embezzling this fuel fund and carrying the
Speaker 1: cash out. I mean, Haiti is not exactly you know,
Speaker 1: you know Switzerland, so that's you know. And they were
Speaker 1: stopped by a guard who called up whoever is directly
Speaker 1: in charge of the fund and stopped it, and they
Speaker 1: all got arrested in the state department work to get
Speaker 1: him out of Haiti, and they did. Um. It's an
Speaker 1: ambiguous situation because in a country like Haiti, you don't
Speaker 1: really know who's in charge. And if you're being hired
Speaker 1: for an operation like this, even though you think you're
Speaker 1: you're reporting to a sovereign authority, in fact you're not.
Speaker 1: I mean a lot of parts of the world it's
Speaker 1: it's unclear who's really in charge of these countries, whether
Speaker 1: it's Saudi Arabia or a lot of countries in South America.
Speaker 1: You know, as there's a disintegration of law generally around
Speaker 1: the world, it becomes very complicated. Yeah, and I mean
Speaker 1: even with you know, the guys and Yemen, they put
Speaker 1: themselves under the auspices, are seconded to the Emirati military
Speaker 1: and they think they're covered then under the under the law, um,
Speaker 1: but really you're not. I mean that that could be
Speaker 1: construed as mercenary activity. It could be construed as a
Speaker 1: number of things. Yeah, and you get hauled in for
Speaker 1: a war crimes investigation out of the Hague, any number
Speaker 1: of things, because you're ultimately acting as a mercenary. I mean,
Speaker 1: even though the UAE is a nominal ally of this country,
Speaker 1: you're still operating as a mercenary, just as the NSA
Speaker 1: people did that worked at Abudhabi and they brought that
Speaker 1: software to him, and you know, it's it's it's dangerous.
Speaker 1: I mean some of the software you can put into
Speaker 1: an iPhone too. I'm messaging and just set to sit
Speaker 1: in queue, like a text from my messaging was sitting
Speaker 1: queue for five seconds and I'll put malware into your phone.
Speaker 1: I think they've closed that gap. But that's the kind
Speaker 1: of technology that can't be produced indigenously in these countries,
Speaker 1: and former employees are selling it essentially, And I wonder
Speaker 1: then what you think, which this is raises even more
Speaker 1: eyebrows for me personally. Um, And I know there's a
Speaker 1: question of semantics, but the issue of Eric Prince working
Speaker 1: with the Chinese government in some capacity, well, I mean,
Speaker 1: no one seems to care if you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: you know, it's he's you know, to look at it
Speaker 1: the least, uh the worst way. He's out there building
Speaker 1: concentration camps from Muslims. Now, he doesn't anything about it,
Speaker 1: but he's working for the Chinese, and he's worked for
Speaker 1: the Chinese in Africa, and he's worked for the UAE,
Speaker 1: and it all gets sort of messy, especially when princes
Speaker 1: in touch with the Russian oligarch who effectively work for
Speaker 1: the Russian government. I mean, who's in charge in Russia.
Speaker 1: It's hard to tell. Is it Dairy Posca, the guy
Speaker 1: that owns the aluminium monopoly, or is it Putin or
Speaker 1: is it Russian intelligence. I don't know anymore. I means
Speaker 1: so much of stuff is getting outsource to corporations or
Speaker 1: peristatal bodies that it's it's hard to tell. And the
Speaker 1: old days, you know, you a Soviet was a Soviet,
Speaker 1: but law it's hard to tell what's going on in
Speaker 1: the world. I mean, if you could go work for
Speaker 1: the Chinese, why couldn't you go work for the Russians
Speaker 1: in Moscow? You know, because they're they're getting deep into
Speaker 1: Africa through through oligarchs, and they're providing mercenary forces, as
Speaker 1: they did in Syria, which, by the way, we almost
Speaker 1: gotten in the middle of a war with these Russian
Speaker 1: mercenaries when they moved on one of our forward operating bases.
Speaker 1: So it's becoming very dicey out there. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: especially in Syria. It seems like those flashpoints could have
Speaker 1: erupted at any moment. I mean, I think in the
Speaker 1: incident you were referring to, there's a Russian mercenary company
Speaker 1: moving on oil field and a fob that the SDF
Speaker 1: controlled where there are American troops. And as I read
Speaker 1: about anyway, we called up on the hotline. We called
Speaker 1: the Russians and said, hey, are those are your boys
Speaker 1: moving on us and they were like nope, So it's
Speaker 1: called an air and artillery on them and killed all
Speaker 1: of them, and something like that could erupt into a
Speaker 1: war I mean very easily. Yeah. I mean it's it's
Speaker 1: like we're up against the Iranians and the Iranians are
Speaker 1: operating through paramilitary organizations malicious the Hashta Shabi as it's called,
Speaker 1: and itybody's using these proxies for plausible deniability. It's it's
Speaker 1: just getting very confusing. Well, is there I mean a
Speaker 1: real concern? I mean, Erik Prince allegedly ran a number
Speaker 1: of covered programs for the intelligence community back in the day,
Speaker 1: um doing some interesting activities. I mean, is there a
Speaker 1: real concern that he could take that kind of know
Speaker 1: how over to communist China and help them develop similar capabilities. Well,
Speaker 1: I look at it more. You know, with his sister
Speaker 1: sitting in the cabinet as sort of approval of the
Speaker 1: White House's you know, there's a big move into Libya
Speaker 1: right now supporting Khalifa Haffcar for the oil resources. Now
Speaker 1: on one side, you got the State Department that has
Speaker 1: backing the U N backed government and Tripoli, and then
Speaker 1: you've got the sky Hoffcar who was supported by the
Speaker 1: Russians and very as Americans that are swirling around Half
Speaker 1: Dart and Prince was there for a while too in Libya,
Speaker 1: So what is our policy? And then you got the
Speaker 1: President saying, I'm you know, we we share a vision
Speaker 1: half Tar and I do. So is that the State
Speaker 1: Department making policy or is it Erik Prince or these
Speaker 1: other people in Libya? And it's it's very hard to tell. Well,
Speaker 1: I was wondering since you brought it up. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you could if you knew anything about Half Tar,
Speaker 1: because I think he's an interesting personality and that he
Speaker 1: was captured during the Toyota War. We got him out
Speaker 1: of prison down there and he lived in Virginia for
Speaker 1: many years, which I know, Bobby, you're a smart enough guy.
