My sense was that basically Ivanova jumped onto the wrong path as she
fled...the shadows were in proximity, and she ended up briefly on their path,
which took her to the interception of the transmission.

The one comment that I find most interesting, repeated here a few times,
is that they didn't buy the Nightwitch (as some have dubbed her) because in
her address to the Nightwatch, she was not exactly what you might call subtle,
and thus nobody'd believe her, and see her for what she was.

I find it interesting because we always think we're smarter than that,
when history proves *exactly* the opposite. The Big Lie, spoken not just
openly, but loudly, firmly and with conviction, has been one of the most
successful tactics in history. When Hitler and Goebbels stood before a crowd
and blamed jews for destroying society, circulated pamphlets with ugly
cariacatures, indicated that they weren't *really* human (this in actual
newsreels provided to the medical profession members charged with eliminating
"mental defectives and jews")...when Joseph McCarthy stood up in front of the
nation waving a list of names of commies in the state department, the
military, congress, showbiz, and the sciences...the public didn't suddenly
wake up, hear the voice of the fanatic, and say, "Hey, this guy's nuts!"

They bought it. Because they were primed to believe it. Because they
wanted to believe it. Because they were afraid *not* to believe it. No, she
wasn't subtle. Because there's a time for subtlety, and there's a time to
perform grandly for your hand-picked audience and go for the Big Lie. If she
were addressing a larger audience, she might softpedal her message. To the
Nightwatch, she's got to hammer them, just as the Hitler Youth were hammered,
as the Anti-Communist Youth meetings were hammered about the Red Peril, as
Croatian or Serbian soldiers were hammered about the need to rape women of the
other "race" to make the resultant babies more ethnically pure...which
happened.

Most of her dialogue was paraphrased from actual speeches given over the
decades, or longer, by fanatical leaders to their followers. There's bits of
Hitler, of Goerring, of Goebbels...bits of McCarthy, bits of Stalin, bits of
Pat Buchanan and Rep. Dornan.

Because people fell for it. It did work

It does work.

And it will *continue* to work...for as long as people think that THEY
would NEVER fall for such a thing....

jms