Planning the Final Escape Strategy

For exclusive interviews, bonus episodes, ad free listening, early access to series, first look at live show tickets, a weekly newsletter, and discounted books, join the declassified club The rest is classified. com One of the most audacious rescue operations CIA has ever run It begins with a mob at the gates of the U. S. emmbassy in Tehran slipping out a side door and a man painting a wolf in a studio above his garage in rural Maryland. This is the true story of Argo This episode is brought to you by HP. In intelligence work, it's rarely the obvious problem that causes failure. It's the overlook detail or the flaw nobody quite solved, the kind of vulnerability intelligence services look for. 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Maybe being one of your books, Not in real life atch every killer episode. You're someone who can dododge for your whereabouts at the time to getid it. Whatre are you the alibi police? That's literally. Exactly who I am. You're killing me. All episodes now streaming on acorn TV. Well, welcome to the Rest is Cassified. I'm Gorden Carrera And I'm Did McClasky. And today David, we begin a four part series on I think one of the most strange and perhaps improbable intelligence operations in history. how the CIA and we'll come back to how much it really was the CIA too It took Gordon twentyw seconds. The CIA were talking about this before we started recording and no discipline, Gordon. When you made me read the first line about one of the most audacious rescue operations CIA hass ever run, E that I'm gonna kind of dispute. but I read it. So anyway, it is the CIA are definitely involved in this operation. And it's audacious. And it is audacious, and it is improbable And it's a rescue operation. It involves the rescue of six US diplomats from Tehran in january nineteen eighty. And it is, of course, David, best known to most people as Ago, isn't it? Because of the film? As we'll see, the operation is at the time not known as Argy. That is not the sort of codename for the operation, anything like that, but it is memorialized in twenty twelve Ben Affleck film, Argo. in which Affleck directed, produced and starred One best picture that film, Gordon and spoiler alert, we will be doing a film review of Argo for club members and Gordon Carrera, as you've ell has very strong thoughts about this film after having rewatched it last night. I have. I have strong views having both watched the film And having researched the story, I have strong views about not its qualities as of drama or its worthiness even for best picture, but at the degree to which it is historical reality, I am going to dispute quite strongly. But anyway, sorry, Ben Affleck, if you're listening, please do come on the pod and tell us about it, but the level of historical accuracy I'm just going just gently question that's all Well, and what's great is were actually we are involved right now. This is, I'm not joking. We are involved right now in an effort to get an interview with Bet Affleck about ourrgo, which I've just completely styied On the podcast, would you have just styied with with your need, your outburst about his wonderful film, which won the Oscar for Pfest. I should have played it better, shouldn't I? Wait a second, did you actually nearly bump into Bet Affleck? Is this also part of the of your adulation for this film and for Ben Affleck. Is there some story about this? I did. Well, so Ben Affleck came to headquarters as he was doing the research for the film And I was, of course, not involved at all in those discussions and meetings. I was a young analyst who was not working on Iran. although we have did have a guy. who worked, he worked at another Middle Etern country as an analyst and he was This really old guy who had a big gray beard and would go down to the courtyard everyvery day and smoke a pipe thoughtfully you know, like wearing like a tweed kind of Blazer and he had actually been working on Iran in nineteen seventy nine. And so he got to go and brief Ben Affleck. But my version of my portion of the Ben Affleck story at headquarters is that as I was walking literally past the Dunkin Donuts that headquarters I think this was before Ben Affleck had started doing all the commercials for Dunk and Donuts. I very dearly ran into A kind of short scruffy looking guy who had a Boston Red Sox baseball cap on. And I veered out of the way of him in his entourage and then kept walking. one of my friends said, Do you know who that is And I had no I had no idea who'd almost runan into. It was Bad Affleck, who was scouting for the Argo shoot at headquarters. Well I bet when he comes on the pod, he's going to remember nearly bumping into you Here's like there was there was a there was a tallch lurching analyst who I almost bumped into outside the duck uninet That'll be a good story when it happens real story. It is the story of a daring rescue, isn't it? insside Iran, which has got contemporary resonance as well. We talked about the rescue of a downowned airman during Operation Epic Fury and Re remarkable lengths that the agency and the military went to to recover this airman And we are going to be telling this is a different sort of rescue operation. as we'll see Perhaps more of a heist style drama than a kind of shoot 'em up thriller. It'll be sort of nerve jangling all the same. and what I do find is This is wild details of this story. We're going to be telling the story that's happening in late nineteen seventy nine and early nineteen eighty The details don't come out until nineteen ninety seven seventeen years later Many of the specific details about people who were involved in this operation are not declassified until even just a few years ago on the CIA's own podcast, nonetheless. So the evolution of the story. is in some ways part of the story. of Orgo as well Yeah, how it comes out in the telling. I'm also really I mean, it's not often I pay tribute you and compliment you, David but I it's not no, because often you do stories which, you know seell the greatness of the CIA, but in this case, you've done something different, which is take a story, which is also quite politically brave at the moment for you to sell, because this is actually the story of Canada bailing out the United States. I mean, this is the story of Canada rescuing the US and bailing out and doing the really hard work of saving some Americans, which in the current political context in which Canada U. S. relations are perhaps not at their best put it mildly this is a great chance to say hello Canada and hello to all our Canadian listeners because I think Even though you may think that this is a story about the CIA, I think this is a story about Canadian heroism that's a bold reframing of the Argo story, Gordon. I don't think so. This is a story that shows the power of deep security connections between countries The power in the intelligence world of having partners to help you when things go wrong. I mean Canada will be the focus, but it really shows a lot of the collaboration inside the fiveive ey'es arrangement, the intelligence sharing network between the US., the UK Canada Australia and New Zealand and I mean, for a long time credit for this operation went to Canada So what I'm just trying to do, Gordon is to just shed light on the American role in this operation. because you really need light to be shed on it after an Oscar winning best film Argo, which