Spy Wars with Damian Lewis
Season 1
A docuseries that examines some of the most important international spy operations of the last forty years.
Where to Watch Season 1
8 Episodes
- The Man Who Saved The World
E1The Man Who Saved The WorldThis is the story of Oleg Gordievsky, one of the West’s most valuable Cold War agents who risked everything to avert a third World War. Appearing to be an ambitious diplomat stationed at the Soviet embassy in Denmark. Gordievsky was actually a Russian spy and a rising star of the KGB. After a few years in Copenhagen, he was recruited by the British and posted to London by the KGB. Whilst in London, President Reagan authorised the largest NATO war game in its history: Able Archer. - Bombs In The Sky
E2Bombs In The SkyIt was the largest surveillance operation in British history, involving 800 agents monitoring 24 suspects around the clock in order to thwart a fiendish terrorist plot. Host Damian Lewis examines the 2006 joint investigation between MI5, London's Metropolitan Police Counter-Terrorism Unit, and the CIA to track down a homegrown Al Qaeda cell in east London and stop its plan to blow up multiple U.S.-bound passenger planes using liquid bombs. - Spies Next Door
E3Spies Next DoorThis is the story of the biggest spy swap between Russia and the United States since the Cold War involving Sergei Skripal, the victim of the infamous 2018 Salisbury Novichok attack. From the United States ten Russian ‘illegals’, who have, for a decade or more in some cases, masqueraded as Americans and had operated undetected by their neighbours, but not by the FBI, who have had them under surveillance for years. In the other direction are four spies who have been released from Russian jails. One of which was Sergei Skripal. Another,Gennady Vassilenko, a long-standing CIA double agent, and the man some say was involved in giving up the infamous traitor, Robert Hanssen. But what the Russians don’t know is just how valuable Gennady is to the West. - A Perfect Traitor
E4A Perfect TraitorThis is the story of Robert Hanssen - a former FBI agent who systematically dismantled the United States’ network of undercover Soviet agents, from the inside out. His espionage was described by the Department of Justice as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history”. Hanssen spied for Soviet and Russian intelligence services against the United States from 1979 to 2001 and his actions pitted CIA against FBI and triggered a mole hunt that brought the American intelligence services to their knees. - Escape from Tehran
E5Escape from TehranIn November 1979, 53 American employees of the U.S. Embassy in Iran were taken hostage by Islamic revolutionaries. Six diplomats managed to escape, but getting out of the country seemed impossible. Enter CIA officer Tony Mendez, who used inspiration from Hollywood to school six frightened diplomats in the art of assuming false identities and pulled off a bold rescue mission during one of the darkest moments in American foreign policy history. - Trojan Horse
E6Trojan HorseThis episode tells the amazing story of Vladimir Vetrov, a high-ranking KGB officer and secret operative for the French Intelligence Service, during the Cold War. In December 1980, he made the decision to spy for the French Intelligence Service after spending a number of years in Paris. As a secret agent Vetrov passed more than 4,000 documents to his handlers revealing the extraordinary depth of the Soviet industrial espionage mission against the West. President Ronald Reagan’s advisors manipulated the situation to their advantage, by feeding faulty technology back to the Russians in a decade-long Trojan Horse operation which fatally undermined Soviet science and technology. In February 1982, Vetrov was arrested for the murder of a bystander and the attempted murder of his mistress, KGB secretary Ludmilla Ochinkina. - Merchant of Death
E7Merchant of DeathThis is the story of Viktor Bout, and he would become one of the most famous - or infamous - Russian businessmen in history. A former spy, he became the world’s most dangerous arms dealer, a man responsible for the deaths of millions worldwide. It’s a tale of greed and immorality that led to one of the most audacious undercover sting operations ever conducted. - Exodus
E8ExodusIt was called Operation Brothers, a 1980s covert Mossad mission to rescue 12,000 Ethiopians, Jewish descendants of the lost tribe of Israel, from Sudan. The mission would take five years to pull off, involving an audacious plot, a maverick field agent, and a small group of deep cover operatives who ran a fake scuba diving resort so convincingly, they actually turned a profit. Host Damian Lewis guides us through the improbable rescue mission.
