Dr Daniela Richterova

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 history as well as contemporary issues related to intelligence liaison, covert action, counterterrorism intelligence, and intelligence analysis. Dr Richterova is director of the MA in Intelligence and International Security and deputy director of the King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence. She also co-convenes the Cambridge Intelligence Seminar, and teaches on the Cambridge Security Initiative’s specialist course in International Security and Intelligence (ISI). Dr Richterova is co-investigator on UKRI-funded research and practitioner training grant ‘Transformation of Transatlantic Counter-Terrorism, 2001-25’ (with Dr Patrick Bury, University of Bath).

Dr Richterova has presented her work at Harvard University, Columbia University, University of Cambridge, and various academic/practitioner fora specialising in intelligence and international security. She completed her Chancellors-funded PhD at the Politics and International Studies Department, University of Warwick; 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 as a researcher and analyst at the NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Brussels and later was head of program of GLOBSEC – The Bratislava Global Security Forum – an annual high-level conference on international security policy.

Research Interests

• Cold War History
• Intelligence Studies
• Covert Action/Active Measures
• Terrorism & Counterterrorism
• Soviet Bloc/Russia

Teaching

• 7SSWM142 Intelligence in Peace and War (MA)
• 7SSWN336 Influence: Covert action, active measures, and deception (MA)
• 6SSW3041 The Secret World: Global Intelligence Systems (BA)

She is happy to offer PhD supervision in the following broad areas:

• Intelligence history, particularly the former Soviet Bloc
• Contemporary intelligence issues
• History of terrorism and counterterrorism
• Central-Eastern European intelligence issues

Publications

Dr Richterova has published in International Affairs, The International History Review, West European Politics, and Intelligence and National Security. Her monograph Watching the Jackals will be published by Georgetown University Press in 2024. The book explores the complicated relationship between Czechoslovak spies and violent Middle Eastern non-state actors - including the PLO, Carlos the Jackal, and Abu Nidal. She is series editor for ‘Intelligence, Surveillance, and Secret Warfare’ for Edinburgh University Press.

To date, her research has been featured in Foreign Policy, International Affairs Blog, The Guardian, The BBC, The Times on Sunday, The Daily Mail & The Mail on Sunday, the Israeli daily Maariv, the Czech Lidove noviny and Respekt, and the Slovak daily DennikN; as well as in documentaries and docuseries: ‘The Spy Who Died Twice’ (Channel 4, 2022); ‘ŠTB Prísne tajné’ [StB Top Secret] (Slovak and Czech Television, 2023); and in the podcast series The Secret Struggle for Cold War Dominance PODCAST.

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