George Bush’S Great America [EN]: Chapter 141

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This all transpired on the very day President Bush and Prime Minister Blair held their private meeting—specifically, at the moment their conversation turned to, “How can I help you?”

Simultaneously, halfway around the world in South Korea…

That day, the rain was unusually heavy, each drop thick with a cocktail of fine dust and heavy metals. Although China’s business activities had decreased somewhat, leading to a reduction in overall pollution, this wasn’t yet widely known. Consequently, all the dust from China was still broadly categorized as ‘yellow dust.’

Most will recall the National Intelligence Service (NIS) suffering intense scrutiny from top to bottom thanks to a certain audacious American president. The scale of the fallout, with mass staff dismissals, was so vast it inevitably became public knowledge. Try as they might to cultivate relationships with journalists, complete amity is impossible, isn’t it?

The public, in general, didn’t particularly fault the NIS. After all, who could anticipate someone arriving in a fighter jet? And the question everyone whispered: Why gukbap [a type of Korean rice soup]? The underlying reasons remained elusive. Thus, save for a select few, most suffered no real repercussions, viewing it merely as an odd footnote in the news—content, at last, that their newspaper subscription had delivered some value.

“You all know who those ‘select few’ are, don’t you?”

An uncomfortable silence permeated the NIS’s clandestine conference room. The quiet itself was oppressive, and the high humidity further weighed down their shoulders.

“The National Intelligence Service. That’s us. We took a direct hit.”

Perhaps, if they had to find a silver lining, their budget increased afterward. They were finally able to highlight those budgetary shortcomings that had been persistently impacting operations. So, regardless of the messy circumstances, one could argue the NIS’s overall intelligence capabilities were, in the end, strengthened. They still couldn’t crack that madman’s skull open, but they wished they could given the increased budget they received.

The real issue was the NIS’s already shaky credibility plummeting to new depths. In almost every nation, intelligence agencies are easily perceived as parasitic. After all, their work is inherently shrouded in secrecy. They can hardly trumpet successful covert operations, can they? This holds true even for organizations like the CIA or SIS [Secret Intelligence Service, the British intelligence agency], part of the Five Eyes alliance.

However, an intelligence agency’s image *can* be improved with soft power propaganda, even film. The ‘007’ franchise, for example, cultivated the image of the SIS in the minds of people who otherwise knew little about the agency’s real role. Governments often warn, ‘Don’t confuse reality with games and movies,’ yet, the image shaped by mass media often forms the foundation of understanding.

“When evaluating statistics or information, regardless of the content itself, the *source* of the investigation is most important.”

Whether on a small or grand scale, investigating statistics or intelligence inevitably requires funding. In a capitalist society, it’s nearly impossible to find areas where money *isn’t* a factor. Yet, this very financial element can lead to critical and profound distortions in the information gathered.

For instance, suppose news articles and reports heavily promote the notion that vitamins are effective for treating colds. Naturally, people would start taking vitamins regularly at the first sign of a sniffle—it’s relatively harmless, unlike some medications.

Now, add a condition: what if these statistics were funded by a ‘pharmaceutical company’ that *manufactures* vitamins? Suddenly, the reliability of those statistics becomes questionable, doesn’t it? Yet, unless corrected or refuted, most people will continue to believe in vitamins’ cold-fighting prowess for a long time. Even if conflicting data emerges, the initial information has already solidified in their minds.

So, what did the NIS do with its freshly boosted budget?

“They concealed it, right?”

The NIS secretly commissioned dramas and films that portrayed the agency in a favorable light, obscuring the source of the funds through multiple layers. Of course, given the nature of the content, some scrutiny was unavoidable. Yet, the public vaguely attributed the funding to the government overall, never suspecting the NIS’s direct investment.

This is all useless if the disparity between reality and media portrayal becomes too wide. Law enforcement finds it hard to get away with the same kinds of whitewashing. They’ve desperately tried to instill a ‘friendly officer’ image to move past a bloody past, but are constantly hit with the incompetence label.

