Dr Daniela Richterova is Senior Lecturer in Intelligence Studies at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. Her research and teaching focus on Cold War intelligence as well as contemporary issues related to state-based threats, covert action and counterterrorism. Dr Richterova is director of the MA in Intelligence and International Security and member of the Advisory Board of the King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence. She also co-convenes the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar, and is a trustee of the Cambridge Security Initiative’s specialist course in International Security and Intelligence (ISI).

Dr Richterova has presented her work at Harvard University, Columbia University, University of Cambridge, and regularly delivers lectures at a variety of fora specialising in intelligence and international security. Prior to joining King’s, she held the post of Senior Lecturer at Brunel University London and completed her Chancellors-funded PhD at the Politics and International Studies Department, University of Warwick. Dr Richterova earned her MA degree in War Studies at King’s College London and pursued her undergraduate studies in Politics and International Relations at Comenius University in Bratislava and NYU, New York.

Prior to her career in academia, Dr Richterova worked at NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Brussels and later was head of programme of GLOBSEC – The Bratislava Global Security Forum – an annual high-level conference on international security policy.

Research Interests

• Cold War Intelligence History
• Covert Action/Active Measures
• State-based threats
• Soviet Bloc/Russia/CEE

Teaching

• 7SSWM142 Intelligence in Peace and War (MA)
• 7SSWN336 Influence: Covert action, active measures, and deception (MA)

She is not currently taking on the supervision of new PhD students.

Publications

Dr Richterova’s monograph Watching the Jackals: Prague’s Covert Liaisons with Cold War Terrorists and Revolutionaries was published by Georgetown University Press in 2025. The book explores how states use their spies to interact with violent non-state actors. It focuses on the complicated relationship between the Czechoslovak State Security Service (StB) and violent Middle Eastern non-state actors - including the PLO, Carlos the Jackal, and Abu Nidal.

She has published in International Affairs, The International History Review, West European Politics and The RUSI Journal. She is series editor for ‘Intelligence, Surveillance, and Secret Warfare’ for Edinburgh University Press.

Dr Richterova's research has been featured in:

Media

The New York Times, Foreign Policy, The Spectator, The Guardian, The BBC, The Times on Sunday, The Daily Mail & The Mail on Sunday, the Israeli daily Maariv, the Czech Hospodářské noviny, Lidové noviny, Respekt, the Slovak Forbes and the daily DennikN.

Blogs

War on the Rocks, KCSI Insights, Engelsberg Ideas and International Affairs Blog.

Documentaries

• ‘The Starmer Fires: The Russian Connection’ (BBC Panorama, June 2026)
• ‘Attacks, Sabotage, Espionage: How Russia Uses Low-Level Agents to Strike’ (WDR Documentary, April 2025)
• ‘The Spy Who Died Twice’ (Channel 4, 2022)
• ‘ŠTB Prísne tajné’ [StB Top Secret] (Slovak and Czech Television, 2023)

Podcasts

• Spy Cities: Prague
• True Spies
• Spycraft101
• Cold War Conversations
• RUSI: Suspicious Transaction Report PODCAST
• The Secret Struggle for Cold War Dominance PODCAST

See a full list of Dr Richterova's publications on her PURE Profile.