“Adversity is the P.E.D. for success. You have to fail first before you succeed down the line.”
Marc Polymeropoulos talks through his background and what led him to the CIA where he worked around the world thwarting terror plots. Polymeropoulos details an attack he suffered from an apparent targeted microwave-emitting weapon that has left him and countless other US agents and diplomats with lasting health effects termed Havana Syndrome. He explains the high stakes of counter-terrorism and concerns around a complete withdrawal from Afghanistan. After an early retirement from the CIA due to the effects of his attack, Polyermeropoulos offers the principles and mindset needed to make effective decisions in moments of crisis, stress and ambiguity.
LISTEN AND SUBSCRIBE
SPEAKER
Marc Polymeropoulos
Former Senior Intelligence Service Officer
CIA
MODERATOR
Anthony Scaramucci
Founder & Managing Partner
SkyBridge
TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - Intro
3:10 - Background and path to CIA
6:08 - CIA training and accurate representations
9:15 - US-Afghan history
11:31 - Decision-making under pressure
14:50 - Suffering a Havana Syndrome attack
18:53 - Preventing terrorist attacks
23:13 - Concerns around an Afghanistan withdrawal
25:18 - Learning from failure
28:12 - Mindset during stressful situations
30:36 - Adapting to massive technological advancements
32:49 - Skills needed for the CIA
35:05 - Sacrifices made in the shadows
38:17 - Mental health post-CIA
John Darcie: (00:07)
Hello everyone. And welcome back to salt talks. My name is John Darcie. I'm the managing director of salt, which is a global thought leadership forum and networking platform at the intersection of finance technology and public policy. Salt talks are a digital interview series with leading investors, creators, and thinkers. And our goal on these salt talks the same as our goal at our salt conferences, which we're excited to resume here in September of 2021 in New York city. But that's to provide a window into the mind of subject matter experts, as well as provide a platform for what we think are big ideas that are shaping the future. And we're very excited today to welcome mark polymorph Nepalis to salt talks. Mark worked for 26 years at the CIA before retiring in July of 2019 at the senior intelligence service level. He was one of the CIA's most highly decorated operations officers who served in multiple field assignments for the U S government specializing in counter terrorism, the middle east and south Asia, including extensive time in Iraq and Afghanistan, uh, prior to his retirement mark service CIA headquarters, and was in charge of the CIA's clandestine operations in Europe and Eurasia.
John Darcie: (01:18)
He's re he's recently out with a new book, uh, which I highly recommend you go out and read, not just because of the great stories from his time in the CIA, but the leadership lessons you can draw from it. The book is called clarity in crisis leadership lessons from the CIA, and it comes out today when we're airing this episode, June 8th, Marcus hone has unique leadership style based on nine core principles each builds on the next and the design for real-world application, uh, where one often operates under time constraints and a lack of complete situational awareness. Uh, Martin describes how one must not fear, but instead wildly embrace this ambiguity. And also he teaches you about how to be resilient, which is I think something that we should touch on today, uh, hosting today's talk is Anthony Scaramucci, the founder and managing partner of SkyBridge capital, which is a global alternative investment firm. Anthony is also the chairman of salts. Anthony has done a couple of us troops support missions to Afghanistan and Iraq, but obviously doesn't have the, uh, the experience there that mark does looking forward to a great conversation. Go ahead and take it away, Anthony.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (02:19)
Well, first of all, it'll hold up the book because I love promoting your book. Okay. Clarity and crisis leadership lessons, the CIA, you know, I, uh, a while back Morgan, that you remember Jose Rodriguez. And so a while back, we had him at the salt conference. He wrote a book I think called hard measures maybe almost 10 years ago now. And your book reminded me of Jose's book in some ways, but I thought you contextualized leadership differently. He was really talking more about nine 11 and the CIA's response to nine 11, I guess, where I want to start the interview, uh, is with your background. I want to go into your first, how you grew up, how you got raised, but then I want to talk about CIA and the CIA and leadership as a field officer, which I think was very fascinating in this book.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (03:11)
Sure. Well, first of all, thanks for having me. This is a, it's a, it's a great honor. And, uh, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's, you know, it was pretty interesting after my kind of 26 years living in the shadows that I'm out, talking in public on this, but it's what I've wanted to do because I think, you know, CIA is an indispensable institution and I want to talk to the American people about it and kind of teach people, you know, what I learned there. Tell us about your background though. You grew up where you're obviously you're a Greek American, I'm an Italian American. So, you know, you know, Darcie's not us, let's just put it that way and we'll leave it there. Okay. That's probably not politically correct in these times, but too bad. But go ahead. So I, I have a wild background.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (03:48)
So, you know, first and foremost, I, you know, I spent so much time in the middle east, but before that, you know, I was, uh, I was a middle-class kid from, from Highland park, New Jersey. And, and, you know, I think one of the reasons why I succeeded later on in life is because I had this really unique upbringing. So my mom was a Jewish girl from long island who goes off to Cornell. She meets my dad who on Fulbright from grace, he's as Greek as you can be. And he's at Cornell as well. And they fall in love and it's, it's, you know, it's a, it's, it's, it's kind of a pretty messy, messy situation because each side, I don't think we're too thrilled, uh, uh, with, uh, with kind of crossing over in terms of different kind of, you know, religious lines. But then, so I grew up with this with celebrating everything.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (04:26)
So we celebrated Greek, Easter, Easter, Hanukkah, Passover, you know, Christmas, you name it. Um, uh, and what, what really made that I think important for me is I had such a kind of open-minded open view, um, uh, of the world later on, I married a, uh, Lebanese Catholic. So, you know, it's unbelievable. It kind of, we just need some Buddhists in the family and then, you know, we'd be, we'd be complete. Um, but great upbringing, you know, I love, you know, the, the central Jersey area, you know, my dad still lives there. He was professor at Rutgers for 40 years. Um, and that, you know, while I, while I spent my life running around the world, that really still is, is the place where my kind of my heart. So you, you go, you go into the CIA. Why so growing up, it was interesting.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (05:08)
