December 19, 2025 • 56 mins
The new spy thriller Dhurandhar has sparked a massive controversy. The Adtiya Dhar film explores the concept of 'sleeper spies' -- spies who are deeply embedded in a target country's society. On this episode of In Our Defence, host Dev Goswami and national security expert Sandeep Unnithan look at what the film gets right and wrong about this aspect of espionage.
The two talk about the intersection of ISI and Pakistani underworld that the film portrays and discuss how that is a hat-tip to the unholy alliance between the Pakistani deep state and Dawood Ibrahim that was forged in the early 1960s.
The two also look back at the stories of some of the world's most legendary sleeper agents such as Mossad's Eli Cohen and Soviet Russia's famous 'Cambridge Five'. Also on this episode is a look at how the Research and Analysis Wing's (RAW) operations evolved in Pakistan under several Prime Ministers and what intelligence agencies are actually asked with.
Produced by Areeb Raza
Sound mixed by Suraj Singh
The two talk about the intersection of ISI and Pakistani underworld that the film portrays and discuss how that is a hat-tip to the unholy alliance between the Pakistani deep state and Dawood Ibrahim that was forged in the early 1960s.
The two also look back at the stories of some of the world's most legendary sleeper agents such as Mossad's Eli Cohen and Soviet Russia's famous 'Cambridge Five'. Also on this episode is a look at how the Research and Analysis Wing's (RAW) operations evolved in Pakistan under several Prime Ministers and what intelligence agencies are actually asked with.
Produced by Areeb Raza
Sound mixed by Suraj Singh
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is India Today Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to season three of Another Defense, the podcast that
takes you inside the world of conflict. I'm your host,
Dave Goswami, and every week I sit down with experts
and retired officers from the Army, Navy, and Air Force
to decode all things to do with India security and
explore what it truly means to serve. Get ready for
(00:27):
stories of strategy, sacrifice and strength.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
This is in Our Defense.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to Ano Defense and what promises to be I
think a very unusual episode. If you look at the
headline on the podcast app on which you're listening to
us on, or maybe YouTube if that's where you're watching us,
you must be wondering, what are we doing talking about
a movie that is well, you know, I thought we
(00:56):
would get lots to talk about from the movie because
the movie was pitched as a spy film as pure
as Stillow. That's what I thought. That's what I had
in mind as I walked in into the theater this
this weekend to watch the film, and I messaged and
Deep that it's gonna go for this movie film. Have
you have you seen it yet? And he said no,
I'll probably catch it in the earthy or two. I said,
(01:17):
I'll make some mental notes, you know, we may have
some to talk about him. We talk about the spy universe,
that it shows for spies in a proper light and
not who shows how they work.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Actually or not.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
And that's what happened, and he came out and we
were both wondering, Yeah, it is miss Spy, come gangster
j you know, it's like complay saying Tao the famous theme.
He wrote a review and I read that review just
after I came out of the theater late night, where
he basically said this is Karata.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Oh okay. So my take was it's gangs of that's right.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Yeah, so it's actually just a gangster drama couched in
the premise of Deep Embed spy sent by Indian agencies
prisimally a sleeper spy, presumably RAW. But I think there's
still is a strange we can talk about deep on
this on this podcast has still stayed true to our
name of it had defense by talking about something of
(02:15):
a deep embed a sleeper spy talk talking about Raw's
actual operations in Pakistan, very interesting by the way, which
have seen their ups and downs, very interestingly coinciding coinciding
with certain prime ministers is what a former agency chief
rights in a book that the two of us have read.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Uh. But it also gives us a chance.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
To talk about the entire controversy surrounding Durand and I
think it's an interesting one to talk about before we
get into the spy business. Because one, it dominated headlines
throughout for the lart it still is byway for the
last couple of days, a couple of weeks of people.
There's a very uh, a very.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Show group that thinks that this is a proper canda.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
There's another the one that thinks that this group has
not watched the movie. I lean in favor of people
who think that people are commenting on this develop we've
been watching the movie. Yeah, because I'm gonna spoil it
for you our listeners and viewers. That famous Khana entry scene,
by the way, would be surprising to know is not.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Even an entry scene. People think it's an entry scene,
but no, it's not.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So I mean that tells you that people who are
talking about this movie without even having watched it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
That's okay, Free country.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
But still, like I said, it's a gangster movie. Couch
in the premise of Spy Spy Drama.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
The only thing I felt wrong sleep and I think
you can have you can tell us what you've felt
of the controversy and the film it's itself. Is the
points of the plot. The certain dialogues which could be
construed as propaganda validly. Uh, they for me were not
even relevant to the larger plot. So I felt that
(03:55):
even if those dialogues, those moments in the film, which
were very very few, by the way, for a three
and a half hour movie, a very very few fuse
at moments, if you took them out entirely, they would
not impact the story, the plot the movies impact at all.
So it was I think maybe needless controversy may be
ingeniered controversy. I don't know, but it got me towards
(04:17):
the movie.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right, absolutely, no, no, And I think it's a fine
movie they've and you know, I think I was pleasantly
surprised when I walked into the theater. Here is a
movie that's set in the gangs of a neighboring computer,
and yet he's made it very relemited. It's of course fictional.
A lot of it is, you know, the characters are composites.
(04:38):
There are characters that you know, the these present, you know,
characters who are around and were part of the national
security establishment, like mister Dova, and there are a few
orthers like just what I'm saying. Yes, so it's actually
couched in a bit of a you know, historical narrative.
But for the large part of it, the movie is fiction.
(04:59):
But the gang things, you know, the gangs Park is
actually there is a spy verse kind of a reference
to this because let's not forget the ISI use Daudi
Brandan to carry out the nineteen h three bound glass, right,
So that is the first time that the UH the
(05:20):
ISI used criminal gangs of Bombay to carry out simply
because they had the networks. They will they have the networks.
They were moving gold and silver and narcotics and electronics,
and those networks were used by the ISI to infiltrate
explosives and weapons in nineteen ninety three, and there is
reason to believe that we may have done the same
(05:42):
as well. There are credible sources would say that the
Chota Chakili gang, the Raja gang for instance, was being
used against the old as you know from that famous
Sholey line Si character that kind of So gangs have
always been used by telligence agencies and even in Karachi,
(06:02):
if you look at it, all these gangs that you
saw in the movie, whether it's the Barochs, the MQN
and all of these guys are all pawns of the
Park deep state. The MQM actually was propped up by
Zia and Musharov also kind of used them. So you know,
Karachi is a is a hotbed of ethnic violence. It's
(06:25):
a tender box where there are multiple groups representing multiple
ethnicy cities. The Baluch and the mq maga most prominent
of the Mohajis and the Mohajis. Then of course you
have the Patans. Then you have the Sindhis as well,
but they're not as dominant. And these guys are fighting.
The political class needs these gangs for political reasons, exactly
(06:48):
the way you meet Baho Balize to win elections. At
least that used to be the case many years back.
And you have the Pakistan military jumping in to use
the gangs for their own ends, you know, carrying out
attacks against India or smuggling weapons, smuggling narcotics, because we
smuggled narcotics and you have an unending source of funding
for your covert wars, coort operation, and that is taught
(07:10):
to them, possibly by the CIA, which used the same
in South America. Of the Masters exactly the fifteenth and
the sixteens and the seventeen in South America, they were
the ones who helped a lot of people, you know,
set up the drug business to fund covert towards and
the ISI that's not for day. After nineteen seventy nine,
it was a very different I side from what it
(07:31):
was before seventy nine. So you see in during the
a lot of elements of that, and I think it's
a whole film for an Indian filmmaker to go out
and make them to be like this, which actually set
me thinking that where have I seen? Where have I
read this? And then I reached for Larengeer's book and
I remembered reading all this about ten years back in
that so it is not very often that a movie,
(07:54):
a Bollywood film, actually makes you reach for a book.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, right right, Suddenly I'm going to talk about I
think Bill mesially talk about on this episode about the
origins and how operations in Pakistani world over the years.
Obviously we will not have specifics of exact operations, but
from what we know from open literature. But before we
do that, I want to talk about the concept that
was portrayed in this film of embedding a spy so
(08:18):
deep into any country society that he sort of he
or she sort of has to blend in and then
sort of rise up their ranks of society, sort of
take control and take charge. It's happened in real life people.
The most famous example of which is what I would
say is the Camerish fight when Soviet Russia embedded five
(08:42):
if I'm not wrong, spies who recruited in college years yea,
and they rose up their ranks of British spy agency
has only to be then outed as Russian agents. There's
also one example that comes upon the unit of an
Indian such spy called Rabindra Koshik. No official recognition of it,
no documentation, so not really sure if we're talking about.
(09:03):
But I want to talk about the concept you missed
one which one oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, that is.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Deep cover, deepsting sleeper agent who rose to become the
Deputy ministow of Defense in the Syrian covernment. Bundley was
exposed and then he was hanged out on the street. Yes,
and his body was left there and as a book.
But that's one of the most outstanding examples I remember
post the Second World War.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Yeah, yeah, and it's in a very interesting Netflix show
on that thus by its.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Fantastic show for people who want to get that story.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
So tell us about this concept deep and what does
it really take for somebody, for an agency to convince somebody,
whether someone on their rules or someone in like in
this show. In this case, this is an outlaw, yes,
something that we learn towards the end of the of
the film, an outlow who they then sort of you know,
training set across untold area. So what does it take
(10:03):
for somebody to be trained for something like that? We know,
whatever you've read it, whatever you've talked about, what you
talked about it.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I have met one of them, probably one of the
greatest sleepers of all finals who went by the name
for the longest time, for almost two decades. He went
by the name of Donald Heathfield. But it turns out
that Donald Heathfield was a child who died, was an
infield who guide it six months or seven months of
(10:31):
aage in Canada, and Donald Heathfield assumed that identity came
across to the United States and he went to Harvard
he met his wife, who also assumed identity, and turns
out he was uncovered. He was betrayed by one of
his own in twenty ten, about fifteen years back, and
(10:53):
it turns out that Donald Heathfield was actually Colonel Andrey
Bezrukov of the KGB and had been living beat Cower
in the United States as with discover identity of Donald
head Field, and he was going around in American society.
He had cultivated his friends and contracts and they were
(11:13):
living and they called the illegals. So you actually have
an illegals program in Russia. The KGB had it, and
it's now kind of moved on to the FSB as well.
So I met him a couple of times, and of
course the first question you I asked him is exactly
what you asked me. How did you do this for
twenty How does somebody just manage to, you know, live
(11:36):
deep cover, undercover, uh, not even respond to your original name,
and yet you know, be the KGB agent that you
originally are. And his response was, well, I was an
officer of the KG of the State and I was
(11:57):
on a mission. So there are some missions that will
last of you hours. There were summer as it lasts
for days. In my case, y vision was for several
giars and decades. So they had many such illegals that
were planted in the United States and in other countries
in the West and all that, and they continue to
do that. So it is a characteristic of intelligence agencies
(12:20):
that clay the long game, right, the illegals program, for instance,
because if one single chief of a spy agency starts
looking at operations that will deliver results in his tenure,
you will never have a program like an illegals program
or a deepcover program because for that to fructify it
(12:41):
will take decades. The person that a you have to
select a person who's temperamental lukry, whose poisi ability not
to crack under pressure, who can live in isolated settings,
basically a loaner, but a loaner who can blend into society.
