August 29, 2025 • 21 mins
Who was America's most successful spy? What happens to a spy that's captured? How can you tell if your child is lying? We interrogate a former member of the CIA to get some info about American intelligence.
GUEST: Brittany Butler, former targeting officer within CIA’s Directorate of Operations, Counterterrorism Center. Author of The Syndicate Spy: A Juliet Arroway Novel.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
You've reached American History Hotline. You asked the questions, we
get the answers. Leave a message. Hey, there are American
History Hotliners. Your host, Bob Crawford here, happy to be
joining you again for another episode of American History Hotline.
You're the ones with the questions. I'm a guy trying
to get you some answers and keep those questions coming.
(00:26):
The best way to get us a question is to
record a video or a voice memo on your phone
and email it to Americanhistory Hotline at gmail dot com.
That's Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com. Okay, now to today's question.
This one comes from Ellen Inmanterey, who was the most
(00:48):
successful slash damaging spy in United States history. This is
a great question because to see everything about it is
kind of shrouded in mystery, right, That's the whole point.
And so we don't hear you know, occasionally you hear
(01:10):
about a great a CIA success, but I'm sure there's
a lot we don't know about. And I bet there's
a lot of counterspies that we never hear about. So
who could help me answer this question? Well, I think
we found the perfect person. She is a former CIA
(01:30):
agent who spent nine years as a targeting officer with
the CIAS Directorate of Operations counter Terrorism Center. Britney Butler.
Miss Butler is also the author of The Syndicate Spy,
a Juliet Arroway novel. Brittany, thank you for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to
be here.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Before we get to our listener's question, I have to ask,
how did you become a CIA agent? I mean, what
is the process? Did you like apply for the job
or were you recruited.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah, that's a great question. So I was recruited out
of college. My junior year of college, I did an
internship out at the American Embassy in Paris, France, and
there I was involved in some passport fraud cases. You know,
part of our job at the consulate section is to
both interview candidates for visas and then also to process
(02:26):
them and passports and things like that. And I came
across an individual who should not be trying to get
into the country that was, and because of my knowledge
of Arabic naming conventions, I pinpointed him as a terrorist
trying to get into the country. I didn't know it
at the time, but my bosses at the American Embassy
were undercover CIA officers and they suggested to me, hey, like,
(02:51):
have you ever thought about applying at the CIA? And
I was like, uh no, absolutely not, but they encouraged
me to do that and I did, and I was
recruited to be a case officer. And a case officer
is the officer at the CIA who was in charge
of recruiting and handling our spies overseas, and I transitioned
(03:14):
kind of from that position to the targeting officer position,
which is I can go into that more detail if
you'd like, but I want to ask.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Ye said handling the spot. Ye, what does it mean
to handle a spy?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah? So we provide something called requirements for our spies, right,
our assets, we don't really call them spies, We call
them assets at the CIA. And requirements are like questions,
like questions that our policymakers have, questions that we might
have about, you know, a particular threat. Those are the
(03:52):
requirements that we send to our officers overseas. The case
officers that handle the spies handle the assets, and they
basically just ask them these questions or they task them
to acquire the information, So that's kind of the handling
of the spy on their day to day basis also
(04:12):
like handling a spy, so that's more of like the
work aspect. The nitty gritty kind of administrative stuff is
also what we call like handling a spy, So that's
you know, paying the spy, assessing their motivations, working with
them to ensure their longevity, to make sure that they're
being safe in terms of, you know, their collection of
(04:34):
the information that we're tasking them with. So that's kind
of the handling part.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
And then a targeting agent.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, so targeting officer is someone that helps to target
for potential recruitment operations, so helping to devise who that
next potential source would be, and along with that comes
identifying their weaknesses ways that we can potentially up pipulate
them into working for the US and then also targeting
(05:06):
for in support of our drone program or high value
target operations in which we are targeting terrorists and the
war zones. So target officer kind of does both jobs.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
No, I think television and movies gives us this one
idea about how the CIA works, Like there's a solo
spy who's infiltrated a terrors so it's pretty much up
to him or her alone to bring down the whole organization.
How does it really work?
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Yeah, so it's more it's a lot of very committed
people with their own specialties all working together. So you've
got somebody from NGA, the National Geospatial Agency. You've got
someone from NSA. The more of like the second focused
signals intercepts focused individuals who their specialty is to intercept
(06:00):
communications between sources or for you know, foreign policy people,
and they all kind of work together to work on
a particular operation. So everybody has their own specialty. At
the CIA, our specialty is human. So what we're bringing
(06:21):
to the table are there human sources there are reporting on,
you know, a foreign leader or reporting on a terroirist organization.
