Heroes Behind Headlines

Colonel Robert Howard was a very distinguished member of the top-secret MACV-SOG units that fought during the Vietnam War in America’s secret war in Laos and Cambodia. Comprised of only one to a few U.S. special force team members plus a cadre of native Vietnamese, Montagnard, Cambodian (Khmer Krom), and Nung fighters, these recon units operated deep behind enemy lines recovering downed pilots and attempting POW rescues, destroying enemy fuel dumps and caches, conducting wiretaps, gathering intelligence and spreading propaganda which forced Hanoi to divert 40,000 troops—about four divisions—to rear security missions along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Surrounded by heroes, Bob distinguished himself among his peers, becoming the most decorated Green Beret ever. His medal include the Medal of Honor–for sheer valor and heroism even as he suffered multiple wounds himself defending his men. Today’s guest, historian Stephen L. Moore shares Bob Howard’s story in his book “Beyond the Call of Duty: The Life of Colonel Robert Howard, the Most Decorated Green Beret.”Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Right after the U.S. dropped the bomb on Nagasaki, Victoria Kelly’s grandfather was sent there as part of the U.S. forces sent to occupy the city after its destruction. Victoria grew up curious about her grandfather’s experience there, as he’d died before she was born. Victoria has partnered with Karen Tanabe, whose family survived the bombing, to make “Atomic Echoes”: A documentary that details what it was like for the locals and the U.S. soldiers on the ground, and how they came together to help the afflicted, as they all struggled with the fallout of radiation. Victoria joins HBH today, to share some of the amazing stories and people she and Karen discovered in their journey to make a filmed record of what it was like after an atomic bomb goes off.North Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Patrick Naughton’s father served in Vietnam when he was a child, and shared accounts of his experiences and adventures – from infantry to serving in Special Forces as part of the MACV-SOG teams doing recon and battling across the fence” in America’s secret war with Northern Vietnam forces in Laos and Cambodia.Patrick felt the only path to truly earn his larger-than-life’s father’s respect was to enlist in the military himself, and he likewise joined the infantry and served in Iraq. His book “Born From War,” is a fascinating account of the parallel experiences father and son had, and the lessons about generational impact of military service learned by both.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

The second half of this two-part interview from 2023 with one of our favorite Americans, in celebration of Memorial Day:A living legend of MACV-SOG and the Green Berets, John "Tilt" Stryker Meyer shares some of the most daring first-person stories of combat ever told! Inserted by Kingbee helicopter into the dense jungle along the Ho Chi Minh trail in  Laos and Cambodia during the height of the Vietnam War, Tilt and the US and indigenous members of Strike Force Idaho  deployed on  one impossible  top-secret  mission after another, spying on, harassing  and taking it to the North Vietnamese and Vietcong despite a  casualty rate of over 100%.Top-secret, all-volunteer SOG teams soon became the bane of the NVA's and Vietcong's existence, and despite overwhelming odds and  sometimes  having to face battalion-size enemy detachments, Tilt describes how these small US-indigenous units bravely soldiered on achieving a combined kill ratio of 158 to 1 – the highest in US military history.Bravery like that described by Tilt is not only inspiring, it changes the way we perceive the Vietnam War.  Resilience Podcast SeriesWe explore key challenges affecting civil society in Central and Eastern Europe.Listen on:   Spotify North Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

We're re-airing this two-part interview from 2023 with one of our favorite Americans, in celebration of Memorial Day:A living legend of MACV-SOG and the Green Berets, John "Tilt" Stryker Meyer shares some of the most daring first-person stories of combat ever told! Inserted by Kingbee helicopter into the dense jungle along the Ho Chi Minh trail in  Laos and Cambodia during the height of the Vietnam War, Tilt and the US and indigenous members of Strike Force Idaho  deployed on  one impossible  top-secret  mission after another, spying on, harassing  and taking it to the North Vietnamese and Vietcong despite a  casualty rate of over 100%.Top-secret, all-volunteer SOG teams soon became the bane of the NVA's and Vietcong's existence, and despite overwhelming odds and  sometimes  having to face battalion-size enemy detachments, Tilt describes how these small US-indigenous units bravely soldiered on achieving a combined kill ratio of 158 to 1 – the highest in US military history.Bravery like that described by Tilt is not only inspiring, it changes the way we perceive the Vietnam War.  Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Karen Holt didn’t realize her childhood was anything other than normal--whether it was her father’s absence every Monday to Friday; their odd moves from town to town without any warning;  the FBI arresting her father; seeing Detroit mafioso Peter Licavoli on his ranch; or even visiting her father in his ‘country club’ prison.One of the most unusual figures in recent memory, Chauncey served as accountant and money manager for mobster Meyer Lansky, he was also an off-the-books CIA operative and specialist in forged documents and credentials, a ballistics expert, a circus performer and fine artist.He was also present at Dealey Plaza the day JFK was assassinated, November 22, 1963. In fact, Holt was pictured in Life Magazine as one of the three hobos detained as witnesses.Chauncey's outrageous life, which also included bootlegging, gunrunning, and maintaining multiple aliases, is captured in his autobiography “Self-Portrait of a Scoundrel,”  which reads like a CIA thriller.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Born on a U.S. airbase in London of American parents, Geoffrey Gilson began his career writing  speeches for Margaret Thatcher, leveraging his dual British-US citizenship to navigate elite political circles. With decades of front-row access to senior UK and U.S. officials, Gilson served as a key operative for the British Conservative Party, gaining unparalleled insight into global power structures. In 1988, when his friend and business partner Hugh Simmonds turned up dead in the woods near where they lived with seven million dollars were missing from his law firm’s account, Geoff launched his own investigation into this friend’s death, which eventually revealed a complex web of money laundering, arms deals and political collusion and connections between high-level political leaders, intelligence organizations, and money launderers and arms dealers. The result is detailed in his riveting book, "Maggie’s Hammer," a meticulously researched and gripping exposé. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Former U.S. Army Ranger, Barry Todd, was out celebrating a professional milestone with his wife and several friends at a local watering hole in Yuma, Arizona, when he was attacked by a drunken patron along with some buddies. Barry was slammed headfirst into a cement wall, incurring a concussion and other bodily injuries until his gun went off and shot the man who’d insisted on attacking him.The police were called and incomprehensibly arrested Barry, who explains how self-defense and stand your ground laws don’t always protect you as they should. Police in his case didn’t actually know the law in Arizona, and elected DAs often pursue charges & convictions rather than the truth, as is their legal obligation. Barry also discovered that one friend of his attackers was linked to the local police. Barry walks us through his battle of five years to get his case dismissed, and his record cleared, and how he feels a calling to help anyone unfairly charged with a crime. All proceeds from his book, “Stand Your Ground: One Man’s Self Defense Nightmare,” go to his foundation that helps the charged person and their attorney successfully get their case dismissed.The original culprit was never charged.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