basically just tells the CIA side of the story. I mean, because the other thing we should say about this, it is interesting, I think the narrative around this story and to some extent some of the tensions around it are really interesting and it gets to the role of Hollywood because Hollywood is both partart of the story As we'll see, in getting these guys out of Tehran But it is also part of the reframing and the telling of the story in future years. So it's a really interesting example, I think of the relationship between intelligence and Hollywood The Argo story shows when we're talking about the trade craft that's used. the CIA to backstop the cover for the what will become the exfiltration of these of these diplomats heavily hinges on cononnections, relationship connections That the agency has had in Hollywood for many years. By the time we get to the late nineteen seventies, yeah also a kind of sub theme to the story around the As you're saying, there this kind of back and forth relationship between the CI and Hollywood where Hollywood innovations around disguise and prosthetics become the foundation of the way CIA does disguise There's there's this kind of transfer of knowledge. from Hollywood into the CIA. these operations And you know, a key player in the story is a guy named John Chambers who is played by John Goodman in in the Field Bargo who's a Hollwood makeup artist who who won an Oscar for his work on Planet of the Apes. So G film. It's a great film. So there is a Hollywood element to this. And as you say in your extremely biting review of the Argo film, which declassified club listeners will be able to listen to. We'll talk about the other direction of that transfer, which is how Hollywood then reflects back operation at the CIA conducted with the assistance minor assistance of our friendrs in Canada Y That's right. So let's dive into the story. Let's get into the story. We've done a lot of Iran on the podcast. So you know just to say to people, if you want to go back and hear some of that deep history, we talked in our opening episodes, the first episodes of the rest is classified about how the Sah of Iran is restored and put in power after the CIAMI six coup in nineteen fifty three and is backed by his Western allies, particularly from the CIA from that period in the fifties right until we get to the start of our story really, which is January nineteen seventy nine when his regime is falling. Jary of seventy nine The shah As you said Cordon has been on the throne for thirirty eight years And since the early sixties He's undertaken a a really breakneck modernization program of land reform, womomen's suffrage, secular schools, literacy campaigns, It's been funded by oil money that's also rapidly developing Tehran, so that the skyline of the city changes in these years. You have you know very famously Wealthy secular women in Tehran are wearing mini skirts. They're goingin to university The countryside, for the most part is still very religious, deeply traditional And and summarizing the root causes of the Iranian revolution in about a minute. you essentially have a situation in which modernization and this corrupt autocratic fairly brutal regime of the shah Yeah. is all widening socioeconomic and cultural schisms in the country. you have massive bouts of inflation. The Sah importantly is also sick with lymphatic cancer CIA doesn't know this. The Americans don't know this All of this turns Iron into a tinder box and you have significant protests that begin against the Shah' regime. Yes. And so the protests start, you get strikes, you get demonstrations, nineteen seventy eight, you get repression, you get clampdown You of course have this exiled Shia cleric, Ayatollah Homini, who is one of the key figures who's been leading from the Islamic side, the opposition to the monarchy And then in january nineteen seventy nine, the shah and his wife fly out of Tehran and he says, I think he's going on holiday, doesn't he? But he's never going to return And then Ayatola Homani comes back from his exile? and returns to Tehran He's not yet seized power, yet. There's a provisional government It's kind of a feebral atmosphere, isn't it And at this point, you get the first tensions, particularly with the U.S. and the US. is getting targeted for interesting reasons, isn't it? It's partly because of course, thehah has been backed by the United States. he's been their backer. And of course, you've got the kind of Islamist dislike of the United States. The U.S. embassy is a target, isn't it? But I mean, at this point, again, we don't have an Islamic Republic. We have a provisional government. veryery chaotic security and political situation inside Iran And on the fourteenth of february nineteen seventy nine, a group of Iranian Marxist guerrillas storm the U.S. emmbassy in Tehran. This is not the famous emmbassy seizure of November of nineteen seventy nine, We're coming to that. It's a prelude to, isn't it? It's a prelude to that. They hold the embassy including much of its staff for four or so hours. provisional government with Ayatlla Homeadei's blessing. send in soldiers to boot the occupiers out And we bring this up for a couple of reasons. The first is that the American emmbassy staff has drastically reduced after this ons, including the CIA station And second, and this is the most important point The U.S. comes away with the impression that the Iranian government will protect the embassy if anything ever happens again because The provisional government didn't want the Marxist guerriillas to take over the embassy. reallyally importantly Ayatila homeady the provisional government's decision to send in soldiers to kick out the occupiers. And that's got implications because if we fast forward we are obviously fast forwarding through a lot of things that happen that year to later in the year, you get to Sunday morning fourth of november nineteen seventy nine in Tehrana, Gy Cool day Air is heavy as you say, with the smoke from wood fires burning across the city. And now the U.S embassy is going to be targeted again, but with much more serious consequences for that embassy. It's a big compound, isn't it? I mean, it's something like twentyub an acres, half as big as Grand Central station, Becky our producer is saying, about half as big as the US capapital O for British listeners, almost two times as big as Windsor Castle, That big. So it's a big it's a big embassy Uh, a walled compound dozen or so Marines guarding it responsible for security. I mean, you've been in embassies overseas, David. I think you can say that, can't you? I can't say that embassy cant say Yes.. So you've been there. A you ever worried about it being stalled or something like that? I mean, is that something you think about if you're stationed in an embassy overseas? It depends on where that embassy is. Yeah.' not London hopefully. Not yetet. Although after my comments on this podcast, maybe yeah, go to Oa. I could be taken out by a wild Canadian mob. So so my experience with this that probably most relevant is in Syria. where The embassy that we had at Damascus was in was in a very central part of town. And there was there was no setback from the road. And so you have this ever present concern around car bombs, right. And in fact, that it happened in two thousand six There was an attack on an attempted attack on the embassy that had led to one of the Syrian guards stationed outside being killed. And that