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This article, James Greer (TV series), is a stub and may require expansion. Please help out by editing the page.


For the version of the character that appears in the novel and first film series, see James Greer

"Savvy, dedicated and hard-nosed, Jack’s boss is a hot-head whose personal demons have wrecked his family life and derailed his work as a legendary CIA operative. Demoted to a desk job, Greer is eager to get back to the front lines in the War on Terror."
— Character Description

James "Jim" Greer is the deuteragonist of Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan. He is a careerist in the CIA and a close friend and former boss of Jack Ryan.

Biography[]

Hailing from Belle Chasse, Louisiana, Greer is a former officer in the United States Navy. He later separated from the military to start a career in the CIA. Greer eventually met his future wife, Jasmine, and converted to Islam in order to marry her. The pair conceived two children: J.J. in 2004, and Monique in 2006. Unfortunately, Greer and Jasmine suffered from marital problems as a result of Greer's job in CIA, leading them to file for divorce.

Greer later became the CIA Chief of Station in Karachi, Pakistan. He eventually discovered a potential asset in the form of the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Pakistani Army. Greer knew the man had been suffering from money and marital problems and had been showing signs that he would agree to espionage. Greer set up a meeting three days before the general's daughter's wedding in the back room of a tea house and attempted to turn the man. However, the man was nervous of the potential consequences and changed his mind in the middle of the meeting. He then threatened to throw Greer in a Pakistani prison for the next ten years if he survives the constant torture and beating which was highly unlikely that he will. Fearing for his life, Greer promptly stabbed the man who died at the table and walked out of the building before anyone could notice.

Publicly, the Pakistani Government stated that the man had died of a heart attack. Privately, they were furious with the U.S. Government. Likewise, the incident enraged several high ranking CIA personnel such the CIA Director Sue Joyce. Greer was declared "persona non grata" by the Pakistani Government and he was subsequently sent back to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia and demoted to be the new Group Chief of the CIA's Terror, Finance, and Arms Division (T-FAD).

Season 1[]

Greer is the new head of Terror, Finance, and Arms Division (T-FAD). He was demoted from working in Karachi after having killed an asset who was going to have him tortured. He helps Jack Ryan on his search for Suleiman. Together they travel to Yemen and Paris on the hunt for this new terrorist. He helped Jack save Hanin from Yazid. When they realized that Suleiman was using American hostages as carriers for Ebola, the President was confined to Washington Memorial Hospital. Greer turned the car around and headed for the hospital after Jack realized that Suleiman was planning another attack there. He helped search the hospital for Suleiman and saved Cathy's life by killing Dudayev in the elevator. He was promoted to deputy station chief in Moscow for having helped foil the terrorist attack.

Season 2[]

Working in Moscow as the Deputy Station Chief, Greer begins to follow news regarding a satellite launch via a Russian transport in the South China Sea that is also shipping containers of supposed arms to Venezuela. After a clandestine meeting with his contact in Russian intelligence, he is tailed by a male-female team. He tricks Moscow police into stopping the duo when he tells them the man was being rough with the woman, but the ruse does not last long and they catch up with him and he collapses as he's confronted by the duo for tricking the police into stopping them. The agents dump Greer outside of a hospital emergency room where he is saved, and learns that he has a heart condition. As a result the CIA Station Chief in Moscow wants to pull him off the satellite launch he's looking into. As a trade, Greer convinces the station chief to transfer him to Caracas, Venezuela after he discovers that the ship where the satellite launched from is docked there.

Upon arriving in Caracas he immediately runs into Jack Ryan who is on a diplomatic mission with Senator Jimmy Moreno to investigate an allegedly substantial weapons shipments to Venezuela, concerning the U.S. considering Venezuela is under control of dictator Nicolás Reyes.

Greer ultimately teams up with Jack again when Senator Moreno is assassinated before they can leave Venezuela. Linking up with Matice and his firesquad, Greer and Jack go upriver deep into the Venezuelan jungle where they find that rather than arms shipments, the ship was smuggling mining equipment into the jungle that is being guarded by South African mercenaries lead by Jost Van Der Byl.

