Episode Details

2. WITNESS TO A REVOLUTION: HEIDI AUGUST IN LIBYA Guest Mundy: Guest Mundy recounts Heidi August’s 1969 assignment to Libya, where she witnessed Muammar Gaddafi’s coup firsthand,. Despite being a college graduate, August was hired as a clerk and only informed of secretarial roles. When the coup began, she was the first American official to identify it, while her male superiors remained unaware. Demonstrating remarkable composure, August drove through gunfire to "burn out" the station and destroy classified cables. This experience sparked her lifelong passion for intelligence work, even as agency rules then barred female clandestine officers from marriage or children,. (3)
1956 Hungary