The Art of Manliness - #225： The Real Life James Bond

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast bond james bond

00:00:20.840 007 is a masculine film icon he's handsome debonair and dangerous he completely epitomizes

00:00:27.540 the french idea of savoir faire the ability to know what to do in any situation bond is so darn manly

00:00:33.980 be easy to think that he was purely the creation of author ian fleming's imagination but in fact

00:00:38.460 bond was inspired by a real life world war ii spy and his life and career was even more bond-like

00:00:44.120 than james bond my guest today on the show has written a biography of the real life inspiration

00:00:48.220 for james bond his name is larry loftus and he's the author of the book into the lion's mouth the

00:00:52.980 true story of dusko popoff world war ii spy patriot and the real life inspiration for james bond

00:00:58.060 today on the show we talk about dusko popoff and his career as a double agent during world war ii

00:01:02.120 larry and i discuss how dusko got involved with spying the insanely dangerous missions he went on

00:01:06.700 and the real life encounter between him and ian fleming that inspired one of popular culture's

00:01:10.740 most iconic characters really fascinating show when you're done check out the show notes at aom.is

00:01:16.260 slash bond for links to explore more into this topic so without further ado larry loftus and into

00:01:21.980 the lion's mouth larry loftus welcome to the show thank you brett uh so you have a new book out that

00:01:31.440 uh was just a fantastic read it's a it's an actual it's a true story but it read like a thriller it's

00:01:37.700 called into the lion's mouth the true story of dusko popoff world war ii spy patriot and the real life

00:01:43.860 inspiration for james bond when i was i had no idea this guy existed and when i finished the book i was

00:01:49.560 like why don't more people know about this guy because he contributed so much the ally cause during

00:01:54.380 world war ii so i'm curious how did you get started researching popoff's espionage career and his

00:02:01.840 connection to ian fleming's james bond well i actually stumbled across it i was working on

00:02:08.200 basically just an historical fiction novel and wanted to do espionage because i like the area i like the

00:02:14.280 genre and so i thought you know i better do some research to find out what actual spies did

00:02:19.680 so that my story is believable so i started googling and researching best spy ever greatest

00:02:25.620 spy most daring spy and all roads led to pop off his name just kept popping up again and again so then

00:02:31.380 i started focusing on him and researching him and i quickly found out holy cow this guy did more in

00:02:36.980 real life that i'm making up for my fictional character so i switched then just to focusing on

00:02:44.400 him and then you know my fiction novel basically became a non-fiction but he did so many things

00:02:50.960 so many unbelievable things so many cool things that it does read like a like a a thriller novel

00:02:56.800 right i mean it reads like a james bond movie script you're like there's like scenes and it's like

00:03:00.720 that's just straight out of james bond how it happened yep well there's there's a reason for that which i

00:03:05.720 know we'll get to in a moment right so let's get some background on pop off because he's an

00:03:09.220 interesting character um he uh was a double agent for the united kingdom and for the germans but he

00:03:15.140 was primarily uh working for the united kingdom the allies but he was the serbian playboy from

00:03:21.800 yugoslavia so how did he end up becoming a double agent during world war ii for the allies and for the

00:03:28.960 nazis well he was not a double agent for the germans he was a straight agent for the germans he was a

00:03:35.040 double agent for us gotcha um for the uk and then and then for the for the u.s when he came over here

00:03:41.220 but he came from a wealthy family in yugoslavia and he like us was a lawyer he earned a law degree

00:03:48.460 at bel university of belgrade and then went to freiburg in germany to get a doctorate in law

00:03:54.300 and uh when he was there he meets his best friend johnny jepson johan jepson

00:04:00.040 a german who is brilliant and just becomes a basically his best friend they both hated the

00:04:06.900 nazis and uh they just hit it off well together johnny was very well he came from a very wealthy

00:04:12.860 shipping family which still exists today the jepson family um and then pop off was expelled from

00:04:19.460 germany right after he graduated in 1937 he was expelled for making uh derogatory remarks against the

00:04:26.840 third right and so he was kicked out of the country and then when war breaks out he suddenly

00:04:32.980 gets a telegram from johnny that says he needs to meet immediately uh and and and johnny's coming to

00:04:39.580 yugoslavia to meet with him and says you know meet me on this date and then basically lays out the

00:04:44.880 cards and says i i'm a i'm recruited i'm a german german recruiter i'm in the agwar which is the which

00:04:52.580 was the military intelligence for the germans and he said i need your help i need you and this is his

00:04:57.760 best friend he said i need your help won't be a big deal i need you to do a little work for me just

00:05:03.080 go to some cocktail parties get us some information and so pop off was torn i mean he he despises the

00:05:09.800 nazi but he knows that johnny is stuck because if you're in germany and you're a german you either work

00:05:16.380 you either join the military or you're executed for treason so he knew his best friend was in a

00:05:22.500 bind so it's okay i'll help you um you know so he's essentially recruited by johnny into the agwar

00:05:29.860 has a german agent and then immediately goes to the british and says hey i've just been recruited

00:05:36.680 i'm a german spy how would you like all of my information i'd love to be a british double agent

00:05:41.720 so that's what happens he goes to the embassy and they said uh yeah and then they send him to

00:05:47.800 london and he gets fed it and from there on it's it's history it's history and that's where all the

00:05:52.820 exciting adventures happen um so one thing i thought was great about the book is i learned a lot about

00:05:58.540 espionage during world war ii because i think that's an overlooked aspect of the war or most wars

00:06:03.000 actually you know everyone knows about the battle of the bulge normandy midway but those battles relied

