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Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is

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Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or

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Speaker 1: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A

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Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,

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Speaker 2: my name is Noah.

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Speaker 1: They call me Ben.

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Speaker 3: We're joined as always with our super producer Andrew the

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Speaker 3: try Force Howard. Most importantly, you are you. You are here.

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Speaker 3: That makes this the stuff they don't want you to know.

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Speaker 3: Here's where it gets crazy. Already Previously on stuff they

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Speaker 3: don't want you to know, we asked, does the CIA

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Speaker 3: actually hire magicians? Short answer yes, as bizarre as it sounds, yes, absolutely, Yes, dudes,

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Speaker 3: the CIA high are professional magicians.

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Speaker 4: Yes, and of course we are not talking about practitioners

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Speaker 4: of the dark arts, though that's its own thing and

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Speaker 4: a question perhaps for another day. As we know, operations

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Speaker 4: involving you know, astral projection and things approaching that genre

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Speaker 4: of clandestine activity certainly did exist. We're talking about like

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Speaker 4: stage magicians, vegas magicians, sleight of hand experts, yes, exactly,

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Speaker 4: mind freaks. You gotta wiggle your fingers when you say that,

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Speaker 4: mind freak.

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Speaker 3: Oh, you don't know where I wiggling my fingers right now.

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Speaker 4: Don't don't wiggle that's not that's not the kind of

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Speaker 4: slight of hand we signed out for today. Fellas the

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Speaker 4: FCC won't.

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Speaker 3: Let me be anyway. Believe it or not, this was

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Speaker 3: a brilliant idea. The CIA has a lot of hair

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Speaker 3: bring schemes historically, not not necessarily evil stuff, just well

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Speaker 3: far out of the box. But this was a pretty

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Speaker 3: smart thing for them to do. The public may have

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Speaker 3: never learned about it without the hard work of the

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Speaker 3: intrepid authors and researchers h Keith Melton and Robert Wallace.

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Speaker 3: Our story begins with a guy named John Mulholland. He's

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Speaker 3: born John wick Aser on June ninth, eighteen ninety eight

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Speaker 3: in Chicago.

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Speaker 4: And you know why did he change his name wick

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Speaker 4: Aser the Wizard. That would be a perfect stage magic name.

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Speaker 4: I'm very confused. Mulholland's not nearly as cool.

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Speaker 3: Maybe because of the circles he would run in later

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Speaker 3: are the ones he aspired to run in. Maybe he

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Speaker 3: felt it sounded too foreign.

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Speaker 4: Maybe he felt that it was sort of like Alice Island,

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Speaker 4: you know, folks coming in and changing their name from

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Speaker 4: something that was more Tom, I'm only more American, and

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Speaker 4: I guess Mulholland is pretty American if you think about

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Speaker 4: old Hollywood. M M.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, he was one of those kids who always loved magic.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 3: If you look at the this is a spoiler, but

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Speaker 3: the primary biography written about this guy is the Magician

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Speaker 3: with ci A, A magician capitalized, the Magician amazing. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's in this biography. It is you know, we're no

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Speaker 3: pun left behind crew. In this biography, what we see

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Speaker 3: is that Mulholland's life changes when he's as young as

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Speaker 3: five years old. He sees a performance by a guy

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Speaker 3: named Heinrich Keller, who is known as the Dean of

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Speaker 3: American magicians, not musicians, and he sticks with it. You know,

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Speaker 3: everybody who's spent time around young kids or has raised

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Speaker 3: a kid themselves, you know that that at that age

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Speaker 3: a lot of kids intro can be ephemeral somewhat right,

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Speaker 3: Dinosaurs one month, space exploration the next, or princesses or pirates,

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Speaker 3: et cetera. This kid latched on to magic like a

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Speaker 3: more a eel, and he did not let go. He

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Speaker 3: reached his teens and he set about learning the art

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Speaker 3: of stage magic under a guide named John William Sargent,

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Speaker 3: who was president of the Society of American Magicians. And

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Speaker 3: just spoiler, there are a ton of magicians societies. I

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Speaker 3: had no idea there's so many.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and these societies take illusion and magic very, very seriously.

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Speaker 2: Just quickly, let's throw the oath in here, because it

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Speaker 2: really is the kind of thing that, especially as a kid,

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Speaker 2: I imagine it being such a secretive thing. It would

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Speaker 2: the intrigue would be like way up here magic has been.

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Speaker 2: There's been a lot of disillusionment in the world of

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Speaker 2: magic over the years, as the following oath has been

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Speaker 2: broken over and over and over again. But then this

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Speaker 2: oath was very very serious and it's still series to

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Speaker 2: a lot of people today. As a magician, I promise

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Speaker 2: never to reveal the secret of any allusion to a

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Speaker 2: non magician unless that one swears to uphold the magician's oath.

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Speaker 2: In turn, I promise never to perform any illusion for

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Speaker 2: any non magician without first practicing the effect until I

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Speaker 2: can perform it well enough to maintain the illusion of magic.

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Speaker 4: Can I just say that I, too, much like our

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Speaker 4: buddy Maul Hollins, here have been fascinated by stage magic

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Speaker 4: ever since I was a little kid. I saw David

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Speaker 4: Copperfield perform and I was probably ten or eleven, and

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Speaker 4: I never looked back. And there's a Clive Barker movie

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Speaker 4: from the nineties called Lord of Illusions that you guys

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Speaker 4: may have seen. It's not great, doesn't super hold on

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Speaker 4: you read I have, Yeah, it's I think a part

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Speaker 4: of one of his collections. It is like a short

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Speaker 4: story with then cabal. If I'm not.

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Speaker 3: Mistaken, it's good.

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Speaker 4: It's very good stories. The story is more intense than

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Speaker 4: no the film. I watched it the other day actually,

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Speaker 4: and I remember as a kid being obsessed with it

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Speaker 4: and a big and it didn't it didn't quite hold

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Speaker 4: up to my childhood memory, which is pretty common for

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Speaker 4: movies from the nineties. But it a part of it

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Speaker 4: takes place in a place in Los Angeles called the

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Speaker 4: Magic Castle, which is the headquarters for the Academy of

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Speaker 4: Magical Arts, and it is, you know, one of these

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Speaker 4: very secretive, kind of members only magicians organizations. And I

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Speaker 4: was lucky enough to get to go to a couple

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Speaker 4: of shows at the Magic Castle, and it is like

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Speaker 4: being transported back in time. There is nothing quite like

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Speaker 4: it that I've ever experienced. They're not allowed to take pictures,

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Speaker 4: you have to dress a certain way, and it just

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Speaker 4: feels like the outside world kind of disappears. But it's

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Speaker 4: it's such a neat world, and it's a very niche

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Speaker 4: world today. You know, you don't really think of that

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Speaker 4: many blockbuster magicians anymore. You got your Chris Angels and

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Speaker 4: maybe still David Copperfield and David Blaine's. But it really

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Speaker 4: the ones that are really pounding the pavement and doing

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Speaker 4: the work are the ones that are performing at places

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Speaker 4: like the Magic Castle, like for like super super fans

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Speaker 4: and other magicians, other members of the community.

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Speaker 2: We're in Vegas or on cruise ships.

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Speaker 3: Pen and Teller huge right stills, And I appreciate that

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Speaker 3: we're bringing up the magician oath and the idea of

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Speaker 3: how this feels somewhat Illuminati esque, the initiation into a

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Speaker 3: secret society, something of the level of a cabal.

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Speaker 4: Right.

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Speaker 2: Well, because Mulholland's being trained by the president of one

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Speaker 2: of these societies, right, so this he's an apprentice to

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Speaker 2: a master.

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Speaker 3: Yes, he's taken on a trade, just like in that

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Speaker 3: wonderful fairy tale the Satanic Mill. Check it out. It's

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Speaker 3: also about magic, and it's appropriate for all audiences. I

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Speaker 3: would say it's a great young adult book. So Mulholland

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Speaker 3: is built from this adolescent opportunity to learn from the best.

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Speaker 3: He creates a stellar professional career and he works as

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Speaker 3: a magician for more than two decades. He's performing in

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Speaker 3: small retinues as you know, part of like a vaudeville

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Speaker 3: variety act, and then he's in larger stage shows as well.

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Speaker 3: He starts headlining these. He's doing other stuff. He's not

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Speaker 3: just practicing his famous rising hook trick or cup and

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Speaker 3: ball stuff. He is also a prolific author. He is

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Speaker 3: a prolific collector and of magic books. And in nineteen thirty,

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Speaker 3: when he himself is in his early thirties, think like

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Speaker 3: thirty one thirty two, he becomes the editor of a

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Speaker 3: trade magazine all about magic. It's bm FM. It's by

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Speaker 3: magicians for magicians. The name of it is The Sphinx,

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Speaker 3: and he's a go to scholar. People consult him on

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Speaker 3: the history of certain magic tricks, everything from like is

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Speaker 3: this your card? To how do I appear to solve

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Speaker 3: this lady in half without actually killing her.

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Speaker 4: Well, I think one of the things that's always fascinating

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Speaker 4: to me, or maybe later in life really truly maintained

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Speaker 4: that fascination with magic is that it's not technology based.

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Speaker 4: Like the real stuff. The stuff that you have to

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Speaker 4: be an absolute master of, is movement based, is subtrifuge based,

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Speaker 4: it's misdirection based. Like sure, there's big stage magician shows

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Speaker 4: like in Vegas and the like, they use crazy set

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Speaker 4: pieces and all of that, but at the heart of magic,

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Speaker 4: it's all this kind of stuff that has been going

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Speaker 4: on for generations and passed down and is just a

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Speaker 4: matter of putting in the work and being an absolute

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Speaker 4: master of your craft.

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Speaker 2: Yes, but I would say like a major part of

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Speaker 2: this guy's specialty is understanding the technology parts, the mechanism,

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Speaker 2: the oh fre salment, you know, devices, the all of

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Speaker 2: those things that are such well kept secrets. Right about

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Speaker 2: how you actually saw that lady in half unless you're

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Speaker 2: reading the sphinx, And even then it's probably not outright

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Speaker 2: saying hey, here's how you do this with and this

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Speaker 2: is the cutaway, right.

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Speaker 4: I guess what I'm getting at though, is like that

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Speaker 4: kind of technology that you're talking about, and that we're

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Speaker 4: talking about here is it's old technology. Like it's not

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Speaker 4: like there's some innovation that made the game changer in magic.

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Speaker 4: Like a lot of this tough stuff and these methods

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Speaker 4: and these techniques are like super low tech.

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Speaker 3: The points I think we're making all stand together here

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Speaker 3: because if there was a piece of technology or a

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Speaker 3: technique in Western stage magic, then John Mulholland would know it.

