Free Republic

...Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), the No. 2 man on both the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, revealed that an elite military-intelligence unit known as Able Danger identified Atta and three other hijackers as likely members of a terror cell in this country as early as 1999. The spies wanted to turn the info over to the FBI in 2000, Weldon said, "so they could bring that cell in and take out the terrorists." He claimed Pentagon lawyers rejected the recommendation because they mistakenly believed that since Atta and the others were in the country legally on visas, they...

President Bush... ordered changes intended to break down old walls between foreign and domestic intelligence activities by creating a new national security division within the Federal Bureau of Investigation that will fall under the overall direction of John D. Negroponte, the new director of national intelligence. The directive by Mr. Bush is aimed at consolidating the power of Mr. Negroponte, whose authority over the F.B.I. had been ambiguous. It also sets in motion a major restructuring designed to dissolve the barriers that have often kept the Central Intelligence Agency and the F.B.I. at arm's length, and elevates intelligence operations to...

Porter Goss seems confident he knows where America's most wanted man is. But the CIA director doesn't really want to talk about it. Or so was the impression he gave during a congressional hearing on Monday. And why shouldn't he feel that way? Osama bin Laden has eluded capture the past four years. It's a frustrating issue for the United States. To get the leader of the terrorist group that struck our homeland is an important pursuit. But it comes with many obstacles, and most are likely political. Goss alluded to this during Monday's hearing. He said trying to get...

The exasperation of Porter Goss, the Director of the US' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), with Pakistan's role in the hunt for Osama bin Laden and other remnants of the Al Qaeda, is evident from his remarks on bin Laden during an interview with the "Time" magazine which has been carried by it this week. The interview has come in the wake of the arrest of one Hamid Hayat, a US citizen of Pakistani origin, his father and some others by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) earlier this month. They belonged to a 2500-strong Pakistani community living at a place...

He had been director of the Central Intelligence Agency for just seven months when the onetime CIA spy had to cede much of his power to the new director of national intelligence, John Negroponte. But Porter Goss, 66, says he now has more time to run America's largest human intelligence agency. He sat down for his first interview with TIME's Timothy J. Burger. ..... IT SOUNDS LIKE YOU HAVE A PRETTY GOOD IDEA OF WHERE HE IS. WHERE? I have an excellent idea of where he is. What's the next question?

Beijing Feb.20 -- The United States and Japan has listed in an unprecedented joint statement that Taiwan is their common security concern, and easing tensions in the Taiwan Strait was among their "common strategic objectives." Senior officials of the two countries also talked about China's military investment in the past years, urging China "to improve transparency of its military affairs". Earlier, CIA director Goss said that China's growing defense buildup might "tilt the balance of the Taiwan Strait" and threaten U.S. troops in the Asian region. Chinese Government and people resolutely opposes the United States and Japan in issuing...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 16 - New intelligence information strongly suggests that Al Qaeda has considered infiltrating the United States through the Mexican border, top government officials told Congress on Wednesday. In a wide-ranging assessment of threats to American security, including those posed by Iran and North Korea, the officials also said intelligence indicated that terrorist organizations remained intent on obtaining and using devastating weapons against the United States. "It may only be a matter of time before Al Qaeda or another group attempts to use chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons," Porter J. Goss, the new director of central intelligence, told...

Watersheds We live in a time of democratic revolution. Has there ever been a more dramatic moment than this one? The Middle East is boiling, as the failed tyrants scramble to come to terms with the political tsunami unleashed on Afghanistan and Iraq. The power of democratic revolution can be seen in every country in the region. Even the Saudi royal family has had to stage a farcical "election." But this first halting step has fooled no one. Only males could vote, no political parties were permitted, and only the Wahhabi establishment was permitted to organize. The results will not...

The Bush administration has been carrying out secret reconnaissance missions to learn about nuclear, chemical and missile sites in Iran in preparation for possible airstrikes there, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday. The effort has been under way at least since last summer, Hersh said on CNN's "Late Edition." In an interview on the same program, White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett said the story was "riddled with inaccuracies." "I don't believe that some of the conclusions he's drawing are based on fact," Bartlett said. He said his information on Iran came from "inside" sources who divulged it in the hope...