00:06:08.640 on intelligence absolutely can you tell us about uh the status of spies during world war ii or any

00:06:17.300 war actually and why that status made the job so dangerous well it's critical number one and you've

00:06:25.380 seen recently there are a lot of books out about uh even the spies that george washington used and how

00:06:30.720 critical that was in the revolutionary war the spies are useful because you need information you need

00:06:37.220 accurate information so you know where to send your troops where to keep your troops out of and so

00:06:41.220 forth and when it gets messed up like dunkirk then people die so the spies every site always uses spies

00:06:48.580 i mean they try to be under the radar and invisible but they're out there and if they're caught of course

00:06:53.840 they're tortured for their information and then executed spies are not covered under the um

00:06:59.340 uh under the convention under the geneva convention they're not covered so they're you know they're on

00:07:06.540 their own if they get caught so pop off and every other spy if you agree to become a spy you are

00:07:13.440 taking on the most dangerous job ever because it's not just that they're going to kill you they are

00:07:20.620 going to kill you but they they're going to torture you to get all of your information all of the codes

00:07:24.960 all of the other spies that are involved so that they can then you know go after your whole network

00:07:29.440 so on the on the german side and he ended up working for so many different agents on the german side

00:07:36.640 he's recruited as an adwar agent which is the german military intelligence but then you also have

00:07:43.440 as soon as he joins later when he's in lisbon the gestapo want to use him uh and the sd the the it's a

00:07:51.400 long cedar bench it's a long german name but the that's the nazi intelligence they want to use him

00:07:56.260 so essentially even on the german side he had three masters and then on the british side he has

00:08:02.260 two masters he has mi5 which is counterintelligence kind of like our fbi but it's counterintelligence

00:08:09.120 domestic uh and then you have mi6 which is which is straight foreign intelligence and then later he

00:08:15.960 comes over to he's loaned by the british to the u.s and he uh he works for the fbi as an agent

00:08:22.280 essentially not a formal agent but they call him an informant but for all practical purposes he's an

00:08:27.800 agent so he ends up you know essentially having like six masters if you will and so i mean what

00:08:33.240 was the incentive for these guys to become spies if it was so dangerous and they weren't protected by

00:08:38.760 the laws of uh war well for pop off it was all about um you know patriotism and that's why it's in

00:08:47.680 the title world war ii spy patriot because he's he's from a neutral country yugoslavia is neutral

00:08:53.800 when world war ii breaks out and so he's got germany on one side he's got the uk on the other side

00:09:00.220 and he's he you know his best friend is german he just came from germany he was expelled though he

00:09:06.220 absolutely despises the nazis and he saw what churchill saw and every and everyone else that was

00:09:12.120 paying attention that this is a madman hitler's a madman and that if he's not stopped you know

00:09:17.880 millions of people are going to die so pop off sees that because he was there i mean he was in

00:09:23.480 germany when they started to crack down he was arrested by the gestapo he was thrown in prison

00:09:28.100 and he would have been executed but for something that and i won't spoil it in the book but something

00:09:36.420 happens that gets him out that springs him out but had that not occurred he would have rotted in

00:09:43.420 prison and probably died there and probably been executed and i mean did did pop off sort of have

00:09:49.340 i mean did his personality suit this like was there something about his personality was like

00:09:52.960 yeah this is this is exactly what i do it's dangerous i love risk i mean was there something

00:09:57.300 about yeah there's no doubt about it i mean he it was the perfect storm to create the perfect spy

00:10:02.460 because you've got a guy and it's not just that he's patriotic and it's not just that he i mean

00:10:08.460 essentially it's easy for us you have good and evil and hitler's evil so you're going to fight

00:10:12.780 against hitler but his country's neutral he doesn't have to do this he can just stay in his neutral

00:10:17.780 neutral he had a wonderful life he was a lawyer he had a great law practice he had great clients

00:10:22.920 um he had a he had it came from a wealthy family he had a very nice yacht so he didn't have to do

00:10:29.620 this but part of it was patriotism and he wanted to stop the evil that he saw in hitler and then the

00:10:36.000 other part if he's going to do it what better way to do it than as a spy because he was this guy was

00:10:42.960 brilliant he had a doctrine in law he spoke five languages he was cultured the germans and the british

00:10:50.020 both loved him because he was so cultured he could go into any setting any society setting he could meet

00:10:56.700 with prime ministers he could meet with kings and did the king of yugoslavia and did so he was a guy

00:11:03.080 but he had he had ice water in his veins and so he could pull it off and and and did but he was so

00:11:12.160 cultured he was a great athlete he was a he was a world club i don't know it's world class but he was a

00:11:18.620 top-notch water polo player horseback rider he'd won two shooting contests he was a good boxer i mean

00:11:25.940 this guy just had all of the skills to be the perfect spy and he loved and actually he did

00:11:31.700 like he liked danger because it was exciting he wanted to do something he was a lawyer but he didn't

00:11:37.100 really you know kind of like us he wasn't really all that crazy about it because after a while just

00:11:43.020 office work becomes drudgery and he wanted excitement right he got it in phase so yeah it's

00:11:49.020 starting to sound like james bond a bit and the guy was also good looking and he had

00:11:52.560 charming incredible and this is all over the the mi5 files which used to be classified and now are

00:12:00.220 declassified but it's all over the all over the files all of his personality he was incredibly

00:12:05.700 charming he was handsome again he was athletic highly intelligent but he knew how to treat women

00:12:13.260 he knew how to charm women he was socially extremely socially skilled so he was just