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Speaker 3: He became the premiere biblifile of the magic world. He

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Speaker 3: had this cue huge collection and as far as we

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Speaker 3: know it is currently in the possession of none other

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Speaker 3: than David Copperfield from earlier, which makes sense. He also Muholan,

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Speaker 3: not Copperfield. He became friends with VIP magicians and related

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Speaker 3: experts and everything from pugilism to diplomacy. He was good

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Speaker 3: at cultivating contacts, remember that part. By nineteen thirty nine

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Speaker 3: he was the only member of the British Magical Society

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Speaker 3: only officer who was not British. He was like there

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Speaker 3: fore and hire and he had performed or studied magic

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Speaker 3: in forty two different countries. Do you know how hard

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Speaker 3: it was to not be in the military and travel

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Speaker 3: of forty two different countries in nineteen thirty nine. You

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Speaker 3: had to be like royalty, or you had to be

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Speaker 3: able to do something that rich people liked to watch,

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Speaker 3: you know.

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Speaker 4: Oh Man callback to the first part of this episode,

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Speaker 4: which I guess ultimately is just kind of a brief

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Speaker 4: history of the CIA. That was such an important ability,

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Speaker 4: you know, that would qualify someone to be a spied

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Speaker 4: an intelligence gatherer is the ability to tran to move

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Speaker 4: unseen in these other these places and not seem out

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Speaker 4: of place. Right.

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Speaker 2: We're not saying he was a spy at the time,

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Speaker 2: but he definitely had right.

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Speaker 4: But but that quality is exactly what the CIA would

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Speaker 4: be looking for, is what I'm saying.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, right, not the kind of person to freak out,

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Speaker 3: you know what I mean, it's not their first time

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Speaker 3: in Morocco, that kind of thing, And that's that's what

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Speaker 3: you're that's what you're looking for. You're not necessarily at

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Speaker 3: this point obviously, he's not speaking the lingua franca fluently everywhere. Right,

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Speaker 3: He is there to do his job researching magic and

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Speaker 3: performing stage magic. So he's legit. He's five by fives

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Speaker 3: on the up and up, but he's a big, big

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Speaker 3: deal in these magical circles. And to be clear, he's

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Speaker 3: acknowledged to be very talented at what we call stage

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Speaker 3: magic today, but he never not once made any claims

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Speaker 3: toward what we will call the esoteric arts, hermetic or

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Speaker 3: thelemic magic, all the proudly stuff. He was like many

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Speaker 3: stage magicians or escapologist, including Houdini, he was actually quite

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Speaker 3: skeptical of supernatural claims, and he did not cotton to them,

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Speaker 3: as they would say, Yeah, what's.

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Speaker 4: What's the guy's name, the stage magician that's always out

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Speaker 4: there debunking stuff, James Rand Simpson, James Randy. Yes, that

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Speaker 4: kind of skepticism seems to be a through line in

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Speaker 4: a lot of these stage magic communities.

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Speaker 3: One hundred percent right. And we also know that Mulholland,

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Speaker 3: this is another you'll see how these pieces are all

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Speaker 3: falling together, fellow conspiracy realists. Mulholland is also a US patriot.

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Speaker 3: He is the kind of guy to wave the flag,

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Speaker 3: so much so that during World War Two he turned

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Speaker 3: his prolific pen toward the troops and he wrote a

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Speaker 3: spell book as a diversion for soldiers. And we can

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Speaker 3: only imagine it was the thing where you open the cover,

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Speaker 3: see a little note from him, and then you.

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Speaker 5: See the Magician's Oath and it says, you know, do

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Speaker 5: docturn to page three to understand these hidden secrets until

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Speaker 5: you have recited and sworn accordance with the Magician's Oath.

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Speaker 4: This is a fun book, okay, Okay, So it was

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Speaker 4: more like like some a diversionary entertainment. Yes, entertainment, I guess,

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Speaker 4: because I mean the idea of calling it a spell

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Speaker 4: book seems to me to be a little more along

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Speaker 4: the lines of the hermetic or thelemic flavors of magic.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean this one too, right, was his own idea.

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Speaker 3: We could, if we're being very fair, we could ascribe

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Speaker 3: it to a desire to corner a niche audience market,

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Speaker 3: a literal captive market, because these guys, you know, they

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Speaker 3: can't leave the area of operation. Or maybe it was

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Speaker 3: an aspiration to entertain the boys on the front, like

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Speaker 3: like the USO would later do.

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Speaker 4: Oh yeah, that was seeing some parallels there as well,

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Speaker 4: Like it's his way of kind of pitching in and

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Speaker 4: entertaining the truth.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and maybe it's a combination of both of those factors.

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Speaker 3: Either way, he pulls it off with a plom and

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Speaker 3: if we were to speculate a little bit and play

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Speaker 3: with the puzzle pieces, do a little Charlie Day kind

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Speaker 3: of conspiratorial Bob Ross stuff, then we could say that

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Speaker 3: this self directed act of patriotism may have played a

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Speaker 3: part in the events that were to follow. But what

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Speaker 3: are you talking about, guys? Right now, we're talking about

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Speaker 3: a break for a word from our sponsors. All right,

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Speaker 3: we've returned. We know that he is a big deal magician.

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Speaker 3: Mulholland has done a lot of performances, he's widely traveled,

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Speaker 3: he's urbane, he has gotten through World War Two. He's

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Speaker 3: been a patriot all the way. But there's a new

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Speaker 3: war that is already starting. And this is something we

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Speaker 3: talked a little bit about in chapter one. The frenemies.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the US and the USSR, And a lot

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Speaker 2: of the stuff that's happening is happening in the dark.

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Speaker 2: Both sides are engaged in deception and trickery tactics. But

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Speaker 2: I imagine it like everybody's starting out learning how to

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Speaker 2: trick each other fully, like really fully what they feel

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Speaker 2: is tricking someone fully, And both sides are trying to

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Speaker 2: level up as much as they can on their abilities

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Speaker 2: to deceive the other.

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Speaker 3: Hmm, yeah, yeah, they're definitely leveling up. I would say

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Speaker 3: that the the playing field is a little bit uneven

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Speaker 3: because they have you know how, like this is so dumb,

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Speaker 3: but I was playing Mario Kart earlier, you know how.

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Speaker 3: Like in Mario Kart there are different attributes, right, Like

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Speaker 3: you know you'll have one.

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Speaker 4: Character, yeah, and wait even for the character you pick,

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Speaker 4: they matter as well. Sorry not to get I didn't

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Speaker 4: know this about you, Ben. We've got we must play sometimes.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, every every time I'm in Rome, I'll do

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Speaker 3: as the Romans do, you know. And that's part of it.

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Speaker 3: So the idea here than this terrible analogy of making

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Speaker 3: based off sleep deprivation, is that the USSR and the

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Speaker 3: US and Europe and Britain they all had different stats,

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Speaker 3: different specialties in espionage. They were better at certain things

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Speaker 3: like the British tended to be better at adding stuff

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Speaker 3: through the curtain, right, and the Russians often excelled in

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Speaker 3: other Well, the stereotype is they excelled in more nefarious exercises, right,

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Speaker 3: more dirty pool. As the Cambridge Boys would put it,

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00:18:18,000 --> 00:18:22,040
Speaker 3: they were the Russians and the US were immediately fighting uh,

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Speaker 3: like like you're like, you're talking about Matt. They're they're

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Speaker 3: fighting to level up and they want control of former

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Speaker 3: Nazi territory. This is where the Iron Curtain becomes apparent, right,

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Speaker 3: this is the construction of the literal Berlin Wall. They're

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Speaker 3: fighting for the future of Europe, communist or democratic, and

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Speaker 3: most importantly, we would argue, they're fighting for access to

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Speaker 3: the terrifying scientific minds and innovations of the former Third Reich.

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Speaker 3: And Uncle Sam got the right Nazis. That's why we

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Speaker 3: have NASA, That's how we made it.

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Speaker 4: To the moon front of von Braun.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, nukes, Yeah, and everything was evolving. In nineteen fifty one,

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Speaker 2: the CIA forms this thing called the Technical Services Staff,

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Speaker 2: which sounds very British to me and a lot of

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Speaker 2: the terminology of their things. But these are these are

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Speaker 2: the crew speaking of scientists that were pilfered, right, these

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Speaker 2: are the crew. Yeah, these are the folks who are

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Speaker 2: creating the technical things that you imagine when you think

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Speaker 2: about spycraft. Right, the hidden compartment that is like for

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Speaker 2: film or a secret message that looks just like a quarter,

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Speaker 2: but it's not. It's actually a little hollowed out thing

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Speaker 2: or a pen that's actually an injector or whatever.

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Speaker 3: Just think about single used gun, yeah, single used firearm. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: The technical services staff or just technical services if you're nasty,

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Speaker 2: they are the guys who are creating this, this thing

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Speaker 2: that is like magic.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: These are little magic tricks that they're already creating, but

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Speaker 2: they're just doing it based on something and operative may

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Speaker 2: need or could be they think may be helpful out

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Speaker 2: in the field.

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Speaker 4: If you're interested. I think we've talked about this before.

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Speaker 4: There's a fabulous spycraft museum in New York City that

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Speaker 4: has a lot of these kinds of clandestine devices on display.

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Speaker 3: And you can see them now. Please do check it out.

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Speaker 3: It's worth the trip. The reason technical services, if your

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Speaker 3: Nasty becomes so important in this particular turn of history

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Speaker 3: is because the war that everybody has been predicting is

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Speaker 3: a different kind of war. It's a new animal. It's

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Speaker 3: clear to everybody in the know. It's a war fought

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Speaker 3: not primarily on physical theater, right, No more Napoleonic people

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00:20:53,880 --> 00:20:56,359
Speaker 3: marching at each other. Instead, it's in the hearts and

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00:20:56,440 --> 00:20:59,840
Speaker 3: minds of human civilization. To people on both sides of

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Speaker 3: the conflict, they actually share some goals, and one of

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00:21:04,000 --> 00:21:09,359
Speaker 3: their big goals is to avoid an outright hot war

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Speaker 3: or what we would call a kinetic conflict today, because

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Speaker 3: remember they.

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Speaker 4: All radually assured destruction.

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Speaker 3: Right, They're thinking of the horrors of Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

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Speaker 3: They're thinking about how easily this could be repeated. They're

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Speaker 3: in what Western pulp novelists would call a Mexican standoff.

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Speaker 3: If one person, if one side pushes the line too far,

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00:21:32,160 --> 00:21:36,440
Speaker 3: the nukes are gonna fly and everybody is fubar. That's why.

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Speaker 3: That's why stories like Hunt for Red October and the

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00:21:41,400 --> 00:21:45,040
Speaker 3: Cuban Missile Crisis and so on, that's why they hold

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Speaker 3: such psychic weight in the zeitgeist at this time because

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Speaker 3: everybody knows, just like the doomsday clock, everybody knows the

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00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:58,280
Speaker 3: world is teetering close to the end of civilization.

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Speaker 2: So you can't oh your moves anymore. Your moves have

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Speaker 2: to happen quiet.

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Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, yeah, real g's move in silence like Lasagna.