gets to a point on you know related to the emmbassy seizure in Iran, which is that You have Marines inside They're not really there to engage And in fact, there are tremendous risks if there is an overrun with engaging a large number of people, you know, in a firefight, if they come through the gates or over the walls, the external security should be and is provided by the host government. So You're in this massive compound, but To some degree,re really you're reliant on your host. onn the benevolence of the host to protect the place. And we should say at this point, things are getting tense in Iran key factor, isn't it that the Sah has been allowed into the US to receive medical treatment because he's got cancer And that decision by the Carter administration has ratcheted up the protests which are going on against the United States. And a few days before a thousand demonstrators in war have marched aroundound the embassy walls shouting Death to America, death to Jimmy Carter had been scrawled on the walls This day, this Sunday that we're talking about, around ten AM that morning, you get a crowd, don't you who are deciding that they're actually going to take action? And they're described as militant students. I mean, most students and militants, I think, but I think that has a slightly different meaning in nineteen seventy nine Tehran. And militant students makes them sound spontaneous and disorganized. and certainly there are elements of that, but it's was it was planned and there was some amount of organization to this. but In any case, the security plan in the embassy calls for everyone to fall back to the chancery, which is this three story building that has but hardened grills you know, thick steel door on the second floor That's where the station would be. The plan is to hold out for a few hours until the Iranian government, just like in February seense help. And so this iss there's an assumption here that that will likely happen No Help comomes, which is its own story about Homini seeing value in holding the Americans as hostage, which we won't this point inside this the chancery, the emmbassy and station staff are, you know Falling back, lockking doors There's a frantic to destroy remaining classified material so much so that the shredders can't even keep up. The staff starts to burn documents. someome of they are just ripping up these documented thin strips by hand. and in fact, and this is depicted in the film, although the way this happens in the film is not historically accurate. The Iranians actually have teams of carpet weavers to try to reassemble the shredded documents strip by strip, and they'll eventually publish all of these in several volumes called documents from the U.S. espionage and. Interestingly enough, at this point, the CIA station in Iran has only three people in it, twoo of whom have been in the country only for a few months. The chancery, the militants are trying to go after a pretty hardened building they find a weak spot, which is a basement window that had been left unbarred as a fire escape, and the intruders seem to know where that is. Once they're in the basement, the second floor is no longer defensible And the chief seecurity officer in the embassy leaves the Chancery at one point to try to reason with the crowd outside.s This does not go well. he is captured immediately, brought back at gunpoint and then made to shout through the door telling his colleagues that there's no point at resisting There's a frantic set of calls to Washington And eventually the embassy staff decide to open the door This ends up with sixty six Americans takaking hostage. fifty two of them will end up being guests of the Ayatolla for the next four hundred and forty four days, but this is really, really important, which is this is not a story about those hostages. Yes, and it is worth saying that because they will become in a way the visible facace at the time of the hostages those fifty two of them who stay for so long, you know, blindfolded, paraded for cameras, you know, I think we should dive deeper into this story maybe another time and what's going on with it because it's also fascinating politics around it in Washington because it has a huge impact, I think, on the Jimmy Carter administration, this mock executions But as you say, these are not the hostages that you're looking for. It's not about those hostages. It's about six others, six other diplomats who are in a separate building fact that they're in a separate building on the other side of the embassy compound, the consular section, the bit that basically distributes visas for people who want to visit the United States That means they have the opportunity to see what's happening in the main embassy and escape, isn't it? Well, they have access to the street. So it's this it's this accident of a large compound that has multiple buildings One of them, this building hous in the consular section They don't have to go through the main gate where the massive militant students. have poured into the compound. and there are a number of Diplomats working in that building. They see the commotion, hear the commotion outside. Some in this building do wind up being caught by the mob. But six of them are not One of them is the agricicultural attache, Lee Shatz, who goes out one of the exits, walks across the street to some apartments and then goes on to the Swedish embassy nearby where he spends the night using apparently using the Swedish flag as a blanket to keep warm. Not sure how the Swedes thought about that. The other five take a separate exit. One of them is Bob Anders, senior consular officer. He is fifty four. He is an easy going, fun loving guy who's alone on this Iran tour couple named Mark and Cora Leiek. They're newlywed, they're both in their twenties Markcus is twenty nine blonde. He's got big glasses, he's very young looking. He's a junior couular officer He'd come to the Foreign Service after four years in the Army. Kora his wife is twenty five. She's a consular assistant Her parents had lived in Iran for four years in the seventies and she'd visited twice, thought it was an exotic posting and had been really excited to come back And then there's Joe and Kathy Stafford, who are also a married couple Joe has a very kind of trimmed mustache. he looks like he teaches economics, B big fan of sweater vests and sports coats Kathy is twenty eight has an art school background and hopes to one day be an artist. and they have slipped out away from the bob, but this is nineteen seventy nine, they do not have cell phones. They obviously know their way around the city, but the city at this point is unstable to say the least, which raises the question of Where do you go Wh do you go? in a chaotic city full of mobs out to get Americans, where do you go? I mean, the obvious answer is you try and find friendly people who might shelter you. but as we'll see, I think that is a little bit more challenging perhaps You might think, at first while the mob is seizing the main chancery builduilding. Anders, the Leex and the Staffords. try to walk to the British E embassy compound, which is about twenty minutes away Good choice. Due choice choices most American diplomats would probably make and they can't get there because there's a demonstration that's blocking their path. So instead they head to Andrew's apartment which is nearby and try to figure out where to go. But of course, Remember that the Americans know that