16: Spying on Russians & Inspiring Tom Clancy

In this podcast our guest is a legend of the Submarine Service. He is Doug Littlejohns, who had a remarkable career in the Royal Navy, both as a submarine captain and in command of an intelligence-gathering warship during the Cold War.

Across a fascinating podcast discussion with our host Iain Ballantyne, we hear from Doug about his exciting time on the famed Perisher submarine command course; daring surveillance missions against Russian naval vessels in the diesel submarine HMS Osiris; how he brought the badly damaged nuclear-powered attack submarine HMS Sceptre (and that boat’s crew) back to fighting efficiency.

Doug also relates how, after reading Tom Clancy’s novel ‘The Hunt for Red October’ during a visit to the USA, he met the blockbuster author and ended up inspiring a character in the master story-teller's next bestseller, ‘Red Storm Rising’. Revealed also are Doug’s adventures in command of the Type 22 frigate HMS London, which included forcing a Russian submarine to surface and staging a mock funeral to prank a shadowing Soviet surface ship (both in the Baltic). Doug and HMS London also went eyeball-to-eyeball with the Iranians in the Arabian Gulf during the Tanker War.

Doug reveals how he introduced a special premiere of the Hollywood movie of the ‘Hunt for Red October’ in London and, after leaving the Navy, worked with Clancy. They founded the famous computer games firm Red Storm Entertainment, becoming pioneers of strategy and also tactical-shooter genres, via ‘Rainbow Six’ and others.

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Iain Ballantyne is the Editor of this magazine. He is also the author of the books ‘Hunter Killers’ and ‘HMS London’ which, among other things, tell the story of Doug Littlejohns’ exploits as an undersea warrior and also as a surface warship captain. For more details on Iain and his books visit his websites http://iainballantyne.com and https://www.bismarckbattle.com/
Follow him on Twitter @IBallantyn