California State Assemblyman Mike Gatto was a rising star in the California Democratic Party when on November 12th, 2013, his retired father Joseph Gatto was found murdered in their family home in the neighborhood of Los Angeles. Emotionally devastated, Mike put his career on hold to pursue his father's murderer. With very few clues nad more questions than evidence, the murder has never been solved, and the rate of unsolved murders is higher than ever.Mike recounts the facts of this still unsolved crime, and his own experience grappling with his grief. He asks anyone with information about the murder to step forward.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Proud Canadian and innovative thinker and author, Jeff Brown was flattered beyond  when Sophie Trudeau, (his country’s “first lady” at the time.) reached out to compliment his writing and aphorisms, and engage him to think about ideas that expressed the spirit of what Justin Trudeau and his wife sought to communicate as part of their platform.At their first meeting, Sophie quickly disclosed her own dissatisfaction in her marriage, and proceeded to behave in a flirty and what felt inappropriate manner through their subsequent conversations and collaborations, both live and virtual. Uncomfortable as an unpaid, uncredited speech writer, and deeply distressed by his growing insight into the Trudeaus’ life, marriage, and hypocrisy, Jeff sought to separate in a civil manner, putting polite space between them and retreating from future requests.And then the nightmare began… Sophie sought to pressure Jeff to stay tethered to the ‘first couple,’ and when he resisted, Jeff and his wife were subjected to  a four-year whirlwind of digital surveillance, political pressure, and personal transformation which reshaped his understanding of trust, truth and freedom.social ostracism, government monitoring, and even harassment, including the suppression of his book about the experience, In Trudeau’s Kitchen. Jeff describes how an ordinary citizen can become the target of not only the political world— but of a hidden network of covert systems, governmental agencies, and corporations. His book stands as a warning to all of us. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Growing up in the New Hampshire mountains, country boy Brennan Morton couldn’t wait to join the military, and when 9/11 occurred, it provided the final push for enlistment. Brennan loved every minute of the training as a Marine recon sniper, and was surprised as physically superior candidates washed out. But then he was deployed to Iraq with his unit, and the reality of what he’d sought hit home. Sent into a brutal fighting environment he saw his comrades brutally harmed by IEDs without any visible enemy to directly fight.His acclaimed memoir "Valhalla Boys: Marine Recon Sniper in Iraq" has Brennan Morton hailed as one of the most powerful and literary war memoirs of the post-9/11 generation. "Valhalla Boys" has been called a raw, reflective, and often poetic meditation on combat, brotherhood, and the darkness that war leaves behind. Drawing comparisons to Tim O’Brien, Joseph Heller and Kurt Vonnegut, Morton invites readers not just into the battlefield at the height of the Iraqi insurgency, but into the mind of a Marine Recon sniper struggling to make sense of a war with no clear front lines—and no clear purpose. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Mark Shaw shares his recent discoveries linking the JFK and RFK assassinations, and also the mysterious and dreadful death of famed journalist Dorothy Kilgallen who was hot on the trail to solve the mystery behind President Kennedy's death. Ripped from the pages of his new book, "Abuse of Power," there's plenty of thought-provoking revelation that further strengthens the inescapable conclusion that the President's death was not caused by a lone gunman, and that the American people--in spite of the recent release of documents relating to the assassination--still haven't heard the full truth about the most notorious American crime ever.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Whether you call it brainwashing, programming, indoctrination, or something else, cult members have been taught to think, feel, and act in certain ways. The goal of the cult deprogrammer is to empower the individual to think critically, to evaluate, to reality-test; and to exercise their own free will. Over his long career, Mark Blockson has participated in more than 100 interventions or kidnappings at the behest of families who are trying to rescue loved ones from religious cults. He talks about his own experiences with addiction and how that led to his involvement in rehabilitation and deprogramming and how the techniques involved have evolved over the years.  He’s also very candid about the rewards and pressures of the work and how it has impacted own life and eventually led to divorce, addiction and, even, time in prisonHeroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Retired FBI Agent Stewart Fillmore was trained to break down evidence to solve crimes and build cases. Here, he focuses on the forensics of the JFK assassination and the likelihood that the hole in the front of the late President’s throat was an entry wound, not an exit wound as the FBI and Warren Report had concluded.Stewart walks us through the evidence he’s gathered, and what it tells him about the nature of the crime. Importantly, his account aligns with the prior testimony of HBH guest Tosh Plumlee: Namely, that there was a shooter to the left front of the President’s limousine, from the top of the South Knoll and that gunman was captured in photo taken by UPI  reporter Frank Cancellare.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Early in the morning of October 23, 1983 two truck bombs were detonated at buildings in Beirut Lebanon housing members of the US and French Multinational Force in Lebanon – a military peace mission in the eight-year-old Lebanese civil war. The attack by a terrorist group called Islamic Jihad, which had backing from the governments of Iran and Syria, killed 307 people: 241 U.S. and 58 French military personnel, six civilians and two of the attackers. Two hundred of the 241 US casualties were US Marines, making it the deadliest single-day death toll for the United States Marine Corps since the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II. Based on interviews with survivors, military records and personal records, Targeted Beirut by today's guest, Pulitzer Prize nominated historian and NYT bestselling author author James M. Scott, and past HBH guest Jack Carr is the authoritative account of the deadly attack. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Writer and editor Sarah McCarthy set out to write a book about her friend of 15 years and Jeffrey Epstein survivor Juliette Bryant. She reveals details about how Epstein and his powerful friends lured girls and young women into his network and the techniques he used to manipulate them. But the part that is most shocking, is what Julie experience at Epstein’s ranch in New Mexico – the little-talked-about Zorro Ranch – and the bizarre activities that took place there. Her account helps explain his purpose and how he was able to fund his extravagant lifestyle; and why important men and women were interested in him in the first place. The answer has to do with his interest in eugenics, human cloning and mind control. Sarah’s book about her friend Julie Bryant and her experience with Jeffrey Epstein entitled Blue Butterfly: Inside the Diary of an Epstein Survivor was recently canceled for reasons of, in Sarah’s words, “sustained physical and electronic harassment.”Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