the Iran and these student mobs called Komite out looking for Americans. so presumably onnce these militant students figure out who's in the embassy and where they live and where their American properties. They're going to come and visit these properties and try to extract Americans. so they don't want to stay. at Andw's house. Now the first night They take refuge with friends at the British emmbassy's residential compound Golhog Gardens. So this is not the embassy, but it's a residential compound in Tehran for British diplomats. Have you been there Gordon or? Yeah I've been to Tehran. I've actually been to the British embassy in Tehran, which is in the center of Tehran, is an amazing you know, with these huge sprawling gardens and very very famous, but not to that compound because that compound, I think, is separate and is where the diplomats live, most of the diplomats, I guess, other than the ambassador. But of course, the Brits are also under pressure at this time and are likely to be pretty high on the list of places the Iranians might look for people I mean, the British do put them up, don't they at first? And for their first night at least, they get a warm meal and they even get some cocktails, which I'm impressed by, I don't know, Ginatonic, I' have thought, nineteen seventy nine to h. P know. But I think they realize that it's not going to be the safest place to be. Well, and in part it's because so is this a story, Gordon about British cowardice in some ways because I because that evening, a mob is broasted as the first night that the American diplomats are with their British friends in Sconced in you know, the warm, I suppose, you know, firelight and gin and tonics and good conversation with their British friends. a mob breaks off from yet another mob that is intending to target the British embassy And the splinter mob shows up at the residential compound looking for American diplomats. Yeah. And the Brits kind of say Maybe you should move along Id be look I want to use this series to pay tribute to the Canadians rather than criticize the Brits. The fact you've actually got a mob turning up and looking for Americans there suggests it isn't the safest place. It is alost It is that thing where it's almost too obvious, isn't it to go to the British residency to stay.' defend I'm trying to defend So the Brits, unfortunately in this case or maybe fortunately Fortunately for our story, because it makes it a lot more exciting as a story, ask the Americans that perhaps it's best not to stay there for too long. So they have to move on And it's I mean, there's this period where they're just moving from house to house, trying to find somewhere safe to stay. And they're they're doing this with a combination of their own knowledge of the Western diplomatic community in Tehran. And also the fact that the American Chargay De Fairs is stuck not at the U. S. Ebassy compound, but at the Iranian foreign ministry and for the first few days has access to a phone. So they are occasionally in contact via their host, wherever they might be and the Chger dffaairs who can help them try to coordinate where they might go They go to three more safe houses the next five days First up, they stay at the home of the U.S. Embassy's press officer, who's already been captured at the main embassy compound. They actually end up because they're bored sitting in this guy's house, they end up watching a film that turns out to be footage of the Shah's coronation and are sitting there kind of thinking, Maybe this isn't the best thing we should be watching because if a mob if a mob turns a mob turns up and the Americans are sort of wistfully watching film of the Sah' coronation. that could go poorly. So they turn off the projector, hide the film in a hole, move on. They go to another U. S. diplomat's house, but in this property It' It's on a street corner. It's got floora ceiling windows, there's no curtains. The stairway up to the bedrooms has a tall glass wall facing the street. No good. It's also been empty since the U.S. embassy takeover. because remember this House has been given to a US diplomat. So Anone there? is going to eventually draw suspicion. So they're They're running out of options. And keep in mind that the Iranians have a registry of all U. S. embassy owned properties. So you'd have to assume that eventually someomebody in the mob is going to find the address and is going to show up and search. So these are not long term options. Now onn the eighth of November The Charges Deffairs calls them the Iranian foreign mininister.emember he's been trapped since the fourth says the line's about to be cut The Iranian government shutting down their phones It basically says good luck. I can't I can't help anymore. stay safe. So there's no more word from Washington for a while. So That night, the Americans sleep in their clothes ready to bolt out at the first sign of danger and they they cannot stay where they are, but they also know where to go So Bob Anders picks up the phone and who does he call The friends from the North Oh Canada Let's take a break and afterwards we'll look at how the Canadians save the day Hi, this is Garal Linica from Gold Hangers, The restest is foootball. This episode is brought to you by Wise. It's only when you start moving money between currencies that you really think about the exchange rate, the fee and what might be hidden away in the small print Whether you're living abroad, paying someone overseas or just trying to manage your money across borders, you want a fair exchange rate and easy transfer and no surprises along the way. Wise keeps things simple WS is a smart way to move the currencies you need around the globe. It works in more than one hundred and sixty countries and with over forty currencies. 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Side effects include nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and worsen kidney problems to your doctor Call one eight hundred five four five five nine seven nine or visit zeppbounds. liily. com Welcome back So we'd left these American diplomats on the run Shuttling. from safe house to safe house until they finally turn to their rescuers The Canadians. Canadians There's a Canadian diplomat Named John Sheerdown and Bob Anders playays tennis. with John Sheerown. another little kind of window into the Wabies Diplomatic communities work. Sheerown is the Chief of the immmigration section at the Canadian emmbassy fifty five bald smokes a pipe married to a woman named Zena, originally from British Guyiana B big on the Teron social circuit Anders has been over to the Sheer downowns for dinner many times Sheheerown, of course, thinks that Anders had been captured on the fourth of November along with everybody else. And he is he's amazed to hear his voice. And this is a great this line you know, even if even if our American listeners have a frosty sensibility toward our friends in the North M cheer D's response should cheer us and warm our hearts because he says, Why didn't you call me before? What took you so long And then Sheerown goes upstairs and tells his wife that they're going to have some house guests indefinitely calls the ambassador Ken Taylor Taylor and I think this is and Gordon's raising his hand because he he wants to jump in on a at a moment of Canadian courage. But Taylor we could agree on this. Taylor agrees on the spot hs them Because I think Ken Taylor, it is worth just saying I think We'll