Tip of the Spear:
From Virginia Hall to Gina Haspel
for OSS Society
"I wanted to be a part of something bigger than just me…"
Gina Haspel is a spy’s spy. Serving in some of the world's most dangerous places and leading some of the CIA’s most critical foreign posts was all prelude to becoming the CIA’s first woman director.
Her storied career is part of a long lineage of professional women spies dating back to World War II, when the OSS deployed women across the theater of war in an amazing diversity of roles.
In Director Haspel’s incoming speech, she called out the women of the OSS and how proud she was to serve in their shadows.
She’s done it all…She’s served in deigned territories. She has served in big stations as the chief where there were critical foreign partnerships. She’s done counterterrorism. John Bennett, Former Director, National Clandestine Service, CIA
When the OSS Society asked Pierce Mill to help interview a host of former CIA operatives and mission directors and then to put together a film to honor Haspel, we partnered closely with legendary intelligence filmmaker Carl Coby to create a story that not only highlighted Haspel’s career but also showed that she was not merely following in the footsteps of great women spies, but rather was one of the most accomplished spies the CIA has produced. Period.
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The film premiered at an event at the Four Seasons Georgetown to a capacity audience of 800. It was subsequently distributed to most of the intelligence community—both internally and externally.