Speaker 1: You can put two and two together there. But now
Speaker 1: he's allied with the Russians. It's like, what's going on
Speaker 1: with this cat? Well, he was more run out the
Speaker 1: people who did Libyan operations. Law was run out of
Speaker 1: the White House, started with the Reagan White House. I
Speaker 1: was involved in that when we were we wanted to
Speaker 1: get rid of Kadafi at any price, and anybody that
Speaker 1: came out, whether he was a general or a Muslim
Speaker 1: brother or whatever, we were on it saying, yeah, get
Speaker 1: rid of Kadafi. So I mean, but you know, the
Speaker 1: good thing, let's be fair as he's a secular leader.
Speaker 1: I mean, he if anybody is going to go down,
Speaker 1: you know, crush these Islamic groups in Libya. And they're
Speaker 1: still dangerous, you know. But but the point is, you know,
Speaker 1: going back to our original you know how we started
Speaker 1: this is you've got all these sort of private interests
Speaker 1: out there. It's no longer being you know, led by
Speaker 1: the State Department. You know, there there is not a
Speaker 1: single foreign policy you know what, what's our policy in Russia?
Speaker 1: You know, seriously, I mean you've got there, You've got
Speaker 1: the Russians putting two million dollars into Kentucky to you know,
Speaker 1: you know, McConnell, you know, is it is it a purchase?
Speaker 1: I just don't know anymore. It's it's sort of like
Speaker 1: corrupt money runs the world, and it didn't used to
Speaker 1: be this way. Well, it seems that you know, back
Speaker 1: in the back when you first entered government service, there
Speaker 1: was an ideology that held everything together. I mean that
Speaker 1: the CIA was an organization of people that came about
Speaker 1: after the world after World War Two and started the
Speaker 1: emergence of communism as being just as bad as the Nazis,
Speaker 1: if not a little worse. And it seems like that
Speaker 1: was something that held us together, held our foreign policy
Speaker 1: and our defense infrastructure together. But today with that, you
Speaker 1: know that um global superpower threat from a from a
Speaker 1: pure adversary, it seems like we're decoupled or untethered from
Speaker 1: a unifying ideology like that. Yeah, when I was in
Speaker 1: the CIA, you know, we were warned over and over
Speaker 1: again to say, you don't represent the White House, you
Speaker 1: don't represent the National Security Council. You was in the CIA,
Speaker 1: you don't represent American policy. Even though we were part
Speaker 1: of the government. We were warned over and over again
Speaker 1: when we would tell it, you know, assets hey, we
Speaker 1: can get this message right to the president. And and
Speaker 1: so there was there was a definite discipline. And under
Speaker 1: George H. W. Bush Um, it was one guy ran
Speaker 1: for policy, and that was James Baker, And that was
Speaker 1: very clear the old school. And then along comes Clinton,
Speaker 1: where a lot of people in the White House were
Speaker 1: running private foreign policy. Mc McLarty was one of them.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I remembers him out there doing business.
Speaker 1: I was just saying, it sounds reminiscent of the Dullest
Speaker 1: Brothers back in the old days. Yeah, it was, well,
Speaker 1: at least the Dulles brothers, you know, had tea in
Speaker 1: the afternoon together, you know, and and could you know,
Speaker 1: check notes and things like that and coordinate. But now, um,
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's almost it's so commercially transactional at
Speaker 1: this point. And you'd like to say, well, it started
Speaker 1: with Trump and it's going to go away with him,
Speaker 1: but that's just not true. Who do you think? And
Speaker 1: it's it's the revolving door in Washington. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: just like everybody's saying. You know, you all right, you
Speaker 1: got to get it. You've spent a little time in
Speaker 1: the government, work on your rolodex, and then go out
Speaker 1: and make some go right right now? The total you know,
Speaker 1: instead of serving your country, you're you're attaching this sort
Speaker 1: of um capitalist ideal to it, which it can become
Speaker 1: problematic as you as you make mention of yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's um I don't you know that's
Speaker 1: from a perspective, that's that's old now, but I still
Speaker 1: I still feel it every day, and I still look
Speaker 1: at my colleagues out there trying to make a little
Speaker 1: bit of money or you know, in touch with seals
Speaker 1: or Delta guys or the rest of it. They're just
Speaker 1: you know, first of all, I can't go on this,
Speaker 1: this this global war on terror indefinitely, and you know,
Speaker 1: spending twenty years assaulting three or four houses a night,
Speaker 1: and then all the PTSD that does, and then get
Speaker 1: out and say, oh, by the way, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: you're divorced and you've lost your family, and you don't
Speaker 1: have enough to live on. You really you do have
Speaker 1: to live on? Is going to your divorced life. There's
Speaker 1: a cost to all this. And the comparisons to the
Speaker 1: Roman Empire are kind of cliche, but I mean it's
Speaker 1: almost unavoidable, isn't it. Yeah, Well, I mean it's you know,
Speaker 1: for me, it's like if things would be a little
Speaker 1: bit different, if we had a draft, very different, and
Speaker 1: you wouldn't have this bubble, this elitist bubble in New
Speaker 1: York and Los Angeles. You know, well, we don't really
Speaker 1: do that. We don't serve in the military, you know,
Speaker 1: because we're going to cheat our way into USC or wherever.
