 Dick
Coffman is an international business and security
consultant and media commentator on intelligence,
homeland security and terrorism. He is managing
Director of Odysseus
Group International, which provides risk
management and security solutions to the transportation,
basic infrastructure and manufacturing industries.
Mr. Coffman specializes in ports and maritime
security and homeland defense. He is founder
and President of Coffman
Global Group, which leverages worldwide
networks for business development and marketing
in high technology, basic materials and capital
construction.
Mr. Coffman has conducted assessments of intelligence
operations for the U.S. Customs Service and
the Office of Naval Intelligence and for a
major defense contractor.
Mr. Coffman served 31 years in the Central
Intelligence Agency where he formed and managed
the Agency's first counterterrorism analytic
organization and served as Chief of Station,
chief of staff to the Director of the Clandestine
Service, coordinator of major worldwide covert
intelligence programs and CIA representative
to the NATO Commander.
He also served four years in the U.S. Marine
Corps, including duty in Vietnam in 1965 and
1966. Mr. Coffman remained in the Marine Corps
Reserves retiring in 1992 at the grade of
Colonel. Mr. Coffman is a student of military
history and an authority on the U.S. Civil
War.
Coffman
Column Archives
|
|
|
|
[Have an opinion on this column? Sound
off here.]
June 28, 2004
("Intelligence has never been more important to the security of our country." CIA Director George Tenet, February 5, 2004)
Its performance in the Iraq War and prior to 9/11 under sharp criticism, US intelligence appears headed for a major shake up.
But, this may not be enough to produce better intelligence any time soon.
Reports due in July from the 9/11 Commission and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) are said to be sharply critical of intelligence on 9/11 and Iraq and will add to the growing chorus calling for significant overhaul.
George Tenet's departure from CIA July 11 will remove what some view as a significant roadblock to structural change in the DCI's authorities and shape of the Intelligence Community.
Even staunch defenders of the status quo are backtracking. Tenet himself made a stunning admission before the 9/11 Commission that it will take another five years before the nation's espionage arm - CIA's Directorate of Operations - is operating at full capacity.
In a little noticed statement several weeks ago, FBI Director Robert Mueller retreated from his insistence that a reoriented FBI could adequately handle collection and analysis of domestic intelligence on terrorism. Mueller acknowledged that a stand-alone agency was required, but said it should be housed within the FBI.
An intelligence overhaul couldn't be more opportune. It is hard to overstate the importance of intelligence in the war on terrorism - the seminal security issue of our time.
The US certainly has the military power to confront any enemy virtually anywhere on earth. But only intelligence can provide forewarning and pinpoint our terrorist enemies.
Early warning is particularly critical in the US, as we simply don't have the resources or time to defend all potential domestic targets. By focusing resources on commercial aviation, we have neglected other vulnerable sectors of our transportation and industrial infrastructure. Our enemies will give us neither time nor a second chance to order our defense priorities correctly; only sound and comprehensive intelligence can give us this critical measure of security.
Unfortunately, by largely focusing on whether a national intelligence "czar" should direct all operations, set budgets and deploy resources, Washington may be missing an opportunity to strengthen collection and analysis where the day-to-day work of counterterrorism intelligence gets done.
|
In fact, the czar concept is an old idea shot down many times in the past by the Defense Department backed by its powerful congressional overseers. DoD, which disposes of the lion's share of the Intelligence Community's $40 Billion annual budget, argues vociferously against diluting command and budget authority over in-house military intelligence capabilities that directly support deployed military forces.
Tenet has also argued against the idea on grounds that creating a national intelligence czar would cut off the DCI from command over CIA resources.
Still, against such formidable odds, Congress and former national security officials persist in pushing consolidation of intelligence resources under one central authority. The Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) Porter Goss - an early favorite to replace Tenet as DC I - and ranking member Jane Harman have both introduced legislation creating a czar with Harman's bill giving the position cabinet status and broad budgetary and operational authorities
Former CIA Director Robert Gates weighed in with an op-ed in the New York Times in June trying to square the circle, empowering the DCI with more coordinating and budgetary authority over military intelligence resources, but retaining their operational and bureaucratic control in the Pentagon.
Arguably, US intelligence suffers from lack of unitary operational and resource control. Intelligence personnel and capabilities are so vast and so widely dispersed as to reduce the chances that "connecting the dots" can ever be done efficiently or in time, even on threats of such magnitude as 9/11. Integrating the resources of the Intelligence Community would presumably eliminate redundancies and free up scarce resources for more focused collection and analysis on high priority targets.
