You're listening to the CyberWire Network, powered by N2K. Hello and welcome to Spycast from the Secret Files of the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C.

I'm Peter Ernest, the Executive Director of the Museum. I served for some

36 years in the Central Intelligence Agency, largely as what is called an Operations Officer

or a case officer.

Every month will be bringing you interesting talks

with visitors, with authors, with others who

have something to do with the world of intelligence

and espionage. world of Intelligence and Espionage.

My guest today is a person with a very colorful past in the Intelligence world.

Milt Bearden, he spent some 30 years with CIA. He was a station chief in Pakistan, Nigeria,

Sudan, and Germany. In fact he was in Pakistan from 86 to 89 which was the end of the Soviet occupation, and Milt actually played a role in training

the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, and later was chief of the Soviet East European division at the time that the Soviet Union collapsed at the end of the Cold War.

Interestingly, since retirement, he has done quite a bit of writing and collaboration on films in Hollywood, most notably with Robert DeNiro on Meet the Parents and of course the Good shepherd. His book the main enemy was

critical of certain aspects of the governments the administration's

approach to what was going on in the Middle East.

And so there are many things that we can talk to Milt about.

So first of all, Milt, welcome.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Glad to be here, Peter.

You know what I'd like to kick off with? We've just experienced an extraordinary

change in the picture in this country of who will be in the White House and what the political coloration would be,

if you had an opportunity to sit down with President-elect Obama,

...