come to who the CIA says is the hero of this story I think Ken Taylor is the hero of the story, the Canadian ambassador I think he is such an interesting You know he's been only in Tehran for a few years. he's relatively young. You see this picture of me he's got this kind of crazy curly kind of mop of hair and kind of big glasses and he'd been sent over as a trade rep effectively. He' had a background in trade to sell stuff to the Iranians. And now suddenly he's being plunged into a high political drama And he is the one who's going to have to guide this process over the coming As we'll see, months and to oversee it and he's going to do some really, really interesting things. So I just think it's worth introducing Kent Taylor. And you're right, the fact he agrees on the spot is also really interesting because he basically says Let's do this. And he does the smart thing which someome people in bureaucracies understand, which is that it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission Because once he's basically said, yes, we're going to do this, he then sends a flash cable Ottawa. and this actually has to go first to the foreign minister who then has to grab the prime Mister who's in Parliament and say, is this okay? And the message comes back from Canada, ye, we're going to do this I think that, you know, firstly te to to do that, to take that to make that decision himself and then you know, run it back by headquarters next is a big call and for the Canadian government to do this is a big call because it is risky, isn't it? I mean, other countries, it looks like, were not so keen on taking the risk of sheltering Americans This Canadian diplomat and his high ups thought, no, no, we're going to do this. I think it's worth reflecting on what could have happened Ken Taylor and his mission If this had gone sideways. becausecause it's very possible He would have had diplomats or himself held as ausage or even killed You're right to point him out, Gordon. You know, Ken Taylor and guy we're going to spend a lot of time talking about in the story, Tony Mendez, who ends up leading the CIA of this many people, not just those two. who end up making decisions throughout the course of the story. could have put them at least in captivity, if not worse. Yeah and who do so on behalf of these of these six diplomats. And I think My sense of Ken Taylor is that he viewed not he obviously had a high sense of moral responsibility and personal courage, but that he also saw that seizure of the embassy, the American embassy is like an affront. To diplomacy. To diplomacy. you don't do this. It's not what you do. It's unacceptable And he actually spends a lot of time, doesn't he? He's kind of trying to corral other diplomats in Tehran to complain about this and make more of a thing about it. So he and the Canadian government go out on a bit of a limb to do this. But of course, they do it secretly. We should stress that. It might be worth coming back to the Canadian politics of it later because they're very interesting. That's a that's a teaser right there. We're coming We're going to come back to the Canadian political drama around this. So hold hold on for the you thought you were here for CIA tradecraft. We're going to give you Canadian politics. That's going to give everyone this snig. It's almost as effective a v. a sort of teaser as in our steak knife series, but he said, we're going to come back to the iss issue of bestistial pornography later An episode in episode four So we will come back to the Canadian politiaking for those who those who want that and hello to all of our Canadian listterers who are, you know, probably after over a year of Basically no Canadian spy stories on this podcast are getting a full fire hose of four episodes of Canadian secrecy and high politics. So buckle up for the ride. Now back to Iran. So Sheerown, the Canadian diplomat arranges for the Brits to pick up the other diplomats including the agricultural attache Lee Shatz, who's been bunking up with the Swedes. And they're all ferried to Sheerdown Hom Now when they arrive Sheheer down. I love this detail. He's watering the sidewalk which is carbon to deal with dust in Tehran. Tehran has a massive dust problem And it allows them to keep the garage door open so the diplomats can be dropped off without drawing attention. So by mid November of nineteen seventy nine, All six Americans have been brought to Canadian residences in Tehran. Bob Anders Markin Cor Leeak and Lee Shatz are at the Sheer downowns. Joe and Kathy Stafford are at the Taylors. and remember, Taylor is the Canadian ambassador. The Canadians call them the house guests has a fun kind of homey feel to it. What you might ask her these house guests up to over the course of years not they can't go out. can they? They really are house guests. They are house guests. They're not leaving the house to go do some sightseeing. They They're basically staying in. I mean, it's it's hard. They cook, they and they drink, I think I think this is captured slightly in the film. They drink quite a lot of John Sheerown's liquor stockpile, which is which I note is there because the Canadians had planned to host a big kind of embassy party, but it's been cancellled. I guess you stockpile that stuff just in case, but it's going to get filled with bottles, which becomes a problem, doesn't it? How theyre going to get rid of all these empty bottles? Be you can't yeah, one of the problems is if you've got to load a house guest, you can't make it look like you've got to load a house guest, whoever takes the Trash the bins, the garbage out By this point, it's illegal to consume alcohol in the Islamic Republic because We now are in the Islamic Republic that was passed by a referendum in April. And so sheer down, what he winds up doing is smuggling the empties into the Canadian embassy and disposing of them in the diplomatic trash So There's drinking There's a lot of cooking, which is also depicted in the film. There's Big kind of group meals. Scrabble, a lot of scrabble competitive scrabble particularly between Lee Satz and Bob Anders, they played so much scrabble they could tell which letter it was even if they couldn't see the letter by the wood grain on the tile. They had stared at the tiles for so long they could tell which one was which. They listen to BBC, they read Look, all right paperbacks from Sheerdown's library. Interestingly, I mean, all in all of these homes There are, you know, housekeepers and staff And the Sheerowns have a Filipina housekeeper who's been with them for years Ed knows that there are four extra Americans living upstairs. And again, one are these people who takes real I guess risks and maintains the secrecy. You know, she doesn't say a word about about these guests to anybody else. And in the film argo There's an Iranian, not a Filipino housekeeper, but an Iranadian housekeeper who has this kind of moment of internal conflict and is actually questioned by somebody. in one of these revolutionary committees about whether there might be gu there. and I think' it's interesting I mean, that doesn't happen in real life, but in the real story, the staff keep the secret just as well as the Canadians do Yeah, becausecause it's always an isue, isn't it? With embassies in that you always have locally hired staff and in residencies as well. And you have locally hired staff. and it's a classic thing. You know, if you think about people who lived in