Imagine the vitriol that would be expressed in Western Mainstream media if the Chinese MSS, Russian SVR, Iranian VAJA, or North Korean RGB openly advertised online to recruit agents - agents specifically tasked to target the United States, NATO, and nations like Japan and South Korea.
Western media frequently expresses outrage when a spy from one of these nations is detected or captured in the United States. How dare these nations operate in America or near its bases - trying to steal its secrets. Of course, the United States has the most comprehensive espionage system in history and has no qualms about spying even on its own allies and stealing information from them. The track record regarding this is long and established.
Such a move by the CIA could be a sign of desperation - the need being beyond present capacities or it could be just an attempt to insult Beijing et al. by openly campaigning. It's hard to say.
The media by implication seems to suggest that the US doesn't engage in the recruiting of agents - or at least the assumption is that when the US does it, it's right and proper. But the same people (and their audience) take great offense when these nations reciprocate. Such coverage as well as such recruiting campaigns reveal a mindset both blind and arrogant - and in every way hypocritical.
But once again moral equivalence is not allowed. The US must be understood as exceptional and thus not subject to the moral standards everyone else is held to.
The truth is most assets work for an enemy power out of less than noble motives. Greed of course is a motivator but in many cases the assets are effectively blackmailed or in some kind of desperate situation that requires them to take great risks for financial remuneration.
Such a story should be the source of scandal. It should result in public protest, but it doesn't - not in the religious brainwashing that is the result of nationalism.
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