Journalists and the CIA

[T. Bankson Roach]

Nick:

You say:

>      As for Mr Hunter's comments about Mensa and IQ - such comments
> should be kept off this list. People who work for newspapers and other
media
> outlets are not more or less intelligent than any other profession.
The
> amazing thing to me is that for all the money, resources and brain
power
> available to the intelligence community it produces so little for our
> society.

How sad and how true! The intelligence communities in Britain and the
USA have allowed snotty, amoral sociopaths like Hanssen, Ames, Philby,
Blunt, et al to make fools of them. Too many Ph.D.s and clever society
types end up ruling the roost. In the case of the USA, despite the once
magical awe that the CIA was held in, it turns out to be a niasma of
brilliant incompetents who exist in an Oz like fantasy land.

Sadly, these agencies are often staffed with well meaning and
accomplished people who are poorly led and whose agencies  excel at
back-stabbing, bureaucratic progression, and little else. Their true
failure is their inability to wisely use, for the nation's sake, the
information they so cleverly gather. I can count on about two or three
fingers any one in upper management of the conglomeration of three
letter agencies that seemed to give a damn about national security -
just their agencies or their personal advancement.

One miraculous exception to the rule was the true American genius
Lockheed's Kelly Johnson, who seemed to be able to pull miracles out of
his hat. I might also add that for post World War II years that most of
the major technical accomplishments of intelligence agencies like NSA
and CIA were based on the genius of American industry, not their own
native talent. On the other hand, the armed forces intelligence
collection and analysis specialists have performed well, especially in
comparison to the civilian agencies. Need I point out that most of the
work done by the military in intelligence was done by enlisted men, who
seldom had college degrees let alone Masters or Ph.D.s that abound in
places like the CIA or NSA. Nevertheless, for the most part they
performed superbly. As Robert Steele points out in his book "On
Intelligence", in many instances the very best information and analysis
is available free on the Internet by simply reading the major world
newspapers on-line. It also doesn't require some absurd clearance(s)
that, despite the huge cost of vetting, produces such colossal
traitorous goons of the sort we repeatedly see in the headlines. All
these clearances and "need to know" seem to cause more harm than they
prevent. While it might be cruel, perhaps inevitable torture and a
painful death for uncovered traitors, would be a useful upgrade to CI.

Instead there are rumors about that the death penalty for Hanssen will
be passed up for his "cooperation". I think I would pass on his
cooperation for some brutal and clever interrogation by a mean-spirited
SEAL, followed by a single bullet to the back of his head, Soviet style.
I despise the Russian government, both current and Soviet versions, but
with respect to CI, they sure know how to make fools of the democracies.
Maybe we should adopt some of their techniques for CI operations.

Tom Roach



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