The NSA component, they're listening in on the conversations between
those individuals, and then you've got NNGA who's doing the
analysis of what does the geospatial landscape look like at
a particular location, whether that be a foreign embassy or
(06:44):
a terrorist bed down location. All those components kind of
working together, and then of course there's the action elements,
which is the military, the Special Activities Division, guys who
are actually doing the work of breaking down the doors
and going after the targets. So yeah, it's a lot
of people all working together to achieve a goal rather
(07:05):
than just one dude or one girl. I do like
James Bond.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So our question is who is the most successful spy? So,
given the secrecy surrounding the CIA, are we even allowed
to know who that person is?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
No, the most successful spy like that the CIA has recruited.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Sure, I think what Ellen is asking is both right,
who is who was the most successful spy that the
United States ever had? And then who was the most
success successful spy against the United States.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, so, I honestly do not know who the most
successful spy is that the CIA is ever recruited, and
I don't think that that information is unclassified. I think
it's probably like only a select few people know that.
As far as the most successful damaging spy in the
United States history, the most successful foreign spy I would
(08:07):
say is probably Julius or Ethel Rosenberg. They were American
citizens that spied for the Soviet Union. They passed nuclear
weapons secrets from the Manhattan Project, and their espionage really
helped to accelerate the Soviet atomic bomb program, and that
kind of shifted the balance of power during the Cold War.
(08:27):
So I would say that they are some of the
most damaging spies in US history, probably, Like one of
the most famous domestic spies is Aldridge Ames. He was
a CIA officer who actually spied for the KGB from
nineteen eighty five until his arrest in nineteen ninety four.
(08:49):
He exposed I think it was like one hundred CIA
operations and led to the deaths of gosh ten US
intelligence assets. So what that means is he divulged the
identity of who we were working with in Russia to
collect information on the Soviets. And he was a bad dude.
Another guy that you might be interested in learning about
(09:12):
is Robert Hanson. He was a FBI kindor intelligence agent,
and he also spied for the Soviets from nineteen seventy
nine to two thousand and one, so he did that
for quite a long time, and he divulged details about
US nuclear strategies, kind of intelligence operations, the identity of
(09:33):
double agents. He did a lot of damage.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
How did these spies, I mean Robert Hanson was a
double agent, right I mean, so, but how did they infiltrate?
I mean, I mean, how do you pull that off
to infiltrate the United States intelligence Agency that deeply?
Speaker 2 (09:58):
So in the case of Robert Hans and he was
an FBI kind of intelligence agent, right, so he had
access to the highest levels of classified information. So he's
part of his job, ironically as a counterintelligence agent is
to root out the double agent.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
And I guess, Brittany starting, I guess, I'm asking how
was he turned?
Speaker 2 (10:21):
I don't know, Well, so I think the only the
Soviets probably know that because they're the ones who recruited him.
So most of these guys, their motivation is money. So
like in the case of Aldrich Ames, he acquired I
think it was like two and a half million dollars
from the Soviets, and so he was primarily motivated by money.
(10:42):
And I you know, it really comes down I think,
probably to money and then also ideology. You know, it
might be that these guys are they've been in the
bureaucracy for too long, They're discouraged with their careers, aren't
going anywhere. They want to feel like their work is
important again. Whenever I know, all I can speak to
(11:03):
is how the CIA does it not really have the
KGB or the Russians do it, And it's more about
like trying to make them see that their goals align
with yours. So my specialty having worked with the CIA
was kinnter terrorism operations, and so that was a matter
of working with terrorists who I could I could help
(11:28):
align what they wanted with what we wanted. So like
in Afghanistan, for example, or Iraq, they wanted a more peaceful,
more stable government, right, and so if we could meet
each other on that common goal, we could achieve you know,
great things together. So and then obviously like the money helped,
(11:48):
or if they had a particular health issue. Let's say
like one guy we worked with, you know, his wife
couldn't get pregnant, and so we were able to set
him up with fertility treatments and friend country and that's
how we got into kind of you know, work with us.