Speaker 1: And well it just irritates me, you know. And you know,
Speaker 1: in this crap thank you for your service. You know,
Speaker 1: I've heard that over and that it's sort of meaningless. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it is kind of a throwaway statement, isn't it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they don't care that you try to tell you know,
Speaker 1: you try to talk about it. That's not that's enough.
Speaker 1: We've heard, we've we've heard that's you know, we don't
Speaker 1: need to know um. And and that you're right going
Speaker 1: back to rome point where you're having a professional military,
Speaker 1: it becomes detached from the republic and and it it
Speaker 1: doesn't do us any any good in the long term. Well,
Speaker 1: it's also that, as you mentioned, we're so comfortable here
Speaker 1: in America. No, we don't really we have to know
Speaker 1: what's going on abroad. We can send these these operators
Speaker 1: overseas and they can hit three houses a night, and
Speaker 1: we don't really have to be engaged in that um
Speaker 1: as a public or take any responsibility for it. You know,
Speaker 1: we can just deploy that soldier fifteen times in a row,
Speaker 1: and you know he's having all kinds of problems, which
Speaker 1: is completely normal from living that kind of life, but
Speaker 1: the public itself can disengage from it totally. They don't
Speaker 1: even care. I mean, they don't even care. You know
Speaker 1: that the rules of combat have changed, and it's got
Speaker 1: a psychological It's not like World War Two where you're
Speaker 1: we have an enemy in a uniform, and when you're
Speaker 1: going into a place blind you there are civilian casualties,
Speaker 1: or you're using a drone, there are civilian casualties. So
Speaker 1: the front lines are not clear cut at all. And
Speaker 1: you know, these guys are coming back the same way
Speaker 1: as the CIA, and they're they're they're detached from American
Speaker 1: foreign policy and you're sitting you read the newspapers, you
Speaker 1: talk to people in Washington and and they don't know
Speaker 1: what they're talking about. And and a lot of the
Speaker 1: CIA problems now people keep on reiterating this is they're
Speaker 1: they're sent out to you know, someplace like coast or
Speaker 1: Cobble or Bagdad and they're basically in the green zone. Um,
Speaker 1: and they're you know, could they could get to talk
Speaker 1: to the cheesh leak guy, but otherwise you can't go
Speaker 1: out and Baghdad, bag that, or even be rout now
Speaker 1: and without you know, a couple of suburbans and people
Speaker 1: following you around, and you just don't get to know
Speaker 1: a society unless you can go out and actually meet them.
Speaker 1: Do you think I'm sorry? Go ahead, Yeah, well I'm plus,
Speaker 1: you know, when the when the when the tours are
Speaker 1: so short? If there's six months and you're sitting in
Speaker 1: a in a base and a rack for six months,
Speaker 1: how much can you really know? I was just gonna say,
Speaker 1: I mean, does that represent a failure of the intelligence
Speaker 1: community at this point that we have these case officers
Speaker 1: that are charged with doing collecting human intelligence, but they
Speaker 1: can't go and do their job in so many countries
Speaker 1: now unless they have a bunch of you know, guys
Speaker 1: like me, like former rangers, uh embody armor with them,
Speaker 1: four is rolling out with them, um back, you know you.
Speaker 1: I mean I read your memoir before I joined the military.
Speaker 1: I mean you were out there collecting info, collecting intelligence,
Speaker 1: and I mean you were really out there by yourself,
Speaker 1: just flapping in the breeze. Yeah. I was always out there,
Speaker 1: even in it wasn't an Iraq, you know, It's just
Speaker 1: we're driving in an suv, unmarked without plates or anything,
Speaker 1: and sort of dressed like the locals, a couple of
Speaker 1: collection of cops. But I mean, certainly you could go
Speaker 1: in and spend the night with these people and listen
Speaker 1: to them, which you couldn't do. Or I lived in
Speaker 1: Iraq in a cave to hide from am I twenty four's,
Speaker 1: you know. But at least I I got a sense
Speaker 1: of the Koords and the Arabs. I mean that they
Speaker 1: were frank and they're very untrustworthy, but that was at
Speaker 1: least some sense, you know, And you can't do that anymore.
Speaker 1: And a lot of people. It's funny because I meet
Speaker 1: CIA people now and they said, oh, I got into
Speaker 1: CIA because your book, because I thought I was going
Speaker 1: to go out there and and you know, figure out
Speaker 1: what these societies are about, and do you know, sort
Speaker 1: of being the cowboy out there, And you can't do
Speaker 1: that anymore. In fact, i've heard at the CIA they
Speaker 1: now start their beginning classes for case officers saying who's
Speaker 1: read Bob Bear's book? And see some people raised their
Speaker 1: hands and they said, well, anybody who thinks you still
Speaker 1: operate that way, you can leave right now. The guy
Speaker 1: that quits that seven years later, when he quit, they
Speaker 1: were given the same lecture. I've read two on some
Speaker 1: other subsequent books, like what was Mazzetti's book, Way of
Speaker 1: the Knife, and they talked about one case officer and
Speaker 1: pack stand and he was basically his whole job was
Speaker 1: just sitting in an office and running assets via email.
Speaker 1: At least that's what it sounded like to me. It
Speaker 1: is too dangerous. I mean that you can't really blame
Speaker 1: it on the CIA entirely. It's just dangerous. They don't
Speaker 1: I mean, they can't afford to have somebody kidnapped out
Speaker 1: right on right or really assassinated. And that's the message
Speaker 1: that comes down from the White House. No, we don't
Speaker 1: need to a kidnap c I A guy like Bill
Speaker 1: Buckley was in Beirut and and it just it just
Speaker 1: makes you less intelligent. Wow, I was wondering since you
Speaker 1: were discussing before about guys even in your community getting
Speaker 1: hired by these hostile powers that we've been talking about. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, who need to make ends meet. As you're
Speaker 1: talking about getting out of the military, getting out of intelligence.