While Jack uses CIA offices to establish connections and motive between Reyes and Moreno's assassination, Caracas Station Chief Mike November is forced to expel him from the country. Jack takes the opportunity to pursue one of his leads and flies to London. Meanwhile Greer makes contact with Presidential hopeful Gloria Bonalde, wife of former Interior Minister Sergio Bonalde, who had disappeared at the hands of the Reyes regime a year prior. While assuring her he's not there to rig the election in her favor but simply seeking to get more information on the situation surrounding Sergio's disappearance and offering to send experts to train up her security staff so they can better protect her from Reyes, Gloria shows Greer Sergio's office, which she's left untouched since his disappearance. She retrieves a mineral from Sergio's safe which she says Sergio was very careful with.

Greer has it analyzed and briefs November on the element, having learned that it's a tremendously valuable and important mineral known as Tantalum. A precious metal used in manufacturing of all sorts of technological materials, with China being the largest known source until a massive deposit was discovered in Venezuela. Greer also notes this is where the satellite launch in the South China Sea comes in, as the satellite's payload contained a technology called Flash LIDAR, used to topographically map terrain, especially in places like Venezuela where dense jungle canopies can obstruct views. Flash LIDAR then helps its users better locate the tantalum deposits for mining.

After Ryan returns from London, he and Greer meet with a Venezuelan lawyer who is apparently a facilitator for Reyes' illicit and illegal activities, including hiring Max Schenkel to assassinate Senator Moreno and forming the shell company Cinco Palmas that partnered with an American firm to exploit the tantalum in the jungle.

Eventually Greer is captured and renditioned to one of the prison camps in the jungle, where he is tortured by Reyes' chief of security Bastos. There he also encounters Sergio Bonalde. Bastos is instructed to liquidate the camp, but before the order can be carried out, Jack arrives with the South African mercenaries who were previously guarding the mining equipment. As Jack frantically seeks "the American" (referring to Greer) he sadly discovers Matice instead, who had been killed in a firefight with Bastos' men in the jungle and buried in a shallow grave outside of the camp. He then learns that Bastos departed with Greer back to Miraflores, the presidential palace in Caracas.

Jack convinces November, who is off the reservation now after Americans were ordered to evacuate Venezuela, to form a team with Disco, Coyote, and Uber to fly to Caracas and personally extract Greer. By the time they arrive at Miraflores, riots have broken out on the streets of Caracas as news outlets around the world broadcast video Jack recorded of the prison camp conditions and mass graves, as well as the election tampering that falsely proclaimed him the winner. As rioters gather at the palace gates, Jack and his team land on the roof and assault the palace from above. Meanwhile Greer, who has been held as a prisoner in a cell in the basement, feigns unconsciousness from another heart event that tricks the guard into entering his cell. He then stabs the guard with a fork and subsequently eliminates another guard before wounding Bastos. Greer then exits the basement and ascends the stairs until he incidentally rendezvous with Jack's team. The six then exfil the palace and evacuate to a US Navy ship waiting offshore.

Later, Greer facilitates the reunion of Sergio Bonalde with his family on board the ship, and President-elect Gloria Bonalde thanks him for everything as Greer looks on from above.

Season 3[]

Season 4[]

Quotes[]

1. “If you pull your weapon to shoot, you shoot.” — James Greer

2. “You got to go with your gut, that’s all you got.” — James Greer

3. “Sometimes it doesn’t work out. That’s the job.” — James Greer

4. “Easier to invent a new life for yourself if nobody’s looking.” — James Greer

5. “You just try to look casual; like you know what you’re doing.” — James Greer

6. “Sometimes you have to break a few rules just to get the job done.” — James Greer

7. “Never move anything into an office you can’t carry out in one box.” — James Greer

8. “People don’t randomly pick passwords, not even terrorist masterminds. They pick something personal.” — James Greer

9. “There is no version of this job that doesn’t require compromise, not if you want to do something that matters.” — James Greer

10. “We have to examine every angle, consider every possibility. Especially the one that’s staring us right in our face.” — James Greer

11. “When you work behind a desk, your friends don’t get killed. They don’t get captured. They don’t go down in helicopters. But it’s the work, it’s the real work that still needs to get done.” — James Greer

Appearances[]

Gallery[]

Trivia[]

  • In Sources and Methods, Greer tells Tony Ahmet Demir that he is from Cincinnati, Ohio. This is a reference to the birthplace of the real Admiral James Agustin Greer who was a Civil War Rear Admiral, who served in the U.S. Navy from 1848 to 1895.

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