--- Philip Hart <philiph at slac.stanford.edu> wrote: > > > On Wed, 24 Mar 2004, Bob wrote: [Bryan Newell wrote:] > > > Perhaps it is enough to point at Mellar's fate and say, "that's what > > > happens to people who thieve from us", but I think it would be much > > > better if no one found out it ever happened. > > > > > > If word got out, people[*] would no longer think "can I rob the > > > treasury", they would think "how can I get away with it." > > > > > > I think the point was that news was going to get out regardless of > what the > > Jhereg did. The plan was to make sure by the time anyone found out, > Mellar > > would be pondering his fate in the belly of a Morganti Dagger with a > clear > > implication that anyone who followed after would be dead before they > could > > do anything with it. [snip] I agree with Bob that it must be possible to rob the Jhereg treasury. Money is for spending, so there have to be trusted people with the authority to take money out, and one of them could steal, if nothing else. > Yes - surely there were enough dead bodies scattered about (in concert > with the financial transactions needed to cover the shortfall in > operating funds) that informed observers could put together what > happened - especially given the semi-public events at Castle Black. In addition to this, if the Organization absolutely has to keep Mellar's theft a permanent secret, then after Vlad does his job they should kill him and anyone he might have told. Vlad doesn't even worry about this possibility, as I recall. > But perhaps it would be hard to tell that Mellar had done something > cleverly suicidal and not something stupidly suicidal. One benefit to the Jhereg of my suggestion is that Mellar did do something stupidly suicidal. They can say for internal consumption, "He robbed us, but he wasn't hoping to get away with it. He knew he couldn't; he knew he was going to die. He was hoping to start a war with the Dragons, but it would have been bad for the Organization, and we don't get manipulated into blunders like that." -- Jerry Friedman __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Finance Tax Center - File online. File on time. http://taxes.yahoo.com/filing.html