Transcriber: Annet Johnson Reviewer: Amanda Zhu
So I would like to begin by having everyone close their eyes.
I want you to envision the last time
that you were on the receiving end of an unexpected act of kindness.
I want you to visualize the scenario,
and I want you to feel the impact of that kindness.
Once you have a story in mind, open your eyes so we can begin.
So, by a show of hands,
how many of those unexpected acts of kindness
were extended to you by a stranger?
Keep your hands up if that stranger was someone
that you would consider an enemy or possibly a threat.
Now keep your hands up if that person
was on the CIA’s terrorist list of the high-value targets
with a million dollar bounty on their heads.
(Laughter)
Okay, we have one here.
(Laughter)
As a CIA operative for 28 years,
my job was to spot, assess, develop, and recruit spies,
who I would send into places to gather intelligence
to keep our nation safe.
The policymakers and the President, and the National Security staff
received this intelligence.
So what words do you typically associate with the Central Intelligence Agency?
What immediately comes to mind?
(Audience) Secrecy.
Probably not truthfulness
nor empathy
nor kindness.
But kindness can change lives,
and kindness did save lives
in the worst parts of our global war on terror.
My unexpected “act of kindness” story
begins at a Pakistani safe house outside of the capital of Islamabad.
I was the senior CIA representative assigned to a joint team
with our Pakistani partners from the Inter-Services Intelligence.
The CIA ISI teams
were responsible for tracking down the worst of the worst terrorists.
Now, for the sake of tonight’s discussion,
the name of the target we were chasing is not really important,
but for the sake of this evening, we shall call him “the Amir.”
The Amir reflects his exalted status within his culture,
particularly within his Pashtun culture.
The Amir came from a long line of religious scholars,
but he also came from a long line of folks that were on the CIA’s terrorist list,
and there was a niche within this group of HVT’s,
or high-value targets,
that had known American blood on their hands
and a bounty on their heads.
Now, the CIA had spent years chasing the Amir without success.
My team, our team, however, was successful,
and there were celebrations going on from Washington to Islamabad.
The ISI had 3.5 weeks with him, and he never spoke a single word.
Capturing and debriefing the Amir
turned out to be just as difficult as debriefing him.
Now, my role within the CIA was Human Intelligence, or HUMINT.
In HUMINT, we use CIA tradecraft
to ...
to build trust, to use sound judgment,
and to use the integrity to assess the motivations of our targets.
It didn’t matter whether it was Al Qaeda or ISIS
or, in the instance of the Amir,
the Taliban.
And my job was to do this without judgment, without demonization.
I chose kindness to connect.
When the Amir arrived in the safe house for the first time to be debriefed by me,
he came in with his hands and his feet shackled,
and I knew immediately what I needed to do.
I treated him as a man
and not as the animal which they walked in the room with.
When they brought in tea and finger foods,
I refused to eat until the Amir was also served.
So the Amir and I were able to connect on many levels.
We talked about art and music and culture and history.
We connected on our love of family, our love of country.
We talked about politics
and the fact that we were on opposite sides
of this global war on terror.
Now, this connection between the Amir and I
would not have been possible
if I had not first extended kindness to him.
So, what is kindness?
“It is my simple religion.
There is no need for temples, no need for complicated philosophy.
Our own brain, our own heart is our temple;
the philosophy is kindness.”
This definition from the Dalai Lama is one that I chose
because it reflects my experiences.
It reflects my beliefs.
I believe that kindness exists in each of us.
We might have to tap in a little bit deeper
into our hearts and souls to find that,
but it is there.
Whether you have to do that in a personal sense
or, like I did, in a professional sense.
The Amir and I were able to connect.
We were able to connect because I treated him with respect,
I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and I did not pre-judge him.
At the end of the day,
I recognized that we were different sides of the same coin.
The Amir felt just as strongly about the Taliban and its mission
as I did about the CIA and our mission.
The difference
is that the Taliban was comfortable and specifically targeted innocence
where the CIA did not, would not.
Our job was to protect friend, foe, and innocent.
So as time progressed,
I had to find ways to get the Amir to speak beyond history and culture.
So I decided that we were going to release his father-in-law from custody.
The Amir’s wife was very upset with him
because her father had been captured by the Pakistani ISI,
and this elderly gentleman was in custody.
And for the first time, the Amir looked up and he looked me straight in the eye
and he says, “How do I know that my father-in-law will be released?”
So I said, “I will allow you to call your wife,
and you can speak directly to her, and you can speak to your father-in-law.”
Pakistani ISI, when I released the chains,
when I wanted to feed him,
and certainly when I allowed a prisoner in their custody
to reach out to a family member,
objected vociferously.
But after discussing the details of this plan,
trust was being earned,
and slowly we began to cooperate.
As our relationship developed, we saved lives together.
The Amir helped us understand
the reasoning behind why the Taliban did what they did.
He helped us understand their structure.
He helped us understand their leaders.
But most importantly,
he helped us understand how they went about
identifying those that they would immerse and indoctrinate to go out
and do the most heinous acts in that field.
I understand that this story about global war on terrorism
might seem a bit extreme,
but it’s simple and it’s important.
When the Amir chose silence,
I chose kindness.
I chose to have his shackles released.
I chose not to eat unless he was also being fed.
I chose to release his father-in-law.
The Amir story is really quite simple.
It’s a mechanism,
it’s a vehicle, a tool, for demonstrating
that even in the most dire and extreme circumstances,
kindness is a choice.
Kindness is a choice.
It comes in many forms:
a smile,
words,
or even silence.
We all know the adage that if you don’t have something nice to say about someone,
then don’t say anything at all.
Be quiet.
That is a form of kindness.
Kindness is a choice.
The Amir repaid my kindness to him by helping us to save lives.
We saved lives.
We save CIA lives.
We saved the lives of our NATO partners.
We saved the lives of the Pakistanis and the Afghans,
and we even saved the lives of the Taliban.
Kindness is a choice.
If I can find humanity in an HVT with known blood on his hands,
surely you can find the Amir in your lives and extend to them that same courtesy.
Kindness is a choice.
Our nation’s narrative is moving in the wrong direction.
In order to heal that divide, in order to flip that script,
we must embrace our differences.
We must create narratives of empathy and kindness.
Kindness is a choice.
So I’m asking, I’m begging each of you, every opportunity that presents itself,
choose kindness,
because kindness can save humanity,
one soul at a time.
I’m asking you to listen more,
speak less,
and choose kindness.
Thank you.
(Applause) (Cheers)