London Station: David McCloskey on the CIA, MI6 & the End of the Special Relationship

Andrew Keen (0:00)

Hello, my name is Andrew Keen. Welcome to Keen On America, the daily interview show about the United States.

Hello everybody, back in July, September now, of course. I'm gonna start again, David.

Hello everybody, it is... Today is Tuesday, September the 29th, 2026 A few months ago, back in July, we had one of the world's leading spy writers, novelists on the show, Daniel Silva. He's an old friend. Every two years, he comes on the show. He was talking about the truest fake spy in history, a man called Daniel Allon. Daniel's latest book is called Ransom. He's an American writer. He lives in Washington, DC.

But it's a book set in the UK with an Israeli spy. And he seems very fond of the UK, Daniel Silva. His previous book was also set in the UK. It was called A Death In Cornwall. It has an obscene amount of likes on Amazon, 27,000. Astonishing. My guest today is another very successful spy writer. David McCloskey has written four books, including his latest, which is out today. London Station, he's an ex-CIA officer, so he knows the industry inside out. And as he told me before we went live, he's become somewhat of an Anglophile over the last couple of years, even if he's not particularly kind to MI6 in this new book. David, congratulations on the new book. It's out today, London Station. What is it about you American spy writers that you all have this funness for the UK? Do you all want to be John Le Carré? Is George Smiley always at the back of your mind?

David McCloskey (2:20)

Well, Adrian, first off, it's good to be with you. Thanks for having me. I, you know, what is it about the UK? I would say, I never actually thought I would set a spy novel in the UK.

And the simple reason for that is that it's hard to get the stakes right. In particular, if you want to write something that's really authentic, the relationship between the CIA, the Brits is pretty institutionalized. It's not always life or death. And so for a long time, I kind of thought out, it's not really going to be something I tackle. And then a couple of years ago, before I started writing London Station, I had the thought pop into my head, which was, what if we fell out with the Brits? Like, what if the agency of the Brits started spying on each other again? Because, you know, we have the special relationship now, we didn't always have it. Prior to the Second World War, they spied on us, right? They broke our ciphers, they ran influence campaigns in New York, trying to get us into the war.

Could I imagine a world where we go back to some of those dynamics? And so I thought that was an intriguing question that kind of set me down this path of writing this novel. And you're right, I mean, I am maybe increasingly anglophilic, but I do really dish it out to my British friends in this novel.

Andrew Keen (3:51)

I'm surprised you got any British friends, David, if you're making fun of me.

David McCloskey (3:55)

They like, so I, I might, a cultural observation from this knuckle dragging American is that Brits have a very self-deprecating sense of kind of cultural humor and rather enjoy being picked on. And so I think it.

Andrew Keen (4:15)

Well, yeah, no, I, I, sorry, go on.

David McCloskey (4:19)

I was just, I found that my, my British friends seem to enjoy the various jabs at, at their culture, politics, their intelligence services. They seem to get a, get a kick out of it.

Andrew Keen (4:32)

Where you spend the last couple of years in, in the UK, David, going in and out. I'm sure you've been to some spanking parties, have you?

David McCloskey (4:41)

I actually have. Yeah. I, I have been very fortunate to, to kind of occasionally get invited to interesting clubs and dinner parties and things like that. So, you know, all for the purposes of research, all, all tax deductible.

Andrew Keen (4:57)

Of course. You're based in Dallas, Texas as we joked at the beginning or you joked the Northern Texan capital of literature, at least in Northern Texas.

Do Americans make good spies? I mean, the common understanding, maybe from the British point of view, although I'm Anglo-American, is that all Brits are spies. We all have a bit of George Smiley in us, so we all aspire to be George Smiley. Whereas Americans don't really understand the idea of being a spy. Is that rather unfair?

David McCloskey (5:35)

Well, I mean, I think a lot of my friends and colleagues at the Central Intelligence Agency would beg to differ, but I do think that culturally you are hitting on something, which is that I think Brits, in particular the British reading public, are perhaps more fascinated by espionage and international thrillers in general than an American audience.