So it's it depends on each agent. I don't know
(12:08):
what the specific things were that the Russians did to
turn these agents, but I was I would assume it
had something to do with ideology, money, things like that.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
This is American History Hotline. I'm your host Bob Crawford. Today,
my guest is a former CIA agent and the author
of the syndicate Spy, Britney Butler. We're talking about who
were the most successful and most damaging spies in United
States history. What is it like, with all that you've
(12:38):
experienced and all the knowledge you have from your work
with the CIA at the CIA to be in civilian
life and going to the grocery store and taking your
kids to school and interacting with teachers and doctors and
people on the street, and like, how do how does
(12:59):
your CIA experience kind of filter into your the way
you experience daily life. I mean, I have to be
good at reading people, right.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Right, Yes, absolutely, So this is something that I actually
talk about a lot on my podcast, Spy Girls. So
me and another woman who used to work at the CIA,
Tracy Walder, she's actually she's also a former FBI special agent.
Her and I have transition obviously to civilian life, and
(13:32):
we're both mothers, and we talk about on the podcast
just like what that transition has been like for us
and how we apply some of those capabilities and those
skills to our current life. I have a teenager, so
my kids range that was my next question. Yeah, yeah,
So my kids ranged from thirteen all the way down
(13:54):
to four. I have all boys.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Oh I have a thirteen year old son. You got
to give me some tips here.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean I So, my big
thing is baselining. So in order to tell whether or
not someone is lying, you first need to baseline them
to understand what their mannerisms are when they're telling the truth,
and how to differentiate when they're telling the truth from
a lie. So my son, obviously I know him really well,
so I baselined him and I know what he's telling
(14:23):
the truth and when he's not.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
And Okay, what do you need to baseline somebody?
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Yeah? So baseline so whenever like you ask that, So,
for example, in the polygraph, so whenever you get your
security clearance at the CIA, you have to go undergo
a polygraph. And at the polygraph, one of the first
questions they ask you once you're hooked up to the
machine is your birth date, where you're born, who your
parents are, stuff that they know you're going to tell
(14:50):
the truth on. And that's when they essentially baseline you.
They figure out, these are your mannerisms when you're telling
the truth. And then they start to ask you question
and if your if your body language says something different
than what's coming out of your mouth, so you're looking
at like nonverbal cues, that's an indication that you could
(15:13):
be lying. So one of the things, for example, that
we've we've noticed throughout you know, our work, is like
rubbing your eyes actually, so like if someone is not
telling the truth, Yeah, the rubbing. So think about like
a baby crying, right, something that they do is they
rub their eyes and it's some it's like a coping
(15:34):
mechanism to soothe yourself. And it turns out adults use
the same kind of coping all the time. Okay, who here?
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Because I'm stressed?
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, yeah, I mean that definitely could Well it's an
indication not necessarily you're lying, but you're in distress, and
so you want to pay attention to that. And like
if you're trying to get let's say you're teenager, to
like tell you the truth. How I kind of start
things If you know, you can't start out just asking
(16:08):
them questions did you do this?
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Were you there?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And blah blah blah. You have to like approach it
kind of a roundabout way. I would advise by saying
stuff like, so, what's most concerning to you today?
Speaker 1 (16:22):
What?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
What's got you upset right now? Buddy?
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Like what?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And if you just try, you just try to get
them to start admitting things and just get them talking.
And I think that was a tactic I kind of
learned in debriefing and elicitation training, was just how do
I get my source? How do I get my detainee talking?
And that's definitely something I have used on my teenager, Brittany.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
For a historian, it's hard to think about the CIA
and not think about the Cold War. Can you talk
about some of the great successes of the CIA during
the Cold War?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
So I think that probably the fact that we were
able to safeguard our nuclear program during those that time,
even though we had spies like these Soviet spies like
Julius ann Ethel Rosenberg and Alder James Robert Hanson. The
fact that we were able to safeguard our program I
think is a pretty I think is pretty awesome. A
(17:26):
lot of that comes down to compartmentalization. So at the CIA,
you don't have access to information unless there's an absolute necessity.