In 1942, on the heels of the Pearl Harbor attack as the US entered the war, Canada and the U.S. agreed to form a special top-secret military commando unit – nicknamed by the Nazis as “The Black Devils” for their stealth, bravery and skill. Designed to work as a nimble, highly conditioned unit of ‘super-fighters’ with special skills, selected servicemen from the two nation’s forces became one and trained for eight-and-a-half months in Helena, Montana before being shipped overseas to Europe.Bill Woon’s dad, Dave Woon, was a Canadian national who was recruited to the unit. Dave ultimately married a Montana girl, and raised his family there, and never discussed the details of his adventures with his son. Bill relates the history of the group, trained initially for cold-weather fighting in Norway, but ultimately deployed in Italy where they knocked the German mountain stronghold of  of Monte La Difensa and  held a key strategic position during the Battle of Anzio, before being deployed to France and Germany. Bill later worked to get his dad’s unit a special gold Congressional Medal in 2005. Notably, the First Special Service set the paradigm for the Green Berets and other tier-one fighting gro The FSSF Service originally recruited about 1800 soldiers, won all 22 battles they engaged, had a casualty rate of 134%, and captured over 30,000 enemy soldiers.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

This three part-interview takes us through the amazing career and true-crime adventures of Texas native Zeke Flatten, who grew up knowing he wanted a career in law enforcement, got himself hired as a bail bondsman at 18, and became an undercover cop at 20. Initially placed undercover in a high school to investigate gun sales and other crimes, he ended up buying a bomb from a student  who was later convicted of murder.In 2000, while working undercover, he discovered an ecstasy ring that led to the arrest of Mafia leader Sammy (the Bull) Gravano in Phoenix. In 2017, Zeke, then retired from law enforcement, gained attention as a national whistleblower after exposing a major public corruption scandal involving high-ranking law enforcement officials in Northern California. He was unlawfully detained by local officers posing as U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents, leading him to uncover a complex web of corruption and money laundering involving local law enforcement engaged in a criminal enterprise. His revelations prompted FBI and IRS investigations resulting in multiple federal indictments and convictions, department policy changes and highlighted systemic corruption within local law enforcement in California’s Emerald Triangle.In the summer of 2018, while attending a high school reunion in San Antonio, Zeke learned about the murder of a teenage friend named Gary Osborne. Gary had been shot to death on the night of April 8, 2009 by two men who kicked in his front door. No suspect had ever been arrested until Zeke launched an investigation that led him to a convicted burglar named Trey Fisher, who was also part of a pedophile ring responsible for one of the most famous child murders in Texas history.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

This three part-interview takes us through the amazing career and true-crime adventures of Texas native Zeke Flatten, who grew up knowing he wanted a career in law enforcement, got himself hired as a bail bondsman at 18, and became an undercover cop at 20. Initially placed undercover in a high school to investigate gun sales and other crimes, he ended up buying a bomb from a student  who was later convicted of murder.In 2000, while working undercover, he discovered an ecstasy ring that led to the arrest of Mafia leader Sammy (the Bull) Gravano in Phoenix. In 2017, Zeke, then retired from law enforcement, gained attention as a national whistleblower after exposing a major public corruption scandal involving high-ranking law enforcement officials in Northern California. He was unlawfully detained by local officers posing as U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents, leading him to uncover a complex web of corruption and money laundering involving local law enforcement engaged in a criminal enterprise. His revelations prompted FBI and IRS investigations resulting in multiple federal indictments and convictions, department policy changes and highlighted systemic corruption within local law enforcement in California’s Emerald Triangle.In the summer of 2018, while attending a high school reunion in San Antonio, Zeke learned about the murder of a teenage friend named Gary Osborne. Gary had been shot to death on the night of April 8, 2009 by two men who kicked in his front door. No suspect had ever been arrested until Zeke launched an investigation that led him to a convicted burglar named Trey Fisher, who was also part of a pedophile ring responsible for one of the most famous child murders in Texas history..Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

