Marcus Aurelius: CIA’s Double Standard Exploitation of Secrecy — Use It to Hide Official Attrocities, While Screwing Iconoclasts + RECAP

07 Other Atrocities, 11 Society, Corruption, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), Government
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Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius

Secret Double Standard

By Ted Gup

New York Times, January 9, 2013

Cambridge, Mass. — IN the last week, the American public has been reminded of the Central Intelligence Agency’s contradictory attitude toward secrecy. In a critique of “Zero Dark Thirty,” published last Thursday in The Washington Post, a former deputy director of the C.I.A., Jose A. Rodriguez Jr., defended the use of waterboarding and said that operatives used small plastic bottles, not buckets as depicted in the film, to carry out this interrogation method on three notable terrorists. On Sunday, The New York Times reported on the Justice Department’s case against a former C.I.A. officer, John C. Kiriakou, a critic of waterboarding who faces 30 months in prison for sharing the name of a covert operative with a reporter, who never used the name in print.

The contrast points to the real threat to secrecy, which comes not from the likes of Mr. Kiriakou but from the agency itself. The C.I.A. invokes secrecy to serve its interests but abandons it to burnish its image and discredit critics.

Over the years, I have interviewed many active and retired C.I.A. personnel who were not authorized to speak with me; they included heads of the agency’s clandestine service, analysts and well over 100 case officers, including station chiefs. Five former directors of central intelligence have spoken to me, mostly “on background.” Not one of these interviewees, to my knowledge, was taken to the woodshed, though our discussions invariably touched on classified territory.

Somewhere along the way, the agency that clung to “neither confirm nor deny” had morphed into one that selectively enforces its edicts on secrecy, using different standards depending on rank, message, internal politics and whim.

I am no fan of excessive secrecy, or of prosecuting whistle-blowers or leakers whose actions cannot be shown to have damaged American security. The C.I.A. needs secrecy, as do those who place their lives in the agency’s hands, but the agency cannot have it both ways.

Read full article.

 

Phi Beta Iota:  CIA lacks both intelligence and integrity. It is highly unlikely that John Brennan will do what needs to be done: shut down the pro forma clandestine service, revitalize all-source analysis, transfer the drones to the military, and create the separate Open Source Agency under diplomatic auspices leaving the Open Source Center to rot in its own toxic brew. On a foundation of an Open Source Agency setting the gold standard for what can be known legally and ethically, CIA could shine again in the Collection Requirements and Evaluations arena, and within two years set the stage for the compplete dismantling of the DNI and office of the DNI, restoring the Director of Central Intelligence position.

See Also:

2012 Robert Steele: The Human Factor & The Human Environment: Concepts & Doctrine? Implications for Human & Open Source Intelligence 2.0

2011 Open Source Agency: Executive Access Point

Berto Jongman: Anonymous Takes Down CIA Website + RECAP

Berto Jongman: ICSR Report – As American As Apple Pie – How Anwar al-Awlaki Became the Face of Western Jihad + US Government Assassination RECAP

Chuck Spinney: From Algeria to Libya –Lessons Not Learned + USG CIA Web of Deceit in Arabia RECAP

Chuck Spinney: Drones — Of Idiots, By Idiots, For Idiots + Meta-RECAP

David Isenberg: Jim Clapper Claims Transformation — Robert Steele Comments on Each Misrepresentation

David Isenberg: Steve Coll Reviews Three Books on Secret American Security State

DefDog: Jim Clapper On Way Out? + RECAP

G.I. Wilson: Killer Drones, Moral Disengagement, + War Crimes RECAP

Marcus Aurelius: Blurred Line Between Espionage and Truth – Prosecution of US Truth-Tellers Rampant + Secrecy RECAP

Marcus Aurelius: CIA Flogs on Campus + RECAP

Marcus Aurelius: Jennifer Sims Party Line on Military Clandestine Service with Robert Steele Comment + RECAP

Marcus Aurelius: Rule One for Spies – Do Not Work Out of Embassies . . . Hmmmm

Mini-Me: CIA Loses Official Cover Site in Benghazi — No Plan B + RECAP

Mini-Me: DoD “Spies” Will Die Often — Expect More “Car Crashes” All Over the World — and the Four Part Solution Clapper, Vickers, and Flynn Need to Consider

Mini-Me: Italian Court Confirms Convictions of CIA Personnel for Rendition & Torture – Way Now Clear for Formal Extradition Request

Mini-Me: Jane Harman at CIA? Over Many Dead Bodies + CIA RECAP

Mini-Me: Leon Panetta on Dysfunctional Government + Meta-RECAP

Reference: US Secret Intelligence, US Banks, Illicit Gold, Murder of the Global Economy, RECAP

Robert Steele: Catholic Church Debates Secrecy vs Truth – Something We Should All Be Doing…

Search: humint [Human Intelligence] HUMINT + Meta-RECAP

Search: integrity [as of 5 Oct 2012]

Search: the death of humint + HUMINT RECAP

Search: “True Cost”

Secrecy News: Cost of Secrecy >$10B + RECAP

Secrecy News: Mike Vickers on Leaks as “Serious”

Senator (D-MD): Leaks Should Be a Felony + RECAP

Steven Aftergood: CIA Classifies Open Source Works

Steven Aftergood: Defense Science Board Slams CIA…

Steven Aftergood: Senate Slams Door on Defense Clandestine Service — Robert Steele Comments + DoD Clandestine RECAP

Susan Lindauer: IRAQ – The Legacy of Deception and Its Costs

Winslow Wheeler: ONE COLONEL TELLS THE TRUTH – Major Investigation Called For + Meta-RECAP

Yoda: When Intelligence Loses It’s Integrity, It Is Not Intelligence

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