Why didn't the villains just steal the ATAC right away?

SPOILERS


I didn't understand why Kristatos, just didn't steal the ATAC right away.  He hires a hitman to take out the man who went to look for the ATAC, and I assume that man was somewhere near where the ship sank, so why not wait for him to locate it, and then take him out, and steal it right there?  Why kill him, then wait like two weeks for Bond to find it and take it then?

No one but the British would know how to disarm the self-destruct. They couldn't risk losing it and instead waited for Bond to do the work for them.

But if they wanted Bond to do the work for them, then why do they spend the last hour of the movie trying to kill him like at the ski resort for example where they made three attempts?

ironpony wrote:

SPOILERS


I didn't understand why Kristatos, just didn't steal the ATAC right away.  He hires a hitman to take out the man who went to look for the ATAC, and I assume that man was somewhere near where the ship sank, so why not wait for him to locate it, and then take him out, and steal it right there?  Why kill him, then wait like two weeks for Bond to find it and take it then?

I think (and this is only a guess), since Sir Haveloc disguised his operation as maritime archaeology, that there was no way of telling when he would have found and retrieved ATAC. Hence they wanted the competitor (competitive in finding ATAC) out of the way before he actually did. I mean, the only sure sign that he would have retrieved ATAC would have been the disappearance of his ship - which is unfortunate when you want to ambush it.

Oh I understand why Haveloc disguised the operation as archaeology in order to keep it secret, I just wonder why it took Kristatos so long to find the ATAC afterwards.

It was said before that he was waiting for Bond to find it for him. But that doesn't make any sense to me since he was trying to kill Bond several times previously in the movie.

In the movie Bond asks Columbo "What does Kristatos gain by setting you up?", and Columbo says "he wants me out of the way, by getting a Britsh agent to do his dirty work for him".

But if Kristatos wants Bond to kill Columbo for him cause Columbo knows too much, then again, why was Kristatos trying to kill Bond so many times previously? This movie makes no sense to me, even for a Bond movie, unless I missed something?