This three part-interview takes us through the amazing career and true-crime adventures of Texas native Zeke Flatten, who grew up knowing he wanted a career in law enforcement, got himself hired as a bail bondsman at 18, and became an undercover cop at 20. Initially placed undercover in a high school to investigate gun sales and other crimes, he ended up buying a bomb from a student  who was later convicted of murder.In 2000, while working undercover, he discovered an ecstasy ring that led to the arrest of Mafia leader Sammy (the Bull) Gravano in Phoenix. In 2017, Zeke, then retired from law enforcement, gained attention as a national whistleblower after exposing a major public corruption scandal involving high-ranking law enforcement officials in Northern California. He was unlawfully detained by local officers posing as U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents, leading him to uncover a complex web of corruption and money laundering involving local law enforcement engaged in a criminal enterprise. His revelations prompted FBI and IRS investigations resulting in multiple federal indictments and convictions, department policy changes and highlighted systemic corruption within local law enforcement in California’s Emerald Triangle.In the summer of 2018, while attending a high school reunion in San Antonio, Zeke learned about the murder of a teenage friend named Gary Osborne. Gary had been shot to death on the night of April 8, 2009 by two men who kicked in his front door. No suspect had ever been arrested until Zeke launched an investigation that led him to a convicted burglar named Trey Fisher, who was also part of a pedophile ring responsible for one of the most famous child murders in Texas history..Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

U.S. Government whistleblower Martin Rodil breaks down the Venezuelan efforts to steal elections in the U.S. and also explains how that country's Cartel de los Soles–the largest criminal organization in the world–aims their drug trafficking and other activities at the United States.Martin, along with his partner Gary Berntsen, were tracking down cartel bank accounts and other assets for the U.S. government to rightfully seize, when they tripped over an enormous election theft program created and maintained by Venezuela, (aided by Cuba, China, Iran, and Russia) aimed at America and dozens of democracies around the world. Martin gives us his first-person account of how he recruited the disillusioned engineers who originally helped create the source code and malware that lives inside our electronic voting machines, and how this unexpected discovery proved difficult to share with D.C. officials.Martin made his career in international intelligence working alongside the DEA for over twenty years. He is also a principal source, along with Gary, in host Ralph Pezzullo’s recent book, “Stolen Elections." (Available on Amazon Books.)Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comResilience Podcast SeriesWe explore key challenges affecting civil society in Central and Eastern Europe.Listen on:   Spotify

Former CIA agent and Boston native Ralph Mariani shares the real-life thriller account of the 1975 murder of his boss, Richard Welch, the then-CIA station chief in Athens, and the twenty-seven-year investigation that was only solved when two grandmas came forward when a new description of the culprits was circulated.On the night of December 23, 1975, CIA Station Chief Dick Welch and his family attended a Christmas party at the American Ambassador’s residence. Upon returning home, Dick exited the car to open the main gate. A man appeared amid the darkness and shot him dead. Five days after the attack, a terrorist group called “Revolutionary Organization 17 November” claimed responsibility for Dick’s death. It wasn’t until 2003—almost 28 years later— after 17 November had killed 23 people as a bomb exploded in the hands of Savvas Xiros, one of the organization’s most ruthless killers, that the people responsible for the murder of Dick Welch and several other foreign diplomats were caught. Because of the  steadfast efforts of Ralph Mariani, other colleagues and members of Welch’s family, together with fears about poor publicity ahead of the 2004 Olympics did Greek authorities finally take action against the group, and bring them to justice. The question Mariani helps answer is: Why did it take so long? And why did the Greek government not accept US help in solving the crime?   Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Over his career as a journalist, reporting from mainly Afghanistan and Pakistan, Jere Van Dyk has worked for the New York Times and CBS News and has appeared widely as a commentator on international affairs. His also the author of several books. In 2008 Jere was captured and held by the Taliban, an experience that he wrote about in his fascinating book Captive, which received a Foreign Press Award in 2022. He is with us today to talk about his long experience in Afghanistan that began with  a trip he made as a young man. He recounts the friendship he developed with both Jalaluddin Haqqani and his son Sirajuddin Haqqani, leaders of the famed Haqqani network; (allies of the United States during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan of the 1980s and later some of our fiercest enemies) the significance of the Durand line drawn by the British in 1893; and how all this relates to the current rise of Muslim nationalism. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

With the country of Venezuela and the criminal behavior of the Maduro regime currently headline news, today’s guest is particularly timely – petroleum executive, kidnapping victim and author Jose Angel Pereira. At first glance, Jose Angel Pereira’s career looks like that of someone who reached the pinnacle of corporate success – that of a seasoned executive with over three decades in the oil and gas industry. Jose Angel once led CITGO Petroleum as CEO, navigating billion-dollar deals and international joint ventures across five continents. But in 2017, he was summoned from Citgo's Texas headquarters by the Maduro regime to make a presentation. As he and his executive team left the meeting, they were arrested. Later named the CITGO 6, the six executives were imprisoned in Venezuela and tortured for five years. Conditions were so harsh that one of them perished. Jose Angel is with us today to talk about the experience and what he learned about resilience, purpose and leadership, as detailed in his recent book from Hero to Villain: My True Story of the CITGO6. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