They are all psychologically profiled and obviously before they caught,
(13:01):
the last thing you want to know they want to
happen is for him to squeal and no reveal everything
and he kind of they would find all these illegals
and they will train them, they would infiltrate them, give
them covers. The Russians, of course, are the past masters,
are doing that. The Americans haven't done that as successful.
(13:24):
In the Israelis have done that. They've infiltrated Iran for
US terms. They infiltrate them all their you know, countries
of interest around their region. Multiple they have spies in Egypt,
the spies in Jordering, the spy of course in Iran.
So these are agencies, spy agencies for whom literally it
(13:45):
is like a national uh you know, national security matters
enormously to them, and that's why their intelligence agencies have
the kind of primacy to choose these kind of candidates
and infiltrate them. We've done that in the past, super article.
You know, you mentioned the name of ravens or Courtship.
He was one. There were many others who've been sent
(14:10):
across the border. They were trained, they were trained to
and you would you know, typically pick up people from
more closer to the border because the language that they
spoke was very similar to where they would be and
they would be infiltrated with the across the border and
they would live normal Silviian ribs and gather intelligence and
become conduits and you know, performed reconnaissance, stars, spying missions
(14:32):
and all that. So it's a very highly skilled mission.
And you know, people who were picked like this are
exceptionally talented, very high IQ people like Colonel West Group
of the brightest of the Bride would go in for
these stand of opishs and these because these are long
term operatures, they last decades, ten twenty years. And there
(14:55):
is of course another spy whom the Russians again, like
you mentioned, possibly one of the greatest spies of all time,
who was planted by the was it the KGB or
the agency before the KGB, which it's His name is
Richard Sorge, and he was planted into German. And Sorg
(15:20):
was then a German journalist in Tokyo who had infiltrated
the high circles of Japanese imperial staff. He had a
lot of friends and he was picking up intel and
he gave Stalin two great breakthroughs. The first one is
almost gave the exact date of the German invasion of
(15:42):
the Soviet Union. Yeah, it was just regarded all those
guys that run useless fell and the second intel, and
then when the invasion happened, then they realized, oh my god,
Sorge was right. The second big intelligence thing that he
gave from his sources working as a journalist in Tokyo
was that the Japanese whould not join the war against
(16:04):
the Soviet as the Germans wanted, which meant that so
Stalin was caught between two allies, one Nazi Germany and
Imperial Japan and he had to park his forces here
facing the Japanese because he feared that they would be
a land word invasion, two Malchuria and merely godless intel.
It allowed him to rush ten divisions of his groups
(16:26):
away from the Siberian border to the defense of Moscow.
So that kind of saved Moscow, and that is one
of the biggest breakthroughs of the So the Russians are
past masters, but here we are run the It's a
good story, it's entertaining, and it's very well made. Production
quality is excelled a lot of crips. I mean there
(16:47):
are stuff that they've got right, like the characters. There
is stuff that they could have done better. I mean,
I didn't smell the sea I mean that was because
I don't smell the scene in the film. I don't
see a beach, I don't see a seafront, I don't
(17:07):
see a merchant ship, I don't see a boat nothing.
Because the movie has obviously been the set has been
created elsewhere, thousands of miles in London. I didn't even
give it in the dialogues and the language.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
I didn't feel the local, the local element as much
as ever wanted to write.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
But you know you have to give it. They've The
fact is that I think this is one of the
very few Bollywood blockbusters where a they have set it,
like I said, in a in a country another country, uh,
and espionage film with the substrate of the gangsters whom
the agencies. And this I'm told you won't see in
the second thought, where you will actually see the masterminds
(17:48):
who are actually moving these sides. You wouldn't see the
Pakistan Army from now. You saw a bit of that
in the first start. We saw Major Igbar who actually
a composite for Ilias Kashmiri and others. But you will
actually in the real face of the park arm in
the second part. But you know the other thing about
this is that it is the first Bollywood blockbuster I
think in recent years where all the characters, the character
(18:14):
goes overpowered the hero. Yea, No, one's people running. You know,
my mother in law when I told her that we're
going to watch Drummer, and she's the least interested in them.
So we said, god, oh that's a kind of film.
So so Hannah your that's rakish. I mean, my god,
(18:39):
what a gem you know playing this Nabila bowl. Yeah,
I mean that's the real character that means based on.
So it's a fantastic pastiche of all of these great
characters who are all real life people. There are a
couple of I mean's characters is fictional. It's based on
past missions undertaken by Indian spies, but it isn't exactly
(19:02):
the way. I mean, a lot of it is fictional. Nice,
but the setting, the characters, the narratives are all pretty authentic. Right.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
So you know you talked about when you have the
the when you have the as prospect of launching or
embedding a spy deep into someone's society, it's a long
term operation.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
That ok, it's like foreign policy. It takes generations. It's
a long aage.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
It takes Prime Minister's secretaries, lots and lots of several
different itras, generations for that to happen. So for that,
you need to have a long term view of how
you want to create crandice tinily in a particular country,
just like you need to have a long term view
of a country how you want to deal with them diplomatically.
(19:51):
So when it comes to your cod services, how do
you want them to function in that particular countries or
something to have a long term view on which I
think is something very interes seem to talk about. Because
I've read Bi Raman's book. I forgot the name the
It's called The Cowboys of Row, Yes, the cow Boys
of Rock, where he basically gives us a nice overview
(20:13):
of how the Rock came in to be under under
the legendary Chief cow Uh. The initial bunch of officers,
the top officers were called the Cowboys of of Rock.
How basically Rock sort of branch dot from the ib
to ka shape of its own become a became a
ergency of its own and its operations in in in Pakistan.
(20:35):
Take us to the to the origins as something you
should an extract excerpt of the.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Book with me yesterday before we came in for this recording. UH.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
And it was during the time when during the Pira
Gandhi as prime ministers. There's something very interesting in the
pass that you share is that the sort of idea
he seemed to have of what he would want an
intelligence agency to do the country like Pakistan was very
similar to the idea I think we now have of
(21:05):
what the agency needs to do with a country like Pakistan.
Absolutely so take us to that period raw and it's connection.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
Absolutely so. They've so all as you said, was set
up in nineteen sixty eight. It was born out of
the failure of intelligence in the nineteen sixty two war
with China, where they did not have it veriflated intelligence
for external intelligence agency. You had the External Division of
the Intelligence Bureau, Yes, that was doing all the intelligent
(21:34):
gathering and assessment and stuff. And the government of the
day realized that, look, we need a dedicated the agency
exactly like the CIA, UH, you know, to look at
external intelligence. And in a couple of years rn W
set up. They carved out the ib ib's External Division,
which was headed by people like arn Kao and Mmlujan
(21:57):
legends like that, and that was off into a separate
external agency and it almost immediately began operations because East
Pakistan was identified as a target country and a lot
of covert activities started beginning. They started reaching out of
the political class in Pakistan. And because East Pakistan was
(22:19):
seen as a launch pass for a whole lot of
terror groups into India's northeast, many Pulis and Mizos and Nagas,
they were all being trained in the Chittagong Bill. Practice
of East Pakistani was very active in Pakistan East Pakistan
pre nineteen seventy one, and it was identified as a
threat Byron Tao and therefore the operations to separate East
(22:45):
Pakistan from the West began writer MS as soon as
r W was created. And there are very few examples
in world history of an organization being created and within
three or four years it achieves a massive success, like
the creation of Bangladesh. I mean, you can't debate whether
the Bangladesh that you that you see today is this
(23:06):
the Bangladesh that you wanted to well, but there has
always been a contradiction. In Bangladesh. You have the Awami League,
which is fairly secure and you have a very ray
brig jamat side, which is you're seeing the ugly side
of that today. But aren Kao and his cowboys set
about the task. They created Bangladesh and they went on
(23:28):
to do other things, great things like the merger of
Seeking with India by trained many other foreign agencies. They
were a cover arm of India's foreign policy. And it's
the remarkable for a country of India's limited resources back
then to achieve the kind of things that they did.
They got some things right like Bangladesh, and they got
(23:48):
something something's wrong like Sri Lanka. For us, that was
that backfire. You try to do this replicate the Bangladesh
model in Sri Lanka with the LTT, But of course
you didn't want to bifurcate Si lunk, right. You wanted
some kind of limited autonomy for tamins over there. But
then you know the Forester's history, the industrial and kind
(24:09):
accord collapse in there was fighting with the you know
IKF that went there to enforce the piece. But un
W has been this organization that as you mentioned at
the beginning, it is always directly under the Prime Miister.
It is not subject to any scrutiny, No Act of Parliament.
It is jeriously guarded, zenously guarded, i would say, by
(24:32):
the Prime Mirester. It's almost like an attached office of
Prime Minister's office, the Cabinet Secretary, which is what other
name for it is its cap said and and they've
done some phenomenal operations, you know, because of that kind
of anonymity that they have, the fact that they had
been on a overside. It's been under a lot of criticism. Yes, yes,
(24:55):
that you need parliamentary overside. A lot of MP's have
argued that they have a point. At some point, we
do need that kind of oversight over there functions and
all that. But it's has been you know, agencies like
hard w have taken on the personality with the prime
ministers Inda or Gandhi. If it had not been for her,
(25:16):
I'm not sure Bagladesh have turned out of the way
it had. You had prime ministers like Manaji Decad who's
down the end, and he said, why are we doing
sp arg against Pakistan? And he shut down some of
the covert capabilities that he had developed through the seven
Piece inside West Pakistan, they had actually infiltrated with papists.
(25:40):
The nuclear weapons program. Then you were exactly what his
way on side there. So then you had when missus
Gandhi came back in nineteen eighty, that's the reference, that's
the park, the via for a brillion. She really started
the covert capabilities against Pakistan where which is basically planting
you know, having seen per sees infiltration and cultivate agents,
(26:03):
even moving them across, creating a network within another country.
And that there's a famous case of Ikja freightting that
between and in the interest of peace and good relations
with Pakistan. So you have this wholly headed thing of
you know, Prime Minister saying, oh no, no, we need
these with Pakistan intelligence. You know, business is a dirty
(26:27):
business and it's evil and uh moral, yeah, immoral of course, yeah, yeah,
it is. It is an extension of state car. You
have to just hobbin here. Who tells you this? Thousands
of years back and nothing has really changed in the
basic nature of state car, uh you know, whether it
is administration or uh you know, running of spies, counter
(26:51):
intelligents always have been there for thousands of years. It's
just a close probably that have changed and the technology
that is will be available. But you know, to answer
your person and the Raji thandi. I've asked this, I've
heard this from d chiefs themselves, the former chimps who
actually told me. And this is again I must cullify.
