The pale, soft man pounded his tiny fists on the table. Not just any table, the big desk in the Oval Office. He thought to himself, the President should not have used that word. Just because he thought it was funny when Ann Coulter used it, that doesn’t mean it is really funny. When I use names to describe the President, those are funny. Chief of Important Military Process, that’s a good one. Especially if you use the acronym, not that CHIMP knows the work acronym. The pale man was feeling very stressed. No only did he have to think about every political aspect of every move, he was going to have to actually talk about himself, in public. Life was a lot easier when our people controlled both houses of The Congress; now it’s a giant pain in the ass with those requests – and if we say no to a request now, it’s subpoena time and a lot of media exposure we can’t control. The pale man thought, It’s a good thing I used Harriet’s office when I wrote the memo about the 93 US Attorneys.
The pale man reflected about a lot of good times, with the CHIMP. He remembered the time they visited Moscow. Putin was a very thoughtful host. He asked he CHIMP if he still liked to drink Stolichnya straight from the freezer. CHIMP said, “Hell, I used to drink it straight from the bottle. Still do, when the wife’s away. Wasn’t too long before he was under the table, and the two of us had a real nice conversation.
Putin was pretty pleased that I knew some of the things the KGB was famous for. We talked about some old cases. I read about them in old newspaper clippings, he studied them in his classes at spy school. My favorite was the Rosenbergs. We haven’t had a good execution for treason since then, over fifty years ago. There always was a lot of discussion about whether they were guilty. Good, God-fearing Americans knew they were guilty, and what the hell difference does it make if the trial actually was fair to the defendants. Guilty! Fortunately, a few years ago, the secret files of the KGB were opened to academic researchers from the USA. It’s only a coincidence that President Reagan picked historians at Hoover Institution. Totally trustworthy. And of course, they did not get to actually look into the stacks of KGB files, there were helpful people who brought out the files as they were requested, and made copies for the academicians to take home. Putin chuckled then, the pale man remembered. Kind of a creepy chuckle.
Putin said he actually was responsible for being helpful to the Americans, it was well worth the effort. After all, what difference does it make, now, if those people were guilty. We actually got the atomic bomb secrets from Klaus Fuchs. Dr. Fuchs was a member of the Manhattan Project team. Not only that, the Project had to apply for a US Patent on the devices, and Fuchs was responsible for assembling all the paperwork, and making sure the blueprints all got printed properly. The Rosenbergs never got near any really important information until the KGB got tipped that the FBI were close, and Fuchs was out of the country. They had the stuff when the FBI came to the house, however. Funny stuff.
Putin and the pale man had discussed a lot of cases. A lot of them had that same trick. When there’s something clever to be done, have somebody else standing there when the FBI come around. Putin said it’s a lot easier here in Russia – I get to pick all the public prosecutors, and if one of them does something I don’t like, well, we don’t actually have any former public prosecutors. Something must happen to them, I don’t know.
Putin said another thing. No member of the state security service would ever say something contrary to policy. That would not even need to be reinforced. We are very careful about hiring people. He said, we know a lot about your CIA. They have this fetish about competence. Stupid. That makes it easy for us to infiltrate. We find people who are very good performers, and offer them whatever they want. We can make it easy for them to get a promotion by getting information that looks like it’s true. We can make sure that the people who compete with them for promotions, have some kind of career mishap. Or they might get sick at a time when they were needed for an assignment. IT doesn’t have to involve a bullet… but that could be an option, too.
The pale man asked Putin, what would you do about this Yellow Cake thing. It was silly to make a big thing of it, but that big schmuck Cheney wanted to push his weight around, and the CHIMP let him put it into the State of the Union address. Putin chuckled again, really, really creepy. Putin said that is by far the easiest thing. You know, he said, that Ambassador is married to one of your CIA people– the wife is a covert agent. I wouldn’t bring it up if she worked on something important, but she is in nuclear proliferation, so you won’t even miss her. The pale man asked, “ I have to bring back G Gordon Liddy, and have her killed?” No, Putin said, it is much easier. Just find somebody who owes you a favor, and have him publish the name in the newspapers. Then you can put the blame on anyone you like. The wife has to find a new job, away from the CIA, and you can replace her with someone who is politically reliable. And if you lose a few networks giving you nuclear proliferation information, what do you care?
The pale man heard a band outside playing Hail to the CHIMP. Shit, he thought, I better get back to my own desk.
