# Hey Sevastopol: over here if you want to discuss Bluesman **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 1, 2006, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864 "2006-07-01T16:03:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2006, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/21 "2006-07-01T23:52:52Z")
Wait- **Bluesman** actually said he worked for the CIA? Since when does anyone who works for the CIA admit it? My great-aunt did, but no one found out that she did until she retired. (And she wasn’t an agent or anything, just a secretary). ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2006, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/22 "2006-07-01T23:55:24Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Do you have one scintilla of evidence that **Bluesman** committed some professional breach of integrity, let alone that anything he might’ve done could have deflected the Bushies from taking this country to war? Well, were he an actual intelligence officer, hinting around at “secret evidence” that was going to come out soon and prove something would have been a professional breach of conduct. Of course, I don’t believe for a second that he’s involved in intelligence at all. But it’s simple: his little hints on the message board were a tremendous breach of professional integrity if he was indeed a professional. Otherwise, they were out and out lies and a terrible breach of personal integrity. I try not to view people like him as emblematic of others who share his views. But just look at the thread that inspired this - is there any evidence that they have any integrity whatsoever? Truly, someone like **Bluesman** would fit right in, wouldn’t they? I see no defense for him and you certainly haven’t offered up much of an effort. I’m not necessarily terribly fond of **Sevastopol** , but by comparing him with a pathetic lying sack like **Bluesman** , you’ve done a bang-up job of making him look good. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2006, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/23 "2006-07-01T23:57:01Z")
> [@](#): > > …Bottom line: I know that the best thing that can happen in this world is an Iraq with no Husseins in a position of power. And there is only one way left to get there: armed force. We’ve tried diplomacy, we’ve tried sanctions, and we’ve tried limited military action. All have been exhausted, and my point was this: those of you smug sumbitches that THINK you know what’s best DO NOT… Just to add. Doesn’t this jump out at you as a dangerous and wrong thing to say, for someone who works in intelligence analysis? > [@RTFirefly](#): > > Care to link? [Bluesman Pit thread - contents also link to an earlier thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=251577) > [@](#): > > That’s more than I know. Evidence? Ditto. The evidence is circumstantial. So if you wish to reject circumstantial evidence, feel free. So far, **Airman Doors** has said he was a mere executor of policy. That’s the strongest defence and I don’t buy it for reasons which should be clear by now. The man corrupted his position. > [@](#): > > I don’t know what he _actually_ knew, as opposed to what he thought he knew. Neither do you. I don’t know to a level of certainty. I know enough to say he knew the evidence was not there. > [@](#): > > Maybe he thought the evidence genuinely supported the WMD claims. Maybe he was exaggerating his position - maybe the evidence _he_ saw was already filtered… See **Polycarp** : Trained, experienced and professionally skeptic, intelligence analyst. All that training, experience and professional skepticism was fooled? I don’t think so and neither do you, or anyone in this discussion. > [@](#): > > However, it’s clear that the various pieces of putative evidence justifying the war came through a number of different channels. Below the level of CIA chief George Tenet - that is, below Cabinet level - did anyone know more than that only the piece in front of them was bogus? If I’m Drumheller, I know that the Curveball allegations are unreliable. But I don’t know about the satellite pictures or any of the other supposed evidence, and it’s going to take me awhile to wrap my head around the idea that the President and Vice-President and a whole bunch of other people way above me were lying about the whole thing, even when the case for war falls apart after the fact. > > So at the time, there I am, thinking ‘they fucked up and put that in the SOTU and Powell’s presentation’ but I think it’s a fuckup, and the rest of the evidence is surely good. This is where you and I differ. He was on board with his analysis and his policy view from day 1. To listen, the evidence was rock solid, or even if it wasn’t the policy was necessary and he was taking the necessary steps to back it, evidence be damned. Isn’t that what the quote from him says? > [@](#): > > …You did not say what you said in the other thread as a courtesy to me. You brought **Bluesman** up out of nowhere. If you want to make allegations, put up or shut up. I opened this thread only to aviod hijacking the other one. It is a continuation of the discussion **you** started there. Your claims, your cites. > > Put up or shut up. No, I did it as courtesy to you and understanding **Bluesman** as a byword for bad character and a useful data point, the **Bluesman** scandal is useful and compelling evidence in interesting questions. If not for that I could merely have linked the 2 earlier Pit threads. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2006, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/24 "2006-07-01T23:58:10Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Wait- **Bluesman** actually said he worked for the CIA? Since when does anyone who works for the CIA admit it? I believe he claimed to work for NSA, not that it changes anything. I don’t think those guys go around telling people what they do for a living either. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/25 "2006-07-02T00:00:00Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > **Bluesman** wasn’t just wrong; he was spectacularly wrong, and acting quite the jerk with his claims of special knowledge and insulting manner. And he wasn’t wrong about something unimportant like whether glass flows or not. Yeah, that’s my recollection, too. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/26 "2006-07-02T00:01:43Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > I try not to view people like him as emblematic of others who share his views. But just look at the thread that inspired this - is there any evidence that they have any integrity whatsoever? Truly, someone like **Bluesman** would fit right in, wouldn’t they? “They” in sentence two refers to members of the United States intelligence services. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/27 "2006-07-02T00:22:31Z")