Speaker 1: It's it's hard to do, especially if you live in
Speaker 1: a major city. Have have you had any propositions for
Speaker 1: any work that you just didn't feel comfortable doing how
Speaker 1: did you don't want to know the truth, because I say,
Speaker 1: what's in my mind. I've had no propositions, clean or unclean.
Speaker 1: It's funny, no one's ever had no one in all
Speaker 1: these years, no one's ever said, hey, come consult for me. Mhm.
Speaker 1: Which I don't know if that's I should take that
Speaker 1: as a matter of pride, or they look at me
Speaker 1: as a loose cannon. It's better to step aside now,
Speaker 1: I mean, other than entertainment, I've just I've you know,
Speaker 1: I can't say, well, we're gonna look. When I first
Speaker 1: got out of the CIA, were my wife and our
Speaker 1: approached by a Gulf country to keep taps on a prince,
Speaker 1: which we ultimately, once we figured out what it was about,
Speaker 1: we left. It was in Beirut, and and my wife
Speaker 1: and I looked at each other and said, this is
Speaker 1: before my book came out, and said no, we can't
Speaker 1: do this. You know, It's just that's not what we
Speaker 1: yeared for to go after this guy. And then I
Speaker 1: told the prince that they were going to nail him,
Speaker 1: and indeed they did, but we left by then. He was, um,
Speaker 1: so yeah, I mean I've been in a situation where
Speaker 1: the Gulf. Gulf Country is looked at c I A
Speaker 1: people is potential assets that they could and and it
Speaker 1: wasn't even it wasn't even that I knew anything that
Speaker 1: they were looking at me. They just wanted they needed
Speaker 1: an American face or what they were doing. And that's
Speaker 1: all they needed because what they needed to do was
Speaker 1: go internally tell the royal family, Hey, we got the
Speaker 1: Americans backing us up on this, even though there wasn't
Speaker 1: there was nothing we could do. And that's what they
Speaker 1: always wanted to put an American face on whatever you're doing.
Speaker 1: And that means we got a green light from Washington,
Speaker 1: and that sells internally. That's incredibly dangerous. Yeah, So I
Speaker 1: mean so if you're if you're if you're a seal
Speaker 1: in Yemen X seal and you're you're wandering around, they
Speaker 1: can tell everybody else the mities, Hey, these guys are
Speaker 1: really representing the United States and they you know, the
Speaker 1: United States has got our back on this and and
Speaker 1: the locals believe it. Meanwhile, like that article that came
Speaker 1: out in Reuter's about the n s A folks working
Speaker 1: for the U a E. They it was a like
Speaker 1: a senior n S A official, um former senior n
Speaker 1: s A official working that contract, and he was recruiting
Speaker 1: all his old bros from the n s A and
Speaker 1: telling them like, yeah, this thing has been approved by
Speaker 1: the United States government. When it happened, Yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean that's what mean. People don't know. They call him
Speaker 1: up and say, hey, you know, we've we've got a
Speaker 1: license to export this stuff. And I think that's what
Speaker 1: they were saying with the Kochi stuff that they tracked
Speaker 1: him with. They're going around saying, hey, we got a license,
Speaker 1: we got a green light from the CIA on this technology,
Speaker 1: so we're good to go. I mean, it's not like
Speaker 1: you can get your lawyer to check it out. You
Speaker 1: can't go in to see i A headquarters and wine
Speaker 1: round saying hey, is this really approved? So people will
Speaker 1: just you know, say whatever to recruit people. And these
Speaker 1: ponds are usually the ones that go down and the
Speaker 1: big guys doing the contracts don't. I've noticed that as well,
Speaker 1: that people exploit the you know, the secretive nature of
Speaker 1: the CIA, which it has for a reason to protect
Speaker 1: its sources and methods, but the frauds will exploit it.
Speaker 1: And my favorite example, of course is Wayne Simmons, who's
Speaker 1: a Fox News to see his name? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean what did you make of that whole situation,
Speaker 1: Bob Well, I looked at his his background, and I've
Speaker 1: never heard of any anything like that. I'd have somebody
Speaker 1: walk up to me and there's living in California and say, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm I was at CIA and I know this guy.
Speaker 1: Know that guy, and I didn't really question him. But
Speaker 1: he turned out to be a total fraud. But he
Speaker 1: fooled me as an insider. But this guy Wayne Simmons
Speaker 1: was clearly tucking about some unit that I knew didn't exist.
Speaker 1: It's not the way things work. He wasn't very smart
Speaker 1: about it. But if you if you sat down and
Speaker 1: new some c I A people, you could completely fake it.
Speaker 1: I've seen people do that with Mosa too, that weren't
Speaker 1: in Mosad, that were like, you know, t s A
Speaker 1: guys at Televie Airports saying they were really you know,
Speaker 1: Israeli intelligence, which just is not true. You see it
Speaker 1: all the time. But what what I don't get is,
Speaker 1: I mean, if you were onto him, I feel like,
Speaker 1: to be honest, Jack, you were on to him before
Speaker 1: anything came out. You told me years before. I mean,
Speaker 1: how does he fool guy like Donald Rumsfeld and become
Speaker 1: an advisor to the war in Iraq? Well, the I
Speaker 1: don't know how they do it. I think they mean,
Speaker 1: like Rumshell doesn't take the time, and you know, they
Speaker 1: depend on staff to do due diligence. And I know
Speaker 1: agency people that around the building and they're on contract
Speaker 1: and they can't even get the agency to say something
Speaker 1: about somebody out there in public. And some of these
Speaker 1: will have no connection to the CIA, and there others
Speaker 1: out there I don't want to name them, and some
Speaker 1: of them were briefly worked there but pretend they had
Speaker 1: a career in in operations and and didn't. Another favorite
Speaker 1: is Larry Johnson, who poked his turtle head back out
Speaker 1: just yesterday to again make the claim that Australia and
Speaker 1: the UK were somehow involved in the Steel dossier and
Speaker 1: the whole conspiracy theory. And Larry Johnson is like a
Speaker 1: conspiracy theorist who I think he was an agency analyst
Speaker 1: for like a year in or something like this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then he went to he went to work for
Speaker 1: the State Department. I know Larry Johnson is very convincing,
Speaker 1: but and I've also heard the stories that the g
Speaker 1: h Q we're the ones that tapped Trump's phone. Um,
Speaker 1: I've heard that going around, but of course there's no
Speaker 1: evidence for it. And this is in Trump Tower, but
Speaker 1: there's no there's no you know, nothing that you you know,
Speaker 1: a claim like that, you have a big at piece
Speaker 1: of evidence is absolutely crucial, and there just isn't any
Speaker 1: out there. And you know, it's so funny. After the
Speaker 1: Trump thing, so many people missas, yeah, they that bad
Speaker 1: Obama tapped his phones. And I said, all right, First
Speaker 1: I called up the FBI and said, all right, how
Speaker 1: many people would it take to tap Trump Tower landlines?
