The actual benefit of having an informant network may have nothing to do with the value of the information it brings.
The benefit may be the fact that knowledge of the network’s existence undermines your enemy’s cohesion, detracts from his focus on his mission, and makes him spend his limited resources looking for agents, reorganizing for resiliency to compromise, etc...
The Lies That Bind Us
The Foundational Falsehoods of the American Dream