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Comment by Roritharr | Hacker News Reader

"The FBI hired him because he claimed to be a Vietnam veteran, but Sullivan discovered that this was a lie — during the war Nivette had been a student at UCLA."

This baffles me and lets me question the sincerity of the article. Can this possibly be the case?

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This happens all the time. There's a whole bunch of people who lead VA boards and testify in congress and things who later get discovered to have never served.

Then they move off and make up a new story and start it all over again.

Why couldn't it be? I doubt he needed an actual security clearance to do the work he was doing. The stated "FBI Clearance" probably just amounted to being given access to some confidential records regarding the people he was treating which probably aren't classified.

They hired him to be a therapist for other Vietnam vets. They likely never did a (significant) background check because they weren't hiring him for anything crucial (security wise). They were hiring him to help people who had a similar experience to his.

UCLA as an ROTC student? 'Veteran' implies in the popular mind 'served in theatre' but couldn't it also mean 'was a soldier'?

A "veteran" is a person who served in the military. A "combat veteran" is a person who served in combat while in the military.

In the US Army's case, a combat veteran would have a Combat Infantryman Badge. In the Marines, it would be a Combat Action Ribbon.

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