U.S. intelligence officials make a habit of leaking to the Times. The Times returns the favor with laudatory accounts of our savvy spies — and, you know, if they miss the fall of the Berlin Wall, or the 9/11 plot, or the state of Iraq’s WMD stockpiles . . . well . . . um . . . these things happen.

From today’s dispatch on how our shrewd analysts are stealthily developing a read on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s intentions in Ukraine (while . . . er . . . conceding that they missed that whole annexation of Crimea thing):

Interestingly, one source of insight to Mr. Putin has been conversations with the Russian president himself.
So, like a hostage negotiator, they are determined to keep him talking. Not long after William J. Burns, the C.I.A. director, visited Moscow in November to warn against an invasion of Ukraine, Mr. Biden’s aides came up with a plan of constant engagement, setting up a series of negotiations — in Brussels and Geneva, at many different levels — on the theory that while Russia was talking with the West, airing its grievances and making its demands, it was unlikely to invade.
Paul Kolbe, who oversaw collection of Russian intelligence for the C.I.A. for many years, noted recently that “you keep them talking to try to figure out what they really want, to find another way out.” But Mr. Kolbe, now the director of Harvard’s intelligence project, added, “it made sense — unless what the gunman really wants is to shoot the hostages.”

These are some boffo insights into our strategy. Let’s hope nobody tells Putin.