There's pretty twenty four in there, because the history of
war happens after twenty four has not been retained yet.
(27:13):
It will be at some point and we might see
a very different you know. And I said possibly about
how spy operations of fronducktateteen, we don't know yet, but
I was told, you know, the two prime ministers who
understood new functioning of and to the thin heap and
personally interesting the organization. One was Indra Vandar of course,
(27:37):
and the second is Raji one. And I was told
by one spy chief that where he even flew mission
for US. I take that to mean that he actually
flew arc attle. He didn't say war, but I know,
I know that Rajiv was a pilot and it's possible
that he would have flown in arc acraft. So Aviation
Research Center which is the rw's amiation. We have a
(28:01):
large number of very diverse aircraft and helicopters, so it's possible.
And this is important for prime ministers to understand capabilities
of intelligence agencies because you know, at the end of
the day, I think that prime ministers arelex surgeons. They
have a variety of tools at their disposal. And it's
not like the military dictatorship of Pakistan that you only
(28:24):
have a hammer. And therefore, like I said, every problem
looks like a male that you have to use the
hammer Omo. But prime ministers have a variety of pus
at their disposal, and it could well be that they
could choose a path of you know, instead of direct
military action, they could use covert action. Look, it's not
(28:44):
this issue is not worth going to war with this
particular country. We could use a covert option which could
give us the same result with much less bloodshed and
you know, sacrifice in lives of so many people and all.
So it is important for a primes to understand the
tools that are there there command. And this has been
(29:05):
cool of India as well. And like I mentioned that
there's certain prime ministers who understood it, certain prime ministers
which have it, and the ones that have understood it
are the ones that have run the maximum number of
covered operations. And you know, when I put this question
about shutting down the two operations that are w had
in Panjab, in Pakistani Punjab and sinth those those two
(29:28):
which be Ramana writes about you. He writes about those
two one was in sin and one was in Pakistani Punjab. Uh,
could I ask the ro chief that a former chief?
He said, well, he did shut it down. But what
about prime ministers that followed him. Every time we go
to them and say that, look we need to restart
our co work cap commilities say no, no, no, we can't.
(29:49):
Nobody wanted to take that meld the cat, so to speak.
And with the result that you got completely blind sared
did by the militancy, the state sponsored tepirism that Pakistan
embark tom from the nineties on, and you were entirely
reacting to it. You were reacting because you do not
(30:10):
have COVID capabilities on the other side to understand what
was going on. We had not infiltrated their tanjeans to
understand that Tanzanus was actually working directly under the Pakistan milk.
And this was a Pakistan military plan to bleed you
by you know, the death of a one thousand cuts,
as this character ND says with Major Igbal the chilling guy.
(30:34):
So this lack of COVID CAP, his lack of you know,
intelligence assets in Pakistan, we have been one of the
reasons why we did not understand what they were up to.
For the Pakistan Army was up to what they reviewing
with tenderateency and so big you know, the well, I
wouldn't say intel figure, but his assessment failure to understand
(30:57):
than the ISI. When the Afghan War started drawing down
in nineteen eighty seven nineteen eighty eight, it became clear
that the Soviets so good law from Afgharistan. The ISI
moved the entire Jihar Factory machinery complex into Jammu and Kashmir.
The Punjab thing was all beyond. They just moved the
entire thing into Jamu and Kashmir. And that is where
(31:20):
we bought the brant of the entire Pakhanman sponsort for
like three decades. It continues now, but at a very
very low level. I mean, I've I've been fortunate or
rather had the misfortune of seeing the high watermark of
state sponsored the Pakistani Bahami Bar. Will never forget that
Bahami ba can There was these warehouses trailed with weapons
(31:45):
captured from terriors that the pakistanis had center cost. However,
I remember we were told that there are enough gentlemen,
we are, there are enough weapons in here to equip
in an infantry divisi. And that was in five years
of farking ciops in japansment fifteen thousand assault rifles in
(32:08):
that one location. That is the kind of thing that
and all of this was siphoned off from the Operation Cyclone,
which is a CIA operation to arm the Abghan Mujahitin
against the Soviet occupy. Life And you know, incidentally that
also there is the start point for a lot of
the politics of Lari In case many of you or
(32:32):
they want to read more about it, it actually starts
in nineteen seventy nine to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan,
where Karachi suddenly becomes very important. The drugs are going
out from Afghanistan, the heroine is going on Afghan heroin
is exiting through Karachi, and the weapons are entry for Karachi.
And in the middle are all these gangs, and they're
all heavily armed, and they're all carrying weapons around. And
(32:54):
there's a doubted brand connection as well, because he relocates
to Karachi. Yes, and there is this I trying to
remember where this was, like this somewhere one of the
gangsters saying that you'll be Skarachi. People are not like
the guys in Bombay. They in Bombay, you scare anyone
and they pay up. In needed here, even the hawkers aarm.
(33:17):
They're carrying red weapons and they're carrying us all the rifle.
So it's like, you know, so it's like the gangs
of Bombay trying to relocate in the gangs of the
city is really violent, and it is as violent as
the movie shows them to be. Exactly what happened. I mean,
there's one character who want to break it for you
in probably you will see his ending in the second part.
(33:39):
Who's the guy who's the bad guy in in the
first one. He meets a very gory end in the
second part. I wouldn't mean, yeah, that's all, yeah, yeah,
we won't spoil it in there. But he needs a Corey. Yeah,
I mean, he's a literally this is the real guy, right,
the real character. He's beheaded. They play football with his
head and you know, the chop is body up. He says,
(34:00):
it's really as violent as the case. And that's actually
the way these gangs in Karachi and all that were
our gangsters in Bombia are actually a very team compared
to thank God for that. The worst that they've done
is to break into the j J Hospital and fire
with AK forty seven and all that, and maybe you
know some shootouts and usually public can't let this couple
(34:22):
of targeted shootouts. But these guys in charge, they took
it to a different level. And that's what this movie
captures to some extent, right, And a good point there
about you know how.
Speaker 2 (34:35):
The shutting down of operations coded operations of raw in
Pakistan sort of has impacted India for several years, because
that's I think what the core argument that Biraman also
makes in his book.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Yes that this is a long game. Yes she shut
it down. Building it back also takes equally long. It
takes time. And I think an argument can also.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Be made that that in that that lack of intelligence,
that blindness sort of could be stretched up until the
Mumbai attacks, because that's the ability that you lost several
years ago.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
We'll talk more about co operations, what exactly they might
look like in real life product real quick bick.
Speaker 4 (35:20):
Do you sometimes get frustrated choosing what to eat for
diabetes management while stopping yourself from eating that chocolate pudding
is good, but is it really enough? This month, Health
Wealth will be doing a special podcast on World Diabetes Day,
which is the fourteenth of November. Tune in and discover
(35:41):
with me what nutrients diabetics should be having and how
to supplement your diet for your long term well being.
You can catch the episode on our website, YouTube, Apple, Spotify,
and other audio streaming platforms.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Suddenly before the break, we were talking about the idea,
the idea COVID operations. Yeah, I think people have this
one image of you know, gun dotting agents in the
blind in alleyways, breaking into houses, climbing roof stops and
stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
That I think is maybe one percent of what actual
spies do.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
I once spoke to a major Marning Jolie in one
of my episodes previously, who's retired from the military intelligence.
He's the closest honestly in real life. I've talked to
somebody who's worked in intelligence for the intellegencies and he
said that nine of my work was desk work. Whatever
(36:45):
field work was there involved mostly going out meeting people,
talking to people, getting information, out of there. So you know,
when we say COVID operations, people have this very filmy
idea of this is what happens something that's also obviously
shown shown and the another. But that's just one that's
that's one operator, by the way, one operator who's collecting
(37:07):
intelligence for you. It all is about gathering that and
sitting on a big desk and sort of sorting it
together and you know, bringing everything together. So when we
say it's some deep operations, when you say something that,
you know, Rajibandi understood how operations should be run in
Dragani understood that. We don't know right now how the
operations have been done in the last decade and a half.
(37:28):
We know that very soon. When you say that, what
do you exactly mean and what do you picture happening.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
In real life when you talk about that, Well, you
know eight uh prime ministers who understand intelligence agencies. Uh.
They ask for results from the like you know you
want in tell that comes on your table every day.
Every prime minister gets it like exactly like the President's
They be as prepared by the intelligence agencies. The Prime
(37:57):
Minister of India used to be brief almost every day
by our Chief. I'm not sure if that still happens.
They had a direct link on all issues that had
appearing on India's excellent security was brief by the Raw Chief.
But I think now the NSA has taken up a
water blues roads because he is literally the top intel jar,
(38:18):
so he's the single point of contact for political class
in this case. But the fact is that, you know,
prime ministers, heads of government must expect results from intelligence
agencies which will alert them to the big picture kind
(38:38):
of think that is happening in countries of their interests.
In our case, there are you know, we've traditionally focused
on countries that are around our referee, which we have
on saturary issues, border issues with which is Pakistan and
China primarily, and then you have other states like you
know Banglad issue, Sri Lanka, you know Myanmarrun thoughts the rest.
(39:01):
But there is an argument now that you might need
to expand your budgets, you need to hire more people
because as you guys in the world, your economy becomes bigger,
you will have other countries that are of great interest
to you, like for instance, the United States, Russian tracation.
Of course, traditional friends allies. But I would argue, like,
(39:22):
for instance, in the United States, why did we miss
the fact that trump p was Tourny's words, Pakistanis to
that was that is something that we don't know yet
digged our intelligence against is brief the briand Minister the
fact that the Pakistanis were making repeated visits to the
(39:42):
United States, they were hiring lobbies, you know, and that
would have a that had a scrap bearing on the
Matur city. You know, there are those small little missions
where you have a ra chief operateable city over there
and he sees a Pakistani delegation coming there and buying
and you know, must number of snow boots and high
(40:03):
altitude clothing in the eighties and the early eighties, and
the reviews that this can only mean that they're going
to launch in a thing operation to get Siachi right
and that kind of the Government of India launched out
make too to catre Siachin in nineteen eighty four. So
stuff like this is really important, and you know, it
tips you off about your adversity's capabilities and you know,
(40:28):
tells them what they're up to. Like in this case,
this is a more recent example of the United States
coming turning towards Pakistan, into Pakistan's favor, the fact that
Pakistan had already made deep in roads in through Turkey, Azerbaijan, China,
creating the so called access making themselves useful. And I
(40:50):
want to know, and of course souly traditional friends, partners, allies,
I want to know, at what point did General Assimon
you stop wearing his glas right, there is a change
in as his body language. If you see the time
I think when he was a lectnand journey he hadn't
(41:10):
become the Army chin man. There was this bespectacle. Yeah,
he looked like a scollar. There are photos of him,
there are Yeah, of course there are photos of him
with an He was d G I S I within
wearing glasses like rmulous glasses, and all of a sudden
those glasses vanished. And then you see him wearing boots,
elevator boots, you know, with like three four inches lifts,
(41:33):
going to meet Trump. So there were little changes like
this in money which would have been picked up by
intelligence aeriensis. Again I'm not treeby to whether that was
communicated or no. But these are the kind of things
that wing alert intelligency to something big that's happening now
Cargill for instance, it's being you know, that's that's a huge,
(41:54):
big debate. Where are you said that they did dip
off the UH the armed forces about the fact that
Pakistan was going to try something. There was a certain
build they were warning about it. There were many specific
pieces of intel and stuff. So this is where you
have intelligencies, especially in areas where you have you know,
(42:16):
borders that are not settling and therefore your adversaries who
will try to alter the borders of launch attacks those
kind of places. That's where the role of intelligence agencies
is is really critical. And of course you have you know, integencies.
