Meet A Spy: CIA's Melissa Mahle

Ms. Mahle is a former US intelligence officer and expert on the Middle East and counterterrorism.
As a field operative for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), she worked against many of the key challenges to US national security, including running operations against al-Qaeda terrorists and illicit networks selling weapons of mass destruction.
She received a Presidential Letter of Appreciation for her work on the Middle East Peace Process and numerous exceptional performance awards from the CIA for her recruitment of agents and collection of intelligence. Ms. Mahle is the author of the book Denial and Deception: An Insider’s View of the CIA from Iran-Contra to 9/11.
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[@luminouspage4359]

GOOD JOB, MS. MAHLE! IT WAS A NICE PRESENTATION!

[@galt67]

Great talk! Thanks for sharing.

[@petertrott5107]

Fascinating!

[@santabanter]

Fantastically interesting talk. Thank you.

[@KevinR-xj4pr]

Enjoyed your presentation very much. Thank you very much for your gracious help in protecting the USA. However, I wish the sound quality was better. Many of your words are difficult to understand.

[@ralphernst6037]

Everyone of these operators are very smart.

[@lacharmer441]

Hence the arrogance!

[@MindWalker123]

am I now on a list for having watched this ?

[@DeeDeex007o]

🤣🤣🤣🎯

[@michaelfuchs1467]

It's not about the mics quality or price. It's about setting the levels so that not to over-driving the poor amplifier input. Without a dedicated sound technician you at least need a mixer with automatic gain control! That's a really cheap and simple way to avoid this horrible result.

[@-danR]

The mic at the podium doesn't do that. What's happening is that the hand-mic isn't feeding to the audience, it's just for this broadcast. So she's kinda belting it out so the people at the back can her her un-amped. The mic is getting pushed beyond its dynamic range. 46:18 There's a question, presumably being processed at the same mixer, without the clipping. The speaker is likely speaking with a normal voice with a normal distance from the mic. I don't think the mics have good quality dynamic range and Melissa, and the final presenter, seems to want to belt it out.

[@uploadJ]

re: "It's not about the mics quality or price. It's about setting the levels " tubeistdan doesn't think you need an AUDUO ENGINEER setting levels OR doing post production equalization, noise reduction and COMPRESSION to enhance sound quality!! GOOD SOUND ENGINEERING is a LOST ART!!!!

[@jasonwiley798]

Fuchs, a name which will live in infamy

[@iraq.sometimessunnisometim1981]

Get some Mic's ect from company called Shure give the best performance and highest quality and used in recording studios

[@vadimmartynyuk]

that sennheiser she was talking into is a great mic as well, they screwed up on audio somewhere else

[@arkangel8419]

you guys really need to get your audio sorted out. Great content on the chan but the audio is horrible. Hit up Amazon and spend $200 on some cheap mics. anything is better than this

[@uploadJ]

It's more LEVEL SETTING than just 'cheap mics'. It's a lack of a SOUND ENGINEER. Everybody (incl you) 'thinks' they know how to do 'sound' ... EVEN some post-production processing could help out (like EQUALIZATION and some mild COMPRESSION).

[@-danR]

@@uploadJ Nah, I think it's mostly the mic (you don't hear that sort of thing when the speakers use the podium mic), and that she has a stronger voice than she realizes. She's talking to an audience that has to hear at the back, but she's also a bit too close to her mic at the same time and the peak amplitudes are clipping.

[@uploadJ]

re: " I think it's mostly the mic " Dammit! It's the lack of a SOUND ENGINEER that knows what the hell is going on!!! Doh! America, and the world, has gotten SO STUPID!

[@kathleenczinner375]

On her enigma machine story- has she ever heard of Alan Turing. British Enigma code breaker whose group warned the Churchill government. Alan Turing's team broke the German codes. She may have done many things but not everything she says is factual. Sounds like she's trying to impress her young audience. Not impressed. Others I've listened to are more interesting, less full of themselves and more believable.

[@laughingman9574]

Because this is shameless PR

[@chrisrosenkreuz23]

looks like she knows her craft, would be great to actually understand what she is saying

[@MJ-fj9yv]

😂 right.

[@brucebalsam2127]

Your videos all seem to be created in the same room. You don't have the control of the lighting and audio elements in that room required to make fully coherent recording. I suggest that you get your recording environment under control.

