Posted on 07/29/2003 10:00:38 AM PDT by Bobibutu
Tuesday, July 29, 2003
Did 9-11 Report Soft-Pedal Failures Of U.S. Intelligence?
BY PETER BENESH
INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Last week's report by the Congressional Joint Committee on Intelligence put substance to suspicion. America's intelligence community had plenty of warning about 9-11.
But analysts who've reviewed the censored report give it mixed reviews.
It overstates the obvious and pulls its punches, many say.
A key point, says retired Army Lt. Gen. William Odom, former head of the National Security Agency, is that the FBI is the wrong agency to handle domestic counterterrorist intelligence.
"Since 9-11, we didn't get what we need," said Odom, author of the book "Fixing Intelligence" and a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.
"We need to take the national security function away from the FBI, but the committee has left us where we were before 9-11," he said. "That's an unmitigated disaster."
The core problem: FBI officers trained to catch criminals aren't necessarily good at catching terrorists.
Odom argues the U.S. needs a domestic agency like Britain's MI5. It investigates national security threats, but calls police to make arrests. "It's the only way to go."
The committee agreed that a "stand-alone" agency with MI5-like power could help. But it equivocated: "Some kind of radical reform of the FBI is long overdue."
Ineffective Leadership
The congressional report also blasted the director of Central Intelligence, or DCI.
"He was either unwilling or unable to marshal the full range of Intelligence Community resources necessary to combat the growing threat to the United States," the report said.
The key point is that the CIA is reluctant to take charge.
Technically, the DCI doesn't just head the CIA. His job is to oversee all U.S. intelligence operations.
"The DCI has had coordinating authority, but doesn't want to use it," said Odom. "He doesn't want the responsibility."
President Bush tried to bridge the FBI-CIA gulf by setting up the Terrorist Threat Integration Center.
As the White House Web site puts it, the new body will "close the seam between analysis of foreign and domestic intelligence on terrorism."
Over at the Homeland Defense Department, the new Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate will cover some of the same ground.
Its job, the DHS Web site says, is to "merge under one roof the capability to identify and assess current and future threats to the homeland, map those threats against our vulnerabilities, issue timely warnings and take preventive and protective action."
At the Pentagon, a data-mining operation called the Terrorist Information Awareness program is in the works.
Its job, says its Web site, "is to revolutionize the ability of the United States to detect, classify and identify foreign terrorists — and decipher their plans — and thereby enable the U.S. to take timely action to successfully pre-empt and defeat terrorist acts."
To some longtime spywatchers, the congressional report looks more like a smokescreen by intelligence bureaucrats trying to save their jobs.
"An in-depth report would cause head-rolling inside the Beltway," said John Daly, who writes Jane's Intelligence Watch Report and Terrorism Watch.
"The intel turf wars are well-known," said Daly.
The agencies under fire since 9-11 have invoked rule one for Beltway empires, said Daly: "Expand or die."
What needs to happen, he said, is a "root and branch reorganization to make things more efficient. We're two steps on the chessboard behind the enemy.
"Look on Afghanistan as terrorism university," he added. "Al-Qaida graduated 100,000 people. Our entire education system produces only 10 graduates in Arabic."
Noteable in the committee report are the 28 pages blacked out by the administration that deal with Saudi Arabia's role before and since 9-11.
Even the small amount on the Saudis that was released was viewed by many as damning. The rest of the missing text could embarrass Presidents Bush and Clinton.
"But it's in the public's interest to have the nexus between the bin Laden family, Saudi royal family and higher-ups in Washington splashed over the front pages," said Daly.
The missing text reveals other weaknesses in America's defenses.
"Washington's emphasis on cheap energy and supporting corrupt regimes to get it subsidizes terrorism," said Robert Steele, a former CIA agent and author of two books on terrorism.
Steele has a more serious charge: Neither the Bush nor the Clinton administration, he says, knows how to use intelligence properly.
"This report tells me that a select group of members and congressional staff have a better understanding of the problems than the White House," he said.
The report seems to agree with that assessment — especially when it comes to sharing intelligence.
It said: "Serious problems in information sharing also persisted, prior to Sept. 11, between the Intelligence Community and relevant non-Intelligence Community agencies. This included other federal agencies as well as state and local authorities."
The key point is that the federal government still doesn't seem to have a plan for transferring intelligence from the federal government to the state and local levels — where it's now badly needed.
Better Sharing Needed
"We're putting billions into first responders, but no emphasis on sharing information with them about terrorist threats," said Steele. "We have to create a smart nation (and make) every citizen into an intel Minuteman."
Others concur. U.S. intelligence agencies have failed to cope with the "volume, velocity and variety of the info coming in," said James Adams, head of the Ashland Institute for Strategic Studies.
"Dealing with the intel community is tough because the insiders know the problems while the outsiders don't," Adams said.
"And the insiders won't do anything about it. Does this president or any president understand the minutia of the intelligence community? No.
"Is this president a leader? Yes. To show leadership he would say, 'Do it my way or else.' "
Adams added, "My belief is that without courageous leadership from politicians, the problem will persist for years because bureaucracies are self-perpetuating."
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