The one one of the biggest role of integencies is
is what the former chief becomes one of the most
(42:39):
outstanding writers of former intelligence chief writers who brings that
he's brought. He's got a trilogy of books that I
think all of you should dream and one of the
second book is called The Ultimate Code, where this again
open source when he talks about what does the ultimate
goal of intelligence agency, of course to gather intelligences. One
part of the things too, what is the most nation
(43:02):
target nation up to? Is that how the nuclear weapons
broke going what range are their messiahs? Who's doing this?
What aida they getting from? But he says, and this
is really interesting, the ultimate goal is to build narratives. Right,
That's the goal of intelligency and insteners. That it's not
so much about protecting intail, but to build land of
(43:23):
When you build the narratory, it's such a powerful thing
that you can't fight it. Right, But yet it is
what people believe. It's not the reality. It's exactly like
what we saw and shall do. Right. You may have
destroyed or purchased on the air bases. You have forced
their air force to run away to death bases. The
navy was hiding, there was no They were literally a
(43:45):
landlock stayed with no navy protecting anything. Right, they were
letal a mercy of for gods. But in their mind
they believe they've won a fantastic victory because the narrative
is being shaped. Because they supposedly brought down some jets,
they won the war. Whereas we have not been able
to project the kind of narrative using this our. The
(44:07):
fact that what the Prime Minister said on the twelfth
of May threw the new red lines and actually collapsed
Pakistan's narrative that it had been building up for three
four decades, which is that state actors and non state
actors mean state actors we have nothing to do with
non state Terrorism is a universal religion and this is
(44:27):
something that all politicians and partizan keep parity. Terror is
a universal problem. We must all work together to five pay.
We are also suffering from terrorism. We have not been
able to build the narrative which says that the terrorism
that Pakistan is suffering from is caused by itself. The
terrorism that it is inflicting all its neighbors like Afghanstan
(44:49):
and India is state sponsored terrorism. You know, we're not
able to get those distinctions. And this is where intelligence
agencies come in, like and I think there are the
biggest example again big is this based on something like
you said there about the Cambridge fight the game Ridge
Spies right in the sixteenth fifty nine and sixty is
(45:09):
when the king Filmy sangis exposed. The counter intel chief
of I six is a KGB mole, Right, he's uncovered
of the kg more and in the sixties and in
the sixties there's chaos in MI six, right, the agency
is discredited. You can't have the top the counter intelligence.
(45:31):
The guy whose job is to hunt spies here is fire.
It is as funny as that. It's it's hilarious, hilaristic tragy.
The CIRA is so weakly suspicious of six. These guys
are so thoroughly penetrated, you know, like four five, six
spies and all the top level. Right, can we trust
(45:52):
these guys with any intel? And then right? And that
character continues for six decades Hollywood, Right, James Borne on
her Majesty's secret Service. There's certainly a movie called Doctor
No that makes its remune sixty two. Yes, and that
(46:13):
elevates mi I six is public persona into this ultimate
agency which is punching above its way and James Bond
is saving the world from terrorists and megalomanias. And that
continues to day to wonder where the idea came from
Ian Fleming, former m I six Gien. It's as it's
(46:33):
all out there. It's the ultimate narrative that was constructed
to make people believe that m I six was invincible.
The KGB has not had a great movie about its
own things out give the Sorgy or all of the
other great operations that they've run, including Kim Philpy, but
(46:54):
is the receiving it of a lot of bad breath. Right,
So the narratives is the ultimate thing coric which intelligency
wants to do. And this is something that West is
really good at building narratives. Where the Soviet Union was
defineated in movie after movie after movie through the sixties
and the seventies and the eighties, and finally just collapsed.
The whole thing collapsed, and every from Walking to Rambo
(47:17):
to James Board.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
Of course, you know, I never thought of this until
you said it, the James One thing, but now that
you say it, it makes it makes so much sense.
And now I think of it. There's another character. This
is on the literature side, written by johny Care, your Smiley, who.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Actually is this master spy who uncovers Kim Philby.
Speaker 2 (47:44):
In the books he's not called Kimi, but one of
the books Thinktila's Soldier Spie is actually about five and
six is eternal hunt for these Russian spies.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
And now that I think of it, hello, even johny
Care had some spy back. Of course, their own spies.
This is narrative. They're all building narrative. And note to
my producer. This is gonna be another separate segment altogether. Yeah,
it is.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
But it's a very fantastic point out there, because yeah,
if you think of it, it makes so much sense
this You are basically saying, without saying it out loud,
that James Bond and characters like George Smiley are basically
creations of intelligencies to sort of help the narrative that
all the Hollywood is narrative. It's a narrative factually, you know.
It is like movies like zero thirty. You know, they
(48:32):
all advance a narrative. They are advancing their.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
United States narrative saving this great operation that Will umbarked
on getting mosam bin laden. But Cira was actually going
out there and helping all. And which is why I
think movies like Duranda they attacked the third pillar on
Pakistan strategy against India, right, So I mean this is
(48:56):
to use this and this is in a piece that
an region for India today on why Duranda is literally
is in foughtant I see it as a as a
breakout moment for Bollywood because it's the first time, I
think recent times where somebody has called out the complicity
of a Pakistan state and the army in fomenting terror
(49:18):
against India. Right, You've had small attempts in the past,
but what I see is that three levels. Of one is,
of course it's all the terrorists within India, you know,
the foot soldiers. The second level is when you're looking
at the Tanzines in Pakistan, Jesh and all that. That's
(49:39):
the second level. Now we all know that there's actually
a puppeteer which is the Pakistan military. And this is
possibly the first to movie that actually him set and
this is something that we've probably seen the second part
of the that these all these pawns are actually being
moved by the Pakistan You see one character and that
(49:59):
is the is in that Donda is really a breakout
movement to my mind, because it calls out pakistan sponsorship
of terror. Uh he is no you know an anti
Pakistan movie or an anti Muslian movie or anti in
it is. It calls out Pakistan's sponsorship of terror and
using of all of these characters to achieve its goals.
(50:22):
And I think that's that's what makes it such a
big thing, because if you see this strategy of Pakistan
in the last couple of decades is you had nuclear
weapons enabled terrovisim right, which threatens your political class, which
then restrains the military. Uh. And then you have your
aman Kiyasha projects which directly attack civil society and and
(50:46):
say no, no, we are just like you and we
have the same PGP and all of that and all that.
So UH, these three pillars are what incidentally Clausewitz outlines
and on war central gravity for nation. You have the
political class, military and UH the common minery the equal
So the first two have been taining care of by
(51:06):
NWT and the third one is your public foot pain.
What do the people believe? Yes, do people believe that
the Pakistan are means actually fermenting terror in India by
launching attacks and all that? They say, Oh, you know,
you ask them who's doing Oh it's braying, Oh it's
oh it's Nobody's pointed to the real perpetrators, which was
(51:28):
the Pakistanan And you had none other than UH presidents
then President Mushav General musharaff saying that in one of
our counties when he was on SAT Thing India Today complay,
he tells Australia that don't act in movies that show
Pakistan and poor life. So he's he's not afraid of
the Indian military massing on the Pakistan border Parakhrum. He's
(51:50):
afraid that, you know, influencers like Austaria, Bollywood, the soft
power of things shouldn't pint Pakistan poor line because it
is the ultimate objective, ultimate goal, which is the narrative.
And that is what actually and that that would worry
a lot of people on that side of the border,
(52:11):
that especially the Park military. This is something that money
has no answer for. Right, militarily, he can fight you.
I mean there's no smatch militarily either. Narratives he can
create and fight. How do you fight a Bollywood movie narrative?
Your own people are watching the movie. They even had
(52:31):
that thing of uh Blavan walking and they're playing the
thing as he makes his entry. Yeah that that song
by the rapper yea, Yeah, it's bizarre. So this is
something that they are and that's why that is actually
to me, it is what has really done. It's the
(52:53):
attacking that narrative that these guys are freater the Park Army,
the Park Beach State to tell you that you have
to keep talking to us, we keep attacking you, killing
your citizens in the you know, killing them like dogs
in Mumbai and Deni and bengalou and you know that's
sort moture up dates. That is a big irony of
him telling I, shure, you're not to act in movies
(53:15):
showing Pakistan Poland. This is the man who started the
war against India into the heartlet. He expanded the war
between two thousand and two thousand and eight. He's the
one who pushed it out into Gujarat, into Mumbai, Conteni,
bengalou Hite people and all that. And he's skilled hundreds
of thousands of Indian citizens, and he's worried about the
(53:37):
prospect of a Bollywood that shows in Nicole. So I
think it's interesting that out of these three pillars that
Clauswood says the government, military and the civilians, two pillars
have been attacked in operations in seven months ago, and
the third pillar has now been at This is one called.
Speaker 2 (53:58):
Right.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
I think the ended there and a very good point
to end episode on about how one of the core
jobs of an intelligence agency is also to look after
the narrative and work towards building that. Yeah, but I
want to tell you this one thing, you know, because
I don't know when we're going to come back to
another very quickly. But how this is in an India
(54:21):
Today's story. You should actually link that India story where
rn W wistle blower came to me and told me
that he had evidence of corruption for the r n
W chiefs and senior arm W officials were involved in
companies they had they were directors of companies and therefore
work corrupt. So I followed that up and I landed
(54:45):
up in two flats owned by these directors of these
so called companies that were still there. And it turns
out that those flats did exist. This poppulties did exist,
but they were safe housing, so they had floated a
companies of course it was, and they had these guys
and all impergigencies do. Yeah, I'm relieve they do. You
(55:07):
can have. I ended up working pace all these spaces
of SI. So that's how it works. So that's how
it is. Yeah, that's so that was my first hand
thing with our agencies work. That was a couple of years,
but I must twenty four. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:23):
No, we'll actually do another episode on intelligence because I
don't think you've covered the whole gamut of what this cyber.
Speaker 1 (55:31):
Sense you're going to be talked about in a few
months when the second part of that Navy concert. Oh definitely.
