This is about my father, who died many years ago. He retired from the Navy and went into defense contracting as a senior engineer. The office security policy was that all visitors — no matter if they were oh, say, high-ranking military officers in uniform who’d been showing up for weeks at a time — had to sign in. Reasonable, right?
My father’s security clearance was up for renewal sometime in the 1980s so he had to have the usual FBI interview. Unfortunately the head admin was out of the office at the time The Smallest FBI Agent in the World showed up.
This idjit (in his twenties) berated the junior admin covering the reception desk — until she began crying — about how HE was with the FBI and HE didn’t HAVE to sign in because HE WAS A FEDERAL AGENT and who was SHE to question HIM. She held the line and made him sign in through her tears.
My father was a mustang. He’d finally (per his telling) managed to teach the young self-important engineers (all men the same age as the FBI agent), “If you mistreat other staff — especially our admins, who we cannot function without — because you think you’re more important, you will have ME to deal with. You will not like it.”
So he got angry after someone had the sense to run down the hall and poke their head into his office with “Um, the FBI agent here for you just made the junior admin CRY…” He was barely civil to said FBI agent, giving bored-sounding “uh-huh, yeah, yeah, no, yeah” answers and giving off all the “You annoy me, go away” vibes he could. Disrespect for disrespect, basically.
“YOU are not TAKING this SERIOUSLY,” The Smallest FBI Agent in the World reprimanded him. “This is a SECURITY CLEARANCE INVESTIGATION. Do you UNDERSTAND that?”
My father leaned forward and said coldly, “Young man, I am a retired Naval officer. I have held security clearances *higher* than this for longer than you have been *alive*. I can recite these questions by heart. Let’s get this crap over with.”
“I can have your security clearance PULLED for this DISRESPECT to an FBI AGENT!”
“Go. Ahead.”
“Um…what did you just say?”
“I said Go. Ahead. Super-Sekrit Project is going to sea trials in the near future and I — as a retired Naval officer and engineer — am the designated contractor’s technical representative going with it. You go ahead and pull my clearance and explain why to the U.S. Navy, son. You’ll be explaining it to admirals by the time you’re through. I don’t think your bosses or your bosses’ bosses over at the FBI will like that.”
My father apparently leaned back in his chair and grinned his most infuriating grin. He knew he was the senior technical expert on the project, he knew the Navy would back him/the firm because of that and his stock of favors he could call in, and he knew the clock was ticking to sea trials. Plus, he was angry at having his staff mistreated.
As soon as the Smallest FBI Agent in the World stomped out of the premises, my father apologized profusely to the entire admin staff and gave the junior admin a cash bonus for hazardous duty, as he put it, out of his own wallet.
Then the idjit agent actually DID try to pull his clearance for not being “sufficiently respectful of the FBI.” My father stood on his principles and refused to apologize to the idjit agent no matter how much pressure the FBI put on. His refusal set off an uproar between the FBI, the US Navy, and the engineering firm that reverberated all the way to DC.
Finally, after the FBI realized my father was deadly serious and was willing to tank his entire career (no security clearance = no job) and stall a Super-Sekrit Project because the Smallest FBI Agent in the World had made a receptionist cry, an agreement was brokered to send another agent to do the interview over again.
The head admin was covering the reception desk. A man roughly my father’s age (at the time mid-fifties) showed up, greeted her pleasantly, showed his FBI credentials, signed in without complaint, and was walked to my father’s office.
The agent opened with a pleasant “Ah, I understand you were Navy? I was Army, let’s not talk about The Game…” and they chit-chatted about their respective service before a scrupulously polite interview was conducted on both sides.
At the end, the agent paused. “Sir? I FOUGHT to do this interview because I REALLY wanted to meet you. There were MULTIPLE volunteers who wanted to do it.”
“Really? Why?”
The agent grinned. “Because you have a fan club in [city a long drive away] FBI field office. NONE of us like that little jerk and you put him in his PLACE in a way we COULDN’T! An ADMIRAL was calling our office wanting him FIRED!”
My father started laughing. “Sounds like your young man learned a lesson, now didn’t he?”
“Oh yes. And we at the [city] FBI field office are very GRATEFUL to you for it. There will be no problem expediting the renewal of your clearance and we will NOT have a repeat of this behavior by an FBI agent out of OUR field office. I promise you that.”
Forever after (well, until my father retired), the FBI agents who came to do clearance renewal interviews were all very polite and respectful to the admin staff no matter how old or young they were. And always signed in without complaint.