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Speaker 3: As Wayne would say, uh. As a result, tactics and

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00:22:13,240 --> 00:22:18,040
Speaker 3: weaponry to your point, they evolve, you know, Infiltration replaces assault, cameras,

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00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:24,320
Speaker 3: radio monitoring, nascent, satellite observation, those replace artillery shells. And

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Speaker 3: now more than ever, thankes Fox News. Geopolitical conflict. It's

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Speaker 3: not a matter of bloody, bloody fights with armies. It's

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Speaker 3: a matter of chess, and that means America needs new

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00:22:39,480 --> 00:22:42,600
Speaker 3: pieces for the board. This is where we go back

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Speaker 3: to John mulholland.

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Speaker 4: We need you, We need you to serve your country.

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Speaker 4: John mulholland, at this point he's known, but not like

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Speaker 4: you know, ubiquitously known as a stage magician. And in him,

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Speaker 4: the CIA found a bit of an ace in the hole.

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Speaker 4: Is that is that a gambling turn up their sleeve? Anyway,

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Speaker 4: this he would have the ability to aid them in

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Speaker 4: these more asymmetric goals by employing some of the tools

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Speaker 4: and tricks of the trade as a stage magician.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, let's go to an excellent forward by the former

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Speaker 3: Deputy Director of the CIA, John McLachlan. In his in

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Speaker 3: his writing, he is he is talking about mulholland. McLachlan himself,

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Speaker 3: by the way, is a lifelong intelligence officer and a

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00:23:40,960 --> 00:23:44,240
Speaker 3: lifelong amateur magicians. Just so you know, he's a little

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00:23:44,280 --> 00:23:46,760
Speaker 3: bit biased and he's the perfect guy to write the

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Speaker 3: forward for the official CIA Manual of Trickery and Deception

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00:23:51,080 --> 00:23:54,800
Speaker 3: by Melton and Wallace. And here he says, he kind

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00:23:54,800 --> 00:23:57,000
Speaker 3: of sums up you know what you're referring to there, Nolan,

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Speaker 3: He says. John mulholland was never a household word like

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Speaker 3: the world famous eskepologist Houdini or more recently the illusionist

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00:24:05,520 --> 00:24:12,440
Speaker 3: David Copperfield. But still to McLachlan, Mulholland is the absolute

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Speaker 3: epitome of what a magician is supposed to be.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he's got that secrecy thing on Locke. He also

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00:24:20,920 --> 00:24:24,600
Speaker 2: seems to be extremely good at what he does, and

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Speaker 2: he is well, I think the word that's used in

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00:24:28,880 --> 00:24:32,240
Speaker 2: that quote is inventive, right, Like, yes, he is thinking

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00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:35,520
Speaker 2: outside the box that you put the person in and

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00:24:35,560 --> 00:24:36,480
Speaker 2: saw them in half.

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00:24:36,480 --> 00:24:39,560
Speaker 3: The magic box. He's thinking outside the magic box. Yeah,

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00:24:39,840 --> 00:24:44,760
Speaker 3: he's highly skilled. He can move with the ruffians and

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Speaker 3: the groundlings, but he can well, you know, like Bridgriard

394
00:24:48,960 --> 00:24:51,600
Speaker 3: Kipling would say he could walk with kings but not

395
00:24:51,680 --> 00:24:55,320
Speaker 3: lose his common touch. He could go places and he

396
00:24:55,400 --> 00:24:57,960
Speaker 3: was used to it. He also was.

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Speaker 1: Well known in.

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Speaker 3: Posh New York social circles. He's a real Goldilocks zone

399
00:25:06,320 --> 00:25:13,120
Speaker 3: for the CIA. He has the social, familial, nepotistic connections

400
00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:16,560
Speaker 3: that play a great role in the ad hoc trade

401
00:25:16,560 --> 00:25:20,160
Speaker 3: craft of old. Just like we were talking about this earlier.

402
00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:24,800
Speaker 3: Just like how LDS Latter Day Saint or Mormon missionaries

403
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:28,720
Speaker 3: of the right sort their god to your candidates for

404
00:25:28,800 --> 00:25:33,440
Speaker 3: CIA recruitment. I'm telling you so cool. And Mulholland's kind

405
00:25:33,440 --> 00:25:36,280
Speaker 3: of like on this level of a top pick. He

406
00:25:36,400 --> 00:25:42,040
Speaker 3: checks all the boxes. And at first the idea of

407
00:25:43,720 --> 00:25:47,960
Speaker 3: trying to turn a stage magician to do basically the

408
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:53,119
Speaker 3: greatest trick of his life, it sounds bonkers. You know,

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00:25:53,320 --> 00:25:56,719
Speaker 3: some of the more hard nosed out there in the

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00:25:56,760 --> 00:25:59,879
Speaker 3: field guys are probably thinking, well, what can this entertain

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00:26:00,080 --> 00:26:04,359
Speaker 3: or teach us? We're the world's most dangerous men. You know,

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00:26:04,640 --> 00:26:08,359
Speaker 3: we don't pull rabbits out of hats. We take people's heads.

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Speaker 2: Because they're looking to Mulholland for advice basically, for know how,

414
00:26:13,560 --> 00:26:17,399
Speaker 2: for like you said, a teaching opportunity. They're not looking

415
00:26:17,400 --> 00:26:21,200
Speaker 2: for him to be the person who's out there practicing tradecraft.

416
00:26:21,560 --> 00:26:26,000
Speaker 2: They're basically thinking, what can this guy teach us about tradecraft?

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00:26:26,280 --> 00:26:28,040
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's right, I mean they just they have a

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00:26:28,040 --> 00:26:30,600
Speaker 4: lot in common. There's so many there's so much crossover

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00:26:30,800 --> 00:26:33,240
Speaker 4: Venn diagram, you know, between the skills of a stage

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00:26:33,240 --> 00:26:36,439
Speaker 4: magician and spycraft, and you know the kind of skills

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00:26:36,440 --> 00:26:42,600
Speaker 4: that go into that. Both depend heavily on evasion of

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00:26:43,160 --> 00:26:50,360
Speaker 4: prying eyes, you know, of avoiding scrutiny literally sleight of hand, right, Yeah, that's.

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00:26:50,200 --> 00:26:53,040
Speaker 3: The rub of it when we see the CIA at

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00:26:53,040 --> 00:26:56,320
Speaker 3: this point, we're talking about doctor Gottlieb in particular, he

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00:26:56,480 --> 00:26:59,680
Speaker 3: realized that stage magic, which we would call the art,

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00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:02,679
Speaker 3: and his own trade which we'll call the craft, not

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00:27:02,800 --> 00:27:06,480
Speaker 3: the movie trade craft. They had so much in common,

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00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:10,639
Speaker 3: as you were saying. The Also, just like in Penn

429
00:27:10,720 --> 00:27:15,560
Speaker 3: and Teller's famous TV show Bulls, both a magician and

430
00:27:15,640 --> 00:27:20,280
Speaker 3: an intelligence analyst have to be very sensitive to counterintelligence.

431
00:27:20,520 --> 00:27:23,040
Speaker 3: You got to know the tricks to pull them, you

432
00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:25,760
Speaker 3: got to know the tricks to detect them. And this

433
00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:30,280
Speaker 3: is where we run into It's a common phrase. I

434
00:27:30,320 --> 00:27:34,080
Speaker 3: don't know who originated it, but in the West, counterintelligence

435
00:27:34,160 --> 00:27:38,399
Speaker 3: is often described as a wilderness of mirrors because there

436
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:44,200
Speaker 3: are so many levels of possible information, disinfo, fog of war,

437
00:27:44,840 --> 00:27:49,119
Speaker 3: you know, making the right lie or perfecting the correct

438
00:27:49,160 --> 00:27:53,639
Speaker 3: illusion magic is very similar. You know, you have to

439
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:58,199
Speaker 3: understand the principles misdirection, red herrings, information is symmetry, and

440
00:27:58,320 --> 00:28:01,399
Speaker 3: this strategy. Going back to our earlier thing, here's what

441
00:28:01,440 --> 00:28:05,720
Speaker 3: I mean about specializations. This strategy was well established by

442
00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:10,280
Speaker 3: Russians and the British in their earlier squabbles over control

443
00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:15,640
Speaker 3: of Eurasia. Since we mentioned Bridgard Kipling before, yes he's

444
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:20,080
Speaker 3: kind of an asshole. He's definitely racist, dude, But he

445
00:28:20,200 --> 00:28:23,880
Speaker 3: mentions a lot of this in his novel Kim, which

446
00:28:23,920 --> 00:28:28,159
Speaker 3: is entirely about a boy child spy. I don't know

447
00:28:28,160 --> 00:28:29,760
Speaker 3: if it holds up. It's been a while since I

448
00:28:29,800 --> 00:28:34,399
Speaker 3: read it. All this stuff is based in fact, you know,

449
00:28:34,520 --> 00:28:40,920
Speaker 3: and several legacies of tradecraft and misdirection, magic level misdirection

450
00:28:41,080 --> 00:28:43,960
Speaker 3: continue today. For instance, this is a great one. I'm

451
00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:47,240
Speaker 3: sure we all know this one. But growing up, did you,

452
00:28:47,240 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 3: guys ever hear that carrots are good for your eyes?

453
00:28:49,840 --> 00:28:51,040
Speaker 4: I sure did not.

454
00:28:51,800 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 3: True, they're good.

455
00:28:54,920 --> 00:28:57,320
Speaker 4: For you, but I mean the idea that they're like

456
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:01,400
Speaker 4: somehow magically good for your eyes over other things is

457
00:29:01,440 --> 00:29:03,760
Speaker 4: a little bit of a misdirection.

458
00:29:03,280 --> 00:29:05,120
Speaker 2: In itself, isn't it. No, they help you see in

459
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:05,480
Speaker 2: the dark.

460
00:29:08,480 --> 00:29:12,040
Speaker 3: I mean, you can't see it all if you don't

461
00:29:12,080 --> 00:29:14,719
Speaker 3: eat and you starve to death. So I guess technically

462
00:29:14,800 --> 00:29:21,440
Speaker 3: carrots do help you. See. This is also to that

463
00:29:21,560 --> 00:29:26,080
Speaker 3: excellent point, This is also propaganda. This is a grift

464
00:29:26,680 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 3: from the British that was entirely meant to downplay in

465
00:29:31,760 --> 00:29:36,680
Speaker 3: disguise the existence of radar technology. How do these planes

466
00:29:36,760 --> 00:29:39,440
Speaker 3: keep figuring out where we are? How are they able

467
00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:43,080
Speaker 3: to bomb stuff no one can see in the dark

468
00:29:43,200 --> 00:29:43,560
Speaker 3: like that?

469
00:29:44,200 --> 00:29:44,400
Speaker 4: Sir?

470
00:29:44,760 --> 00:29:49,959
Speaker 3: Have you heard about the carrots? That's terrible?