Speaker 2 (55:36):
Yeah, So we will definitely have another episode on this
topic and we'll cover more. But thanks for the chats
on the great chat, and like I said, I love
that sort of enlightening moment that you've give me about
James Bond and by extension, George Smiley one of my
favorite characters.
Speaker 1 (55:51):
With George Smiley my favorite characters, what a great fictional character.
And Jolly Kevin of our favorite writers as well when
it comes to spine outs. But yeah, that's that.
Speaker 2 (56:00):
Thanks on the Greade Chat as always, As always, thanks
to all our listeners and uwers.
Speaker 1 (56:04):
That's it for this Wee Defense stores for more tune
next week. Then stay safe and don't toss any boundaries
for the Bassport k The.
Speaker 3 (56:19):
Kabi the mah Hard episode Arch the Radio, Apple Podcast,
Spotify audio platform
Speaker 1 (56:42):
S
This is India Today Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to season three of Another Defense, the podcast that
takes you inside the world of conflict. I'm your host,
Dave Goswami, and every week I sit down with experts
and retired officers from the Army, Navy, and Air Force
to decode all things to do with India security and
explore what it truly means to serve. Get ready for
(00:27):
stories of strategy, sacrifice and strength.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
This is in Our Defense.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to Ano Defense and what promises to be I
think a very unusual episode. If you look at the
headline on the podcast app on which you're listening to
us on, or maybe YouTube if that's where you're watching us,
you must be wondering, what are we doing talking about
a movie that is well, you know, I thought we
(00:56):
would get lots to talk about from the movie because
the movie was pitched as a spy film as pure
as Stillow. That's what I thought. That's what I had
in mind as I walked in into the theater this
this weekend to watch the film, and I messaged and
Deep that it's gonna go for this movie film. Have
you have you seen it yet? And he said no,
I'll probably catch it in the earthy or two. I said,
(01:17):
I'll make some mental notes, you know, we may have
some to talk about him. We talk about the spy universe,
that it shows for spies in a proper light and
not who shows how they work.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Actually or not.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
And that's what happened, and he came out and we
were both wondering, Yeah, it is miss Spy, come gangster
j you know, it's like complay saying Tao the famous theme.
He wrote a review and I read that review just
after I came out of the theater late night, where
he basically said this is Karata.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Oh okay. So my take was it's gangs of that's right.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Yeah, so it's actually just a gangster drama couched in
the premise of Deep Embed spy sent by Indian agencies
prisimally a sleeper spy, presumably RAW. But I think there's
still is a strange we can talk about deep on
this on this podcast has still stayed true to our
name of it had defense by talking about something of
(02:15):
a deep embed a sleeper spy talk talking about Raw's
actual operations in Pakistan, very interesting by the way, which
have seen their ups and downs, very interestingly coinciding coinciding
with certain prime ministers is what a former agency chief
rights in a book that the two of us have read.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Uh. But it also gives us a chance.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
To talk about the entire controversy surrounding Durand and I
think it's an interesting one to talk about before we
get into the spy business. Because one, it dominated headlines
throughout for the lart it still is byway for the
last couple of days, a couple of weeks of people.
There's a very uh, a very.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Show group that thinks that this is a proper canda.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
There's another the one that thinks that this group has
not watched the movie. I lean in favor of people
who think that people are commenting on this develop we've
been watching the movie. Yeah, because I'm gonna spoil it
for you our listeners and viewers. That famous Khana entry scene,
by the way, would be surprising to know is not.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Even an entry scene. People think it's an entry scene,
but no, it's not.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So I mean that tells you that people who are
talking about this movie without even having watched it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
That's okay, Free country.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
But still, like I said, it's a gangster movie. Couch
in the premise of Spy Spy Drama.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
The only thing I felt wrong sleep and I think
you can have you can tell us what you've felt
of the controversy and the film it's itself. Is the
points of the plot. The certain dialogues which could be
construed as propaganda validly. Uh, they for me were not
even relevant to the larger plot. So I felt that
(03:55):
even if those dialogues, those moments in the film, which
were very very few, by the way, for a three
and a half hour movie, a very very few fuse
at moments, if you took them out entirely, they would
not impact the story, the plot the movies impact at all.
So it was I think maybe needless controversy may be
ingeniered controversy. I don't know, but it got me towards
(04:17):
the movie.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right, absolutely, no, no, And I think it's a fine
movie they've and you know, I think I was pleasantly
surprised when I walked into the theater. Here is a
movie that's set in the gangs of a neighboring computer,
and yet he's made it very relemited. It's of course fictional.
A lot of it is, you know, the characters are composites.
(04:38):
There are characters that you know, the these present, you know,
characters who are around and were part of the national
security establishment, like mister Dova, and there are a few
orthers like just what I'm saying. Yes, so it's actually
couched in a bit of a you know, historical narrative.
But for the large part of it, the movie is fiction.
(04:59):
But the gang things, you know, the gangs Park is
actually there is a spy verse kind of a reference
to this because let's not forget the ISI use Daudi
Brandan to carry out the nineteen h three bound glass, right,
So that is the first time that the UH the
(05:20):
ISI used criminal gangs of Bombay to carry out simply
because they had the networks. They will they have the networks.
They were moving gold and silver and narcotics and electronics,
and those networks were used by the ISI to infiltrate
explosives and weapons in nineteen ninety three, and there is
reason to believe that we may have done the same
(05:42):
as well. There are credible sources would say that the
Chota Chakili gang, the Raja gang for instance, was being
used against the old as you know from that famous
Sholey line Si character that kind of So gangs have
always been used by telligence agencies and even in Karachi,
(06:02):
if you look at it, all these gangs that you
saw in the movie, whether it's the Barochs, the MQN
and all of these guys are all pawns of the
Park deep state. The MQM actually was propped up by
Zia and Musharov also kind of used them. So you know,
Karachi is a is a hotbed of ethnic violence. It's
(06:25):
a tender box where there are multiple groups representing multiple
ethnicy cities. The Baluch and the mq maga most prominent
of the Mohajis and the Mohajis. Then of course you
have the Patans. Then you have the Sindhis as well,
but they're not as dominant. And these guys are fighting.
The political class needs these gangs for political reasons, exactly
(06:48):
the way you meet Baho Balize to win elections. At
least that used to be the case many years back.
And you have the Pakistan military jumping in to use
the gangs for their own ends, you know, carrying out
attacks against India or smuggling weapons, smuggling narcotics, because we
smuggled narcotics and you have an unending source of funding
for your covert wars, coort operation, and that is taught
(07:10):
to them, possibly by the CIA, which used the same
in South America. Of the Masters exactly the fifteenth and
the sixteens and the seventeen in South America, they were
the ones who helped a lot of people, you know,
set up the drug business to fund covert towards and
the ISI that's not for day. After nineteen seventy nine,
it was a very different I side from what it
(07:31):
was before seventy nine. So you see in during the
a lot of elements of that, and I think it's
a whole film for an Indian filmmaker to go out
and make them to be like this, which actually set
me thinking that where have I seen? Where have I
read this? And then I reached for Larengeer's book and
I remembered reading all this about ten years back in
that so it is not very often that a movie,
(07:54):
a Bollywood film, actually makes you reach for a book.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, right right, Suddenly I'm going to talk about I
think Bill mesially talk about on this episode about the
origins and how operations in Pakistani world over the years.
Obviously we will not have specifics of exact operations, but
from what we know from open literature. But before we
do that, I want to talk about the concept that
was portrayed in this film of embedding a spy so
(08:18):
deep into any country society that he sort of he
or she sort of has to blend in and then
sort of rise up their ranks of society, sort of
take control and take charge. It's happened in real life people.
The most famous example of which is what I would
say is the Camerish fight when Soviet Russia embedded five
(08:42):
if I'm not wrong, spies who recruited in college years yea,
and they rose up their ranks of British spy agency
has only to be then outed as Russian agents. There's
also one example that comes upon the unit of an
Indian such spy called Rabindra Koshik. No official recognition of it,
no documentation, so not really sure if we're talking about.
(09:03):
But I want to talk about the concept you missed
one which one oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, that is.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Deep cover, deepsting sleeper agent who rose to become the
Deputy ministow of Defense in the Syrian covernment. Bundley was
exposed and then he was hanged out on the street. Yes,
and his body was left there and as a book.
But that's one of the most outstanding examples I remember
post the Second World War.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Yeah, yeah, and it's in a very interesting Netflix show
on that thus by its.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Fantastic show for people who want to get that story.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
So tell us about this concept deep and what does
it really take for somebody, for an agency to convince somebody,
whether someone on their rules or someone in like in
this show. In this case, this is an outlaw, yes,
something that we learn towards the end of the of
the film, an outlow who they then sort of you know,
training set across untold area. So what does it take
(10:03):
for somebody to be trained for something like that? We know,
whatever you've read it, whatever you've talked about, what you
talked about it.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I have met one of them, probably one of the
greatest sleepers of all finals who went by the name
for the longest time, for almost two decades. He went
by the name of Donald Heathfield. But it turns out
that Donald Heathfield was a child who died, was an
infield who guide it six months or seven months of
(10:31):
aage in Canada, and Donald Heathfield assumed that identity came
across to the United States and he went to Harvard
he met his wife, who also assumed identity, and turns
out he was uncovered. He was betrayed by one of
his own in twenty ten, about fifteen years back, and
(10:53):
it turns out that Donald Heathfield was actually Colonel Andrey
Bezrukov of the KGB and had been living beat Cower
in the United States as with discover identity of Donald
head Field, and he was going around in American society.
He had cultivated his friends and contracts and they were
(11:13):
living and they called the illegals. So you actually have
an illegals program in Russia. The KGB had it, and
it's now kind of moved on to the FSB as well.
So I met him a couple of times, and of
course the first question you I asked him is exactly
what you asked me. How did you do this for
twenty How does somebody just manage to, you know, live
(11:36):
deep cover, undercover, uh, not even respond to your original name,
and yet you know, be the KGB agent that you
originally are. And his response was, well, I was an
officer of the KG of the State and I was
(11:57):
on a mission. So there are some missions that will
last of you hours. There were summer as it lasts
for days. In my case, y vision was for several
giars and decades. So they had many such illegals that
were planted in the United States and in other countries
in the West and all that, and they continue to
do that. So it is a characteristic of intelligence agencies
(12:20):
that clay the long game, right, the illegals program, for instance,
because if one single chief of a spy agency starts
looking at operations that will deliver results in his tenure,
you will never have a program like an illegals program
or a deepcover program because for that to fructify it
(12:41):
will take decades. The person that a you have to
select a person who's temperamental lukry, whose poisi ability not
to crack under pressure, who can live in isolated settings,
basically a loaner, but a loaner who can blend into society.
They are all psychologically profiled and obviously before they caught,
(13:01):
the last thing you want to know they want to
happen is for him to squeal and no reveal everything
and he kind of they would find all these illegals
and they will train them, they would infiltrate them, give
them covers. The Russians, of course, are the past masters,
are doing that. The Americans haven't done that as successful.
