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| CIA may need a decade to rebuild clandestine service |
| 2006-01-01 |
| A former CIA counterterrorism officer who tracked Osama bin Laden through the mountains of Afghanistan says the U.S. spy agency could need a decade to build up its clandestine service for the U.S. war on terrorism. Gary Berntsen, a decorated espionage officer who led a paramilitary unit code-named "Jawbreaker" in the war that toppled the Taliban after the Sept. 11 attacks, said CIA Director Porter Goss faces an uphill battle to fill the agency's senior ranks with aggressive, seasoned operatives. "He's probably more aggressive than most of the senior officers in the clandestine service. So I think he's having to pull them along a bit," Berntsen said in an interview. "(Goss) is trying to improve the situation. But it's going to be tough. The rebuilding is going to take years. A decade, at least," he told Reuters late last week. The CIA, widely criticized for lapses involving prewar Iraq and the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, has seen its clandestine staff dwindle to less than 5,000 employees from a peak of over 7,000, intelligence sources say. Experts blame a post-Cold War downturn in recruitment for a current lack of seasoned clandestine operatives that has been exacerbated by a rush to lucrative private sector jobs in recent years. "We have a smaller number of really, really aggressive, creative members of our leadership in the senior service," said Berntsen, who recently published a book about his exploits in the war on terrorism, titled "Jawbreaker" (Crown Publishing). Former CIA Director George Tenet told the Sept. 11 commission in April 2004 the CIA would need five years to produce a clandestine service fully capable of tackling the terrorism threat. Goss later said at his September 2004 Senate confirmation hearings that rebuilding the clandestine operation would be "a long build-out, a long haul." President George W. Bush issued an order last year that called for a 50 percent increase in CIA clandestine officers and analysts to be completed "as soon as feasible." "The CIA is moving aggressively to rebuild and enhance its capabilities across the board," CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said. But intelligence sources say the rebuilding process has been complicated by disaffection for Goss' leadership within the clandestine service. Years of double-digit growth in federal spending on intelligence that followed the Sept. 11 attacks may also be about to end. John Negroponte, the new U.S. director of national intelligence, has endorsed an intelligence budget for fiscal year 2007 that is relatively flat, with current spending levels believed to total about $44 billion for the 15-agency intelligence community. Fiscal 2007 begins in October. Berntsen, 48, who also led the CIA Counterterrorism Center's response to the 1998 al Qaeda bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa, sued the CIA in July, accusing the spy agency of trying to stop him from publishing his book. Gimigliano said the CIA reviewed Bernsten's book before publication only to ensure that it contained no classified information. In the book, Berntsen says his Jawbreaker team tracked bin Laden to Afghanistan's Tora Bora region late in 2001 and could have killed or captured the al Qaeda leader there if military officials had agreed to his request for an additional force of about 800 U.S. troops. But the troops were never sent and bin Laden was able to escape, he said. His account contradicts public statements by Bush and former Gen. Tommy Franks, who maintained that U.S. officials were never sure bin Laden was at Tora Bora. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #5 Many of the agencies are going through an evolution to a more agressive, action oriented, organization. This is a different war, blaming it on the Dems, Clinton or Carter won't make it better. Removing or retiring those who will not flex and respond to the new threat is the answer. Throwing the whole org out and starting over will only fail. Our agencies met and defeated the worlds threats for the last 50 years, they will rise to this threat as well. Our nation depends on them and the real leaders in there know it and will never give up on the fight. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2006-01-01 21:04 |
| #4 it goes even further, back to Frank Church. Donks preening for accolades on the torn intelligence networks and agents who go along to get along. I would've cleaned house on the (unforseen) fall of the USSR, our greatest enemy at the time. |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-01-01 18:50 |
| #3 The Clintons set out to destroy CIA human intelligence. Lets admit that they succeeded and start again. Elsewhere. |
| Posted by: Grunter 2006-01-01 18:31 |
| #2 Yeah... ummmm. "What is it that you'd say you DO here?" |
| Posted by: newc 2006-01-01 15:00 |
| #1 I'd turn the job over to another agency rather than keep the CIA going as is, since it is concerned only with overthrowing one government, the one elected by the American people. |
| Posted by: Slolutch Jineger4151 2006-01-01 14:44 |