The difficult position of junior intelligence officers at conferences

Being unwilling to express themselves in a decided manner at a conference at which senior officers are present, a point may sometimes be missed which only the junior can expound. A junior intelligence officer may be the only person present who has a deep knowledge of a subject, the intelligence sources, their validity and security screen. 

He must, therefore, not only have his wits about him and know what to say, but be able to say it in a forthright manner, unawed by the multiplicity of stripes which surround him.  He must press his point of view, secure in the knowledge that, if he does so, he will invariably have the support and sympathy of the chairman, and in fact of the whole gathering who admire nothing so much as a junior officer with something to say, and the guts to say it in a convincing way.

Recent history is peppered with occasions when wishfulness has prevailed in spite of the presence at a conference of those who knew the subject inside out, but just failed to say their bit at the right moment.