14. Crossing the Iron Curtain: The CIA’s...

How did the CIA recruit a Russian asset in Moscow during the height of the Cold War? Why would someone be so determined to defect from the Soviet Union and spy for the US? And what would happen if the KGB found out they had a traitor in their midst? Adolf Tolkachev had a vendetta against the Soviet state and became determined to orchestrate its demise. An e ... Show More

Why are Silicon Valley billionaires developing defence tech? Could Elon Musk build a nuclear bomb? And why did Steve Jobs owe his early success to the CIA? Listen as David is joined by national security journalist Sharon Weinberger to discuss her new book, Valley of Death: How Bi ... Show More

A KGB officer who has secretly gone over to work for MI6 in revolutionary Iran. But will MI6 be able to get him out of the country when things go wrong? Listen as David and Gordon are joined by renowned author and journalist, Ben Macintyre, to discuss his latest book: ⁠⁠⁠Redwood⁠ ... Show More

A KGB officer is recruited by MI6 in Iran at a time of revolutionary upheaval. His intelligence helped shape the Cold War. But how far is agent Redwood motivated by some rather personal difficulties? Listen as David and Gordon are joined by renowned author and journalist, Ben Mac ... Show More

It’s 1960. The world hangs on the brink of nuclear war. But in Moscow, a man’s about to emerge from the shadows with an offer for the CIA. His name is Oleg Penkovsky and he wants to supply the US with the Soviet Union’s greatest nuclear secrets. But is he for real or part of an e ... Show More

It’s 1962 and Oleg Penkovsky has gone to ground after spotting a KGB surveillance team tracking his MI6 contact Janet Chisholm. But when the British Embassy in Moscow invites him to a cocktail party, he sees a chance to reconnect with Western intelligence.Listen to The Spy Who ad ... Show More

`Hayley Atwell tells the story of Adolph Tolkachev, one of the CIA's most prolific Russian assets, with his handler David Rolph. David's task was to keep this priceless information flowing, but first he had to make sure the KGB weren't onto him. What would YOU do? From SPYSCAPE, ... Show More

Oleg Penkovsky is back in the USSR, ready to feed Soviet secrets to his new MI6 contact: a pram-pushing mother of three. But with the Berlin Crisis about to boil over, his intel could be the difference between war and peace. But with the KGB lurking everywhere smuggling these sec ... Show More

Few spies have motives as hard to decipher as those of Oleg Penkovsky. Was he a hero, an egotist or a madman? The Spy Who's Tristan Donovan sits down with Jack Basu-Mellish, host of the LSE Cold War Podcast, to discuss Penkovsky’s actions, plus the lessons to learn from the event ... Show More

This episode is brought to you by Espionage, a Parcast Original. For more episodes like this one, subscribe to Espionage on Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. In 1969, American intelligence officer George Trofimoff agreed to provide copies of highly classified documents ... Show More

It's 1993, and Russia is tearing itself apart. A violent coup is threatening to derail Boris Yeltsin's fragile post-Soviet government. Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, Deputy Chief of Station for the CIA in Moscow, is caught in the crossfire. To get out alive, he'll need to lean on an unlike ... Show More

When the USSR falls apart, GRU officer Sergei Skripal finds himself adrift in the new Russia, having never asked for the country's new democracy. So when he meets a shadowy wine dealer, he leaps at the chance to make some money, without a clue how the deal would lead him to Salis ... Show More

February 21, 1994. Early in the morning, FBI agents assemble near the home of Aldrich Ames. They wait for him to leave his house and then they pounce, arresting one of the deadliest double agents in CIA history. He received almost $2 million from the KGB, selling CIA secrets and ... Show More