Does this, or does this not, sound discomfortingly like an old-school James Bond plotline?

Operating in many NATO and even some neutral countries,^[2] Gladio was first coordinated by the Clandestine Committee of the Western Union (CCWU), founded in 1948. After the creation of NATO in 1949, the CCWU was integrated into the Clandestine Planning Committee (CPC), founded in 1951 and overseen by the SHAPE (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe), transferred to Belgium after France’s official withdrawal from NATO's Military Committee in 1966 — which was not followed by the dissolution of the French stay-behind paramilitary movements. - Operation Gladio in Wikipedia

This is the sort of thing one finds on a rainy afternoon.

Bit of a sad day yesterday - the Crazy Australian leaves us on January 7, departing for another hemisphere and decidedly warmer climes, and yesterday was our goodbye. A bowling expedition occurred, followed by a meal (tavuc doner pide - chicken kebab in a pita. Sort of), and then Canada, Ohio, et moi wandering through freezing drizzle and bonecracking wind for an hour or two, trying to find a mall with a multiplex playing Australia. No luck. Exactly how his city supports two mega-malls within blocks (cold, wet, windy blocks) of each other rather boggles the mind.