(13:24):
In the Israelis have done that. They've infiltrated Iran for
US terms. They infiltrate them all their you know, countries
of interest around their region. Multiple they have spies in Egypt,
the spies in Jordering, the spy of course in Iran.
So these are agencies, spy agencies for whom literally it
(13:45):
is like a national uh you know, national security matters
enormously to them, and that's why their intelligence agencies have
the kind of primacy to choose these kind of candidates
and infiltrate them. We've done that in the past, super article.
You know, you mentioned the name of ravens or Courtship.
He was one. There were many others who've been sent
(14:10):
across the border. They were trained, they were trained to
and you would you know, typically pick up people from
more closer to the border because the language that they
spoke was very similar to where they would be and
they would be infiltrated with the across the border and
they would live normal Silviian ribs and gather intelligence and
become conduits and you know, performed reconnaissance, stars, spying missions
(14:32):
and all that. So it's a very highly skilled mission.
And you know, people who were picked like this are
exceptionally talented, very high IQ people like Colonel West Group
of the brightest of the Bride would go in for
these stand of opishs and these because these are long
term operatures, they last decades, ten twenty years. And there
(14:55):
is of course another spy whom the Russians again, like
you mentioned, possibly one of the greatest spies of all time,
who was planted by the was it the KGB or
the agency before the KGB, which it's His name is
Richard Sorge, and he was planted into German. And Sorg
(15:20):
was then a German journalist in Tokyo who had infiltrated
the high circles of Japanese imperial staff. He had a
lot of friends and he was picking up intel and
he gave Stalin two great breakthroughs. The first one is
almost gave the exact date of the German invasion of
(15:42):
the Soviet Union. Yeah, it was just regarded all those
guys that run useless fell and the second intel, and
then when the invasion happened, then they realized, oh my god,
Sorge was right. The second big intelligence thing that he
gave from his sources working as a journalist in Tokyo
was that the Japanese whould not join the war against
(16:04):
the Soviet as the Germans wanted, which meant that so
Stalin was caught between two allies, one Nazi Germany and
Imperial Japan and he had to park his forces here
facing the Japanese because he feared that they would be
a land word invasion, two Malchuria and merely godless intel.
It allowed him to rush ten divisions of his groups
(16:26):
away from the Siberian border to the defense of Moscow.
So that kind of saved Moscow, and that is one
of the biggest breakthroughs of the So the Russians are
past masters, but here we are run the It's a
good story, it's entertaining, and it's very well made. Production
quality is excelled a lot of crips. I mean there
(16:47):
are stuff that they've got right, like the characters. There
is stuff that they could have done better. I mean,
I didn't smell the sea I mean that was because
I don't smell the scene in the film. I don't
see a beach, I don't see a seafront, I don't
(17:07):
see a merchant ship, I don't see a boat nothing.
Because the movie has obviously been the set has been
created elsewhere, thousands of miles in London. I didn't even
give it in the dialogues and the language.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
I didn't feel the local, the local element as much
as ever wanted to write.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
But you know you have to give it. They've The
fact is that I think this is one of the
very few Bollywood blockbusters where a they have set it,
like I said, in a in a country another country, uh,
and espionage film with the substrate of the gangsters whom
the agencies. And this I'm told you won't see in
the second thought, where you will actually see the masterminds
(17:48):
who are actually moving these sides. You wouldn't see the
Pakistan Army from now. You saw a bit of that
in the first start. We saw Major Igbar who actually
a composite for Ilias Kashmiri and others. But you will
actually in the real face of the park arm in
the second part. But you know the other thing about
this is that it is the first Bollywood blockbuster I
think in recent years where all the characters, the character
(18:14):
goes overpowered the hero. Yea, No, one's people running. You know,
my mother in law when I told her that we're
going to watch Drummer, and she's the least interested in them.
So we said, god, oh that's a kind of film.
So so Hannah your that's rakish. I mean, my god,
(18:39):
what a gem you know playing this Nabila bowl. Yeah,
I mean that's the real character that means based on.
So it's a fantastic pastiche of all of these great
characters who are all real life people. There are a
couple of I mean's characters is fictional. It's based on
past missions undertaken by Indian spies, but it isn't exactly
(19:02):
the way. I mean, a lot of it is fictional. Nice,
but the setting, the characters, the narratives are all pretty authentic. Right.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
So you know you talked about when you have the
the when you have the as prospect of launching or
embedding a spy deep into someone's society, it's a long
term operation.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
That ok, it's like foreign policy. It takes generations. It's
a long aage.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
It takes Prime Minister's secretaries, lots and lots of several
different itras, generations for that to happen. So for that,
you need to have a long term view of how
you want to create crandice tinily in a particular country,
just like you need to have a long term view
of a country how you want to deal with them diplomatically.
(19:51):
So when it comes to your cod services, how do
you want them to function in that particular countries or
something to have a long term view on which I
think is something very interes seem to talk about. Because
I've read Bi Raman's book. I forgot the name the
It's called The Cowboys of Row, Yes, the cow Boys
of Rock, where he basically gives us a nice overview
(20:13):
of how the Rock came in to be under under
the legendary Chief cow Uh. The initial bunch of officers,
the top officers were called the Cowboys of of Rock.
How basically Rock sort of branch dot from the ib
to ka shape of its own become a became a
ergency of its own and its operations in in in Pakistan.
(20:35):
Take us to the to the origins as something you
should an extract excerpt of the.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Book with me yesterday before we came in for this recording. UH.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
And it was during the time when during the Pira
Gandhi as prime ministers. There's something very interesting in the
pass that you share is that the sort of idea
he seemed to have of what he would want an
intelligence agency to do the country like Pakistan was very
similar to the idea I think we now have of
(21:05):
what the agency needs to do with a country like Pakistan.
Absolutely so take us to that period raw and it's connection.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
Absolutely so. They've so all as you said, was set
up in nineteen sixty eight. It was born out of
the failure of intelligence in the nineteen sixty two war
with China, where they did not have it veriflated intelligence
for external intelligence agency. You had the External Division of
the Intelligence Bureau, Yes, that was doing all the intelligent
(21:34):
gathering and assessment and stuff. And the government of the
day realized that, look, we need a dedicated the agency
exactly like the CIA, UH, you know, to look at
external intelligence. And in a couple of years rn W
set up. They carved out the ib ib's External Division,
which was headed by people like arn Kao and Mmlujan
(21:57):
legends like that, and that was off into a separate
external agency and it almost immediately began operations because East
Pakistan was identified as a target country and a lot
of covert activities started beginning. They started reaching out of
the political class in Pakistan. And because East Pakistan was
(22:19):
seen as a launch pass for a whole lot of
terror groups into India's northeast, many Pulis and Mizos and Nagas,
they were all being trained in the Chittagong Bill. Practice
of East Pakistani was very active in Pakistan East Pakistan
pre nineteen seventy one, and it was identified as a
threat Byron Tao and therefore the operations to separate East
(22:45):
Pakistan from the West began writer MS as soon as
r W was created. And there are very few examples
in world history of an organization being created and within
three or four years it achieves a massive success, like
the creation of Bangladesh. I mean, you can't debate whether
the Bangladesh that you that you see today is this
(23:06):
the Bangladesh that you wanted to well, but there has
always been a contradiction. In Bangladesh. You have the Awami League,
which is fairly secure and you have a very ray
brig jamat side, which is you're seeing the ugly side
of that today. But aren Kao and his cowboys set
about the task. They created Bangladesh and they went on
(23:28):
to do other things, great things like the merger of
Seeking with India by trained many other foreign agencies. They
were a cover arm of India's foreign policy. And it's
the remarkable for a country of India's limited resources back
then to achieve the kind of things that they did.
They got some things right like Bangladesh, and they got
(23:48):
something something's wrong like Sri Lanka. For us, that was
that backfire. You try to do this replicate the Bangladesh
model in Sri Lanka with the LTT, But of course
you didn't want to bifurcate Si lunk, right. You wanted
some kind of limited autonomy for tamins over there. But
then you know the Forester's history, the industrial and kind
(24:09):
accord collapse in there was fighting with the you know
IKF that went there to enforce the piece. But un
W has been this organization that as you mentioned at
the beginning, it is always directly under the Prime Miister.
It is not subject to any scrutiny, No Act of Parliament.
It is jeriously guarded, zenously guarded, i would say, by
(24:32):
the Prime Mirester. It's almost like an attached office of
Prime Minister's office, the Cabinet Secretary, which is what other
name for it is its cap said and and they've
done some phenomenal operations, you know, because of that kind
of anonymity that they have, the fact that they had
been on a overside. It's been under a lot of criticism. Yes, yes,
(24:55):
that you need parliamentary overside. A lot of MP's have
argued that they have a point. At some point, we
do need that kind of oversight over there functions and
all that. But it's has been you know, agencies like
hard w have taken on the personality with the prime
ministers Inda or Gandhi. If it had not been for her,
(25:16):
I'm not sure Bagladesh have turned out of the way
it had. You had prime ministers like Manaji Decad who's
down the end, and he said, why are we doing
sp arg against Pakistan? And he shut down some of
the covert capabilities that he had developed through the seven
Piece inside West Pakistan, they had actually infiltrated with papists.
(25:40):
The nuclear weapons program. Then you were exactly what his
way on side there. So then you had when missus
Gandhi came back in nineteen eighty, that's the reference, that's
the park, the via for a brillion. She really started
the covert capabilities against Pakistan where which is basically planting
you know, having seen per sees infiltration and cultivate agents,
(26:03):
even moving them across, creating a network within another country.
And that there's a famous case of Ikja freightting that
between and in the interest of peace and good relations
with Pakistan. So you have this wholly headed thing of
you know, Prime Minister saying, oh no, no, we need
these with Pakistan intelligence. You know, business is a dirty
(26:27):
business and it's evil and uh moral, yeah, immoral of course, yeah, yeah,
it is. It is an extension of state car. You
have to just hobbin here. Who tells you this? Thousands
of years back and nothing has really changed in the
basic nature of state car, uh you know, whether it
is administration or uh you know, running of spies, counter
(26:51):
intelligents always have been there for thousands of years. It's
just a close probably that have changed and the technology
that is will be available. But you know, to answer
your person and the Raji thandi. I've asked this, I've
heard this from d chiefs themselves, the former chimps who
actually told me. And this is again I must cullify.
There's pretty twenty four in there, because the history of
war happens after twenty four has not been retained yet.
(27:13):
It will be at some point and we might see
a very different you know. And I said possibly about
how spy operations of fronducktateteen, we don't know yet, but
I was told, you know, the two prime ministers who
understood new functioning of and to the thin heap and
personally interesting the organization. One was Indra Vandar of course,
(27:37):
and the second is Raji one. And I was told
by one spy chief that where he even flew mission
for US. I take that to mean that he actually
flew arc attle. He didn't say war, but I know,
I know that Rajiv was a pilot and it's possible
that he would have flown in arc acraft. So Aviation
Research Center which is the rw's amiation. We have a
(28:01):
large number of very diverse aircraft and helicopters, so it's possible.