So just because I worked at the CIA, I think
it's a misconception that I have access to everything, that
I know what's going on in China or Russia or whatever,
But it really is dependent upon what your job is
(17:46):
at CIA. So if I'm working like for example, I
worked in the CIA's Canartarisan Center and Pakistan Afghanistan Division,
there would be no reason why I would need to
know what was going on with Rush operations. So I
think going back to the Cold War or it's like
one of those things where they things were highly compartmentalized,
and so people who did not have a what we
call like a need to know at the CIA did
(18:08):
not have access to the information. And so I think
that limited the ability for our clandestine operations to be
compromised because we kept that information so tightly concealed.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
What happens when a spy is captured.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
It depends on the country, so they have sometimes whenever
we're operating under diplomatic immunity, So like if you're working
under cover, but you are working under the cover of
the State Department, you will have a diplomatic passport, you'll
have diplomatic community and the worst that can happen is
(18:44):
you're just sent back to your to the United States
back to your country. There are obviously other situations where
that is not the case, like in Russia or China
where they will detain you, and it's a case by
case situation on if you get tortured or there have
obviously been cases where the IA officers have been killed.
(19:08):
So yeah, it definitely depends on the situation.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Brittany, can you envision a world, a future world where
there are no spies or do you think there will
always be a need for espionage.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Well, I think if you, I mean, if you go
all the way back to the Roman Empire, there's always
been espionage. There's always a need to gather information, to
collect it, to use it to make informed decisions. I think,
especially whenever it comes to foreign policy, it's absolutely critical
to be able to collect information and carry that kind
(19:45):
of back to policymakers. I mean, that's one of the
CIA's main functions is to develop a product called the
Presidential Daily Brief, and that is compiled by basically gathering
together all of our intelligence from all over the world
and highlighting the most important bits for senior policy makers
(20:06):
to make informed decisions. So I don't think you want
to start making decisions. Without that information, they're not going
to be very informed. So yeah, I do think they'll
always be a need for it.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Brittany Butler, former CIA agent and author. Her most recent
book is The Syndicate Spy, and I have it on
good information. There's another book coming, so look forward to that. Brittany,
thank you for joining us today on American History Hotline.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Of course, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
You've been listening to American History Hotline, a production of
iHeart Podcasts and Scratch Track Productions. The show is executive
producer is James Morrison. Our executive producers from iHeart are
Jordan Runtall and Jason English. Original music composed by me,
Bob Croft. Please keep in touch. Our email is Americanhistory
(21:04):
Hotline at gmail dot com. If you like the show,
please tell your friends and leave us a review in
Apple Podcasts. I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Feel free to
hit me up on social media to ask a history
question or to let me know what you think of
the show. You can find me at Bob Crawford Base.
(21:24):
Thanks so much for listening. See you next week.
You've reached American History Hotline. You asked the questions, we
get the answers. Leave a message. Hey, there are American
History Hotliners. Your host, Bob Crawford here, happy to be
joining you again for another episode of American History Hotline.
You're the ones with the questions. I'm a guy trying
to get you some answers and keep those questions coming.
(00:26):
The best way to get us a question is to
record a video or a voice memo on your phone
and email it to Americanhistory Hotline at gmail dot com.
That's Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com. Okay, now to today's question.
This one comes from Ellen Inmanterey, who was the most
(00:48):
successful slash damaging spy in United States history. This is
a great question because to see everything about it is
kind of shrouded in mystery, right, That's the whole point.
And so we don't hear you know, occasionally you hear
(01:10):
about a great a CIA success, but I'm sure there's
a lot we don't know about. And I bet there's
a lot of counterspies that we never hear about. So
who could help me answer this question? Well, I think
we found the perfect person. She is a former CIA
(01:30):
agent who spent nine years as a targeting officer with
the CIAS Directorate of Operations counter Terrorism Center. Britney Butler.