471
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:55,360
Speaker 4: What about the sticks? That's the question? Nice? So why

472
00:29:55,400 --> 00:29:57,959
Speaker 4: don't we in this case, as you like to say, been,

473
00:29:58,040 --> 00:30:00,280
Speaker 4: exercise a bit of empathy. You don't just like say

474
00:30:00,360 --> 00:30:02,600
Speaker 4: it's a good thing to do. And let's assume the

475
00:30:02,640 --> 00:30:07,080
Speaker 4: perspective of the Central Intelligence Agency at this time. What

476
00:30:07,160 --> 00:30:09,479
Speaker 4: they're thinking here makes a lot of sense. They're facing

477
00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:13,600
Speaker 4: an enemy that plays dirty, that doesn't operate by some

478
00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:16,640
Speaker 4: sort of rigid moral code, or at least maybe they

479
00:30:16,760 --> 00:30:19,400
Speaker 4: have a code, but it's not necessarily one that is

480
00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:22,080
Speaker 4: predictable or one that plays by.

481
00:30:21,960 --> 00:30:28,760
Speaker 2: The rules, right exactly. So let's jump to a report

482
00:30:28,960 --> 00:30:33,920
Speaker 2: that President Eisenhower received in nineteen fifty four that was

483
00:30:33,960 --> 00:30:37,720
Speaker 2: talking about more potential surprise attacks that are on the way.

484
00:30:38,240 --> 00:30:41,520
Speaker 2: And in this it's not authored by but it's headed

485
00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:45,560
Speaker 2: by a retired general named James H. Doolittle. And this

486
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:49,720
Speaker 2: is the this is the quote. This is a takeaway

487
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:54,160
Speaker 2: here quote. If the US is to survive this is

488
00:30:54,200 --> 00:30:58,480
Speaker 2: in nineteen fifty four, long standing American concepts of fair

489
00:30:58,560 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 2: play must be reconcs We must learn to subvert, sabotage,

490
00:31:02,600 --> 00:31:06,240
Speaker 2: and destroy our enemies by cleverer and more sophisticated and

491
00:31:06,280 --> 00:31:10,280
Speaker 2: more effective methods than those used against us. It may

492
00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:14,800
Speaker 2: become necessary that the American people become acquainted with, understand,

493
00:31:15,120 --> 00:31:19,000
Speaker 2: and support this fundamentally repugnant philosophy.

494
00:31:19,200 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, repugnant is one of the words that was used,

495
00:31:23,320 --> 00:31:29,240
Speaker 3: not infrequently, if anybody remembers this time, because one of

496
00:31:29,240 --> 00:31:33,440
Speaker 3: the concerns was, weirdly enough, it was similar to how

497
00:31:33,600 --> 00:31:38,640
Speaker 3: European forces felt fighting Americans in the Revolutionary War. These

498
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:41,160
Speaker 3: guys aren't playing by our rule book. You know what

499
00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:44,080
Speaker 3: I mean, You're not doing it fair. And if you've

500
00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:47,400
Speaker 3: ever been in a real fight, you know that fairness

501
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:50,600
Speaker 3: goes out the window in about two seconds.

502
00:31:50,960 --> 00:31:51,160
Speaker 4: Right.

503
00:31:51,200 --> 00:31:53,560
Speaker 3: That's why ninety percent of real fights out on the

504
00:31:53,600 --> 00:31:56,920
Speaker 3: street end up on the ground, so quickly they're going

505
00:31:56,920 --> 00:31:59,080
Speaker 3: for your hair, They're going for your eyes, your throat,

506
00:31:59,160 --> 00:32:01,320
Speaker 3: and your balls, you know what I mean. They're gonna

507
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:03,640
Speaker 3: a lot. They're gonna break those bones if they can.

508
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:07,440
Speaker 3: And that's what the US is dealing with a version

509
00:32:07,480 --> 00:32:12,680
Speaker 3: of that, and they're saying, look, also, our counterparts on

510
00:32:12,720 --> 00:32:15,200
Speaker 3: the other side of the curtain, they don't have a

511
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:20,719
Speaker 3: problem with sending people on one way operations, you know,

512
00:32:21,000 --> 00:32:26,280
Speaker 3: just like the Japanese Army would send divine wind or

513
00:32:26,360 --> 00:32:33,120
Speaker 3: kamikaze pilots, you know, on these suicide missions and funny story, well,

514
00:32:33,400 --> 00:32:35,200
Speaker 3: the opposite of a funny story. A lot of people

515
00:32:35,240 --> 00:32:39,560
Speaker 3: don't know this. I think the Japanese Empire also did

516
00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:47,120
Speaker 3: that with naval vessels. They took teenage boys age like

517
00:32:47,440 --> 00:32:50,600
Speaker 3: fourteen to seventeen, and they put them on these plywood

518
00:32:50,640 --> 00:32:54,200
Speaker 3: boats with a single massive depth charge and they gave

519
00:32:54,240 --> 00:32:58,000
Speaker 3: them just enough fuel to hit an enemy vessel. So

520
00:32:58,160 --> 00:33:01,440
Speaker 3: this is stuff that is an ass them unclean to

521
00:33:01,600 --> 00:33:04,440
Speaker 3: American forces. They've got to figure out, like you were

522
00:33:04,480 --> 00:33:07,840
Speaker 3: saying in the Eisenhower pull there, Matt, They've got to

523
00:33:07,840 --> 00:33:14,880
Speaker 3: figure out how they how they respond in the face

524
00:33:14,920 --> 00:33:20,200
Speaker 3: of something that seems so cold, right and unceasing, and

525
00:33:20,600 --> 00:33:24,600
Speaker 3: is more than willing to lose a few fingers right

526
00:33:24,720 --> 00:33:25,840
Speaker 3: to advance its hand.

527
00:33:26,440 --> 00:33:28,960
Speaker 4: Yes, and let's also remember that the US is still

528
00:33:29,120 --> 00:33:33,360
Speaker 4: relatively new to this type of operation. They have a

529
00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:35,560
Speaker 4: lot of catching up to do. You know, they really

530
00:33:35,560 --> 00:33:38,640
Speaker 4: do have to kind of assess the enemy and begin

531
00:33:38,760 --> 00:33:41,800
Speaker 4: to shift their focus into this new kind of world

532
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:46,680
Speaker 4: of clandestine asymmetric warfare. So let's fast forward now to

533
00:33:46,720 --> 00:33:51,840
Speaker 4: the presence. I believe Ben you've requested a special secretive

534
00:33:51,880 --> 00:33:53,360
Speaker 4: sound cue from Triforce.

535
00:33:54,160 --> 00:33:57,280
Speaker 3: Oh yes, if we're all cool with it, TryForce give

536
00:33:57,360 --> 00:34:00,200
Speaker 3: us some music as we switch the present tense. Let's

537
00:34:00,240 --> 00:34:04,640
Speaker 3: go in situ in media arrests. It's nineteen fifty three.

538
00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:05,760
Speaker 3: What does that mean?

539
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:08,960
Speaker 4: Full on cold wars? What that means?

540
00:34:09,120 --> 00:34:12,799
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe only four years after the Soviet Union did

541
00:34:12,840 --> 00:34:16,319
Speaker 2: a little nuclear bomb testing in surprise the pants off,

542
00:34:16,480 --> 00:34:18,960
Speaker 2: Uncle Sam full bit? Yeah, Uncle Sam?

543
00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:19,160
Speaker 3: Wait?

544
00:34:19,239 --> 00:34:23,040
Speaker 2: Wait what what? And now now the all of the

545
00:34:23,080 --> 00:34:25,839
Speaker 2: things we've been talking about are culminating, right, we got

546
00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:28,560
Speaker 2: to get better information as fast as we can.

547
00:34:30,080 --> 00:34:35,560
Speaker 3: And this is where the CIA approaches Johnny boy, this

548
00:34:34,960 --> 00:34:38,640
Speaker 3: is this is so funny. It's a twisted rom com.

549
00:34:39,040 --> 00:34:43,960
Speaker 3: Through a series of plausibly innocuous conversations, they pitched the

550
00:34:44,080 --> 00:34:48,239
Speaker 3: idea of writing a manual for field officers work that

551
00:34:48,360 --> 00:34:52,600
Speaker 3: weaponizes magic, essentially, as we're saying earlier, teach our folks

552
00:34:52,640 --> 00:34:54,520
Speaker 3: to perform your tricks.

553
00:34:54,800 --> 00:34:58,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's incredible stuff. Just the idea of how do

554
00:34:58,160 --> 00:35:02,120
Speaker 2: we make our guys better at giving a secret message

555
00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:02,760
Speaker 2: to somebody?

556
00:35:02,840 --> 00:35:03,000
Speaker 4: Right?

557
00:35:03,080 --> 00:35:05,400
Speaker 2: The old what is that move called the bumping the

558
00:35:05,560 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 2: like bumping past or the thing where no, no, the

559
00:35:10,120 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 2: thing where you like you just brush past each other off.

560
00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:18,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, that kind of thing, right pocketing, Yeah, well yeah.

561
00:35:18,640 --> 00:35:22,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, pickpocketing or two agents that you know, nobody knows

562
00:35:22,800 --> 00:35:24,520
Speaker 2: their agents, but they were able to pass each other

563
00:35:24,560 --> 00:35:27,400
Speaker 2: and get a message, or to hide something, you know,

564
00:35:27,760 --> 00:35:29,080
Speaker 2: or to kill somebody.

565
00:35:28,840 --> 00:35:33,080
Speaker 3: In secret, right right, And the CIA wants Mulholland to

566
00:35:33,200 --> 00:35:36,319
Speaker 3: break that magician's oath that he's loved since he was

567
00:35:36,360 --> 00:35:40,479
Speaker 3: a child, and in doing so, educate dem boys, which

568
00:35:40,560 --> 00:35:43,120
Speaker 3: is not how they refer to themselves. On the art

569
00:35:43,200 --> 00:35:48,280
Speaker 3: of secretly administering pills and poison. In addition to transmitting messages,

570
00:35:49,160 --> 00:35:53,080
Speaker 3: they wanted him, specifically to develop the skill to surreptitiously

571
00:35:53,200 --> 00:35:56,360
Speaker 3: place a pill or other substance in drink or food

572
00:35:56,400 --> 00:35:59,080
Speaker 3: to be consumed by a target. We're giving you that

573
00:35:59,239 --> 00:36:03,239
Speaker 3: verbatim quote because it's important to know that John was

574
00:36:03,880 --> 00:36:07,880
Speaker 3: cognizant of what was happening. He knew that if he

575
00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:12,160
Speaker 3: revealed these techniques to people that to your earlier point,

576
00:36:12,160 --> 00:36:15,839
Speaker 3: NOL didn't need a ton of technology. They were going

577
00:36:15,880 --> 00:36:18,520
Speaker 3: to try to kill folks with them, like they were

578
00:36:18,600 --> 00:36:21,160
Speaker 3: going to try to take his sleight of hand, and

579
00:36:21,880 --> 00:36:24,760
Speaker 3: you know, slim down some life expectancies.