00:12:21.000 i mean again he was james bond before james bond that's why he didn't let me base it on him

00:12:26.020 right so um he he started doing these missions for the germans and the british but he ended up in

00:12:32.520 lisbon and portugal which played an important role for both german and british spies why is that

00:12:39.040 both during world war ii there's really only two countries that are neutral ostensibly neutral

00:12:45.600 on continental europe and that's spain and and portugal and spain was only really ostensibly

00:12:53.360 neutral because uh uh they were hitler had actually uh provided franco with military uh equipment and

00:13:02.580 so forth during their civil war so they were really fighting sort of secretly fighting with um with

00:13:08.400 germany but portugal was completely neutral and lisbon and secondly madrid those were the two hubs

00:13:16.100 where every country sent their spies and diplomats so in both cities lisbon and madrid um you would have

00:13:24.500 hundreds of diplomats that were really spies i mean diplomats and spies embedded within the diplomats so

00:13:32.180 uh like i got the i got the actual um embassy list of the personnel uh and from the it was in the

00:13:41.280 portuguese secret police files but it shows the the actual embassy list of both sets the german set

00:13:48.560 and the um and the british set that are in that are in lisbon and i'm going down the list okay this guy's

00:13:55.880 this guy's this guy's gustapo this guy's sd this guy's abwar um pop-up supervisors on on on the german

00:14:04.940 side on karstov is listed there and he's just listed basically as an attache so it was the hub it was

00:14:12.540 where um all of the country sent spies we sent military people there so there would be military

00:14:18.440 uh attache's there diplomats spies and um so they were all it was the bottleneck that's where they

00:14:27.200 all went right and then also lisbon was like the perfect background adding this spy mystique because

00:14:33.180 it's kind of a exotic romantic place there's casinos fancy hotels oh no question the actually

00:14:40.200 if you look at the map you'll see lisbon which is a beautiful city and then you'll see just to the

00:14:46.140 west of it you'll see a storle which is a it's a suburb and the best way to describe it is just

00:14:51.660 think of the french riviera i mean it is essentially the portuguese riviera and was built that way it

00:14:57.640 was a small fishing town a store was that they decided around the turn of the century to build

00:15:03.260 into this beautiful resort area that would compete with the french riviera and they did so they built

00:15:08.800 the palacio which is a world-class hotel still is um they built this magic casino which was the

00:15:15.380 biggest in europe at the time um you've got the ocean there so they've got this beautiful beach

00:15:21.820 you got a castle right there on the beach um you just have the beautiful climate you just had all

00:15:28.000 of these things that really made it the perfect destination and they built shops and restaurants

00:15:32.660 and so forth and a lot of a lot of royalty uh were going there to vacation so they built these

00:15:39.680 beautiful homes for the royalty to stay in so it was just an incredibly romantic place for for effinats

00:15:48.120 to happen and and um you know there were a couple of books that i used that gave me the background

00:15:54.860 lisbon and it's just fascinating right and this in lisbon this is where ian fleming bumped into pop-up

00:16:02.040 correct correct so yeah how did how did how did so i guess it's interesting a lot of people don't

00:16:07.840 know that ian fleming before he was a spy writer was actually part of naval intelligence i guess for

00:16:12.800 the british correct correct he was in naval intel or in british intelligence you really have three groups

00:16:19.360 you have mi6 foreign intelligence you have mi5 domestic intelligence and then you have the british

00:16:26.220 naval intelligence and for uh in naval intelligence director the director was admiral john godfrey

00:16:34.440 godfrey there are two boards that supervised pop-up and and all of the spies there was the planning

00:16:41.220 board at the top which was called the w board and that had uh admiral godfrey on there and stewart

00:16:47.600 menzies who was the mi6 uh director which which ian fleming would call m but he went by c

00:16:54.640 fleming of course had to change it but it went by c but anyway so you had this this overarching

00:17:00.340 supervisory board that does the planning and then you had a second board which was called the double

00:17:07.240 cross committee which was much more involved and basically handled the day-to-day affairs of these

00:17:13.100 guys so everything pop-up did on a daily basis the double cross committee knew about it had planned and

00:17:18.240 so forth well admiral godfrey was one of only a couple of people that actually was on both

00:17:23.260 the w board and the double cross committee so godfrey knew everything about pop-up i mean had to okay

00:17:29.980 it i mean he was in the decision making group for both both uh both boards there fleming was his

00:17:37.760 personal assistant he was his secretary so as as his personal assistant he was his right-hand man

00:17:44.100 fleming was was the ear for everything that godfrey heard so and early in the summer of uh 1941

00:17:54.060 godfrey's going to go over to the united states to meet with um president roosevelt and try to persuade

00:18:01.600 him to start a foreign intelligence basically like to mimic mi6 because u.s doesn't have one all we have

00:18:09.400 at the time is the fbi and hoover wanted to control everything including foreign intelligence

00:18:15.780 and the british said that that's idiotic and they didn't trust hoover anyway so they he went over

00:18:21.160 godfrey went over to meet with fdr to persuade him to start a foreign intelligence like the mi6 which

00:18:30.220 became for the u.s the oss which is the forerunner to the cia when he takes this trip of course he takes

00:18:37.140 his right-hand man with him ian fleming so fleming goes with him and fleming meets with the other

00:18:43.620 uh underlings and basically fleming uh writes the essentially writes the charter to the oss which

00:18:51.880 becomes rcaa most people don't realize that fleming had a connection to our intelligence as well

00:18:56.740 when they come back uh both going over and coming back they stay in lisbon on on a layover

