The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) will remain the intelligence community's center of excellence under General Michael V. Hayden, his immediate boss, Director of Intelligence John Negroponte, said on Monday, and the agency will continue to be the most important repository for intelligence analysis "on virtually every imaginable topic, including our highest priority areas, such as Iran, North Korea and weapons of mass destruction." Asked about the recent letter sent by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to President George W. Bush through the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, Negroponte said that "given the fact that the issue of Iran is before the United Nations at this time, certainly one of the hypotheses you would have to examine is whether and in what way the timing of the dispatch of that letter is connected with trying in some manner to influence the debate before the Security Council." Addressing those who have expressed concern that the CIA, a civilian intelligence agency, will be led by a military man, Negroponte, during a special White House briefing, said Hayden "is a very, very independent-minded person, blunt-spoken, and who I do not think will have any difficulty whatsoever staking out positions that are independent and responsive to the needs of our civilian intelligence community." Hayden was among those who recommended that the National Security Agency (NSA)come under the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which was not the conventional view within the Pentagon, for example, Negroponte said. The most important intelligence priority for Bush is information on al Qaeda and international terrorism, Negroponte said, and the President "wants us to press ahead in the field of tracking down and disabling and harming the international terrorist movement, and I think that is the number one priority. I think the second is to continue to move forward in strengthening the human intelligence and analytical intelligence capabilities of the CIA." Hayden will bring to the CIA his 30 years of experience in intelligence at home and abroad, and he is widely acknowledged for his command of all aspects of the discipline, Negroponte said.
"His expertise is by no means limited to technical aspects of intelligence, " Negroponte said of his deputy. Hayden "has been at the forefront of integrating all aspects of intelligence: technical collection, human intelligence operations and analysis." Over the past year, Hayden was instrumental in creating the National Clandestine Service, which he will lead as CIA director, creation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's National Security Branch and "countless other initiatives," Negroponte said.
"Equally important, having been director of the National Security Agency for six years, he knows how to manage and transform large organizations," Negroponte said of Hayden. "As the director of the NSA, he won the respect and admiration of those whom he led as well as congressional leaders. I am confident that he will bring the same visionary leadership and management ability to the CIA." Hayden is also a reformer who understands "the imperative that we create a truly integrated intelligence community," Negroponte said. "Over the past year, he has dedicated himself to implementing the vision of the Intelligence Reform Act, and I know that he will do the same at the CIA, and that he will as a consequence improve intelligence for all intelligence customers, whether they are policy-makers, the Congress, military leaders, diplomats or law enforcement officials."