2. The Double Agent

0:00 Operation Rising Lion is a fictional series based on real world events. Any similarities between persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Calaruga Shark Media. My name is Marcus Cole, and I need to tell you about the man who made everything possible. Three months after we stole Iran's nuclear secrets from that warehouse in Shaabad, I received an encrypted message that changed the course of the Shadow War. It came through channels so secure I didn't even know they existed a single line of texts that appeared on my screen at three seventeen am Tehran time Archive Control. The Wolf sends his regards. We need to talk. This is episode two. The double Agent, The Wolf.

1:20 Colonel Darius Karimi, head of Iran's Counterintelligence division, the man tasked with finding the operatives who had robbed that warehouse, The man who had been hunting us for months with methodical precision that impressed even our analysts. What we didn't know, what I couldn't have calculated in any equation, was that Colonel Kareimi had been working for us all along. But I'm getting ahead of myself to understand how a senior Iranian intelligence officer became our most valuable asset. You need to understand what the archive heights set in motion, and you need to meet doctor Ahmad Tarani, the brilliant physicist whose life we were about to destroy. Doctor TEHRANI worked at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, housed in a gleaming complex in northern Tehran for fifteen years. He dedicated his life to what he believed was peaceful nuclear research, uranium enrichment for power generation, isotope production for medical applications.

2:17 His daughter, Mariam was studying medicine in London, planning to return to Iran to build hospitals in rural provinces. Ahmad was proud of his work, proud of serving his country, proud of the future he was helping build. But as I sat in my Tel Aviv control center reviewing the documents we'd stolen, I knew Ahmad's world was about to collapse. His meticulous calculations, his careful research notes, his detailed technical drawings, they weren't feeding Iran's civilian nuclear program. They were providing the foundation for fifteen nuclear weapons. The stolen archive contained videos of meetings where senior officials discussed Project one ten, code for nuclear warhead production. Ahmad's uranium enrichment research was being used to produce weapons grade material. His centrifuge designs were being modified for military applications. His dreams of peaceful atomic energy were feeding a program designed to incinerate cities.

3:14 We had to tell him more accurately. I had to calculate whether telling him would serve our operational needs. The mathematics were brutal but clear. Doctor Ahmad Tehrani represented a potential intelligence asset worth more than his weight in enriched uranium. But first we had to survive Colonel Karemi's investigation. Karemi was everything Iranian intelligence should have been. Methodical, brilliant, utterly dedicated to protecting his homeland. In the weeks following the warehouse heist, he'd coordinated a man hunt involving tens of thousands of personnel. He'd identified three of our extraction routes. He'd arrested a tea house owner who'd provided cover for our operatives. He was closing in on the network that had made the heist possible. What he wasn't doing was sharing everything with his superiors. The first clue came in April twenty nineteen, two months After that midnight message, one of our deep cover assets in Tehran reported unusual activity in Karremi's investigation. Files were being moved, witnesses were being questioned privately. Evidence was disappearing from official reports archive control.

4:27 The asset reported, something's wrong with the wolf's hunt. He's tracking prey, but not the prey they think. I spent weeks trying to understand the pattern. Kremi was conducting two parallel investigations, one visible to Iranian leadership, another hidden in classified channels they couldn't access. The visible investigation was making steady progress toward dead ends. The hidden investigation was making disturbing discoveries about the scope of our penetration. The breakthrough came when Karemi himself requested a meeting. The encrypted message appeared on my screen on a Tuesday morning in May. The wolf knows his pack has been compromised. Time to choose sides. Director Cohen authorized the contact. If this is a trap, he warned, we lose more than an operation, We lose you. Marcus. I understood the calculation. If Karemi was legitimate, he represented unprecedented access to Iranian intelligence. If he was running a counter operation, my capture would give Ron everything they needed to roll up our networks, but the mathematics were compelling. The intelligence Kareemi could provide was worth the risk, and frankly, after twenty years of calculating human lives like variables and equations, I was curious to meet the man who'd been hunting us with such impressive precision.

5:49 The meeting took place in Istanbul, in the basement of a carpet shop owned by one of our Turkish assets. I arrived first, carrying a briefcase containing documents that would prove our sincerity or get me killed if this was a trap. Koremi entered alone, precisely on time. Tall, gray haired, with the measured movements of someone accustomed to command. He looked exactly like what he was, a career intelligence officer who'd spent decades serving his country with distinction. Mister Cole, he said, in accent to English, settling into the chair across from me, we need to discuss the future of the Middle East. For the next three hours, Colonel Darius Kreimi told me a story that redefined everything we thought we knew about Iranian intelligence. Kareimi had joined Iran's intelligence service in nineteen ninety five, motivated by genuine patriotism and a desire to protect his homeland from foreign interference. He'd risen through the ranks during years when Iran faced real threats American invasion plans, Israeli assassination campaigns, terrorist attacks by opposition groups. But somewhere in the darkness of intelligence work, Kareimi had begun to question whether protecting Iran meant protecting its government. I've watched my country's leadership march toward nuclear war, he said, his voice carrying the weight of impossible decisions.

