Panetta has unusual portfolio to be CIA chief
By TOM RAUM
Associated Press
January 6, 2009
Page 2 of 2
Also, the CIA chief no longer reports directly to the president but to the relatively new post of director of national intelligence. Obama has selected Retired Adm. Dennis Blair to head that post.
"Between the DNI and the director of central intelligence, it's harder and harder to figure out who's directing what," said Anthony Cordesman, a national security analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who has an intelligence background.
He suggested Panetta's brief experience with intelligence as a first lieutenant and much later as a member of the Iraq Study Group don't count for much.
"I didn't find that people in the Iraq Study Group developed any particular experience in intelligence," said Cordesman. "The recommendations that came out were essentially political."
Panetta also was apparently not Obama's first choice for the job. John Brennan, Obama's transition intelligence adviser with extensive intelligence experience, withdrew his name from consideration late last year over his role in some Bush administration detention and interrogation policies.
Panetta's supporters pointed to the Californian's managerial skills and ability to reach across party lines, as he did in 1996 when, representing the White House, he helped negotiate the 1996 budget, which took a major step toward balancing the budget.
"He is a strong personality with an incredible level of integrity," said Norman Ornstein, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who has served with Panetta on various boards and study groups. "The CIA is a large and complex organization. A large part of the job is about managing people, a skill that is not all that widespread."
In an interview two years ago, Panetta said his experience in Congress and at the White House persuaded him of the importance of not having "a tin ear to the political consequences" of major issues that grip the country, as he claimed Bush's team did on Iraq and Hurricane Katrina.
If a leadership vacuum or gridlock results, "leadership has to bear a lot of the responsibility. Because, in the end, it's up to them basically to be able to put discipline together to get both the House and the Senate to work," Panetta said.
Stephen Hess, a presidential scholar at the Brookings Institution, said Panetta's selection was an invigorating gamble by Obama.
"Let Panetta look at all of this mess from a clean slate," said Hess. "He is the wise outsider -- inside government, outside intelligence. That's a great combination."
>> Back -- Page 1 2
Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
++ Discuss this topic in The Forum
Current rating:  4.4 out of 5.0 (5 total votes)
| 
