The Spy's Guide Briefing
See what everyone else is missing.
Twice a week, former CIA officer John Braddock applies analytical frameworks to what's happening in the world. No hedging. No both-sides. Tells you what to watch for next.
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Read the first four issues. If they're not worth $21, reply to any issue and I'll refund your first month. You keep everything you've read.
- John Braddock
What you get
See what’s really happening.
Twice a week, a current situation - geopolitics, business, strategy - gets run through the frameworks. Not surface-level commentary. A specific assessment of what’s happening, what the games are, and what comes next.
If you’re in that game, the actions to take.
Each issue gives you something specific to watch for. Not opinions. Not takes. A framework, a conclusion, and a next move. The kind of analysis that drives decisions and action.
All the past issues, the day you subscribe.
Full archive access from day one. Every framework application. Every analysis. Searchable and yours.
No filler. Every sentence earns its place.
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Spy's Guide Assessment Prep
This is the tool I send someone before a strategic consultation. You're facing a negotiation. A risky decision. A personnel call. A competitive move. A family decision. The Assessment Prep walks you through which framework applies. Which questions to ask. How to run your situation through the same process I use.
Frameworks Quick-Reference Card
Six frameworks on one page. When to use each one. The key questions for each. Print it. Keep it on your desk. Use it before your next meeting.
Sample issue
How to tell a real risk from an imagined one. Billionaires building bunkers.
Someone close to you is worried about something. But you're not.
They moved money. Changed plans. Made big decisions. Started sounding like a conspiracy theorist.
It's one of two things.
Maybe they see something you don't. Maybe they did the analysis and saw something you missed.
Or maybe they just thought about it so much that they convinced themselves it's real. Because that's a psychological trick of risk. The more you think about one, the more likely it feels. Not because it became more likely. Just because you thought about it so much.
For the billionaires building bunkers: which is it?
Mark Zuckerberg is building a 5,000-square-foot bunker beneath a $270 million compound in Hawaii. Soundproofed doors. Keypad entry. An escape hatch. Its own food and water supply.
Peter Thiel arranged a New Zealand passport and a compound there. Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, has said more than half the billionaires in Silicon Valley have some version of an escape plan. The Survival Condo in Kansas, fifteen stories of fortified apartments underground, is sold out.
Are they paranoid? Disconnected from reality? Acting out a fantasy?
These are people who built fortunes by seeing risks and managing conditions. They acted before results were obvious. So the harder question is the one worth asking.
What if the billionaires see something the rest of us don't?
The Risk Framework says every bad outcome requires necessary conditions. All of them must be present at the same time. Connected by AND operators. Remove one and the bad outcome can't happen.
To manage risk, we name the necessary conditions for the thing being feared. Then look at whether they're actually present. If they are, and they're stacking, it's time to act. If they're not, the risk is all in the imagination.
A civilizational disruption serious enough to need a bunker requires five conditions, all present at once:
1. A shock that takes out the basics. Electricity, water, food, or physical safety stops working across a wide area. Not a storm you board up for. Something that breaks the systems you rely on every day.
2. Nowhere to escape to. The disruption is wide enough that you can't drive to where it isn't. A local disaster, you leave. A bunker is for the disaster you can't outrun.
3. What fixes things stops fixing things. Government, emergency services, supply chains. The things that normally restore order are overwhelmed or gone.
4. It lasts. Not days. Months or longer. Long enough that staying above ground is a dangerous choice.
5. Other people become the threat. This is the condition the bunker is actually built for. The soundproofed doors. The hidden entrance. The security force. None of that protects you from a storm or a virus. It protects you from other people once order is gone.
Five conditions.
What could meet all five?
Reviews of John Braddock's work
“Holds your attention and makes you think. Effective tricks-of-the-trade for making decisions. Concise, accessible, and best of all, GRIPPING!”
- Eric
“A great introduction to critical thinking in a very practical, day-to-day way. Although, from the perspective of a spy, it can be applied to all pragmatic aspects of daily living.”
- Shaun
“A practical read that's equal parts pragmatic and entertainment. The author juxtaposes his sound academic wisdom with a short story that reads like a teaser to a spy thriller. Great insight from a guy you'd love to sit and have a beer with.”
- Jim
About the author
John Braddock was a case officer at the CIA. He recruited and handled sources on weapons proliferation, counter-terrorism and high-impact issues. A former university research fellow, he is now a strategy consultant and the bestselling author of 5 books on the thinking tools of spies.
Subscribe
Next issue drops Friday.
Annual
$210/yr
Monthly
$21/mo
No risk. Read the first four issues. If they're not worth $21, reply and we'll refund your first month.
Not ready to subscribe? Get a free sample issue.