[buran77]

Creating an enemy is politics 101 and routinely used by people of all walks of life. It's the easiest way not only to excuse your low performance, which is suddenly made to look good by comparison, but will also keep the people busy with worrying about that "larger evil" while you do your thing. Sets a low bar and distracts you from real issues.

The opposition would have crippled the country even worse, that other country violates human rights far more egregiously, and that other plumber would have needed even more attempts to get that "paranormal" leak fixed.