Speaker 1: And said, I would take about a hundred, you know,
Speaker 1: run a wire room, and and it would take uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the illegally a T and T would have
Speaker 1: to sign off on this to put actuators on the phone.
Speaker 1: So they're not gonna happen to the FBI. And they
Speaker 1: can't even agree where they're going to lunch to FBI agents,
Speaker 1: let alone conspiracy for a lame duck president. And then
Speaker 1: I then I checked the Task Force Orange and said, yeah,
Speaker 1: we could do it, but you'd still need a hundred people,
Speaker 1: you know, in Manhattan to get through fiber optics, and
Speaker 1: so it's you know, conspiracy like that you just really
Speaker 1: couldn't carry off. And for the British two illegally tap
Speaker 1: the land lines of a candidate, that's that would be
Speaker 1: very ballsy. Would I would find that difficult to believe
Speaker 1: in any case, in all these conspiracy theories. Show me
Speaker 1: some evidence, you know, and I'll start I'll start thinking
Speaker 1: about it. That's actually interesting that it would take that
Speaker 1: many people to monitor the landlines coming out of one building.
Speaker 1: You'd think they'd have some better system. Yeah, they actually
Speaker 1: have to go the phone company and put actuators on
Speaker 1: the lines. That's for the for the copper and for
Speaker 1: the fiber optics. Apparently, I don't know how you do it.
Speaker 1: You can do this remotely, but you would need a
Speaker 1: part of the military to agree to break the law,
Speaker 1: and they know flat out it's a celony. You've got
Speaker 1: to jail with thirty years. Yeah, you'd have to spike
Speaker 1: the fiber like um like the submarines do when they
Speaker 1: tap fiber. Yeah, you can. You can bend it or
Speaker 1: some damn thing, or you can. I don't know what
Speaker 1: it's been explained to me, but it's too complicated. Um,
Speaker 1: but anyhow, everybody agrees that would you take a lot
Speaker 1: of people and as you know, in the government, you
Speaker 1: can't keep a secret, especially one this big. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: kind of like gets into like the same thing with
Speaker 1: the nine eleven conspiracy theories. It's like, you mean to
Speaker 1: tell me hundreds of people, you know, tore down facades
Speaker 1: in these buildings and put explosives in them without anyone
Speaker 1: knowing about it? Really? Yeah, put charges, okay, buddy, you know,
Speaker 1: precisely put in running up and down the World Trade
Speaker 1: Center to take it. Time. Just it's so crazy, you
Speaker 1: don't even know where to start. And it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's like what the CIA didn't tell the FBI about
Speaker 1: those two hijackers legist share in competence, you know, Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: failure of imagination, that's what it was. Yeah, you're talking
Speaker 1: about the that documentary that I think the New Yorker
Speaker 1: put it together with. Isn't Richard Clark in it? And
Speaker 1: Ali Safon And they're talking about the FBI and the
Speaker 1: CIA not talking in one another about the hijackers. Well,
Speaker 1: they knew about that, that meeting, that meeting in Kuala
Speaker 1: Lumpoor and then these guys when them went off to
Speaker 1: Thailand and got a visa, and and you know, people
Speaker 1: just didn't put two plus two together, you know. And
Speaker 1: I know the people that didn't do it, and they
Speaker 1: weren't you know, the sharpest tool in the shed, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, and then they just assumed somebody else that
Speaker 1: told the FBI. And then I asked the FBI, and
Speaker 1: I said, he said, well, these guys didn't commit a crime.
Speaker 1: You know, presumably they could get state department to withdraw
Speaker 1: their visas and send them out of the country. But
Speaker 1: in order to do a full you know, telephone taps
Speaker 1: and the rest of it, you pretty well have to
Speaker 1: commit a crime. And even if they had identified them
Speaker 1: getting on the airplanes as suspicious, that FBI agent told
Speaker 1: me this was a sign of the case. They couldn't
Speaker 1: do anything except follow them once they got to the
Speaker 1: desk a nation. Of course, that was too late by them.
Speaker 1: I mean, FBI rest people for committing crimes, not for
Speaker 1: on suspicions, you know, to we we forget what the
Speaker 1: system is. Yeah, they have to work within our constitutional framework.
Speaker 1: Do you think the agency was trying to target those
Speaker 1: guys for eventual recruitment though? That they were interested in
Speaker 1: recruiting them as assets. No, I think that's a rumor.
Speaker 1: There's no evidence that. I mean, there was no there
Speaker 1: would have been a message to the CIA office in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles or San Diego. I don't even know if
Speaker 1: there's one in San Diego. Yes, I think there's one.
