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May 11,2004

Caution and Years of Budget Cuts Are Seen to Limit C.I.A.

By DOUGLAS JEHL

W ASHINGTON, May 10 - Even now, 32 months after the Sept. 11 attacks, America's clandestine
intelligence service has fewer than 1,100 case officers posted overseas, fewer than the number
of F.B.I, agents assigned to the New York City field office alone, government officials say.

Since George J. Tenet took charge of the Central Intelligence Agency seven years ago, rebuilding that
service has been his top priority. This year, more new case officers will graduate from a year-long
course at Camp Peary in Virginia than in any year since the Vietnam War. They are the products of
aggressive new recruiting aimed in particular at speakers of Arabic and others capable of operating in
the Middle East and South Asia.

But it will be an additional five years, Mr. Tenet and others have warned, before the rebuilding is
complete and the United States has the network it needs to adequately confront a global threat posed by
terrorist groups and hostile foreign governments. In an interview on April 30, James L. Pavitt, who as
the C.I.A.'s deputy director for operations oversees the clandestine service, said he still needed 30 to 35
percent more people, including officers based overseas and in the United States, supervisors and
support workers.

"I need hundreds and hundreds, thousands," Mr. Pavitt said. At a time when the United States is
fighting a war on terrorism and a war in Iraq, he said, "we are running hard to get the resources we
need."

On Capitol Hill and among former intelligence officers, most experts agree that the clandestine service
needs improvement, but there is some debate about whether the agency is addressing the right
problems.

"The question is, should you require better before you get bigger?" said a senior Congressional official,
describing a question on Capitol Hill that he said had been prompted by inquiries into intelligence
failures involving Iraq and the Sept. 11 attacks.

The size and scope of the clandestine service, whose overseas officers recruit and supervise spies and
work with foreign intelligence services but rarely try to infiltrate foreign targets themselves, has always
been among the government's most closely guarded secrets.

But as the dimensions of the intelligence failures on Iraq and Sept. 11 have come to light in recent
months, so too has a picture of American spying operations stretched thin through the 1990's and only
now recovering.

In numbers, Mr. Pavitt said in the interview, the clandestine service hit a low point in 1999, when its
ranks had been trimmed by 20 percent from its highs during the cold war. And in morale and sense of

http://www.nytimes.eom/2004/05/l 1/politics/l lintel.html?hp=&pagewanted=print&positi... 5/11/2004

 L

put together a network," Jumper
said. "Did we build that for him?
No, we had to invent all this in the
course of battle."
Ijuring a dust storm in Iraq,
crews manning Rivet Joint, Glob-
al Hawk and other platforms
watching Iraqi movements had to
force-feed information to each
other because their systems could
not connect.
"That's working at the speed of
typing, not the speed of light,"
Jumper said. "We didn't build a
~ uX*?<=> 6»eu I/O avoid nSK.
The project, ultimately a great
success, finally went forward
when he agreed to fund it out of
his budget.
"This is not the fault of the ac-
quisition community. This is the
rules that we work by," he said.
"It's not that we can't do it —
somehow, we're afraid to do it.
"This is us, people, and we can
be a hell of a lot better."
The key is to work on getting
the machines talking to each
other because "the digits don't
nate on.
"Possibilities open up by the
mere notion of platforms collabo-
rating with platforms in another
medium," he said.
But the key is to keep focused
on the ultimate goal, he said.
"I worry about space-based
radar, not because I'm worried
about space-based radar, but be-
cause I'm worried about some-
thing where the name implies a
solution," he said. "The problem is
not space-based radar. The prob-
lem is what? Killing the target.
radar working with the airborne
platforms in this domain, then I
have a completely new way of
thinking about it than if I think
the solution has to all reside in
space."
Jumper said it isn't about any
specific technology, it's about
things that make "killing the tar-
get" easier.
"Hell, I don't know what net-
work-centric warfare is," he said.
"I know what I need to do — I
need to put the cursor on the tar-
get."
cess to focus more on results than
on specific technologies is not im-
possible, it just requires a clear
vision and the willingness to pur-
sue it aggressively, he said.
And it's essential to do now, be-
cause the U.S. military is going to
be dealing with the threat of ter-
rorism for some time and needs
all the technological help it can
get, he said.
"You have to track 'em down one
at a time and take 'em out,"
Jumper said. "That's what I mean
by 'cursor over the target.'" D