Moscow the local you know, drivers, you know, cleaners Gardeners are often recruited by the KGB or the local security serervice to spy. So that is an issue here, isn't it? I think particularly there's a gardener that they're worried about might have ties to the Revolutionary commommittee. so they need to keep him in the dark So this's, you know, it's it's really and really difficult to try and keep the secret that these people are in these different houses. And throughout this period, the security situation, in Tehran has become even more tense. The provisional government collapses in early November, largely as a result of the embassy takeover and dysfunction and debate inside the government over the wisdom of that path. You have none extremist, characters running some of the ministries, but the government is essentially non fununctioning And in some cases, those ministries don't control anything outside of the buildings themselves You have the the revolutionary guard. which is new as of May. This is an organization in its infancy. they manand checkpoints. They are conducting grades. It's not yet a disciplined kind of organized paramilitary force, but it is increasingly active is most worrisome Are these revolutionary committees, the Katee that aret basasically small gangs that rorove across Tehran and the broader countryside not particularly organized or centralized, beholden to different Iranian elites, Mullah, strong men. We have revolutionary tribunals that have executed hundreds of people since February public haggnings from cranes begin appearing in the autumn You have the obvious signs of hardliners who are tightening up morality codes, you know, forcing women to wear the hijab and loads of revenge killings against members of the former regime So you you get this feeling that the context around the house guest has become much more worrisome since the embassy seizure. Yeah. so you have that pressure, which must be intense if you're in that house and you're aware of what's going on because of course you are hearing through the ammbassador through Sheerown about events But also I think there are worries that the secret might be slipping out. I mean, there's some very interesting things going on briefly in Canada. You've got a Canadian prrime Mister who is being challenged by Pierre Tudeau, who's the former prime mininister and lead the opposition about not doing enough for America and to stand up to America. And you know, in Parliament he's being kind of criticized And so at one point, the Prime Minister goes to Pierrideeo and tells him the secret that there are these American diplomatacs who shelterick. But Pierrideeo still goes and criticizes, you know and kind of slams him. because it's pretty brutal. But one of the problems they've got is actually some journalists are starting to learn about the secret that these diplomats might be missing and journalists have pieced it together by a mixture of the fact that there are some unaccounted for Americans. and so suddenly word is getting out. One journalist in particular finds it a secret and is asked to keep it secret, which he does to his tribute, his editor, I think, wanted to publish the story that they were sheltering these diplomats, but they agree not to. But at that point, the Canadians, I think say the Canadian Foreign Mister goes to the U.S. Secretary of State and says, This secret is not going to hold. We need to do something to get them out. this is by the time you get into mid December, I think that the Canadians realize there is a time limit on how long they can hold them and there's a need to do something. Well the Canadians are also making arrangements to close their own embassy and evacuate diplomatic personnel because of the security situation. So You've got. multiple clocks running and none of them are favorable. So enter the CIA at last, at last. just feels like a Like a nice, cheerful bear hug. Wombff. A nice warm bath, a bear hug from a loved one. So what has the CI been up to throughroughout November. Yeah, what has it been up today? What have they been doing? The CIA has tried to grapple with the immensity of the disaster. that has happened in Tehran. So Tehran station is gone The chief of station and two other officers are hostages There's cables flying back and forth from the station as the you know to Lankley as the overrun is happening And with the loss of the station in the context of the broader Embassy seizure in a span of eleven months. so going back to where we started the story in January of nineteen seventy nine The CI has gone from deeply embedded partner of the Shah security serervice,Zak to essentially blind Iraq The focus is on a couple of fronts The first is Panning already. in late nineteen seventy nine for the operation that will the ill fated operation that will become known as Eagle Claw end in disaster in April of nineteen eighty. And that's an operation to actually rescue the main body. of American hostrages held in the embassy. And what's so interesting and this is another fascinating detail is the US is kind of blind, as you say, CIA is pretty blind in terms of collection So who becomes their surrogate? on the ground And the answer is Ken Taylor Canadian ammbassador basasically has to bail out the CIA whose people are being captured. And again, the Canadians, so they're not just, this is what is such an interesting detail of the story And this only comes out many, many, many years later notot only is Ken Taylor responsible for rescuing or helping rescue and you know these hostages, but he's also going to act effectively as a kind of station chief for the CIA because he's going to go out and do intelligence collection for the CIA. He's going to go look at the embassy where the Americans are being held. he's actually going to be scouting for locations where a rescue party free those hostages could hold up when they come in. and he's going to be also sending messages back from when the CI do manage to get some undercover agents in. He's the one who's going to be sending back the messages. So he plays this and it's a really I think really unusual roles. for a foreign ambassador to act as an intelligence collector for the U.S. government. I mean, I think pretty unique in many ways. And again, Canada bailing out the Americans justust saying Ken Taylor he takes his Martini shake and not stirred. He can do it does. He can do it all So and we set up front Gordon, I think you've tried to portray me throughout the course of this I mean this episode as some kind of, you know anti Canadian Monster. but the reality is, again a theme of this series is how these kind of security relationships and foreign partnerships end up adding tremendous value even when you're in the bigger country. the United States that has the CIA is bigger than the Canadian Secret Intelligence Service. It has more money, It has more technological capabilities. And yet, in this case, sometimes you need allies. who do all? Sometimes I mean You don't, you don't, you don't want allies, you know, you just want you don't want to, but you sometimes somet sometimes you need them. sometometimes they help That's right CI is planning for operation Ggle Claw. CI is Laning on Ked Taylor And we should say Eagle Claw is the rescue operation for the hostages, which which which we will'll look at another time. We're not going to get deep into those other hostages. In by notes, I was like Gordon was Gordon was going to talk a