580
00:36:25,080 --> 00:36:27,719
Speaker 4: No, for sure. I mean it's a very definition of

581
00:36:27,760 --> 00:36:33,640
Speaker 4: weaponizing a craft. Mulholland accepts a meager salary stipend, really

582
00:36:33,680 --> 00:36:37,960
Speaker 4: more of three thousand dollars to write this manual that

583
00:36:38,000 --> 00:36:42,239
Speaker 4: we are talking about. The CIA proves this expense as

584
00:36:42,360 --> 00:36:48,320
Speaker 4: part of MK Ultry Subprojects number four on May fourth

585
00:36:48,360 --> 00:36:51,279
Speaker 4: of nineteen fifty three. Ben, what do you say we

586
00:36:51,600 --> 00:36:55,040
Speaker 4: ridiculous history inflation? Calculate this bad boy.

587
00:36:55,719 --> 00:36:59,920
Speaker 3: Ah, Yes, let's do it. So three thousand US dollars

588
00:37:00,040 --> 00:37:08,959
Speaker 3: in nineteen fifty three is equivalent to drum roll, Matt,

589
00:37:09,000 --> 00:37:09,920
Speaker 3: will you do the honors?

590
00:37:11,080 --> 00:37:14,680
Speaker 2: Thirty five thousand, two hundred and forty five point nine

591
00:37:14,719 --> 00:37:17,440
Speaker 2: to six US dollars sterling.

592
00:37:17,840 --> 00:37:19,160
Speaker 4: No, it'spell never mind.

593
00:37:19,719 --> 00:37:23,719
Speaker 3: I mean, look, that's a hefty payday, but it's not

594
00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:26,879
Speaker 3: a ton of money. It's not what you would think

595
00:37:26,960 --> 00:37:29,600
Speaker 3: of as it. I think also, we get as weekly.

596
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:34,160
Speaker 3: There's no publishing.

597
00:37:34,480 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 4: This is just here.

598
00:37:35,640 --> 00:37:41,160
Speaker 3: Here's why they're drawing on Mulholland's previously proven patriotism. They're

599
00:37:41,200 --> 00:37:43,400
Speaker 3: giving him a stipend, right, but it's just kind of

600
00:37:43,400 --> 00:37:46,560
Speaker 3: for his time. Uh, he's in his fifties at this point.

601
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:49,240
Speaker 3: He doesn't need the money. And we need to bust

602
00:37:49,239 --> 00:37:51,640
Speaker 3: a myth that often happens with this kind of stuff.

603
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:56,040
Speaker 3: Just like when you read about corrupt politicians in Congress

604
00:37:56,080 --> 00:37:59,399
Speaker 3: on either side of the aisle, and you see how

605
00:37:59,440 --> 00:38:05,000
Speaker 3: little it takes to buy their vote, right, like a

606
00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:09,480
Speaker 3: small amount of money. We could put that together, the

607
00:38:09,520 --> 00:38:12,359
Speaker 3: five of us tonight, we could do that. We could

608
00:38:12,400 --> 00:38:17,359
Speaker 3: sway a member of Congress. Potentially. It turns out that

609
00:38:18,560 --> 00:38:22,920
Speaker 3: the assets right and turning people and all that jazz

610
00:38:23,560 --> 00:38:27,359
Speaker 3: also is way more affordable than you think. And that

611
00:38:27,400 --> 00:38:35,000
Speaker 3: should scare you. That should scare the crap out of everybody. Really, Uh,

612
00:38:35,480 --> 00:38:37,480
Speaker 3: we're gonna move on though, we're not gonna talk to

613
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:43,920
Speaker 3: us about that. Yeah, yeah, I'm smiling from fright. So anyway,

614
00:38:44,200 --> 00:38:47,920
Speaker 3: Mulholden doesn't need money. He also doesn't need to play

615
00:38:47,960 --> 00:38:51,000
Speaker 3: this game. And interestingly enough, as we see time and

616
00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:54,960
Speaker 3: time again, the CIA is coming to him hat in hand.

617
00:38:55,520 --> 00:39:00,560
Speaker 3: They are politely, diplomatically, if cryptically, asking him to help.

618
00:39:01,000 --> 00:39:04,800
Speaker 3: They are not doing things that they've done in the past,

619
00:39:04,880 --> 00:39:08,759
Speaker 3: or that the Russian counterparts would do, which is to

620
00:39:09,040 --> 00:39:13,080
Speaker 3: use the stick method we referred to earlier, the stick

621
00:39:13,160 --> 00:39:15,320
Speaker 3: method Karen and stick we've talked about in the past,

622
00:39:15,640 --> 00:39:18,400
Speaker 3: the stick method that in this case would be blackmail,

623
00:39:19,080 --> 00:39:22,760
Speaker 3: would be extortion, would be threatening a family member, things

624
00:39:22,840 --> 00:39:27,000
Speaker 3: like that, which are totally possible and happen all the

625
00:39:27,080 --> 00:39:30,600
Speaker 3: time in this era of history. Instead, they say, look, man,

626
00:39:30,800 --> 00:39:33,759
Speaker 3: you're a patriot, we're on the same team. Also, you

627
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:35,560
Speaker 3: like magic, help us out.

628
00:39:36,800 --> 00:39:40,720
Speaker 4: And he is fully on board for this. As previously mentioned,

629
00:39:40,760 --> 00:39:44,439
Speaker 4: his patriotism is on full display. He's more or less

630
00:39:44,440 --> 00:39:47,560
Speaker 4: in it not for the money, but to help his country,

631
00:39:47,600 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 4: and he does so with one of his greatest tricks

632
00:39:50,239 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 4: of all time.

633
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:55,400
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, this guy is well known. He's not Houdini,

634
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:58,319
Speaker 2: he's not Copperfield, but he's known. So how do you

635
00:39:58,360 --> 00:40:01,240
Speaker 2: cover the tracks and get this to spend the amount

636
00:40:01,239 --> 00:40:04,399
Speaker 2: of time that it would take to create this work? Right,

637
00:40:04,880 --> 00:40:09,160
Speaker 2: he's he's he is the I guess he's the editor

638
00:40:09,880 --> 00:40:12,600
Speaker 2: of The Sphinx, which again comes out all the time.

639
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:16,480
Speaker 2: If he's just gone from there, you're not covering your

640
00:40:16,520 --> 00:40:17,279
Speaker 2: tracks very well.

641
00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:19,120
Speaker 4: Yeah, he is.

642
00:40:19,320 --> 00:40:21,680
Speaker 3: You know, he's not coke, he's not pepsi, but he's

643
00:40:21,719 --> 00:40:24,000
Speaker 3: kind of like cheer wine. You know, people are aware

644
00:40:24,000 --> 00:40:28,480
Speaker 3: of him. He needs he needs that cover story you're

645
00:40:28,520 --> 00:40:32,080
Speaker 3: talking about. So in nineteen fifty three, it comes to

646
00:40:32,200 --> 00:40:36,280
Speaker 3: pass that he finally takes a sabbatical from the Sphinx.

647
00:40:37,080 --> 00:40:38,279
Speaker 3: The official reason.

648
00:40:38,040 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 2: Spend time with his family.

649
00:40:40,480 --> 00:40:43,439
Speaker 3: I love it. I'm sorry, sorry, wait, no, no, no, no,

650
00:40:43,520 --> 00:40:45,600
Speaker 3: let's stay there. How often do you guys think that.

651
00:40:45,640 --> 00:40:47,960
Speaker 4: Is sincere, what to spend time with their family?

652
00:40:48,560 --> 00:40:52,240
Speaker 3: No politicians say it, like what a politician?

653
00:40:54,320 --> 00:40:57,839
Speaker 4: Very rarely, maybe never, because.

654
00:40:57,520 --> 00:41:01,520
Speaker 3: They could have spent time with their family all of

655
00:41:01,560 --> 00:41:04,719
Speaker 3: the years before they were caught, you know, taking illegal

656
00:41:05,280 --> 00:41:08,560
Speaker 3: bribes or I hate to have to say illegal bribes,

657
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:13,279
Speaker 3: or you know, awarding with sex workers. But then it

658
00:41:13,400 --> 00:41:15,480
Speaker 3: shows up in the news and they're like, I'm in

659
00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:19,480
Speaker 3: a I remember I had a kid earlier. I'm going

660
00:41:19,520 --> 00:41:24,279
Speaker 3: to hang out with little Tyson. I don't know why.

661
00:41:24,320 --> 00:41:27,479
Speaker 3: Tyson's a funny name, but anyway, Yeah, the official reason

662
00:41:27,520 --> 00:41:30,840
Speaker 3: he gives their health concerns, and the public buys it

663
00:41:30,920 --> 00:41:34,400
Speaker 3: because he's got an extreme work ethic. He's prodigious in

664
00:41:34,440 --> 00:41:39,799
Speaker 3: his output. He's always working and traveling and maintains, you know,

665
00:41:40,320 --> 00:41:44,160
Speaker 3: reams of correspondence. So not just the public, but his

666
00:41:44,320 --> 00:41:46,560
Speaker 3: colleagues in the world of magic, they all buy this

667
00:41:46,719 --> 00:41:49,600
Speaker 3: and they say, you know, sometimes, hey, the guy's taking

668
00:41:49,640 --> 00:41:52,960
Speaker 3: a vacation. Good for him, and that's how he maintains

669
00:41:52,960 --> 00:41:55,560
Speaker 3: his secrecy. And we're going to take a break for

670
00:41:55,600 --> 00:41:58,359
Speaker 3: a word from our sponsors. Then we're going to learn

671
00:41:58,520 --> 00:42:02,239
Speaker 3: what John Mulholland RUMs and how, and we'll also see

672
00:42:02,280 --> 00:42:04,520
Speaker 3: some of that rom com we were talking about.

673
00:42:17,280 --> 00:42:21,920
Speaker 4: And we've returned and let's jump right into MK Ultra.

674
00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:25,280
Speaker 4: We've already set up some of the other operations involved

675
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:29,839
Speaker 4: in this program, and Mulholland's manual is no different. This

676
00:42:30,120 --> 00:42:33,200
Speaker 4: is not meant to be known about by the public.

677
00:42:33,560 --> 00:42:37,680
Speaker 4: And doctor Godlieb and his cronies deploy their own kind

678
00:42:37,719 --> 00:42:41,480
Speaker 4: of brand of tradecraft in an effort to conceal all

679
00:42:41,520 --> 00:42:45,600
Speaker 4: of the correspondence that goes into this project writing this manual.

680
00:42:46,239 --> 00:42:46,719
Speaker 1: Yeah.

681
00:42:46,840 --> 00:42:50,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like a courtship dance, you know, where they

682
00:42:50,640 --> 00:42:53,120
Speaker 3: don't want to give away too much, but they have

683
00:42:53,200 --> 00:42:58,400
Speaker 3: to convey enough information somehow that this guy can agree.