WASHINGTON - The CIA has told Henry Kissinger to kiss off, saying his services as an informal adviser to Director Porter Goss are no longer needed. The pink slip came in the form of a terse communiqué from Goss to Kissinger - the vaunted diplomat and counselor to Presidents - and other members of an intelligence advisory board that meets several times a year, Newsweek magazine reported yesterday. The council of wise men recently sacked by the new CIA honcho includes 9/11 Commissioner and ex-Sen. Bob Kerrey (D-Neb.), who heads New School University in New York; former Sen. Sam Nunn...

Looks like Porter Goss is not twiddling his thumbs. Hopefully, many good patriots will step up and serve their country. If I were younger, I would. God Bless all who serve. CIA Employment Site Maybe Uncle Sam wants you?

NEW YORK - The top analyst at the CIA is resigning next year, joining more than a dozen agency officials who have stepped down since Porter Goss became the Director of Central Intelligence, NBC News has learned....

c By DOUGLAS JEHL ASHINGTON, Dec. 28 - The head of the Central Intelligence Agency's analytical branch is being forced to step down, former intelligence officials say, opening a major new chapter in a shakeup under Porter J. Goss, the agency's chief. The official, Jami Miscik, the agency's deputy director for intelligence, told her subordinates on Tuesday afternoon of her plan to step down on Feb. 4. A former intelligence official said that Ms. Miscik was told before Christmas that Mr. Goss wanted to make a change and that "the decision to depart was not hers." Ms. Miscik has headed...

Twelve years of CIA discontent By Tomas Jones and Marc Erikson For a dozen years or more, things have been going from bad to worse at the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Some, of course, may welcome this. They should note the following, however: for better or for worse, the United States - militarily and economically - is the world's most powerful nation. When its foreign-intelligence service stumbles from intelligence failure to intelligence failure, mis-assessment to mis-assessment, and, finally, a near-collapse of its discipline, integrity and morale, more than just US national security is put at risk. Avoidable, globally destabilizing...

One former CIA official told NEWSWEEK that [Porter Goss' aide]Murray leaned on him more than once to declassify information so he could use it to "embarrass the Democrats." Murray was irritated when the agency declined.

[Porter Goss] brought with him from Congress four partisan staff members of the Intelligence Committee who have not adjusted from their old role as political advocates and critics. Instead, they are grabbing authority wherever they can and making decisions that should be left to the existing chain of command. In only a few weeks, they have exhibited an arrogance that may have served them well on Capitol Hill but is inappropriate – and counterproductive – within the agency.

The following is posted on Drudge right now: Names of people being vetted by the White House for the new position of Director of National Intelligence: DCI Porter Goss Gov Tom Kean General Michael Hayden John Lehman Sen. Joe Lieberman Rep Pete Hoekstra Rep Jane Harman...

To those who worked with him, Stephen Kappes seemed the perfect choice to lead the covert side of the CIA in the midst of the war on terrorism. Appointed in June, Kappes, a former marine, is a veteran CIA case officer who served in dangerous and difficult postings in Moscow and Pakistan. More recently, he reported directly to President Bush as the CIA's point man in secret high-stakes negotiations with Libya that ended the rogue state's weapons-of-mass-destruction programs.

The new national counterterrorism center established by President Bush under an executive order is to begin operations in early December, at about the same time that Congress may be debating whether to approve a law that would create a different version of the same agency. The center would be the "primary organization in the United States government for analyzing and integrating" all intelligence "pertaining to terrorism and counterterrorism, excepting purely domestic counterterrorism information." The center's director is to supervise correlation of the terrorism intelligence and produce reports to be sent to the president and other senior officials. It would operate...

WASHINGTON - When former CIA (news - web sites) Director George Tenet said his farewells at a two-hour ceremony this summer, a deputy noted that 40 percent of the agency's staff had worked for just one chief. AP Photo It was a symbol of Tenet's endurance, seven years on the job, the second longest tenure of a director. It also was a mark of agency's growth during a hiring spree that began in 1998 and accelerated after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. With Tenet's successor, former Rep. Porter Goss (news, bio, voting record), in charge and making changes, one...