logo
episode-header-image
Jul 2025
50m 32s

67. The Great Betrayal: Defecting to Mos...

Goalhanger
About this episode
How do you switch sides and become a spy for the KGB? When the FBI is tracking you, how do you escape the country? And what is life like for a traitor on the other side of the Iron Curtain? Join David McCloskey and Gordon Corera as they discuss the life of Edward Lee Howard, his defection, and whether recent events mean there may soon be more like him. -- ... Show More
Up next
Today
102. Putin's Secret Army: Criminals And Cannibals - Russia's War In Ukraine (Ep 5)
It’s 2022 and Russia is preparing to invade Ukraine. But, for Putin, all is not going to plan. Enter: Yevgeny Prigozhin and the Wagner Group.  Listen as David and Gordon tell the story of the disastrous first few months of the war in Ukraine and how Prigozhin’s force of cannib ... Show More
35m 2s
Nov 21
The Rise Of Putin: Spying With The Stasi
Vladimir Putin is now part of the KGB and has been sent to Soviet East Germany to spy with the infamous Stasi. With life for those living under Stasi control becoming increasingly terrifying, where does Putin fit in? Listen as David and Gordon are once again joined by one of t ... Show More
9m 52s
Nov 19
101. Putin's Secret Army: Wagner's Control Of Africa (Ep 4)
From St Petersburg to the Central African Republic, Yevgeny Prigozhin and the infamous Wagner Group are extending their grip across the Global South and leaving death and destruction in their wake. In this episode, David and Gordon explore how the Wagner Group became embedded ... Show More
38m 53s
Recommended Episodes
Sep 28
33. Prince Albert’s Dying Wish: Stopping An American-British War (Ep 2)
Why did Britain and America nearly go to war over the capture of two Confederate officers from a British Ship? What did President Lincoln’s Emergency War Cabinet respond to Britain’s threatening ultimatum? How did Prince Albert keep the peace with the last letter he ever sent? Jo ... Show More
33m 22s
Jul 2025
Encore: The Spy Who Inspired 007 | A Friend Among Foes | 1
<p>It’s 1940 and Serbian playboy Duško Popov hopes to sit out World War Two in Belgrade. But when his best friend, Johnny Jebsen shows up at his door to call in an old debt, Popov finds himself sucked into the wartime spy game – as an agent for both Nazi Germany and Britain’s MI6 ... Show More
35m 27s
Oct 15
609. Nelson: The Gathering Storm (Part 2)
After two years at sea, what happened when Horatio Nelson - now Britain’s most celebrated naval commander - finally returned home, to his wife and father? Following his involvement in the poisonous politics of Naples, his terrible treatment of the Jacobite rebels, and starting an ... Show More
1h 2m
Sep 2024
Philby, Fleming and Putin: A History of Spies
<p>Ed Vaizey interrogates the past, present and future of espionage, from moments that could have come from fiction to the reality of spying in the modern world. He speaks to former GCHQ director Sir David Omand and Lord Robin Renwick, former UK ambassador to the United States an ... Show More
43m 29s
Mar 2024
Fatal Neutrality: Lumumba, the CIA, and the Cold War
In 1960, the Congo gained independence from Belgium. Patrice Lumumba was elected prime minister and Joseph Kasavubu president. Within a year, Lumumba was deposed and assassinated. This week on Deconstructed, executive editor of Foreign Affairs and author Stuart Reid joins Ryan Gr ... Show More
46m 10s
Feb 2025
The Spy Who Infiltrated Auschwitz | Pilecki’s Great-Grandson on the Man Behind the Mission | 4
<p>Krzysztof Kosior was thirty when he first felt ready to visit Auschwitz. But since childhood, he had heard stories of his great-grandfather’s time there, and of his journey from unknown soldier to one of Poland’s greatest heroes. Talking to actor and spy novelist Charlie Higso ... Show More
33m 28s
Dec 2024
The Spy Who Killed a Prime Minister | Heart of Darkness | 2
<p>Newly independent Congo is spiralling into disorder. Disorder the Communists could be quick to exploit. MI6 officer Daphne Park needs to act, and fast.</p><p>Listen to The Spy Who ad-free on Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Start your free trial by visit ... Show More
40m 14s
Mar 2025
235. The Viceroy, The Psychopath, and The Merchant: The Irish in Empire (Ep 3)
Ireland may have been England’s first colony but, by the 17th century, Irishmen were carving out their own imperial legacies in India. Gerald Aungier, an ambitious East India Company official, saw Bombay as a new frontier for plantation and trade. Drawing from his family’s planta ... Show More
51m 58s
Feb 2025
233. Blood and Betrayal: Oliver Cromwell's Irish Invasion (Ep 1)
His statue may stand proudly outside the Houses of Parliament in London, but in Ireland, Oliver Cromwell is remembered as “the Devil from over the Sea” for the bloodshed he unleashed there from 1649 to 1653.  Rising to prominence as a Parliamentarian during the English Civil War ... Show More
40m 27s
Sep 17
601. Scandal in the White House
Who was Grover Cleveland, and why is he one of the most controversial American Presidents of all time? Why was the run up to his first term, in 1884 at the height of the Gilded Age, so pivotal to American politics? How did he rocket to the heights of political power? What dark se ... Show More
1h 11m
Listen to millions of songs and podcasts on Anghami