Can't hide ssh.exe when started by TortoiseSVN

I've been trying to find a way to hide the ssh.exe run by TortoiseSVN when doing its operations.

I even went to the point of writing a tiny exe to wrap and call ssh.exe, but an ssh.exe window still opens even though my exe is a 'windows' app and i'm using STARTUPINFO to hide the window, or even move it off the screen, or even create with no window.

Is this something that can be fixed in SSH.EXE?

Why not use TortoisePlink? Because you have to use Putty with TortoisePlink and putty is always a pain to set up (particularly when new hires show up). I'd rather just deal with the popup--but I'd rather deal with neither.

Start with ssh.exe's Windows process and console-window behavior, using the STARTUPINFO settings described in the report, and reproduce the launch through TortoiseSVN rather than the wrapper. Compare the behavior with TortoisePlink, then define done as completing the operation without a visible ssh.exe window. No source file or test is named, so locating the implementation and regression coverage is part of the work.