I spent 24 years in the Air Force. Lots of different bases. Some were better than others, and some were excellent, but some were pretty bad. According to the article, this guy talked to supervisors and others in his organization, and got told to shut up. I've seen that happen in the Air Force, and it always comes back to haunt someone eventually, but that doesn't stop some folks from giving it a try. One of the training bases I went to lost their base commander over an IG complaint that got stonewalled for a couple of years at the local level. Eventually, higher HQ IG wandered through, as they do, and everything fell apart: the commander, and several of his officers and sr. nco’s got taken down. This happened just before I got there, and we suffered the repercussions the whole time I was there.
Well, in the rest of the government, particularly in the intelligence community, the IG is not one person but a staff, and they can’t stonewall since complaints are a matter of record, reviewed by multiple people. The IG in these cases have no vested interest in stonewalling any complaints because their charter is to investigate and make findings. They aren’t under the command of any single group and they can’t be pressured by people who have no impact on their careers.