7:12 They speak of weapons as if they were firecrackers. They calculate acceptable casualties in the millions. They've convinced themselves that nuclear deterrence requires nuclear weapons, not nuclear restraint. The turning point came in twenty eighteen, when Karemi was tasked with investigating our warehouse heist. As he reviewed the stolen documents, the ones we'd left behind to obscure the scope of our operation, he realized he was looking at evidence of a nuclear weapons program far more advanced than Iranian leadership had admitted. I spent my career protecting Iran from foreign threats. He continued, but the greatest threat to my country isn't Israeli bombs or American sanctions. It's Iranian leadership that believes nuclear weapons will make us safer instead of making us targets.

7:59 Karemi had made his choice months before our meeting. He would help Israel prevent Iran from building nuclear weapons, not because he supported Israeli policy, but because he understood the mathematics of nuclear war better than his own government. How many others, I asked, twenty three in my division alone, he replied, Analysts, technicians, operatives who joined to serve Iran and discovered they were serving a regime that will destroy Iran to maintain power. Twenty three Iranian intelligence officers working secretly for Israel. The scope of the penetration was staggering and terrifying. If Iranian leadership discovered the network, the executions would make headlines for weeks. But Karremi wasn't finished. There's something else you need to know. Doctor Ahmad Tehrani has been asking questions about his research applications. He's starting to understand what Project one ten really involves. This was the moment I'd been calculating for months. Irani represented both an opportunity and a risk. If we could recruit him, he'd provide unprecedented access to Iran's nuclear program. If he discovered the truth and reported it, he'd trigger security reviews that could expose Karemi's network. What do you recommend, I asked, Tell him the truth, Karimi said, show him what his research is feeding. Give him the choice his government has taken away. Three weeks later, I authorized an operation that

9:36 still haunts my private file of names and faces. Doctor Ahmad Trani received an unmarked envelope at his Tehran apartment, inside photographs from the stolen archive showing his research being used for weapons development, technical specifications for nuclear warheads incorporating his uranium enrichment calculations, video footage of military officials discussing delivery systems for atomic weapon and a handwritten note, if you want to save your country from nuclear war, someone needs to know you're asking questions. The response came faster than we'd calculated. TEHRANI requested a meeting through channels that proved he understood operational security better than most trained intelligence officers.

10:19 The meeting location a medical conference in Vienna, where his attendance would seem routine. I didn't go myself. The operational risk was too high, and I had twenty three Iranian double agents to coordinate from Tel Aviv. Instead, we sent doctor Sarah Rosen, the linguistics professor who'd spent months in Tehran preparing for the warehouse heist. Sarah had volunteered for the assignment despite the psychological cost. She had already betrayed Iranian hospitality once by conducting reconnaissance under academic cover. Now she would recruit an Iranian scientist by destroying his faith in everything he'd work to build. He looked like my grandfather, she reported after the Vienna meeting, intelligent dedicated, completely convinced he was serving the greater good. When I showed him the evidence of what his research really fed he aged ten years and ten minutes. Doctor Alma Tarani made his choice that night in Vienna. He would provide Israel with intelligence about Iran's nuclear program. Not because he supported Israeli policy, but because he understood that preventing nuclear wars sometimes requires betraying your government to save your country. The network grew through twenty nineteen. In twenty twenty, Karemi's initial twenty three operatives became fifty seven. Tarani recruited colleagues who shared his concerns about weapons development. We established communication channels that could survive Iranian counterintelligence investigations, but networks built on moral complexity are inherently unstable. Every operative carried the weight of betraying

11:52 their homeland to serve their principles. Every meeting risked exposure that would result in execution. Every intelligence report brought us closer to preventing nuclear war and closer to triggering conventional war. The first casualty came in November twenty twenty. Doctor Mosen Rahimi, Iran's chief nuclear scientist, was assassinated while traveling with his wife near Tehran. The operation used a remote controlled machine gun mounted in a truck, precision that was only possible with intelligence provided by our network. I coordinated that assassination from my Tel Aviv control center, calculating angles and timing while watching satellite feeds of Iranian security forces discovering Rahimi's body another name for my private file. Another human cost in the equation of preventing nuclear war. Doctor Tehrani attended Rahimi's funeral. He watched colleagues grieve for a man who'd been developing weapons capable of destroying cities. He calculated the moral mathematics of assassination one scientist's death to prevent millions of civilian cares casualties. But attending that funeral cost Tehrani something irreplaceable. He began drinking, He stopped calling his daughter in London. He started questioning whether any of US Iranian, Israeli American deserved to survive the wars we were fighting in the shadows. I'm not sleeping, he reported in a message transmitted through Koremi's network. I see Rahimi's face. I

13:23 know his research was feeding weapons development, but he had grandchildren, He coached youth soccer, He donated blood to disaster victims. We killed a human being, not just a nuclear scientist. That message reached my desk on a December morning, when Tehran was covered in snow. I read it three times. Calculating the psychological breakdown of an asset worth more than most military divisions, Doctor Ahmad Trani was questioning the moral foundation of everything we'd built. The mathematical solution was clear, replace a compromised asset with fresh recruitment. The human cost was equally clear. Ahmad Tehrani would likely be executed if Iranian counterintelligence discovered his communications with Israel. But sometimes the calculations make themselves. We needed Tehrani's intelligence to prevent nuclear war.

