China - DCI Tenet Claims Responsibility
Kirby Urner
>"It was a major error," Tenet told the House Permanent Select Committee
>on Intelligence. "I cannot minimize the significance of this." The
>Yugoslav Directorate of Supply and Procurement was the first target
>"unilaterally proposed and wholly assembled" by CIA. Tenet also gave
>new details about a mid-level intelligence analyst who challenged
>the targeting data before the airstrike. Washington Post 7/23/99 A16.
Somebody needs to take the fall, that's for sure, as the Chinese
are naturally still very upset about this fiasco and deserve to
see a responsive government, able to take active measures when
the situation so clearly calls for this.
We saw earlier that CIA mea culpas were accompanied by House action
to supply the CIA with more funding. But given the CIA is here
cast as part of the brute force military, actually unilaterally
proposing things to blow up and following through, I'm doubtful
that its functions need to be divorced from the DIA's.
Here's an opportunity to simplify the budget by conflating line
items. Just roll the DCI's job function into that of the JCS
and be done with it -- is the logical consequence of pursuing
the present course of action (something the Kennedy administration
tried to accomplish, when the CIA proved incapable of delivering
the results Joe Kennedy wanted to see in Cuba).
Clearly the CIA is now a mere appendage of the Pentagon, at least
in the DCI's reading, much as it was in the Vietnam Era, and is
seeing solutions to its problems in basically military terms.
In contrast to the above narrative, my CIA immediately put a lot
of distance between itself and NATO once the Russians launched
their psyops throughout Europe to cast the USA as a LAWCAP puppet
hell bent on using NATO as an ordinance dispensing mechanism to
(a) circumvent the UN and (b) keep Military Orwellianism alive
and well in the homeland (an ideology fundamentally alien to
the USA's -- more Anglo than American).
The Russian campaign was quite effective, and focused a lot of
thinking on technologies and trainings which NATO *could* have
had on tap, but didn't [1], because it's staffed by 2nd rate
thinkers with little appreciation for 21st century approaches
-- something a lot of us already knew, but could no longer
hide when the bombs started flying.
My analysis to the home office (including a cartoon in the public
domain [2]) was about this Russian propaganda offensive [3] and
about how the NSC course was steering both Europe and much of
the Middle East into a more Moscow-friendly orientation [4] --
and what could the CIA do to use this result to USA advantage
("Moscow-friendly" doesn't *have* to mean anything negative
in post Cold War narrative accounts, despite obsolete reflex-
conditioning to the contrary -- Russia and the USA have had
a lot of experience being allies, even if appearing more coldly
hostile to one another on the surface).
Some of my readings of the situation resonanted with peers
and vice versa, and our feedback made some difference I'd say.
There was ample cross-checkable, omnitriangulated evidence
that our thinking held water.
However, from the DCI's testimony I have to conclude that he
feels himself surrounded by 2nd tier operators who have
completely bought into the CIA's being a mere appendage of
the military mindset. The Washington DC elite, including
its media gurus (e.g. at CNN/CBS), are buying the story that
the CIA was behind the bombing of the Chinese Embassy, vs.
actively resisting the slide into brute force thinking re
the Balkans (a centuries-old trap, which snares one victim
after another in an endless parade).
Given the outgoing administration's exceedingly poor track
record of driving while intoxicated with power, it's unlikely
that the DCI position will survive without turnover into the
coming millenium, i.e. through the coming election. I don't
say this in criticism of Tenet, as his job is to "doll" for
the president in crisis situations when called upon. You
don't get anywhere in Washington by refusing to have your
mug on TV from time to time.
I can understand if Tenet wants to use this opportunity to
draw some attention to the corruption and amateurism he
experiences all around him. Maybe when he goes, he can take
a lot of these 2nd tier people with him. That'd be very
good for the agency, which suffers under the rule of such
piss-poorly educated folk (cite Atlantic Monthly, Feb 98).
However, I hope the public debate which any such resignation
would trigger will focus on why we even need a CIA, if its
mission is just to supply us with more military-minded
NATO-type thinking i.e. is just another source of more
targets in need of overnight FedEx-style ordinance delivery.
That's just to play into the stereotype that the USA has no
functioning intelligence community (IC), is a bunch of dumb
ass wild west bozos who want to play Bully in a China Shop.
Certainly this is the Chinese perception, and Tenet is doing
a lot to reinforce this with his testimony. Will the American
people accept this as their enduring reputation on the world
stage, as Bozos from Hell?
In the next century, the corporate sector will need to win
contracts overseas in competition with other firms, based
on excellence in customer service, not with "brute force"
mercantile tactics, ala Guatemala and other "banana republic"
scenarios ala 1900s imperialism. If the DCers persist in
projecting the USA as an oblivious numbskull, a lot of subtle
"reflagging" is going to continue, as high tech engineering
corporations (e.g. Bechtel) distance themselves from an
embarrassing spectacle and try to retain their image of
being more world class and cosmopolitan.
