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The developing story about how the US intelligence and national security agencies may have conspired to influence and possibly even reverse the results of the 2016 presidential election is compelling, even if one is disinclined to believe that such a plot would be possible to execute. Not surprisingly perhaps there have been considerable introspection among former and current officials who have worked in those and related government positions, many of whom would agree that there is urgent need for a considerable restructuring and reining in of the 17 government agencies that have some intelligence or law enforcement function. Most would also agree that much of the real damage that has been done has been the result of the unending global war on terror launched by George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, which has showered the agencies with resources and money while also politicizing their leadership and freeing them from restraints on their behavior.
If the tens of billions of dollars lavished on the intelligence community together with a “gloves off” approach towards oversight that allowed them to run wild had produced good results, it might be possible to argue that it was all worth it. But the fact is that intelligence gathering has always been a bad investment even if it is demonstrably worse at the present. One might argue that the CIA’s notorious Soviet Estimate prolonged the Cold War and that the failure to connect dots and pay attention to what junior officers were observing allowed 9/11 to happen. And then there was the empowerment of al-Qaeda during the Soviet-Afghan war followed by failure to penetrate the group once it began to carry out operations.
More recently there have been Guantanamo, torture in black prisons, renditions of terror suspects to be tortured elsewhere, killing of US citizens by drone, turning Libya into a failed state and terrorist haven, arming militants in Syria, and, of course, the Iraqi alleged WMDs, the biggest foreign policy disaster in American history. And the bad stuff happened in bipartisan fashion, under Democrats and Republicans, with both neocons and liberal interventionists all playing leading roles. The only one punished for the war crimes was former CIA officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou, who exposed some of what was going on.
Colonel Pat Lang, a colleague and friend who directed the Defense Intelligence Agency HUMINT (human intelligence) program after years spent on the ground in special ops and foreign liaison, thinks that strong medicine is needed and has initiated a discussion based on the premise that the FBI and CIA are dysfunctional relics that should be dismantled, as he puts it “burned to the ground,” so that the federal government can start over again and come up with something better.
Lang cites numerous examples of “incompetence and malfeasance in the leadership of the 17 agencies of the Intelligence Community and the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” to include the examples cited above plus the failure to predict the collapse of the Soviet Union. On the domestic front, he cites his personal observation of efforts by the Department of Justice and the FBI to corruptly “frame” people tried in federal courts on national security issues as well as the intelligence/law enforcement community conspiracy to “get Trump.”
Colonel Lang asks “Tell me, pilgrims, why should we put up with such nonsense? Why should we pay the leaders of these agencies for the privilege of having them abuse us? We are free men and women. Let us send these swine to their just deserts in a world where they have to work hard for whatever money they earn.” He then recommends stripping CIA of its responsibility for being the lead agency in spying as well as in covert action, which is a legacy of the Cold War and the area in which it has demonstrated a particular incompetence. As for the FBI, it was created by J. Edgar Hoover to maintain dossiers on politicians and it is time that it be replaced by a body that operates in a fashion “more reflective of our collective nation[al] values.”
Others in the intelligence community understandably have different views. Many believe that the FBI and CIA have grown too large and have been asked to do too many things unrelated to national security, so there should be a major reduction-in-force (RIF) followed by the compulsory retirement of senior officers who have become too cozy with and obligated to politicians. The new-CIA should collect information, period, what it was founded to do in 1947, and not meddle in foreign elections or engage in regime change. The FBI should provide only police services that are national in nature and that are not covered by the state and local jurisdictions. And it should operate in as transparent a fashion as possible, not as a national secret police force.
But the fundamental problem may not be with the police and intelligence services themselves. There are a lot of idiots running around loose in Washington. Witness for example the impeachment hearings ludicrous fact free opening statement by House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff (with my emphasis) “In 2014, Russia invaded a United States ally, Ukraine, to reverse that nation’s embrace of the West, and to fulfill Vladimir Putin’s desire to rebuild a Russian empire.”
