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Chapter 1: What preparations are needed for undercover operations?
When a government sends one of its people undercover into a hostile country or a dangerous criminal organization, the operation that follows is the product of years, sometimes decades, of institutional knowledge, training, and infrastructure.
For instance, candidates for the British secret intelligence service MI6 must complete an intense six-month training program before they are considered operational. They learn how to select and handle agents, how to operate under a false identity, how to use tradecraft skills such as dead drop surveillance detection and counter surveillance.
The CIA's equivalent program runs for around eight months. A typical covert surveillance team alone can consist of 14 operators, five vehicles fitted with concealed cameras and discrete communications, and a disguised van equipped with high-resolution optics. Behind each field operation is a chain of command, a station chief, legal cover built into embassies and diplomatic missions.
And in extreme cases, special forces units available for extraction. This is what it looks like when a professional intelligence service sends someone into danger. Now consider North Korea. Capital punishment in North Korea is applied for offences including espionage, treason, political dissent and the consumption of foreign media not approved by the government.
Chapter 2: What are the dangers of operating in North Korea?
People have been publicly executed by firing squad in front of crowds. A man was sentenced to death for smuggling and selling copies of the Netflix series Squid Games. A student who bought a USB drive received a life sentence. A woman was shot for possessing a Bible.
This is a country where the penalty for watching a foreign television program can be death, where the secret police operate with total impunity and foreigners caught with cameras, recording devices or anything that could be interpreted as intelligence gathering face outcomes ranging from decades in labor camps to immediate execution.
And this is the country that Jim Latrasche, a former cocaine dealer and ex-con, will be walking into to expose the regime's black market dealings. Not a spy, not a trained intelligence operative, not backed by any government, no agency, no extraction team, no chain of command ready to act if things went wrong.
However, before he would even become the infamous Mr. James, he still had another lengthy prison sentence yet to start.
moon in the sky i'm looking at the moon in the sky it shouldn't come as a surprise but i can't sleep war in my mind i'm trying to fight a war in my mind i don't know who's the winner tonight but it ain't me
Chapter three, becoming Mr. James.
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Chapter 3: How did Jim Latrache become Mr. James?
So Jim was serving his first sentence in the Denmark prison system and he was nearing the end of that sentence and was allowed to return home for weekend visits. And it would be while he's out on one of these visits that he would meet his soon-to-be wife.
First of all, it's a little bit hard to say to a girl, well, I'm in prison for dealing drugs. But to say to her, and you know, the funny part is, I'm still a criminal. So I said to her, I'm in prison. I'm serving for dealing drugs. But I helped a friend. I know it's bad, but right now I'm taking education. I'm a key account manager, which is not entirely a lie. And we... We started dating.
And when I was released from prison, we went to India and we got married. We came home. She became pregnant. And in the summertime, her parents had a big wedding for us. And two weeks later, I was sent to prison again. Jesus, Jim. Yep.
So up until this point, Jim's new wife and the mother of his child has had no idea that her husband is still a cocaine dealer. He's been living a double life.
Chapter 4: What challenges did Jim face while living a double life?
He said there was never any large amounts of cash around that needed explaining, no nefarious characters turning up to his house, and each day he would leave the house to go to work. Until, of course, the day he was arrested for the second time. Jim talks me through the moment of his arrest.
I had just met with the guy from another country, and he had given me 800 grams of pure cocaine. And I went by a flat. I never had it at my own place, so I had a flat I used for that. I went back, dropped that, came back to a cafe where my wife was with my dad. And with my son, I drove my dad home to his town. And on my way back, I needed some products. So I put my wife off at a cafe.
And I went up, got the things I needed, and went back to the cafe. I sat down. I started drinking my soda. And out of the blue, two big figures came and jumped me from the back. And that was the cop. And at that point, I really thought I was fucked because I knew, of course, what there was up in that apartment.
But it was more that I really thought she was going to leave me because I normally say if I was a racehorse, I would definitely not have put money on me at that time because I was 37 years old. I had a kid for earlier marriage. and I had no education and I was about to serve my second prison time for cocaine and they sentenced me eight years to prison.
Jim is back off to prison, this time for eight years.
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Chapter 5: What led to Jim's second arrest?
But his wife doesn't leave him. She decides to stand by her man, but has some conditions attached.
You have to promise me not to go to prison again, and you have to promise me to take education. And I said, okay, this is not going to prison again. I can promise you that, then I can just get a job in a supermarket or whatever. But going back to school, that's not going to happen. But she said, we have to find a way. So I was waiting at that sentence one and a half years for my sentence.
And the only way we could communicate was like one hour visit a week where there was a police officer. And by letters.
Jim says he was writing terrible letters to his wife full of spelling and grammar mistakes. But being a smart lady, she used this as an opportunity to get the education-shy Jim to start learning. She would correct his mistakes and send the letters back with her own and eventually forced him to start reading. And this would all pay off.
