It is possible, of course, that the most sensitive intelligence is sent by more secure means, not yet breached by Wikileaks.Even so, the cables are worth a read just for some diplomats' lively turns of phrase.
Moe Berg, a Red Sox catcher who also worked for American intelligence, was sent to a Werner Heisenberg lecture in Switzerland in 1944 with instructions to listen carefully and, if it sounded like he was catching on to the physics of making a bomb, shoot him; he didn't.
Intelligence officers were sent to infiltrate the Chile Solidarity Campaign, a movement backed by Labour MPs, trade unions, students and church groups.
So Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, and Mikhail Y . Fradkov the director of the Russian foreign intelligence service, were sent to Syria with what the Russians said was a proposal to end the crisis.
A senior interrogator at Kandahar and Bagram, who wrote a book about his experiences (The Interrogators) under the pseudonym Chris Mackey, stated explicitly that, under orders handed down from senior figures in the US military and the intelligence agencies, who were sent the prisoner lists from Afghanistan, all "non-Afghan Taliban/foreign fighters" were to be sent to Guantánamo.
Two of Mrs Merkel's most important advisers, foreign policy adviser Christoph Heusgen, and intelligence coordinator Guenter Heiss were sent to take part in the talks - seen as a measure of how seriously Mrs Merkel takes the matter.
After joining the Polish diplomatic corps, where he worked for Polish intelligence, Reich-Ranicki and Tosia were sent to London.
The Tripoli archive shows that summaries of his interrogations were sent to British intelligence, and that both MI5 and MI6 submitted questions that they wished to be put to him.
In a video recording shown on Georgian news broadcasts, Mr. Gedenidze said Mr. Kurtsikidze had initially purchased pictures on behalf of his photo agency, but then blackmailed him into passing on documents, which he suspected were sent to foreign intelligence agents.
Nürnberg and Titania were sent to gather intelligence at Hawaii and raid the cable station at Fanning Island.