00:19:03.940 and when they come back it's when when fleming runs into pop off godfrey knows ian pop or pop off

00:19:12.520 was involved in a incredibly labyrinthine scam to basically steal the germans blind through money

00:19:21.100 laundering if you can believe it so as part of this scam pop off works this incredible feat to

00:19:29.280 essentially steal all this money from him which he does and of course godfrey had to approve this it

00:19:35.060 was called the midas plan and uh so godfrey knows all about it and presumably informed ian fleming of

00:19:42.540 what was going on well pop off gets the money right as fleming is coming back and when fleming is staying

00:19:50.580 in uh lisbon on the way back he knows that pop off just got all of this money and it was

00:19:57.140 it was uh forty thousand dollars which in today's you know would be like you know six hundred thousand

00:20:05.660 in cash so fleming follows pop off and pop off kept it on because he couldn't he couldn't trust that

00:20:13.460 amount of money in the safe in the hotel safe and he couldn't trust leaving in his room because his room

00:20:19.360 was always searched by by different countries different spies and so forth so he kept it on him

00:20:24.420 and he is followed by ian fleming this is about august 1 it's about the date that this happened 1941

00:20:32.860 so he follows pop off from the palacio where fleming had stayed in the palacio on the prior trip

00:20:39.880 and there's this hotel spy bar that's kind of famous where they both went so he follows him from the

00:20:44.960 to uh to get then to get a drink and he's just shadowing him you know but but pop off notices

00:20:51.140 hey there's this guy following me and then uh to dinner and then to the casino so when he's in the

00:20:56.720 casino he knows that fleming is watching well if i can segue back to casino royale have you read that

00:21:03.820 yeah i have yep if you look at casino royale it is a thinly veiled recreation of what actually

00:21:10.440 occurred in casino royale i mean in casino astoro in 1941 so casino royale just mirrors everything that

00:21:19.280 actually happened so the town royale is essentially astoro and the britney cliffs are the cliffs of

00:21:28.220 cascade and the splendide and the hermitage hotels are the palacio and the parquet and they both have

00:21:35.360 fountains and they both are decorated the same and they both have red curtains and they both have

00:21:39.660 the casino next door and they both have majestic gardens out there all of that was just recreated

00:21:45.780 identically from casino astoro to casino royale and it could it continues right to what happened

00:21:53.640 in the famous casino royale scene which is the casino scene which is the the heartbeat of of the story

00:22:01.680 that was recreated fleming is mathis and pop off is bond and the chiffra was a gentleman named block

00:22:12.360 and and in both the real life and in the fictional version the the british agent is an mi6 agent james

00:22:20.740 bond just go pop off uh the agent watching is mathis who's really ian fleming and then of course the

00:22:29.500 villains and in in the in the book version le chiffra is fleeing the russians in the real version

00:22:36.100 which actually happened block had was fleeing the nazis and the money that is bet in real life was

00:22:44.180 mi6 money and in the story was mi6 money so it all matches identically what happened in real life to

00:22:52.380 what happened in the fictional version of the of the novel yeah i thought that was really interesting

00:22:56.720 and he also too you look at um the way ian fleming originally imagined james bond um it just i mean

00:23:05.440 it was sort of like i mean it looked like pop off it was sort of dark skinned dark hair um and i think

00:23:11.120 it sort of uh it's not like the james bond we think of today well everything matches in fact if you look in

00:23:18.580 the back of my book there's a chart and i compare all of the people through history who have the most

00:23:25.740 common names that have been suggested as a model or an inspiration for bond and and it so i include

00:23:32.900 what we see from casino royale the first james bond novel to these these potential agents who he could

00:23:41.760 have based it on and only one matches everything and that's duska pop-off and you start with the

00:23:46.860 physical appearance which is you have this dark hair combed straight back and i actually had a blog

00:23:53.420 article where i showed the picture of duska pop-off he's having dinner he's in a tuxedo

00:23:59.980 with ian fleming's commissioned sketch of what james bond looked like and they're identical i mean they

00:24:06.560 it looked like the artist was looking at pop-off as he was drawing it um but he's got black hair

00:24:13.760 combed straight back short crops uh both have blue gray eyes not just blue or not just gray but blue gray

00:24:20.700 they both have blue gray eyes uh they're clean shaven um they're they're both athletic they're

00:24:27.480 both good with their hands uh pop-off speaks five languages james bond speaks three uh james bond is

00:24:34.900 a good shot at pop-off had just won two shooting contests i mean it just mirrors it all the way down

00:24:41.660 so there's no question this was this was the guy he was basing it on that's right and um so yeah

00:24:49.000 after lisbon uh pop-off ends up the united states for a while um he was sent there by the germans

00:24:55.700 correct yes the germans sent him to new york he was this is almost hard to believe he was britain's

00:25:04.340 greatest agent and he was germany's greatest agent or so they thought they he was they thought he was so

00:25:10.900 successful mi5 when he goes to visit his controller his supervisor and lisbon major von karstoff mi5 is

00:25:19.060 is creating all of these documents and false maps and things that are that look good and it's just

00:25:25.320 that either the information was old it was already public or they made it just a little bit incorrect

00:25:30.900 and so that was to obviously to deceive them but the germans it looked fabulous and pop off

00:25:36.960 you know the germans one of his uh one of his uh one of the uh uh colonels on the other side said

00:25:44.940 it looked like the work of 10 men and as they're saying that as and this was as jepson gives him

00:25:50.820 ten thousand dollars to be so pleased admiral uh pekenbrock said it looked like the work of 10 men