So my dad ended up doing a sabbatical as a, as a professor. He went to Algeria. So when I was 10 years old, my mom think about, think about it as a parent doing this. Now she put me on an airplane and I flew to meet him in Algeria and my dad and I for an entire month in an old beat up Volkswagen mini bus drove 2000 miles to the Sahara desert. So I thought I was Lawrence of Arabia. And this is what kind of got my itch for the middle east, um, along with, you know, each summer going back to Greece. So my, you know, my dad still had, uh, his family was still there and, you know, the, a house on the island called Mykonos, which is a beautiful place. And so every summer I'd go back to Mykonos. So I'm getting this kind of, you know, view of the world.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (05:45)
Uh, and then I probably watched, you know, a Tom Clancy film or two, and, and, and then off I go and, and, you know, I, when I was, uh, I went to Cornell for undergrad and grad school, but, you know, I, I applied to the CIA and that's the only job literally have ever had you, you, you, you mentioned in the book that you have a kitchen table, knowledge of Greek, that's exactly your words, right. Uh, what other languages do you speak? So I learned Arabic, uh, through the CIA, um, you know, they sent me to school for two years, um, in Spanish as well. Um, and then, you know, and of course now, as I'm, as I'm kind of getting older, I'm retired, it's all jumbled in my head. So I, you know, speak a little bit of everything, but, but on a serious note, what CIA really does well is teach our officers kind of the language skills that are required.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (06:28)
So, and, and the hard target language skills are things like Arabic and Farsi and Russian, uh, uh, and Chinese. And so, you know, I spent two solid years learning Arabic, which was, you know, that's a tough time. Cause you know, you go, then you do this after you're trained as a case officer, then they take you offline for two years. And so that's a lot of patients and a lot of kind of dedication to kind of get to the point. But if you want to go serve in the middle east and, and, and do the stuff that we all did, you got to speak the language. You're, I mean, you just have such an amazing story. You talk about your field operational experience, Doug, about the fact that you're not James Bond, it's a rough and tumble situation. What would you want the American people to take away from this book and your life experience about the CIS?
Marc Polymeropoulos: (07:14)
I think in terms of CIA as a whole look, these are, these are American Patriots. You know, we operate in the shadows. And so, you know, the successes are never talked about in the, and the failures are always kind of highlighted, um, you know, especially where it kept going. It gets caught up in politics, but, but you know, my, my brothers and sisters at CIA, you know, this is the, these are, you know, to me heroes, uh, of the United States cause they operate with so little, little fanfare. These are regular people, you know, it's not like the old, you know, uh, uh, the old days of, of kind of, you know, all kind of, you know, what they called it, you know, white male and Yale, that's, that's the old kind of stereotype of the agency. It's not at all like that. It's a place which is full of different ethnic groups, different kinds of, you know, uh, races, religions.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (07:53)
And so, um, it's, it's a reflection of America. Um, and then people who put their, you know, their, their life on the line and, and, you know, it was, it was a, I think it was an institution in which I, I want more people to kind of understand because there's so many misnomers about it, but it's a, it's a place I believe in, you know, really deeply because, you know, we're the, you know, my colleagues were the ones standing on the ramparts, you know, you know, protecting the United States and it's done with very little fanfare, but, but boy, you know, espionage is, is the, is the world's second oldest.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (08:24)
Yeah. We won't talk about the first soul because that'll also get me in trouble, but, but let's, let's talk about terrorism. Let's talk about our ambiguous relationships in the middle east. And so the CIA back in the, uh, during the, uh, the Russian invasion Afghanistan, we funded what we were calling the mojo mojo Dean, uh, which were holy warriors. Uh, we help them in their fight against the Russian empire, the Soviet, uh, they turned on us effectively, um, and became part of Al-Qaeda and then they, they, fomented a domestic terrorist attack on the United States. And so there's ambiguity there. And I was wondering if you could explain to people in your view what happened and the CIA's role in all of them. So, you know, boy, what a great word you used ambiguity because that, that kind of defines a lot of what I talk about in my book, but defines that's that's the intelligence business right there.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (09:25)
It's we, you know, we live in the world of gray. So look at, in order to push back against the Soviet union, we certainly armed, um, you know, the Afghan Mujahideen, but also groups of, of Africa Arabs. We call them the Afghan Arabs and they came from all over the Arab world, different estimates, some as many as 10,000, uh, who fought and ultimately, uh, you know, pushed the Soviet union out of Afghanistan. And one can make an argument that, that led, that helped, that helped lead to the collapse of the Soviet union. So a tremendous victory, but it came as a, at a cost because what Afghanistan turned into then was a failed state. And so, and, and, and, and that's kind of, you, you can talk about now our worries about our Afghan withdrawal, uh, as well because terrorist groups take advantage of those kinds of those, those empty spaces.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (10:06)
And so that's what happened. And so these Afghan Arabs were certainly trained, but they flopped even more so to Afghanistan when the Soviet union with withdrew, and this is in the nineties and the United States kind of lost interest in that part of the world. And Qaeda found themselves as part of, uh, as part of the base. It's not necessarily the case, you know, cause there was such a great lapse in time. So it's not really that Al-Qaeda that we faced, you know, after nine 11 or the same Afghan Arabs who, who fought the Soviets, um, you know, uh, you know, a decade plus before, but, but fundamentally, you know, I think they, they, you know, they had the same beliefs and they evolved from wanting to kick out the Soviet union to them being opposed to the United States. You know, I think it's, it's a, it's an interesting lesson that the us needs to learn as we, as we support in our covert actions, some indigenous groups who are perhaps doing something we want them to do, you do have to look at kind of the long-term effects and that's, that's fair to say.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (10:59)