684
00:42:58,800 --> 00:43:01,600
Speaker 3: There is a formal secrecy agreement. Think of it like

685
00:43:01,640 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 3: an NDA on steroids. Obviously, someone who loves the magician's

686
00:43:05,680 --> 00:43:08,840
Speaker 3: oath is also going to be kind of interested and

687
00:43:08,920 --> 00:43:13,560
Speaker 3: intrigued in that. And there's shell companies, aliases, there's shadow

688
00:43:13,680 --> 00:43:16,880
Speaker 3: po boxes. Quick note for all of us playing along

689
00:43:16,920 --> 00:43:19,839
Speaker 3: at home. This was way easier back in the day

690
00:43:20,120 --> 00:43:23,320
Speaker 3: to do physically. I think you can still do stuff

691
00:43:23,400 --> 00:43:26,520
Speaker 3: like this digitally, but it's I don't know, what do

692
00:43:26,520 --> 00:43:29,160
Speaker 3: you think is it easier to get Well, let's talk

693
00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:33,719
Speaker 3: about what he's doing, so all right, Gottlieb contacts Mulholland

694
00:43:34,200 --> 00:43:38,640
Speaker 3: under a fake name. He's should and C. Griffith representing

695
00:43:38,760 --> 00:43:42,520
Speaker 3: Chemo Freil Associates via a PO box in DC.

696
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:48,760
Speaker 4: That's an amazing a globokeem name for a fake company.

697
00:43:48,920 --> 00:43:54,480
Speaker 3: Kimro Field and later the peobox number changes. Kemro Field

698
00:43:54,560 --> 00:43:57,640
Speaker 3: becomes the Granger Research Company. What do we say about

699
00:43:57,640 --> 00:44:03,480
Speaker 3: innocuous names and news? Yeah? Yeah, and Grifford becomes Granger.

700
00:44:03,880 --> 00:44:07,279
Speaker 3: Mull Holden clocks this. This is super He's guys, he's

701
00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:10,279
Speaker 3: so down. He's so super down with this. That is

702
00:44:10,280 --> 00:44:12,239
Speaker 3: where I have to pause and ask, do you think

703
00:44:12,280 --> 00:44:18,799
Speaker 3: it's easier to do this kind of shenaniganism in the

704
00:44:18,880 --> 00:44:20,680
Speaker 3: digital age or is it more difficult?

705
00:44:21,560 --> 00:44:25,720
Speaker 4: I guess that there are conveniences, but there are also

706
00:44:25,880 --> 00:44:30,560
Speaker 4: much more robust interception methods and monitoring methods, So I

707
00:44:30,560 --> 00:44:31,960
Speaker 4: think it might be a bit of a wash.

708
00:44:32,000 --> 00:44:36,960
Speaker 2: When you think Matt oh sliding a message into you know,

709
00:44:37,120 --> 00:44:41,680
Speaker 2: a mailbox somewhere that get sent off that doesn't have

710
00:44:41,920 --> 00:44:44,360
Speaker 2: anything on it, but what's written on it, I feel

711
00:44:44,400 --> 00:44:48,799
Speaker 2: like it's pretty easy. Uh yeah, I don't know. I

712
00:44:48,800 --> 00:44:52,600
Speaker 2: don't know, because you trace everything, even the most like, oh,

713
00:44:52,719 --> 00:44:59,520
Speaker 2: this is untraceable. Electronic activity is if you work backwards, traceable.

714
00:45:00,960 --> 00:45:06,960
Speaker 3: Agreed, Yeah, well said and Mullholland Also, he's doing his

715
00:45:07,080 --> 00:45:09,920
Speaker 3: part of the dance. It's very important to be aware

716
00:45:09,960 --> 00:45:14,120
Speaker 3: of this. He never refers to the CIA nor any

717
00:45:14,200 --> 00:45:18,160
Speaker 3: operations by name. As a matter of fact, as the

718
00:45:18,680 --> 00:45:22,800
Speaker 3: authors we mentioned, the investigators we mentioned earlier, as they argue,

719
00:45:23,640 --> 00:45:27,239
Speaker 3: it's pretty likely that he did not have visibility on

720
00:45:27,280 --> 00:45:31,400
Speaker 3: any specific operation, which is sort of par for the course.

721
00:45:31,880 --> 00:45:35,560
Speaker 3: You can't have a morning meeting where you catch everybody

722
00:45:35,600 --> 00:45:40,120
Speaker 3: affiliated with the CIA up on everything. It's just too

723
00:45:40,120 --> 00:45:44,319
Speaker 3: many people, too many things. So instead he doesn't write

724
00:45:44,320 --> 00:45:48,520
Speaker 3: about field operatives. He writes about performance and tricksness, and

725
00:45:48,880 --> 00:45:52,759
Speaker 3: he and his it's like an improv game where they're

726
00:45:52,800 --> 00:45:57,040
Speaker 3: inventing a code. As they go. They start talking about

727
00:45:57,160 --> 00:46:02,120
Speaker 3: he is a trick that every prof should know, and

728
00:46:02,160 --> 00:46:06,200
Speaker 3: they're in fact, step by step instructions on covert actions

729
00:46:06,440 --> 00:46:08,680
Speaker 3: like you were talking about Matt with the hollowed out coin,

730
00:46:09,160 --> 00:46:09,879
Speaker 3: that kind of thing.

731
00:46:10,000 --> 00:46:14,160
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, exactly. And then you jump forward just a

732
00:46:14,200 --> 00:46:19,000
Speaker 2: little while later to the late days of nineteen fifty four. Well,

733
00:46:19,000 --> 00:46:22,800
Speaker 2: we'll just say approximately a year in change after including

734
00:46:22,800 --> 00:46:27,120
Speaker 2: that quarter, and he submits the first manual and guys,

735
00:46:27,160 --> 00:46:29,279
Speaker 2: I've got an edit on the title, but this is

736
00:46:29,320 --> 00:46:34,000
Speaker 2: the title that was submitted. Quote some operational applications of

737
00:46:34,040 --> 00:46:35,440
Speaker 2: the Art of deception.

738
00:46:36,400 --> 00:46:39,560
Speaker 4: Okay, not super sexy, but I get what it's about.

739
00:46:39,840 --> 00:46:40,520
Speaker 3: What's the edit.

740
00:46:40,880 --> 00:46:42,680
Speaker 2: Well, I think you start with the you say, the

741
00:46:42,800 --> 00:46:47,880
Speaker 2: Art of Deception colon operational applications. That's not some much better.

742
00:46:47,960 --> 00:46:51,400
Speaker 2: These are the operational Applications of the Art of Deception.

743
00:46:51,840 --> 00:46:55,600
Speaker 4: You should I have Matt to name their documents.

744
00:46:56,000 --> 00:47:00,680
Speaker 3: And weirdly, well, actually it's not even weird. Old Gotti

745
00:47:01,239 --> 00:47:05,920
Speaker 3: loves it, as his friends called Sidney and God leaves

746
00:47:06,120 --> 00:47:08,680
Speaker 3: a weird dude. Okay, it's just this. He's a super

747
00:47:08,760 --> 00:47:14,440
Speaker 3: weird dude, and he's very difficult to impress. He is

748
00:47:14,520 --> 00:47:17,760
Speaker 3: so on board with magic. There's something about stage magic

749
00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:23,680
Speaker 3: that just brightens the date of these spooky guys. And

750
00:47:23,800 --> 00:47:27,560
Speaker 3: so soon after this first manual, which I agree, Noel,

751
00:47:28,280 --> 00:47:31,759
Speaker 3: that you have a better title, Matt, we wish you

752
00:47:31,840 --> 00:47:35,719
Speaker 3: were in the room with him. Doctor g asked moholland

753
00:47:35,800 --> 00:47:39,600
Speaker 3: to create a new book, a sequel to the Banger,

754
00:47:39,920 --> 00:47:43,879
Speaker 3: some Operational Applications of the Art of Deception, and this

755
00:47:43,920 --> 00:47:49,200
Speaker 3: one is instructions entirely on how to communicate information through

756
00:47:49,360 --> 00:47:55,759
Speaker 3: unconventional meaning non electrical means. So mholland comes back with

757
00:47:55,880 --> 00:48:01,040
Speaker 3: a different manual called Recognition Signals. It's much kind of

758
00:48:01,120 --> 00:48:03,760
Speaker 3: like how Part two of this series is it's probably

759
00:48:03,800 --> 00:48:05,240
Speaker 3: a little shorter than part one.

760
00:48:05,560 --> 00:48:07,760
Speaker 4: Yes, so, I mean the question then becomes like, what

761
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:12,160
Speaker 4: is the difference between a stage magician and a covert operator.

762
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:15,800
Speaker 4: Early on Mulholland made note that the alpha and omega

763
00:48:15,840 --> 00:48:20,719
Speaker 4: difference between stage performance and field work is the presence

764
00:48:20,840 --> 00:48:22,800
Speaker 4: or the nature of an audience. I guess an audience

765
00:48:22,800 --> 00:48:26,200
Speaker 4: seeing a magician consents to be tricked. However, an operative

766
00:48:26,200 --> 00:48:28,920
Speaker 4: in the field is as much higher stakes as we

767
00:48:29,000 --> 00:48:32,080
Speaker 4: talked about having your cover blown. It is all a

768
00:48:32,320 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 4: non consensual act of deception. A bad magician might lose

769
00:48:38,040 --> 00:48:41,839
Speaker 4: their reputation or be ostracized by the magic community or

770
00:48:42,000 --> 00:48:45,040
Speaker 4: God forbid, boot off the stage, or given the old hook.

771
00:48:45,360 --> 00:48:51,600
Speaker 4: An operative might be arrested, detained, interrogated, or of course

772
00:48:51,800 --> 00:48:56,360
Speaker 4: killed after horrific interrogation methods and torture, you know, for

773
00:48:56,640 --> 00:48:59,920
Speaker 4: just a tiny little slip up. And Mulholland describes all

774
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:01,680
Speaker 4: this these stakes beautifully.

775
00:49:01,880 --> 00:49:04,799
Speaker 3: Yeah, he says, the more of the performer that can

776
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:08,480
Speaker 3: be seen, the less his chance of doing anything without detection.

777
00:49:08,960 --> 00:49:11,360
Speaker 3: As an example of performer on the stage would be

778
00:49:11,440 --> 00:49:14,000
Speaker 3: seen where he to put his hand into his pocket,

779
00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:17,000
Speaker 3: but that action can be made without being seen while

780
00:49:17,080 --> 00:49:20,560
Speaker 3: standing close to a person, so the hand is outside

781
00:49:20,680 --> 00:49:24,080
Speaker 3: of his range of vision. This is pretty specific, but

782
00:49:24,239 --> 00:49:29,360
Speaker 3: he's it gives you a sense of the clarity with

783
00:49:29,520 --> 00:49:33,880
Speaker 3: which he writes. Right, He's not trying to wax philosophical.

