Lethal Action - Understanding Poison with Neil Bradbury

SpyCast

News, Education, History

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 27 August 2024

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Summary Neil Bradbury (Website, LinkedIn) joins Andrew (X; LinkedIn) to discuss the deadly history of poison and espionage. Neil is an author and biochemist. What You’ll Learn Intelligence How different poisons affect the human body The usage of poisons as a covert assassination method The deaths of defectors Alexander Litvinenko and Georgi Markov The Soviet Union’s Lab X and the production and research of poisons on the state level Reflections The double edge of creativity The necessity for research and experimentation And much, much more … Quotes of the Week “In order to counteract lots of the poisons, you have to know how they work, and you have to be able to develop your own. So, yes, undoubtedly, Western governments are just as actively involved in creating these chemicals and also the antidotes to them.” – Dr. Neil Bradbury. Resources SURFACE SKIM *Spotlight Resource* A Taste for Poison: Eleven Deadly Molecules and the Killers Who Used Them, Neil Bradbury (St. Martin’s Press, 2022) *SpyCasts* The Murder of an IRA Spy with Henry Hemming (2024) I Helped Solve the Final Zodiac Killer Cipher with David Oranchak (2024) The North Korean Defector with Former DPRK Agent Kim, Hyun Woo (2023) Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East vs. West with Calder Walton (2023) DEEPER DIVE Books Poison: The History of Potions, Powders and Murderous Practitioners, B. Hubbard (Welbeck Publishing, 2020) Poison: A History: An Account of the Deadly Art and its Most Infamous Practitioners, J. Davis (Chartwell Books, 2018) The KGB's Poison Factory: From Lenin to Litvinenko, B. Volodarsky (Zenith Press, 2010) Primary Sources Press Release on the Poisoning of Alexei Navalny (2020) Update on the Use of Nerve Agent in Salisbury, UK (2018) The Litvinenko Inquiry (2016) Situation Report on Piesteritz (1953) Analysis of Madame Lefarge’s Arsenic Trial (1840) *Wildcard Resource* This week’s companion song can only be Waterloo Sunset (1967) by The Kinks. Heralded as one of the most beautiful songs of the swingin’ sixties, “Waterloo Sunset” is appropriately incorporated into the title of Neil’s chapter on the assassination of Georgi Markov, which took place on London’s Waterloo Bridge. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:57.0	I'm Aaron Dietrich and your host is Dr Andrew Hammond, the Museum's historian and curator.
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1:05.7	future of intelligence and espionage. If you enjoy the show, please consider leaving us a
1:10.9	five-star review.
1:13.0	Coming up next on Spycast.
1:15.7	And as they're talking about this, they pour a cup of tea for Littvenenko.
1:21.0	Littinenko did not know that into the teapot had been placed
1:25.5	Polonium 210 which is a highly radioactive chemical. a book or two or seen a movie where the main character sips a cup of tea and then suspiciously dies moments later.
1:47.0	But how much do you actually know about Poisons and the very real stories of how they've been used by spies and on spies.
1:55.0	This week Andrew was joined in the studio by Dr. Neil Bradbury,
1:59.0	author of the book A Taste for Poison,
2:02.0	11 Deadly Substances in the killers who used them.
2:05.4	Neil is an author, a researcher, and a professor of physiology and
2:10.0	biophysics at the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science.
2:16.0	I really can't think of a better person to give us a lesson on this fascinating and quite
2:20.4	scary method of lethal action.
	...

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