And I think that the CIS has taken a hard look at that as well. I think it's a fascinating part of what you talk about in the book is you're dealing with ambiguity, you're dealing with high pressure situations. Uh, I love the title clarity in crisis. Um, you discuss high pressure situations and how you make decisions there. So offer our listeners and viewers a template for what they need to think about when they're forced into a high pressure situation and they've got to make some tough decisions. So, so ultimately, and we'll start with where you want to get to be. You want to get to that place where, where there's ambiguity, w you know, when, when there's, when you have a lack of situational awareness, that's actually your happy place. And that's really hard sometimes because that is, that's kind of counterintuitive. So my book talks about nine core principles that I kind of, that you build over time as you build teams as you lead.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (11:53)
So that inevitably when there is times, um, you know, when times are tough that, you know, you have no fear in this. I mean, that's, that's the whole point. And, and, you know, there's, there's a, uh, a friend of mine once said, as we're kind of going into one of these situations, um, and we're like, boy, know, this is, you know, we're in the gray now. And he actually said to me, he goes, this, this is my happy place. This is where I want to be. So what does this mean? Well, it's, it's building blocks. So, you know, one of the things I talk about, um, consistently in the book is as a principle, I call it adversity is that PD, that performance enhancing drug to success. So the point is you got to fail first before you're ever going to succeed down the line.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (12:28)
And you can think of things like Michael Jordan getting, getting cut from his high school basketball team. But, but in reality, it's that failure that getting kicked in the teeth is going to teach you. You got to learn from that. And the next time you face a similar situation, you know, you're, you're gonna, you're gonna succeed. I think one of the themes in my book is, is, uh, you know, that, that one of the principles I really spousal the time is humility. Um, you know, you can't, you know, I was at the tip of the sphere of the U S government, you know, but you can't believe your own hype. Um, and so you follow these principles, uh, you know, I'll talk about another one. It's, it's one of my favorites. I call it the glue guy or the glue gout. And that's finding the indispensable member of your team that perhaps is not the superstar.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (13:06)
Um, I, you know, I use, I used some great examples. One of them was what I called, um, the, uh, the, our, our, our doctors, our medical staff, you know, we call them doc in the war zones. So I'm a case officer. Maybe you have some of the door kickers, you know, we're trying to take down a high value target. There's the doc in the back. You know, now if that person has not taken care of us, it's not doing kind of the right things, that team is not going to perform up to its capabilities. And so you kind of think through these principles, um, and as you, as you build these teams to get to the point where you gotta make those tough decisions, you're really comfortable doing so, and you can learn this. And that's the thing I really try to put forward in the book.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (13:43)
Yeah. I, I heard John Darcie's feelings before we opened up the Saul talk by telling him he was not the glue guy at SkyBridge, but that was actually a backhanded compliment Darcie, because you like mark are at the tip of the spear. This is more about somebody that in the background, tying things together, I thought it was a fascinating discussion about selfless people. And again, John Darcie is a team player. I like teasing him on these salt talks, but he's exceptionally talented at what he does. Uh, that'll be all the compliments you give from me though to the remainder of the year. So we'll just leave it there. I want to go to something that you write about, uh, you're in a hotel room in Moscow, it's December of 2017, and you were debilitated with severe nausea ringing in your ears and what ultimately is known as Havana syndrome.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (14:38)
Uh, did that tell, tell us about that? Tell us what it is. Did, did they hit you inside the building, or they got to get you outside to create that kind of, uh, illness? What there, so that was a, you know, early December of 2017, I was on what we call, you know, uh, uh, you know, uh, a temporary duty assignment, a short trip to Moscow. I'm at a, a, you know, a five star hotel, just two blocks to the embassy. It's the middle of the night. And I was kind of awakened to it to a start. I had incredible vertigo. Um, tonight is ringing in my ears. I felt like I was going to be sick. I had a splitting headache, and I knew something really bad happened. So it was inside, uh, the hotel room, which is frankly, consistent to what you hear about some other victims of this.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (15:19)
No. So the, the people above you and below you also probably got it then, right. Because you hit it or they, they can isolate it. I think, you know, the, the kind of the running theory now is that it can be very, it can be really directed at you. Um, and so, so, but, you know, so I think it was directed right at me in the hotel room. The fact of the matter is when you go to a place like Moscow, you know, there was, there was no one to the left of me in the room and no one to the right. It was pretty clear. I was under heavy surveillance. I'd go down to the gym and I'd have some guy in a black leather jacket following me down there. So, you know, I think, you know, my theory is that certainly it was, it was set up for it kind of a directed, uh, attack at me.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (15:57)
