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About this quote

What does it mean?
Skorzeny rescued Mussolini; Hitler expected similar success in Tehran, but it failed.
In plain terms
A daring operative succeeded once but could not repeat the feat elsewhere.
What can you take from it?
Success in covert missions is unpredictable.

Where it applies

  • military planning
  • intelligence operations

Putting it to work

  • prepare contingency plans
  • avoid overreliance on a single agent

Questions to consider

  • What factors cause covert missions to fail?
  • How should leaders manage expectations after a success?

Another view

Limited context makes it hard to judge the broader implications.

More from Gevork Vartanian

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  3. We were lucky - we never met a single traitor. For us, underground agents, betrayal is the worst evil. If an agent observes all the security rules and behaves …

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