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Analysis: CIA can't retain trained staff
WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 (UPI) -- U.S. spy agencies cannot retain the people they are recruiting and training for the toughest jobs of all -- collecting human intelligence on al-Qaida and other terrorist groups.Thomas Waters, a former CIA officer who was a member of the agency's first post-Sept. 11 training class, told United Press International that the agency's clandestine service -- which recruits agents who spy for the United States -- had special problems retaining those like him, who had joined mid-career. "You start doing the math and thinking about when you're going to retire and you can't get the numbers to add up," he said, adding that he had left the agency because he could not afford to stay there. "You don't want to end up working at Wal-Mart (after retirement) to put your kids through college," said Waters, who has written a book about his experiences in CIA training called "Class 11," and who is now an intelligence contractor for the Department of Defense. The article goes on for more whining about how the Govt is competing against contractors for talent, but NEVER once addresses the biggest issue outside of money: the old-boy network made up of incompetent risk-averse ass-covering career b-crats who backstab analysis and ops people, leak documents and are generally political assholes. I'm talking about the ones that can't tell between a shia and a sunni, and think it doesnt matter, they probably have better contacts in the NYTimes and Dem Party than they do in tracing Al Qaeda. NOBODY want to work for those sorts, and unfortunately there are a lot of them there in crucial positions; they are mainly dregs who wormed their way there during the Bush-41 and Clinton years while shedding the "talent" that is now missing. Try firing an entrenched management-type GS-UpThere. Can't be done. And thats why the CIA needs to be dismantled and parceled out to NSA, NRO, DoD and so on. Posted by: Oldspook 2006-10-24 |
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