And this is important for prime ministers to understand capabilities
of intelligence agencies because you know, at the end of
the day, I think that prime ministers arelex surgeons. They
have a variety of tools at their disposal. And it's
not like the military dictatorship of Pakistan that you only
(28:24):
have a hammer. And therefore, like I said, every problem
looks like a male that you have to use the
hammer Omo. But prime ministers have a variety of pus
at their disposal, and it could well be that they
could choose a path of you know, instead of direct
military action, they could use covert action. Look, it's not
(28:44):
this issue is not worth going to war with this
particular country. We could use a covert option which could
give us the same result with much less bloodshed and
you know, sacrifice in lives of so many people and all.
So it is important for a primes to understand the
tools that are there there command. And this has been
(29:05):
cool of India as well. And like I mentioned that
there's certain prime ministers who understood it, certain prime ministers
which have it, and the ones that have understood it
are the ones that have run the maximum number of
covered operations. And you know, when I put this question
about shutting down the two operations that are w had
in Panjab, in Pakistani Punjab and sinth those those two
(29:28):
which be Ramana writes about you. He writes about those
two one was in sin and one was in Pakistani Punjab. Uh,
could I ask the ro chief that a former chief?
He said, well, he did shut it down. But what
about prime ministers that followed him. Every time we go
to them and say that, look we need to restart
our co work cap commilities say no, no, no, we can't.
(29:49):
Nobody wanted to take that meld the cat, so to speak.
And with the result that you got completely blind sared
did by the militancy, the state sponsored tepirism that Pakistan
embark tom from the nineties on, and you were entirely
reacting to it. You were reacting because you do not
(30:10):
have COVID capabilities on the other side to understand what
was going on. We had not infiltrated their tanjeans to
understand that Tanzanus was actually working directly under the Pakistan milk.
And this was a Pakistan military plan to bleed you
by you know, the death of a one thousand cuts,
as this character ND says with Major Igbal the chilling guy.
(30:34):
So this lack of COVID CAP, his lack of you know,
intelligence assets in Pakistan, we have been one of the
reasons why we did not understand what they were up to.
For the Pakistan Army was up to what they reviewing
with tenderateency and so big you know, the well, I
wouldn't say intel figure, but his assessment failure to understand
(30:57):
than the ISI. When the Afghan War started drawing down
in nineteen eighty seven nineteen eighty eight, it became clear
that the Soviets so good law from Afgharistan. The ISI
moved the entire Jihar Factory machinery complex into Jammu and Kashmir.
The Punjab thing was all beyond. They just moved the
entire thing into Jamu and Kashmir. And that is where
(31:20):
we bought the brant of the entire Pakhanman sponsort for
like three decades. It continues now, but at a very
very low level. I mean, I've I've been fortunate or
rather had the misfortune of seeing the high watermark of
state sponsored the Pakistani Bahami Bar. Will never forget that
Bahami ba can There was these warehouses trailed with weapons
(31:45):
captured from terriors that the pakistanis had center cost. However,
I remember we were told that there are enough gentlemen,
we are, there are enough weapons in here to equip
in an infantry divisi. And that was in five years
of farking ciops in japansment fifteen thousand assault rifles in
(32:08):
that one location. That is the kind of thing that
and all of this was siphoned off from the Operation Cyclone,
which is a CIA operation to arm the Abghan Mujahitin
against the Soviet occupy. Life And you know, incidentally that
also there is the start point for a lot of
the politics of Lari In case many of you or
(32:32):
they want to read more about it, it actually starts
in nineteen seventy nine to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan,
where Karachi suddenly becomes very important. The drugs are going
out from Afghanistan, the heroine is going on Afghan heroin
is exiting through Karachi, and the weapons are entry for Karachi.
And in the middle are all these gangs, and they're
all heavily armed, and they're all carrying weapons around. And
(32:54):
there's a doubted brand connection as well, because he relocates
to Karachi. Yes, and there is this I trying to
remember where this was, like this somewhere one of the
gangsters saying that you'll be Skarachi. People are not like
the guys in Bombay. They in Bombay, you scare anyone
and they pay up. In needed here, even the hawkers aarm.
(33:17):
They're carrying red weapons and they're carrying us all the rifle.
So it's like, you know, so it's like the gangs
of Bombay trying to relocate in the gangs of the
city is really violent, and it is as violent as
the movie shows them to be. Exactly what happened. I mean,
there's one character who want to break it for you
in probably you will see his ending in the second part.
(33:39):
Who's the guy who's the bad guy in in the
first one. He meets a very gory end in the
second part. I wouldn't mean, yeah, that's all, yeah, yeah,
we won't spoil it in there. But he needs a Corey. Yeah,
I mean, he's a literally this is the real guy, right,
the real character. He's beheaded. They play football with his
head and you know, the chop is body up. He says,
(34:00):
it's really as violent as the case. And that's actually
the way these gangs in Karachi and all that were
our gangsters in Bombia are actually a very team compared
to thank God for that. The worst that they've done
is to break into the j J Hospital and fire
with AK forty seven and all that, and maybe you
know some shootouts and usually public can't let this couple
(34:22):
of targeted shootouts. But these guys in charge, they took
it to a different level. And that's what this movie
captures to some extent, right, And a good point there
about you know how.
Speaker 2 (34:35):
The shutting down of operations coded operations of raw in
Pakistan sort of has impacted India for several years, because
that's I think what the core argument that Biraman also
makes in his book.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Yes that this is a long game. Yes she shut
it down. Building it back also takes equally long. It
takes time. And I think an argument can also.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Be made that that in that that lack of intelligence,
that blindness sort of could be stretched up until the
Mumbai attacks, because that's the ability that you lost several
years ago.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
We'll talk more about co operations, what exactly they might
look like in real life product real quick bick.
Speaker 4 (35:20):
Do you sometimes get frustrated choosing what to eat for
diabetes management while stopping yourself from eating that chocolate pudding
is good, but is it really enough? This month, Health
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which is the fourteenth of November. Tune in and discover
(35:41):
with me what nutrients diabetics should be having and how
to supplement your diet for your long term well being.
You can catch the episode on our website, YouTube, Apple, Spotify,
and other audio streaming platforms.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Welcome back.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Suddenly before the break, we were talking about the idea,
the idea COVID operations. Yeah, I think people have this
one image of you know, gun dotting agents in the
blind in alleyways, breaking into houses, climbing roof stops and
stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
That I think is maybe one percent of what actual
spies do.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
I once spoke to a major Marning Jolie in one
of my episodes previously, who's retired from the military intelligence.
He's the closest honestly in real life. I've talked to
somebody who's worked in intelligence for the intellegencies and he
said that nine of my work was desk work. Whatever
(36:45):
field work was there involved mostly going out meeting people,
talking to people, getting information, out of there. So you know,
when we say COVID operations, people have this very filmy
idea of this is what happens something that's also obviously
shown shown and the another. But that's just one that's
that's one operator, by the way, one operator who's collecting
(37:07):
intelligence for you. It all is about gathering that and
sitting on a big desk and sort of sorting it
together and you know, bringing everything together. So when we
say it's some deep operations, when you say something that,
you know, Rajibandi understood how operations should be run in
Dragani understood that. We don't know right now how the
operations have been done in the last decade and a half.
(37:28):
We know that very soon. When you say that, what
do you exactly mean and what do you picture happening.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
In real life when you talk about that, Well, you
know eight uh prime ministers who understand intelligence agencies. Uh.
They ask for results from the like you know you
want in tell that comes on your table every day.
Every prime minister gets it like exactly like the President's
They be as prepared by the intelligence agencies. The Prime
(37:57):
Minister of India used to be brief almost every day
by our Chief. I'm not sure if that still happens.
They had a direct link on all issues that had
appearing on India's excellent security was brief by the Raw Chief.
But I think now the NSA has taken up a
water blues roads because he is literally the top intel jar,
(38:18):
so he's the single point of contact for political class
in this case. But the fact is that, you know,
prime ministers, heads of government must expect results from intelligence
agencies which will alert them to the big picture kind
(38:38):
of think that is happening in countries of their interests.
In our case, there are you know, we've traditionally focused
on countries that are around our referee, which we have
on saturary issues, border issues with which is Pakistan and
China primarily, and then you have other states like you
know Banglad issue, Sri Lanka, you know Myanmarrun thoughts the rest.
(39:01):
But there is an argument now that you might need
to expand your budgets, you need to hire more people
because as you guys in the world, your economy becomes bigger,
you will have other countries that are of great interest
to you, like for instance, the United States, Russian tracation.
Of course, traditional friends allies. But I would argue, like,
(39:22):
for instance, in the United States, why did we miss
the fact that trump p was Tourny's words, Pakistanis to
that was that is something that we don't know yet
digged our intelligence against is brief the briand Minister the
fact that the Pakistanis were making repeated visits to the
(39:42):
United States, they were hiring lobbies, you know, and that
would have a that had a scrap bearing on the
Matur city. You know, there are those small little missions
where you have a ra chief operateable city over there
and he sees a Pakistani delegation coming there and buying
and you know, must number of snow boots and high
(40:03):
altitude clothing in the eighties and the early eighties, and
the reviews that this can only mean that they're going
to launch in a thing operation to get Siachi right
and that kind of the Government of India launched out
make too to catre Siachin in nineteen eighty four. So
stuff like this is really important, and you know, it
tips you off about your adversity's capabilities and you know,
(40:28):
tells them what they're up to. Like in this case,
this is a more recent example of the United States
coming turning towards Pakistan, into Pakistan's favor, the fact that
Pakistan had already made deep in roads in through Turkey, Azerbaijan, China,
creating the so called access making themselves useful. And I
(40:50):
want to know, and of course souly traditional friends, partners, allies,
I want to know, at what point did General Assimon
you stop wearing his glas right, there is a change
in as his body language. If you see the time
I think when he was a lectnand journey he hadn't
(41:10):
become the Army chin man. There was this bespectacle. Yeah,
he looked like a scollar. There are photos of him,
there are Yeah, of course there are photos of him
with an He was d G I S I within
wearing glasses like rmulous glasses, and all of a sudden
those glasses vanished. And then you see him wearing boots,
elevator boots, you know, with like three four inches lifts,
(41:33):
going to meet Trump. So there were little changes like
this in money which would have been picked up by
intelligence aeriensis. Again I'm not treeby to whether that was
communicated or no. But these are the kind of things
that wing alert intelligency to something big that's happening now
Cargill for instance, it's being you know, that's that's a huge,
(41:54):
big debate. Where are you said that they did dip
off the UH the armed forces about the fact that
Pakistan was going to try something. There was a certain
build they were warning about it. There were many specific
pieces of intel and stuff. So this is where you
have intelligencies, especially in areas where you have you know,
(42:16):
borders that are not settling and therefore your adversaries who
will try to alter the borders of launch attacks those
kind of places. That's where the role of intelligence agencies
is is really critical. And of course you have you know, integencies.