784
00:49:34,400 --> 00:49:37,279
Speaker 3: He's giving you what may as well be the equivalent

785
00:49:37,680 --> 00:49:42,560
Speaker 3: of an ikea assembly manual. At different parts in his industry,

786
00:49:42,600 --> 00:49:46,320
Speaker 3: this is called sideline or stage management. But his audience

787
00:49:46,680 --> 00:49:50,879
Speaker 3: doubtlessly already recognizes this as the importance of proximity.

788
00:49:51,120 --> 00:49:53,960
Speaker 2: Oh, for sure, there's all kinds of fun little tidbits

789
00:49:53,960 --> 00:49:57,480
Speaker 2: in there about lighting a cigarette and the use of

790
00:49:57,800 --> 00:50:01,000
Speaker 2: light in your hand, right live sleight of hand, just

791
00:50:01,000 --> 00:50:03,160
Speaker 2: to do something else on the scene with your other hand,

792
00:50:03,160 --> 00:50:07,799
Speaker 2: because of how much attention that action draws, Right sure,

793
00:50:07,800 --> 00:50:11,440
Speaker 2: all kinds of just incredible little things like that that

794
00:50:11,880 --> 00:50:15,520
Speaker 2: people do. Anyway, it's just you're, you're. He's telling you

795
00:50:15,560 --> 00:50:19,279
Speaker 2: how to use that thing that everybody does is completely inocuous,

796
00:50:19,320 --> 00:50:21,120
Speaker 2: and then hide something within that.

797
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:26,000
Speaker 3: Action, and how to especially in uh the second book,

798
00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:30,640
Speaker 3: recognition signals. He's also talking a little, a little closer,

799
00:50:30,680 --> 00:50:32,920
Speaker 3: I would say, even to the pre existing language of

800
00:50:33,000 --> 00:50:35,680
Speaker 3: trade craft. You know what I mean, Like, tie in

801
00:50:35,719 --> 00:50:39,839
Speaker 3: the shoe is a good old way we could talk about.

802
00:50:40,080 --> 00:50:42,479
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and how to hide somebody if you're trying

803
00:50:42,480 --> 00:50:44,839
Speaker 2: to get them in or out of a place. Inside

804
00:50:45,520 --> 00:50:48,120
Speaker 2: a loaded like a crate that you are taking in

805
00:50:48,280 --> 00:50:50,600
Speaker 2: or out of a place. Make it look like a

806
00:50:50,640 --> 00:50:55,520
Speaker 2: series of bottles, right the giant, you know, have four

807
00:50:55,560 --> 00:50:58,759
Speaker 2: palettes of something, but then there's actually a compartment in

808
00:50:58,800 --> 00:50:59,759
Speaker 2: there for a human being.

809
00:51:00,440 --> 00:51:05,959
Speaker 3: Magic box exactly. So this is brilliant stuff. And he

810
00:51:06,080 --> 00:51:10,000
Speaker 3: breaks them, just like the Cia or the oss breaking

811
00:51:10,080 --> 00:51:14,040
Speaker 3: laws for a greater good. He breaks the magician's oath

812
00:51:14,520 --> 00:51:18,200
Speaker 3: in service of a greater good. And he also is there.

813
00:51:18,640 --> 00:51:22,400
Speaker 3: You can tell sometimes, I think his frustration or his

814
00:51:22,560 --> 00:51:25,680
Speaker 3: concern that comes across because there are some things that

815
00:51:25,719 --> 00:51:28,480
Speaker 3: can only really be taught in person. And one of

816
00:51:28,520 --> 00:51:33,160
Speaker 3: the things that he has he takes pains to emphasize

817
00:51:33,320 --> 00:51:36,799
Speaker 3: is the importance of acting natural. You know, you have

818
00:51:36,880 --> 00:51:40,040
Speaker 3: to you have to look like you belong here, even

819
00:51:40,040 --> 00:51:42,880
Speaker 3: if you don't speak the language. What is acting natural?

820
00:51:43,080 --> 00:51:47,239
Speaker 3: It's a combination of indifference, maybe a little bit of stupidity,

821
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:49,839
Speaker 3: and then confidence, you know what I mean.

822
00:51:50,080 --> 00:51:52,560
Speaker 4: Yeah, like and stuff that's kind of hard to teach,

823
00:51:52,760 --> 00:51:55,799
Speaker 4: you know. Yeah, it certainly requires a certain kind of aptitude.

824
00:51:56,120 --> 00:51:58,279
Speaker 4: You know, it makes you a good candidate for this

825
00:51:58,360 --> 00:51:58,920
Speaker 4: kind of stuff.

826
00:51:59,239 --> 00:52:01,480
Speaker 3: Swim through the water like you don't know, people can

827
00:52:01,560 --> 00:52:02,560
Speaker 3: drown there.

828
00:52:02,600 --> 00:52:05,759
Speaker 2: You go and look a little disheveled while you're doing it,

829
00:52:05,960 --> 00:52:10,080
Speaker 2: because only a spy would be completely buttoned up in

830
00:52:10,160 --> 00:52:12,040
Speaker 2: all this stuff, and you're outfit would look great and

831
00:52:12,040 --> 00:52:15,080
Speaker 2: your hair would be perfect, and you know, it's really interesting.

832
00:52:15,239 --> 00:52:19,279
Speaker 3: So yeah, yeah, you want to be invisible, right, You

833
00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:22,279
Speaker 3: want to be non interesting. You don't want to be

834
00:52:22,360 --> 00:52:26,200
Speaker 3: the Dosakis guy, because the Dosakis guy dies, so does

835
00:52:26,239 --> 00:52:30,320
Speaker 3: every James Pond pretty much. But this, like that, that's

836
00:52:30,360 --> 00:52:35,920
Speaker 3: the art of this stuff, and his insights are incredibly helpful.

837
00:52:35,960 --> 00:52:38,480
Speaker 3: If we fast forward to nineteen fifty six, we know

838
00:52:38,480 --> 00:52:42,440
Speaker 3: Gottlieb is digging the holy heck out of his favorite

839
00:52:42,440 --> 00:52:46,839
Speaker 3: Patriot magician and he essentially promotes mul Holland from what

840
00:52:46,880 --> 00:52:50,040
Speaker 3: we would call a contributing author to an active consultant.

841
00:52:50,320 --> 00:52:52,840
Speaker 3: And there are two reasons he does this. Neither of

842
00:52:52,880 --> 00:52:55,759
Speaker 3: them are based in friendship. The first reason we have

843
00:52:55,840 --> 00:53:00,239
Speaker 3: to assume is that the instructions in these manuals yield result.

844
00:53:00,680 --> 00:53:04,399
Speaker 3: Field operatives, whether or not they actually like magic, are

845
00:53:04,480 --> 00:53:07,680
Speaker 3: able to do this stuff. They're able to really read

846
00:53:07,719 --> 00:53:11,000
Speaker 3: this book and really pull off operations right.

847
00:53:11,280 --> 00:53:14,240
Speaker 4: The step by step guide, you know, in the hands

848
00:53:14,280 --> 00:53:18,560
Speaker 4: of qualified agents that already have that kind of aptitude,

849
00:53:19,040 --> 00:53:23,680
Speaker 4: gives them this ability to execute an objective and most importantly,

850
00:53:23,760 --> 00:53:27,600
Speaker 4: to make an escape, to get out there, returning to

851
00:53:27,680 --> 00:53:31,840
Speaker 4: management and proceeding onto the next assignments.

852
00:53:32,160 --> 00:53:38,320
Speaker 3: Yeah. And secondly, weirdly enough, most importantly, well, Holland stays quiet.

853
00:53:38,520 --> 00:53:41,279
Speaker 3: He never talks to anybody about his work, or we

854
00:53:41,360 --> 00:53:44,160
Speaker 3: have no record of him doing so. In the age

855
00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:47,680
Speaker 3: of social media where everybody is so incentivized to brag

856
00:53:47,719 --> 00:53:50,920
Speaker 3: about anything, this is pretty wild. So how do we

857
00:53:51,000 --> 00:53:54,040
Speaker 3: know about this today? We teased it in chapter one.

858
00:53:55,239 --> 00:53:59,120
Speaker 3: We know about this due to happy accident and intrepid investigation.

859
00:53:59,560 --> 00:54:03,640
Speaker 3: This case, we owe a big, big thanks to Robert Wallace,

860
00:54:03,880 --> 00:54:06,759
Speaker 3: who is the former director of the CIA's Office of

861
00:54:06,800 --> 00:54:11,120
Speaker 3: Technical Services in two thousand and seven. Right, this guy

862
00:54:11,239 --> 00:54:15,360
Speaker 3: is pouring through all these old documents, all these old papers,

863
00:54:15,560 --> 00:54:19,600
Speaker 3: you know which ones need the famous black highlighters and

864
00:54:19,640 --> 00:54:23,960
Speaker 3: so on, and he discovers these vague references to something

865
00:54:24,040 --> 00:54:28,279
Speaker 3: called magician manuals, you know, like, what are these? What

866
00:54:28,400 --> 00:54:32,040
Speaker 3: is responding signals? What's all this clap trap? So he

867
00:54:32,120 --> 00:54:36,560
Speaker 3: tenaciously hunts them down, and eventually, after way too much time,

868
00:54:36,920 --> 00:54:41,520
Speaker 3: he uncovers copies that have somehow escaped the great culling

869
00:54:41,719 --> 00:54:45,600
Speaker 3: of MK Ultra. Problem is, according to what I understand,

870
00:54:45,640 --> 00:54:50,120
Speaker 3: these were really low quality copies, like physically difficult to read.

871
00:54:50,680 --> 00:54:54,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, you couldn't read them at all. But also there's

872
00:54:55,000 --> 00:54:58,440
Speaker 2: a book opportunity sitting here right Like what if you

873
00:54:58,480 --> 00:55:00,719
Speaker 2: just couldn't read them at all? Every copy of this

874
00:55:00,840 --> 00:55:03,480
Speaker 2: was supposed to be destroyed in nineteen seventy three, and

875
00:55:03,560 --> 00:55:07,759
Speaker 2: we've got them. That's write a book. Just get your

876
00:55:07,760 --> 00:55:11,520
Speaker 2: intelligence historian friend Keith Keith Melton to help you out,

877
00:55:11,560 --> 00:55:13,200
Speaker 2: and let's just put it out as a book. Baby.

878
00:55:14,400 --> 00:55:17,680
Speaker 4: Well, and you know, given the way time works, these

879
00:55:17,719 --> 00:55:21,520
Speaker 4: manuals at this point weren't considered classified anymore. So Wallace

880
00:55:21,600 --> 00:55:25,719
Speaker 4: and h. Keith Melton were able to dig through some

881
00:55:25,760 --> 00:55:29,200
Speaker 4: of these remnants and bring you know, more information about

882
00:55:29,239 --> 00:55:30,440
Speaker 4: this stuff to the world.

883
00:55:30,960 --> 00:55:35,640
Speaker 2: It's so brilliant because they officially don't exist, right, but

884
00:55:35,680 --> 00:55:36,200
Speaker 2: you've got them.