Security chief envisions integrated signals Intel

By Rod Hafemeister Signals intelligence today is Those are the dilemmas facing where we conduct operations — gence to the people who need it —
TIMES STAFF WETTER just as likely to come from a Ma- Hayden as he works on what NSA had shifted on us," Hayden said. before it's too late.
SAN ANTONIO — In a major change rine in a Humvee as it is from a has dubbed Transformation 2.0, a Hayden's first task was to re- Hayden cited the example of an
from the way it used to do busi- base station in the United States follow-on to the internal rebuild- build NSA to deal with 21st-cen- F-16 pilot who might appreciate
ness, the National Security — and both may be working the ing Hayden undertook when he tury threats, an intercept on air defense radar
Agency is working to provide sig- same target but for different pur- took over NSA in 1999. including the that would allow operators to tell
nals intelligence more quickly to poses. Like the rest of the military, the explosion in when that same radar was used
those who need it, including front- And those who use the Sigint NSA had gone through nearly a signals infor- somewhere else, years later. But
line troops — even if the intel is often are capable of extracting the decade of cuts while at the same mation. the pilot might have more imme-
not fully processed. information they need from the time, the world experienced an ex- Although he diate concerns, like whether the
Lt. Gen. Michael V. Hayden, di- data without the need to wait for plosion in communications tech- said there still radar is on and targeting him.
rector of the NSA and chief of the complete processing by the NSA, nology, including the Internet and is work to do, So the new goal is to "push" Sig-
Central Security Service, told at- he said. cellphones. he has since int material to the "earliest point
teirdees at an April 20 luncheon But opening the data to more But with a policy of reducing 2001 received of consumability" — which means
that it no longer is practical to try users also means that securing it staff by "shutting the front door" Hayden about a 60 per- what goes to whom will depend
to separate national, strategic and is even more important. — restricting new hires to about cent increase both on the Sigint and on the ca-
tactical intelligence collection or "The fact that you have Marines 200 a year — the NSA was not in his budget, which is classified, pabilities and needs of the cus-
needs, because they all overlap. in a Humvee plugging into NSA bringing people on board with the and expects to hire about 1,500 tomer getting it. D
The new vision is "one global, in- Main is a wonderful thing," he new skills needed for dealing with people this year.
tegrated, self-aware, self-synchro- said. "But that means NSA Main the new technologies. But the big challenge is to work Rod Hafemeister can be reached at (210) 658-
nizing Sigint system," he said. is now less secure," "Our battle space — the place out ways to get signals intelli- 6400 or rhafeme@atpco.com.

30 Air Force Times

2. Sept. 11 families slam Congress for failing to follow through

ALEXANDER BOLTON
The Hill

Relatives of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks say the House and Senate
intelligence committees have failed to follow up on the recommendations of their joint report
issued at the end of 2002.

The recommendations, made after a joint investigation by the committees, preceded the current
investigation by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, known as
the Sept. 11 commission.

The family members, whose vocal advocacy was instrumental in persuading Congress and
President Bush to create the independent commission, say there is no evidence that any of the
findings of the joint congressional investigation have been implemented.

In addition, the families charge that the lack of congressional follow-up fits into a larger pattern of
weak oversight and supervision of federal intelligence agencies by
Congress.

Some of the family members are questioning whether Congress can adequately scrutinize the
administration when the same party controls both branches. To this point, Congress has largely
avoided blame for the intelligence failures leading to Sept. 11 or for hindering efforts to reform
national intelligence operations.

Some leading victims' family members are also criticizing the Sept. 11 commission for failing to
address sufficiently the issue of weak congressional oversight of the intelligence community, one
of the commission's mandates. Several commission members previously served in Congress.

However, sources on the commission and on the Senate Intelligence Committee say they have
already held several staff-level meetings on how to overhaul congressional oversight of the
national intelligence agencies.

Reforms under discussion include making the House and Senate intelligence panels permanent
instead of select committees, lifting term limits on membership,
unifying budgetary control of national intelligence operations and declassifying the overall
intelligence budget as well as the budget for individual agencies.

'We have some issues with the intelligence committees, namely that they had the joint-inquiry
report released in December of 2002, it's been in their hands for almost a year and five months,
and they have yet to have a hearing on any of the public recommendations," said Kristen
Breitweiser, a member of a highly visible group known as the Family Steering Committee, which
represents many of the victims' families.

Breitweiser, whose husband, Ron, died in the collapse of the World Trade Center's second tower,
said she and other family members met with the top Republicans and Democrats on the House
and Senate Intelligence Committees last fall to ask that the panels follow up on their 2002
recommendations with a hearing.

'They promised public hearings after the new year, and we are entering the month of May and
have yet to see any public hearings," she said, adding that there is no evidence that Congress
has followed up on its recommendations after the joint Sept. 11 inquiry. "Congress is great at

PRESS CLIPS FOR MAY 5, 2004

"Bob has been a really invigorating addition to the commission," says Lehman. "He asks
questions that are really insightful and provoke everybody to think about new ways of looking at
problems. He's been absolutely nonpartisan."

Kerrey, of course, is fully capable of making his own quick work of complaints aimed at him: "I'm
not in politics anymore and I don't give a damn."