And that's very consistent with other intelligence officers and diplomats who I've talked to subsequently who have been, uh, been, been hit by this. And it's, you know, it's a pretty insidious, you know, uh, uh, kind of event it's pretty insidious weapon. Cause it's, it's designed to impasse and capacitate not to kill. And it derailed my career. And I had to retire at 50, which was not a lot, a lot of gas left in the tank. Um, but, uh, but I had to retire, you know, in, uh, in July of 2019. So, but you, you, but you also, there, there are other members it's called the Havana syndrome because many of our diplomats and, uh, uh, governmental workers, et cetera, have been afflicted by this in a Vana. Uh, we think this is Russian inspire. Is that fair to say? I think that's, that's fair to say, you know, there is a microwave pulse, they hit your skull with.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (16:45)
So the theory is it's a directed energy weapon, which by the way, we know the Russians have had before. And, and frankly, this technology is something that the us government has as well. For example, there's companies that use directed energy weapons to knock drones out of the sky. And so, so this technology exists. It's just a matter of using it against another human being is, you know, there's a question on morality there, but, but yeah, there's, you know, it's a, it's a, uh, so far, so one of the things is I eventually got treatment at Walter Reed, national Intrepid center of excellence, which is the world's most renowned traumatic brain injury program. And they died at diagnose me with a TBI, with a traumatic brain injury based on an, you know, an, an exposure event. And the theory is, you know, whatever, this kind of energy was kind of got me in the back of my head. It's closer to its closest to the occipital nerve. And so, and it's, you're right. There's something that, that, you know, I can undergo treatment for meaning, you know, there are things I can do to make myself feel better. Uh, but ultimately it's, it's something that we haven't found yet that can in any way be curious.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (17:44)
Well, all right, well, we wish you great success with that and I'm sorry that you're going through that, but I appreciate and admire your courage and talking about it because by raising the awareness, hopefully it will reduce the number of our people that are exposed. Um, let me, let me switch gears. I'm going to turn it over to John Dorsey in a second because he always, what he does at this point, mark, is that he tries to out shine me by asking better questions than me, but then of course our, our guests say, oh John, that's a great question, which always horrifies me and upsets me, but that's fine. We'll get there in a second. I have two last questions. Okay. Um, uh, quiet question. Number one, which is important to me is terror plots. You and I both know the United States has to be Dessa go 100 for a hundred, a thousand for a thousand.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (18:36)
They only have to get it right once, uh, without giving up anything that's classified. Uh, have we disrupted a lot of terror plots in the United States since nine 11? And, uh, where do you think we are today in terms of our safety here in the country? So, uh, I will say that is a great question. There you go. I'll preempt the front, uh, saying that for John knows, there's no doubt that we have, we have, uh, prevented numerous terrorist plots is nine 11. That's what CIA did. I think if you see I personnel, you know, right after nine 11, we took this personally because you have to be, you have to be perfect. You have to, you know, you have to bat a thousand, you gotta be a soccer goalie and you can't let a single Golan. And we felt that we failed. And so the efforts we made post nine 11 were really extraordinary and not allowing for a future attack.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (19:23)
And there is, I do that as success. America was not hit again. And whether you look at, you know, core Al-Qaeda or Al-Qaeda in the peninsula, if you recall, and the 2000, what, uh, uh, you know, 12 to 2014 timeframe, there was all this threat streams became in public about threats against civilian, us airliners, um, serious stuff. And the CIA did incredible work to prevent Americans from dying. And, you know, that's what we do. And I'm, you know, I'm, I'm incredibly proud of it. The key counter-terrorism is you can't take your eye off the ball. And right now, if you take a look at our, you know, our national security posture, we have China as an existential threat. I think people agree on that. You have Russia as a country that wants to do us harm, and counter-terrorism has taken a bit of a backseat, but we've gotta be really careful on that because just like, you know, in the period before nine 11, um, you know, w you know, we w we, we have to kind of continue to put kind of, you know, money people, you know, resources, um, towards the, towards the CTF root cause.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (20:18)
Cause you know, you can't fail. I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's hard to say that that in any endeavor you need to have a zero fail mentality, but in counter terrorism, that's what you gotta have. And that's frankly, what the American people demand. Where are we today in terms of safety? I think we're far better off, I think core Al-Qaeda has been degraded, um, to a significant extent where, what worries me, of course, you know, you still have ISIS out there. Um, and then, and then the kind of the key part now I'm not as concerned about kind of a mass terrorist, like we saw, uh, you know, uh, nine 11, but it's more of kind of either homegrown, inspired, you know, individuals or, or, or kind of smaller, smaller units that carry out an attack. And I'll tell you one thing, you know, uh, you know, if one person does something, you know, in times square or the New York subway system, or the DC Metro, you know, not only think about the loss of life, even if it was small, it's tragic to think about the economic costs that it, that that would come at the United States.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (21:13)
Um, so I, you know, I think you can never take your ball eye off the ball of counter-terrorism. And I worry about the withdrawal from Afghanistan, frankly. Um, because I think that, you know, we're asking again, uh, you know, kind of giving terrorists an opportunity to look for those empty spaces, those ungoverned spaces to reconstitute. So there's a lot of work that the United States still has got to do on counter-terrorism. And, you know, even if we talk a lot about China and Russia, you know, that the CT fight, which was that, that was really was what I did most of my career. Um, and I'm really passionate about, I mean, that's got to continue and you never take your eye off the ball. All right, I'm going to turn it over to John Dorsey before I do that, I want to hold the book up again. It's a clarity and crisis. Market's a tremendous book. Uh, it's a, it's a brief, concise book, but it hits on a lot of different elements of what people need to think about when they're dealing with pressure situations, leadership, utility, glue, John Dorsey, glue, holding things together. Okay. With that, I'm gonna turn it over to John.
