Remember TENET?

[Octafish]

With the latest news angle, we seem to have forgotten some very important, very recent history.

So, whatever happened to George Tenet?

And who's side is he on?

Implications of Tenet's resignation

By Tariq Khosa
     
The timing of US CIA director George Tenet’s resignation on personal grounds is both surprising and intriguing. Why did the second longest serving director of lead intelligence agency leave just before, when the presidential elections are round the corner? Is the Bush camp in disarray? Has he been made a scapegoat to divert attention from faux paus of Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defence, who should have resigned after Abu Ghraib prison torture trauma and drama? Have the neo cons cleverly sacrificed a senior intelligence community official who was hired by President Clinton and allowed to be part of Bush administration?

The answers to the above questions may soon be known. However, it is important to assess George Tenet’s role and performance from a professional perspective. Obviously, there are lessons for Pakistan’s intelligence community and leadership who have dealt with him, especially since 9/11 tragedy which was obviously an intelligence fiasco.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, George Tenet, according to Bob Woodward’s book, “Bush at War” was vehemently expressing apprehensions about Osama Bin Laden on a breakfast meeting with another prominent person, in the context of possible acts of terrorism against the United States. 9/11 was a huge intelligence failure but no heads rolled in the top agencies like FEMA, NSC, FBI and CIA. The CIA director in recent Senate and 9/11 Commission hearings admitted his agency’s failure, especially in the context of lack of effective human intelligence.

George Tenet is reported to be a very popular chief of CIA and was widely respected in the US intelligence community. However, there were certain glaring problems and issues that require a mention here. First, there was a significant lack of communication and coordination between the CIA and FBI. Second, there were not enough translators and language experts in the US Intelligence Agency to decipher “chatter” or communication amongst terrorist networks. Third, the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction claim by Colin Powell in the United Nations was clearly an intelligence sources failure, rebutted by Chief UN Weapons Inspector Hans Blix, and proved wrong after fall of Saddam’s regime in Baghdad. Fourth, intelligence gathering is not sophisticated guessing; it is solid information both from human and technological sources, which carries very serious consequences. CIA clearly botched up in going to war in Iraq on a false premise, just because the neo con agenda dictated that option. This was a case of intelligence being tailored to follow a policy. It should have been the other way round, policy formulation on the basis of correct and solid information.

CONTINUED...

Don't you just LOVE Pakistani journalism?! Now there's a free press that certainly knows how to cover an issue. That's an LTTE from the Deputy Chief of Police. Now here's what a few American writers are urging the U.S. Congress do now:



Frustrated intelligence reformers see window of opportunity

By Siobhan Gorman, National Journal

Advocates of intelligence reform saw their stock skyrocket on June 3 when George Tenet announced his resignation as director of central intelligence. Tenet's impending departure opens a long-awaited and potentially fleeting window of opportunity fora fundamental overhaul of the U.S. intelligence community's command structure. Frustrated for decades, the reformers want to ensure that the answer to "Who's in charge?" stops being "Nobody."

No fewer than 40 studies of the U.S. intelligence infrastructure -- some of them dating back almost to the CIA's birth in 1947 -- have lamented that no single person really runs the nation's intelligence efforts and have declared that the lack of clear leadership is a huge problem with enormous consequences.

Now, reform advocates can push for restructuring without seeming to register a vote of no confidence in Tenet. The status quo no longer seems frozen solid. As Ronald Marks, who spent 16 years at the Central Intelligence Agency, puts it, "The ice has broken; I can hear it all around."

The reform proposal quickly catching fire is the idea of creating a director of national intelligence, who would wield far more power -- including budgetary authority -- than directors of central intelligence have had. Many reformers envision that the new intelligence czar would be at the helm of the entire 15-agency U.S. intelligence apparatus. He or she would be charged with designing and implementing an overall strategy for gathering, analyzing, and disseminating U.S. intelligence about security threats, both foreign and domestic. And, the thinking goes, this new director would be held accountable in the event of a major intelligence failure.

There would still be a CIA director, but no director of central intelligence. And the new superchief would oversee the CIA's director.

CONTINUED...

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0604/061104nj1.htm

Oh. They'll use this opportunity to promote Tenet's successor? More power to the BFEE -- not!

[Octafish]

1. Kick to the pants of the BFEE

:kick:

"...Arbusto, HARKEN, Spectrum 7, Aloha. Yeah. We're married."

[Stephanie]

2. Bush hires a criminal defense attorney, Tenet "resigns"

And we've heard about nothing but the Glory of Reagan for one solid week.

Cheney's been deposed in the Plame case, the neo-cons are taking lie detector tests in the Chalabi case, the orders WRT torture came from the top, but we've heard nothing but Reagan.

[Octafish]

3. Wheels were falling of the BFEE bus for a while, there.

But all missed by "The Glory of Reagan" as Ronnie gets in this interminable close-up. Then he hops on the media horse and makes his agonizingly long exit, stage right. Meanwhile, a source which makes great reading adds, with little fanfare...

 
Behind the resignation of CIA Director George Tenet:

The Bush administration begins to break up

By Patrick Martin
7 June 2004

The sudden but by no means surprising resignation of CIA Director George Tenet is an unmistakable sign of the intensifying crisis of the Bush administration, which is beginning to shed the leading personnel responsible for the US debacle in Iraq. The resignation of Tenet was followed within hours by the CIA’s public acknowledgement that Director of Operations James Pavitt, who has headed the section of the agency responsible for covert action, was retiring. Tenet named Pavitt’s deputy, Stephen Kappes, to succeed him.

SNIP...

There was little disguising the fact that the parting between Tenet and Bush was acrimonious. The CIA director turned in his resignation Wednesday night, June 2, by some accounts after a stormy session with Bush. The president did not inform his own staff until the next morning, then made the resignation public that afternoon.

SNIP...

Congressional insiders, both Republican and Democrat, agreed that Tenet had been forced out. Republican Senator Richard Shelby, a frequent critic of Tenet, said of the White House, “I don’t think there are any tears over there. I suspect there was some push out of the office.” Democratic Senator Robert Graham, former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Bush had removed Tenet to secure his own political position, “under circumstances where he is at the crime scene as short as possible.”

Whatever the immediate circumstances of Tenet’s dismissal, however, there is no question that the administration has suffered a blow. As the Boston Globe commented: “Now, with five months until the presidential election, President Bush must confront looming challenges in Iraq and homeland security with a temporary CIA director, a defense secretary fending off calls for his own departure, a secretary of state who has distanced himself from key administration policies, and several departments riled up over ongoing criminal investigations.”

CONTINUED...

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/jun2004/tene-j07.shtml

[BeFree]

4. OverCing the CIA

Isn't congress supposed to design a plan for agencies? If not, what the hell are they doing?

IMO, Tenet was fired because he wouldn't call off the CIA agents who are independently dogging *. I do believe Sen Graham (fla) agrees.

Sic 'em boys.