Joe Coburn is the person who spotted Jack, assessed him as potential and recruited him into the Company.
They first crossed paths at Ramstein, where Jack was a young soldier driving the motor pool and Joe was a passenger on his way to meetings in Munich. They stayed in touch (if you’ve read the novel, you know how). By the time Jack enrolled at Cal State on the GI Bill, it was Joe who steered him toward international studies and Russian, and it was Joe who came calling again near graduation, pulling Jack straight out of university and into the Agency. Jack owes Joe for a career he wouldn’t otherwise have had. By the time Jack reaches Moscow, Joe is chief of operations for the Soviet/East European Division, the man who decides which cases get resources, which officers go where, and how far the job is allowed to cost you.
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