http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/31/AR2006053101411.html?referrer=emailSpies Are Called Essential
Bush Says U.S. Must Continue to Develop Covert Agents
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 1, 2006; A03
President Bush, at the public ceremony swearing in Gen. Michael V. Hayden as director of the CIA, yesterday urged continued development of human intelligence, calling it essential in determining the intentions of "dangerous regimes and terrorist organizations."
In focusing his brief remarks on the CIA's need to recruit spies "to penetrate closed societies and secretive organizations," the president hit on an agency problem highlighted last week in a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report. The committee said it was concerned that the CIA had not resolved issues that made it difficult to place new officers abroad under "non-official cover," a status that puts them in covert civilian roles and outside U.S. embassies where they lack diplomatic protection....
Placing U.S.-born covert officers abroad is difficult and dangerous, present and former CIA officials said. Recently, an Italian magistrate publicly identified what he said were 13 CIA officers operating in that country. And agency aircraft used to transport suspected terrorists have been spotted by civilian airport watchers.
All are a sign that the CIA is not doing enough to keep its covert officers' identities secret, especially in the Internet age when so much personal information can be easily searched, said one congressional aide familiar with the Senate report.
"We understand how difficult it is, and they are working to fix it, but the agency doesn't seem yet up to the task," the aide said.
WELL, MAYBE PUTTING AN END TO THE LEAKER-IN-CHIEF AND HIS WOODEN DUMMY WOULD BE A GOOD START...
TELL IT TO VALERIE PLAME, DUBYA!!!
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