Speaker 1: It's a small office, saying hey, let's find a way
Speaker 1: to meet these guys. And every time I've ever tried
Speaker 1: to recruit somebody a terrorist that came to this country
Speaker 1: on a visitors visa, we called the local FBI office
Speaker 1: and they'd actually drive us to the meeting where we'd
Speaker 1: meet these guys and try to recruit them. Because you
Speaker 1: need all a metadata, you need to talk to neighbors
Speaker 1: and whatever you need, or if there's some sort of
Speaker 1: as sociate, you need the FBI involved. So the CIA
Speaker 1: does not, as a matter of course, go out and
Speaker 1: try to recruit these people inside this country. And it
Speaker 1: just it just doesn't does not the culture I recall
Speaker 1: in your book, if I remember correctly, that you were
Speaker 1: working with somebody in the United States during the Gulf
Speaker 1: War that you're trying to recruit. Yeah, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: we we could do it, but it was. We had
Speaker 1: these offices in major cities, but they're mainly to talk
Speaker 1: to businessmen or to look at students or visitors to
Speaker 1: the country. And I've worked with a bunch of times
Speaker 1: where the FBI would identify somebody and say, hey, he's
Speaker 1: going to be here for two weeks, do you guys
Speaker 1: want to recruit him? And there was. It was a
Speaker 1: matter of cooperation. So if if the counter Terrorism Center
Speaker 1: went after the two hijackers in San Diego, that would
Speaker 1: be totally completely a black swan. Just it just doesn't
Speaker 1: happen right Unilaterally. They have to coordinate. They do, and
Speaker 1: you know, there may be one person who just you know,
Speaker 1: goes rogue and tries it, but there's no evidence and
Speaker 1: and that kind of thing. You know, all the investigation
Speaker 1: in the nine eleven something would have come out by
Speaker 1: now that there was an attempt to recruit them. So
Speaker 1: people who say there was are are just speculator trying
Speaker 1: to explain incompetence. Yeah, no, I mean, sadly, you're probably right.
Speaker 1: Probably what it probably isn't competence rather than conspiracy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was like it's like Sri Lanka. You know, hey,
Speaker 1: you guys were given the address these potential suicide bombers.
Speaker 1: They were named the Indians gave it to him on
Speaker 1: four April Sri Lanka's and some dummy decided, well, you
Speaker 1: know these are nose, these kids are from nice families.
Speaker 1: It couldn't possibly be. Yeah. Um, I was actually curious, Bob.
Speaker 1: The last book that you put out, the Perfect Kill
Speaker 1: twenty one Laws for Assassins. It's been I think nearly
Speaker 1: five years since that has been out. Are you working
Speaker 1: on any new projects? I'm looking Yeah, I'm looking at it.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to write a book proposal. And it's very
Speaker 1: goes very excruciating because with global warming, everybody's talking about
Speaker 1: social collapse. A lot of scientists are that. You know,
Speaker 1: if it gets as bad as a lot of people
Speaker 1: suspect it will, it's going to involve social collapse. Like
Speaker 1: Syria was largely civil war was driven by drought, as
Speaker 1: it is in Somalia and in Afghanistan and Molly and
Speaker 1: every You just go right down the line, So what
Speaker 1: what would social collapse look like? And I'm working with
Speaker 1: a guy from Doctors Without Borders who is the liaison
Speaker 1: with shebak Up in the Taliban and things like that,
Speaker 1: he's a Canadian, so we're trying to put you know,
Speaker 1: if things fall apart on the on the rim, or
Speaker 1: even closer to home, what's what does it look like?
Speaker 1: And both of us are spent our careers in failed societies,
Speaker 1: and we're trying to go there. And I'm assuming this
Speaker 1: would be a nonfiction book just basically sounds like a
Speaker 1: dystopian novel. That's why I ask, Yeah, well, I mean
Speaker 1: it's like this one guy, he was doing m he
Speaker 1: built a hospital bowl of hospitals. He supervised him, and
Speaker 1: the question is what do you do with the waste
Speaker 1: from these hospitals and the and the dead bodies. Because
Speaker 1: the water tables only two ft, you can't bury him um.
Speaker 1: And he also worked on pandemics and Siberia multi resistant TB.
Speaker 1: I mean, what do you do about things like that?
Speaker 1: Or in Iraq there's a huge case of osteo militis
Speaker 1: and that's sort of ground zero for these superbugs and
Speaker 1: rising temperatures and the rest of it. And there there
Speaker 1: have been societies in the past that have collapsed because
Speaker 1: global warming civilizations and you know, I mean, I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure that makes a book, but I think a
Speaker 1: lot about it. I also enjoyed your book. I believe
Speaker 1: it was called Sleeping with the Devil, the one about
Speaker 1: k s A. Yeah, yeah, it's a good book as well.
Speaker 1: I you know, come on, we gotta face at the Saudis.
Speaker 1: We're in the Pakistani's. We're keeping bin Lotten College. Shake Mohammad.
