Spy Valley

Silicon Valley is an espionage innovator—it has been since its inception. During the dawn of the high-tech age, an engineer named James Harper begins his industrious climb. But as Silicon Valley blossoms into what it is today, so too does the dark side of all this newfound wealth and ambition—right as the cold war reaches its final crescendo.

As Harper works to build his fortune, his ambition endangers his nation’s safety. He sells nuclear secrets to the Soviet Bloc—intelligence that might still help Moscow in a nuclear exchange today. It would become the chase of a lifetime for San Francisco’s FBI spy hunters.

In this series, we’ll walk you through a maze. One of nuclear spying, technology theft, and double agents, and the too wild-to-be-believed events that placed James Harper at the center of this story.

And you’ll hear that story from James Harper–the Soviet Bloc spy–himself.

Silicon Valley is an espionage innovator—and it has been since its inception. Journalist Zach Dorfman uncovers how Moscow’s spies opened up shop in San Francisco and Silicon Valley at the dawn of the hi-tech age, and how a group of pioneering FBI spy hunters assembled to stop them—and solve the case of a lifetime.

Don’t want to wait for the next episode? Subscribe to Brazen+ and binge all six episodes today. Subscribers also get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

For more, visit: brazen.fm/spy-valley

Silicon Valley blossoms, but there’s a dark side to all this newfound wealth and ambition. With his technical savvy and a penchant for scheming, one of America’s most notorious cold war nuclear spies gets his start.

Don’t want to wait for the next episode? Subscribe to Brazen+ and binge all six episodes today. Subscribers also get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

For more, visit: brazen.fm/spy-valley

One million dollars, lives on the line, and a spy who keeps a diary. James Harper’s wild ride selling nuclear secrets as the cold war heats up—secrets that might still help Moscow in a nuclear exchange today.

Don’t want to wait for the next episode? Subscribe to Brazen+ and binge all six episodes today. Subscribers also get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

Nuclear tensions between Moscow and Washington are reaching a fever pitch. When a desperate James Harper doubles down on spying for the Soviet Bloc, he gets his big payday. But in a game of double-cross and deception, even your friends start to feel like enemies.

Don’t want to wait for the next episode? Subscribe to Brazen+ and binge all six episodes today. Subscribers also get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

James Harper is in dire need of protection—and money. But the nuclear spy has exhausted his options and left breadcrumbs of his trail. The FBI is watching.

Don’t want to wait for the next episode? Subscribe to Brazen+ and binge all six episodes today. Subscribers also get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

In this bonus episode, we bring you an intimate conversation with Zach Dorfman, an award-winning intelligence and national security journalist and host of the podcast Spy Valley: An Engineer’s Nuclear Betrayal. Recorded live at the Podcast Garage at KQED in San Francisco earlier this month, the conversation delved into the making of the podcast series and featured audio clips from the show. The discussion was moderated by Ian Enright, founder and CEO of Goat Rodeo and an executive producer of Spy Valley.

Spy Valley is a new six-part podcast series from Project Brazen that explores the story of James Harper, a Silicon Valley engineer turned nuclear spy during the Cold War.

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ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Zach Dorfman is a National Security Writer and the Writer and Host of Spy Valley. He was previously a National Security Correspondent for Yahoo News and a Senior Staff Writer at the Aspen Institute. His work has appeared at Foreign Policy, Politico, The Atlantic, the Wall Street Journal, and elsewhere. He was also a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, where he spent over half a decade as a full-time staff editor. Dorfman is a past winner of the Gerald R. Ford Prize for Defense Reporting and a Livingston Award finalist.

Ian Enright is the founder and CEO of Goat Rodeo, a creative podcasting company. As a senior audio producer and creative executive, Goat Rodeo’s work includes award winning and groundbreaking podcasts such as The Report, Allies, Cornbread Mafia, and Long Shadow. He is an executive producer on Spy Valley.

For more, visit brazen.fm/spy-valley.

Spyhunters and prosecutors are closing in on James Harper. They need one last fount of information that could help put him away for good. But obtaining it could prove fatal for its source.

For more from Spy Valley, subscribe to Brazen+ and get ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content from the show. To sign up, head to the Brazen channel in Apple Podcasts or visit brazen.fm/plus.

The man codenamed “Caribou” plays a critical role in James Harper’s story, but his own story remains in the shadows. In this bonus episode, Spy Valley host Zach Dorfman sits down with Hanna Kozlowska, journalist and translator of the Polish archives used in the series, to discuss Caribou’s position as a mole for the US within the Polish spy service—and what happened when the Poles found out about his double-cross.

For more, visit brazen.fm/spy-valley.

In collaboration with SpyCast, this week on Spy Valley we’re sharing a bonus episode recorded live at the International Spy Museum in Washington, DC. The panel was moderated by Sharon Weinberger, the national security and foreign policy editor at The Wall Street Journal, featuring Spy Valley host Zach Dorfman with Dr. Raymond J. Batvinis, a historian and former FBI Special Agent, John Gibbons, who headed the US Attorney’s prosecution team in the case against James Harper, and nuclear historian and National Cryptologic Museum Director, Dr. Vince Houghton.

For more espionage stories from the International Spy Museum, listen to SpyCast, hosted by the museum’s Historian and Curator, Dr. Andrew Hammond.