Chalabigate
"Weapons of Mass Deception"
2002-10-24
Pentagon Sets Up Intelligence Unit
By ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER
New York Times, October 24, 2002
WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and his senior advisers have assigned a small intelligence unit to search for information on Iraq's hostile intentions or links to terrorists that the nation's spy agencies may have overlooked, Pentagon officials said today.
Some officials say the creation of the team reflects frustration on the part of Mr. Rumsfeld, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz and other senior officials that they are not receiving undiluted information on the capacities of President Saddam Hussein of Iraq and his suspected ties to terrorist organizations.
But officials who disagree say the top civilian policy makers are intent on politicizing intelligence to fit their hawkish views on Iraq. In particular, many in the intelligence agencies disagree that Mr. Hussein can be directly linked to Osama bin Laden and his network, Al Qaeda, or that the two are likely to make common cause against the United States. In addition, the view among even some senior intelligence analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency is that Mr. Hussein is contained and is unlikely to unleash weapons of mass destruction unless he is attacked.
But Mr. Rumsfeld's inner circle of advisers view Mr. Hussein's record, which includes aggression against Kuwait and the use of poison gas against his people, as much more alarming, and they are not willing to risk leaving him in power. They cite numerous intelligence findings indicating links between the Iraq and senior Qaeda leaders. The four- to five-person intelligence team was established by Douglas J. Feith, the under secretary of defense for policy and another strong advocate for military action against Mr. Hussein. It was formed not long after the Sept. 11 attacks to take on special assignments in the global war on terror. The team's specialty is using powerful computers and new software to scan and sort documents and reports from the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and other intelligence agencies. The team's current task, described by one official as "data mining," is to glean individual details that may collectively point to Iraq's wider connections to terrorism, but which may have been obscured by formal assessments that play down the overall Iraqi threat.
In an interview tonight, Mr. Wolfowitz said the members of the special intelligence team "are helping us sift through enormous amounts of incredibly valuable data that our many intelligence resources have vacuumed up." He emphasized, "They are not making independent intelligence assessments." He described "a phenomenon in intelligence work, that people who are pursuing a certain hypothesis will see certain facts that others won't, and not see other facts that others will." "The lens through which you're looking for facts affects what you look for," he added.
But as adherents of different views on the Iraqi threat use intelligence findings to argue their case, Mr. Wolfowitz said, "It should not permit you to create facts or deny facts." "The correct process is one that surfaces as many facts as possible," he added.
By law, the sprawling American intelligence bureaucracy is managed by the director of central intelligence, George J. Tenet, who also is in charge of the best-known spy organization, the Central Intelligence Agency. Separate intelligence units also are operated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Departments of State, Energy and the Treasury.
But nearly 80 percent of the overall budget for intelligence is within the Defense Department and managed by Mr. Rumsfeld. This classified sum is divided among such organizations as the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the intelligence arms of the armed services.
Agencies like the N.S.A. and the D.I.A. in effect have two masters, since the defense secretary controls the budget and is a significant client of their information, while the director of central intelligence watches over the entire constellation of spy organizations. Tension between the defense secretary and the C.I.A., which has resented moves by Mr. Rumsfeld to beef up the Pentagon's role in intelligence gathering, has been intensifying, according to one defense official. "There is a complete breakdown in the relationship between the Defense Department and the intelligence community, to include its own Defense Intelligence Agency," the official said.
"Wolfowitz and company disbelieve any analysis that doesn't support their own preconceived conclusions. The C.I.A. is enemy territory, as far are they're concerned."
Senior Pentagon aides reject that criticism, with Mr. Wolfowitz saying tonight that both he and Mr. Rumsfeld rely on their C.I.A. briefings as "our main source of information."
But other senior Pentagon officials say Mr. Rumsfeld, Mr. Wolfowitz and Mr. Feith are consciously challenging "cherished beliefs and assumptions" that they believe prevent intelligence analysts from focusing on certain information. In addition, those officials said, Mr. Rumsfeld and his senior advisers are laboring to strip away risk assessments that they say should be left to policy makers. "Yes, there's frustration, but don't make this out to be a conspiracy," said another Defense Department official. "We're not politicizing intelligence. We're just trying to get another angle on this."
Or as another top Pentagon aide described the team's purpose: "We've seen a distinct need for multiple sources of intelligence for some time. It's an ongoing supplementary effort to insure that top policy makers get the most information possible."
Although the team was created one year ago, its existence is only now becoming known outside of Mr. Rumsfeld's inner circle as the debate over the administration's Iraq policy intensifies. The new team is the latest example of an often contentious relationship between Mr. Rumsfeld and his top policy makers on one side, and intelligence agencies on the other. Mr. Rumsfeld, for example, has moved to strengthen his control over the military's intelligence apparatus by proposing a civilian position reporting directly to him to manage the sprawling operation. He is also considering ways to expand the role of Special Operations forces in the campaign against terrorism, including getting them more deeply involved in long-term covert operations that traditionally have been the domain of the C.I.A. The work of the new team at the Pentagon is becoming well known among senior-level officials throughout the Bush administration.
One senior administration official defended the effort, saying that regardless of whether analysis of intelligence reports is done by intelligence agencies or policy makers, both are at some level "informed speculation." The official said it should not be surprising that there are differences of opinion in a large administration.
Mr. Rumsfeld voiced his concerns this week about the difficulty of predicting the most dramatic threats to national security. During a Pentagon news briefing on Tuesday, he quoted from a National Intelligence Estimate written on March 21, 1962. That summary of findings said it was "unlikely that the Soviet bloc will provide Cuba with strategic weapons," Mr. Rumsfeld said, noting however that the Cuban missile crisis came the following October.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F70C10F639580C778EDDA90994DA404482
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New York Times, October 24, 2002
WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and his senior advisers have assigned a small intelligence unit to search for information on Iraq's hostile intentions or links to terrorists that the nation's spy agencies may have overlooked, Pentagon officials said today.