On the evening of  January 7, 2025 several destructive wildfires swept through the Los Angeles area, including the fast-moving Eaton Fire near the neighborhoods of Altadena and Pasadena. Firefighters and three night-flying helicopters with the Los Angeles County Fire Department were ordered to respond. They intended to drop water on the Eaton fire but, buffeted by ferocious updrafts and downdrafts, aborted the operation at 6:45 p.m. By midnight, the fire expanded to over 1,000 acres fueled by strong Santa Ana wind blowing northeast to southwest with gusts of up to 100 mph.As flames threatened neighborhoods, Pasadena Transit operators from Transdev were called on to help. Working around the clock for three days, fourteen bus drivers led by their manager and dispatcher Letty Ochoa and assistant general manager Erasmo Rodriguez, drove through flames, flying embers and overwhelming smoke and managed to rescue 500 people living in senior centers and getting them out of harm’s way. Letty Ochoa is with us to talk about that dramatic experience and the heroic response of members of Transdev when their community was threatened. The Eaton Fire eventually killed 19 people and destroyed more than 9,000 buildings, becoming the 5th deadliest and 2nd most destructive wildfire in California history. It burned simultaneously with the deadly and destructive Palisades Fire in the Santa Monica Mountains, which spread to 23,448 acres, killed 12 people and destroyed 6,837 structures.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

HBH is so proud of this episode--we think this breakdown of an important and ongoing issue bears repeating:Award-winning journalist Sam Quinones lays out the facts behind the meth and fentanyl drug crisis in the U.S.:He expertly describes how mass manufacturing has made these drug ubiquitous, cheap, and infinitely more potent, and thus unlike any other drugs--legal or illegal--ever consumed by human beings. Sam explains how today’s meth has triggered an abrupt rise in homelessness, and why these drugs and so destructive to users, their families, and ultimately all of us.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

In 1944, Sgt. Donald D. Fida was tortured and gutted by Japanese solders and left to die in the Philippine jungle, when his childhood friend miraculously came upon him and saved his life.  Because of this experience, Donald survived and continued to fight til the war's end, living to finally tell his tale at age 99.Twice a Purple Heart recipient, Donald shares his first-person account of his numerous adventures as an Army Scout in the wartime Pacific Theater, describing his combat in the Aleutian Islands, the Marshall Islands (Sitka, Attu), the Philippines (Leyte), and the brutal Battle of Okinawa.This video is airing posthumously; we salute and honor the spirit of this remarkable yet humble man, and are proud to help his voice reach across time and inspire all of us.North Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Part two of Dash's awesome interview: Former Navy SEAL Dash Dong Wong’s journey from growing up as a street urchin in Hawaii to becoming a Navy special operations operator is a powerful testament to resilience and inner strength. Says Dash, “I grew up in paradise, but was raised in hell.” Through all the trauma he faced as a kid, including battling in a child fight club at ten years old, he learned to find hope and beauty in even the worst situations. Though he never knew his real father, he was adopted by a friend of his mother, a delivery man named Andrew Wong. Dash has faced numerous challenges throughout his life – including his career in the military, being diagnosed with cancer, and reconnecting with his adoptive father after a 37-year separation. Prepare to be inspired and learning the importance of faith and resilience in overcoming trauma and finding meaning in life’s challenges.    Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Former Navy SEAL Dash Dong Wong’s journey from growing up as a street urchin in Hawaii to becoming a Navy special operations operator is a powerful testament to resilience and inner strength. Says Dash, “I grew up in paradise, but was raised in hell.” Through all the trauma he faced as a kid, including battling in a child fight club at ten years old, he learned to find hope and beauty in even the worst situations. Though he never knew his real father, he was adopted by a friend of his mother, a delivery man named Andrew Wong. Dash has faced numerous challenges throughout his life – including his career in the military, being diagnosed with cancer, and reconnecting with his adoptive father after a 37-year separation. Prepare to be inspired and learning the importance of faith and resilience in overcoming trauma and finding meaning in life’s challenges.    Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Art theft expert, security expert and author of “The Rembrandt Heist: The Story of a Criminal Genius, a Stolen Masterpiece, and an Enigmatic Friendship,” Anthony Amore introduces us to Boston native, Miles Connor Jr., a combination rock star, samurai sword collector, and brilliant art thief. Connor's fascinating motives for stealing art were tied up with his policeman father’s passion for collecting, and also for avenging what he felt was a grave insult to his father by a local museum, the Forbes House. His first theft was to break into that museum as a teenager and steal dozens of artifacts. One of his remarkable heists was stealing from the famed Woolworth collection housed in Maine. In one of his more brazen acts, Miles also stole and then helped in repatriating a Rembrandt in order to lessen his sentence for that art theft. Amore's book explores Connors most audacious theft and of the most unusual art crimes in history -- the 1975 theft of Rembrandt's Portrait of Elsbeth van Rijn from the Boston Museum. His reason for stealing the painting was even bolder and more surprising. Today in his eighties, Connor lives on a sprawling property with about a dozen horses in Blackstone, Massachusetts.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

