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Watch this podcast on YouTube: The CIA Mole Who Brought US Intelligence to its Knees

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What motivates a person to become a spy and betray their own country? For some, it's a matter of principle and ideology, a belief in a cause that supersedes national loyalty. For others, it's all about the money, the allure of wealth proving stronger than any patriotic duty. 

Aldrich “Rick” Ames, a former CIA officer turned KGB mole, fell firmly into the latter category. Driven by greed and the demands of an extravagant second wife who lived well beyond her means, Ames embarked on a 9-year path of treachery that would lead to the arrest or death of no less than 10 of the US’s highest-ranking spies.

The aftermath of his near-decade-long spying spree was immense, with the US government recognising it as the most disastrous failure of intelligence in the nation’s history.   

This is the story of the notorious CIA mole who shook American intelligence to its very foundations.