Posted on 06/24/2004 12:02:30 AM PDT by kattracks
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US House of Representative made history when it passed the largest intelligence funding bill ever, calling for a review of information about alleged pre-war ties between Iraq (news - web sites) and al-Qaeda but stopping short of ordering any significant reform of the intelligence community.The 360-61 vote came as all 15 agencies and units comprising the US intelligence community are facing sharp criticism for failing to correctly assess the Iraqi weapons arsenal in the lead-up to the Iraq war and not paying enough attention to the rising threat from the al-Qaeda terrorist network ahead of the September 11, 2001, attacks.
But partisan griping aside, lawmakers gave the Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites) and its counterparts all necessary funds to bolser both spy recruitment and electronic intelligence gathering in fiscal 2005, particularly in the Islamic world, the main stage of the war on terror.
"It exceeds the president's federal request by 15 percent," Republican House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss said of the bill, whose overall size remains classified. "It is the largest intelligence authorization in history."
Goss limited himself to noting that the approved measure exceeded last year's appropriation by "hundreds of millions" of dollars. But various unoffical estimates that circulated on Capitol Hill this week put the size of the new intelligence budget at approximately 40 billion dollars.
The US Senate has already passed its own version of the intelligence bill, which now will have to be reconciled with the House version.
This increase is a colossal waste of money if it's going to be "business as usual" over at the CIA.
I wonder what pork projects were added on to the House version of the bill?
Hatch was going to tack on a hate crimes bill, I hope it died.
bttt
So is the message from congress "we hate the job you're doing... here's a lot more money for you to keep on doing it" ?
God, what a fool's paradise.
Thanks.
Can't complain about the intentions of the spending after former Congresses gutted intelligence because there was no "enemy".
This all seems to suggest that there is a clear enemy. That is good.
That money will be put to good use. You can be sure that this is a bill the Preseident will review very carefully and cut out the garbage.
I think the President has already shown his committment to fixing the intelligence community.
You forgot the /sarcasm tag.
i don't believe in any major restructuring while the war is going on.
But they need to atleast commission a study to look into its working and come up with suggestion for its restructuring.
The restructuring can take place later on, but the recommendations have to come now, while people's memory is fresh.
In my opinion the re-structuring should wait till we get a firm grip on the war on terror.
However a study should be commissioned to propose changes to the agencies, right now while the memories of 911 and iraq war are fresh.
the restructuring can wait, but the study should take place now.
The review should take a look at the success the agency had against the soviets, contrast that with it's failures against the islamic world to come up with a definitive explaination for its failures against the islamic world.
It should also contrast past procedures with present ones and see if they can be even further improved.
Finally the study needs to see why it couldnt topple arab leaders like kaddafi, how the islamic world fooled it about saudi and paki ties to al qaeda and the iranian, pakistani and libyan nuclear programs.
it should also look at why the CIA hasn't been able to force a policy favorable to the west through it's cadres in islamic countries, rather than forcing us into a policy to favor the islamic world.
it should look into the recruiting of islamists during the 80's in the pakistan-afghanistan-arabia region and in the iran-iraq region during the 90's, to make sure those mistakes are not repeated again.
The study should also take a look at the need for watching our islamic allies more closely.
It should look at the prospect of replacing islamic translators with non muslim americans versed in islamic languages.
it should look at the possibility of using latinos and africans in the islamic world
Finally it should look at the war on terror from its onset with the first world trade center bombing in 1993, through 911, to the present day.
If changes are to be proposed to the agency, they have to study its performance over a longer time period
Couple this news, with the news of Porter Goss being the new DCI!
You think he has a better handle on where the fundings going?
I need a little more research on Congressman Goss, and how he's performed as head of the Intel Committee.
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