Government control is like seed oils, toxic and pervasive.

I don’t see why a room full of scientists couldn’t be fooled same as everyone. Sounds trivial as well as necessary to extend the ruse to the support team. Just Patch up the leaks as they come up.

NDAs can't silence everyone. Consider the Snowden leaks, showcasing the power of one whistleblower with access to sensitive info.

it isn't a matter of "if every single person in the control room is a CIA asset it could be faked" a mission like this takes thousand of people, international cooperation and years of planning. AND there are thousand of people who know that and care deeply about it. So you have to compromise SO MANY and fake SO MUCH shit for SO LONG that you might as well do it for real. yeah, maybe you could pull it off (at massive expense) and the big payoff is "looking like you're doing something" no. it's fucking ridiculous and you vastly underestimate the difficulty of faking it.