That’s because any mistakes are front-page news. There are cases of neglect and indifference among law enforcement and often light punishments or none at all, even after repeat or secondary offenses from known criminals.

In fact, police forces are always made up of people working all day to make arrests. Their overall reputations always go down with bad headlines, and no progress can ever happen while any officers do not suffer appropriate judgement in the case of severe errors of judgement.

“Nothing works since that guy came and went in a fighter jet!”

Strictly speaking, cooperation with North Korea improved then, but in reality, this was right around when President Bush began directly influencing matters in Korea.

“The upside is that the US shares information more readily than the previous administration. Almost excessively so.”

Beyond a few exceptions, US cooperation was significant, bordering on alarming from Korea’s perspective. Perhaps they should have renamed it the ‘Six Eyes’ instead of the ‘Five Eyes’? But, there was a reason why they weren’t called that.

“The downside is that they occasionally hand us information that’s essentially garbage.”

That’s right. Were they to only pass on high-quality intelligence, a gesture of 108 prostrations to the US would be due daily. Unfortunately, they often received questionable information. They were often warned for actions about to happen.

For example: ‘Practice physical destruction through the military to give a mental shock.’

In other words, ‘Shock and Awe’—a deliberate distortion of the truth. Another example: the proclamation that ‘all illegal immigrants must be removed from the United States.’ The conclusion was some sort of barrier, however, they all received citizenship because there has been such a dramatic shortage of people willing to work.

For the time being, the CIA were passing reports of potential “deliberate” tainting by members leaking state secrets of intelligence.

There wasn’t anything really that substantiated those claims except gut feelings.

‘The President told people what to do and people started leaking intelligence because the directives did not make a lot of sense’

That was a conviction that everyone could believe. If you knew the reality. He alone dictated things from the White House.

The long story is, no one had the power to give more information other than in segments or out of context.

Why the US was like that to South Korea, even high-level staff never got any answers.

Then no matter what happens, that also doesnt clarify what we can depend on the President for.

Then Bush gave whispers in his cabinet for the single purpose

“That is just better and all I want to do.”

The way he always wanted to pick on people at the NIS because of Kap-hwan.

“The imperative now is to thoroughly assess the political climates of the nations surrounding Korea. Our priority must be establishing our *own* robust intelligence network, instead of leaning on the CIA’s unreliable data.”

There’s a key nuance to be drawn from the emphasis the NIS had with Korea that has already passed, even if Korea itself can barely pass. What was already lost in Russia could barely stay above other spies to maintain their own networks. Budget issues had already been established and planned to improve, although that has proven futile at times.

No, an agency was recently annihilated, so there has never been information since.

This elimination kicked-off with actions done in China. An endless litany of actions was reported in high frequency. They grabbed just about everyone they can to catch the smallest fish possible as agents that reported, for which many spies in a given field met untimely dooms and the actions were hard to come back from.

Due to how often it has become from people and reports saying people selling classified information, Putin was livid, even by executing some members, one of whom had barely sold or delivered secret items from other locations, while others lived, or at most stayed locked up where no one saw or remembered them ever again. Putin himself tried a terror attack previously in his time.

Korea and America maintain authority over them where anything related to Korea or Mt. Kumgang were not much more than semi-privatized locations with businesses setting them. Now all of those places no longer are useful in an age with satellites.

The middle east had almost no reporting. And in Europe the terror incidents had people making espionage all for naught. The USA were more involved than any others reporting intel so none of it had an impact.

“We received almost twice as much budget because of this. We have to overcome this crisis somehow.”

In response the heavy weight that lingered there.

“We just got another piece of information.”

That brought up to have people read that that was what has spun a loop over those involved.

“What is this?”

“Is this skewed?”

“No, what is it?”

「US President to visit China, UK, and then secretly visit several other countries.」

An endless string of information from others causes the people on hand here the inability to decide if things that can and will cause problems. No one can explain things the President causes here for better or worse.

“Why is he going to China?”

“Does he wanna die?”

This cannot work.

The twist has not ended yet as of this intelligence being found.