885
00:55:36,200 --> 00:55:40,480
Speaker 3: Somehow exactly. Yeah, what is it? We always used to

886
00:55:40,520 --> 00:55:46,160
Speaker 3: say we don't lie. The truth changes. We've mentioned that before.

887
00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:46,960
Speaker 2: There you go.

888
00:55:47,400 --> 00:55:49,719
Speaker 3: It's a scary thing that people say with a street.

889
00:55:49,440 --> 00:55:52,440
Speaker 4: Face, and we wonder why we don't trust the CIA.

890
00:55:53,120 --> 00:55:56,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is a fascinating look at what are the

891
00:55:56,719 --> 00:56:02,560
Speaker 3: most successful of conspiracies. These are reproducible strategies. They don't

892
00:56:02,600 --> 00:56:07,000
Speaker 3: need much in the way of equipment, environment or capital investment. Right,

893
00:56:07,120 --> 00:56:09,560
Speaker 3: you can hide these secrets in your head and you

894
00:56:09,600 --> 00:56:13,480
Speaker 3: can apply them to the world around you. History proves

895
00:56:13,520 --> 00:56:16,759
Speaker 3: that these things can happen on a small, large scale.

896
00:56:17,400 --> 00:56:19,319
Speaker 3: At the end of the day, the CIA and the

897
00:56:19,360 --> 00:56:23,440
Speaker 3: magicians agree all the world is a stage. Mulholland dies

898
00:56:23,640 --> 00:56:28,520
Speaker 3: in nineteen seventy. He never tells people about his job

899
00:56:28,640 --> 00:56:33,760
Speaker 3: or about that time he went away for his health.

900
00:56:34,560 --> 00:56:37,320
Speaker 3: It makes you wonder, right, how much hidden knowledge is

901
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:38,439
Speaker 3: already out there.

902
00:56:38,760 --> 00:56:41,399
Speaker 4: It's interesting. On the one hand, he broke that magician's oath,

903
00:56:41,480 --> 00:56:43,520
Speaker 4: but then he kind of took it back up again.

904
00:56:43,560 --> 00:56:47,000
Speaker 2: I guess, oh, yeah, there's all I guarantee you there's

905
00:56:47,040 --> 00:56:49,279
Speaker 2: all kinds of stuff like this out there, a lot.

906
00:56:49,600 --> 00:56:52,239
Speaker 2: But you know, well, I mean and isn't it a

907
00:56:52,239 --> 00:56:55,239
Speaker 2: little weird that the former director of that office of

908
00:56:55,280 --> 00:57:00,560
Speaker 2: Technical Services we talked about the magicians, right, the technical magicians,

909
00:57:01,520 --> 00:57:05,200
Speaker 2: he's the guy that discovers it. Kind of cool, the

910
00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:09,319
Speaker 2: weird lineage that's snaked its way through the story of

911
00:57:09,360 --> 00:57:09,920
Speaker 2: this stuff.

912
00:57:10,160 --> 00:57:15,120
Speaker 3: I would call it interesting in the Interesting America.

913
00:57:15,640 --> 00:57:18,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, hmm. It does make me think just more and

914
00:57:18,800 --> 00:57:24,959
Speaker 2: more about that that underlying mind state of somebody who

915
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:28,800
Speaker 2: finds themselves immersed in these worlds, these worlds of tradecraft

916
00:57:29,120 --> 00:57:33,200
Speaker 2: and all that stuff. As we said, the perceived misdirection

917
00:57:33,680 --> 00:57:36,880
Speaker 2: that's always coming your way, right, everything is a misdirection.

918
00:57:37,160 --> 00:57:43,320
Speaker 2: So therefore I must mix misdirect everybody outwardly because I

919
00:57:43,560 --> 00:57:45,760
Speaker 2: you know, nobody can know the true me kind of

920
00:57:45,760 --> 00:57:48,520
Speaker 2: thing or what I'm actually doing, because they're all doing

921
00:57:48,560 --> 00:57:49,200
Speaker 2: it to me too.

922
00:57:49,760 --> 00:57:53,680
Speaker 3: Yeah. Hey, if you want to totally non fictional example

923
00:57:53,720 --> 00:57:56,840
Speaker 3: of this, please check out The Passage, which is a

924
00:57:56,880 --> 00:58:01,480
Speaker 3: podcast series ep by you Matt with our pal Nick

925
00:58:01,520 --> 00:58:04,920
Speaker 3: Tikowski as a head writer. There's an episode on Hoover

926
00:58:05,360 --> 00:58:07,800
Speaker 3: that may interest you and give you a window into

927
00:58:07,840 --> 00:58:12,000
Speaker 3: that kind of paranoid reasoning. Again totally factual. The other

928
00:58:12,040 --> 00:58:15,040
Speaker 3: episodes are fiction. That one is one hundred percent true.

929
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:16,520
Speaker 3: It's basically a transcript.

930
00:58:16,960 --> 00:58:19,480
Speaker 2: While we were recording this episode, Dan Bush, the creator

931
00:58:19,520 --> 00:58:21,840
Speaker 2: of that show, was texting me, that's so funny.

932
00:58:22,320 --> 00:58:26,200
Speaker 3: Yes, and check out Dan's other work. Also check out

933
00:58:26,240 --> 00:58:28,880
Speaker 3: all the other episodes we have mentioned in this two

934
00:58:28,960 --> 00:58:32,440
Speaker 3: part series. Folks, write to us, let us know what

935
00:58:32,720 --> 00:58:38,440
Speaker 3: else is out there. What other hidden stories and strange

936
00:58:38,480 --> 00:58:44,160
Speaker 3: bedfellows have the CIA created or made in the course

937
00:58:44,360 --> 00:58:47,160
Speaker 3: of their existence. We'd love to hear from you. We

938
00:58:47,240 --> 00:58:50,040
Speaker 3: try to be easy to find online. You can email us,

939
00:58:50,040 --> 00:58:52,160
Speaker 3: you can call us on the phone. You can hop

940
00:58:52,240 --> 00:58:56,400
Speaker 3: on social media. If you've listened to our episode about

941
00:58:56,480 --> 00:59:00,600
Speaker 3: social media and attention spans, yep, we're we're still on

942
00:59:00,680 --> 00:59:03,200
Speaker 3: there too, so don't feel weird about it.

943
00:59:03,440 --> 00:59:06,280
Speaker 4: Necessary evil. You can find us the handlic Conspiracy stuffhere.

944
00:59:06,280 --> 00:59:08,480
Speaker 4: We exist on Facebook with our Facebook group Here's where

945
00:59:08,520 --> 00:59:11,840
Speaker 4: it gets crazy, on YouTube where we have video content

946
00:59:11,960 --> 00:59:16,720
Speaker 4: galore for your perusing enjoyment, and on ex fka Twitter,

947
00:59:17,080 --> 00:59:19,480
Speaker 4: on Instagram and TikTok you can find us at the

948
00:59:19,480 --> 00:59:21,480
Speaker 4: hand look inspiracy Stuff, show up with there's more.

949
00:59:22,160 --> 00:59:25,000
Speaker 2: Oh, yes, we have a phone number. It's one eight

950
00:59:25,200 --> 00:59:30,280
Speaker 2: three three st D WYTK. It's a voicemail system. And

951
00:59:30,840 --> 00:59:33,120
Speaker 2: you know what we didn't mention in here is the

952
00:59:33,160 --> 00:59:37,960
Speaker 2: concept of concealment and dead drops, which was it wasn't

953
00:59:38,280 --> 00:59:43,040
Speaker 2: invented by our magician friend here who created the memos

954
00:59:43,120 --> 00:59:45,360
Speaker 2: that became the topic of this series, but he did

955
00:59:45,400 --> 00:59:49,720
Speaker 2: revolutionize it, I think, because I just want to talk

956
00:59:49,720 --> 00:59:53,480
Speaker 2: about this. What is the weirdest thing that you could

957
00:59:53,560 --> 00:59:58,080
Speaker 2: hide in plane sight and put like a letter inside

958
00:59:58,080 --> 01:00:01,640
Speaker 2: of it? Right, That's what it drop would be. What

959
01:00:01,760 --> 01:00:03,960
Speaker 2: is the weirdest thing? Call us and let us know

960
01:00:04,480 --> 01:00:06,520
Speaker 2: when you call in, give yourself a cool nickname, and

961
01:00:06,600 --> 01:00:07,800
Speaker 2: let us know if we can use your name and

962
01:00:07,840 --> 01:00:09,640
Speaker 2: message on the air. If you got more to say

963
01:00:09,680 --> 01:00:12,240
Speaker 2: they can fit in a voicemail, why not send us

964
01:00:12,240 --> 01:00:13,360
Speaker 2: a good old fashioned email.

965
01:00:13,480 --> 01:00:17,160
Speaker 3: We are it's dease that read every piece of correspondence

966
01:00:17,240 --> 01:00:19,640
Speaker 3: we receive. It doesn't have to be more than can

967
01:00:19,680 --> 01:00:22,360
Speaker 3: fit in a voicemail. It can be a single one

968
01:00:22,480 --> 01:00:25,360
Speaker 3: line that you like. It can be a response to

969
01:00:25,440 --> 01:00:28,120
Speaker 3: a question we've posed in this series. It can be,

970
01:00:28,280 --> 01:00:32,160
Speaker 3: perhaps most importantly, a proposal for another episode that you

971
01:00:32,280 --> 01:00:37,080
Speaker 3: feel your fellow conspiracy realist will enjoy. We can't wait

972
01:00:37,840 --> 01:00:40,640
Speaker 3: to play out here in the dark with you in

973
01:00:40,680 --> 01:00:45,040
Speaker 3: the greatest of games. A big special thanks to everybody

974
01:00:45,120 --> 01:00:48,960
Speaker 3: who took the time to email us about the Manchester Pusher.

975
01:00:49,240 --> 01:00:52,040
Speaker 3: I can't believe it. We had so much correspondence. We're

976
01:00:52,080 --> 01:00:55,120
Speaker 3: going to bring that to bear in a future listener

977
01:00:55,280 --> 01:01:00,400
Speaker 3: mail program, and when you write to us see this

978
01:01:00,440 --> 01:01:05,120
Speaker 3: we can all respond. Please tell us your favorite strange

979
01:01:05,240 --> 01:01:09,720
Speaker 3: story of espionage, and to the degree that you are comfortable,

980
01:01:10,320 --> 01:01:13,240
Speaker 3: tell us if you ever think you've run a foul

981
01:01:13,400 --> 01:01:16,680
Speaker 3: of an active operation, We'll see you out here on

982
01:01:16,720 --> 01:01:37,360
Speaker 3: the edge of the map. Conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.

983
01:01:37,520 --> 01:01:39,600
Speaker 2: Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production

984
01:01:39,680 --> 01:01:44,240
Speaker 2: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

985
01:01:44,320 --> 01:01:47,360
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.