Has Trust in the U.S. Intelligence Community Eroded?
rand.org
rand.org
Retrospectively, it's easier to answer "Were they right in predicting X, about which more information has now come to light?" than to evaluate "Were they effective in pursuing administration goal Y with the information reasonably accessible at the time?" which involves a lot of messy counterfactuals.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Intelligence_Agency
The issue is that the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself.
I want a non-political intelligence agency, or as close to it as possible. I think it structurally cannot be within or reporting to the executive branch.
> the DIA isn't above the rest of the alphabet soup agencies in the hierarchy, hence it cannot just report on the activities of the other agencies itself.
None of the others are either, afaik. The only intelligence organization above the rest is the Director of National Intelligence, whose job is to ~ oversee and coordinate the intelligence community.
"[after the debacle of 9/11's intelligence failures], the CIA fundamentally changed its core mission, values, and culture: a metamorphosis designed to earn White House approval and guard itself from the encroachments of the Department of Defense and the FBI, agencies seen as threats that might steal its turf and authorities, and perhaps swallow the CIA whole.
A slippery slope of compromises, facelifts, and revised narratives justifying a unique set of capabilities and authorities undertaken to preserve the Agency would instead leave it barely recognizable for the institution it was meant to be. Established in 1947 as a small, elite, independent, civilian, and nonpartisan foreign intelligence service, the CIA's charter was intelligence collection, analysis, and covert action. Freeing the CIA from association with defense, law enforcement, and diplomacy theoretically protected it from grading its own homework as a policy maker, as was the case for the Pentagon, the Department of Justice, and the Department of State. Small, under the radar, and relatively chaste from the political pressures of its larger counterparts, the CIA was intended to speak truth to power....
That was the mindset of the CIA I joined in 1984. Today, the CIA must choose whether to be the elite spy service it was intended, or continue the Agency's post-9/11 leadership's ill-fated path of compromise." (emphasis mine)
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> an intelligence branch whose remit is just to gather info and do analysis on issues of geopolitical and security importance -- and _not_ to execute on any particular administration goals ...
I think this is what the CIA was meant to be and started out as. But in its struggle for survival after 9/11, it reinvented itself as a far more political entity.
The first part is, afaik, part of the intelligence community's mission. It worked to the extent that when GW Bush wasn't getting the answers he wanted on Iraq, he setup his own intelligence office to create the disinformation they wanted. (On the other hand, CIA head George Tenet, perhaps due to pressure, told Bush that Iraq WMD would be a "slam dunk".)
Also, afaik, that happens in a separate branch of the CIA than the covert operations. Is that not separate enough?
HUAC and the McCarthy committee were bad enough without Congress having its own independent spying capacity.
Emphatically calling the Russian invasion despite widespread media, domestic and international skepticism helped gain a bit of it back. They should keep doing more of that and less fucking around with paramilitaries in South America.
(Obviously you can argue that he still wasn't talking to the right people about Iran & Kuwait in July of '90.)
Are the right governments being overthrown? Or no.
with both having nothing to hide, of course
Don't many who fit that description consider the IC to be part of the 'deep state'?
But I wonder where to draw the line between LE and IC. All LE does some IC work, at least if it comes their way.
Edit: 12 -> 23 years. Wow it's been a long time.
Don't you think that you got 9/11 because of their actions?
I guess it's honest to call it 'imagination'. What evidence do you have? There haven't been those attacks anywhere for 23 years, and they didn't happen for 23 years before that.
> I do think their north star is in the countries' best interest.
Per TFA, their north star is often pleasing the current President.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_....
And by the way, do you also think that Nazi's north star was in the Germany's best interest? It didn't work out well, but their heart was in the right place, wasn't it?
Vaguely related video which I found interesting, about the geography of state secrecies in the US: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf64nBAfujk
“Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you,” Schumer told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/312605-schumer-t...
I want the intel community, the politicians, the journalists, the judges, etc to all be mutually antagonistic. Sorry, but that's just how I see it.