You should read **black455’s** cite: [Frontline story link](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=7540759) Some pertinent quotes: > [@](#): > > So why would the analysts, why would WINPAC > > –Because it’s a bureaucracy. We had one officer that was working on the Iraqi ops tell one of my chiefs of station, and this was in the fall, “Look, we’ve got information that contradicts this.” This isn’t about intel; it’s not about WMD; we’re into regime change now. … They were gambling, too, that when they got on the ground, they would find these things. … And the amazing thing was – this makes me look like an idiot, but the fact was I really believed Curveball couldn’t possibly be the only source they had on that, but it was. … > [@](#): > > A lot of intelligence analysts were caught up in several things: a previous consensus against which there just wasn’t enough intelligence to challenge it; the consensus being that yes, there were programs. The atmosphere in which they were working, in which a policy decision clearly had already been made, in which intelligence was being looked to to support that decision rather to inform decisions yet to be made, was a very important part of the atmosphere. > > Not everything I did. The issues of tradecraft errors, nobody feels good about that. If you’re looking at things that I didn’t feel good about doing, I would refer to the unclassified “[white] paper” that was laid out. In retrospect, although people who worked on it, including myself, didn’t have substantive problems with it at the time, it was clearly requested and published for policy advocacy purposes. This was not informing [a] decision. What was the purpose of it? The purpose was to strengthen the case of going to war with the American public. Is it proper for the intelligence community to publish papers for that purpose? I don’t think so, and I regret having had a role in that. … > [@](#): > > I think it was always in the back of people’s mind that Saddam was a continual problem. Terrorism was a continuing problem; Saddam and terrorism were probably connected. Proliferation was a problem; Saddam was connected to that. So when you look at those three things, you see Iraq keeps bubbling up. We spent, what, 10 years of semi-war with the Iraqis, in terms of flying missions in the south part of Iraq? And clearly, Iraq was going to continue to be a thorn in the sense that Saddam wasn’t going to go away: He’s hostile to his neighbors; he was a terrorist in the sense of his own people and his own opposition; he was willing to support terrorists and those who were committing suicide by paying them and the Palestinians, Hamas. So he’s going to be a continual problem, there’s no question about that. … ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/28 "2006-07-02T01:02:15Z")
> [@Sevastopol](#): > > Just to add. Doesn’t this jump out at you as a dangerous and wrong thing to say, for someone who works in intelligence analysis? And this has to do with your argument how? > [@](#): > > [Bluesman Pit thread - contents also link to an earlier thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=251577) Good Lord, I’d forgotten all about that thread - which isn’t surprising, given its date of April 2004. I read the first page, and all I found from you were unsupported allegations. When come back, bring better links. > [@](#): > > The evidence is circumstantial. So if you wish to reject circumstantial evidence, feel free. So far, **Airman Doors** has said he was a mere executor of policy. That’s the strongest defence and I don’t buy it for reasons which should be clear by now. The man corrupted his position. So: are you going to explain what the evidence is, and how it adds up to an argument supporting your claims? I guess not. Never mind. > [@](#): > > I know enough to say he knew the evidence was not there. See **Polycarp** : Trained, experienced and professionally skeptic, intelligence analyst. All that training, experience and professional skepticism was fooled? I don’t think so and neither do you, or anyone in this discussion. Kindly don’t tell me what I do or don’t think. It’ll just be yet one more thing you’re wrong about. > [@](#): > > No, I did it as courtesy to you and understanding **Bluesman** as a byword for bad character and a useful data point, the **Bluesman** scandal is useful and compelling evidence in interesting questions. If not for that I could merely have linked the 2 earlier Pit threads. You did NOT post the following as a courtesy to me: > [@Sevastopol](#): > > In fact it is the general and demonstrable pattern of current US intelligence policy that ‘intelligence gathering’ means ‘finding intelligence officers with no integrity and Republican affiliation who will report what the administration wants to hear’. > > e.g. ex-doper Bluesman.\* > > \*promise that’s the last time I mention that prick. I wasn’t even in the thread at that point. Did your crystal ball tell you I’d show up? