On this episode of Espresso Martini, Chris & Matt take a look at President Xi’s trip to China, Chinese espionage against the west and the revelations of a recent Russian defector who paints a less than flattering picture of President Putin and his mental state. Links to articles discussed on this episode “China portrays Xi’s Russia trip as bid for leadership of non-Western world” – by Lily Kuo for the Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/03/21/china-xi-russia-world-leadership/ “China waging decades-long spy war” by Calder Walton for Foreign Policy https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/03/28/china-has-been-waging-a-decades-long-all-out-spy-war/ “Russian defector sheds light on Putin paranoia and his secret train network” by Andrew Roth and Pjotr Sauer for The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/05/russian-defector-sheds-light-on-putin-paranoia-including-secret-train For more information about the podcast, check out our website: https://secretsandspiespodcast.com/ Connect with us on social media TWITTER twitter.com/SecretsAndSpies FACEBOOK www.facebook.com/secretsandspies INSTAGRAM https://www.instagram.com/secretsandspies/ SPOUTIBLE   https://spoutible.com/SecretsAndSpies Support Secrets and Spies:  

Find out more about Matt and his book “Active Measures” https://mattfulton.net/ Check out Chris’s short spy film “THE DRY CLEANER”, now available on Apple TV & Amazon Prime. Watch the trailer here: https://youtu.be/j_KFTJenrz4 Music on this podcast is provided by Andrew R. Bird (Andy Bird) Check out his work here: https://soundcloud.com/andrewbirduk Secrets and Spies is part of the Spy Podcast Network. Check out our other excellent spy-related podcasts here: https://www.spypodcasts.com/