And the press is no better, note the following excerpt from The New York Times lead editorial on the hearings, including remarks of the two State Department officers who testified, on the following day: “They came across not as angry Democrats or Deep State conspirators, but as men who have devoted their lives to serving their country, and for whom defending Ukraine against Russian aggression is more important to the national interest than any partisan jockeying…
“At another point, Mr. Taylor said he had been critical of the Obama administration’s reluctance to supply Ukraine with anti-tank missiles and other lethal defensive weapons in its fight with Russia, and that he was pleased when the Trump administration agreed to do so…
“What clearly concerned both witnesses wasn’t simply the abuse of power by the president, but the harm it inflicted on Ukraine, a critical ally under constant assault by Russian forces. ‘Even as we sit here today, the Russians are attacking Ukrainian soldiers in their own country and have been for the last four years…’ Mr. Taylor said.”
Schiff and the Times should get their facts straight. And so should the two American foreign service officers who were clearly seeing the situation only from the Ukrainian perspective, a malady prevalent among US diplomats often described as “going native.” They were pushing a particular agenda, i.e. possible war with Russia on behalf of Ukraine, in furtherance of a US national interest that they fail to define. One of them, George Kent, eulogized the Ukrainian militiamen fighting the Russians as the modern day equivalent of the Massachusetts Minutemen in 1776, not exactly a neutral assessment, and also euphemized Washington-provided lethal offensive weapons as “security assistance.”
Another former intelligence community friend Ray McGovern has constructed a time line of developments in Ukraine which demolishes the establishment view on display in Congress relating to the alleged Russian threat. First of all, Ukraine was no American ally in 2014 and is no “critical ally” today. Also, the Russian reaction to western supported rioting in Kiev, a vital interest, only came about after the United States spent $5 billion destabilizing and then replacing the pro-Kremlin government. Since that time Moscow has resumed control of the Crimea, which is historically part of Russia, and is active in the Donbas region which has a largely Russian population.
It should really be quite simple. The national security state should actually be engaged in national security. Its size and budget should be commensurate with what it actually does, nothing more. It should not be roaming the world looking for trouble and should instead only respond to actual threats. And it should operate with oversight. If Congress is afraid to do it, set up a separate body that is non-partisan and actually has the teeth to do the job. If the United States of America comes out of the process as something like a normal nation the entire world will be a much happier place.
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An outstanding article by a very honorable man.
Give the man a hand!
Sending them all out to earn a living in the wretched economy they helped create, excellent.
Oddly enough, Americans seem to think the abusers are doing them a favor in a patriotic sort of way. “Now get your children off to war, and yourself back to work – you’ve got taxes to pay!”
Ironically CIA was created to prevent a “new Pearl Harbor”. Obviously it was a dismal failure without exploring the circumstances surrounding the event. The FBI was always cross dressing Hoover’s personal fiefdom and totally corrupt from the get go but with the help of Hollywood was able to shall we say airbrush their image.
NSA was supposed to be a Foreign Intelligence Service yet spends much of its time spying on Americans much like CIA another alleged FI agency. Does it get any crazier? Well yes because the FBI spends much of its time now trying to influence foreign policy and when they’re not doing that then they are trying to overthrow the elected government.
The only effective intelligence apparatus we had was Able Danger who was tracking the actual perpetrators of 9/11 much like Alec Station before them so of course those operations had to be shut down because they would have exposed our “friends” the Israelis involvement in 9/11 and other false flag terrorist events like the USS Cole for example which would have been bad news for the AIPAC traitors in congress.
Don’t get me started on the Department of Hebrew Security which is pretty much based on Marcus Wolfe’s Stazi.
The whole “Intelligence” Community doesn’t just need an overhaul. It needs a tactical nuke.