[@poopinlumpy]

Do Russian secret services put up stuff like this? Do they?

[@user-be5ss2ir9z]

Самое главное начать с того что нужно отбросить высокомерие, даже если есть грамм, миллирамм.

[@Nota769]

What’s the point

[@kurtk4223]

it'd wonderful to see the art in action. a wonderful mix of truth and propaganda. and so believable as a woman. shows exactly how good these people r at spinning the truth or is it that she actually believes her own propaganda. remember she admits to being a trained liar. how can u tell just when she's telling the truth or why?

[@goedelite]

Compare the geopolitical situations of the countries who have been or are now called our enemies by our political leaders and media with our own. All, China, DPRK, Germany, Japan, Russia border or are near countries that have been their historical adversaries. One has borders with or are only a short distance from as many as 17 other countries. Some, such as Germany, Russia have had wars and repeated invasions from their neighbors. The United States, by contrast, has two major oceans that form its greatest boundaries. To the north we have a relatively weak country, Canada, that has never been a threat. To the south is Mexico, again never a threat. Whatever hostilities have existed were provoked by the US (1812 War, Mexican War). The reason the US created the OSS and the CIA was not defensive. It was aggressive. It was to pursue the "Grand Strategy" formulated during WW2 by Washington. It was to take up the role played by Great Britain until then. It was to assume a global hegemony by which the US would decide for all other countries of the world what their roles would be in regard to international trade, access to natural resources, and even in regard to their domestic affairs. There was NO defensive, ethical, or moral reason for creating an agency, after WW2, which was not only for intelligence gathering, spying, but also for secret operations. Those operations soon became the overthrow of governments that would not take orders from Washington DC: Guatemala, Iran, Chile, and many others. None of this is mentioned by Ms Mahle, at least not in the first ten minutes of her address.

[@eyesopened1874]

I think the CIA has crossed that great big wall towards becoming the Gestapo.

[@chernobylFarms]

Field work aversion training, for the cubicled staff....

[@jonathanr5238]

Highly engaging as ever. However, considering the phenomenal seductive capabilities present within the assembled brain trust of the museum board, I do find it somewhat ironic that you've not yet managed to recruit a capable sound engineer.

[@sophiesmith5922]

no investments in deprecated equipment. New building is sucking up funds

[@joeborders]

Real intelligence is knowing when you're too close to the mic.

[@robertthegrape2192]

Yes, and some folks haven't learned that. Geez!

[@jonpender]

Perhaps it was part of her plan along with standing against a bright background in order to make her hard to recognize.

[@joanneblack7697]

😆😆😆😆😆🎯

[@lynnhauenstein4136]

Or the invited were given shit microphone.

[@vadimmartynyuk]

I’m a sound guy. The closer to the mic the better. Have you seen how close pro singers are to the mic ? The issue here is the gain staging, the preamp gain is too high overloading the circuit causing distortion

[@viagra4x4]

when is Snowdon coming back?

[@HimanshuShekhar1]

Please talk a little bit about the coup de tats and murders CIA has done over the years in latin America, including bringing cocaine to the US from Colombia.

[@rage.against.the.regime1913]

This is propaganda.

[@stevelenores5637]

The first clue was "ethical spying". Spying is a crime, nothing ethical about it. It involves theft, manipulation, trespass, and drugging targets to set them up for blackmail.

[@BigRW]

I believe differently.

[@Caleb_Mandrake872]

Audio Quality is so poor that this is Unwatchable.

[@Impedancenetwork]

I've watched somewhere around 15 video from the IntelSpyMuseum and I have to say she is the most boring to listen to. She says nothing for 51 minutes. Everything she said is common knowledge. We know what spies do. We know their tradecraft. This is all publicly available information. When you invite someone to speak you want them to give you something that you didn't know, something that is not common knowledge or an interesting perspective on an old operation. She is captain obvious. I really don't like her arrogance either. She stands up there and lectures to you, the common person, who just doesn't understand what it takes to be a spy. Nobody in the CIA is a spy. They handle spies from other countries, but the CIA rarely does any significant spying of it's own.