00:25:57.100 and dusko had to be smiling and thinking well it kind of was 10 men that worked for mi5

00:26:02.840 so anyway he was their best spy so they sent him they decided well we're going to we're going to use

00:26:09.340 him to set up a whole network in in the united states so they sent him to new york to start a spy

00:26:15.260 network there number one and secondly to investigate the defenses of pearl harbor which uh there's you

00:26:23.020 know japan had been asking the germans to do this for some time and so they figured that they'll kill

00:26:28.840 two birds with one stone and then pop off to do both both tasks so that's how he ended up in the

00:26:33.540 united states but like while he was there he really wasn't doing anything for the germans seems like

00:26:37.480 he's just spending their money uh you mean when he was in new york yeah well yeah when he was in new

00:26:42.360 york well he he was if you read the if you read my book you'll see that he was really frustrated

00:26:49.620 because his hands were tied he's the star agent that that the british are just drooling over because

00:26:57.180 he's so good and you know they're thinking god this is great we'll get we'll get him to do the same

00:27:03.060 thing in in the united states the problem was hoover just had every character trait that made it

00:27:10.620 impossible he was xenophobic he hated foreigners he hated spies so he doubly hated double agents

00:27:17.520 didn't trust him didn't trust pop off and while hoover assisted in bringing him in bringing him

00:27:25.240 in by contacting the state department to help get his visa once pop off was in all he wanted to use

00:27:31.940 him for was bait to catch real other german spies not to do counter espionage just simply as bait

00:27:39.040 and pop up just hated that you know you've got a thoroughbred and you're basically you're basically

00:27:43.680 using him as a walking horse and so uh pop off couldn't send messages they wouldn't even they

00:27:50.320 wouldn't let him send radio messages they had the fbi do it pop off couldn't see it uh it was just it

00:27:56.660 was just the worst case scenario and um they weren't sending any good information mi5 worked really hard

00:28:03.820 to send good information to the germans through pop off that looked absolutely wonderful it was just

00:28:11.480 wrong um but it wasn't wrong by a lot it was just again like information that that happened the day

00:28:18.540 before so they can't really use it but when they first see it it looks brilliant but the hoover wanted

00:28:25.600 no part of doing any of that and so the germans obviously figured out this god well his work really

00:28:32.100 got bad all of a sudden right and then you get into the book this is kind of interesting so we won't get

00:28:36.420 the details it spoils it but you know j edgar hoover's obstructionism with pop off um played a

00:28:41.820 you know possibly played a role in pearl harbor and i think that's completely fascinating had no idea

00:28:46.640 that this went on yeah and i'll just again you're right i don't we don't want to spoil the ending but

00:28:51.400 uh or even the middle but the what people don't know and and if you look on if you look on uh the back

00:29:00.380 of the book there's a blurb that i have from admiral james lyons who was the who is a four-star

00:29:06.100 admiral and former commander of the u.s pacific fleet i actually have two blurbs from two admirals

00:29:11.000 like that but lyons is the admiral that is actually giving the 75th pearl harbor anniversary address

00:29:16.280 this year on december 7 and he knew nothing about this no one does basically but he knew nothing

00:29:23.340 about this i've been advising him and giving the documents but the short version is top off warned the

00:29:28.880 fbi on august 18 1941 almost four months before pearl harbor that the japanese were planning to

00:29:38.380 uh planning to attack pearl harbor and i won't get the details of what it's all in the book the

00:29:43.920 documents are in the book uh the main document has never been seen before in public but one that i

00:29:49.800 actually copied out of the fbi files from the national archives the admiral lyons had not even seen

00:29:55.360 that knew nothing about it because who were kept it buried it was all classified who were kept

00:29:59.760 everything buried uh throughout his entire life and and went to his grave with with none of this

00:30:06.360 information coming out there were eight pearl harbor investigations not a one knew anything about this

00:30:11.940 document anything about pop-off meeting or anything about pop-off it's interesting yeah and you get the

00:30:17.420 details it's really fascinating um but while he's in america um pop-off uh was covers was potentially

00:30:23.600 you know blown because he like he's the you know living up to the the playboy stereo you know

00:30:29.960 playboy spy stereotype that he lived he started a relationship with a movie star named simone simon

00:30:35.800 that's that's her name and uh the famous journalist walter winchell uh wrote an article about this

00:30:43.420 and um at this time too as you said pop-off's information he was applying to the germans was getting

00:30:49.140 pretty crappy so he had the germans were calling him back for an accounting and this is where the

00:30:54.740 title of your book comes from you said that this is when pop-off was jumping into the lion's mouth

00:30:59.460 why was it so dangerous for pop-off and what was it about his personality that he's able to

00:31:05.620 you know jump into the lion's mouth but then come out unscathed well in fact people always ask where

00:31:11.560 where where does the title come from into the lion's mouth and if you look in the front of the book

00:31:16.960 between the copyright page and the table of contents there are two quotes there in the top

00:31:21.820 one this is where the title comes from the top one is from lieutenant commander ewan montague also with

00:31:26.940 british intelligence a colleague of ian fleming they had the same the same office uh rank lieutenant

00:31:33.200 commander montague was essentially one of his case officers he would meet regularly with pop-off to craft

00:31:41.120 what they called uh chicken feed false information to feed to them for example like mine charts

00:31:47.740 around around britain which were wrong but not wrong by a lot but if you're bringing a ship in and you

00:31:55.760 think a mine is here and it's not you avoid this area and then they're of course showing an open area

00:32:02.100 where there actually are mine so anyway he works real closely with you and montague and montague

00:32:07.100 said about pop-off this quote he had the steel within the ruthlessness and the cold-blooded courage

00:32:14.280 that enabled him to go back to the german secret service headquarters and lisbon in madrid time and

00:32:19.100 again when it was likely that he was blown it was like putting his head into the lion's mouth so that's

00:32:25.480 where the quote comes from so yeah you're right the essentially the biggest thing that blew his cover was

00:32:33.940 the fbi would not let him send his messages to the avar which he was supposed to do they were sending it

00:32:41.880 on his behalf but they don't know all the details they don't know all the codes they can't you know

00:32:47.780 he's been he's been working for them now for a year and he's got all of these codes and the way he

00:32:54.520 responds and the information and so they botch it so they botch a lot of the information they hoover doesn't

00:33:00.820 trust him to send codes they think he might be a real german agent so he never gets to he never

00:33:06.460 gets to even see that the transmit uh the transmitted radio messages going back and forth so the fbi

00:33:13.500 botches that and come combine that with the fact that they're getting no valuable information they're

00:33:20.080 like something's wrong because he was brilliant for us right up until he went to america and then all

00:33:26.820 of a sudden it just all drops off and now let's see he's got this girlfriend over there he's dating

00:33:33.020 this movie star he's you know going to all these parties because he shows up as you mentioned walter

00:33:38.640 winchell uh has this very interesting short blurb in an in an article um and this is he was naturally

00:33:46.240 syndicated so this was everywhere about simone simon dating her new toy is is uh uh what they call him

00:33:54.740 yugoslav diplomats uh and and he had a caption and that's no double talk which the germans said

00:34:00.840 what is that all about uh dusko papa so anyway the germans figured out something happened and they're

00:34:07.720 pretty sure that he's gone to the other side uh in other words become a double agent and there are two

00:34:14.800 the british intercept two messages that show he's he's blown so the british said to him when they found

00:34:22.160 out uh and it was time the germans okay you need to come back and report report to lisbon

00:34:27.080 the british knew at that point he was blown and if he went back he would be tortured and executed

00:34:34.800 and uh so they said you can't go back you're blown and he said well i have to i mean and we know in

00:34:42.480 time that he's the he's the only real great agent that the germans have and and or that the british

00:34:49.580 have to deceive the germans and you know they would eventually need him to deceive the germans

00:34:54.540 about d-day so anyway so pop off is so courageous and he says well i have to go back and they're

00:34:59.680 like no no no dusko you can't you'll be tortured do you understand you'll be tortured and executed

00:35:04.900 and he said to his his case officer uh uh ian wilson and his supervisor for nmi5 tarl robertson

00:35:14.460 colonel tarl robertson he said he said to them well they won't kill me right away and his case

00:35:20.060 officer said you might wish they had right and i mean that's pretty chilling that is i mean it just

00:35:27.520 shows me again it's sort of that james bond like doubles may care attitude he had yeah and he was

00:35:33.360 just confident he was so he had so much confidence he was so charming he was so smart that he just

00:35:41.080 believed that once he got back he could talk his way out of it he just believed that he had such

00:35:46.920 confidence and if he got killed he got killed you know he just knew look you know my job is to help

00:35:53.120 win the war if i die i die so be it but i'll die in a great cause so i mean just ice water in his veins

00:36:01.340 this guy had right and he did make it out of the lion's mouth we won't tell how because that's really

00:36:06.400 we won't tell how exactly the story is great of how he's able to do that um i mean going back to

00:36:12.020 more of this cool spy stuff um you also talk about uh the oss or is it the oss or british secret

00:36:19.360 service where they had this camp in scotland where they bring in uh william fairbain

00:36:24.280 this hand-to-hand like combat expert uh can you tell us about fairbain and how you know the training

00:36:30.680 that pop off did under him sure the british decided um this is before there are any commandos

00:36:37.020 or any uh agents like that that are trained to be commandos the british decided that they needed

00:36:42.460 basically a fast action sort of like our navy seal some some group that they could just drop in

00:36:47.840 anywhere that would be these great warriors that could just withstand anything and so they asked uh

00:36:55.660 a gentleman by the name of colonel gubbins to start this hit squad commando group which originally was

00:37:02.800 only going to be about 500 soldiers and uh it eventually grew from there but they said you start

00:37:08.740 this this great commando group that we can just drop in anywhere and churchill definitely wanted this

00:37:15.640 so they founded what was called the soe the special operations executive which is essentially like

00:37:23.400 navy seals just a fast action get in get out wreak havoc destroy something capture somebody kill

00:37:29.780 somebody and so they set up this very secret ultra secret training in the middle of nowhere which was

00:37:37.200 a little town called arisag scotland and you can actually pull it up online and look at it and you can

00:37:43.340 see the uh the actual the building that they were housed in is still there in fact i had some friends

00:37:50.340 who had their daughter married in that building but the building is still there but it's literally in

00:37:54.420 the middle of nowhere and gubbins needed the best of the best for both instruction in hand-to-hand

00:38:01.740 combat and in armaments rifles uh weapons knives pistols machine guns so he brought in as his main two

00:38:11.700 instructors the first one was the hand-to-hand combat guy william fairbairn who was in short the

00:38:17.420 baddest man on the planet he was he headed the shanghai police department which shanghai back

00:38:23.560 then was this lawless city with gangs and bugs and the word was my research uh at least estimated that

00:38:30.480 he had been at that point he had been in 600 fights street fights knife fights um had scars all over his

00:38:36.900 body scars on his hands from knife fights um i mean he was just the baddest guy on the planet he had

00:38:43.100 gotten a black belt from the founder of judo um and uh kano jigoro was the founder of judo got a black

00:38:53.620 belt was from him the first westerner to do so he took lessons in jiu-jitsu and aikido and boxing

00:38:58.600 all these other things so he was just a walking lethal weapon so that's who they brought in to train

00:39:04.800 the commandos in hand-to-hand combat which they did for dusko and then they brought in eric sykes

00:39:10.540 who who fairbairn had recruited he was he worked for reinington at the time and and and fairbairn

00:39:17.840 recruited him into the shanghai police department who was the weapons expert so he was the weapons he

00:39:23.580 was the guy that would teach them about every single weapon you could find in the battlefield of all the

00:39:27.900 german weapons the czech weapons polish weapons everything russian and so they learned how to fire

00:39:33.780 literally any machine gun pistol rifle and then the two instructors fairbairn and sykes developed

00:39:41.200 a commando knife called a fighting knife and it's called the fairbairn sykes fighting knife which is

00:39:48.780 basically used by most military and commando groups even today so that was the knife that they created

00:39:54.960 for them to participate in you know knife fights so that that was the guy that trained pop off and

00:40:01.360 there's a chapter in the book called the art of the silent kill and i won't detail how that was

00:40:06.740 done but it's in the book and fairbairn's specialty was the silent kill using your bare hands and he

00:40:13.660 taught pop off how to do that so this is where pop off learned to be a double o exactly exactly and in

00:40:20.960 the in the epilogue of the book i explained that he earned that double o the way that fleming envisioned it

00:40:28.680 right um so you know pop off had an amazing career um you know he played a role in d-day

00:40:35.100 we won't get into the details of that because it's fascinating it just spoils like i said like

00:40:38.720 like we said earlier this book is a historical book but it reads like a thriller um so if we

00:40:43.380 that's why we've been like kind of coy with the like hey we don't want to spoil it because like it

00:40:47.260 really does spoil if you know the ending um yeah i'll just say that d-day was was the um

00:40:53.680 pop off was was unsuccessful in in the u.s using the information about pearl harbor because hoover

00:41:02.280 ignored it but he was very successful with d-day because he did deceive the germans about and and

00:41:09.040 you know we will not spoil exactly how he does this but he deceived the germans about d-day so that

00:41:14.540 they thought we were attacking at calais uh instead of at normandy where we did and they thought that it

00:41:21.760 was going to come in july because that's what pop off told him and of course it comes uh you know

00:41:27.840 on june 6th so he both for the location and the time and this and pop off did this over but they

00:41:34.140 the germans are very thorough so they sent to lisbon to grill him their best interrogators sd gestapo

00:41:42.440 abwar their best seasoned interrogators to and get to interrogate him about the allied plans for the

00:41:50.520 invasion of france these interrogations would go on five six seven eight hours at a time

00:41:55.860 and pop off didn't miss a beat didn't miss a beat so pop off had this amazing career as a spy uh

00:42:02.940 and you know he learned how to kill people with his bare hands did these crazy missions um you know

00:42:09.020 having to be duplicitous with the germans betting you know thousands tens of thousands of dollars of

00:42:14.780 british money on baccarat uh lots of relationships with women uh i mean just amazing just action-filled

00:42:22.000 life what did he do after the war well let me just add one thing about because you mentioned when we

00:42:27.900 haven't talked about this one of the things that james bond is known for is his suave and and uh

00:42:33.740 successful way with women and womanizing all of that am slimming said in the interview a bbc interview

00:42:39.760 when he was asked about that he said look my my character james bond really only has one girlfriend

00:42:45.080 per book it's only so he only really has one girlfriend per year top off in real life had two

00:42:52.440 three four girlfriends in every city that he went to lisbon madrid new york rio um everywhere i mean and

00:43:01.040 and i know because it's in the files i mean their names their love letters there are all these love

00:43:05.620 letters because remember the british would would intercept all of the mail to see if it was if

00:43:10.820 they were german secret messages so they're opening it so they would get letter after letter and and

00:43:15.880 so in the file and and some of these i a couple of these i i know i put at least one in the book

00:43:21.280 but you'll see these these love letters that are in there and they're like who is this you know and

00:43:28.560 there were so many when he went and when he went to new york they mi5 and getting the letter

00:43:33.340 from a girl and pop off couldn't even remember who it was he thought it was a german spy girlfriend but

00:43:38.920 he couldn't even remember that's how many girls this guy went through so anyway okay back to your

00:43:44.360 question so yeah he had this exciting career uh during world war ii what did he do after the war

00:43:49.480 well here's the let me give you two parts the he continued i mean his cover during the war is as a

00:43:58.340 businessman as an export import businessman and he did it in real life and and unlike if you read

00:44:05.060 dr no you'll see that james bond coincidentally happens to have the same cover import export

00:44:09.740 which he never does but in real life pop off did i mean he actually had to affect business on a day-to-day

00:44:16.640 basis as a businessman and in the book i talk about some of the deals and some were huge there's a 14

00:44:21.860 million dollar ship deal um so after the war he continues his business in export import in real

00:44:29.440 life and and build this global company where he travels all over the world uh still doing his

00:44:38.420 business he's involved in south africa and helping their government uh doing the bond deal i mean he did

00:44:44.560 some really high-powered stuff the second part is well did he continue as a secret agent and i'll leave

00:44:51.560 that to let let people read at the end of the book because i address it at the end of the book