P. Geraldo says: “Rethinking National Security: CIA and FBI Are Corrupt, But What About Congress?”
Wake up and smell the coffee! This “just”in:
“Because they are all ultimately funded via both direct and indirect theft [taxes], and counterfeiting [central bank monopolies], all governments are essentially, at their very cores, 100% corrupt criminal scams which cannot be “reformed”or “improved”,simply because of their innate criminal nature.” onebornfree . http://onebornfree-mythbusters.blogspot.com/
“Taking the State wherever found, striking into its history at any point, one sees no way to differentiate the activities of its founders, administrators and beneficiaries from those of a professional-criminal class.” Albert J. Nock. https://mises.org/library/our-enemy-state-2
“Regards” onebornfree
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/09/02/are-spies-more-trouble-than-theyre-worth
Military intelligence and the DIA is looked down upon by the CIA but the CIA wastes a lot of time playing games with their opposite numbers.
The American government no longer believe in the CIA’s ability to get things done at low cost, and the Joint Chiefs themselves are increasingly likely to see it as their their duty to tell Presidents that using the military has to be done all out or not at all and even with total commitment victories are likely to be very costly ones. McMaster’s book is very much along those lines and is required reading in the Pentagon.
The US will not step back from supremacy, it will be supplanted, and there is not much doubt who by but the US deep state is deeply invested in annoying the Bear.
The 600-lb gorilla glowering in the corner of the room is…Why in the world do we need 17 intelligence agencies?
“The way to get rid of corruption in high places is to get rid of high places.” – Frank Chodorov
Nothing will change as long as the money keeps flowing into the Washington swamp. The solution is to dismantle the Fed Gov; get rid of it root and branch. There should be enough gov’t left at the state level to satisfy any statist.
Let the states compete with each other for citizens and industry. Allow a true free market to emerge to show which states have policies that can survive the test of time and which are based on fantasy.
Trump is missing a great opportunity by not making this reform a big issue.
These agencies have been corrupt for a long long time.
The CIA went rogue out of the gate on the Korean War–they plotted to make it happen. It was the early days–so they weren’t very good at lying about it:
Reforming the Intelligence Services is a daunting task. I’ve tried to think what it would look like, but the system is jut too big, dark and deep to get a grip on it.
I wish Mr. Giraldi would get together with a few friends and write a book on the subject.
This is a very good article I’ll probably link to it.
Roatan Bill says : “The solution is to dismantle the Fed Gov; get rid of it root and branch”
Yes! Some common sense here at last!Thanks for that [and the Chodorov quote]😛
The only presidential candidate I’m aware of in recent history who proposed anything even close to that was the great Harry Browne:https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Browne ,who proposed an immediate, overnight return to original constitutional limits, thereby downsizing the Federal government by approximately 95%. Not perfect,per your statement, but definitely a big step in the right direction. Nobody,either before or since, has even come close to Browne’s campaign proposals. Maybe unsurprisingly, he’s the only presidential candidate who I have ever financially supported to date.
Regards,onebornfree
It takes exceptionel leadership to handle spies, double spies and agents of intelligence.
Simply by having 17 agencies means it is a mess. Not under control of the leadership it officially resides.
It means some other party is profiting from the situation.
“America is too important to be left alone”
Why should any self-respecting citizen endorse an institution grounded on thievery? For that is what one does when one votes. If it be argued that we must let bygones be bygones, see what can be done toward cleaning up the institution of the State so that it might be useful in the maintenance of orderly existence, the answer is that it cannot be done; you cannot clean up a brothel and yet leave the business intact. We have been voting for one “good government” after another, and what have we got?
Frank Chodorov
These are private fiefdoms but funded by the government. Can you imagine the power they have? Jeffery Epstein was just one of the many, and I bet 90% of the politicians are comprised by them one way or another.
Why even attempt reform? The entirety of the ‘intelligence’ agencies is as useless to us as a bicycle is to a fish. Just shut it all down.
The Fed Gov has gone way past its sell by date. Shut it down.
There’s way too much gov’t and way too many people sucking on gov’t teat.
If there were 50 new countries, it would take 50 times as much effort to control the overall population. These new countries would suddenly have to compete with each other for residents and industries. The countries with the most reasonable policies would out live and out strip those progressive empires rapidly failing to find ‘other peoples money’.