little bit about Eagle Claw. and instead he just talked about Ken Taylor. So we didn't even talk about Eagle Clw Ken Taylor, James Bond distinguish him both. Okay. so the CI is planning what will become Operation Eo Clot. The CI is also trying to rebuild lost humuban intelligence networks inside Iran becausecause I mean think about it, the CI had run assets in Iran who are trying to get out as the security situation has devolved The CI also had a network of stay behind agents in Tehran. These are Iradian citizens who had agreed to keep reporting A lot of these have melted away The agenccyies trying to get officers in under nontraditional cover. There's also, Mendez talks about this in his book There's a wild CII plan to try to deceive the world into thinking that the Shah, who has then come to the US and who is one of the proximate causes of the diplomats continuing to be held is the fact that the Shah is in the United States of America And the reasoning in the CI plan is the idea is let's make it look like the sha has fled the U.S or even died And the idea is pitched at the CI the reasoning then the hostages are taken because the shots in the U S. removing him might remove the problem. They actually fly, the CI flies disguise and makeup specialists out from Hollywood. We're going to talk much more about the Hollywood connection in the next episode The plan was to create a body double of the Shaw and stage his death The idea made it up to the deputy director of CIA before the idea was killed. I mean, that does strike me as not the smartest thing because the show is still alive. I mean, anyway, it just it's bizarre. Well, it didn't make it. it got shelved in the end. Yeah. So they you know, we got a picture of the CIA in crisis mode, lots of meetings, meetings about meetings, you know, trying to rebuild its networks, trying to think about how it can gather intelligence using Ken Taylor, James Bond to gather intelligence to potentially rescue the hostages in the embassy, the main hostage ool if you like, but not our six. But that six in a way are not the priority, are they partartly because they're not visible And it's that very interesting thing. You see this as a journalist with hostage stories. When you have a visible group of hostages who the captors are putting out on the media, all the pressure, the public opinion, the political pressure is, let's do something about them of which there is a lot in Washington. But there isn't much pressure to deal with these six because of course no one knows about them. Yeah. But at this point, the realization, as we said, because the sense of You know that they can't go on like this in these houses being hidden and because of the fear the secret will come out. The job of trying to do something about them will end up with in part CIA and Langley and working, I think with the Canadians, it's fair to say, to come up with a way of getting them out And here's where we meet we've met the Canadian hero. Let's meet the American, you know, the American hero who is immortalized in film, of course, by Ben Affleck Tony Mendez that ad operation I think from the cover side of things. and the ultimate exfiltration is largely his grandchild, although as we'll see, it is a team effort this done, including Gordon. Canadians. Mendez is forty in nineteen seventy nine, wears glasses. He's say he's well m mustachioed or at least above average mustachioed. He's not quite in Tom Sellck territory, but, you know, in the neighborhood, he doesn't have the beard Now maybe he had it for the operation, when you look back at pictures of him from this time. He's not he doesn't have the Ben Affleck scruffy beard that he has in the film. Mendez is a very low key guy, no drama guy, unflappable, very methodical someone during the press tour for the fhil Bargo asked Ben Affleck why he played the character of Tony so low key. And Affleck's response was, do you know Tony? So he is a very no drama guy. Yeah Grows up poor in Eureka, Nevada, which according according to National Geographic Magazine Gordon, is the lonelest town on the loneliest road in America So I don't know what that says about him. Yeah He's an artist by trade. sketching watercolor actually works as a commercial illustrator and industrial draftsman.aints paints on weekends for The entirety of his CIA career, much later homeome and Design magazine We'll do a profile of his studio in Maryland Mendees answers a blind ad in nineteen sixty five. This was the text arrtists to work overseas U. S. Navy civilians which is a job listing, which sounds quite vague and you'll see why for a graphic artist role that turned out to be for the CIA. Which is really interesting, isn't it? be to you know, you're not joining the CIA as a kind of classic spy But as a graphic artist, the skills actually of Mendees as an artist are relevant to what he's going to be doing. as well as the practical skills, I guess, if you like of being able to draw But also, I mean, as we know in the intelligence world, actually you're dealing with sometimes with forgeries, with with pictures with things like that. And I think that's one of the interesting aspects of this, isn't it? He's got a really peculiar skill set. I don't know if you knew any any arrtists or forgers at the CIA or whether you can tell us or Well, they're not they're not called forgers They're called Artist Validators, Gordon. Is that really what they're called? No really? ye, yeah. I've heard some people doing some fake monets and they're gonna to start calling themselves Artistalid. Artist Validators. I think it is a It's a very fascinating subculture of the CIA. these people that come in out of trades and end up with jobs and espionage. I mean, as we'll see, some of the Forgery work, Gordon You need you need chemists Right? So you have PhD chemists working on on these teams at the CIA. You have people who are cararpenters, you have people who are obsessive about and the creation of documents so the supplies, the inks, the papers. So there's a very This is the world that Mendz is recruited into And he'll wind up working for what is then known as the Technical Services Division which is then renamed the Office of Tchnical Service. in nineteen seventy three. a year ago when we did MK Ultra. I mean, this is where Sidney Gotley famously came out of Friend of the Pod F of thepod, the people who made the poisons at one point in the fifties and the sixties. But I guess now it's also it's a wide array of skill sets who are doing all kinds of things. But it's very practical, isn't it? Disguises as well as forged documents, these kind of things. mean you do wonder how much of it would be done by AI now these days, some of those some of those you know documentation and those things. But I guess some of it is still very physical, isn't it? There's something very physical and practical about the devices, the disguises, the forgeries, but that particularly in this era are having to be made by these people By the mid seventies, Mendez is running the disguise division And up until this time Dguy's work at the CIA as Mendez writes had been Really primitive. You had ill fitting wigs, you had bad maches, you had hats, Th things that kind of came out of costume shops. As a result, a lot of the case officers didn't to use disguise. And Mendez really tries to change that. So by nineteen seventy nine Mendez is in charge of what's called the authentication branch. So he is in charge of really globally