A Victory Worth Celebrating

EverydaySpy Podcast

Andrew Bustamante

Spy, Learning, Spies, Thinking, Human, Cia, Intelligence, Espionage, Education, Lifehack, Social Sciences, Advantage, Edge, Unfair, Science, How To, Humint, Secret, Growth, Business

4.7 • 640 Ratings

🗓️ 22 June 2021

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Not every spy lesson is equal, and not every spy looks they way you might expect. In this episode, Andrew shares a spy story about a covert CIA operative that you should have been able to see a mile away. And a shop that you'd never think would come to the rescue.

Transcript

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0:00.0	My name is Andrew Bustamante, and this is everyday espionage.
0:07.0	Freedom Freedom Freedom
0:23.6	Freedom
0:24.6	Choosing to leave CIA
0:28.6	was one of the hardest decisions
0:31.6	I've ever had to make in my life.
0:34.6	I had amazing friends and colleagues
0:36.6	serving undercover along with me and leaving CIA
0:40.4	meant also having to leave them. And one of the closest friends I had to say goodbye to was a guy who
0:47.8	worked a sensitive case with Ji and I. Let's call him Tom. Now, Ji and I served as a tandem operational couple for a long time, and we knew each other's
0:58.1	ops tempo, we knew each other's preferences, our attitudes, we could almost predict one
1:03.9	another's next thought, and it wasn't easy when Langley assigned us to work with a new guy.
1:10.3	It was especially hard when they told us that we had to meet this new guy for the first time,
1:15.0	in the field, in alias, and then take him somewhere private to authenticate and break
1:21.2	cover and set up shop.
1:22.6	But those were the orders, and we were sworn to follow them.
1:27.2	I remember my first thought when I met Tom was, damn, he is tall.
1:33.1	Now, he was huge.
1:34.3	Standing 6'6 foot 6 may not be that rare in the U.S., but it's super awkward once you get
1:41.0	outside of the Western world, and our op was thousands of miles away from
1:46.7	the nearest American farm. But despite his painfully American height and skin, his accent, his
1:55.2	American attitude, Tom was a born operator. When it came time to do the work, that dude knew how to disappear.
	...

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