David McCloskey

His intelligence helped shape the Cold War, but how far is Agent Redwood motivated by some rather personal difficulties? Well, welcome to The Rest is Classified.

I'm David McCloskey.

And I'm Gordon Corera.

And welcome to a very special series as we delve into the amazing story of an MI6 agent known as Redwood.

Yes.

This is the other one of many distinguishing features of Vladimir Kozichkin, was that he was six foot four, going on six foot five.

How tall are you, David? What's your-

I'm six foot five.

I'm Gordon Corera.

And I'm David McCloskey.

And David, this is the final episode in our six-part series on 9/11.

We've gone through the day itself last time, but this time we're gonna look at this really important, and to some extent, still argued over question, which is whether there was an intelligence failure and whether this could have been prevented.

And then we're gonna look at the legacy, the impact of that day.

The dots.

Yeah.

So, so David, there is this talk about the failure to connect the dots.

Yeah.

Dave McCloskey, that David McCloskey, he's very tall, and he's very good at quizzes, it turns out, and they won.

Well, I will, I, I, I will say this.

Katty Kay predicted that they were gonna win at the beginning.

I'm Gordon Corera.

And I'm David McCloskey.

For four episodes, we followed the plot, how it was assembled, how the hijackers were trained, how they came into the United States.

We've looked at what the FBI and CIA knew about them, at the fact the lights were blinking red in the summer of 2001, but with no specific details about what was coming.

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So David, it was a brilliantly clear blue sky that September morning.

I think everyone can remember it from the pictures, and yet a day in which some of the darkest things are gonna happen in American history.

I'm Gordon Corera.

And I'm David McCloskey.

And David, this is the fourth of our series on 9/11, and we got to the summer of 2001.

The pilots have learnt how to fly the muscle.

The men who are gonna help take over the aircraft had arrived in the United States.

Help them go smarter.

sallie.com/goparents.

So David, last time we looked in detail really at the, the Saudi muscle.

My guest today has lived in both worlds.

David McCloskey spent nearly a decade as a CIA analyst before turning to fiction, where he's become a bestselling author of spy novels.

He's also the co-host of The Rest is Classified, a podcast that explores the real history of espionage.

We'll talk about what it's really like inside the intelligence world, how the Cold War changed espionage, and whether spies like the Rosenbergs truly shaped the course of history.

In our new season, Sweet and Low, Equal, and Splenda are locked in a bitter fight, battling for billions while scientists and regulators threaten to shut them all down.

Make sure to listen to Business Wars on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts.

David McCloskey, welcome to American Scandal.

Lindsay, great to be here.

I'm Gordon Corera.

And I'm David McCloskey.

So, so far, David, we have been looking at how the pilots who are gonna take part in 9/11 reached America and were learning how to fly, how the CIA had indications, bits of intelligence about two of them, but how the handoff to the FBI didn't go as it should have done.

And we've looked overall, I think, more at the leadership back in Afghanistan, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Osama bin Laden, and the pilots, people like Mohamed Atta from the Hamburg cell.

But of course, Al-Qaeda needs more than just pilots to take over that plane.

[theme music] What kind of men do you recruit to fly planes into skyscrapers? And as the 9/11 plot developed, why didn't the CIA spot what was coming? Well, welcome to The Rest Is Classified, I'm Gordon Corera.

And I'm David McCloskey.

And David, uh, this is the second of our series looking at 9/11, and we ended last time with Osama Bin Laden, leader of Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, KSM, having come to him with this idea for what is gonna be called the Planes Operation, the idea of flying planes into buildings in the United States, and it being approved by Osama Bin Laden.

Although at that point, it is just an idea rather than a plan.

But first, before we get into the details of how that plan comes to fruition, let's hear a word from our sponsors at HP.

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So David, let's look at how the idea becomes an actual plan, and how people are recruited to carry it out.

Greetings to our Secret Squirrels, old and new.

Welcome back, especially though, to a guest we have, uh, David, who appeared with us a few months ago on our Iraq WMD series.

People might remember Michael Morell, and he is back with us again to look at the subject of 9/11, isn't he?

He is.

[laughs]

It's great to be with you guys again.

Thank you, David.

Thank you, Gordon.