One and a half year later, when I started my sentence, she said, now you take your high school diploma. So she helped me to take my whole high school diploma from prison. and I came out with one of the country's highest average grade point averages, and I was accepted to study psychology at Copenhagen University.
Amazing.
I think the turning point here was that for the first time in my adult life, there was somebody who believed in me and loved me for who I was.
Well, it's going back to that gentleman that took you in, that you thought you owed him something, and I suppose you probably thought the same with your wife now, that you owed it to her to do the same.
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Chapter 6: How did Jim's wife influence his transformation?
Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, most definitely. And it made me look at something in a whole other way because, I mean, she was spitting on me and she loved me for who I was. And then I was like, I mean, why do I need a big car? Why do I need a penthouse apartment? I mean, I have the most beautiful girl in town. And I just started to figure out who I am as a person. And I didn't have to pretend.
I don't have to... a chance to be something I'm not. And that was really, really good from my own self-esteem.
Ironically, after Jim finally discovers who he really is and can be himself, he then gets approached to do the complete opposite, to become someone else, to play a character and to infiltrate the world's most secretive dictatorship in the world, North Korea.
Thank you.
North Korea wasting no time in retaliating. Official state media saying the North launched two cruise missiles on the eve of the drills from a submarine off North Korea's coast. Breaking news overnight. North Korea test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile. The missile, which fell into the sea off Japan, is thought to be capable of reaching the continental U.S.
This is one of the most powerful missiles we've seen North Korea test.
Now, after Jim comes out of prison, he's of course got a high-profile case, which means journalists are contacting him, wanting to do interviews.
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Chapter 7: What was the process of negotiating with North Korean officials?
However, he says he just wasn't interested, as all they cared about was creating a sensationalized story.
So how much money have you made? Which famous customers did you have and stuff like that? And I was, of course, not interested in that because that would not make the world a better place. But then a guy I started psychology with, he said, my wife, she worked at Danish National Radio. And she wants you to tell the story as you want. And say, if I have a saying, I want to make a love story.
And I think it's more interested in explaining why do people become criminal and what's more important, what does it take for them not to become a criminal? And we did this radio show called 1.6 Kilo of Coke. And... And the 18th of September, 2015, we were nominated for Best Feature of the Year. And we won. And at that award show, I met Mads Brugger.
At that time, Mads Brugger had a radio station. And while I was in prison, I had watched some of his documentary. So I was a big fan of what he did. So we had a chat and he invited me to the radio and we became friends.
So a quick backstory on Mads Brugge, a name you may not be familiar with. He's a documentary filmmaker from Denmark who's made a couple of satirical documentaries, including one made in North Korea called The Red Chapel. It chronicles the visits of Brugge and two Danish comedians who were adopted from South Korea to North Korea.
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Chapter 8: What unexpected outcomes arose from Jim's undercover mission?
under the pretense of a small theatre troupe on a cultural exchange. Of course, the entire trip is a ruse, and the trio are actually trying to get a chance to portray the absurdity of the pantomime life they are forced to lead in the DPRK.
I think six months later, I had a phone call, and he called me up and said, Hey, Jim, how are you doing? I said, I'm good. Have you ever heard about the North Korean Friendship Association? I said, what? God! Because in my mind, it sounded so fucking crazy that anybody in Denmark, in their right mind, could think that North Korea was great. And he said, but this is the truth.
And then he just quick explained to me about Ulrich that This former chef, now retired, had gone undercover in this friendship association and he had been there for seven years.
You heard that right. A man named Ulrich Larsen, a former chef living on benefits, would, by the time the entire documentary was filmed, have spent 10 years of his life infiltrating North Korea and the Korean Friendship Association. Yes, the KFA exists and has multiple factions across the globe where people can become members and supporters of North Korea and, of course, the Supreme Leader.
Not only would he make his way up the ranks of the KFA, but... with the help of Jim, would have high-level meetings with North Korean officials.
Three years prior, the president of the whole Friendship Association all around the world had started asking him if he knew anybody who could be interested in investing in North Korea.
and that was why he thought about me because when that had happened first he tried to look at actors but it's a little difficult that if the North Korean looked him up that one day he's an investor the next day he's an IMBD yeah and then he tried to find businessmen but you couldn't find any businessmen in the right mind who want to do that task and that was why he thought I could be up for the task
But, I mean, it is truly, when you think about it, I mean, I'm watching it.
It's just, it's absolutely mind-blowing to think, number one, you've got Ulrich, who's, you know, this former chef who's now infiltrating North Korea, and then you're coming in pretending to be this billionaire, and you end up doing an arms deal with the North Korean government or are a part of the North Korean government. I mean, it's not, this is not child's play. This is dangerous stuff.
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