the false identities, disguises and the forensic monitoring of foreign and forged documents that the CIA uses worldwide. So you think about the number of if a case officer might have multiple passports, multiple alias identities. that those passports are used to travel on You have to centrally manage what that looks like rigorous records. of how those alias documents are used. So it it's a big and very important job as a result he ends up being personally involved in a number of exfiltrations includluding out of Iran. I mean that's what I find so interesting is that so he's running disguises, he's running this authentication stuff But he actually directly gets involved on the ground with doing exfiltrations, including one out of Iran earlier that year with I think an asset code named Raptor who'd been a colonel in the Chles military and he had been a CIA asset and who they had to get out. And so he actually is really involved these in planning and executing these exfiltration operations using his documents and disguises Think about it though. Maybe Hollywood Piction of an exfiltration, which might have know helicopters coming in late at night and a lot of fancy military gear and special operations, commandos and things like that mayaybe a submarine. what Mendees talks about and what Spoiler alert will'll see in this Argo story. is that you don't want to do an exfiltration where you're being hunted And you don't want to do an exfiltration where You won't later on be able to deny the role of the American government or the CIA in the execution of that exfiltration So as a result, you end up try to think about these operations as essentially nitty gritty logistics exercises to have documents ready for somebody and to be able to them or a disguise and to be able to get them out of an airport or just drive them out of a country. So in some ways and I think this is One of the distinctions between the film. in the actual story of Argo is to film shoot as we'll talk about in our review juices up the tension at various points to make it feel like a thriller. Of course. Yeah, whichich makes sense. The way that this is actually run is like Yeah he runs this in some ways like he's a rigorous travel agent, right? Yeah. So this is this is bor a story of the intricacies of cover and alias documents than it is shhoot 'em up kind of stuff. Mendez, as we're say has been involved in running. and exfiltration out of Iran. And this story in and of itself could probably be its own episode, but essentially what he has done is flowed into Iran and built it disguise and a set of alias documents. for This guy had been a kernel under the shaw and walks him This guy was terrified and nearly cracked as this happened, but walks him through Marabad Airport in Tehran and takes him out on a Swiss air flight to Zurich. And that exfiltration involved disguise a substantial disguise package to make this Persian cololonel looked like he was an Arab businessman who traveled around the Gulf and a new set of documents and they fly him out. And so I think from Mendez as he is becoming aware in mid December of nineteen seventy nine pressure is kind of ratcheting up on these house guests. And there might need to be something done to get them out He's coming to this operation with that context of haaving worked on exfiltrations for betty years, but having in particular float into Iran cover around this for this kirdle, a disguise and just Walk him out of the airport That's that's the play that he's most recently run. So he's got this amazing experience And by the time we get to, I guess Just before Christmas seventy nine. Mendez is thinking about how he might do that. The Canadians are looking for a way to get them out Amendez is trying to think about some of the different options. and at this point, you know, there are lots of options he is trying to work out how he might be able to do it. And Mendes Mentez wrote that the the idea that something needed to be done notot the specifics of the idea, but that there was an urgency and the CIA might need to get more heavily involved in the exfiltration. had come to him on Saturday, the nineteenth of of december nineteen seventy nine He is in his artist studio, as you so eloquently read in the initial teaser to this episode, Gordon He is working on a painting called Wolf Rain and his description of the painting is The figure of the wolf recognizable only by its eyes, two golden orbs floating in a rain soaked forest. add it as it A this point that Bendez writes probably with sub amount of Artistic license, he after all. He is an artist He decides Okay we need to. We need to get more involved in what to this point has been a channel between Ottawa and the State Department over the management of the house guests and how to get them out Because it is fair to say, isn't it that the U. S. State Department has been quite happy to have this quite quiet to to some extent to take a wait and see approach with the Six Americans because because there wasn't publicity around them But of course, there is this fear that the Iranians might realize that there's a discrepancy As they go to all those shredded documents that there is a discrepancy between the number of people who were at the embassy and the ones that they've managed to take hostages and work out who they might be. Now, you know, that hasn't happened yet they're not sure about it. But certainly you get that sense as you get to the end of nineteen seventy nine that there are that the Iranians might get onto them is a worry in Washington and on the ground in Tehran, they're having some close calls about people may be spotting that they're there. So this The whole policy of just kind of hoping no one notices just doesn't feel sustainable, which is the key for Mendez to really get involved, isn't it? Well there were some semi close calls as the house guests are staying at at the sheerowns and at the tailors There's one instance where Bob Anders and Lee Satz are sunbathing in the Sheardown's courtyard and an Ironian helicopter hovers directly overhead andnt so they scramble inside. You have servants, housekeepers at the Taillor's residence that are repeatedly asking questions about the staffords who are staying with the Taillors Tourists, whyy are they always indoors? You have one instance where ABC news hanker Peter Jennings comes to dinner at the Taylor's home, which makes sense for Jetnings to go have a conversation with Canadian ambassadores Canadian. Yeah and the Stafford spend the evening huddled upstairs in their room. So you you have this sense that Not only are the Iranians working the math out to figure out people are missing. They don't have everyone accounted for. but you have a deteriorating security situation and a sense that at any point, this secret, you know, whether whether it's housekeeper or whether they're just spott by somebody on the street. Yeah then then you're in a different game, aren't you? Because then you're suddenly having to rush them out rather than come up with a carefully planned operation, which is Obviously what you prefer mayaybe there Gordon, that is a good place to leave this first episode and next time will we come back and look at this. daring operation of Canadian American brrotherhood. We'll look at how Tody Bendez goes to Hollywood for an answer on how you create pllausible cover to exfiltrate these six diplomats from Tehran. That's right. just a reminder if you don't want to wait