Here’s an example of CIA problems
Jeff Stein at Congressional Quarterly:
It took only a couple months and about 100 CIA operatives and Special Forces troops, supported by U.S. air power, to chase the Taliban out of Kabul in 2001.
In contrast, the only thing the four-year-old Directorate of National Intelligence seems to be accomplishing is hiring more Washington bureaucrats.
Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee has found that at least some of the spy agencies under DNI’s purview have not been reporting their true numbers of employees.
The revelation is buried in a new report from the Senate Intelligence Committee on the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY 2010, examined adroitly Wednesday by my CQ colleague Tim Starks.
"The legislation grants several DNI requests for flexibility to move personnel, and an explanation of the bill expresses an inclination to support the removal of a DNI personnel ceiling," Starks wrote.
Of course, the DNI has all sorts of rationales for removing the ceiling, among them one of official Washington’s favorites: It will actually save money.
"Exercise of this authority should result in an actual reduction of the number of contract personnel and not a shift of resources to hire other contract personnel," the bill says.
Right.
Starks noted that the DNI is claiming …
