Espionage
Ex-CIA officer says staff sometimes claim to execute orders they did not
Everyday Spy
Ex-CIA Officer Reveals Which World Leader Will Actually Launch a Nuke First
"There are many times where an officer gets a direct order. They leave to go execute the order, never actually execute the order, and then come back and make a formal statement that it was executed. And that's just the way it works."
Andrew Bustamante claims intelligence officers sometimes respond to an instruction by appearing to carry it out but returning with a written statement asserting it was completed. He presents this as a cultural feature of intelligence work shaped by “lies and misdirection”, contrasting it with military structures he describes as more “reality based”.
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Everyday Spy