The one one of the biggest role of integencies is
is what the former chief becomes one of the most
(42:39):
outstanding writers of former intelligence chief writers who brings that
he's brought. He's got a trilogy of books that I
think all of you should dream and one of the
second book is called The Ultimate Code, where this again
open source when he talks about what does the ultimate
goal of intelligence agency, of course to gather intelligences. One
part of the things too, what is the most nation
(43:02):
target nation up to? Is that how the nuclear weapons
broke going what range are their messiahs? Who's doing this?
What aida they getting from? But he says, and this
is really interesting, the ultimate goal is to build narratives. Right,
That's the goal of intelligency and insteners. That it's not
so much about protecting intail, but to build land of
(43:23):
When you build the narratory, it's such a powerful thing
that you can't fight it. Right, But yet it is
what people believe. It's not the reality. It's exactly like
what we saw and shall do. Right. You may have
destroyed or purchased on the air bases. You have forced
their air force to run away to death bases. The
navy was hiding, there was no They were literally a
(43:45):
landlock stayed with no navy protecting anything. Right, they were
letal a mercy of for gods. But in their mind
they believe they've won a fantastic victory because the narrative
is being shaped. Because they supposedly brought down some jets,
they won the war. Whereas we have not been able
to project the kind of narrative using this our. The
(44:07):
fact that what the Prime Minister said on the twelfth
of May threw the new red lines and actually collapsed
Pakistan's narrative that it had been building up for three
four decades, which is that state actors and non state
actors mean state actors we have nothing to do with
non state Terrorism is a universal religion and this is
(44:27):
something that all politicians and partizan keep parity. Terror is
a universal problem. We must all work together to five pay.
We are also suffering from terrorism. We have not been
able to build the narrative which says that the terrorism
that Pakistan is suffering from is caused by itself. The
terrorism that it is inflicting all its neighbors like Afghanstan
(44:49):
and India is state sponsored terrorism. You know, we're not
able to get those distinctions. And this is where intelligence
agencies come in, like and I think there are the
biggest example again big is this based on something like
you said there about the Cambridge fight the game Ridge
Spies right in the sixteenth fifty nine and sixty is
(45:09):
when the king Filmy sangis exposed. The counter intel chief
of I six is a KGB mole, Right, he's uncovered
of the kg more and in the sixties and in
the sixties there's chaos in MI six, right, the agency
is discredited. You can't have the top the counter intelligence.
(45:31):
The guy whose job is to hunt spies here is fire.
It is as funny as that. It's it's hilarious, hilaristic tragy.
The CIRA is so weakly suspicious of six. These guys
are so thoroughly penetrated, you know, like four five, six
spies and all the top level. Right, can we trust
(45:52):
these guys with any intel? And then right? And that
character continues for six decades Hollywood, Right, James Borne on
her Majesty's secret Service. There's certainly a movie called Doctor
No that makes its remune sixty two. Yes, and that
(46:13):
elevates mi I six is public persona into this ultimate
agency which is punching above its way and James Bond
is saving the world from terrorists and megalomanias. And that
continues to day to wonder where the idea came from
Ian Fleming, former m I six Gien. It's as it's
(46:33):
all out there. It's the ultimate narrative that was constructed
to make people believe that m I six was invincible.
The KGB has not had a great movie about its
own things out give the Sorgy or all of the
other great operations that they've run, including Kim Philpy, but
(46:54):
is the receiving it of a lot of bad breath. Right,
So the narratives is the ultimate thing coric which intelligency
wants to do. And this is something that West is
really good at building narratives. Where the Soviet Union was
defineated in movie after movie after movie through the sixties
and the seventies and the eighties, and finally just collapsed.
The whole thing collapsed, and every from Walking to Rambo
(47:17):
to James Board.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
Of course, you know, I never thought of this until
you said it, the James One thing, but now that
you say it, it makes it makes so much sense.
And now I think of it. There's another character. This
is on the literature side, written by johny Care, your Smiley, who.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Actually is this master spy who uncovers Kim Philby.
Speaker 2 (47:44):
In the books he's not called Kimi, but one of
the books Thinktila's Soldier Spie is actually about five and
six is eternal hunt for these Russian spies.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
And now that I think of it, hello, even johny
Care had some spy back. Of course, their own spies.
This is narrative. They're all building narrative. And note to
my producer. This is gonna be another separate segment altogether. Yeah,
it is.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
But it's a very fantastic point out there, because yeah,
if you think of it, it makes so much sense
this You are basically saying, without saying it out loud,
that James Bond and characters like George Smiley are basically
creations of intelligencies to sort of help the narrative that
all the Hollywood is narrative. It's a narrative factually, you know.
It is like movies like zero thirty. You know, they
(48:32):
all advance a narrative. They are advancing their.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
United States narrative saving this great operation that Will umbarked
on getting mosam bin laden. But Cira was actually going
out there and helping all. And which is why I
think movies like Duranda they attacked the third pillar on
Pakistan strategy against India, right, So I mean this is
(48:56):
to use this and this is in a piece that
an region for India today on why Duranda is literally
is in foughtant I see it as a as a
breakout moment for Bollywood because it's the first time, I
think recent times where somebody has called out the complicity
of a Pakistan state and the army in fomenting terror
(49:18):
against India. Right, You've had small attempts in the past,
but what I see is that three levels. Of one is,
of course it's all the terrorists within India, you know,
the foot soldiers. The second level is when you're looking
at the Tanzines in Pakistan, Jesh and all that. That's
(49:39):
the second level. Now we all know that there's actually
a puppeteer which is the Pakistan military. And this is
possibly the first to movie that actually him set and
this is something that we've probably seen the second part
of the that these all these pawns are actually being
moved by the Pakistan You see one character and that
(49:59):
is the is in that Donda is really a breakout
movement to my mind, because it calls out pakistan sponsorship
of terror. Uh he is no you know an anti
Pakistan movie or an anti Muslian movie or anti in
it is. It calls out Pakistan's sponsorship of terror and
using of all of these characters to achieve its goals.
(50:22):
And I think that's that's what makes it such a
big thing, because if you see this strategy of Pakistan
in the last couple of decades is you had nuclear
weapons enabled terrovisim right, which threatens your political class, which
then restrains the military. Uh. And then you have your
aman Kiyasha projects which directly attack civil society and and
(50:46):
say no, no, we are just like you and we
have the same PGP and all of that and all that.
So UH, these three pillars are what incidentally Clausewitz outlines
and on war central gravity for nation. You have the
political class, military and UH the common minery the equal
So the first two have been taining care of by
(51:06):
NWT and the third one is your public foot pain.
What do the people believe? Yes, do people believe that
the Pakistan are means actually fermenting terror in India by
launching attacks and all that? They say, Oh, you know,
you ask them who's doing Oh it's braying, Oh it's
oh it's Nobody's pointed to the real perpetrators, which was
(51:28):
the Pakistanan And you had none other than UH presidents
then President Mushav General musharaff saying that in one of
our counties when he was on SAT Thing India Today complay,
he tells Australia that don't act in movies that show
Pakistan and poor life. So he's he's not afraid of
the Indian military massing on the Pakistan border Parakhrum. He's
(51:50):
afraid that, you know, influencers like Austaria, Bollywood, the soft
power of things shouldn't pint Pakistan poor line because it
is the ultimate objective, ultimate goal, which is the narrative.
And that is what actually and that that would worry
a lot of people on that side of the border,
(52:11):
that especially the Park military. This is something that money
has no answer for. Right, militarily, he can fight you.
I mean there's no smatch militarily either. Narratives he can
create and fight. How do you fight a Bollywood movie narrative?
Your own people are watching the movie. They even had
(52:31):
that thing of uh Blavan walking and they're playing the
thing as he makes his entry. Yeah that that song
by the rapper yea, Yeah, it's bizarre. So this is
something that they are and that's why that is actually
to me, it is what has really done. It's the
(52:53):
attacking that narrative that these guys are freater the Park Army,
the Park Beach State to tell you that you have
to keep talking to us, we keep attacking you, killing
your citizens in the you know, killing them like dogs
in Mumbai and Deni and bengalou and you know that's
sort moture up dates. That is a big irony of
him telling I, shure, you're not to act in movies
(53:15):
showing Pakistan Poland. This is the man who started the
war against India into the heartlet. He expanded the war
between two thousand and two thousand and eight. He's the
one who pushed it out into Gujarat, into Mumbai, Conteni,
bengalou Hite people and all that. And he's skilled hundreds
of thousands of Indian citizens, and he's worried about the
(53:37):
prospect of a Bollywood that shows in Nicole. So I
think it's interesting that out of these three pillars that
Clauswood says the government, military and the civilians, two pillars
have been attacked in operations in seven months ago, and
the third pillar has now been at This is one called.
Speaker 2 (53:58):
Right.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
I think the ended there and a very good point
to end episode on about how one of the core
jobs of an intelligence agency is also to look after
the narrative and work towards building that. Yeah, but I
want to tell you this one thing, you know, because
I don't know when we're going to come back to
another very quickly. But how this is in an India
(54:21):
Today's story. You should actually link that India story where
rn W wistle blower came to me and told me
that he had evidence of corruption for the r n
W chiefs and senior arm W officials were involved in
companies they had they were directors of companies and therefore
work corrupt. So I followed that up and I landed
(54:45):
up in two flats owned by these directors of these
so called companies that were still there. And it turns
out that those flats did exist. This poppulties did exist,
but they were safe housing, so they had floated a
companies of course it was, and they had these guys
and all impergigencies do. Yeah, I'm relieve they do. You
(55:07):
can have. I ended up working pace all these spaces
of SI. So that's how it works. So that's how
it is. Yeah, that's so that was my first hand
thing with our agencies work. That was a couple of years,
but I must twenty four. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:23):
No, we'll actually do another episode on intelligence because I
don't think you've covered the whole gamut of what this cyber.
Speaker 1 (55:31):
Sense you're going to be talked about in a few
months when the second part of that Navy concert. Oh definitely.
Speaker 2 (55:36):
Yeah, So we will definitely have another episode on this
topic and we'll cover more. But thanks for the chats
on the great chat, and like I said, I love
that sort of enlightening moment that you've give me about
James Bond and by extension, George Smiley one of my
favorite characters.
Speaker 1 (55:51):
With George Smiley my favorite characters, what a great fictional character.
And Jolly Kevin of our favorite writers as well when
it comes to spine outs. But yeah, that's that.
Speaker 2 (56:00):
Thanks on the Greade Chat as always, As always, thanks
to all our listeners and uwers.
Speaker 1 (56:04):
That's it for this Wee Defense stores for more tune
next week. Then stay safe and don't toss any boundaries
for the Bassport k The.
Speaker 3 (56:19):
Kabi the mah Hard episode Arch the Radio, Apple Podcast,
Spotify audio platform
Speaker 1 (56:42):
S
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