Miss Butler is also the author of The Syndicate Spy,
a Juliet Arroway novel. Brittany, thank you for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to
be here.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Before we get to our listener's question, I have to ask,
how did you become a CIA agent? I mean, what
is the process? Did you like apply for the job
or were you recruited.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
Yeah, that's a great question. So I was recruited out
of college. My junior year of college, I did an
internship out at the American Embassy in Paris, France, and
there I was involved in some passport fraud cases. You know,
part of our job at the consulate section is to
both interview candidates for visas and then also to process
(02:26):
them and passports and things like that. And I came
across an individual who should not be trying to get
into the country that was, and because of my knowledge
of Arabic naming conventions, I pinpointed him as a terrorist
trying to get into the country. I didn't know it
at the time, but my bosses at the American Embassy
were undercover CIA officers and they suggested to me, hey, like,
(02:51):
have you ever thought about applying at the CIA? And
I was like, uh no, absolutely not, but they encouraged
me to do that and I did, and I was
recruited to be a case officer. And a case officer
is the officer at the CIA who was in charge
of recruiting and handling our spies overseas, and I transitioned
(03:14):
kind of from that position to the targeting officer position,
which is I can go into that more detail if
you'd like, but I want to ask.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Ye said handling the spot. Ye, what does it mean
to handle a spy?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah? So we provide something called requirements for our spies, right,
our assets, we don't really call them spies, We call
them assets at the CIA. And requirements are like questions,
like questions that our policymakers have, questions that we might
have about, you know, a particular threat. Those are the
(03:52):
requirements that we send to our officers overseas. The case
officers that handle the spies handle the assets, and they
basically just ask them these questions or they task them
to acquire the information, So that's kind of the handling
of the spy on their day to day basis also
(04:12):
like handling a spy, so that's more of like the
work aspect. The nitty gritty kind of administrative stuff is
also what we call like handling a spy, So that's
you know, paying the spy, assessing their motivations, working with
them to ensure their longevity, to make sure that they're
being safe in terms of, you know, their collection of
(04:34):
the information that we're tasking them with. So that's kind
of the handling part.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
And then a targeting agent.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, so targeting officer is someone that helps to target
for potential recruitment operations, so helping to devise who that
next potential source would be, and along with that comes
identifying their weaknesses ways that we can potentially up pipulate
them into working for the US and then also targeting
(05:06):
for in support of our drone program or high value
target operations in which we are targeting terrorists and the
war zones. So target officer kind of does both jobs.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
No, I think television and movies gives us this one
idea about how the CIA works, Like there's a solo
spy who's infiltrated a terrors so it's pretty much up
to him or her alone to bring down the whole organization.
How does it really work?
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Yeah, so it's more it's a lot of very committed
people with their own specialties all working together. So you've
got somebody from NGA, the National Geospatial Agency. You've got
someone from NSA. The more of like the second focused
signals intercepts focused individuals who their specialty is to intercept
(06:00):
communications between sources or for you know, foreign policy people,
and they all kind of work together to work on
a particular operation. So everybody has their own specialty. At
the CIA, our specialty is human. So what we're bringing
(06:21):
to the table are there human sources there are reporting on,
you know, a foreign leader or reporting on a terroirist organization.
The NSA component, they're listening in on the conversations between
those individuals, and then you've got NNGA who's doing the
analysis of what does the geospatial landscape look like at
a particular location, whether that be a foreign embassy or
(06:44):
a terrorist bed down location. All those components kind of
working together, and then of course there's the action elements,
which is the military, the Special Activities Division, guys who
are actually doing the work of breaking down the doors
and going after the targets. So yeah, it's a lot
of people all working together to achieve a goal rather
(07:05):
than just one dude or one girl. I do like
James Bond.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So our question is who is the most successful spy? So,
given the secrecy surrounding the CIA, are we even allowed
to know who that person is?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
No, the most successful spy like that the CIA has recruited.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Sure, I think what Ellen is asking is both right,
who is who was the most successful spy that the
United States ever had? And then who was the most
success successful spy against the United States.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, so, I honestly do not know who the most
successful spy is that the CIA is ever recruited, and
I don't think that that information is unclassified. I think
it's probably like only a select few people know that.
As far as the most successful damaging spy in the
United States history, the most successful foreign spy I would
(08:07):
say is probably Julius or Ethel Rosenberg. They were American
citizens that spied for the Soviet Union. They passed nuclear
weapons secrets from the Manhattan Project, and their espionage really
helped to accelerate the Soviet atomic bomb program, and that
kind of shifted the balance of power during the Cold War.
(08:27):
So I would say that they are some of the
most damaging spies in US history, probably, Like one of
the most famous domestic spies is Aldridge Ames. He was
a CIA officer who actually spied for the KGB from
nineteen eighty five until his arrest in nineteen ninety four.
(08:49):
He exposed I think it was like one hundred CIA
operations and led to the deaths of gosh ten US
intelligence assets. So what that means is he divulged the
identity of who we were working with in Russia to
collect information on the Soviets. And he was a bad dude.
Another guy that you might be interested in learning about
(09:12):
is Robert Hanson. He was a FBI kindor intelligence agent,
and he also spied for the Soviets from nineteen seventy
nine to two thousand and one, so he did that
for quite a long time, and he divulged details about
US nuclear strategies, kind of intelligence operations, the identity of
(09:33):
double agents. He did a lot of damage.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
How did these spies, I mean Robert Hanson was a
double agent, right I mean, so, but how did they infiltrate?