At the height of World War II, Oak Ridge, Tennessee was home to 75,000 residents, who consumed more energy than New York City. Most of the world didn’t know that the town even existed. And most of the people who lived there, who were largely young women from small towns across the America, didn’t know the true nature of the work they were doing day after day in the hulking factories that had been hastily built in the middle of the Appalachian Mountains. That is until the end of the war when Oak Ridge’s important secret was revealed, namely that Oak Ridge had served as the production site of the Manhattan Project, and the huge factories there produced highly enriched uranium and plutonium as fuel for the world’s first nuclear weapons. Oak Ridge’s important historical mission and the lives of the mostly women who worked there are brought to life in Denise Kiernan’s excellent book, The Girls of Atomic City, which is an important addition to our country’s history. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Retired FBI agent Pete Lapp helped capture Ana Montez, a Puerto Rican-born American and UVA alumna who was a senior analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency overseeing the Cuban account. For 17 years, she was also a spy for Cuba and was an avowed communist. Ironically, as many of four of Anna’s close family members worked for the FBI and despite Anna’s more extreme political views, assumed she was a loyal American. From his book “Queen of Cuba,” Pete relates how Ana was identified as a potential national security risk, secretly investigated, and ultimately apprehended after years of committing espionage. He describes how she transmitted information and also shares his view of her psychology: Withdrawn, lonely, at odds with her father, and driven by her political convictions and personal disagreement with U.S. foreign policy (including its policy towards Nicaragua) rather than financial gain, by which so many other spies have been enticed.Recruited while in college in 1983 during the Reagan administration by Cuban agent Marta Velasquez, (who was also a Puerto Richan-American) Ana’s steadfast career rise at the Department of Defense gave her increased access over time to information of value to Castro’s Cuba, stopping short of putting agents in personal peril. Cuban intelligence has been chronically underestimated over decades and makes Ana’s case a warning example of an organized program to infiltrate critical branches of the U.S. government, along with the recent apprehension of former U.S. Ambassador to Bolivia, Manuel Rocha, whose been identified as a Cuban spy.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Part Two of this fascinating interview: Douglas Horne is the preeminent JFK assassination expert and a former investigator with the official government JFK Assassination Records Review Board. He’s also the author of the five-volume book set titled: Inside the Assassination Records Review Board: The U.S. Government’s Final Attempt to Reconcile the Conflicting Medical Evidence in the Assassination of JFK, JFK’s War with the National Security Establishment: Why Kennedy Was Assassinated.Recently he was one of the JFK Assassination experts who was called to testify before  the House Oversight Task force on Declassification of Federal Secrets chaired by Congressman Anna Paulina Luna. Among his findings are shocking revelations about efforts by the government to alter the wounds to JFK’s head and body before the official autopsy, and changes that were made to the Zapruder film. For anyone seeking the truth about the Kennedy assassination and coverup, there isn’t a person who has done more investigation or delved deeper into that existing evidence than Douglas Horne. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Douglas Horne is the preeminent JFK assassination expert and a former investigator with the official government JFK Assassination Records Review Board. He’s also the author of the five-volume book set titled: Inside the Assassination Records Review Board: The U.S. Government’s Final Attempt to Reconcile the Conflicting Medical Evidence in the Assassination of JFK, JFK’s War with the National Security Establishment: Why Kennedy Was Assassinated. Recently he was one of the JFK Assassination experts who was called to testify before  the House Oversight Task force on Declassification of Federal Secrets chaired by Congressman Anna Paulina Luna. Among his findings are shocking revelations about efforts by the government to alter the wounds to JFK’s head and body before the official autopsy, and changes that were made to the Zapruder film. For anyone seeking the truth about the Kennedy assassination and coverup, there isn’t a person who has done more investigation or delved deeper into that existing evidence than Douglas Horne. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

World War II hero Phil Larimore remains the youngest candidate to ever graduate from Army Officer Training School, which he did at the age of seventeen, on the eve of America’s involvement in World War II. Landing on the Anzio beachhead in February 1944, Phil – the youngest commissioned US officer in World War II – was put in charge of an Ammunition Pioneer Platoon of the 3rd Infantry Division. Their job: to deliver ammunition to the frontline foxholes—a dangerous assignment involving regular forays into No Man’s Land. As Phil fought his way up the Italian boot, into Southern France and across the Rhine River into Germany, he experienced some of the most intense combat ever. But it was what happened in the final stages of the war, when Phil was sent on a secret mission into Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia to find the farm where Hitler was hiding his world-famous Lipizzaner stallions that makes his story incredibly special and is  the ultimate expression of Phil Larimore’s life-long love of horses. Like so many veterans of that “greatest generation,” Phil didn’t talk much about his war experiences until much later in life, and when he did his stories seemed outrageous to his family and his sons. After his death, his son and our guest Dr. Walt Larimore discovered his father’s papers in the attic—and learned that his father’s stories were all true. In this episode, Dr. Larimore describes his father’s remarkable service to his country, including meeting Eisenhower, losing his leg, fighting to stay in the army, and being awarded  the Distinguished Service Cross, two silver stars, two bronze stars, three Purple Hearts, the Medal of France, the Crois du Garde with a palm, and more. All of this and more is described in Dr. Walt Larimore’s remarkable book At First Light.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Phoenix Police Department cold case homicide detective and and former CPA Troy Hillman tells the extraordinary, detailed inside story of how an elite team of detectives—hounded by the press, a frustrated and frightened public, and their own doubts and exhaustion—solved a double murder that had haunted the Phoenix area for more than twenty years. The initial details were already chilling—the brutal murder of two women, found headless, who were assaulted while riding their bikes along a well-known canal bike path—but Hillman reveals how the initial headlines only scratched the surface and how his team’s use of groundbreaking methods and familial DNA set a precedent for cold cases like The Golden State Killer. These methods included consulting with The Vidocq Society –  an all-volunteer team of forensic experts and investigators – and an expert in the new field of forensic genealogist  – which utilizes genetic information from direct-to-consumer companies to identify suspects or victims in criminal cases.All of this is captured in his fascinating new book Chasing Down the Zombie Hunter.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