00:44:55.920 very good well you know larry this has been a great conversation um we've gotten a pretty you know

00:45:01.840 bird's eye view of pop-off's career i'm curious as you researched and wrote about pop-off uh did you

00:45:08.380 gleam any life lessons from him on being a man absolutely there are i mean i guess i would say probably

00:45:16.020 about five four or five different areas where uh and a lot of it overlaps to things that you have put

00:45:23.420 in blogs and so forth and i would just say they were these number one courage this guy a man has

00:45:30.580 courage even when when he knows that there are great risks of danger to himself and sometimes bodily

00:45:37.680 harm and pop-off was just one of the most courageous characters that i've ever read about like we talked

00:45:43.980 about earlier he goes back to lisbon so that he can help defeat hitler even though he's been told

00:45:50.520 you're going to be tortured and executed that that takes you know some chutzpah to to do that so he's

00:45:58.780 willing to give his own life uh for the cause and uh so the first lesson on on being a man is just is

00:46:07.940 courage the second and this is all over pop-off's career and all over the book is decision making a

00:46:14.900 man makes decisions and um pop-off was very independent he was his own man and had his own

00:46:22.320 mind and i think that's important for men to do is to do your own research figure it out do the hard

00:46:28.180 work and make a decision this is not a guy that that would take a poll you know he he would not really

00:46:35.680 ask anyone well what's your thinking what's your thought he would do his own research and make up

00:46:41.460 his own mind and make a decision and and that's a very attractive trait and something that that we as

00:46:48.000 men you know really should be should be doing it is is being able to make a decision and and he did that

00:46:54.240 and you know one of the reasons he was a perfect spy was because he could make a snap decision on the

00:46:59.460 spot with the pressure on uh and and be right so that would be the second one is just decision making

00:47:06.380 the third is he was a gentleman he was chivalrous he he uh had manners did he date all of these women

00:47:15.500 yes some of them actually were german spies and they were trying to get information from him so they're

00:47:20.460 using women as bait to try to get and of course they don't do it but so he's a gentleman he knows

00:47:27.040 in our day we'd say okay you open the door for a woman you stand when a woman comes to the table

00:47:31.500 um and so forth those were things that were just ingrained to him that he was a perfect gentleman

00:47:37.920 and simone simon who was this famous movie star that he dates she was she was one of the top stars in

00:47:46.120 hollywood at the time and she absolutely was crazy about him and and in her uh interviews and things she

00:47:53.740 would talk about her mom she lived with her mother in she had a a an apartment in new york and she

00:48:00.400 stayed in the beverly hills hotel and um uh in in hollywood but when she was in new york she stayed

00:48:06.760 with her mother and so disco is dating her and has to go to you know talk to mom while simone's getting

00:48:14.160 ready and mom loved him and the even though he's this james bond dates all of these women he was a

00:48:21.760 perfect gentleman with uh simone and simone's mother and simone's mother loved him so he was a

00:48:29.320 gentleman he was chivalrous and and that's something that you know we want to aspire to be as as men as

00:48:35.220 well uh as i mentioned he was very well rounded i mean he spoke five language he was cultured he was

00:48:41.180 adept at society he was a great athlete he was a reader uh he was he was good with his hands he could

00:48:47.980 take care of himself um in fact there's a story that um uh after uh years after the war he went to

00:48:55.800 the bahamas and for an interview and there was a quote-unquote bad guy that showed up that was

00:49:02.340 harassing them and the journalist who i got this information from to pop off in a calm but very

00:49:10.660 confident manner basically told the guy uh you need to disappear or else and the bad guy did i guess

00:49:20.060 pop up was so confident and and just it was clear that he was he did not suffer fools well or criminals

00:49:26.140 and the journalist said i was just stunned because pop off just ran him off just by talking to the guy

00:49:31.120 um and lastly i would say you know part of being a man he was extremely confident

00:49:37.360 without being arrogant and and there's there's often a fine line there between being confident

00:49:42.660 being arrogant but the you know all the files and all the information that i saw in my research

00:49:48.160 and interviews and so forth he was extremely confident without being arrogant and that's a

00:49:54.820 hard line about it's a hard line to balance on yeah yeah well larry uh this has been a great

00:50:01.080 conversation where can people learn more about uh into the lion's mouth well they can uh just for

00:50:06.840 some of the details and so forth they can look at my website larryloftus.com or

00:50:11.180 easier to remember realjamesbond.com the books on amazon barnes and noble walmart i mean the books

00:50:18.780 everywhere so they could go online and get it and all of the review boards and stuff are on there so

00:50:23.960 they could see all that on on amazon so any of those places excellent well larry loftus thank you so

00:50:29.060 much for your time it's been a pleasure likewise brett thanks for having me my guest today was larry

00:50:33.580 loftus he's the author of the book into the lion's mouth you can find that on amazon.com go check it

00:50:37.980 out it really it's a historical book that reads like fast-paced spy fiction you can find out more

00:50:42.820 information of the book at larryloftus.com also make sure to check out the show notes at aom.is

00:50:47.400 slash bond

00:50:48.280 well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips and advice

00:51:03.340 make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com and if you enjoy

00:51:06.800 the show i'd appreciate if you give us a review on itunes or stitcher helps us out a lot as always

00:51:11.120 thank you for your continued support and until next time this is brett mckay telling you to stay

00:51:14.540 manly

The Art of Manliness - July 31, 2025

#225： The Real Life James Bond

Episode Stats

Misogynist Sentences

Hate Speech Sentences

Summary

Transcript