He has two years remaining on his New School contract and, while he won't rule out a political
comeback, he's not encouraging such speculation.

For now, Kerrey is content to be the free spirit on the 9/11 Commission and to informally push for
a rewrite of the Iraq fix-it manual. Bush, he believes, erred by framing the war as "a religious
cause," a quasi-biblical clash between right and wrong, between noble Christians and misguided
Muslims.

Kerrey, for one, is willing to entertain the notion of turning prison operations over to the Iraqis.
The sooner they get the hang of running their own country, the better. The key, he says, isn't
whether they like Americans. It's whether they believe this newfound freedom can ease the
burdens of their daily existence, whether Kurds and Sunnis and Shiites can put aside centuries-
old grudges and forge a singular national identity.

At the moment, Bob Kerrey - former professional soldier, current amateur poet - hears beauties
soft and quiet calling. He's overlooking street demonstrations, beheadings, prison-photo fallout
and all that chatter about parallels to Vietnam. He is casting his lot with the starry-eyed idealists.

"I believe that you cannot establish a democracy without some naivete. Because there's the
presumption in democracy that people will do the right thing."

14. A Kerry-Kerrey Ticket?

MICHAEL KELLY
The Omaha World-Herald

The Dallas Morning News asked Democratic pundit James Carville who will be John Kerry's
running mate.

"It will be Bob Kerrey, "Carville said, "and it will happen two weeks before the convention."

A Kerry-Kerrey ticket? Rockin' Bob, 60, the former governor and U.S. senator from Nebraska, has
raised his profile anew with pointed questioning on the 9/11 commissiqn.

15. Tenet speaks to A&M grads

LAMONICA
The Houston Chronicle

CIA Director George Tenet acknowledged that his agency has made mistakes, but defended it
and its values Friday during a commencement ceremony at Texas A&M University.

PRESS CLIPS FOR MAY 15-17, 2004 21

9. How to Set the C.I.A. Free

THOMAS POWERS
The New York Times

Recent staff reports from the 9/11 commission, soon to be followed by the results of a Senate
investigation into flawed intelligence before the invasion of Iraq, lend powerful new support to
conclusions long fermenting in official Washington: American intelligence is broken, and the
moment is ripe to do something about it.

Prominently at stake in any reorganization will be the title and job description of the director of
central intelligence, the post soon to be vacated by George Tenet. Successful reform will require
three things: more independence for the C.I.A., fewer distractions for the person running it, and
some way to divide up the whole intelligence pie while compelling our myriad organizations to
cooperate.

Change will not be easy or automatic — presidents and directors of central intelligence both like
the way things are arranged now, and the C.I.A. has weathered many storms in the past. What
promises to make the difference this time are the succeeding body blows of the full reports from
the 9/11 commission and the Senate due later in the summer. Mr. Tenet is reported to have told
friends that he is not being chased out of his job "by a piece of paper," but it seems clear that
neither he nor the White House was looking forward to weeks of explaining why the C.I.A. missed
things it ought to have seen before Sept. 11 and then conjured up stockpiles of Iraqi weapons of
mass destruction that weren't there.

Intelligence errors so glaring inevitably raise two urgent questions: how could the C.I.A. have
failed so completely on questions central to its mission? And what can be done to ensure it never
happens again?

Chapter and verse on the C.I.A.'s failures will come first in the two official reports, followed
eventually by a list of recommendations for improving American intelligence from senators and
commissioners. But too long a list will diffuse attention and weaken resolve. The challenge facing
reformers is not to tighten every loose nut and bolt, but to identify what is really broken and come
up with ways to fix what matters most.

Three years of official studies, public debate and news reporting on 9/11 and Iraq, amply backed
up by the history of secret intelligence during the cold war, suggest that the many dysfunctions of
American intelligence may be reduced to two: resistance to cooperation between separate
intelligence organizations (especially between the C.I.A. and the Federal Bureau of Investigation);
and the tendency of intelligence officials and organizations to interpret thin or ambiguous
evidence to support the assumptions or desires of the next official or organization up the chain of
command.

A frequently cited example of the latter was the ability of Air Force intelligence, beginning in the
1940's, to repeatedly find evidence of dangerous new Soviet bombers or missiles that urgently
required research and development of whatever was at the top of the Air Force wish list.
Naturally, Air Force intelligence officers never admitted this systematic abuse of the evidence —
just as C.I.A. officers from George Tenet on down vigorously deny now that analysts devised
scary claims about Iraqi weapons because that was what the White House wanted. But the
pattern is the same, and in the long run in the intelligence world, as elsewhere, bosses get what
they want.

The best solution to this problem and to that of bickering among agencies is arguably the same: a
cabinet-level official, over the director of central intelligence, responsible for all American
intelligence service. Public discussion of such proposals so far has focused on a "national
intelligence director," but without making clear how much the director is intended to direct.