THE CIA'S DARKEST SECRET

THE CIA'S DARKEST SECRET


CLANDESTINE INCOMPETENCE


By DEREK LEEBAERT

June 2, 2006 -- IN all the questioning of Gen. Michael Hayden before his confirmation as CIA director last week, not one senator openly asked his opinion of one of the biggest controversies involving the agency: the 9/11 Commission's recommendation that U.S. Special Operations Command take over CIA's responsibility for paramilitary operations.
Every other major reform proposed by the commission has gone ahead - but the agency has so far fought off this one. Some insiders insist that's one reason why Osama bin Laden remains free.

Since it was set up in 1947, the CIA theoretically has been in charge of U.S. covert actions - that is, operations where the U.S. role is concealed. Yet the uniformed services are not only undertaking ever more clandestine missions (those kept secret only while being carried out) but are busily running covert ones, as well.

Covert-action programs embrace disguise, forgery and bribes; they involve an infrastructure of safehouses, agents in place, undetectable bank accounts and false-front businesses. The venue may be a hostile state (such as Iran or North Korea) or even an allied one (such as Pakistan, which can't keep even its best friends' secrets).



Contrary to public perception, few CIA officers have training in clandestine warfare techniques such as "double-tapping" - shooting an enemy twice in the head before he can draw.

U.S. Special Operations forces (Green Berets, SEALs, Air Force commandos and certain Marine formations) train in clandestine techniques, but until 2003 did not venture into the bleaker terrain of covert action, where prisoners are rarely exchanged. They're now empowered by presidential orders to go undercover, and have done so repeatedly - though their chiefs couch these exploits in the military terminology of "black reconnaissance" and "preparing the battlefield," in hopes of avoiding outright rivalry with the CIA and the curiosity of Capitol Hill's intelligence committees.

Respectable critics, such as former NSA Director Gen. William Odom, doubt that special forces routinely can pull off such supremely subtle tasks. Yet they can hardly do worse than the CIA.

More @ http://tinyurl.com/r9pls NYPOST

I have some detailed knowledge of how clandestine ops worked in the past and this is my take on the subject.

By their very nature clandestine ops are secretive and should be on a need to know basis.

The failures in clandestine ops are well known and well documented.

The successes in clandestine ops aren't know unless they are in the dim past and not even then in some cases.

A successful clandestine op would not be clandestine at all if you could read about it on MSM and would in fact then be classed as a failure if you could read about it on MSM.

Spies and snipers have a lot in common. No one wants to know about them, be seen with them or even have them until your're under enemy attack and suddenly you need spies and snipers. Being a spy or a sniper is a thankless job because your failures are plain to see and your successes should remain secret.