After the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the death of Saddam Hussein, scientists who worked for the regime were killed or left the country. When one of them –microbiologist Thamer Abdul Rahman Imran – learned the new regime wanted to arrest him and the insurgents wanted to kill him, he went into hiding. Racing against time, ex–Secret Service agent Steve Monteiro and his team from the Department of Homeland Security set out to find the missing scientist and learn what he knew about the anthrax crisis that was baffling investigators in the United States. The journey took them from the White House to the Middle East as they fight bureaucrats in Washington who seemed to want them to fail. The Gray Bird of Baghdad tells the true story of one’s man’s quest to protect his country and another man’s fight to save his family from the ravages of a country at war.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

We are re-airing Doug Laux's second appearance on HBH, as we fondly remember him upon his passing:Being accepted to work at the CIA is highly difficult. The interview process is long and secretive - and applicants and their references are often vetted without ever knowing it. Once accepted, very few go on to practice espionage. That distinction is reserved for those invited to the CIA’s top secret and legendary training program known as ‘The Farm’. Fewer still actually graduate the program and become Case Officers or as they are most commonly referred: Spies. HBH is excited to welcome back former CIA Case Officer Doug Laux.Before deploying abroad, or even traveling to Camp Peary - which houses ‘The Farm’ somewhere deep in the forests of Virginia - Doug was required to make enormous personal sacrifices. He had to to lie to family and friends, leaving them all completely in the dark, as to what he was really doing with his life. This is all the very beginning of a CIA Case Officer’s career. Doug’s career at the agency was a significant one which took him to Afghanistan, Syria and other other hot zones around the world.Make sure to check out the outstanding book ‘Left of Boom’ by Doug Laux and Ralph Pezzullo - and thanks for listening to Heroes Behind Headlines.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Henry (Dick) L. Thompson is back to share more adventures from his latest book SOG Code Name Dynamite 2 about his time in Vietnam as part of MACV-SOG.From 1964-1972 America engaged in a Top Secret war in Southeast Asia to support our efforts in Vietnam, with an elite group of warriors who were sworn to secrecy for decades. If caught, the US government would deny any involvement.Missioned primarily to do recon on North Vietnamese forces massing across the border in Laos and Cambodia, the small teams were comprised of US soldiers and local fighters, and were dropped near the enemy. They almost always encountered much larger forces, posted a casualty rate of over 100%, and relied on helicopter pilots like recent guest Roger Lockshire to ferry them to safety once the bullets started flying.We're delighted to have Dick back in this two part episode.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

In tribute to our friend and past HBH guest, we're re-airing the first of former CIA officer Doug Laux's two appearances during our first season:CIA Officer Doug Laux explains how he developed a network of spies to track down the man responsible for running the Taliban's lethal IED network, which at the height of the Afghan War was responsible for over 80% of US and Coalition deaths.RIP Doug, you'll be sorely missed.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Henry (Dick) L. Thompson is back to share more adventures from his latest book SOG Code Name Dynamite 2 about his time in Vietnam as part of MACV-SOG.From 1964-1972 America engaged in a Top Secret war in Southeast Asia to support our efforts in Vietnam, with an elite group of warriors who were sworn to secrecy for decades. If caught, the US government would deny any involvement.Missioned primarily to do recon on North Vietnamese forces massing across the border in Laos and Cambodia, the small teams were comprised of US soldiers and local fighters, and were dropped near the enemy. They almost always encountered much larger forces, posted a casualty rate of over 100%, and relied on helicopter pilots like recent guest Roger Lockshire to ferry them to safety once the bullets started flying.We're delighted to have Dick back in this two part episode.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comResilience Podcast SeriesWe explore key challenges affecting civil society in Central and Eastern Europe.Listen on:   Spotify

Courageous resistance fighter Elżbieta Zawacka, aka ‘Agent Zo’, was the only woman to parachute from Britain to Nazi-German occupied Poland during the Second World War. While being hunted by the Gestapo there, who arrested her entire family, she established a military intelligence network, couriered microfilm across wartime borders and, as the only female member of the Polish elite special forces, the ‘Silent Unseen,' played a key role in the largest organized act of defiance against Nazi German occupation – the Warsaw Uprising. Author Clare Mulley shares her amazing story described in her book Agent Zo: The Untold Story of a Fearless World War II Resistance Fighter.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

On April 2nd, 2015, after getting a degree and paying off his loans, Tom Turcich stepped out his front door to start a quest that would last for seven years, take him to six continents, and cover twenty-eight thousand miles. At the end of it he became the tenth person to walk around the world, and his dog, Savannah, became the first dog to do so. Through encounters with strangers, weeks of solitude, and a sheer resilience of spirit, Tom emerged as a beacon of inspiration for countless individuals yearning to find purpose in their lives. His tale serves as a reminder that fulfillment lies not solely in reaching a destination but in the transformative power of the journey itself. Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

