Chapter 1073 - 1005 Both Spontaneous and Premeditated_2
"This doesn’t seem right." Liu Jinghui frowned: "If Li Dianzhong was such an important source of intelligence, even if he was in danger, they wouldn’t have disposed of him so easily. Was the mimeograph factory still operational at that time?"
Qi Changye’s eyebrows knitted as well: "Yes, it was. The mimeograph factory struggled to survive for over two years after Li Dianzhong’s death, with its scale shrinking more and more. Eventually, it was shut down along with the third-party company."
"Exactly. With this in mind, it doesn’t make sense. If the intent was to order Li Dianzhong to kill Zhang Xiaoming to preserve the mimeograph factory, that would be to protect the intelligence source. But what’s the point of keeping the mimeograph factory after Li Dianzhong’s death? Isn’t that putting the cart before the horse? Unless..."
"The factory has another source of intelligence?" Qi Changye immediately caught up with Liu Jinghui’s logic, hitting the point sharply. His brows furrowed instinctively, and after a long pause, he said: "Courier agents are exposed individuals, and normally, they operate in conjunction with the core intelligence source."
Courier agents actually take on greater risks, and their existence serves to mitigate the risks to the core intelligence source. Otherwise, adding a courier agent merely increases the core source’s risk, which would be pointless.
In fact, the entire spy network exists to minimize the risks to the core intelligence source. By ensuring the core source engages in the least amount of espionage activity and transferring the risk of intelligence delivery and message transmission to the couriers and field operatives, the spy network fulfills its purpose.
From this perspective, Li Dianzhong’s fatal fall was essentially an act of risk elimination—a textbook display of the spy network’s operational logic.
The opposition could simply replace the courier with another trained individual and keep the network functioning.