14:15 His psychological state was a variable we had to manage, not a reason to abandon the operation. Three months later, Karimi reported disturbing news. Iranian leadership had discovered inconsistencies in nuclear program security. They suspected foreign intelligence penetration. They were conducting interviews with personnel who had access to sensitive research. The wolf says, the hunt is turning inward. Came the encrypted message. Time to be very careful. Iranian paranoia was intensifying. Security reviews were expanded. Personnel with foreign contacts were being questioned.

15:00 Network that had taken three years to build was under pressure that could collapse it in weeks. But the greater pressure was coming from Iranian nuclear development itself. Intelligence provided by our network indicated that Iran was accelerating weapons research. They were months away from producing weapons grade uranium and quantity sufficient for multiple nuclear devices. Time was running out for preventing nuclear war through intelligence operations. Military action was becoming inevitable. The final message from Colonel Koremi came in May twenty twenty five. Archive Control the Wolf reports that Tehran has decided to complete the weapons program regardless of international pressure. They believe nuclear deterrence requires nuclear weapons, not nuclear negotiations. Recommend immediate action to prevent irreversible escalation. I forwarded that message to Director Cohen, who forwarded it to Prime Minister Weiss, who authorized the operation the world would know as Rising Line. But as I write this now, seven years after that warehouse heist in Shabad, I have to reckon with the human cost of the network we built.

16:09 Colonel Karimi was executed by hanging in Tehran last week after being convicted of treason. Doctor Ahmad Tehrani died in Israeli air strikes during the opening hours of Rising Lion, killed by the very military action his intelligence had helped make possible. Twenty three Iranian intelligence officers who chose conscience over country, fifty seven nuclear scientists and technicians who risked everything to prevent nuclear war, dozens of support personnel who believed they were serving the greater good. All of them are gone now, some executed by Iranian authorities who discovered their betrayal. Others killed in military strikes they helped plan.

16:50 The network that prevented nuclear war was consumed by the very conflict that tried to prevent, But their sacrifice accomplished something unprecedented in the mathematic of modern warfare. The intelligence they provided enabled precision strikes that destroyed Iran's nuclear weapons program while minimizing civilian casualties. The war they helped trigger prevented the nuclear war their research would have made inevitable. Doctor Ahmad Trani's daughter graduated medical school in London last month. She'll never return to Iran to build hospitals and rural provinces, but she'll live in a world where Iranian nuclear weapons don't threaten to incinerate those hospitals. Colonel Koremi's family believes he died serving Iranian security. They don't know he spent his final years betraying his government to save his country.

17:36 That's probably for the best. And somewhere in Tehran there are families mourning nuclear scientists who died in Israeli air strikes. They don't know those scientists were developing weapons capable of starting regional nuclear war. They just know their fathers and brothers and sons are gone. The mathematics of preventing nuclear war are brutal but clear. Sometimes saving the world requires destroying the people trying to save it from a different direction, Sometimes preventing catastrophe means becoming complicit in tragedy. I keep a photograph of Colonel Koremi on my desk, not his official Iranian intelligence portrait, but a picture Sarah took during that Istanbul meeting. He's looking directly at the camera with the expression of someone who's calculated impossible decisions and chosen to live with the consequences. Next to it, I keep doctor Ahmad Trani's final message. Tell my daughter I was trying to build something beautiful. Tell her the world is worth saving, even when saving it requires sacrificing everything we love.

18:39 The network is gone now. The double agents, the scientists, the support personnel who made Rising Line possible, all consumed by the operation they enabled. But their intelligence prevented nuclear war in the Middle East and prevented regional conflict from becoming global catastrophe. Was it worth it? The lives saved versus the live sacrife, the nuclear war prevented versus the conventional war triggered. I still don't know but I know Colonel Karemi and doctor Ahmad Tarani made their calculations with full knowledge of the cost. They chose to betray their government to serve their principles. They chose to sacrifice their lives to prevent nuclear war, and they chose to trust Marcus Cole with coordinating operations that would determine whether their sacrifices meant something or just added more names to my private file of people who died believing they were saving the world. Next time, I'll tell you about Captain Reza Ami, the Iranian security officer who started hunting our network after Rahimi's assassination. What we didn't know was that Captain Amiri was more brilliant than we'd calculated, and more dedicated than we'd anticipated. The man who would spend five years tracking down every operative, every safe house, every communication channel we'd use to prevent nuclear war. The man who would die defending Tehran from the very air strikes his investigation had made possible. Some hunts take years to complete, some hunters become the prey, and some calculations balance only after everyone

20:10 who made them is gone. This episode is a production of Caloroga Shark Media executive producers Mark Francis and John McDermott. For more shows like this based on real world events, please go to Caloroga dot com. The link is in the show notes. AI production assistance may have been used in this series.