Wippl Receives OSS Society Hugh Montgomery Award
Joseph Wippl, Professor of the Practice of International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, recently received the Hugh Montgomery Award from the Office of Strategic Services Society in Washington, D.C.
The Hugh Montgomery Award, named after legendary Central Intelligence Agency officer Hugh Montgomery, symbolizes the historic and unbreakable bond between the Office of Strategic Services and the Central Intelligence Agency.
“Receiving this award in the same year as the death of our colleague and my friend, Hugh Montgomery, I think it is important and appropriate for me to remember his life and my experiences with him,” Wippl said when receiving the award. “I entered CIA some 20 years after he did. But it is no surprise that I heard his name well before becoming acquainted with him.”
Senator Daniel Coats, the United States Director of National Intelligence, presented the award to Wippl. Sen. Coats recently visited the Pardee School to meet with students and faculty and discuss his role as the Director of National Intelligence, his time serving in Congress and the current security challenges facing the United States.
You can watch Sen. Coats present Wippl the award below:
“Both Hugh and I were obsessed by the need for language among operations officers because we had both experienced how language was essential in whatever success we had in recruitment, handling and liaison operations,” Wippl said. “Neither he nor I ever met a Soviet or Russian diplomat or intelligence officer who did not speak the language of the country he was posted. They knew not only the language but also the culture of where they were and with whom they spoke. These competitors respected expertise.”
Wippl is a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer. He spent a 30 year career as an operations officer in the National Clandestine Service (NCS). Wippl has served overseas as an operations officer and operations manager in Bonn, West Germany; Guatemala City; Luxembourg; Madrid, Spain; Mexico City; Vienna, Austria; and Berlin, Germany.