{"podcast":{"title":"Conspiracy Cabal","slug":"conspiracy-cabal-7759106","podcast_index_feed_id":7759106,"rss_url":"https://feeds.acast.com/public/shows/692e431c1fc8491a7b9a3769","website_url":"https://shows.acast.com/conspiracy-cabal","image_url":"https://assets.pippa.io/shows/692e431c1fc8491a7b9a3769/1780012564788-fbe66255-abc6-4b7b-97a1-b15d86551a5f.jpeg","author":"Southern Ocean Media","episode_count":38,"summary":"The sh*t that's in your group chat...just a fair bit more fact checked and a lot more explained. Big Pharma. The deep state. The crisis actors. Alien life. Spy agencies and cover ups. Whatever it is, award winning journo Richard Baker and Dr Nick Coatsworth are your guides on the search for the kernel of truth. Conspiracies are everywhere right now. But, we don’t peddle theories, we go to their point of origin and follow the breadcrumbs to sort the bullsh*t from the verified, while keeping an open mind to things that can’t be explained. Rich has spent years exposing the crooked and corrupt, and Nick has copped death threats from people who thought he was one of THEM. They know what real cover-ups look like, and they also know what happens when paranoia meets the algorithm. Sometimes the conspiracy is real. Sometimes it's designed to sell you on something. Often, it's both. Our mission is to entertain and inform. Rather than condemn and judge. Hear the Conspiracy Cabal every week, and contact the show at conspiracycabal@outlook.com Conspiracy Cabal is proudly supported by WholeLife . Use code CABAL10 for $10 off your first order of $50 or more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privac…","last_synced_at":"2026-09-09T06:20:27.742949+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspiracy-cabal-7759106"},"episode":{"title":"08: The Vanishing of Harold Holt | The Chinese Spy Theory","slug":"08-the-vanishing-of-harold-holt-the-chinese-spy-theory","published_at":"2026-04-14T15:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspiracy-cabal-7759106/08-the-vanishing-of-harold-holt-the-chinese-spy-theory","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspiracy-cabal-7759106","url":"https://shows.acast.com/conspiracy-cabal/episodes/the-vanishing-of-harold-holt-the-chinese-spy-theory","audio_url":"https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/692e431c1fc8491a7b9a3769/e/69de3af0f02f2470e922b55b/media.mp3","summary":"A Chinese submarine loaded with \"frog men\", the CIA nabbed him with an underwater assassination or...get this...he drowned. Which of these three could it possibly be! Harold Holt had been Prime Minister for less than two years. He was an experienced ocean swimmer. And in the months before he disappeared, Australia was navigating one of the most politically sensitive periods in its history. Vietnam was escalating, Pine Gap was being quietly negotiated, and the relationship between Canberra and Washington was more complicated than the public knew. Then he went for a swim at Cheviot Beach, and was gone. What followed was one of the strangest episodes in Australian political history. No body was ever recovered. The inquest took decades to happen. And somewhere along the way, a theory emerged, that Holt hadn't drowned at all, but had been extracted by a Chinese submarine. In this episode, Richard Baker and Dr. Nick Coatsworth go back to Cheviot Beach and ask what the official record actually tells us - and what it doesn't. The disappearance itself, the timeline, the witnesses, and what the conditions were actually like that day Harold Holt and the Americans, his relationship with LBJ, Pine Gap, and the geopolitical backdrop to his final months in office The Chinese submarine theory, where it came from, who's argued for it, and why it's never been fully put to rest The intelligence files - what ASIO and the CIA held, and what became of the paperwork The body that was never found, and what that may or or may not tell us Why Australia moved on so quickly, a state memorial with no coffin, a new PM within days, and very few official questions asked Some of this is documented. Some remains classified. None of it has ever been fully resolved. Join Rich and Nick as they wade in. Co…","meta_description":"A Chinese submarine loaded with \"frog men\", the CIA nabbed him with an underwater assassination or...get this...he drowned. Which of these three could it…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1735,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/conspiracy-cabal-7759106/episodes/08-the-vanishing-of-harold-holt-the-chinese-spy-theory/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/conspiracy-cabal-7759106/08-the-vanishing-of-harold-holt-the-chinese-spy-theory.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}