In 2009 Savannah Cannon joined up at nineteen, to escape her hardscrabble circumstances. She was quickly tapped as having an aptitude for math and computers. Once trained, she was promptly deployed to a dangerous desert outpost in Afghanistan, where female Marines were not supposed to be assigned. There Corporal Cannon worked as a "data dork" - a data networking specialist - setting up and maintaining critical communications and computer systems. She also went on patrol. The stakes were life and death, and her mostly male fellow Marines were ordered to avoid her.Isolated, depressed, and stressed by the brutal, surrounding reality, Savannah then found herself pursued, assaulted, and then pregnant by a fellow Marine who insisted they had a real relationship. Afraid of being drummed out of the military for being pregnant, she kept silent at great cost to her mental and physical health, and ultimately miscarried.Savannah recounts the challenges she faced as a part of a generation of female soldiers thrown together with their male counterparts, and her experiences coping with a military ill-prepared and riddled with arbitrary rules for the problems which naturally arose. Savannah ultimately rebuilt her life when she returned stateside, and wrote her raw and honest memory, "Corporal Cannon."Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Oxford Professor in International History Steve Casey lays out the fascinating media history of the Korean War. He explains how the Truman administration promoted their case for participating in the  Korean conflict to a nation fatigued from WWII, and how Truman faced public resistance led by his own commanding general,  Douglas Macarthur, who used his powerful cult of personality and enormous public popularity to try and sway national policy, even as he was mulling his own presidential run for the other party.In this episode, Casey gives us a behind-the-curtain view of policy-making and political power in action that sheds light on a “forgotten’ conflict and provides an early example of US policy makers deliberately using the media to build consensus and support for the the most powerful and deadly tool in their toolbox: War. His book “Selling Korea” shows how every stage of the war brought different messaging problems and media strategies.Initially expecting the conflict to be only a quick joint effort with UN forces against a fledgling North Korean army, Truman, MacArthur, and their allies failed to anticipate the brutal fighting conditions, nor did they expect China to deploy massive military forces in active support of North Korea’s Kim Il Sung. The divide between North and South Korea still plays out in today’s headlines with Kim Il Sung's grandson, Kim Jong Un.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Part two of this terrific interview:One of HBH’s favorite guests is back, sharing more stories from his time on a Huey gunship helicopter as a Crew Chief and Door Gunner. As part of the 101st Airborne and a Black Angel, Roger Lockshier and his crew were routinely tasked with extracting MACV-SOG Green Berets during hairy combat in the jungles of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.In this episode and his latest book, “Saving Infantry and SOG Souls,” Distinguished Flying Cross recipient, (and many other awards) Roger shares his adventures stateside in training; supporting Airborne infantry, LRRPs, MACV-SOG; and his combat experiences – including when the six-week Tet offensive caught US forces unawares. He describes how they sat on an armor backplate to protect them from gunfire coming from below, and how they carried their guns freehand, riding on the skids to get the best view possible of the battlefield below. Roger also details his equipment, (including the wider-blade C model helo, his ‘chicken vest,’ etc.) his teammates, and taking on wounded even though their Huey wasn’t designed or intended for that.(This is part one of two episodes airing back-to-back.)Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

One of HBH’s favorite guests is back, sharing more stories from his time on a Huey gunship helicopter as a Crew Chief and Door Gunner. As part of the 101st Airborne and a Black Angel, Roger Lockshier and his crew were routinely tasked with extracting MACV-SOG Green Berets during hairy combat in the jungles of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.In this episode and his latest book, “Saving Infantry and SOG Souls,” Distinguished Flying Cross recipient, (and many other awards) Roger shares his adventures stateside in training; supporting Airborne infantry, LRRPs, MACV-SOG; and his combat experiences – including when the six-week Tet offensive caught US forces unawares. He describes how they sat on an armor backplate to protect them from gunfire coming from below, and how they carried their guns freehand, riding on the skids to get the best view possible of the battlefield below. Roger also details his equipment, (including the wider-blade C model helo, his ‘chicken vest,’ etc.) his teammates, and taking on wounded even though their Huey wasn’t designed or intended for that.(This is part one of two episodes airing back-to-back.)Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

A living national treasure, Col. Paris Davis was one of the first sixteen U.S. Marine officers–and the only African-American–recruited to help form the Special Forces division–the inspired brainchild of JFK, who himself had seen the limits of military bureaucracy during WWII and wanted to add smaller, nimbler highly trained fighting squads to the US military’s toolkit. A native of Cleveland, Paris describes what it took to create the SF cadre; meeting JFK; his combat experiences in VIetnam–and his role in the specific operation in 1968 that ultimately earned him a Medal of Honor, which he did not receive until over fifty years later during the Biden administration.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Judyth Vary Baker was a teenage science prodigy who caught the attention of the top cancer researchers in the country, including Dr. Alton Ochsner – past president of the American Cancer Society and head of the prestigious Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans. In the summer of 1963 Judy accepted a summer job at the Oschner Clinic in return for a promise to enter Tulane Medical School in the Fall. Arriving in New Orleans – a city she had never been to before – she learned that instead of working on a cure for cancer, she was actually there to help create a bioweapon  – a fast-acting cancer virus for the purpose of killing Cuban leader Fidel Castro. This top-secret project put her in the company of prominent medical researcher Dr. Mary Sherman, the brilliant but bizarre David Ferrie, mobster Carlos Marcello, nightclub owner Jack Ruby, and a charming young man named Lee Harvey Oswald with whom she fell in love.Two days before the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Lee confided to Judyth that he suspected he was being set-up to take the blame for the death of the president – a crime that she claims he was trying to prevent. He also named some of the powerful figures involved in the conspiracy.Emotionally shattered by Lee’s death at the hands of his old friend Jack Ruby four days later, Judyth was warned to keep silent and abandon her dreams if she wanted to live.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Investigative journalist and author Nick Bryant broke the story of high-level sex trafficking networks operating in the U.S. with his groundbreaking book "The Franklin Scandal" about a pederast ring based in Nebraska. Nick was one of the first journalists to break the Epstein story, and he lays out the common attributes of the notorious Franklin network and Epstein's more recent operations, and how both sought to minimize public awareness of underage victims. He highlights key facts about Jeffrey Epstein: Why Epstein is likely only one purveyor among others; what's involved in bringing justice to his victims; and why the truth is coming out in what seems like an achingly slow fashion.Heroes Behind HeadlinesExecutive Producer Ralph PezzulloProduced & Engineered by Mike DawsonMusic provided by ExtremeMusic.comNorth Idaho ExperienceIdaho life, real talk. Community, outdoors, and the freedom to live your way.Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify