State Secrets

In this episode, I’m talking with journalist and author Renee Dudley.  Renee is a technology reporter at ProPublica who stumbled onto a band of what she describes as misfits while reporting on the rapid rise of ransomware.  What she found was an incredible group of individuals who decided to be a change for good by helping fight cybercrime.  She tells the story in a new book she wrote with co-author and fellow journalist Daniel Golden, The Ransomware Hunting Team: A Band of Misfits’ Improbable Crusade to Save the World from Cybercrime. Here's my conversation with Renee Dudley.

China remains the top concern for long-term US national security and tensions over Taiwan have increased steadily over the past several months. Chinese President Xi Jinping used the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party to cement his grip on power – and to make clear where his party stands on its future ambitions, to include the reunification of the self-governing island of Taiwan.    So just how close are China and the US moving toward war over Taiwan?   That's something that Cipher Brief Expert Admiral James Stavridis (Ret.) has been contemplating for some time.  He is the author of 2034: A Novel of the Next World War - that he co-wrote with journalist Elliott Ackerman - played out just how that war might start.

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in October - with a speech that makes clear where his party stands on its future ambitions, to include the reunification of the self-governing island of Taiwan. But tensions between the US and China over Taiwan’s future are really just one part of the story.  Beijing has made clear that it has a thorough and organized strategy to achieve its ambitious goals while the US – in part because of a democratic system that can change leadership every four years – is realizing that it must do something different if it wants to remain a dominant power in the world. I can’t imagine anyone better on this issue that my guest in this episode: former assistant secretary of defense turned Harvard Professor Graham Allison.  Allison is the Douglas Dillon Professor of Government and Harvard and he is also the author of the book, Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’ Trap?  If you haven’t read it, it’s a master class in understanding just where both countries are coming from and what advantages they hold in this great power competition. Here's my State Secrets conversation with Harvard Professor Graham Allison.

In this episode, Cipher Brief COO Brad Christian sits down with former CIA Officer Brett Davis and Entrepreneur Jeremy Hitchcock to talk about the future of US national security from an investor’s perspective. Brett is a former Senior Executive with the CIA, and a former Special Operations Officer with the US Navy.  Jeremy is an angel investor who co-founded a company called Dyn in 2001 that grw out of an open source project.  He sold the company in 2017 for $600mm. The two men are now partners in New North Ventures, which – full disclosure – The Cipher Brief works with.  New North is a sponsor of this year’s Cipher Brief Threat Conference. Brad sat down with the two men – from very different backgrounds – to get their perspective on investing in future US national security.  

China’s Communist Party is deep into preparations for its 20th party Congress that begins October 16th in Beijing, where expert observers are expecting President Xi Jinping to be confirmed for an unprecedented third five-year term. Xi is also expected to announce his new leadership team that will execute on the party’s agenda.  And it’s safe to say that near or at the top of that Agenda is the issue of Taiwan. For context: When it comes to US policy, Washington’s official stance is that Taiwan is in fact, part of China and that if reunification occurs, it must be through a peaceful reunification.  Beijing, meanwhile, sees Taiwan as a breakaway province that must be reunified, and has not rule out use of force to do so.   Washington is bolstering Taiwanese defenses in the event that Beijing grows impatient and makes the strategic decision to reunify the island by force. So, diplomatically, the US recognizes one Chinese government yet Washington treats Taiwan like an independent nation when it comes to diplomatic engagement and military support.  That’s the reason why China took such offense to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent visit to Taipei. Today’s guest agrees that the U.S.’ One China Policy presents a complicated engagement strategy.  How did we get here?  And what is the likelihood that the world’s two most powerful nations could come to blows over Taiwan? Ambassador Joe DeTrani has focued much of his career on China.  He is not only a former Special Envoy for Six Party Talks with North Korea, he is also a former director of East Asia Operations at the CIA. In this episode, Cipher Brief COO Brad Christian sits down with Ambassador DeTrani to unpack the US’ One China Policy.

On the morning of July 31, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, who has been in hiding since 9/11, walked onto the balcony inside a compound in downtown Kabul. The Egyptian-born physician had taken over the leadership of the terrorist organization after US Navy SEALS killed Osama bin laden in Abbottabad in 2011. For 11 years he had directed al-Qaeda from the shadows and there had been many false starts for the US intelligence agencies and special operations team who were tracking him.  But on this day, as he stood outside, a US directed hellfire missile, reportedly fired from a drone killed him.  The missile was incredibly precise, it killed the al Qaeda leader but not his family, who are believed to have been inside the building at the time. Air to surface missiles like this one are just one of the tools that US counter-terrorism teams have been using as they hunt down terrorist leaders around the globe.  While Zawahiri’s killing was seen as the end of a long and costly manhunt – both in human lives and resources – what does his death mean to the future of the al Qaeda? I spoke recently with retired Lieutenant Generals Scott Howell and Mike Nagata. Lt. Gen Howell served as Commander of Joint Special Operations Command Central before he retired just over a year ago and Lt. Gen Mike Nagata served as Commander of US Special Operations Command before retiring in 2019. As the first Air Force officer to command JSOC, Lt Gen. Howell led a force of 14,000 personnel engaged in special operations across multiple areas of instability and was responsible for the readiness and mission execution of highly-specialized forces of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines. And Lt. General Nagata’s final position before retiring was Director of Strategy for the National Counterterrorism Center – a job he held from 2016 to 2019. He served as Commander of US Special Operations Command-Central and was responsible for Special Operations across the Central Command region from 2013 to 2015 and was heavily involved in the first two years of combat operations against the Islamic State in Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere.

Suzanne talks with former National Intelligence Manager for Iran (NIM-I) at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) Norm Roule on the impact of a potential deal to restore the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear agreement with Iran.  

The former Director of the Pentagon’s Joint Artificial Intelligence Center joins us in The Cipher Brief Studio to talk about why technology is not enough when it comes to maintaining a competitive edge in national security over China.  If the US doesn’t organize as well as it innovates, there will be no victory. 

In this episode Suzanne talks with former CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence and founder of the Mossbridge Institute, Dr. Julia Mossbridge.

This week Suzanne talks with former CIA officer and author of new book Victor in the Trouble Alex Finley.  They talk about her career, her path to becoming an author and how she recenlty became an expert on oligarchs and yachts.