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"NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES - Public Hearing - Tuesday, October 14, 2003
MR. CLELAND: Can we follow up on that from some of the readings, some of the testimony here. I understand that the people who were involved in warning were somehow separate or different than the people involved in normal analytical efforts. I thought all analytical efforts, all data, all information was out there to estimate what the threat to the United States was.
MS. McCARTHY: Not everyone would agree with me on this, but I think that the conscious effort to do warning analysis on much of the community actually had gotten diverted to the exercise of producing the daily intelligence that needed to be produced for senior policymakers, and on the issue that you cited earlier about the early identification of an al Qaeda cell in New York, for example.
That to me is an indication that the kind of warning analysis on the counterterrorism front was not taking place. In other words, we tended to look at individual cells and individual activities and actors rather than at the broad strategic cultural picture to identify the kinds of activities, the kinds of goals and missions that these groups would intend to have, and my fix for that would be -- and I don't have a notion that this is the only fix, but my fix for that would be to have -- on the counterterrorism issue, which I think is sui generis in terms of its complexity --would be to have a central component.
I don't favor a new agency, because if you develop a new agency, you end up having to develop a new culture, and trying to fix the cultures we have already is difficult enough.
But I would have a separate component that would deal with all of the information across the government including domestic intelligence, all the information including information from state and local levels and from the private sector, when available, to do the warning job on counterterrorism. I would not have that particular -- it's a difficult choice, because I think it's very dangerous to have that component involved in any kind of collection or operation.
Then you end up with -- as a citizen rather than as an intelligence expert, that would concern me. That you have a group of operatives, essentially, who are used to very proactive -- in a different kind of legal framework -- activity, undertaking domestic operations.
So I think it has to be solely an analytic component. But it would also have to have some way of stimulating collection, which I think makes it very difficult to try to kind of visualize or legislate such a component, because it's kind of a fine line sometimes between collecting -- particularly in domestic groups -- and interfering in their lives and First Amendment issues and so on. But that would be what I would favor.
(snip)
MR. ROEMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Nice to have all three of you here. We very much appreciate your testimony and I hope -- I know on our part it was certainly worth the wait, we apologize for the long delay and I hope, although I'm not claiming it will be, reciprocated on your part.
Dr. McCarthy, I want to ask you a couple of questions, I've read some of your extensive writing on the National Intelligence Officer for Warning, and I want to be clear. You were Officer for Warning?
MS. McCARTHY: Yes, I was.
MR. ROEMER: And you were serving in that position when?
MS. McCARTHY: I served as the Deputy National Intelligence Officer from 1991 to 1994 and then '94 to mid '96 as the National Intelligence Officer for Warning.
MR. ROEMER: So, mid '96, so about five years you had experience in this position --
MS. McCARTHY: That's right.
MR. ROEMER: -- and then you've written extensively on this as well, too. I believe in your writing you have said that in 2001 when the 9/11 terrorist attack took place, that the National Intelligence Officer for Warning did not have responsibility for terrorism, is that correct?
MS. McCARTHY: Well, I don't -- that's my understanding, that's correct. That some time after I left the position in '96 I think sometime around that time, it was decided that, and I suppose although I can't say this authoritatively, that the counterterrorism center would in fact have that responsibility. In any case, the National Intelligence Officer for Warning did not have terrorism as part of his portfolio.
MR. ROEMER: Explain to me and explain to the American people who may be watching this, how is it that the National Intelligence Officer for Warning at the Central Intelligence Agency tasked with telling the country when there's an imminent threat, and certainly through the Joint Inquiry hearings we heard of the alarm and the record chatter in the summer of 2001, that that person did not even have it in their portfolio?
To warn the CIA nor the country about a threat from terrorism or al Qaeda?
MS. McCARTHY: Mr. Roemer, I really can't speak with first hand knowledge of how that decision was made, I was as you know, down at the White House by that time.
MR. ROEMER: But the decision was made and to the best of your understanding they did not have that in their portfolio, is that correct?
MS. McCARTHY: That's to the best of my understanding, that's right.
MR. ROEMER: And if that was the case in September of 2001, has that been fixed?
MS. McCARTHY: I don't know. I don't know, I believe that is still not the case, so if the follow up question then is who does have responsibility, I can't answer that but maybe Mr. Kerr can.
MR. ROEMER: Well, as I move on to somebody else, and I don't mean to hone too much in on you, it's because you have such good knowledge in this area. My next question would be, why hasn't it been fixed, and then who has responsibility for warning our country about terrorism? Mr. Kerr, before I ask you the question, you were the one that said in your very eloquent and helpful statement, that you would predict that there's going to be another terrorist attack, it's going to be successful, why haven't we fixed the system at this point?
MR. KERR: Well, I -- John may have the specific dates but my understanding is that the decision was made that because you had the Counter Terrorism Center, because you had both analysts in it and you had collection people in it, and it assumed responsibility for the judgments about the threat, that having the warning function performed where the bulk of the people, large number of people were working on the threat itself, was the most logical place.
An NIO for Warning, you know, Mary will excuse me I'm sure, lives off the other organizations, they have very little staff, they fundamentally have to live off the other organizations. What they can do, and this is a point that's legitimate I think implicit in your question, is they can ask questions in a different way, or turn the problem around slightly from what the analytic elements might do.
But I think the anticipation was that given the size of CTC, the collection, the counterterrorism center, the fact that the bulk of the analysts, in fact, many regional analysts had been transferred there, and their responsibilities that it would be a better organization to assume this larger role.
And John may be able to help a little bit, but I think that's the logic behind it. And why they didn't recreate it, I think is the very reason that they moved it there in the first place. It is where the bulk of counter terrorism work is done today, and was done at that time.
MR. ROEMER: I'm still not sure I understand how that's going to be helpful post 9/11 in terms of getting warning out and fixing a system that had some real problems in it, but John can you -- Mr. Gannon, can you help at all in explaining why that officer was not responsible for terrorism and if it in fact has been fixed at this point?
MR. GANNON: Well, I think there were -- prior to 9/11 I think there were -- there was more than one officer who was responsible for articulating the terrorist threat. If you will pardon me, if I could go back to that point, and I left the intelligence community about that time and I think the major problem we were having and those officers were having was prioritizing the various threats we had.
I recall going to the I think it was the Armed Services Committee with Director Tenet and Senator Levin at the time, did what he does so well, he said okay, you have laid out for us, a very rich and diverse threat assessment here.
(((Gannon sucking up to Levin????)))
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This numbskull sounds like a blathering idiot, who doesn't appear to have done her job, and in time chose to be a traitor. I want to see her prosecuted for treason and sedition AFTER she's spilled the beans on the other vermin, and jailed for life! What a despicable partisan WORM. How is it that she got to be escorted out instead of arrested ??
Would they make her sign a confession before she left?
Jeeze, a new Peter Principle .. rising to the level of your highest treachery.