I mean, I mean, how do you pull that off
to infiltrate the United States intelligence Agency that deeply?
Speaker 2 (09:58):
So in the case of Robert Hans and he was
an FBI kind of intelligence agent, right, so he had
access to the highest levels of classified information. So he's
part of his job, ironically as a counterintelligence agent is
to root out the double agent.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
And I guess, Brittany starting, I guess, I'm asking how
was he turned?
Speaker 2 (10:21):
I don't know, Well, so I think the only the
Soviets probably know that because they're the ones who recruited him.
So most of these guys, their motivation is money. So
like in the case of Aldrich Ames, he acquired I
think it was like two and a half million dollars
from the Soviets, and so he was primarily motivated by money.
(10:42):
And I you know, it really comes down I think,
probably to money and then also ideology. You know, it
might be that these guys are they've been in the
bureaucracy for too long, They're discouraged with their careers, aren't
going anywhere. They want to feel like their work is
important again. Whenever I know, all I can speak to
(11:03):
is how the CIA does it not really have the
KGB or the Russians do it, And it's more about
like trying to make them see that their goals align
with yours. So my specialty having worked with the CIA
was kinnter terrorism operations, and so that was a matter
of working with terrorists who I could I could help
(11:28):
align what they wanted with what we wanted. So like
in Afghanistan, for example, or Iraq, they wanted a more peaceful,
more stable government, right, and so if we could meet
each other on that common goal, we could achieve you know,
great things together. So and then obviously like the money helped,
(11:48):
or if they had a particular health issue. Let's say
like one guy we worked with, you know, his wife
couldn't get pregnant, and so we were able to set
him up with fertility treatments and friend country and that's
how we got into kind of you know, work with us.
So it's it depends on each agent. I don't know
(12:08):
what the specific things were that the Russians did to
turn these agents, but I was I would assume it
had something to do with ideology, money, things like that.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
This is American History Hotline. I'm your host Bob Crawford. Today,
my guest is a former CIA agent and the author
of the syndicate Spy, Britney Butler. We're talking about who
were the most successful and most damaging spies in United
States history. What is it like, with all that you've
(12:38):
experienced and all the knowledge you have from your work
with the CIA at the CIA to be in civilian
life and going to the grocery store and taking your
kids to school and interacting with teachers and doctors and
people on the street, and like, how do how does
(12:59):
your CIA experience kind of filter into your the way
you experience daily life. I mean, I have to be
good at reading people, right.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
Right, Yes, absolutely, So this is something that I actually
talk about a lot on my podcast, Spy Girls. So
me and another woman who used to work at the CIA,
Tracy Walder, she's actually she's also a former FBI special agent.
Her and I have transition obviously to civilian life, and
(13:32):
we're both mothers, and we talk about on the podcast
just like what that transition has been like for us
and how we apply some of those capabilities and those
skills to our current life. I have a teenager, so
my kids range that was my next question. Yeah, yeah,
So my kids ranged from thirteen all the way down
(13:54):
to four. I have all boys.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Oh I have a thirteen year old son. You got
to give me some tips here.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean I So, my big
thing is baselining. So in order to tell whether or
not someone is lying, you first need to baseline them
to understand what their mannerisms are when they're telling the truth,
and how to differentiate when they're telling the truth from
a lie. So my son, obviously I know him really well,
so I baselined him and I know what he's telling
(14:23):
the truth and when he's not.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
And Okay, what do you need to baseline somebody?
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Yeah? So baseline so whenever like you ask that, So,
for example, in the polygraph, so whenever you get your
security clearance at the CIA, you have to go undergo
a polygraph. And at the polygraph, one of the first
questions they ask you once you're hooked up to the
machine is your birth date, where you're born, who your
parents are, stuff that they know you're going to tell
(14:50):
the truth on. And that's when they essentially baseline you.
They figure out, these are your mannerisms when you're telling
the truth. And then they start to ask you question
and if your if your body language says something different
than what's coming out of your mouth, so you're looking
at like nonverbal cues, that's an indication that you could
(15:13):
be lying. So one of the things, for example, that
we've we've noticed throughout you know, our work, is like
rubbing your eyes actually, so like if someone is not
telling the truth, Yeah, the rubbing. So think about like
a baby crying, right, something that they do is they
rub their eyes and it's some it's like a coping
(15:34):
mechanism to soothe yourself. And it turns out adults use
the same kind of coping all the time. Okay, who here?