John Darcie: (22:13)
Thank you. You touched on Afghanistan, mark, and it's great to have you on the program. Um, but I think it's an interesting topic. You know, Anthony, as I mentioned, the opening has been on troop support missions where he, after the trip, got these really detailed briefings, uh, obviously no classified information, but detailed briefings from the generals on the ground about the situation Afghanistan, obviously we'd been there for almost 20 years. Um, you know, there's no real end in sight in terms of putting a neat bow on the entire situation. But at the same time, a withdrawal does create a vacuum whereby the Taliban probably regain some level of power and potentially create another Haven, uh, for terrorist plots. If you were talking to the American people and they're coming to you and saying, well, you know, we've been there for 20 years with nothing really to show for it. We continue to lose American lives and spend money, uh, with no end in sight. Why would we continue to pour money into that situation? I'm not saying that you necessarily disagree with them, but how would you explain to them the benefit of staying in Afghanistan, the benefit of not retrenching as a country, our borders.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (23:13)
So it would be kind of with a simple phrase that I like to say is defend forward. And so, you know, we can't sit back, you know, just because we're, you know, we're across the pond. When I say defend Ford is we have to have a forward presence. Does that mean a hundred thousand us troops? Of course not. But I think the, the, the issue of kind of troop levels in Afghanistan and Iraq has been taken over by politics because ultimately we're talking about leaving 2,500 to 5,000 troops on the ground. That's nothing, we've got 30,000 troops in Korea. We have, you know, similar numbers in, in Germany. And the idea of, of, you know, this need to go to zero, which is what they're talking about. That's where we're going to, to me, that that seemed to be, uh, you know, really misguided. And it's almost a political, uh, decision to do this.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (23:57)
Cause it sounds good rather than keeping us very small residual force where we then can have the, you know, the, the special operations and intelligence forces necessarily on the ground with 2,500 to 5,000 us troops that's enough, um, to kind of keep a lid on that on a counter-terrorism situation. And so I would, I would argue that the defend forward concept is not putting forward tens of thousands or a hundred thousand us troops believing small number of us forces. That's what we do all over the world. That's what we could have done in Afghanistan. Um, you know, I just, I don't agree with the decision to go down to zero. Um, I certainly would not advocate going up to 50,000, but I think a, you know, a small residual force where we can keep enough of a footprint to, to continue our counter-terrorism missions is absolutely essential.
John Darcie: (24:42)
You talked in your book and you alluded to this earlier about how adversity in your mind is a performance enhancing drug. And I think Anthony says something nice about me. So I'm going to say something nice about him. He, in the business world, he is a very resilient person in my mind. He's been through ups and downs, talks about it a lot in his books. Uh, you know, obviously the gravity of some of the ups and downs that he's experienced might not compare to the things that you've been through. Could you talk about specific examples of failures, you know, really deep grave failures, even that you've experienced that you talk about in the book that affected you and how you train yourself to be resilient and to become better as a result of those mistakes.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (25:18)
Sure. And so I think the story is, you know, the story goes from Iraq and then ends in Afghanistan. And it starts in Iraq when I was up on, you know, one of our teams that was living in the mountains of Kurdistan before the invasion of Iraq. And we had re you know, we were running and recruiting in a Rocky agent. I was handling him. So it was a penetration of Iraqi government and, and he had what we call, you know, very good, uh, order of battle information. So these are the, the, the disposition of Saddam Hussein's forces. And I pushed them. I was handling my, pushed him too hard. So he was crossing the border, crossing the, the, the, kind of the line between a Rocky Kurdistan and Rocky regime controlled rock, but we had him cross too much. And this is my fault.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (25:58)
This is, this is on me. And he ends up getting caught, um, and tortured and executed. And that really weighed on me heavily because it was my fault. Cause I pushed him too hard. You know, I was looking good back home in DC cause the Intel was flowing. Everyone was loving me and I did something. I made a mistake and I got someone, someone hurt, um, when it was, you know, likely not necessary. I fast forward that in part of my leadership principles, I fast forward to my time in Afghanistan and this was in 2011 and we were going after a high value target and an individual who had killed two CIA officers, but I was much more patient this time. And there was tremendous interest back home, but over time and, you know, and, and maybe some, a lot of false starts and, um, uh, uh, we just patiently built the picture where finally we could put this, this high-value target where we call on the X, um, where he met his demise, that doesn't happen, that's success.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (26:51)
And I'll say it was a success. Cause we, we killed a high value target who was responsible for the deaths of CIA officers. Um, that doesn't happen if I hadn't failed earlier. And failure for me earlier was pretty dramatic as you said, and that's not necessarily going to be, you know, happened in every instance, uh, in the business community or elsewhere. Um, but boy, I don't have that. We don't have that success later on if I didn't fail that first time. And I didn't really learn that that lesson went, that was ingrained in me. And the story ends, it's pretty remarkable where we, that night from a fire pit along the PAC Afghan border, um, we call the widow of one of our officers who was killed by this individual, this high-value target. And we, we told her that, you know, justice was served and then that we avenged her, her, you know, her, her husband's death. And you know, to me, that was really powerful moment as, as you know, we thought about what we had.