In fact, if I can get the factions inside of the different silos to be sniping at each other as well, then score one for me! The idea of checks and balances is smart. If they want to be underhanded in kneecapping each other's power, more's the better for us.
Do you really want people like DeSantis or Nikki Haley to have unchecked power over you? Of course not. These people are essentially criminals. The fact that they want to be president, is all you need to know to be confident that they shouldn't be president. If the intel community or the journalists take them down, that's nothing but good news for all of us out here in flyover country.
You want Biden and Harris off the leash and running around the neighborhood? You want Trump doing whatever he wants with the levers of power? No. That's madness. This is why we have CNN and FOX, to snipe at sheriffs, mayors, police chiefs, DA's, governors, congresspeople and Presidents. Bonus points if the intel community gets in on the action. That'll guarantee no one will ever get control of your republic.
And vice versa as well by the way. You want homeland security to be doing whatever they want? Or do you want senators and presidents to agitate against them? You want cops to be doing whatever they want? Or do you want the news media and judges to be breathing down their necks?
The adversarial nature of our system's power allotments works for us. Maybe it causes gridlock? But so what? That's preferable to the alternative.
It is however, disconnected from reality. Basic fundamentals of human existence since the dawn of time remit one thing above all else in a large civilaztion:
Money and power dictate the actions of those wielding it and use it to continue a very closed cycle of power enticing money and vice versa. Period.
Put any government up against that, any mega-corporation, and nearly all individuals whom are not named that have more money and control over assets (including populations) than you are keen to continue to remain in this cycle.
they're not only getting financed by the US gvt through the budget. But they have their own ventures that generate profits to feed the monster. their ventures could be public such as the CIA venture firm or dark money as usual.
Truly whatever they have figured out is a massive boon to humanity. And they probably should be in charge of everything as no one else has figured out how to make unlimited profit. Their workers must be exceptionally productive.
The TLAs could thus balance the budget simply by paying the taxes owed on these unlimited profit companies.
Does IranContra ring a bell ? the CIA pushing drugs in the minority community in the 80s ? Now the CIA is supposed to be handling foreign issues - but they're doing this in their homeground. Now imagine what they're doing in other foreign countries.
Then take the DOD which has failed multiple audits - you know how dysfunctional you've to be as an org to fail audits ? and the amounts are in the trillions. Even though the CIA is not part of DOD - just to throw that there.
It's really hard to have a meaningful conversation based on that...
The CIA was caught selling weapons to Iran to illegally fund contras and death squads in Latin America.
There's also BCCI, their own international bank to fund who knows what. By going through shell companies and subsidiaries they escape congressional oversight and FOIA requests.
(1) has been weaponized against non-establishment politicals
(2) is heavily involved in censorship cutouts against non-establishment politicals
(3) is evading the spirit of the law around constitutional protections via 5 eyes & outsourcing collection to BigTech
(4) is heavily involved in regime change operations "color revolutions" overseas that may trigger WW3.
(5) Hasn't been completely forthcoming around a number of different things such as JFK assassination, 9-11 hijackers, Epstein/Mossad, Spying on Congress, intentional weakening of crypto standards, plots vs Asssange.
IC analysts and managers have consciously changed or watered down assessments. This self-censorship was largely driven by a desire to stay relevant or an effort to avoid retaliation from policymakers.Would anyone be able to offer insight into this? Are they worried about pointing out ties of lawmakers foreign investment ties? Biden's son to Ukraine and Republicans to Russia?
Due to the political nature of this please post credible links to back up your claims.
I remember some intelligence agency or agencies assessing that Iran had much less of a nuclear weapons program than generally thought. The report was dragged through the mud.
Look up reports on past intelligence failures and you'll find similar issues.
I am an immigrant from China, I never trusted any intelligence community.
In a title, it implies there has been a time when the intelligence community was trusted (by who?)
I think this is mental manipulation from rand
*E.g. One group can be trusted with fair elections, another can be trusted to predictably obliterate a village without asking questions.
The lizard-people type you seem to reference is actually quite rare.
They’re spies with little to no oversight.