Using the new Bonus Mk 155mm weapon, the two countries – often at odds – now work together in joint exercises. Positive news, says Brad Johnson, and an intelligent move given world conflict growth. The West faces increasing hostility and must unite to fend off dangerous conflict.
https://youtu.be/7pQ1BEepoOk
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uh brad johnson here america for
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americans for intelligence reform
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intel reform.org it is march 2nd 2021
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uh there’s kind of an interesting
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development in uh in europe what was
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traditionally called
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yukon now uh europe and africa command
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they’re doing some uh exercises with the
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french military
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and uh they’re they’re shooting at bonus
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mk is the type of uh new
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newly developed ammunition that’s it’s
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an improved system
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155 uh uh 155 millimeter
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very highly precise stuff that can be
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fired by
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towed howitzer or self-propelled
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howitzer things like that
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pretty effective 155 millimeter it’s you
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know
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got uh can deliver some substantial
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kinetic energy
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so it’s a really sounds like a really
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advanced nice system and it uses ladar
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lidar
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it’s these systems that are uh thermal
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and laser sensors so
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it greatly improves the accuracy of the
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first shot
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so it’s you know hopefully one shot one
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kill at the other end
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and uh would be a you know a vast
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improvement i’ll put it that way in
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these things so
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very interesting that the americans are
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going to be able to go out there this
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was developed in europe uh
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french run it now have it are using it
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and they’re gonna they’re gonna do these
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joint exercise sizes in the american
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artillery unit is going to have a chance
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to fire off let me just say it’s the uh
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33 uh 319th airborne field artillery
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regiment from the 173rd airborne brigade
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uh that’ll those will be the american
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stuff it’s a unit of the fourth
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battalion
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so you know kudos to you guys that’s
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pretty cool wish i was going to be there
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to see this but
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uh we’re going to get uh get out there
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with the french and fire off four of
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these things and see how they do in one
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of the
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the training fields that they that they
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use for these sorts of munitions
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now what’s very interesting out of this
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what’s important to me other than just
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the coolness of being able to go do this
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is uh the fact that this is the first
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time
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in modern history that we’ve done a
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joint
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military exercise of this nature with
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the french
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now the french have always since world
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war ii
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and world war ii was a mass as everyone
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knows the the french initially fought on
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the side of the
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germans the nazis with the vishy french
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and then
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uh later they were thrown out and the
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french changed sides and then began
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fighting with the americans this was
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through charles de gaulle
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who was the head of the of the free
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french military that came in
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after the vichy were thrown out he had
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always been fighting against the nazis
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and later became the prime minister of
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france and was
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very famous there uh militarily he was
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you know okay i suppose there were a
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number of things reserved for him
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uh that uh that uh
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the the allied command and trying to
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support the allied armies
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uh left for him to do as a result in
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some of these things that came off he
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always had a very deep resentment of
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americans and
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one of the reasons that we in the united
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states have had so many problems
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with france and a lot of the dislike and
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hatred even
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even hatred to some degree that came out
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of the french towards us was
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was uh came from de gaulle who
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that was his uh his attitude uh he was
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not a very good military commander and
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that sort of thing and i think he was
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very resentful it was one of those cases
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where the
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ego was much larger than the actual
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ability of the man
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and uh which i would argue brits please
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forgive me but montgomery i think is
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another perfect example of that but
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not to delve too far into the history of
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it
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what’s as i said so interesting out of
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this is this is a joint exercise
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for the very first time coming out of
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that very anti-american
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attitude that that evolved from de
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gaulle
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and world war ii so suddenly now we’re
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going to do this i i shouldn’t say
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suddenly but now we’ve finally
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achieved that point where we’re doing
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joint exercises and for a great reason
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this is a
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good one to do it on so they’ve picked a
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good example where they can start doing
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these
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joint exercises but i think the world
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has evolved enough and french
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france has come around to the point
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where they recognize
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the dangers of this world are really
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starting to accumulate
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i think what this is is a tacit
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recognition
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by france who is essentially the
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center of the eu along with germany but
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really france number one and everyone
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else you know a close second with
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germany when everyone else
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kind of distant third place and uh
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that is that tacit recognition on the
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part of
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of france as to how this world has
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evolved and becoming more and more
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dangerous
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uh with the cold war it was one of those
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things where there was balance achieved
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and there was actually while it could
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have gone catastrophically bad there was
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actually sort of overall less danger
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now that’s not the case now there’s just
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danger popping up all over
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one of the things i spend a lot of time
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on is in updating all of these things to
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lay out what has the potential to really
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go bad and wrong and sideways
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and and evolve into a larger uh
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conflict that that could
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theoretically put us on a world war iii
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type setting which that we all want to
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avoid
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and i think this is tacit recognition by
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the country of france
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just how much more dangerous the world
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has become
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and while we here the united states are
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downgrading our capability especially in
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the
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intelligence community the military was
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built back up
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under uh president trump who recognized
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many of these dangers
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and it’s now already we’re starting to
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see some of these things
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where money’s being taken away from the
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military and a lot of our
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militarily related issues out there so
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this is one of those things where our
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defenses are beginning to drop
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where the world recognizes that we need
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to be building up and preparing for
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conflict or
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problems or dangers that are out there
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versus downgrading like what we’re
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seeing here
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so i hope this military-to-military
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cooperation with france
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blossoms and i think now it looks like
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the french have become
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a more friendly partner to this sort of
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activity and at least in that level
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we’ll be a little bit better prepared
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and hopefully the intelligence community
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back here in the united states will
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will fall in line and begin to recognize
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it but probably not at least during
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these next four years of the
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of the oba of the biden administration
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the obama
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leftover obama administration biden
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administration so
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uh unfortunately but at least this is a
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very positive nice step i’m certainly
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very happy to see it and it just makes
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us that little tiny bit better off
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you
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Brad Johnson retired as a Senior Operations Officer and Chief of Station with the Central Intelligence Agency’s Directorate of Operations. Having served domestically and abroad, many assignments included areas of armed conflict. He served overseas in direct support of the War Against Terrorism and he took multiple assignments overseas as Chief of Station.
A certified senior expert in counterintelligence, surveillance and surveillance detection, his proven expertise in dangerous operational environments included the highest level of training available in the USG and globally. His tradecraft expertise was honed in dangerous, difficult, and restrictive operational environments.
Brad is an enrolled member of The Cherokee Nation, a Federally Recognized Tribe.
In the summer of 2017, he founded the non-profit organization Americans for Intelligence Reform to create awareness of political corruption and the resulting diminished capabilities within the intelligence community. Serving as President, he brings you his unique perspective from deep, international experience and conservative, Christian values.