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Because I'm stressed?
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, yeah, I mean that definitely could Well it's an
indication not necessarily you're lying, but you're in distress, and
so you want to pay attention to that. And like
if you're trying to get let's say you're teenager, to
like tell you the truth. How I kind of start
things If you know, you can't start out just asking
(16:08):
them questions did you do this?
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Were you there?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And blah blah blah. You have to like approach it
kind of a roundabout way. I would advise by saying
stuff like, so, what's most concerning to you today?
Speaker 1 (16:22):
What?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
What's got you upset right now? Buddy?
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Like what?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And if you just try, you just try to get
them to start admitting things and just get them talking.
And I think that was a tactic I kind of
learned in debriefing and elicitation training, was just how do
I get my source? How do I get my detainee talking?
And that's definitely something I have used on my teenager, Brittany.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
For a historian, it's hard to think about the CIA
and not think about the Cold War. Can you talk
about some of the great successes of the CIA during
the Cold War?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
So I think that probably the fact that we were
able to safeguard our nuclear program during those that time,
even though we had spies like these Soviet spies like
Julius ann Ethel Rosenberg and Alder James Robert Hanson. The
fact that we were able to safeguard our program I
think is a pretty I think is pretty awesome. A
(17:26):
lot of that comes down to compartmentalization. So at the CIA,
you don't have access to information unless there's an absolute necessity.
So just because I worked at the CIA, I think
it's a misconception that I have access to everything, that
I know what's going on in China or Russia or whatever,
But it really is dependent upon what your job is
(17:46):
at CIA. So if I'm working like for example, I
worked in the CIA's Canartarisan Center and Pakistan Afghanistan Division,
there would be no reason why I would need to
know what was going on with Rush operations. So I
think going back to the Cold War or it's like
one of those things where they things were highly compartmentalized,
and so people who did not have a what we
call like a need to know at the CIA did
(18:08):
not have access to the information. And so I think
that limited the ability for our clandestine operations to be
compromised because we kept that information so tightly concealed.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
What happens when a spy is captured.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
It depends on the country, so they have sometimes whenever
we're operating under diplomatic immunity, So like if you're working
under cover, but you are working under the cover of
the State Department, you will have a diplomatic passport, you'll
have diplomatic community and the worst that can happen is
(18:44):
you're just sent back to your to the United States
back to your country. There are obviously other situations where
that is not the case, like in Russia or China
where they will detain you, and it's a case by
case situation on if you get tortured or there have
obviously been cases where the IA officers have been killed.
(19:08):
So yeah, it definitely depends on the situation.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Brittany, can you envision a world, a future world where
there are no spies or do you think there will
always be a need for espionage.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Well, I think if you, I mean, if you go
all the way back to the Roman Empire, there's always
been espionage. There's always a need to gather information, to
collect it, to use it to make informed decisions. I think,
especially whenever it comes to foreign policy, it's absolutely critical
to be able to collect information and carry that kind
(19:45):
of back to policymakers. I mean, that's one of the
CIA's main functions is to develop a product called the
Presidential Daily Brief, and that is compiled by basically gathering
together all of our intelligence from all over the world
and highlighting the most important bits for senior policy makers
(20:06):
to make informed decisions. So I don't think you want
to start making decisions. Without that information, they're not going
to be very informed. So yeah, I do think they'll
always be a need for it.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Brittany Butler, former CIA agent and author. Her most recent
book is The Syndicate Spy, and I have it on
good information. There's another book coming, so look forward to that. Brittany,
thank you for joining us today on American History Hotline.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Of course, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
You've been listening to American History Hotline, a production of
iHeart Podcasts and Scratch Track Productions. The show is executive
producer is James Morrison. Our executive producers from iHeart are
Jordan Runtall and Jason English. Original music composed by me,
Bob Croft. Please keep in touch. Our email is Americanhistory
(21:04):
Hotline at gmail dot com. If you like the show,
please tell your friends and leave us a review in
Apple Podcasts. I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Feel free to
hit me up on social media to ask a history
question or to let me know what you think of
the show. You can find me at Bob Crawford Base.
(21:24):
Thanks so much for listening. See you next week.
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