Bill Rapp was an academic historian before joining the CIA where he spent 35 years as an analyst. Among his assignments was as White House PDB briefer for Condoleezza Rice. After retiring he combined his past careers to become a prolific novelist. We talk to him about his latest book set in the middle of the Cuban Missile Crisis - but the action is in Turkey where CIA Soviet assets are mysteriously dying.
Imad Mughniyeah was a Lebanese terrorist responsible for more American deaths than any other individual – until 9/11. He is now the subject of a 4-part Showtime dramatic series that debuts on May 19. We talk with Greg Barker who directed and co-wrote this unusual series that tells from American, Israeli and Lebanese perspectives the story of the man who was behind many suicide bombings, hijackings and murders in the Middle East and who evaded capture for two decades until he was killed by a car bomb in Syria. The drama also weaves in first-hand, real-life interviews with prominent officials from the CIA and Mossad.
One man knows better than most, just what cyber tactics Russia has been using to attack Ukraine – not just since the full invasion in February of 2022 – but since the war began in Crimea in 2014. Since then, Ukraine has served as an unwitting testing ground for Russian cyber aggression with an impact that has often spread well beyond the country’s borders. State Secrets host Suzanne Kelly sat down in Kyiv with the head of Ukraine’s Department of Cyber and Information Security at the Security Service of Ukraine to dig in on Illia Vitiuk’s frontline perspective on what he calls the first cyber war in history.
Cipher Brief CEO & Publisher Suzanne Kelly interviews the former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen Robert Ashley to discuss Ukraine, Russia, China, and the impact of technology on todays complicated world. Listen in on what Gen. Bob Ashley has to say about the private sector’s mission in today’s security landscape.
Former New York Times correspondent Thom Shanker and defense expert Andrew Hoehn have crafted an important new book looking at the challenges the United States faces from Russia and China – and from emerging threats like pandemics, AI-enabled weapons and cybersecurity. We talk with them about how to address these challenges which they say will require revamping the U.S. national security structure.
The story of how a small group of women - wives of Vietnam POWs founded the National League of Families and rallied the nation behind the cause of bringing home American POWs and resolving the status of MIAs. Author Taylor Kiland tell this moving story.
State Secrets Host Suzanne Kelly is joined by co-host Brad Christian in this conversation with Lt. General Michael Groen (Ret.) on the basics of AI and how it’s impacting U.S. National Security.
Interview with VADM Pete Daly, USN, Ret. CEO and Publisher of the U.S. Naval Institute. Daly discusses how USNI Press differs from mainstream publishers and academic presses. He talks about trends in the publishing industry, how the pandemic impacted book publishing, how authors can submit material for consideration and some of USNI’s greatest hits – including Tom Clancy’s “The Hunt for Red October.”
A few weeks ago, Cover Stories co-host Suzanne Kelly interviewed Executive Producer Alex Cary, the man behind the new show (on MGM+) A Spy Among Friends. The series is a fictional adaptation of the book by the same name by author Ben McIntyre, and tells the story of Kim Philby, one of the most damaging double agents to ever infiltrate MI6. Cary made his own confession during that conversation, that there is a real-life woman who inspired him to create one of the central characters in the series. Kelly has a surprise of her own for Cary as she introduces him for the first time to the woman who served as his inspiration for the character.