John Darcie: (27:39)
Yeah. I mean, P powerful is right. I'm sure you can't talk about a lot of things that you've done and seen, but just, uh, you know, the, the gravity of a lot of the stuff that you dealt with is just remarkable. But when you're in the heat of battle and you talk about this in the book and you're having to make decisions on the fly that are life or death decisions, what type of mindset, and you can apply some of this to business, which you write about in the book, what type of mindset or strategies or concrete steps do you recommend for people that are in the middle of a intense or a stressful situation to make sure they're thinking clearly and making sound decisions.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (28:12)
Sure. And so, so my principals kind of lead up to this cause if you've done several of the things that I talk about, that, that period of time where it seemed to be the most stress, actually, you, you find some calm. That's why I caught it. You find that you find that clarity. Um, and so, so ultimately, you know, most of the time in, in high stress situations, you're going to have a basis you're going to have kind of a core foundation of, of what you believe, uh, can be done. Now, for example, what I would do is as I build teams and so think about, you know, the end point, the high stress call you have to make, but I've built a team. I trust these other members of the team. They trust me, I've developed them, I've mentored them. You know, I've given them opportunities to lead, uh, you know, in other situations, um, there's processes, I've put in place.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (28:56)
One of the, one of the keys I talk about, I call it the process monkey, but there's core foundational processes in the intelligence business that we've done. Um, and so, so if you have, if you build that foundation, ultimately when it comes down to it, uh, the decision's not going to be difficult. I always talk about, you know, emergency rooms, such as scenarios, my stepbrother, um, his name is Matt Kaufman. He's a, he's a doctorate, Brooklyn. Um, he runs an ER there and, you know, and he's been on the frontline with COVID. And so, you know, when I, when I call and I ask him and I kind of explained to him the principles, the book, he said, this is exactly what we face all the time, but what have they done? You know, they have nurses, the glue guy, or the glue gal. They have processes, you have to do things to prepare someone before an operation, or if someone's coming in with a gunshot wound, you know, you're going to do a couple of things that are absolutely critical to ensure that person's survival. Um, and so, so you build those teams, you build those foundations then ultimately when there is time to make a tough call, it actually isn't that tough. Uh, and, and, you know, that's, that's what I, I now I learned this, I, I realized this at the end of my career after a lot of failing, but I think it's really important because it can apply to the business world, uh, you know, in, in really in tremendous fashion.
John Darcie: (30:01)
Right? How has technology, so you had a 26 year career and you got to the very senior levels of the CIA during that 26 year period of time, you lived through amazing technological innovation and change. How did your job change and how has the job of the CIA changed in general? Uh, as it relates to technology, has it made it harder, uh, to combat terrorism because the threats are getting, you know, greater, um, and there's more ways that people can hurt you using technology or as it become easier because you have the ability to track people using, you know, technology, or how has it affected the job. So
Marc Polymeropoulos: (30:37)
That's, you know, I think that you have to look at it from a couple of different ways. You look at it from technology on, you know, offensive standpoint, how do we use it more effectively? And then our defensive standpoint, because our adversaries can learn how to track us much more closely. Um, and so both are really important. And then you kind of, you kind of juxtapose that on top of the intelligence businesses about humans. And so the one thing that hasn't changed is the relationship that I have with a source. You know, it's an agent, someone, an agent is a forerunner we've recruited you spot, assess, develop, recruit, and handle someone. And that's a, that's a class on psychology, 5 0 1. So that never changes. You know, that's a deeply personal relationship. And I talk about it in the book because it's extraordinary. I had all the time, especially as a junior officer, I had other people's lives in my hands.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (31:20)
So that's going to remain the same, but how we innovate, um, you know, offensively and defensively is absolutely critical. And I think that's where, you know, especially when you see how our adversaries have the ability to track us, for example, I mean, look at biometrics, look at smart cities, smart cities sounds really good. Smart cities is the bane of the existence of intelligence officer. That means there's cameras everywhere. Well, I don't want, I don't want that. So if I'm going out in the street to try to meet someone, I have to defeat that camera system. What does that mean? I can't look like the way I'm looking. Like even my gate, even the way I walk has to be different. Obviously, physically I have to look different as well. I can't be carrying a cell phone. Um, whereas my cell phone during this time. So all these things to kind of think of so technology, we have to evolve with it, but don't forget.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (32:03)
It's, uh, it's, you know, the human intelligence profession is a, is a personal one. And that's what I really love, love the most. I mean, when you sit down with someone, you know, you're sitting across the, you know, maybe a hotel room, um, and this person says to you, you know, mark, your life is in my hands and if you mess up, I'm going to die. And that happened. I talk about it in the book, boy, that's a, that's a, that's a pretty weighty feeling on you. And it's, it's something that you actually then kind of that you learned that, that that's what drives you. Uh, you know, and so, so, um, yeah, it's a, it's a psychology 5 0 1 class. That's why I love talking
John Darcie: (32:33)
About it. Is that something that you feel like you were born with certain, a certain skill set or a certain disposition enabled you to be very effective in that job? Or does the CIA able to mold people and teach people the skills necessary to engage in that interpersonal aspect of being an officer?
