CIA Veteran to Head Clandestine Service

The Washington Post ^ | September 15, 2007 | Walter Pincus

[2ndDivisionVet]

CIA Director Michael V. Hayden yesterday named Michael J. Sulick to head the National Clandestine Service, bringing back to government service a veteran covert operator who left almost three years ago after a confrontation with aides to Hayden's predecessor, former congressman Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.).

In announcing the appointment, Hayden described Sulick as "a familiar figure to many of you" and "a seasoned operations officer" who "earned a reputation for superior tradecraft and sound judgment."

In November 2004, Stephen R. Kappes, then CIA deputy director of operations, the top spy position, and Sulick, then his deputy, became involved in a controversy involving leaks to the media, which pitted them against members of Goss's senior staff who had come with the congressman to the agency from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Sulick reportedly argued against transferring a senior officer who was accused of the leak. As events escalated, Kappes and Sulick resigned.

Their departure was followed by a rash of resignations from other senior clandestine operatives. "Their leaving," a former senior CIA officer said yesterday, "led to the loss of a number of talented people which the agency is still recovering from."

With Kappes returning as Hayden's No. 2 in July 2006 and Sulick coming back this month, Hayden has brought back to the CIA two men who in 2004 developed a plan for the agency to get back to tradecraft basics in the wake of intelligence failures related to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and Iraq's alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction.

"They just did not have time to get started on that when they were forced out of the agency," the senior official said.

[SevenMinusOne]

Sorry DevSix, but I tend to agree with jeltz25 here - there is no substitute for developing your own human intelligence - and in 99.9 percent of situations like this we run the risk of having our informers turn on us.

I never suggested this wasn't the case - Having your own direct agents/sources for HUMINT is obviously the optimal choice - It only shortens one's OODA loop - (Which is just another reason to respect and love SecDef Rummy....Who allowed JSOC to go around the risk adverse OGA Intel apparatus...and gather their own).

I am all for DA type Intel Ops by our guys (snatch and grabs) out of these border regions (we should be doing more)....However, if you think within six years we are going to build a working team of Pashtun agents, put them into the Indian country of the Pak border regions and have them survive........That is foolishness, plain and simple (not within 6 years).

Again, there are a sizable number of brave souls....who have died headless up in these border regions....(The side they were on is clear - The notion that all get a "star" if KIA.....isn't reality.

[Candor7]

These men are risk adverse, they are pussy footers. Gone are the days of spy craft and special intervention exercises. Rough, effective interrogation is disallowed. Assassination of national security risks abroad are illegal. Thank you liberals.

The CIA has been ruined by liberals. It cannot be cleaned out , and the CIA works to destroy those who insist on its reform.The CIA is too powerful and needs to be dismantled and its tenure ended.No loss.

Next another agency which follows the requirements of the president needs to be put in place, with a rigid , clear command structure, emphasizing field craft and direct action intervention exercises.No agent who feels he must put his persoanl liberal ideology over the mission should be hired, or if dicovered doing so, then must be incarcerated under the National Security Act, or summarily executed for treason.

The intelligence failure of the CIA is directly attributable to liberalism as a sickness in the CIA. Look at Valerie Plame, for example. How could the CIA retain such a complete, political idiot as an employee, who felt free to express her partisan politics in Washington. Just think what she would do in the field if she was an operative?

End the CIA for good.

It needs and deserves it.

[expatguy]

"...if you think within six years we are going to build a working team of Pashtun agents, put them into the Indian country of the Pak border regions and have them survive..."

Okay, now this pretty much summarizes what I've been saying, and that is that maybe it's high time that we put an end to the "outsourced intelligence".

Our intelligence efforts are focused on recruiting foreign assets - why not recruit our own American assets instead?

An American Expat in Southeast Asia