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2006-03-11 Science & Technology

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Posted by Anonymoose 2006-03-11 15:52|| || Front Page|| [2 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Article: At a minimum, the CIA's seeming inability to keep its own secrets invites questions about whether the Bush administration is doing enough to shield its covert CIA operations from public scrutiny, even as the Justice Department focuses resources on a two-year investigation into whether someone in the administration broke the law by disclosing to reporters the identity of clandestine CIA operative Valerie Plame.

This is obviously the reporter seeking to pin the blame on the current administration, in spite of the fact that the Internet existed throughout the Bush administration. Other clandestine services appear to have had no trouble hiding their secrets. Do we hear about the identities of covert DEA, FBI, local police and Special Forces agents being disclosed over the Internet. The correct question is whether the culture of incompetence that has pervaded the CIA since it was castrated during the Carter era has made it impossible to salvage. Perhaps the correct approach is to abolish the CIA and set up a new intelligence agency from the ground up.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2006-03-11 19:21|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2006-03-11 19:21|| Front Page Top

#2 Perhaps the correct approach is to abolish the CIA and set up a new intelligence agency from the ground up.

I believe Don Rumsfeld is working on the later. When he's done, Porter Goss will wrap up the former.

Posted by Nimble Spemble 2006-03-11 19:32|| 2006-03-11 19:32|| Front Page Top

#3 All that money on Plame and all Novak had to do was use the net.....

Posted by anonymous2u 2006-03-11 19:40|| 2006-03-11 19:40|| Front Page Top

#4 Stansfield Turner's rank incompetence, willingly politicizing and pressuring the experienced and respected field agents to retire, damaged the CIA (perhaps) beyond repair. It was his tenure that yielded the "culture of incompetence" that has plagued the agency ever since.

The Internet does expose the security gaps to far more people, in real-time, and of course this includes enemies of the US who actively seek such information.

The problem is that there are gaps and exposed information in the first place. This is but one consequence of the (now) obvious incompetence. Most of it resides above the field agents and analysts - in mid-level and upper-level management.

From the outside, it's impossible to determine whether Goss lacks the determination to do wholesale cleanup or the authority to do so. We've seen some prominent ranking people who've been dismissed or forced to resign, but there's little chance this approach has accomplished anything more than to cause the remaining intelligent (LOL) bad apples to keep their heads down to wait out the political cycle. In civil service of all varieties, and the State Department is a case in point, this is a failed methodology.

Even the military, which needed a thorough house-cleaning to remove the defeatist rot from the Vietnam era, and allows for much easier removal when such is identified, had to "grow" its way out of the disastrous condition of having allowed politicians to advance along with, and too often instead of, seasoned and capable officers.

I do not believe we have anything like the luxury of time it took post-Vietnam for the military to shed much of its dead weight through attrition anyway, not to mention that a military career is usually about half that of an agency career.

Goss' task is both huge and thankless - very literally - as every political agent of any rank has a political "master" (sponsor and, perhaps mentor) who appreciates his or her willingness to leak information and advance renegade political agendas within the agency.

Would that the will existed to get serious about the problems and aggressively identify and remove the tumors, unapologetically bloody and deep surgery, instead of layering on more pointless gauze over unbroken skin.

Culling the agency herd makes sense at this point, and we would actually be less vulnerable during a rebuild from scratch if the DoD agencies took over for the duration, but all of this is politically impossible. Culling the Legislative and extra-governmental power-broker herds, those who would lose their insider agents, would necessarily have to come first, LOL.

Unless and until a major catastrophe occurs which makes this obvious to all, nothing significant will happen. Goss and Rice will be forced to continue sniping the occasional arrogant fool, leaving the smarter, truly dangerous, "foreign" agents in place.

In other words, we're f**ked until we're f**cked.

Thanks, Carter, Turner, Church.

Posted by Unusing Elmenter7034 2006-03-11 20:34|| 2006-03-11 20:34|| Front Page Top

#5 So does this mean Scooter's off thehook?

Posted by Bobby 2006-03-11 23:13|| 2006-03-11 23:13|| Front Page Top

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