The Washington Independent

Posts Tagged Intelligence

Hagel, Boren Join Historically Unimportant Intelligence Board

By | 10.28.09 | 1:06 pm

The White House just announced the leadership of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board: former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), a big Obama supporter, and former Sen. David Boren (D-Okla.), a former intelligence committee chair and mentor of disastrous ex-CIA Director George Tenet. Their reactions, as per a White House release:

“I

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RAND’s Gompert Nominated to Be Blair’s Intelligence Deputy

By | 10.13.09 | 3:35 pm

David C. Gompert, a former RAND Corporation vice president and longtime nonpartisan State and National Security Council official (Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush the Elder), has been nominated to be the principal deputy to Adm. Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence. He’s testifying before the Senate intelligence committee right More…

It’s Not the Drones, It’s the Network

By | 10.06.09 | 3:34 pm

The Wall Street Journal has a wonderful story on the role of the CIA’s drones in harassing al-Qaeda in Pakistan, and it includes, at the bottom, this paragraph that explains why the efficacy of the drone strikes has reportedly increased:

At the same time, U.S. intelligence collection in Pakistan

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‘A Major Intelligence Success’

By | 09.25.09 | 10:32 am

I don’t have any more yet, but the early speculation on the cable networks is that Iran’s very belated disclosure of its nuclear facility under construction near Qom came after western intelligence services closed in on the structure. Less than five years ago, the Silberman-Robb commission on WMD intelligence More…

Intelligence Chief Reveals Obscure Budget Figure

By | 09.15.09 | 12:40 pm

To add some clarity and context to Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair’s disclosure this morning that the U.S. intelligence budget is $75 billion, it’s helpful to distinguish between two budget lines: the national intelligence program and the military intelligence program, with their inevitable NIP and MIP acronyms. Congress More…

Obama Intel Chief Reveals Intel Budget Is $75 Billion

By | 09.15.09 | 11:42 am

On a conference call with reporters to release an unclassified version of the new National Intelligence Strategy, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair revealed an intelligence community budget that goes far over recent disclosures of its total. You’re spending $75 billion on intelligence, America.

“We really believe the American people More…

Hoekstra Fear-Mongers GTMO in Michigan

By | 08.21.09 | 11:12 am

As Daphne has written this week, the residents of Standish, Mich., are starting to turn against a proposal to send terrorism detainees from Guantanamo Bay to their town’s prison, a proposal floated by the legislature and seconded by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) to alleviate Standish’s economic woes.  David Munson, More…

Bin Laden Might Not Be in Pakistan?

By | 08.10.09 | 8:53 am

Blink and you’ll miss this, from National Security Adviser Jim Jones’ “Meet The Press” appearance yesterday:

MR. GREGORY:  Is it still your belief that Osama bin Laden is in Pakistan?

GEN.  JONES:  That one’s a little bit more elusive.  We are still very much on the hunt.  We think

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Holt Calls for Next Church Committee on CIA

By | 07.27.09 | 6:00 am

After years of examining CIA operations of dubious legality, an important member of the House intelligence committee is exploring an option that many in the intelligence community view with apprehension: a comprehensive investigation of all intelligence-community operations over years and perhaps even decades. The model is the famous Church and More…

Law Enforcement and Military Intelligence: Closer & Closer

By | 07.21.09 | 11:08 am

To build on one aspect of Daphne’s post, there was an interesting debate during the July 7 Senate hearing on military commissions about the degree to which it was feasible to expect soldiers on the battlefields of Afghanistan to consider the courtroom admissibility of statements they extract from More…