Speaker 1: They were protecting them. I mean, you cannot sit in
Speaker 1: a botta body without the Pakistani's involved. And Gates said
Speaker 1: they were. And you know, for for a country like
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabia or Pakistan to protect our number one enemy,
Speaker 1: well that it's not a good son. He was a
Speaker 1: bada bad which it was like their neighborhood. It was
Speaker 1: kind of like the west point of Pakistan. You know,
Speaker 1: he was in a protected area. Well, I mean you
Speaker 1: in Pakistan, I've lived there a lot. Is you know
Speaker 1: you David, the chokey dar. The guy sits out front,
Speaker 1: reports to s I, to the to Pakistani intelligence. Everything
Speaker 1: you got shopping. They come around in question, would that
Speaker 1: foreigner do well? He went out, drove out in his
Speaker 1: car of his license plate number, and they give a
Speaker 1: little piece of paper. I've seen him and same thing
Speaker 1: applies to a bot about these weird foreigners are living
Speaker 1: in this very large house and not you know, they're
Speaker 1: burning their trash, They're not throwing it out in the
Speaker 1: street or whatever they do with it. Something, something weird
Speaker 1: is going on. So they knew somebody in Pakistan, as
Speaker 1: Gates said, And you know, it's just it's a bad thing.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, when you're when your allies are protecting
Speaker 1: your number one enemy. Well, we've talked about it quite
Speaker 1: a bit on this podcast, and maybe while we have
Speaker 1: you here for a moment, do you want to give
Speaker 1: your take on the controversy around that raid and how
Speaker 1: all of that went down and we ended up getting
Speaker 1: ben Laden. I mean, what do you think actually happened there? Well,
Speaker 1: I I worked a lot with Delta and on assaults
Speaker 1: and hostage rescue things, and they were they got to
Speaker 1: the point after Desert one they would only go in
Speaker 1: to a remote area like that with overwhelming force and
Speaker 1: air cover, which would an air cover, which we know
Speaker 1: they did. They had that was stacked up. But the
Speaker 1: question is what's what's what's the standoff? Jamming? It's probably
Speaker 1: a hundred fifty miles and they had to refuel over
Speaker 1: the tribal areas, so there was some message went to Pakistan.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure saying we can do this the hard
Speaker 1: way or the easy way, because how do you jam
Speaker 1: the radar is Lam about international air work with all
Speaker 1: that ship in the air. You can't, I mean and
Speaker 1: not have the Pakistani Air Force scramble. And if they scramble,
Speaker 1: that's the last thing you need. Or when there was
Speaker 1: something when the military was waved off in Islamabad because um,
Speaker 1: the locals called the police when they saw the helicopter
Speaker 1: crash and burn as you would, as anybody would. And
Speaker 1: the police also, don't worry about it. We know what's
Speaker 1: going on, the military told us. So I've had people
Speaker 1: in the White House that were there at the time.
Speaker 1: I've had people at State Department working for Carrie at
Speaker 1: the time have told me that flat out, that that
Speaker 1: is that it came as a total surprise the Pakistani's.
Speaker 1: I just I don't understand how. You know, twenty four
Speaker 1: seals got ahead of the pack like that they never
Speaker 1: have in any operation. And those fighter jets stayed on
Speaker 1: the ground that night. Yeah, and they and they and
Speaker 1: what would you do if the Pakistani's were totally surprised?
Speaker 1: But there was a patrol out that night. You know
Speaker 1: what a bot about. I mean, if there's some guys
Speaker 1: just pulling out, pulling out a base and an exercise
Speaker 1: and you know, with live ammo and they saw this
Speaker 1: going on. I don't know. I just but I'm not
Speaker 1: you know this This is not my specialty, is it.
Speaker 1: All I know is if I were in the White
Speaker 1: House in our gates, I would call it the Pakistani
Speaker 1: Chief of State, uh Defense Secretary and my chief staff
Speaker 1: chief of staff and say hey, let's don't let's don't
Speaker 1: let this become a problem. Yeah. Yeah, like we're gonna
Speaker 1: do this. We can destroy your entire fleet of fighter
Speaker 1: aircraft tonight or not. That's kind of up to you,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, I mean that's the only sensible thing
Speaker 1: to do. I just don't know how that message was passed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it definitely seems like some sort of a
Speaker 1: durrance was made. Yeah, I mean, you know, and you
Speaker 1: don't have to talk to somebody about the refueling for
Speaker 1: those Blackhawks because they could be they either would have
Speaker 1: had to do it with a FARP yes um and
Speaker 1: like five guys in the tribal areas, which is not
Speaker 1: possible without the Pexstan. You know, they would have had
Speaker 1: to do it from the air, and there's a lot
Speaker 1: of slow moving aircraft be flying over a country that
Speaker 1: wouldn't be picked up by the air force. But I'm
Speaker 1: passing that on secondhand. What people that do this for
Speaker 1: a living tell me or so? But I defer to
Speaker 1: you guys. Yeah, no, I don't know if those aircraft
Speaker 1: even had um were the refueling pods for mid air
Speaker 1: refueling UM Yeah, I don't know that either, And they
Speaker 1: came out so they had a staging ground in Afghanistan.
Speaker 1: I mean, a FARP can be thrown up fairly quickly.
Speaker 1: You just throw some aircraft, uh, fly some helicopters into
Speaker 1: an area where there's not too many people, offload fuel
Speaker 1: bladders and you know, have a couple of Jo's standing
Speaker 1: by rate A felt the aircraft when they land. But
Speaker 1: that's just speculative on my part. Well, in the tribal area,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want to go down there with less than fiers.
Speaker 1: You know, seriously, we're crazy up there. If that's where
Speaker 1: it would have been, you'd have to look at the map. Um.
Speaker 1: You certainly wouldn't want to do it clandestinely. You're not.
Speaker 1: You're not going to do that in the tribal areas.