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/29 "2006-07-02T01:18:54Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > And it wasn’t just that he believed the WMD thing, or that he tried to sell it. It was his open contempt for anyone who disagreed with or even questioned him about it. Yeah, I was pretty pissed at him about that too. And I don’t blame you for being pissed even now. He was, quite simply, an asshole about that. I can’t excuse him for what he said, or especially how he said it. > [@](#): > > And **RTFirefly** , i didn’t realize that he was your friend. I assume this means that he’s your real-life, off-board friend? You’re a good guy, and i agree with you about plenty of things, but next time you see him, tell him to fuck himself from me. Yeah, I try to drop in on him and **Lucretia** whenever I’m down that way, which is a few times a year. I’ll pass the message along. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/30 "2006-07-02T01:34:13Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > And this has to do with your argument how? Because it shows he brought a biased mind to his professional responsibility. > [@](#): > > Good Lord, I’d forgotten all about that thread - which isn’t surprising, given its date of April 2004. I read the first page, and all I found from you were unsupported allegations. When come back, bring better links. No need, other people provided the relevant links in that thread. Do I really need to duplicate what’s there? > [@](#): > > So: are you going to explain what the evidence is, and how it adds up to an argument supporting your claims? Some of the circumstantial evidence is in my previous post. It’s too large a task to find it all. > [@](#): > > Kindly don’t tell me what I do or don’t think. It’ll just be yet one more thing you’re wrong about. So do you believe trainedProfessionalExperiencedIntelligenceAnalyst was fooled? And so enthusiastically? What do you think happened? > [@](#): > > You did NOT post the following as a courtesy to me:… No of course not that. But subsequent references to the man yes, my promise not to do so notwithstanding. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/31 "2006-07-02T02:27:02Z")
Isn’t it just barely possible he’s too embarrassed about having been fooled so badly to face it himself, much less say so to anyone else? ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/32 "2006-07-02T03:04:41Z")
yea, I remember that ass. but aren’t there still some dumbfucks currently around who have the fucking audacity to continue to spout the party line as if **we** were the ones who had it wrong back then? ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/33 "2006-07-02T03:15:31Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Isn’t it just barely possible he’s too embarrassed about having been fooled so badly to face it himself, much less say so to anyone else? Ya know, that’s a characteristic I really **don’t** want in an intelligence agent. Because, well, their job is dealing with life and death situations, and someone who refuses (for example) to call off an operation, because they’re too embarassed to admit that they got bad intel, is someone who’s going to allow a whole lotta innocent people to get killed for no good reason. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/34 "2006-07-02T03:16:49Z")
> [@](#): > > **ElvisL1ves** : Isn’t it just barely possible he’s too embarrassed about having been fooled so badly to face it himself, much less say so to anyone else? What would Mr. Rogers do? ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/35 "2006-07-02T03:17:45Z")
He’d make a plan and he’d follow through / That’s what Mr. Rogers would do. ---
**Author:** ![Klaatu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Klaatu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Klaatu)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/36 "2006-07-02T05:55:24Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#): > > Ya know, that’s a characteristic I really **don’t** want in an intelligence agent. Because, well, their job is dealing with life and death situations, and someone who refuses (for example) to call off an operation, because they’re too embarassed to admit that they got bad intel, is someone who’s going to allow a whole lotta innocent people to get killed for no good reason. Well, I agree with that on its own, but why apply it to Bluesman. I remember the dude, and I don’t care who here knows him, who has sat on his porch, whatever. He always seemed to me as full of shit as any other “If I told you I’d have to kill you” types on the board. As AD said, he might have an intel billet. That could mean anything from a clerk to a low level analyst to a full fledged spook. The latter I highly doubt. And if he showed an NSA (or insert agency of choice) ID to somebody who he knows, that don’t mean shit either. There are tens of thousands of alphabet agency employees that never see anything on the intel end. As was said earlier, the real intel guys don’t say shit about what they do, much less on a message board. Personally, I think at the most he might have rubbed elbows here and there with intel types, and decided to play it up here on the Dope without really knowing shit. Just my opinion, feel free to flame, but remember I might have your dossier… 😉 ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/37 "2006-07-02T06:00:44Z")
I still can’t get my head around the notion of an enlisted man being in the position to sign off on anything remotely resembling a comprehensive analysis. A single cog in the machine, perhaps. I have this image of an NCO being given a stack of documents, each representing an assertion that is in question, and being ordered to determine whether the fact in each document can be shown to be true or not true. In my imaginary scenario, the NCO is not asked or encouraged to submit evidence that might place a fact into a context that shows it to be more or less significant than any other fact. When the officer[s] in charge of submitting the _actual_ comprehensive analysis of the situation have put together the picture they believe most usefully describes the reality, they assemble it and forward it up the chain. Now, if there’s any validity to the picture I have just drawn, our imaginary NCO will not himself be doing the cooking of intel, or the cherry-picking, and although the sign on the door of his department may say “Intelligence Analysis and Retrieval” in a big official-looking font, he’s not really an analyst in any true sense of the