Marc Polymeropoulos: (32:50)
So I think it's both, you know, you know, first look, you got to love people. So, you know, I joke like I'm a Greek American, I'm outgoing, you know, I'm, you know, I'm always, you know, in people's faces and loud and, and all of sudden you have, like, you can be an introvert, you got to love people. That's what you do. Um, now we are taught, you know, how to conduct Tradecraft. So we'll go to, you know, we go to our secret base somewhere and you'd go off for a year and you're taught how to run a surveillance detection route and how to, you know, put down a dead drop or make a mark a signal. Those are things that are taught. Um, but, but you know, the, I think the, the best CIA officers are those, um, who are kind of intellectually curious. Um, they certainly want to know about the world.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (33:27)
You know, my job was not to inter interact with Americans. It was interact with foreigners. Um, and, and, and just to kind of have that thirst for knowledge, and then kind of the last part. Um, obviously the people part is like, I never served, you know, in Paris or London, I was serving in, in, in the middle east. So, you know, you gotta be able to deal with some hardships and, you know, sometimes your family's coming with you too. So whether I have great stories, you know, we had no power or the water runs out, or, you know, the, the apartment in the middle Eastern city is infested with cockroaches. I mean, just crazy stuff that then you have this resilient family that kind of hangs on with you. But, um, uh, I think that the most successful CIA officers are just able to kind of roll with it. Uh, and, uh, and, and I I'll tell you one thing that, and maybe you, you both we'll, we'll relate this. I mean, growing up in, in, in central Jersey, it's, that was a great lesson and had a, had a joined the CIA because, uh, you know, my childhood was, uh, was a fun and exciting and loud, and, you know, that's what, that's what I kind of rolled into in my career.
John Darcie: (34:20)
Yeah. So you, you write for the Washington examiner, you write a frequent column, which I love reading, especially as we started preparing for this talk, I dug into a lot of your writing since you're a fantastic writer, but you talked about in one of the pieces in the last two weeks, I think it might've been last week, another four stars were added to the agency's famous Memorial wall for a total of 137. You talked about how you operate a lot in secrecy. Uh, you know, you had to call a widow to tell her about avenging her husband's death, but the world doesn't even know what he did and what you did, frankly, to thwart terrorism or other threats to the country. How hard is it to operate in that secret type of environment and make those types of sacrifices for the country? What type of comradery develops within individuals in, in something like the CIA?
Marc Polymeropoulos: (35:06)
So, you know, camaraderie is the, is the kind of the best term that, that, that you used. That was a really good question. Okay. I'll even admit to that. Go ahead, mark. I'm sorry. I had to just jump in there. Comradery is everything, you know, one of the principles I talk about in building these teams is, you know, it's family values and, and just that means, you know, having this love for one another and taking care of each other. And, and so, you know, comradery to me means, um, things like, you know, each year I still gather with the team that I was, that I led in Afghanistan, you know, at a little dive bar in Northern Virginia called the BNN. Um, camaraderie means when I came back from Iraq, the chief at the time, a guy by the name of Charlie Sydell, uh, uh, who, who has passed away, but he knew that a lot of us were suffering for some PTSD.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (35:53)
And so he, he hosted us at his, at his house on Cape Cod just to make sure we're all okay. I mean, it's a brotherhood and sisterhood. It, you know, it's not a nine to five job. And so, so th th th the aspect of, of this being, you know, not just a job, but it's, uh, it, you know, it's part of your identity. It's part of your way of life is really true. Um, you know, we are, you're a, doctrinated a little bit about that because, you know, or you're considered the tip of the spirits hard to get in, you know, it's hard. And then you have to kind of go through the selection to become an operations officer. Um, but it's a, it's a pretty small fraternity that clandestine service is actually quite small. Um, and so, you know, there, there is, there is a feeling that, that, you know, not necessarily that you're special, but you were part of something, uh, special.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (36:33)
And so, you know, when we, when, you know, we are, we are, uh, uh, you know, uh, teams of officers, individuals, but it's also teams of families. Um, I'll give you one story and I love telling these kinds of these stories, but, you know, I, I was, when I was in Afghanistan in 2012, my mom passed away in New Jersey suddenly, and I had to get home. And it was amazing. I was on the border. I was, I was 7,000 miles away and I had to take multiple helicopter flights and then a fixed wing to get home, to bury my mom. And I remember the flight out of my frontline base. It was, it was socked in with weather yet. Our helicopter pilots were like, we're getting out of here. And I remember, you know, we're hovering in a, in a mountain pass and I'm on, you know, where I'm in night vision, uh, goggles and, and, you know, on comms with them.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (37:13)
And I'm like, turn around, like this is too dangerous. And we didn't, and we eventually got to the next, the next space is to eventually get home. And I, and I, and these are, these are veterans that, you know, uh, uh, us military special operations, the best pilots in the world. And I went through them. I said, why don't you do this? Like, that was dangerous. And they said, chief, not. So they called me cause I was a base. She said, chief, you know, your mom died and we're getting you home, period, that's it. So how do you not have this affinity for your fellow men and women who you serve with when that's the kind of ethos that that has been developed? And, and that's what I talk about when I, when I talk about, you know, family values, you kind of build that love and camaraderie, um, and dedication to one another. And it's, uh, it's, it's pretty spectacular, but that's the part that, you know, people ask me, what do I miss in retirement? That certainly is, that is the part that I really missed even today.