Speaker 1: The other thing that I've written about a little bit
Speaker 1: in the past. Um, what do you make of this
Speaker 1: whole story that came out of the White House that
Speaker 1: we buried Jacobin Laden at sea? Oh? I think that's
Speaker 1: there's there's you know, well, the problem is that the
Speaker 1: White House lied from from the first moment about that,
Speaker 1: so it's hard to tell what's true and what's not
Speaker 1: about that. There was a gunfight with Ben Laden and
Speaker 1: the rest of it. You've heard that, But um, I
Speaker 1: think it's somebody smart would have said, let's get rid
Speaker 1: of the let's get rid of the body so it
Speaker 1: doesn't become an issue and throw them out. I think
Speaker 1: that's probably the most likely. The Hers article, um is
Speaker 1: what really caused problems for this whole story because he
Speaker 1: made mistakes and it was easy to focus on the mistakes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree, And and then just take the whole story
Speaker 1: and push it into conspiracy land. And that's the best
Speaker 1: way to kill one of these stories. Um, Like the
Speaker 1: phone call from Gates the Pakistani chief of staff, if
Speaker 1: it didn't in fact Kirk, because who's no one's going
Speaker 1: to touch that story now because it got it got
Speaker 1: trash so much. Yeah, there were aspects of that story,
Speaker 1: like he made the claim that, um, the Seal Team
Speaker 1: six operators hacked up bin Laden's body and through pieces
Speaker 1: of it the helicopter. I mean, I don't believe that
Speaker 1: happened for a moment. But then there are other aspects
Speaker 1: of it, like that there was a walk into the
Speaker 1: embassy in Islamabad that coughed up bin Laden's location. That
Speaker 1: actually seems like it's fairly plausible. Well, you know what,
Speaker 1: these guys don't won't move unless they got green eyes
Speaker 1: on you simply don't get some CIA analysts like in
Speaker 1: Zero Dark Dirty saying, you know, we followed his courier
Speaker 1: here and we think he's here, and blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Come on, they just the military will not act going
Speaker 1: into a hostile country in Pakistan is hostile on that
Speaker 1: kind of intelligence. Someone mcgraven is going to say, no,
Speaker 1: we'll go in if we know he's there. And and
Speaker 1: I think the walk in started this whole thing. And
Speaker 1: I've heard his name and he's relocated here in the
Speaker 1: United States. Um, and he started the whole thing. And
Speaker 1: then it was a matter of assembling the proof. Now
Speaker 1: that's I think what that doctor was arrested for. They
Speaker 1: were trying to get d n A samples from that
Speaker 1: house and they were going to send him in on
Speaker 1: the supposed you know, vaccination campaign, and he gets arrested. Um,
Speaker 1: and then they sound a different way to prove that
Speaker 1: that was beIN lud And then of course you had
Speaker 1: the overhead had been long walking at night and you
Speaker 1: could you could measure him from the overhead that he
Speaker 1: was what he was six for something like that, And
Speaker 1: so you start you start putting it all together, and
Speaker 1: then you you know, then the second piece was take
Speaker 1: care of the Pakistani air Force. And then the interesting
Speaker 1: addendum to all of it, of course, is that Dewey
Speaker 1: Clarridge had all those you know, private intel networks that
Speaker 1: he was running along the Pakistani border. And how did
Speaker 1: that play in or not play in? It starts to
Speaker 1: get confusing. Yeah, I think that's that's just you know,
Speaker 1: they don't you're not going to get Jay Sock to
Speaker 1: move on speculative intelligence. So when Obama said, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: so if you percent chance he was there, I just
Speaker 1: don't think he would ever do that. So you think
Speaker 1: we military would they just say flat out and no,
Speaker 1: you think Jaysock got eyes on before we some sort Yeah,
Speaker 1: they had some proof um whatever that was d n
Speaker 1: A or something before they went in. Because the last
Speaker 1: thing Jaysock needs to do is raid an empty house
Speaker 1: that high profile. Yeah, especially if you get a couple
Speaker 1: of helicopters shot down and operators killed and it turns
Speaker 1: out to be a dry hole. Yeah, you just you
Speaker 1: just wreck the reputation of Jaysock and the military and
Speaker 1: the White House. That's my armchair view of the whole thing.
Speaker 1: It's one of those things that's like almost it's contemporary history,
Speaker 1: but it's like already lost to history because it's been
Speaker 1: so muddled. Yeah. Like I said, I've seen people sense
Speaker 1: and said, you know what, what you know? I've asked
Speaker 1: people in the White as well, what is the range
Speaker 1: of a black Hawk? I don't know, um, And I said, well,
Speaker 1: couldn't fly all the way from Afghanistan botot, I know
Speaker 1: that much without without refueling. And then I asked these questions.
Speaker 1: They have no answers for him, so you know, they
Speaker 1: tell them I'm absolutely wrong that there's it occurred, as
Speaker 1: described by the White House afterwards, I don't believe that.
Speaker 1: I still find that hard to believe. I don't believe it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: nobody in the military beliefs that it thinks about this. Well,
Speaker 1: this has been a fascinating conversation. I think we covered
Speaker 1: a lot of ground. I really appreciate you going almost
Speaker 1: a full hour with us. Um, I don't know really
Speaker 1: what to promote from the Great Robert bet because, as
Speaker 1: I said, the Perfect Kill twenty one Laws of Assassin
Speaker 1: for for Assassins is the last book that you put out.
Speaker 1: But anything else that you want to get out there,
Speaker 1: that you're working on or where people could find you
Speaker 1: if anywhere. Um, you know, I do stuff for CNN.
Speaker 1: You don't comment on I like doing it. Just commenting
Speaker 1: on the obvious that those guys in Sri Lanka somebody
Speaker 1: taught how to make those bombs. Yes, they didn't just
Speaker 1: get on the internet and figure that out to make
Speaker 1: nine of them go off nearly simultaneously. Absolutely that that's
Speaker 1: a bridge too far. Yeah, And UM, I know it's
Speaker 1: a long time ago, Bob, But like I said, I
Speaker 1: read your memoir years ago before I before I joined
Speaker 1: the military. So it's like, probably when did it come
Speaker 1: out two thousand, two thousand one came out and it
Speaker 1: came out after nine two thousand to two two. Okay,
Speaker 1: so I must have read it when when I was
Speaker 1: just joining. But what's the name of it so people
Speaker 1: can go find it. It's Seen No Evil. Seeing that
Speaker 1: we made into the movie Siriana with George Booney. Good
Speaker 1: movie too. But umah, yeah, it's a you know, Bob's
Speaker 1: memoirs definitely worth giving a read. There's some hair raising
Speaker 1: stories in there. Yeah, well's I think I got at it. Yeah. See,
Speaker 1: I hates the book, but I guess that's an accomplishment, right,
Speaker 1: it comes with the territory. Yeah, well, we appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Thanks for going along with us, all right, thanks, all right,
Speaker 1: thank you, Bob, thank you. Alright, great interview with Bob
Speaker 1: Bear there. I mean to me, that's an ast guest
Speaker 1: and really appreciate having him on. Be sure to check
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