[laughs]

So this is, this is really interesting, I think, and we talked about this.

We had actually some academics on the show when we, when we spoke to Rory Cormac and, uh, Magda Long, and she was saying, like, one of the big changes in espionage in this century is that it's happening on the gig economy.

And I first ran into this in investigating Havana Syndrome and the harassment that Havana victims had stateside after they came back.

And victims, these, these guys, former CIA, former State Department people, they're being followed around and photographed by people.

And, you know, because some of these people have, you know, counter-surveillance training and so on, they picked up on it pretty...

I mean, th- it wasn't even being hidden, really.

Which is kind of interesting because, you know, you can hire these people, like you said, and also the Hells Angels was involved in a similar attempt where they were actually illegal immigrants from Canada, uh, coming over here, Hells Angels guys who one of them overstayed his visa, and the other two illegally entered the country to go do an assassination just like this.

So I guess tell us a little bit about that process and then a little bit about The Most Dangerous Man, like inspiration for this book.

Sure.

Um, so crooked lane came to me.

Um, and I, I suspect that they were and are interested in, um, expanding their horizons a little bit into the, the bro lit genre, the, uh, military action adventure, um, type of genre.

And, um, I I'm perfectly comfortable.

They're perfectly happy to write that type of stuff.

Um, So I pitched to them maybe like 12 different premises for a first book.

Is he rooted in yourself or a composite of multiple people that you know or just random? It just came to you.

Sean's working on his tan.

Yeah, I hope so.

I...

And, uh, so the story is, uh, about, on one hand, it's about a, a type of, uh, mission that JSOC has been training for since its inception, which is counterproliferation on counter-weapons of mass destruction.

Uh, but it also zeros in specifically on the case of Iran and, uh, the plans and the training exercises that JSOC has conducted to potentially go into Iran by force and remove the highly enriched uranium.

Um, and this is an operation that would be incredibly complex a-and incredibly dangerous.

Uh, some people in the command began referring to it as Eagle Claw two point O, uh, which is a reference to Operation Eagle Claw in nineteen eighty, in which Delta Force, uh, and the Rangers went to rescue hostages that were being held in Tehran.

Right? It-

He'd been out to an escape room and a friend brought along Chelsea Manning.

And Chelsea Manning is the whistleblower/traitor, depending on how you look at it, and we had fun.

We did the escape room, we succeeded, it was great.

Chelsea was a [laughs] great contributor.

We had, I had a blast, and afterwards we just snapped, like, a group photo and nobody thought anything of it.

And that photo just got put away.

It got put away for a while.

And then he explained how his employer reacted.

As the far left began to dig into Chelsea's attendance of the event, the old escape room picture became an issue.

I don't know how it happened, but one thing led to another, and that photo made its way onto the internet, and it made its way into the progressive media's hands, and it just got, it just exploded.

And they took this picture, these Antifa people and the progressive left, they took the picture, and they numbered all of the faces on the picture, and they're like, we know who 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and 10 are.

Who are these other people? And I was one of the other people in the picture.

And so in a matter of 24 hours, they were able to, I don't know, backtrace, however you do it on the internet, figure out from that picture who I was and what my real identity was.

So the event's Saturday.

The hubbub is on Sunday.

The investigation went on for two months.

Yeah, 'cause I mean, you know, I, there's always the, "Oh, he's a Ranger," and it's like, well, he tab versus regiment and, and then why does the Army consider, like why is it so expected of junior commanders to have a tab?

tab?Okay, yeah, sure.

So there's a couple different things.

So Ranger School itself, Ranger School is a two-month course that takes place at Fort Benning, Georgia, Dahlonega, Georgia, and, uh, a Fort, um, Eglin Air Force Base down in Florida.

And it is all based on leadership and tactics, so you fill squad leader positions, team leader positions, PL positions, platoon sergeant positions, and your patrols are graded.

Uh, so you're actually being graded on how well you're able to patrol.

And in the course of this training and going through, uh, Ranger School, you conduct so many ambushes and raids and patrols that it all becomes like second nature.

Yeah.

Like, why is it so expected of junior commanders to have a tab?

tab?Okay, yeah, sure.

So there's a couple different things.

So Ranger School itself, Ranger School is a two-month course that takes place at Fort Benning, Georgia, Dahlonega, Georgia, and, uh, a Fort, um, Eglin Air Force Base down in Florida.

And it is all based on leadership and tactics, so you fill squad leader positions, team leader positions, PL positions, platoon sergeant positions, and your patrols are graded.

Uh, so you're actually being graded on how well you're able to patrol.

And in the course of this training and going through, uh, Ranger School, you conduct so many ambushes and raids and patrols that it all becomes like second nature.

Yeah.

What's going on? I mean, did we destroy the program or not? Did we disrupt their ability to enrich or not? Are they seven months and six months away from a nuclear weapon or not? Or is this just a goalpost that gets lifted and shifted every time we need to justify an action?

Yeah, I mean, my impression of it is that Iran wants to maintain a sort of disposition, sort of like Japan and a few other countries do, where they have the capability to develop a nuclear weapon, but they're not going to do it.

And it's sort of a signal to the rest of the world, like, hey, don't really mess with us, but we're not going to take that extra step, which triggers all sorts of things, right? Yep.

As far as the enrichment of uranium, I think we have degraded it and stymied their efforts by hitting those sites.

But here is the deal, man.

I mean, the highly enriched uranium is underneath rubble right now.

We don't know exactly what the disposition of those tunnel complexes are.

Where do you think the threat actually stands when it comes to specifically the insider threat, the terrorist attack, sleeper cell, Iranian specifically here in the U.S.?

And, and Jack did a lot of reporting on, uh, the, the sort of missions that they, that they were engaged in, the sort of people that they were, uh, in contact with in, in Lebanon.

Yeah.

And so this is kind of like the fun part of being a reporter is that you meet with some spooky character at a bar in Manhattan with a notepad and ask him 150 questions [laughs] over the course of an hour.

Um, and, uh, so this person that I spoke to worked under non-official cover.

Um, he was a member of JSOC.

He spoke, uh, fluent Greek and also learned Arabic, so he was, you know, at least trilingual.And, uh, he was, you know, based out of Cyprus and, you know, JSOC was establishing, um, sort of a front company, a logistics company that moved air freight back and forth from Cyprus to Lebanon.

Um, and that was kind of a way for JSOC to get into the country, to get people into the country, to get equipment into the country.

But, like, it's just an example of, I don't wanna say the hubris, but just the difficulty in getting these guys in the mindset of doing something so radically different than what they've done before.

We'll get to that in a second.

So as far as I know, he got up on whatever communication, survival communication system he had.

Um, I know there's stories about the CIA going around and how the CIA did this big heroic thing, but I've had sources tell me that that's basically just political BS that they're, you know, spreading to journalists, trying to take credit.

It, it, specifically Director Radcliffe trying to take credit for a military operation and make himself look good in front of his boss.

So I mean, maybe the CIA had some, you know, role, ancillary role in this.

I don't wanna discount that.

They may have resistance networks on the ground.

... that we might get in the coming days or weeks?