Or maybe the USA will continue to sail in this more globally
aware direction itself (sometimes in spite of Washington's
behind-the-times misdirection), such that its trademarked
symbols remain effective in their connotative values
(including among the young), retain their deep (sometimes
almost mystical) significance (freedom, space, human rights).
Corporate PR departments would die to have such iconography
going for them, and watch in amazement as the bozo-minded
continue to squander their potentially greatest assets, by
failing to "reposition" in ways any half-savvy marketer can
see would be in its own long term best interests.
The 30 years anniversary of the Apollo Project was a move
in the right direction -- even if many of today's youth
were cynically hostile, because to them it still looked
like a lot of pointless nostalgia, and what can it possibly
mean for them?
Anyway, I'll continue to reassure the Chinese that my CIA,
as characterized in narrative accounts for which I am
ultimately responsible, had nothing to do with the blowing
up of the Chinese embassy. If my operatives had any advance
knowledge of this plan, they would have phoned their assets
in that Embassy directly, and told them to evacuate pronto
-- none of this half-assed whining to NATO bomb centers and
pleading with dumb asses to abort their pet "CIA" project.
The whole war in the Balkans was just too stupid. I was
forthright about this from the beginning, because I didn't
want to see my CIA and/or USA used by alien powers in a
puppet role. Russian psyops were on target because they
were about spurring USAers to remember their true American
Heritage. It would be good for the world if the USA were
to live up to its real potential -- but these military ops
are not a manifestation of this (quite the opposite I'd
say, although the professionalism and aerospace savvy
contain the elements of a Project Renaissance type scenario,
if harnessed by more effectively trained top management).[5]
To my way of thinking, people who just "go with the flow"
when the scene turns to hot war, versus the kind of cold,
psychological, cyberspacey war which our operatives know
and love, are not true intelligence agents. If under the
skin they lust for the big bang brute force style of action
they see on the big screen, then they should resign from
the CIA immediately and sign on with some blood 'n guts
military intelligence unit. Leave the CIA to the pros,
please. This is no place for would-be Rambos.
My CIA runs best in cryogenic conditions -- the colder the
better -- and is in perpetual tension with the JCS to keep
global complexities from overwhelming the situation rooms.
From our point of view, "hot war" is a kind of "spazzing
out" and needs to be anticipated, and countered, before
it gets out of hand. This is how we defend our Constitution
and Bill of Rights from erosion, as brute force reflex
conditioning inevitably leads to an abrogation of the
rights of men, spells death to democracy both here and
abroad.[6] In an era where we could be eradicating a lot
of the root causes of hot war, to do anything else is to
fight the USA, which militates against such greedy short-
sightedness (has an eye on the future, cares about its
young).
You can't have it both ways: either you have a CIA committed
to performing a real intelligence service role, or you have
another mindless appendage ready to spaz out on cue, when
panic and paranoia have bedeviled the rest of the establishment.
Better to have no CIA than a pretend, pseudo-CIA, is my reading
of the situation, as the latter will only serve to lull people
into a false sense of security. Sounds a lot like the situation
we're in today.
Kirby
[1] From: ur...@alumni.princeton.edu (Kirby Urner)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.org.cia
Subject: Re: So THAT's... "Geodesic domes for refugees..."
Date: Sat, 03 Apr 1999 05:35:26 GMT
"The Marines have used the dome for a long time. The DEW
line radomes are geodesic. When you're looking at thousands
of people huddled on the dirt, it's not stupid, unrealistic
or utopian to think about the best way to provide a lot of
shelter efficiently, at low cost, in a hurry. We have lots
of companies who do this for a living -- industrial sized
(I'm not talking about little family-sized domes, but places
big enough for hundreds, even thousands of people to get out
of the rain).
There's nothing vague or impractical about any of this. If
you want to see pictures, click on the GIFs below:
http://www.geometrica.com/Images/CemChiSACirExt.JPG
http://www.geometrica.com/Images/CemChiSACirInt.JPG
http://www.abuildnet.com/users2/000401.html
http://www.starnetint.com/Images/Products/Star.jpg (fancy)
[2] http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/graphics/cartoon4.html
[3] http://www.inetarena.com/~pdx4d/afsc/Airshow.jpg
[4] http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=463292795&fmt=text
[5] http://listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9907&L=geodesic&O=A&P=9117
[6] see Arnold Toynbee quote, NYT 5/7/71, used in context
in L. Fletcher Prouty's 'JFK' (Birch Lane Press, 1992),
pg. 230-231
For further reading:
http://www.teleport.com/~pdx4d/bosnia.html