Espionage

NY Times reporter David Sanger says the world's leading producer of telecom equipment will be central to the spread of a global 5G network — which could pose a major threat to U.S. national security.

Le Carré worked for MI5 and MI6 early in his career. "I felt I had to suppress my humanity," he said of those years. His novel A Legacy of Spies came out in 2017. Originally broadcast Sept. 5, 2017.

John le Carre who wrote the classic novels The Spy Who Came in From the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy discusses his new spy novel, his own work as a spy for British Intelligence Services, and growing up with a father who was a pathological liar.

George Crile is a veteran producer for CBS's 60 Minutes and 60 Minutes II. He's the author of the new book, Charlie Wilson's War: The Extraordinary Story of the Largest Covert Operation in History. It's about the CIA's secret war in Afghanistan in the 1970s and 1980s, and its support of the Afghan Mujahideen against the Soviet Union. Ammunitions and weapons were smuggled across the border and at one point over 300,000 fundamentalist Afghan warriors carried weapons provided by the CIA.

Charlie Wilson is a retired congressman and the subject of the book Charlie Wilson's War. It's about the secret CIA operation arming the Afghan Mujahideen against the Soviet Union. Wilson left office in 1996 after 24 years in office. He is now a lobbyist and one of his main clients is Pakistan.

In the '60s, the CIA began a secret program that aimed to curb Communism by arming and training local fighters in Laos. Author Joshua Kurlantzick calls it "the largest covert operation in US history."

Francine Prose's latest novel was inspired by a 1932 photo of two lesbians, one of whom was in the Gestapo. Critic Maureen Corrigan says it's an ingenious excursion into the Parisian demimonde.