But, in the best of worlds, it would take years for an Intelligence Czar to be fully functional. Think not? Ask Tom Ridge at the Department of Homeland Security about corralling more than a dozen independent agencies and then integrating their efforts and resources into coherent and effective operational activity.
And, ladies and gentlemen, the stark reality is that we do not have years, probably not even the five that George Tenet thinks we need to bring our espionage arm to full capacity.
As Washington investigates, debates, and issues reports, America's enemies continue to marshal forces, develop more lethal weapons, recruit adherents and prepare for future attacks, all too often beyond the vision and reach of US intelligence.
So, while it may not be particularly glamorous when stacked up against a national intelligence czar, it is clear that in the near-term we must focus on those intelligence capabilities - human source collection and terrorism analysis - that can have most immediate impact on the most imminent threats facing the US.
This means putting more resources, energy and management focus directly into such components as the CIA's Directorate of Operations - the heart of US clandestine human source collection - and counterpart components at the FBI, National Security Agency and Defense Department.
Recruiting and exploiting human agents against ruthless and elusive targets is an imperfect, risky business, in which a ten percent success rate is very high. There is no substitute for highly trained, tough-minded and field-tested intelligence officers. They must be unencumbered by silly, politically inspired restrictions, excessive Washington nit picking and unpredictable swings in funding support.
Like much of the Intelligence Community, the DO and its counterparts in DoD and the FBI were starved for resources in the 90's suffering cutbacks in the early part of the decade and flat budgets through the balance of the Clinton Administration.
Moreover, years of politically motivated investigations and restrictions took their toll virtually institutionalizing an aversion to risk and undermining serious espionage against serious targets.
Many experienced and creative operations officers retired or left the Service, not to be replaced by new recruits creating a shortfall in critical, indispensable skills. Those that remained on duty accommodated themselves to the prevailing political and bureaucratic winds.
Post 9/11 budget increases have improved the health of our clandestine services, and recruitment is up. Not only must these levels of funding be sustained, a more robust compensation schedule is needed to bring salaries in the private sector and government service to something approaching parity. We must have financial incentives to ensure that these new operations specialists are retained on active duty as full performance officers following their second and third foreign tours of duty. They must be confident that the country will provide the resources that match the risks and difficulties of the missions they are undertaking.
Another important measure that would send positive signals to aggressive field officers and remove the psychological shackles from clandestine components would be publicly junking the restrictions and multiple layers of Washington-review imposed during the mid-1990s on agent recruitment and field investigations. Whatever the intentions of intelligence executives, lawyers, and congressional overseers, these measures had the practical effect of stifling field operations and discouraging risk-taking.
Equally important is an ironclad commitment from CIA, Executive Branch and congressional leadership to stand behind these operations and the officers that undertake them, particularly when it is politically difficult to do so. An early public show of support would go a long way to erasing the concerns of operations officers that going out on a limb, no matter how important the target and how well the operation is conducted, risks one's career, especially if the outcome is negative or even ambiguous.
This may be the toughest reform to implement, as both CIA and the FBI appear to have resumed their defensive crouches in the wake of the over-blown and heavily politicized Abu Ghraib prison controversy. The Washington Post reported on June 27 that CIA has suspended "enhanced interrogation techniques" used with senior terrorist prisoners pending legal and political review.
Among the techniques affected are threats to the detainee and his family, sleep deprivation and deceiving captives into believing they are being interrogated by another government, so-called "false flag" interrogations commonly employed in clandestine operations.
Let us remember that these prisoners - among them, al Qaeda leaders Abu Zubaida and Khalid Sheik Mohammed - are responsible for the deaths of 3,000 people on 9/11 or have information that could save the lives of thousands of others.
And we are wringing our hands about depriving them of sleep? Threats to their well-being? False flag interrogations?
For its part, the Post reported that the FBI stayed out of the interrogation of Abu Zubaida out of concern that use of "enhanced" interrogation methods might compromise evidence in a subsequent court case.
And this is the agency that ensures us it is fully capable of conducting timely and effective domestic intelligence collection and analysis against this same ruthless terrorist target?
Not only must we get past such eye-catching but largely academic proposals as a national intelligence czar, but there remains serious unfinished intelligence reforms to implement. And time is not on our side.
 Email
this page to friends
[Have an opinion on this column? Sound
off here.]
© 2004 Richard Coffman. All opinions expressed in this article
are the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of Military.com.
|
