I think what Hersh “reports” has more to do with promoting “the narrative” than anything resembling the truth.
If such an operation was undertaken, nobody who had any knowledge of it would have talked to Hersh. But whether it was or not, there are plenty of people with no knowledge of it who’d be happy to make ambiguous statements about what might have happened, so long as their names were kept secret.
“Truth” isn’t even a secondary concern.
You don’t think that anybody involved would’ve decided “hey This immoral and highly illegal I got to tell somebody”