[@filianablanxart8305]

Just in the first minute , this is a different format that their usual videos . Usually these will be tied to a particular author discussing around a recent book . Ms Mahle is a board member of the Museum . No host or introduction , just jumps right in . She starts off to the effect of " I understand you have already been around the Museum , and seen some of the exhibits ........ " . I had the impression this was an instance of a particular tour group having a bonus talk from an impressive museum representive , and they just rolled tape of it rather than part of the usual lecture series . If my suppositions are close , we don't know the makeup of the audience , so this may have been tailored for a general audience .

[@kristinvandertick7591]

The enigmacode was NOT broken by an american! He was british! Also, the US did not win the ww2- you came in at the end and helped a little. Don’t mock the many warheros of Europe by saying or even thinking that!

[@krisloveskristiiii]

No, you are wrong, Churchill phoned Roosevelt and begged for US help

[@MurrayJoe]

@@krisloveskristiiii the US didn’t enter the war till they were forced into to it. Same with the Great War, (WW1).

[@MurrayJoe]

A lot of the very early enigma work was also down to Poles who not only helped the British get started but I believe they got England their first enigma machine.

[@kevindorland738]

"....helped a little. "

[@jasonwiley798]

Polish actually.

[@perfectallusion6757]

We forgive but never forget.

[@kdlofty]

Have you ever killed anybody?.................................... "I never pulled the trigger directly".

[@ninirema4532]

great news lecture 🏕🏕🏕🏕🏕🏕🏕🏝🏔🌋🏝🏕🌏

[@salyoutubepremium7734]

Mic problems plus the speakers level of angst/drama = not good listening experience.

[@americaneagle76]

NEVER OKAY TO TORTURE PEOPLE!

[@sarahslye2726]

This lady is full of herself. The real spooks don't brag so much.

[@wasilaify]

She's talking to a roomful of teenagers. There's a certain attitude required.

[@-danR]

​@@wasilaify​ I don't see how her presentation-style is tailored to teens.

[@wasilaify]

@@-danR She thinks she needs more authority to keep them under control. It's obvious to me.

[@luminouspage4359]

NEVER OKAY TO TORTURE DETAINEES

[@Animalwon]

Horrible audio! You could have done better with a cheap Radio Shack microphone!

[@uploadJ]

It isn't the 'cheap mics'. EVERYBODY thinks they know sound ... the sound is into HARD LIMITING. Geesh. You ppl.

[@FidesAla]

"As Americans," "As Americans,"... really awkward to watch this as someone in another place. Also, "what Americans support," "we do this because we're Americans," like every right thing has always passed the test of "what the people will stand for"... if you think of what "the people stood for" 100 years ago, or 200 years ago, if you really know history, you know how much people then took for granted things "we", "people today", think of as horrible... but if you truly understand that, then you understand that that means that people 100 years from now will see the 2020's the same way. There are things that everyone takes for granted as morally sound or morally abhorrent today, that most people 100 years from now will feel the opposite way about. And that doesn't mean they're wrong, or that they've declined. The 2010's/2020's might be wrong about some things. "We today" are *definitely* wrong about *something*, because no one is 100% right. Like, I personally think that an ideal society would have 1820's-esque decorum, etiquette, and ritual for some things, but 2120's-esque gender/LGBT equality. Others definitely disagree with me. I dunno just... hearing "we as Americans" and "the values of our society" makes me think about those kinds of things. But you don't get involved in politics, law enforcement, espionage, etc. unless you agree with what you see as "the values" of your own society, and decide that you want to "uphold" those values. Maybe a voice from people who want to change those values might be meaningful...

[@goodgood9955]

Poor sound quality.

[@embreesmith7613]

you told us this story due to Guilt ... there is no reason you could not have taken him to a hospital

[@afreenu1656]

Her presentation was rather academic. 🙄

[@etiangfrederick6257]

The Anglo- Americans have one advantage their black population could even more effective double agents than their adversaries but in their self conceited mentality that is why their adversaries take advantage of them. And its why their adversaries always win!!!

[@cladglas]

she doesn't know what waterboarding is?

[@krissy7342]

Water board HER!

[@Franklin-pc3xd]

Is that Hillary in another one of her disguises?

[@smward]

Arrogant and over dramatic speaker who needs learn how to hold a microphone properly - audio is terrible!