John Darcie: (37:57)
Right. You know, from a mental health perspective, I think a lot of people that are in the military, they come out of service and they struggle to find that meaning, uh, that exists when you're in the throws of it, um, from a mental health perspective, is that a challenge for, for ex CIA that come out, uh, both finding that meaning and also coping with, you know, some of the obviously heavy things that you see. Gotcha.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (38:17)
So, you know, the answer is, is, is a hundred percent. Yes. And one of the things that I've seen happen, and I don't like it, and I've actually talked to, and I've written about this in my examiner column, but I've talked to, are the new CIO for CIA director, bill burns about it is, is why you so many kinds of formers end up, we would call them formers, are the people that retired, why are they leaving kind of bitter and disgruntled? Um, and that's, and so I think that, that, you know, that's not a good thing. And I think that a lot of it has to do with the transition to the outside world is so difficult. And so one of the things that, that I, you know, that I'm going to try to do is try to, you know, find ways to kind of keep the formers more engaged with the building, because all of a sudden you go from having, you know, the, the keys to the secrets of the planet to going out there and looking at the New York times in the morning and wondering, scratching your head, wondering if that's actually what is happened.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (39:05)
Cause you know, a lot of times it's not. And so that transition is, is certainly difficult. One of the things that I think has been helpful for me is I decided, and I, after, you know, some consultation with some, some other, you know, uh, former senior officials like, like Mike Morrell, uh, we talked, you know, we talked earlier about former acting director of the CIA, a good friend of mine. I said, I said, look, I think I want to talk and write about the agency. And it might be a little controversial, but this is an institution that the American people have to have to learn about for us to stay relevant and, and, and, uh, and to educate American people, but for me by doing so, I also still feel connected. So that's kind of how I have dealt with it as I wrote this book on leadership.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (39:42)
Um, and I liked talking to the American people about the CIA. And so that transition for me was not as difficult probably, but certainly for many others. Um, uh, it is. And, and it's, it's some of the, some of the, my kind of columns that are, that are coming in the future are going to talk about kind of the mental health challenges, um, that, uh, that many kinds of intelligence community and, and, and, you know, former military, um, face when they learn and when they leave service, because there's nothing like being on the tip of the spear, the us government, but then it's gone. And then, you know, and then it's time to kind of hang up your cleats and then you don't, you don't, you don't have that anymore. And that's for many, that's really tough.
John Darcie: (40:16)
Yeah. It's hard to go from being a tip of the sphere and thorning terrorist plots to being, and this is no offense to it consultants, but being an it consultant for some large corporation. And we work with a variety of organizations, um, uh, at the salt conference, frankly, that, that help both help veterans find meaning when they come home team Rubicon is one of them, Jake woods, uh, help veterans find meaning when they come home and also deploy this special skillset, uh, that CIA officers and special forces have when they come home to the maximum benefit of society. So I think what you're doing in terms of talking about these things openly, not in a way that reveals sources and methods and things like that, but talking about them, I think it's valuable, uh, for people that have served and also for our society to make sure that we're learning from people like you. So, uh, mark poly mirabilis, thank you so much for joining us here on salt talks. Again, the book is called clarity in crisis leadership lessons from the CIA Anthony, come in and hold that book up again. He's a better person.
Marc Polymeropoulos: (41:14)
The book, the book, the book is awesome. Mark. I really enjoyed reading it. It's a quick read, but it's got a lot of terrific content and we want to get the word out and, uh, we'll be, we'll be doing a lot of social media alongside of you to help promote the book. And so, so thank you. Thank you for your service to the, and we want you to get better with, uh, the Havana syndrome and, uh, you know, we, we're very grateful to you. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much. It's a great being here. Thank you.
John Darcie: (41:46)
And thank you everybody for tuning into today's salt. Talk with mark. Polymorph Nepalis talking about his new book, clarity and crisis. Just a reminder, if you missed any part of this talk or any of our previous salt talks, you can access them on demand on our website. It's salt.org backslash talks or on our YouTube channel, which is called salt tube. Anthony mentioned social media. We're on Twitter at salt conferences where we're most active, but we're also on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook as well. And please spread the word about these salt talks. Again, this is a subject matter that we think is very important for people to learn more about, but on behalf of Anthony and the entire salt team, this is John Darcie signing off from salt talks for today. We hope to see you back here again soon.