word; he’s more of a collation specialist. Nevertheless, he actually eyeballs a metric assload of facts that he’s been ordered to determine the factualness of, and he _will_ form his own perceptions of what the whole truth is, based on the facts he has seen, and in some cases, vetted. Such an NCO, while not blameless for the part he played in the creation of final intelligence documents, can be said to be offering his opinions (outside the context of the office environment) in good faith, and probably should not be considered as culpable as, say, Condoleeza Rice, in the screwed-up mess that emerges trom the bowels of the NSA. OTOH, shooting off his mouth (metaphorically speaking) on an Internet message board, is probably not the wisest thing to do, at least if he values the opinions that the message board denizens hold of him. DISCLAIMER: the above is pulled entirely out of my ass, and I make no representation that I believe it to be an accurate summation of the role of an enlisted man in an analysis department of the NSA. ---
**Author:** ![TVeblen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@TVeblen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TVeblen)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/38 "2006-07-02T06:48:19Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > I still can’t get my head around the notion of an enlisted man being in the position to sign off on anything remotely resembling a comprehensive analysis. A single cog in the machine, perhaps. Same here, **kaylasdad**. And I can’t get too hot and bothered, even retrospectively, over **Bluesman’s** rigid stance back then. IIRC I rather tangled with his wife **Lucretia** , also an Air Force officer, over whether even questioning the justification for war would cause active harm to our folks serving. We differed, sharply. But…meh. None of it’s worth retrospective spite. It was give-and-take on a message board. I believed then, as now, that **Bluesman** and **Lucretia** sincerely and whole-heartedly believed every word they wrote. Neither of 'em made any secret of their dedication to the military, nor their loyalty to it. They both shared some–equally IMO–genuinely moving insights about why they believed their sacrifices and service mattered. They misled no one about where they came from or why. Of _course_ **Bluesman** believed what his chain of command told him. It’s part and parcel with serving honorably. I don’t fault him for a minute for stating his views strongly. He was lied to. We all were. Most of us don’t expect a whole helluva lot out of politicans but the consequences for cynical political idiocy are vastly different for serving military folks. Scapegoating **Bluesman** is wrong, just plain flat wrong. He, and so many good, dedicated people like him, have been betrayed worst of all. I wouldn’t be suprised if he still _wants_ to believe, if for no other reason than anything else makes a mockery of his life of service. Offhand I can’t think of many more excruciating traps. He didn’t cause it, he couldn’t control it and he couldn’t cure it. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/39 "2006-07-02T06:54:38Z")
> [@TVeblen](#): > > He didn’t cause it, he couldn’t control it and he couldn’t cure it. Perhaps, but he didn’t have to imply that others were traitors or friends of Saddam for disbelieving it. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2006, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864/40 "2006-07-02T06:56:52Z")
> [@Klaatu](#): > > He always seemed to me as full of shit as any other “If I told you I’d have to kill you” types on the board. As AD said, he might have an intel billet. That could mean anything from a clerk to a low level analyst to a full fledged spook. The latter I highly doubt. And if he showed an NSA (or insert agency of choice) ID to somebody who he knows, that don’t mean shit either. There are tens of thousands of alphabet agency employees that never see anything on the intel end. Military intelligence (go ahead, make your jokes) is strictly operator based. Before we deploy, before we fly, and in the case of the Army before they go out on any sort of mission, patrol, whatever, we are the end-users of that information. With certain clearances, required for intel people, you can see much more, but the bottom line is that military people are at the end of the chain, especially low-ranking enlisted people (at that time he was a Tech Sergeant and I was a Senior Airman). We know what we were told, he saw more big-picture stuff but it was all disseminated down to us. His job was to make what got down to us into a cogent and coherent briefing with everything we needed to know, or to provide the same briefing to his bosses. My point in all this is that when it got to us it was already spun in the direction the Administration wanted it to go. Where that happened, I don’t know. But it happened way above our pay grades. The problem with this sort of thing is that when you’re dealing with somebody with a history of subterfuge like Saddam, if they tell you that they know where the stuff is, well, they know. They knew where the Scuds were in the first war, right? Nothing can hide from the US government, right? It wasn’t hard to believe that we did know. I think (I hope) that we have learned to cast a critical eye to this kind of stuff now. Nevertheless, we in the military are stuck in an interesting quandary, because if we don’t believe what they’re saying now how are we supposed to believe them when they give us a mission briefing with information that could save your life? It’s not easy for me to reconcile anymore. Let’s be honest. **Bluesman** wasn’t any more arrogant than the rest of us who were for the war, and he really wasn’t any more arrogant than some of you who were against it. That whole period of time was very trying for everybody, and it got ugly at times. This is really about trying to put the screws to somebody a little bit more because you can. It’s spiteful more than anything else. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hey-sevastopol-over-here-if-you-want-to-discuss-bluesman/362864.md?page=3)