Antonio J. Mendez
Antonio Joseph "Tony" Méndez was an American CIA technical operations officer who specialized in clandestine and covert CIA operations. He smuggled six State Department employees out of Tehran during the Iran hostage crisis, an operation portrayed in the movie Argo. He wrote multiple memoirs about his CIA experiences.
“The trick is that you have to believe the lie and believe it so much that the lie becomes the truth.”
Antonio J. Mendez
“Allan Dulles said it best: "Any intelligence service worth its salt can make the other fellow's currency." In other words, every nation needs to have its own airtight security measures, while at the same time be actively working in secret to reverse engineer those of the enemy faster than they can invent them.”
Antonio J. Mendez
“One of the main lessons I had learned is that exfiltrations are almost ninety percent logistics - just making sure everything is lined up as it needs to be.”
Antonio J. Mendez
“Every intelligence agency is ultimately judged on its ability to successfully rescue people and bring them out of harm's way, which is essentially what an exfiltration is.”
Antonio J. Mendez
“Exfiltrations are like abortions," I said. "You don't need one unless something's gone wrong. If you need one, don't try to do it yourself. We can give you a nice, clean job.”
Antonio J. Mendez
“Intelligence is only as good as the consumer's ability to believe and utilize it.”
Antonio J. Mendez