Some officials say the creation of the team reflects frustration on the part of Mr. Rumsfeld, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz and other senior officials that they are not receiving undiluted information on the capacities of President Saddam Hussein of Iraq and his suspected ties to terrorist organizations.
But officials who disagree say the top civilian policy makers are intent on politicizing intelligence to fit their hawkish views on Iraq. In particular, many in the intelligence agencies disagree that Mr. Hussein can be directly linked to Osama bin Laden and his network, Al Qaeda, or that the two are likely to make common cause against the United States. In addition, the view among even some senior intelligence analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency is that Mr. Hussein is contained and is unlikely to unleash weapons of mass destruction unless he is attacked.
But Mr. Rumsfeld's inner circle of advisers view Mr. Hussein's record, which includes aggression against Kuwait and the use of poison gas against his people, as much more alarming, and they are not willing to risk leaving him in power. They cite numerous intelligence findings indicating links between the Iraq and senior Qaeda leaders. The four- to five-person intelligence team was established by Douglas J. Feith, the under secretary of defense for policy and another strong advocate for military action against Mr. Hussein. It was formed not long after the Sept. 11 attacks to take on special assignments in the global war on terror. The team's specialty is using powerful computers and new software to scan and sort documents and reports from the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and other intelligence agencies. The team's current task, described by one official as "data mining," is to glean individual details that may collectively point to Iraq's wider connections to terrorism, but which may have been obscured by formal assessments that play down the overall Iraqi threat.
In an interview tonight, Mr. Wolfowitz said the members of the special intelligence team "are helping us sift through enormous amounts of incredibly valuable data that our many intelligence resources have vacuumed up." He emphasized, "They are not making independent intelligence assessments." He described "a phenomenon in intelligence work, that people who are pursuing a certain hypothesis will see certain facts that others won't, and not see other facts that others will." "The lens through which you're looking for facts affects what you look for," he added.
But as adherents of different views on the Iraqi threat use intelligence findings to argue their case, Mr. Wolfowitz said, "It should not permit you to create facts or deny facts." "The correct process is one that surfaces as many facts as possible," he added.
By law, the sprawling American intelligence bureaucracy is managed by the director of central intelligence, George J. Tenet, who also is in charge of the best-known spy organization, the Central Intelligence Agency. Separate intelligence units also are operated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Departments of State, Energy and the Treasury.
But nearly 80 percent of the overall budget for intelligence is within the Defense Department and managed by Mr. Rumsfeld. This classified sum is divided among such organizations as the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the intelligence arms of the armed services.
Agencies like the N.S.A. and the D.I.A. in effect have two masters, since the defense secretary controls the budget and is a significant client of their information, while the director of central intelligence watches over the entire constellation of spy organizations. Tension between the defense secretary and the C.I.A., which has resented moves by Mr. Rumsfeld to beef up the Pentagon's role in intelligence gathering, has been intensifying, according to one defense official. "There is a complete breakdown in the relationship between the Defense Department and the intelligence community, to include its own Defense Intelligence Agency," the official said.
"Wolfowitz and company disbelieve any analysis that doesn't support their own preconceived conclusions. The C.I.A. is enemy territory, as far are they're concerned."
Senior Pentagon aides reject that criticism, with Mr. Wolfowitz saying tonight that both he and Mr. Rumsfeld rely on their C.I.A. briefings as "our main source of information."
But other senior Pentagon officials say Mr. Rumsfeld, Mr. Wolfowitz and Mr. Feith are consciously challenging "cherished beliefs and assumptions" that they believe prevent intelligence analysts from focusing on certain information. In addition, those officials said, Mr. Rumsfeld and his senior advisers are laboring to strip away risk assessments that they say should be left to policy makers. "Yes, there's frustration, but don't make this out to be a conspiracy," said another Defense Department official. "We're not politicizing intelligence. We're just trying to get another angle on this."
Or as another top Pentagon aide described the team's purpose: "We've seen a distinct need for multiple sources of intelligence for some time. It's an ongoing supplementary effort to insure that top policy makers get the most information possible."
Although the team was created one year ago, its existence is only now becoming known outside of Mr. Rumsfeld's inner circle as the debate over the administration's Iraq policy intensifies. The new team is the latest example of an often contentious relationship between Mr. Rumsfeld and his top policy makers on one side, and intelligence agencies on the other. Mr. Rumsfeld, for example, has moved to strengthen his control over the military's intelligence apparatus by proposing a civilian position reporting directly to him to manage the sprawling operation. He is also considering ways to expand the role of Special Operations forces in the campaign against terrorism, including getting them more deeply involved in long-term covert operations that traditionally have been the domain of the C.I.A. The work of the new team at the Pentagon is becoming well known among senior-level officials throughout the Bush administration.
One senior administration official defended the effort, saying that regardless of whether analysis of intelligence reports is done by intelligence agencies or policy makers, both are at some level "informed speculation." The official said it should not be surprising that there are differences of opinion in a large administration.
Mr. Rumsfeld voiced his concerns this week about the difficulty of predicting the most dramatic threats to national security. During a Pentagon news briefing on Tuesday, he quoted from a National Intelligence Estimate written on March 21, 1962. That summary of findings said it was "unlikely that the Soviet bloc will provide Cuba with strategic weapons," Mr. Rumsfeld said, noting however that the Cuban missile crisis came the following October.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F70C10F639580C778EDDA90994DA404482
This site may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Milton Frihetsson, 03:21
