The first woman to graduate from French Commando school (227)

Mar 19, 2022

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Maura McCormick was posted to Berlin as a Signals Intelligence voice interceptor (Russian). Her workplace was the Teufelsberg U.S. listening station, aka Field Station Berlin.

Maura shares her early impressions of Berlin and working at the Tberg. She talks about her impressions of the infamous James Hall, a United States Army warrant officer and signals intelligence analyst who sold eavesdropping and code secrets to East Germany and the Soviet Union from 1983 to 1988.

Maura also recounts a close call with Hüseyin Yıldırım, a Turkish-American auto mechanic who was a Stasi courier for the espionage activities of James Hall.

Maura often visited East Berlin where she tells of an unusually close encounter with a chimney sweep that almost resulted in an international incident.

In West Berlin, Maura became the first woman to graduate from French Commando school. The commandant had a nightly call to Paris to confirm that she had survived the day's training…

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0:00 Introduction and Maura McCormick's role in the Cold War

2:35 Interview with Maura McCormick begins

5:56 Maura's first posting in Berlin and impressions of West Berlin

16:21 Maura's interaction with Stasi spies James Hall and Hüseyin Yıldırım

24:52 Maura's acclimatization trip to East Germany and encounters

36:04 Maura's experiences in East Berlin and close encounter with East German leader

44:13 Maura's interactions with East Germans

48:40 How Maura ended up in French Commando school and her training experiences

1:00:53 Exploring Berlin through books and films

1:07:25 Accidental crossing of the border and reflections on Berlin

1:13:15 First impressions of the Berlin Wall and questioning the depth of the Cold War victory

1:14:28 Acknowledgement of the podcast's patrons and invitation to join the Facebook group

1:15:19 Closing remarks and promotion of the podcast store

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