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| CUCULLU |
The
General and the Agency
by Gordon
Cucullu 5/19/06 |
If
General William “Wild Bill” Donovan were alive today, as
Yogi Berra might say, he’d be turning over in his grave.
Not allow a military man to head CIA? How ridiculous, considering
that a military man – Donovan himself – birthed
Central Intelligence. Donovan, a transplanted New York City
attorney originally from Buffalo, was a Medal of Honor winner
from the Great War (World War I) who founded the outstanding
legal firm of Donovan Leisure between the wars. Typical of
the Northeast elite of the day – in contrast to present
times – he was highly patriotic and fully committed to
the success of the country in which he had total confidence
and faith. Because he considered it his duty, Donovan volunteered
to return to active service on outbreak of WWII. Having the
ear of Franklin Roosevelt, he convinced the president to let
him put together a behind the lines, covert unit that would
take the war to the aggressors.
General Bill
Donovan’s creation – the Office of Strategic Services – was
legendary for the confusion and chaos that its operatives sowed
behind the line of the Nazis in Occupied Europe and eventually
inside the Reich itself. One of the highest accolades that
a warrior possessed was to be part of the Jedburgh teams, small
groups of two officers and a radio operator who parachuted
at night from the belly of a bomber into France, Holland, and
Yugoslavia. William Casey, himself later a Director of Central
Intelligence, was a Jed case operator who managed a Who’s
Who of agents including luminaries such as Major General Jack
Singlaub.
Contributor
Gordon Cucullu
Former
Green Beret lieutenant colonel, Gordon Cucullu is
now an editorialist, author and a popular speaker.
Born into a military family, he lived and served
for more than thirteen years in East Asia, including
eight years in Korea. For his Special Forces service
in Vietnam he was awarded a Bronze Star, Vietnamese
Cross of Gallantry, and the Presidential Unit Commendation.
After separation from the Army, he worked on Korea
and East Asian affairs at both the Pentagon and Department
of State as well as an executive for General Electric
in Korea. His first major non-fiction work, Separated
at Birth: How North Korea became the Evil Twin,
is based in large part on his extensive experience
in Korea and East Asia as a governmental insider
and businessman. [website]
[go to Cucullu index]
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Eventually
the OSS spread to the Pacific where it tangled with the Japanese
from
Burma to Manchuria, conducting legendary missions
such as the liberation of a Japanese prison camp in a far corner
of Northeast Asia by Roger Hilsman, later part of President John
F. Kennedy’s legendary advisory team. By the end of the
war the OSS had clearly proven its worth. As the Cold War opened
all agreed that American intelligence – so abysmally lacking
and confused – needed to be overhauled. From the roots
of the OSS came two organizations that came to play important
roles in the six post-War decades: the US Army’s Special
Forces and the CIA.
The Central Intelligence Agency was born in the same spirit
of reform and lessons learned that produced the Department of
Defense (bringing separate Services together). The motivation
for the bureaucratic changes was the need to avoid the kinds
of surprise that caught America short on December 7, 1941. In
a Cold War, facing a nuclear-armed Soviet Union, the thinking
was that we required a combined, shared agency that could process
information from all sources and prevent a disaster. Given the
attack on September 11, 2001 the CIA fell considerably short
of that goal.
Time and the inevitable tendencies of bureaucracies and institutions
to grow bloated and eventually stagnate contributed to the ineffectiveness
of the Agency. So did a misguided Congressional oversight that
led to the gutting of the sometimes messy human intelligence
gathering arm in favor of increasingly higher technologically-based
intelligence systems. Over time the senior management of the
Agency grew incestuous, self-serving, xenophobic toward outside
forces, and highly partisan and political. It was penetrated
by Soviet moles, betrayed by agents whose bizarre behavior was
somehow overlooked, and became enslaved by an intelligence ideology
that rewarded group-think and punished those who strayed outside
of the consensus box.
Recently
resigned Director of Central Intelligence Porter Goss, according
to
National Security Advisor Dr. Stephen Hadley, was
intended from the start to be a transitional Director. His nominated
replacement, Air Force General Michael Hayden, is now the focus
of dark rumor and innuendo about Pentagon control of CIA, which
Hadley dismisses as nonsense as does Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld. Goss had “spoken of leaving for some time,” Hadley
said, and that wish “accelerated his plans” when
President Bush decided to assemble a team that would stay with
him till the end of his second term.
Hadley considers
this changeover a quite normal stage in a series of anticipated
events. “Porter started a process that will
enable Mike Hayden to complete the [CIA] reform,” Hadley
noted, indicating strongly that reform of the Agency, feared
lost in this change of command, was still a primary administration
objective. This is the key point in the entire discussion from
which attention has been diverted – perhaps intentionally – with
the red herring about Hayden’s active duty status. Is the
long-overdue reform of the highly dysfunctional, anti-administration
Central Intelligence Agency now stalled with Goss’ removal?
This question
was raised by Center for Security Policy President Frank Gaffney
as a great concern. “It would be troubling,” Gaffney
observes, “if anything less than an energetic house cleaning
of the CIA were to occur.” Other observers such as Kenneth
Timmerman remain skeptical. Timmerman had a piece here about
the danger of appointing fired CIA officer Steve Kappas as Deputy.
Such an appointment, Timmerman considers, would have a chilling
effect on the reform process initiated by Goss, if it did not
flat repudiate it. Commentator and attorney Victoria Toensing “wants
to be positive” about the new appointment, but is “concerned” about
a possible cessation of overdue reforms.
Throughout
the conservative, patriotic community it has long been recognized
that two of
the most critical Federal agencies,
State and CIA, have been institutionally and morally corrupted.
They have become incestuous in reporting, analysis, operations,
and politics, and – despite professional ethics standards
to the contrary – have become highly partisan and actively
engaged in the political process. This subversion of the Bush
administration (and previously the Regan administration) is often
done in collusion with a friendly media contact who then releases
classified information that could be interpreted as damaging
to the administration. That it is also harmful to the country
and at times to troops in harm’s way, is not considered
sufficient reason to desist in the behavior.
For these reasons and many more the agencies have become useless
as presently configured. Deep, long lasting, institutional reform
is critical to the utility and vitality of these agencies and
is in the best interests of the country, regardless of political
viewpoint. What is now considered a gotcha by the fever swamp
left could turn on them in the future to their dismay. It is
an unhealthy state of affairs and needs correcting immediately.
Many of us are watching the appointment of Mike Hayden with
hope that he will in fact arrive at Langley with a buzzing chain
saw in his fist. Be must beware: any perceived timidity on his
part will be attacked with open rebellion and contempt by entrenched
bureaucratic interests. Kappas must be blocked as deputy right
away. Hayden ought to be vocal in his opposition to this appointment.
If the CIA is going to have a positive role in American foreign
policy rather than that of an out of control, rogue element then
it must be fixed. Is Mike Hayden the man for the challenge? We
shall see. CRO
Gordon is
excited to announce that Doubleday Publishers has purchased
his latest book on Guantanamo being writing in
cooperation with General Paul Vallely . Release date to be
announced.
copyright
2006 Gordon Cucullu
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