Here Today. Tomorrow?

Mark Hosenball
NEWSWEEK
From the magazine issue dated Nov 10, 2008

No matter who wins the presidential election on Nov. 4, U.S. spy agencies worry that the intelligence community could be big losers, with heads rolling either way. Sources close to both campaigns did little to assuage those fears, suggesting that top intel officials

—including CIA Director Michael Hayden—are likely to be replaced and that the United States' new intel apparatus, created in response to 9/11 failures, still has a long way to go.

Sen. John McCain favors more dramatic change than Sen. Barack Obama. Several government officials, who asked for anonymity when discussing sensitive matters, said they expect a President McCain would purge not only Hayden but also his two top deputies. McCain's plans for the rest of the agency could be even more sweeping. According to little-noticed comments he made last year, McCain has mulled effectively dismantling the CIA and replacing it with a new covert-ops outfit patterned on the OSS of World War II: "A small, nimble, can-do organization," he said, that "could take risks that our bureaucracies today rarely consider taking." Campaign spokesman Brian Rogers told NEWSWEEK that McCain "hasn't talked about personnel at all, and has not gone into details" about his CIA plans.

An Obama spokeswoman declined to comment on his plans. But sources close to the campaign's transition apparatus, who also asked for anonymity, said Obama would prefer to tweak, rather than remake, the intel system. Obama is being advised on intel matters by former senior CIA officials, at least one of whom, John Brennan, is rumored as a possible future CIA director; for intel czar, Obama has been looking at former four-star military officers. Hayden, himself a retired four-star general, would consider staying on if asked, though some Democrats believe he was a too-vigorous defender of controversial Bush administration policies.

Inside the various agencies, trepidation is widespread. "The last thing American intelligence needs is another shake-up," one of the anonymous officials said, noting that the previous reshuffle "is barely two years old. It's still shaking out, and it can be made to work better than it does now--without using a chain saw."
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/166999