If Trump has the authority to name that swine CIA director, then does he have the authority to simply shut the whole thing down?
Candidly, if Trump went on TV and told the American people that he’s going to piss on the courts and Congress and use the military to surround Langley and empty the building, he’d rise 30 points in the poles.
Sadly, the man is stupid.
Can anybody recommend good books on the decline of the Florentine bankers?
Richard Goldthwaite’s two books on the Florentine economy are very good with citations that can lead you to more focused articles in more difficult to find journals. For general commentary Harold Acton’s two books on the Last Medici and the Pazzi Conspiracy have considerable information on both the banking and cloth making industries. Any scholarly book on the Medici will inevitably discuss their bank as well as the other great banking families that were rivals.
A couple of days ago Col. Patrick Lang posted this comment on his blog forum replying to a commenter. It’s all the more interesting because Lang was/is not a big fan of Trump:
I agree. And I am pessimistic about the conspirators facing justice in our current judicial system. So my hope is on the revolution [Deep State] eating itself.
Btw, this is the same Col. Patrick Lang who would be a regular guest on CNN, PBS, et al., because he is considered one of the top geopolitical and military analysts and has a reputation for calling things correctly (e.g., one of the very few to predict Saddam Hussein would invade Kuwait). But that stopped when he would carry water for the neocons (or Borg as he calls them).
How nice you two idiots have found each other. Mazel tov.
Yes, I am already very familiar that particular Chodorov quote, having used it both here and in my own blog.
Here’s one of mine I cooked up to piss off all of the vast legions of state worshipers of all stripes:
“Because they are all ultimately funded via both direct and indirect theft [taxes], and counterfeiting [central bank monopolies], all governments are essentially, at their very cores, 100% corrupt criminal scams which cannot be “reformed”or “improved”,simply because of their innate criminal nature.” onebornfree
Regards,onebornfree
“Taking the State wherever found, striking into its history at any point, one sees no way to differentiate the activities of its founders, administrators and beneficiaries from those of a professional-criminal class.” Albert J. Nock
“Everything government touches turns to crap” Ringo Starr
“The kind of man who wants the government to adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of man whose ideas are idiotic” H.L.Mencken
“My first rule- I don’t believe anything the government tells me- nothing!- ZERO!” George Carlin
“Government is a disease masquerading as its own cure” Robert LeFevere
“Regards” onebornfree
Thank you Phil.
You’re the best.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.
Sedition and Treason is to big for any election to fix.
First, Arrest the seditious DOJ top brass and replace them with Judicial Watch!
Arrest the seditious FBI top brass and place all re-vetted agents under the US Marshall’s Service!
The CIA? B#rn it down.
Next, Trump must declare Martial Law to arrest the “Deep State” entrenched in the DOJ/CIA/FBI/DNC/CAIR/SPLC/Leftist Academia …..and all the leftist MSM members Fa☭ebook, Twitter, ☭oogle, ☭NN, AB☭, NB☭, ☭BS, MSNB☭, ☭NB☭, NPR, WaP0S, HuffP0S, MEDIA MALPRACTICE and THE NY SLIMES.
The FBI is now filled with partisan leftists from top to bottom and for all intents and purposes is an appendage of the Democrat party and left wing political apparatus in America. It’s virtually become a power unto itself and is a serious threat to civil liberties. As such it needs to be abolished or subject to sweeping reforms which would entail the arrest and imprisonment of much of its brass and many agents.
The same goes for the DOJ and especially the so called civil rights division. Both they and the FBI seek not justice, but to destroy the lives of their targets, especially if they hold right of center political viewpoints.
The CIA is much and same and the many post WWII assassinations and government coups they’ve been directly or indirectly responsible for has only made the world a more unstable and dangerous place. Now they’ve staged a color revolution against a duly elected U.S. president.
All three have become treasonous and tyrannical and a power onto themselves. The time has come to start sending the little tyrants in the FBI, DOJ and CIA to Guantanamo Bay.