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Quiet revolt of the generals
(David Ignatius, IndyStar.com, December 22, 2005)
The national security structure the Bush administration created after Sept. 11, 2001, began to crumble this month because of a bipartisan revolt on Capitol Hill. . . . Newly emboldened legislators forced the administration to accept new rules for interrogation of prisoners, delayed renewal of the Patriot Act, and demanded an investigation of warrantless wiretapping by the National Security Agency. . . . President Bush has bristled at these challenges to his authority over what has amounted to an undeclared national state of emergency. But the intelligence professionals who have daily responsibility for waging the war against terrorism don't seem particularly surprised or unhappy to see the emergency structure in trouble. They want clear rules and public support that will allow them to do their jobs effectively over the long haul, without getting second-guessed or jerked around by politicians. . . . I met this week with a senior intelligence official who has spent much of his career pursuing terrorist targets. I asked him what he thought, watching the emergency structure come down around him. "We all knew it would," he said. The interim structure was inherently unsustainable. . . . One little noted factor in this re-balancing is what I would call "the officers' revolt" -- both military generals in uniform and intelligence officers at the CIA, NSA and other agencies. There has been growing uneasiness among these national-security professionals at some of what they have been asked to do -- and at the seeming unconcern among civilian leaders at the Pentagon and the CIA for the consequences of administration decisions. . . . The quiet revolt of the generals at the Pentagon is a big reason why U.S. policy in Iraq has been changing, far more than President Bush's stay-the-course speeches might suggest. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is deeply unpopular with senior military officers. For months, they have been working out details of troop reductions next year in Iraq -- not just because it will keep the Army and Marine Corps from cracking, but because they think a smaller footprint will be more effective in stabilizing Iraq. . . . A similar revolt is evident at the CIA. Professional intelligence officers are furious at the politicized leadership brought to the agency by ex-congressman Porter Goss and his retinue of former congressional staffers.

posted by LoZo 7:51 PM